The Works of Mr. A. Cowley: In Prose and Verse, Volume 1

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John Sharpe, 1809 - English poetry

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Page 167 - For modes of faith let graceless zealots fight; His can't be wrong whose life is in the right...
Page xxxi - What they wanted, however, of the sublime, they endeavoured to supply by hyperbole - their amplification had no limits - they left not only reason but fancy behind them, and produced combinations of confused magnificence that not only could not be credited, but could not be imagined.
Page lxxxix - His spear, — to equal which, the tallest pine Hewn on Norwegian hills, to be the mast Of some great ammiral, were but a wand...
Page 82 - Phoebus loves, and does inspire Phoebus is himself thy sire. To thee, of all things upon earth, Life is no longer than thy mirth. Happy insect! happy thou, Dost neither age nor winter know; But when thou'st drunk, and danced, and sung Thy fill, the flowery leaves among, (Voluptuous and wise withal, Epicurean animal!) Sated with thy summer feast, Thou retir'st to endless rest.
Page 61 - If I should tell the politic arts To take and keep men's hearts ; The letters, embassies, and spies, The frowns, and smiles, and flatteries, The quarrels, tears, and perjuries (Numberless, nameless, mysteries...
Page lxxxviii - Some that have deeper digg'd love's mine than I, Say, where his centric happiness doth lie: I have lov'd, and got, and told; But should I love, get, tell, till I were old; I should not find that hidden mystery; Oh, 'tis imposture all! And as no chymic yet th...
Page xxxix - On a round ball A workman that hath copies by, can lay An Europe, Afric, and an Asia, And quickly make that, which was nothing, all, So doth each tear, Which thee doth wear, A globe, yea world by that impression grow, Till thy tears mixt with mine do overflow This world, by waters sent from thee, my heaven dissolved so.
Page 27 - WHAT shall I do to be for ever known, And make the age to come my own...
Page xxx - Nor was the sublime more within their reach than the pathetic ; for they never attempted that comprehension and expanse of thought which at once fills the whole mind, and of which the first effect is sudden astonishment, and the second rational admiration. Sublimity is produced by aggregation, and littleness by dispersion. Great thoughts are always general, and consist in positions not limited by exceptions, and in descriptions not descending to minuteness.
Page 166 - And bade to form her infant mind. Stern, rugged nurse ! thy rigid lore With patience many a year she bore ; What sorrow was, thou bad'st her know, And from her own she learn'd to melt at others...

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