A Compendium of English Literature: Chronologically Arranged, from Sir John Mandeville to William Cowper ; Consisting of Biographical Sketches of the Authors, Selections from Their Works, with Notes, Explanatory, Illustrative, and Directing to the Best Editions and to Various Criticisms...

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E. C. and J. Biddle, 1859 - 762 pages
 

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Page 597 - The applause of listening senates to command, The threats of pain and ruin to despise, To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land, And read their history in a nation's eyes...
Page 213 - We have short time to stay, as you, We have as short a Spring ; As quick a growth to meet decay As you, or any thing. We die, As your hours do, and dry Away Like to the Summer's rain ; Or as the pearls of morning's dew, Ne'er to be found again.
Page 598 - Muse, The place of fame and elegy supply: And many a holy text around she strews, That teach the rustic moralist to die. For who, to dumb forgetfulness a prey, This pleasing anxious being e'er resign' d, Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day, Nor cast one longing lingering look behind?
Page 164 - Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man. And, therefore, if a man write little, he had need have a great memory; if he confer little, he had need have a present wit; and if he read little, he had need have much cunning, to seem to know that he doth not.
Page 664 - Whatever withdraws us from the power of our senses ; whatever makes the past, the distant, or the future predominate over the present, advances us in the dignity of thinking beings.
Page 593 - Fair laughs the Morn, and soft the zephyr blows, While proudly riding o'er the azure realm In gallant trim the gilded vessel goes: Youth on the prow, and Pleasure at the helm: Regardless of the sweeping whirlwind's sway, That hush'd in grim repose expects his evening prey.
Page 247 - That to the faithful herdman's art belongs ! What recks it them? What need they? They are sped; And when they list, their lean and flashy songs Grate on their scrannel pipes of wretched straw; The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed...
Page 598 - Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day, Nor cast one longing lingering look behind? On some fond breast the parting soul relies, Some pious drops the closing eye requires; E'en from the tomb the voice of Nature cries, E'en in our ashes live their wonted fires. For thee, who, mindful of th...
Page 394 - I consider the vanity of grieving for those whom we must quickly follow; when I see kings lying by those who deposed them, when I consider rival wits placed side by side, or the holy men that divided the world with their contests and disputes, I reflect with sorrow and astonishment on the little competitions, factions, and debates of mankind. When I read the several dates of the tombs, of some that died yesterday, and some six hundred years ago, I consider that great day when we shall all of us be...
Page 266 - Methinks I see in my mind a noble and puissant nation rousing herself like a strong man after sleep, and shaking her invincible locks: methinks I see her as an eagle mewing her mighty youth, and kindling her undazzled eyes at the full mid-day beam...

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