Johnson's Lives of the British poets completed by W. Hazlitt, Volume 21854 |
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Page 20
... attention from life to nature . They seem to think that we are placed here to watch the growth of plants or the motions of the stars . Socrates was rather of opinion , that what we had to learn was how to do good and avoid evil : ὅττι ...
... attention from life to nature . They seem to think that we are placed here to watch the growth of plants or the motions of the stars . Socrates was rather of opinion , that what we had to learn was how to do good and avoid evil : ὅττι ...
Page 25
... attention ; and he who told every man that he was equal to his king could hardly want an audience . That the performance of Salmasius was not dispersed with equal rapidity , or read with equal eagerness , is very credible . He taught ...
... attention ; and he who told every man that he was equal to his king could hardly want an audience . That the performance of Salmasius was not dispersed with equal rapidity , or read with equal eagerness , is very credible . He taught ...
Page 46
... attention than the end ; and as those that understand it know commonly the beginning best , its rehearsal will seldom be necessary . It is not likely that Milton required any pas- sage to be so much repeated as that his daughter could ...
... attention than the end ; and as those that understand it know commonly the beginning best , its rehearsal will seldom be necessary . It is not likely that Milton required any pas- sage to be so much repeated as that his daughter could ...
Page 50
... attention . The dispute between the lady and Comus is the most animated and affecting scene of the drama ; and wants nothing but a brisker reciprocation of objections and replies to invite attention and de- tain it . The songs are ...
... attention . The dispute between the lady and Comus is the most animated and affecting scene of the drama ; and wants nothing but a brisker reciprocation of objections and replies to invite attention and de- tain it . The songs are ...
Page 54
... attention , and employs the memory rather than the fancy . Milton's delight was to sport in the wide regions of possibility ; reality was a scene too narrow for his mind . He sent his faculties out upon discovery into worlds where only ...
... attention , and employs the memory rather than the fancy . Milton's delight was to sport in the wide regions of possibility ; reality was a scene too narrow for his mind . He sent his faculties out upon discovery into worlds where only ...
Common terms and phrases
Absalom and Achitophel admired afterwards ANDREW MARVELL appears beauties Ben Jonson better called censure character Charles Charles Dryden church College comedy court Cowley criticism Davenant death delight diction died dramatic Dryden Duke Earl elegance English Essay excellence fancy father favour genius heroic honour Hudibras imitation John Dryden Johnson kind king labour lady language Latin learning lines lived London Lord Lord Roscommon Matthew Prior Milton mind nature never numbers observed occasion opinion Otway Oxford Paradise Lost passions performance perhaps pieces Pindaric play pleasure poem poet poetical poetry Pope praise preface produced prose published queen reader reason relates remarks reputation rhyme Richard Brome satire says seems sentiments sometimes Sprat supposed thing thou thought tion Tom D'Urfey tragedy tragi-comedy translation verses versification Virgil virtue Westminster Westminster Abbey Westminster School words write written wrote
Popular passages
Page 85 - O could I flow like thee, and make thy stream My great example, as it is my theme! Though deep, yet clear, though gentle, yet not dull, Strong without rage, without o'er-flowing full.
Page 21 - Memory and her siren daughters, but by devout prayer to that eternal Spirit, who can enrich with all utterance and knowledge, and sends out his seraphim, with the hallowed fire of his altar, to touch and purify the lips of whom he pleases.
Page 141 - A man so various that he seemed to be Not one, but all mankind's epitome : Stiff in opinions, always in the wrong, Was everything by starts and nothing long ; But in the course of one revolving moon Was chymist, fiddler, statesman, and buffoon ; Then all for women, painting, rhyming, drinking, Besides ten thousand freaks that died in thinking.
Page 110 - To move, but doth if th' other do. And, though it in the centre sit, Yet, when the other far doth roam, It leans and hearkens after it, And grows erect as that comes home. Such wilt thou be to me, who must Like th
Page 195 - Blest above; So when the last and dreadful hour This crumbling pageant shall devour, The trumpet shall be heard on high, The dead shall live, the living die, And Music shall untune the sky!
Page 89 - I found everywhere there (though my understanding had little to do with all this); and by degrees with the tinkling of the rhyme and dance of the numbers, so that I think I had read him all over before I was twelve years old, and was thus made a poet as immediately as a child is made an eunuch.
Page 34 - Englishmen being far northerly, do not open our mouths in the cold air wide enough to grace a southern tongue; but are observed by all other nations to speak exceeding close and inward; so that to smatter Latin with an English mouth, is as ill a hearing as law French.
Page 205 - I am as free as Nature first made man, \ Ere the base laws of servitude began, [• When wild in woods the noble savage ran.
Page 19 - Let not our veneration for Milton forbid us to look with some degree of merriment on great promises and small performance, on the man who hastens home because his countrymen are contending for their liberty, and, when he reaches the scene of action, vapours away his patriotism in a private boardingschool 3.
Page 100 - Nor was the sublime more within their reach than the pathetic, for they never attempted that comprehension and expanse of thought which at once fills the whole mind, and of which the first effect is sudden astonishment, and the second rational admiration. Sublimity is produced by aggregation, and littleness by dispersion. Great thoughts are always general, and consist in positions not limited by exceptions, and in descriptions not descending to minuteness.