A Compendium of English Literature: Chronologically Arranged, from Sir John Mandeville to William Cowper . .

Front Cover
E. C. & J. Biddle, 1865 - 776 pages
 

Other editions - View all

Common terms and phrases

Popular passages

Page 597 - Th' applause of listening senates to command, The threats of pain and ruin to despise, To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land, And read their history in a nation's eyes Their lot forbade ; nor circumscribed alone Their growing virtues, but their crimes confined; Forbade to wade through slaughter to a throne, And shut the gates of mercy on mankind...
Page 163 - To spend too much time in studies is sloth ; to use them too much for ornament is affectation; to make judgment wholly by their rules is the humor of a scholar. They perfect nature and are perfected by experience...
Page 137 - Like little wanton boys that swim on bladders, This many summers in a sea of glory ; But far beyond my depth : my high-blown pride At length broke under me ; and now has left me, Weary, and old with service, to the mercy Of a rude stream, that must for ever hide me. Vain pomp and glory of this world, I hate ye ; I feel my heart new open'd. O, how wretched Is that poor man, that hangs on princes...
Page 259 - WHEN I consider how my light is spent, Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide, And that one talent which is death to hide Lodged with me useless, though my soul more bent To serve therewith my Maker, and present My true account, lest he returning chide, ' Doth God exact day-labor, light denied ?
Page 363 - If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food, and one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled ; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?
Page 598 - Muse, The place of fame and elegy supply : And many a holy text around she strews, That teach the rustic moralist to die. For who, to dumb forgetfulness a prey, This pleasing anxious being e'er...
Page 316 - Go, lovely Rose ! Tell her, that wastes her time and me, That now she knows, When I resemble her to thee, How sweet and fair she seems to be. Tell her that's young And shuns to have her graces spied, That hadst thou sprung In deserts, where no men abide, Thou must have uncommended died. Small is the worth Of beauty from the light retired: Bid her come forth, Suffer herself to be desired, And not blush so to be admired. Then die ! that she The common fate of all things rare May read in thee: How small...
Page 721 - It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the Queen of France, then the dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she just began to move in — glittering like the morning star, full of life, and splendor, and joy.
Page 135 - The sixth age shifts Into the lean and slipper'd pantaloon, With spectacles on nose and pouch on side, His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide For his shrunk shank ; and his big manly voice, Turning again toward childish treble, pipes And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all, That ends this strange eventful history, Is second childishness and mere oblivion, Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.
Page 254 - Now came still evening on, and twilight gray Had in her sober livery all things clad ; Silence accompanied ; for beast and bird, They to their grassy couch, these to their nests Were slunk, all but the wakeful nightingale ; She all night long her amorous descant sung...

Bibliographic information