The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D.Alexander V. Blake, 1840 |
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Page 7
... easily find his way back , when solitude should grow tedious . His re- treat was at first but slenderly accommodated ; yet he soon obtained , by the interest of the Earl of St. Alban's and the Duke of Buckingham , such a lease of the ...
... easily find his way back , when solitude should grow tedious . His re- treat was at first but slenderly accommodated ; yet he soon obtained , by the interest of the Earl of St. Alban's and the Duke of Buckingham , such a lease of the ...
Page 56
... easily supposed to want ; or that the attention of the poet and the player has have been differently employed : the one been considering thought , and the other action ; one has watched the heart , and the other con- templated the face ...
... easily supposed to want ; or that the attention of the poet and the player has have been differently employed : the one been considering thought , and the other action ; one has watched the heart , and the other con- templated the face ...
Page 66
... easily found than magnanimity . The delicacy which he cultivated restrains him to a certain nicety and caution , even when he writes upon the slightest matter . He has , therefore , in his whole volume , nothing burlesque , and seldom ...
... easily found than magnanimity . The delicacy which he cultivated restrains him to a certain nicety and caution , even when he writes upon the slightest matter . He has , therefore , in his whole volume , nothing burlesque , and seldom ...
Page 73
... easily find the reason for which the world has sometimes conspired to squander praise . It is not very un- likely that he wrote very early as well as he ever wrote ; and the performances of youth have many favourers , because the ...
... easily find the reason for which the world has sometimes conspired to squander praise . It is not very un- likely that he wrote very early as well as he ever wrote ; and the performances of youth have many favourers , because the ...
Page 80
... easily deceive . He might fied that as the Prince and General " [ Rupert and Monk ] “ are incomparably the best subjects I ever had , so what I have written on them is much better than what I have performed on any " Sir Martin Mar - all ...
... easily deceive . He might fied that as the Prince and General " [ Rupert and Monk ] “ are incomparably the best subjects I ever had , so what I have written on them is much better than what I have performed on any " Sir Martin Mar - all ...
Common terms and phrases
Addison afterwards appears blank verse censure character considered court Cowley criticism death declared delight desire diligence discovered Drake Dryden Duke Dunciad Earl easily elegance endeavoured enemies English excellence father favour fortune French friends genius honour hope Hudibras Iliad imagination kind King King of Prussia known labour Lady language Latin learning lence letter lines lived Lord ment Milton mind nation nature never Night Thoughts nihil Nombre de Dios numbers observed opinion Paradise Lost perhaps Pindar pinnaces pleasure poem poet poetical poetry Pope Port Egmont pounds praise Prince published Queen racter reader reason received remarks reputation rhyme Savage says seems sent ship sion sometimes soon Spaniards supposed Swift Syphax Tatler thing thought tion told tragedy translation verses Virgil virtue Waller whigs write written wrote Young
Popular passages
Page 275 - He had employed his mind chiefly upon works of fiction, and subjects of fancy ; and by indulging some peculiar habits of thought, was eminently delighted with those flights of imagination which pass the bounds of nature, and to which the mind is reconciled only by a passive acquiescence in popular traditions. He loved fairies, genii, giants, and monsters ; he delighted to rove through the meanders of enchantment, to gaze on the magnificence of golden palaces, to repose by the water-falls of Elysian...
Page 279 - I have found out a gift for my fair; I have found where the wood-pigeons breed; But let me that plunder forbear, She will say 'twas a barbarous deed...
Page 96 - To judge rightly of an author, we must transport ourselves to his time, and examine what were the wants of his contemporaries, and what were his means of supplying them.
Page 148 - His prose is the model of the middle style; on grave subjects not formal, on light occasions not grovelling; pure without scrupulosity, and exact without apparent elaboration; always equable, and always easy, without glowing words or pointed sentences. Addison never deviates from his track to snatch a grace; he seeks no ambitious ornaments, and tries no hazardous innovations. His page is always luminous, but never blazes in unexpected splendour.
Page 8 - ... what, on any occasion, they should have said or done; but wrote rather as beholders than partakers of human nature; as Beings looking upon good and evil, impassive and at leisure; as Epicurean deities making remarks on the actions of men and the vicissitudes of life without interest and without emotion. Their courtship was void of fondness, and their lamentation of sorrow. Their wish was only to say what they hoped had never been said before.
Page 21 - Cooper's Hill is the work that confers upon him the rank and dignity of an original author. He seems to have been, at least among us, the author of a species of composition that may be denominated local poetry, of which the fundamental subject is some particular landscape, to be poetically described with the addition of such embellishments as may be supplied by historical retrospection, or incidental meditation.
Page 46 - He was naturally a thinker for himself, confident of his own abilities, and disdainful of help or hinderance : he did not refuse admission to the thoughts or images of his predecessors, but he did not seek them. From his contemporaries he neither courted nor received support; there is in his writings nothing by which the pride of other authors might be gratified, or favour gained ; no exchange of praise, nor solicitation of support.
Page 211 - ... nothing will supply the want of prudence; and that negligence and irregularity, long continued, will make knowledge useless, wit ridiculous, and genius contemptible.
Page 252 - What his mind could supply at call, or gather in one excursion, was all that he sought, and all that he gave. The dilatory caution of Pope enabled him to condense his sentiments, to multiply his images, and to accumulate all that study might produce, or chance might supply. If the flights of Dryden therefore are higher, Pope continues longer on the wing. If of Dryden's fire the blaze is brighter, of Pope's the heat is more regular and constant. Dryden often surpasses expectation, and Pope never falls...
Page 111 - Tis not enough that Aristotle has said so, for Aristotle drew his models of tragedy from Sophocles and Euripides ; and, if he had seen ours, might have changed his mind.