The Works of John Dryden: Dramatic works

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Page 43 - But know, that I alone am king of me. 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 262 - Twas pleasure first made it an oath. If I have pleasures for a friend, And further love in store, What wrong has he whose joys did end, And who could give no more ? 'Tis a madness that he should be jealous of me, Or that I should bar him of another: For all we can gain, is to give ourselves pain, When neither can hinder the other.
Page 249 - Melantha is as finished an impertinent as ever fluttered in a drawing-room, and seems to contain the most complete system of female foppery that could possibly be crowded into the tortured form of a fine lady.
Page 329 - The youth, though in haste, And breathing his last, In pity died slowly, while she died more fast; Till at length she cried, — Now, my dear, now let us go ; Now die, my Alexis, and I will die too ! IV.
Page 228 - ... either in rejecting such old words, or phrases, which are ill sounding, or improper ; or in admitting new, which are more proper, more sounding, and more significant.
Page 4 - No, there is a necessity in Fate, Why still the brave bold man is fortunate; He keeps his object ever full in sight, And that assurance holds him firm and right, True, 'tis a narrow way that leads to bliss, \ But right before there is no precipice; ) Fear makes men look aside, and so their footing miss.
Page 77 - Poor Robin, or any other of the philo-mathematicks, would have given him satisfaction in the point: " If I could kill thee now, thy fate's so low, That I must stoop, ere I can give the blow. But mine is fixt so far above thy crown, That all thy men, Piled on thy back, can never pull it down.
Page 3 - If from thy hands alone my death can be, I am immortal, and a god to thee. If I would kill thee now, thy fate's so low, That I must stoop ere I can give the blow : But mine is fixed so far above thy crown, That all thy men, Piled on thy back, can never pull it down.
Page 174 - Fair though you are As summer mornings, and your eyes more bright Than stars that twinkle in a winter's night; Though you have eloquence to warm and move Cold age and praying hermits, into love ; Though Almahide with scorn rewards my care,— Yet, than to change, 'tis nobler to despair. My love's my soul ; and that from fate is free; 'Tis that unchanged and deathless part of me.
Page 121 - Our author fears those critics as his fate ; And those he fears by consequence must hate, For they the traffic of all wit invade, As scriveners draw away the bankers

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