The Plain Speaker: Opinions on Books, Men, and Things, Volume 2 |
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Page 44
... circumstances . I think more highly of Wycherley than I do of Lord Hinchin- broke , for looking like a lord . In the one , it was the effect of native genius , grace , and spirit ; in the other , comparatively speaking , of pride or ...
... circumstances . I think more highly of Wycherley than I do of Lord Hinchin- broke , for looking like a lord . In the one , it was the effect of native genius , grace , and spirit ; in the other , comparatively speaking , of pride or ...
Page 46
... circumstances , and is used to enter into society on equal terms ; he is taught the modes of address and forms of courtesy , most commonly practised and most proper to ingra- tiate him into the good opinion of those he associates with ...
... circumstances , and is used to enter into society on equal terms ; he is taught the modes of address and forms of courtesy , most commonly practised and most proper to ingra- tiate him into the good opinion of those he associates with ...
Page 82
... relished such names , is not to have lived quite in vain . 66 There are other authors whom I have never read , and yet whom I have frequently had a great desire to read , from some circumstance relating to 82 ON READING OLD BOOKS .
... relished such names , is not to have lived quite in vain . 66 There are other authors whom I have never read , and yet whom I have frequently had a great desire to read , from some circumstance relating to 82 ON READING OLD BOOKS .
Page 83
... circumstance relating to them . Among these is Lord Cla- rendon's History of the Grand Rebellion , after which I have a hankering , from hearing it spoken of by good judges - from my interest in the events , and knowledge of the ...
... circumstance relating to them . Among these is Lord Cla- rendon's History of the Grand Rebellion , after which I have a hankering , from hearing it spoken of by good judges - from my interest in the events , and knowledge of the ...
Page 89
... circumstances , favourable or unfavourable , does little more than minister occasion to the first predisposing bias - than assist , like the dews of heaven , or retard , like the nip- ping north , the growth of the seed originally sown ...
... circumstances , favourable or unfavourable , does little more than minister occasion to the first predisposing bias - than assist , like the dews of heaven , or retard , like the nip- ping north , the growth of the seed originally sown ...
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Popular passages
Page 43 - I'll tell you, friend! a wise man and a fool. You'll find, if once the monarch acts the monk Or, cobbler-like, the parson will be drunk, Worth makes the man, and want of it the fellow, The rest is all but leather or prunella.
Page 14 - As a sick girl. Ye gods ! it doth amaze me A man of such a feeble temper should So get the start of the majestic world And bear the palm alone.
Page 270 - O'er a' the ills o' life victorious! But pleasures are like poppies spread, You seize the flow'r, its bloom is shed; Or like the snow falls in the river, A moment white — then melts for ever; Or like the borealis race That flit ere you can point their place; Or like the rainbow's lovely form Evanishing amid the storm. Nae man can tether time or tide; The hour approaches Tam maun ride; That hour, o...
Page 315 - Yet nature is made better by no mean, But nature makes that mean: so, o'er that art, Which you say adds to nature, is an art That nature makes. You see, sweet maid, we marry A gentler scion to the wildest stock, And make conceive a bark of baser kind By bud of nobler race: this is an art Which does mend nature, — change it rather; but The art itself is nature.
Page 341 - Merciful heaven! What, man! ne'er pull your hat upon your brows; Give sorrow words: the grief that does not speak Whispers the o'erfraught heart, and bids it break.
Page 422 - I care not, fortune, what you me deny ; You cannot rob me of free nature's grace ; You cannot shut the windows of the sky, Through which Aurora shows her brightening face, You cannot bar my constant feet to trace The woods and lawns, by living stream, at eve : Let health my nerves and finer fibres brace, And I their toys to the great children leave : Of fancy, reason, virtue, nought can me bereave.
Page 293 - Piety displays Her mouldering roll, the piercing eye explores New manners, and the pomp of elder days, Whence culls the pensive bard his pictured stores. Nor rough nor barren are the winding ways Of hoar Antiquity, but strewn with flowers.
Page 270 - DUKE'S PALACE. [Enter DUKE, CURIO, LORDS; MUSICIANS attending.] DUKE. If music be the food of love, play on, Give me excess of it; that, surfeiting, The appetite may sicken and so die.— That strain again;— it had a dying fall; O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south, That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour.— Enough; no more; 'Tis not so sweet now as it was before.
Page 174 - How charming is divine Philosophy! Not harsh and crabbed, as dull fools suppose, But musical as is Apollo's lute, And a perpetual feast of nectar'd sweets, Where no crude surfeit reigns.
Page 9 - Though equal to all things, for all things unfit, Too nice for a statesman, too proud for a wit : For a patriot, too cool ; for a drudge, disobedient ; And too fond of the right to pursue the expedient. In short, 'twas his fate, unemploy'd, or in place, Sir, To eat mutton cold, and cut blocks with a razor.