The Works of Samuel Johnson: Lives of the poetsW. Pickering, London; and Talboys and Wheeler, Oxford, 1825 - English literature |
From inside the book
Results 1-5 of 100
Page 2
... never could bring it to retain the ordinary rules of grammar . " This is an instance of the natural desire of man to propa- gate a wonder . It is , surely , very difficult to tell any thing as it was heard , when Sprat could not refrain ...
... never could bring it to retain the ordinary rules of grammar . " This is an instance of the natural desire of man to propa- gate a wonder . It is , surely , very difficult to tell any thing as it was heard , when Sprat could not refrain ...
Page 4
... never had resolution to tell his passion . ness . In the first edition of this life , Dr. Johnson wrote , " which was never in- serted in any collection of his works ; " but he altered the expression when the Lives were collected into ...
... never had resolution to tell his passion . ness . In the first edition of this life , Dr. Johnson wrote , " which was never in- serted in any collection of his works ; " but he altered the expression when the Lives were collected into ...
Page 5
... never saw ; complains of jealousy which he never felt ; supposes himself sometimes invited , and sometimes forsaken ; fatigues his fancy , and ransacks his memory , for images which may exhibit the gaiety of hope , or the gloominess of ...
... never saw ; complains of jealousy which he never felt ; supposes himself sometimes invited , and sometimes forsaken ; fatigues his fancy , and ransacks his memory , for images which may exhibit the gaiety of hope , or the gloominess of ...
Page 9
... never cancelled ; nor that it made him think him- self secure , for , at that dissolution of government which followed the death of Oliver , he returned into France , where he resumed his former station , and staid till the re ...
... never cancelled ; nor that it made him think him- self secure , for , at that dissolution of government which followed the death of Oliver , he returned into France , where he resumed his former station , and staid till the re ...
Page 11
... never be as much pleased as he that attains it , even when he can impute no part of his failure to himself ; and when the end is to please the multitude , no man , perhaps , has a right , in things admitting of gradation and comparison ...
... never be as much pleased as he that attains it , even when he can impute no part of his failure to himself ; and when the end is to please the multitude , no man , perhaps , has a right , in things admitting of gradation and comparison ...
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
acquaintance Addison admiration Æneid afterwards appears beauties better blank verse Cato censure character Charles Dryden compositions considered Cowley criticism death delight diction dramatick Dryden duke earl elegance English Euripides excellence fancy favour friends genius heroick honour Hudibras images imagination imitation Jacob Tonson John Dryden kind king known labour lady language Latin learning lines lived lord Marriage à-la-mode ment metaphysical poets Milton mind nature never NIHIL numbers observed opinion Paradise Lost passage passions performance perhaps Philips Pindar play pleasure poem poet poetical poetry Pope pounds praise preface produced publick published reader reason remarks reputation rhyme satire says seems Sempronius sentiments sometimes Sprat supposed Syphax Tatler terrour thing thou thought tion told Tonson tragedy translation Tyrannick Love verses versification Virgil virtue Waller Westminster Abbey whig words write written wrote
Popular passages
Page 324 - From harmony, from heavenly harmony This universal frame began: From harmony to harmony Through all the compass of the notes it ran, The diapason closing full in Man.
Page 80 - The danger of such unbounded liberty, and the danger of bounding it, have produced a problem in the science of government, which human understanding seems hitherto unable to solve. If nothing may be published but what civil authority shall have previously approved, power must always be the standard of truth...
Page 467 - What he attempted, he performed ; he is never feeble, and he did not wish to be energetic ; he is never rapid, and he never stagnates. His sentences have neither studied amplitude, nor affected brevity ; his periods, though not diligently rounded, are voluble and easy. Whoever wishes to attain an English style, familiar but not coarse, and elegant but not ostentatious, must give his days and nights to the volumes of Addison.
Page 357 - I come to town. I remember the counsel you give me in your letter; but dissembling, though lawful in some cases, is not my talent ; yet, for your sake, I will struggle with the plain openness of my nature, and keep in my just resentments against that degenerate order.
Page 298 - Those weights took off that on his planet hung, Will gloriously the new-laid works succeed. He has, elsewhere, shown his attention to the planetary powers ; and, in the preface to his Fables, has endeavoured obliquely to justify his superstition, by attributing the same to some of the ancients.
Page 328 - As only buzz to heaven with evening wings; Strike in the dark, offending but by chance, Such are the blindfold blows of ignorance. They know not beings, and but hate a name; To them the Hind and Panther are the same.
Page 73 - 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 boarding-school.
Page 59 - Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer, And without sneering, teach the rest to sneer; Willing to wound and yet afraid to strike, Just hint a fault and hesitate dislike; Alike...
Page 318 - Or searcloth masts with strong tarpauling coats : To try new shrouds one mounts into the wind, And one, below, their ease or stiffness notes. 149 Our careful monarch stands in person by, His new-cast cannons' firmness to explore: The strength of big-corn'd powder loves to try, And ball and cartridge sorts for every bore.
Page 305 - Dryden derives only his accidental and secondary praise ; the veneration with which his name is pronounced by every cultivator of English literature, is paid to him as he refined the language, improved the sentiments, and tuned the numbers of English poetry.