Essays Biographical, Critical, and Historical, Illustrative of the Tatler, Spectator, and Guardian, Volume 2 |
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Page 63
... DRYDEN , in prose as in verse , has attained to great excellence . No writer , indeed , seems to have studied the genius of our language with happier success . If in elegance and grammatical precision he has since been exceeded , to ...
... DRYDEN , in prose as in verse , has attained to great excellence . No writer , indeed , seems to have studied the genius of our language with happier success . If in elegance and grammatical precision he has since been exceeded , to ...
Page 64
... Dryden . 66 The highest compliment ever paid to his diction has been recorded by Mr. Malone ; namely , the imitation of Edmund Burke , who , " says the cri- tic , " had very diligently read all his miscella- neous essays , which he held ...
... Dryden . 66 The highest compliment ever paid to his diction has been recorded by Mr. Malone ; namely , the imitation of Edmund Burke , who , " says the cri- tic , " had very diligently read all his miscella- neous essays , which he held ...
Page 66
... of judgment . Neither did he want that in All * On the Origin and Progress of Satire . Malone's Dryden , vol . iii . p . 75 , 76 . + Cowley . discerning the beauties and faults of other poets , but 66 ON THE PROGRESS AND MERITS.
... of judgment . Neither did he want that in All * On the Origin and Progress of Satire . Malone's Dryden , vol . iii . p . 75 , 76 . + Cowley . discerning the beauties and faults of other poets , but 66 ON THE PROGRESS AND MERITS.
Page 69
... be taken be- tween the extravagant praise of Dr. Johnson , * Preface to the Fables . Malone's Dryden , vol . iii . p . 611 , & c . & c . and the unqualified condemnation of Lord Or- rery ; the OF ENGLISH STYLE , & C . 69.
... be taken be- tween the extravagant praise of Dr. Johnson , * Preface to the Fables . Malone's Dryden , vol . iii . p . 611 , & c . & c . and the unqualified condemnation of Lord Or- rery ; the OF ENGLISH STYLE , & C . 69.
Page 79
... DRYDEN . Though much was done by these illustrious or- naments of English literature to polish and reform their native tongue , much still was wanting to impart a systematic correctness , and to give that force and precision , that ...
... DRYDEN . Though much was done by these illustrious or- naments of English literature to polish and reform their native tongue , much still was wanting to impart a systematic correctness , and to give that force and precision , that ...
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Addison admirable Anatomy of Melancholy ancient apologues appear Arabian beauty caliphs Canterbury Tales century character charms Chaucer Chimæra colours composition consider criticism crusade delight diction Ditto Dryden East edition effect elegant endeavours English English Poetry Essays excellent exhibited exquisite fable fairy fancy genius Geoffery grace guage hath heaven humour imagery imagination justly king language learned literary literature Lord manner ment merit Milton mind moral nature never night observes opinion oriental passage period Persian perspicuity philosophy Pilpay pleasing pleasure poem poet poetry present productions prose racter reader remarks rich Roger de Coverley romance says second Crusade sense Shakspeare shew Simeon Seth simplicity Sir Roger species specimen Spectator spirit stars story style sublime supposed sweetness taste Tatler things third crusade thou tion verse whilst William of Malmesbury wonderful words writers written
Popular passages
Page 34 - Time serves not now, and perhaps I might seem too profuse to give any certain account of what the mind at home, in the spacious circuits of her musing, hath liberty to propose to herself, though of highest hope and hardest attempting; whether that epic form whereof the two poems of Homer and those other two of Virgil and Tasso are a diffuse, and the book of Job a brief model...
Page 113 - 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, HUGHES.
Page 13 - Of law there can be no less acknowledged, than that her seat is the bosom of God, her voice the harmony of the world ; all things in heaven and earth do her homage, the very least as feeling her care, and the greatest as not exempted from her power...
Page 46 - But so have I seen a rose newly springing from the clefts of its hood, and, at first, it was fair as the morning, and full with the dew of heaven, as a lamb's fleece ; but when a ruder breath had forced open its virgin modesty, and dismantled its too youthful and unripe retirements, it began to put on darkness, and to decline to softness and the symptoms of a sickly age; it bowed the head, and broke its stalk, and, at night, having lost some of its leaves and all its beauty, it fell into the portion...
Page 20 - STUDIES serve for delight, for ornament, and for ability. Their chief use for delight is in privateness and retiring ; for ornament, is in discourse ; and for ability, is in the judgment and disposition of business.
Page 101 - ... though I am always serious, I do not know what it is to be melancholy ; and can therefore take a view of nature, in her deep and solemn scenes, with the same pleasure as in her most gay and delightful ones.
Page 37 - Neither do I think it shame to covenant with any knowing reader, that for some few years yet I may go on trust with him toward the payment of what I am now indebted...
Page 36 - ... faith against the enemies of Christ ; to deplore the general relapses of kingdoms and states from justice and God's true worship. Lastly, whatsoever in religion is holy and sublime, in virtue amiable or grave ; whatsoever hath passion or admiration in all the changes of that which is called fortune from without, or the wily subtleties and refluxes of man's thoughts from within ; all these things with a solid and treatable smoothness to point out and describe.
Page 37 - ... reading, steady observation, insight into all seemly and generous arts and affairs; till which in some measure be compassed, at mine own peril and cost I refuse not to sustain this expectation from as many as ' are not loth to hazard so much credulity upon the best pledges that I can give them.
Page 2 - From the authors which rose in the time of Elizabeth, a/ speech might be formed adequate to all the purposes of use and elegance. If the language of theology were extracted from Hooker and the translation of the Bible ; the terms of natural knowledge from Bacon; the phrases of policy, war, and navigation from Raleigh; the dialect of poetry and fiction from Spenser and Sidney; and the diction of common life from Shakespeare, few ideas would be lost to mankind, for want of English words, in which they...