The Essays of Elia

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Armstrong, 1890 - 424 pages

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Page xiii - People built slighter and slighter every day, until it was feared that the very science of architecture would in no long time be lost to the world. Thus this custom of firing houses continued, till in process of time, says my manuscript, a sage arose, like...
Page 288 - Despair at me doth throw; 0 make in me those civil wars to cease; 1 will good tribute pay, if thou do so. Take thou of me smooth pillows, sweetest bed, A chamber deaf to noise and blind to light, A rosy garland and a weary head: And if these things, as being thine by right, Move not thy heavy grace, thou shalt in me, Livelier than elsewhere, Stella's image see.
Page 134 - Him thought he by the brook of Cherith stood, And saw the ravens with their horny beaks Food to Elijah bringing, even and morn; Though ravenous, taught to abstain from what they brought.
Page 308 - BELSHAZZAR the king made a great feast to a thousand of his lords, and drank wine before the thousand. Belshazzar, whiles he tasted the wine, commanded to bring the golden and silver vessels which his father Nebuchadnezzar had taken out of the temple which was in Jerusalem; that the king, and his princes, his wives, and his concubines, might drink therein.
Page 165 - Again he felt and fumbled at the pig. It did not burn him so much now, still he licked his fingers from a sort of habit. The truth at length broke into his slow understanding that it was the pig that smelt so, and the pig that tasted so delicious...
Page 308 - In the same hour came forth fingers of a man's hand, and wrote over against the candlestick upon the plaster of the wall of the king's palace: and the king saw the part of the hand that wrote.
Page 134 - ... brought; He saw the prophet also how he fled Into the desert, and how there he slept Under a juniper; then how awaked He found his supper on the coals prepared, And by the angel was bid rise and eat, And ate the second time after repose, The strength whereof sufficed him forty days: Sometimes, that with Elijah he partook, Or as a guest with Daniel at his pulse.
Page 120 - Here at the fountain's sliding foot, Or at some fruit-tree's mossy root, Casting the body's vest aside, My soul into the boughs does glide: There like a bird it sits, and sings, Then whets and claps its silver wings; And, till prepared for longer flight, Waves in its plumes the various light.
Page 289 - Townsfolk my strength ; a daintier judge applies His praise to sleight, which from good use doth rise : Some lucky wits impute it but to chance ; Others, because of both sides I do take My blood from them, who did excel in this, Think Nature me a man of arms did make. How far they shot awry ! the true cause is, STELLA looked on, and from her heavenly face Sent forth the beams which made so fair my race.
Page 169 - ... sweetness growing up to it — the tender blossoming of fat — fat cropped in the bud — taken in the shoot — in the first innocence — the cream and quintessence of the child-pig's yet pure food the lean, no lean, but a kind of animal manna — or, rather, fat and lean (if it must be so) so blended and running into each other, that both together make but one ambrosian result or common substance. Behold him, while he is " doing " — it seemeth rather a refreshing warmth, than a scorching...

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