The Brothers Wiffen: Memoirs and Miscellanies

Front Cover
Samuel Rowles Pattison
Hodder and Stoughton, 1880 - 375 pages

From inside the book

Other editions - View all

Common terms and phrases

Popular passages

Page 24 - own exceeding great reward ; ' it has soothed my afflictions ; it has multiplied and refined my enjoyments ; it has endeared solitude ; and it has given me the habit of wishing to discover the good and the beautiful in all that meets and surrounds me.
Page 74 - As for nobility in particular persons; it is a reverend thing to see an ancient castle or building not in decay, or to see a fair timber-tree sound and perfect: how much more to behold an ancient noble family, which hath stood against the waves and weathers of time.
Page 22 - For some, that hath abundance at his will, Hath not enough, but wants in greatest store; And other, that hath little, asks no more...
Page 285 - More sweet than odours caught by him who sails Near spicy shores of Araby the blest, A thousand times more exquisitely sweet, The freight of holy feeling which we meet, In thoughtful moments, wafted by the gales From fields where good men walk, or bowers wherein they rest.
Page 76 - ... as the other. He that dies in an earnest pursuit is like one that is wounded in hot blood, who for the time scarce feels the hurt' and therefore, a mind fixed and bent upon somewhat that is good, doth avert the dolours of death. But above all, believe it, the sweetest canticle is Nunc dimittis, when a man hath obtained worthy ends and expectations.
Page 7 - Memory and her siren daughters, but by devout prayer to that eternal Spirit, who can enrich with all utterance and knowledge, and sends out his seraphim, with the hallowed fire of his altar, to touch and purify the lips of whom he pleases.
Page 95 - There are among the walks of homely life Still higher, men for contemplation framed, Shy, and unpractised in the strife of phrase: Meek men, whose very souls perhaps would sink Beneath them, summoned to such intercourse: Theirs is the language of the heavens, the power, The thought, the image, and the silent joy: Words are but under-agents in their souls...
Page 220 - And thou shalt be brought down, and shalt speak out of the ground, and thy speech shall be low out of the dust, and thy voice shall be, as of one that hath a familiar spirit, out of the ground, and thy speech shall whisper out of the dust.
Page 261 - Tis dusk of day; — in Eden's towers A mother o'er her infant bends, And lists, amid the whispering bowers, The sound that from the stream ascends. It comes in murmurs up the stairs, A low, a sweet, a mellow voice, And charms away the lady's cares, And bids the mother's heart rejoice. " Sleep sweetly, babe !" 't was heard to say ; " But if the goblet break or fall, Farewell thy vantage in the fray ! Farewell the luck of Eden-hall!
Page 64 - Tis sweet to hear the watch-dog's honest bark Bay deep-mouthed welcome as we draw near home; 'Tis sweet to know there is an eye will mark Char coming, and look brighter when we come...

Bibliographic information