The Spectator, Volume 4J. Tonson, 1729 - English essays |
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Page 13
... himself been the fole Wonder of the Age . I need not tell my Reader , that I here point at the Reign of Auguftus , and I believe he will be of my Opinion , that neither Virgil nor Horace would have gained fo great a Reputation in the ...
... himself been the fole Wonder of the Age . I need not tell my Reader , that I here point at the Reign of Auguftus , and I believe he will be of my Opinion , that neither Virgil nor Horace would have gained fo great a Reputation in the ...
Page 21
... himself . WERE not this Defire of Fame very ftrong , the Dif- ficulty of obtaining it , and the Danger of lofing it when obtained , would be fufficient to deter a Man from so vain a Purfuit . HOW few are there who are furnished with ...
... himself . WERE not this Defire of Fame very ftrong , the Dif- ficulty of obtaining it , and the Danger of lofing it when obtained , would be fufficient to deter a Man from so vain a Purfuit . HOW few are there who are furnished with ...
Page 22
... himself , and betrays him into vain fantaftick Recitals of his own Performances : His Dif- courfe generally leans one Way , and whatever is the Sub- ject of it , tends obliquely either to the detracting from others , or to the extolling ...
... himself , and betrays him into vain fantaftick Recitals of his own Performances : His Dif- courfe generally leans one Way , and whatever is the Sub- ject of it , tends obliquely either to the detracting from others , or to the extolling ...
Page 24
... humbled in his Reputation , and in fome measure reduced to our own Rank , who had fo far raised himself above us in the Reports and Opinions of Mankind.- THUS THUS we fee how many dark and intricate Motives there 24 N ° 255 The SPECTATOR .
... humbled in his Reputation , and in fome measure reduced to our own Rank , who had fo far raised himself above us in the Reports and Opinions of Mankind.- THUS THUS we fee how many dark and intricate Motives there 24 N ° 255 The SPECTATOR .
Page 27
... himself to the good or ill Speeches of others , and puts it in the Power of every malicious Tongue to throw him into a Fit of Melancho- ly , and deftroy his natural Reft and Repofe of Mind ? Efpecially when we confider that the World is ...
... himself to the good or ill Speeches of others , and puts it in the Power of every malicious Tongue to throw him into a Fit of Melancho- ly , and deftroy his natural Reft and Repofe of Mind ? Efpecially when we confider that the World is ...
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Popular passages
Page 154 - English, a glowing bold expression, and to turn it into ridicule by a cold ill-natured criticism. A little wit is equally capable of exposing a beauty, and of aggravating a fault; and though such a treatment of an author naturally produces indignation in the mind of an understanding reader, it has however its effect among the generality of those whose hands it falls into; the rabble of mankind being very apt to think that every thing which is laughed at, with any mixture of wit, is ridiculous in...
Page 15 - ... 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.
Page 148 - The dervise told them he intended to take up his night's lodging in that caravansary. The guards let him know, in a very angry manner, that the house he was in was not a caravansary, but the king's palace. It happened that the king himself passed through the gallery during this debate, and smiling at the...
Page 67 - ... for preserving of this unity of action they follow them in the disposition of the poem. Milton, in imitation of these two great poets, opens his Paradise Lost with an infernal council plotting the fall of man, which is the action he proposed to celebrate...
Page 202 - Lucian relates concerning this river, viz. that this stream, at certain seasons of the year, especially about the feast of Adonis, is of a bloody colour ; •which the heathens looked upon as proceeding from a kind of sympathy in the river for the death of Adonis, who was killed by a wild boar in the mountains out of which this stream rises.
Page 112 - I shall show more at large in another paper ; though considering how all the poets of the age in which he writ were infected with this wrong way of thinking, he is rather to be admired that he did not give more into it, than that he did sometimes comply with the vicious taste which still prevails so much among modern writers.
Page 148 - Tartary, being arrived at the town of Balk, went into the king's palace by mistake, as thinking it to be a public inn or caravansary. Having looked about him for some time, he entered into a long gallery, where he laid down his wallet, and spread his carpet, in order to repose himself upon it, after the manner of the eastern nations. He had not been long in this posture before he was discovered by some of the guards, who asked him what was his business in that place?
Page 281 - In short, as the critics have remarked, that in those poems, wherein shepherds are actors, the thoughts ought always to take a tincture from the woods, fields, and rivers...
Page 112 - I have before said, these are rather to be imputed to the simplicity of the age in which he lived, to which I may also add, of that which he described, than to any imperfection in that divine poet.
Page 281 - O thou that, with surpassing glory crown'd, Look'st from thy sole dominion, like the god Of this new world, at whose sight all the stars Hide their diminish'd heads, to thee I call, But with no friendly voice, and add thy name, 0 sun, to tell thee how I hate thy beams, That bring to my remembrance from what state 1 fell, how glorious once above thy sphere...