History of English Poetry from the Twelfth to the Close of the Sixteenth Century, 2. köideReeves and Turner, 1871 - 384 pages |
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againſt alfo alſo ancient Anglo-Saxon Arabian Beowulf beſt Bibl biſhop Boccaccio Bodl Bodleian library Brunne caftle called Canterbury Tales caſtle Charlemagne Chrift Chronicle circumftance compofed compofition copy Cynewulf defcribed defcription Du Cange Early English Text edit Edward Edward III Engliſh faid fame fatire fays feems fhould firft firſt fome fone fong forto Froiffart ftory fubject fuch fuppofed fupr gret grete Harl Henry Hift hiftory himſelf hire ibid king King Arthur knight kyng Latin leaſt londe manufcript mentioned metrical minstrels moft monks Morris's Chaucer moſt muſt obferves occafion paffage Paris Percy Folio Petrarch pieces poem poet poetry prefent printed profe Prologue Provençal publiſhed reign Richard Robert Robert of Brunne Roxburghe Club Saint ſeems Sir F ſome ſtate ſtory Tale thefe ther theſe thoſe tranflated uſed verfe verfion verſe whofe Wincheſter wolde writer written þat
Popular passages
Page 314 - Ligurge him-self, the grete king of Trace; Blak was his berd, and manly was his face. The cercles of his eyen in his heed, They gloweden...
Page 223 - Herod's court is introduced, desiring of his lord to be dubbed a knight, that he might be properly qualified to go on the adventure of killing the mothers of the children of Bethlehem. This tragical business is treated with the most ridiculous levity. The good women of Bethlehem attack our knight-errant with their spinning-wheels, break his head with...
Page 191 - God's creatures, and of the daughters of paradise; but even the trees themselves will celebrate the divine praises with a harmony exceeding whatever mortals have heard , to which will be joined the sound of the bells hanging on the trees, which will be put in motion by the wind proceeding from the throne of God, so often as the blessed wish for music...
Page 336 - An attempt to unite order and exactness of imagery with a subject formed on principles so professedly romantic and anomalous, is like giving Corinthian pillars to a Gothic palace.
Page 221 - The like Toye I myselfe (beinge then a Chyld) once saw in Poules Church at London, at a Feast of Whitsontyde, wheare the comynge downe of the Holy Cost was set forthe by a white Pigion, that was let to fly out of a Hole, that yet is to be sene in the mydst of the Roofe of the great He...
Page 318 - First, who died in the year 1547. But there is a considerable difference in the merit of the two authors. William of Lorris, who wrote not one quarter of the poem, is remarkable for his elegance and luxuriance of description, and is a beautiful painter of allegorical personages.
Page 220 - ... fourteen mantles embroidered with heads of dragons, fourteen white tunics wrought with heads and wings of peacocks, fourteen heads of swans with wings, fourteen tunics painted with eyes of peacocks, fourteen tunics of English linen painted, and as many tunics embroidered with stars of gold and silver.
Page 223 - Mathias, sending of the Holy Ghost, &c. by the Fishmongers. Antichrist, by the Clothiers. Day of Judgment, by the Websters. The reader will perhaps smile at some of these combinations. This is the substance and order of the former part of the play. God enters creating the world ; he breathes life into Adam, leads him into Paradise, and opens his side while sleeping. Adam and Eve appear naked, and not ashamed, and the old serpent enters lamenting his fall. He converses with Eve. She eats of the forbidden...
Page 223 - ... excused all incongruities. They had no just idea of decorum, consequently but little sense of the ridiculous : what appears to us to be the highest burlesque, on them would have made no sort of impression. We must not wonder at this, in an age when courage, devotion, and ignorance, composed the character of European manners...
Page 340 - My brother shal be warisshed hastily; For I am siker that ther be sciences By whiche men make diverse apparences Swiche as thise subtile tregetoures pleye; For ofte at feestes have I wel herd seye That tregetours withinne an halle large Have maad come in a water and a barge, And in the halle rowen up and doun.