A History of English Literature, in a Series of Biographical Sketches

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T. Nelson and Sons, 1862 - 538 pages

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Page 493 - Kent. Vex not his ghost. O, let him pass! He hates him That would upon the rack of this tough world Stretch him out longer.
Page 149 - Made by the joiner squirrel, or old grub, Time out of mind the fairies' coach-makers. And in this state she gallops night by night Through lovers...
Page 148 - Mine eyes are made the fools o' the other senses, Or else worth all the rest; I see thee still, And on thy blade and dudgeon gouts of blood, Which was not so before. There's no such thing: It is the bloody business which informs Thus to mine eyes.
Page 392 - Almighty's form Glasses itself in tempests ; in all time, — Calm or convulsed, in breeze or gale or storm, Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime Dark-heaving — boundless, endless, and sublime, The image of eternity, the throne Of the Invisible ; even from out thy slime The monsters of the deep are made ; each zone Obeys thee ; thou goest forth, dread, fathomless, alone.
Page 209 - The other Shape — If shape it might be called that shape had none Distinguishable in member, joint, or limb ; Or substance might be called that shadow seemed, For each seemed either — black it stood as Night, 670 Fierce as ten Furies, terrible as Hell, And shook a dreadful dart : what seemed his head The likeness of a kingly crown had on.
Page 211 - Almighty hath not built Here for his envy ; will not drive us hence : Here we may reign secure, and, in my choice, To reign is worth ambition, though in Hell: Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heaven...
Page 378 - It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the Queen of France, then the dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision.
Page 391 - And monarchs tremble in their capitals, The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs make Their clay creator the vain title take Of lord of thee and arbiter of war,— These are thy toys, and, as the snowy flake, They melt into thy yeast of waves, which mar Alike the Armada's pride or spoils of Trafalgar.
Page 363 - It was on the day, or rather night, of the 27th of June 1787, between the hours of eleven and twelve, that I wrote the last lines of the last page in a summer-house in my garden. After laying down my pen, I took several turns in a berceau, or covered walk of acacias, which commands a prospect of the country, the lake, and the mountains.
Page 210 - Is this the region, this the soil, the clime," Said then the lost Archangel, "this the seat That we must change for Heaven ? this mournful gloom For that celestial light? Be...

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