The Plain Speaker: Opinions on Books, Men, and Things, Volume 2 |
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Page 7
... object , than a greater enlargement of comprehension or susceptibility of taste , which ( as far as the trammels of custom and routine of business are concerned ) only operate as diversions to our ensuring the main- chance ; and , even ...
... object , than a greater enlargement of comprehension or susceptibility of taste , which ( as far as the trammels of custom and routine of business are concerned ) only operate as diversions to our ensuring the main- chance ; and , even ...
Page 8
... object ; so that the widest range of knowledge and most diffusive subtlety of intellect will not uniformly produce the most beneficial results ; -and the performance is very frequently in the inverse ratio , not only of the pretensions ...
... object ; so that the widest range of knowledge and most diffusive subtlety of intellect will not uniformly produce the most beneficial results ; -and the performance is very frequently in the inverse ratio , not only of the pretensions ...
Page 11
... object , flitting in the idle air , and glittering only in the ray of fancy . No subject can come amiss to him , and he is alike attracted and alike indifferent to all - he is not tied down to any one in particular - but floats from one ...
... object , flitting in the idle air , and glittering only in the ray of fancy . No subject can come amiss to him , and he is alike attracted and alike indifferent to all - he is not tied down to any one in particular - but floats from one ...
Page 18
... object of admiration ? -It has been said that a good face is a letter of recommendation . But the finest face will not carry a man far , unless it is set upon an active body , and a stout pair of shoulders . The countenance is the index ...
... object of admiration ? -It has been said that a good face is a letter of recommendation . But the finest face will not carry a man far , unless it is set upon an active body , and a stout pair of shoulders . The countenance is the index ...
Page 64
... and petty details interrupt the calm current of our reflections . If you want to know what any of the authors were who lived before our time , and are still objects of anxious inquiry , you have only 64 ON READING OLD BOOKS .
... and petty details interrupt the calm current of our reflections . If you want to know what any of the authors were who lived before our time , and are still objects of anxious inquiry , you have only 64 ON READING OLD BOOKS .
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Common terms and phrases
abstract admire appears artist beauty Black Dwarf Boccacio cause character circumstances colour common delight effect elegance Elgin marbles English ESSAY evanescent expression face fancy favour favourite feel French genius gentleman give grace habit hand head heart House House of Commons human ideas imagination imitation impression Job Orton lady laugh less living look Lord Byron Madame Pasta Mademoiselle Mars manner means ment merit mind nature neral ness never object opinion Othello painted pass passion person philosophy picture play pleasure poet poetry portrait prejudice pretensions principle racter Raphael reason respect Second Series seems sense sentiment Shakespear shew sion Sir Walter Sir Walter Scott smile sophism soul speak spirit style supposed sympathy taste thing thought tion Titian Tom Jones true truth turn understand vanity Whigs whole words write
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.