The British Essayists;: The worldJ. Johnson, J. Nichols and son, R. Baldwin, F. and C. Rivington, W. Otridge and son, W.J. and J. Richardson, A. Strahan, R. Faulder, ... [and 40 others], 1808 - English essays |
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acquaintance advantages Æneid ancient appear arguments bad company beauty Bedford coffee-house Belinda Bellair BIRTH called character coffee-house confess consequence country-women daugh daughter desire Dorimant dress endeavoured entertain equal expence fashion father favour Fitz-Adam fortune frequently gentleman give glorious revolutions GOOD-BREEDING happiness Hilarius honour humble servant husband Iliad imagine justice kind labour lady late latively laws letter Libertine live lord lovers Luke Hansard mankind manner marriage means misery misfortune moral myst nature neighbours never noise nose obliged observed occasion odd women Old Bailey opinion paper Paradise Lost particular passion perhaps persons pleasure poets politics prejudices present profession readers reason ridiculous seems shew spirit stept sure surprize taste thing THOMAS SCOT thought THURSDAY tion town truth turn turtle virtue whole wife William Kempe woman women write XXVIII young
Popular passages
Page 82 - ... and goes and comes near him, according as that good man frequents the house. He entertains him, gives him gifts, feasts him, lodges him ; his religion comes home at night, prays, is liberally supped, and sumptuously laid to sleep, rises, is saluted, and after the malmsey...
Page 27 - To advise the ignorant, relieve the needy, comfort the afflicted, are duties that fall in our way almost every day of our lives.
Page 117 - ... on the bright side of objects, she preserves a perpetual cheerfulness in herself, which by a kind of happy contagion, she communicates to all about her.
Page 117 - When you return with her to the company, in hopes of a little cheerful conversation, she casts a gloom over all, by giving you the history of her own bad health, or of some melancholy accident that has befallen one of her children.
Page 63 - This day was published Nurse Truelove's new-year's gift, or the book of books for children, adorned with cuts, and designed as a present for every little boy who would become a great man, and ride upon a fine horse ; and to every little girl who would become a great woman, and ride in a lord mayor's gilt coach.
Page 48 - I shall therefore content myself with ridiculing the folly of it. The ancients most certainly have had very imperfect notions of HONOUR, for they had none of DUELLING. One reads, it is true, of murders committed every now and then among the Greeks and Romans, prompted only by interest or revenge, and performed without the least Attic politeness, or Roman urbanity.
Page 57 - My friend was going on, and to say the truth, growing dull, when I took the liberty of interrupting him, by acknowledging that the cogency of his arguments, and the self-evidence of his facts, had entirely removed all my doubts, and convinced me of the unspeakable advantages of illustrious birth: and unfortunately I added, that my own vanity was greatly flattered by it, in consequence of my being lineally descended from the first man. Upon this my friend looked grave, and seemed rather displeased...
Page 53 - It is the child of Pride and Folly coupled together by that industrious pander Self-love. It is surely the strongest instance, and the weakest prop of human vanity. If it means any thing, it means a long lineal descent from a founder, whose industry or good fortune, whose merit, or perhaps whose guilt, has enabled his posterity to live useless to society, and to transmit to theirs their pride and their patrimony. However, this extravagant notion, this chimerical advantage, the effect of blind chance,...
Page 257 - I saw quite filled with genteel persons of both sexes, in dishabille, with their hair in papers; the cause of which I was quickly informed of, by the many apologies of my lady for the meanness of the apartment she was obliged to allot me, "By reason the house was so crowded with company during the time of their races, which she said, began that very day for the whole week, and for which they were immediately preparing.
Page 85 - ... guide ! In vain she points out to us the plain and direct way to truth; vanity, fancy, affectation, and fashion assume her shape, and wind us through fairy-ground to folly and error. These deviations from nature are often attended by serious consequences, and always by ridiculous ones: for there is nothing truer than the trite ob.servation, ' that people are never ridiculous for being what they really are, but for affecting what they really are not.