The Age of Fable: Or Beauties of Mythology

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Henry Altemus Company, 1903 - Mythology - 456 pages
A collection of Greek, Roman, Eastern and Northern mythologies.

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Page vii - The intelligible forms of ancient poets, The fair humanities of old religion, The power, the beauty, and the majesty, That had their haunts in dale, or piny mountain. Or forest by slow stream, or pebbly spring, Or chasms and wat'ry depths; all these have vanished ; They live no longer in the faith of reason!
Page 373 - And, missing thee, I walk unseen On the dry smooth-shaven green, To behold the wandering moon, Riding near her highest noon, Like one that had been led astray Through the heaven's wide pathless way, And oft, as if her head she bowed, Stooping through a fleecy cloud.
Page 173 - Fillet of a fenny snake, In the cauldron boil and bake ; Eye of newt and toe of frog, Wool of bat and tongue of dog, Adder's fork and blind-worm's sting, Lizard's leg and howlet's wing, For a charm of powerful trouble, Like a hell-broth boil and bubble. All. Double, double toil and trouble ; 20 Fire burn and cauldron bubble. Third Witch. Scale of dragon, tooth of wolf, Witches...
Page 119 - With burnished neck of verdant gold, erect Amidst his circling spires, that on the grass Floated redundant. Pleasing was his shape And lovely ; never since of serpent kind Lovelier — not those that in Illyria changed Hermione and Cadmus, or the god In Epidaurus...
Page 161 - Whose midnight revels, by a forest side, Or fountain, some belated peasant sees, Or dreams he sees, while overhead the moon Sits arbitress, and nearer to the earth 785 Wheels her pale course ; they, on their mirth and dance Intent, with jocund music charm his ear ; At once with joy and fear his heart rebounds.
Page 79 - IN Xanadu did Kubla Khan A stately pleasure-dome decree : Where Alph, the sacred river, ran Through caverns measureless to man Down to a sunless sea. So twice five miles of fertile ground With walls and towers were girdled round : And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree ; And here were forests ancient as the hills, Enfolding sunny spots...
Page 371 - The oracles are dumb, No voice or hideous hum Runs through the arched roof in words deceiving. Apollo from his shrine Can no more divine, With hollow shriek the steep of Delphos leaving. No nightly trance or breathed spell Inspires the pale-eyed priest from the prophetic cell.
Page 373 - In that fair clime, the lonely herdsman, stretched On the soft grass through half a summer's day, With music lulled his indolent repose : And, in some fit of weariness, if he When his own breath was silent, chanced to hear A distant strain, far sweeter than the sounds Which his poor skill could make, his fancy fetched, Even frqm the blazing chariot of the sun, A beardless Youth, who touched a golden lute, And filled the illumined groves with ravishment.
Page 383 - Three poets, in three distant ages born, Greece, Italy, and England did adorn. The first in loftiness of thought surpassed, The next in majesty, in both the last. The force of Nature could no farther go ; To make a third she joined the former two.
Page 353 - Soft is the strain when Zephyr gently blows, And the smooth stream in smoother numbers flows ; But when loud surges lash the sounding shore, The hoarse, rough verse should like the torrent roar : When Ajax strives some rock's vast- weight to throw, The line too labours, and the words move slow ; Not so, when swift Camilla scours the plain, Flies o'er th' unbending corn, and skims along the main.

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