The Plays of William Shakspeare: In Fifteen Volumes. With the Corrections and Illustrations of Various Commentators. To which are Added Notes

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T. Longman, 1793

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Page 506 - To draw no envy, Shakespeare, on thy name, Am I thus ample to thy book and fame; While I confess thy writings to be such As neither man nor Muse can praise too much.
Page 506 - Or blind affection, which doth ne'er advance The truth, but gropes, and urgeth all by chance; Or crafty malice might pretend this praise, And think to ruin, where it seemed to raise.
Page 530 - This pencil take (she said) whose colours clear Richly paint the vernal year : Thine, too, these golden keys, immortal Boy ! This can unlock the gates of Joy ; Of Horror that, and thrilling Fears, Or ope the sacred source of sympathetic Tears.
Page 316 - His mind and hand went together ; and what he thought, he uttered with that easiness, that we have scarce received from him a blot in his papers.
Page 506 - Shakespeare, must enjoy a part. For though the poet's matter nature be, His art doth give the fashion; and, that he Who casts to write a living line, must sweat (Such as thine are) and strike the second heat Upon the Muses...
Page 506 - And shake a stage; or, when thy socks were on Leave thee alone for the comparison Of all that insolent Greece or haughty Rome Sent forth, or since did from their ashes come. Triumph, my Britain, thou hast one to show To whom all scenes of Europe homage owe.
Page 176 - True, representing some principal pieces of the reign of Henry the Eighth, which was set forth with many extraordinary circumstances of pomp and majesty, even to the matting of the stage ; the Knights of the order, with their Georges and Garter, the guards with their embroidered coats and the like; sufficient, in truth, within a while to make greatness very familiar, if not ridiculous.
Page 523 - WHEN Learning's triumph o'er her barb'rous foes First rear'd the stage, immortal Shakspeare rose ; Each change of many-colour'd life he drew, Exhausted worlds, and then imagin'd new: Existence saw him spurn her bounded reign, And panting Time toil'd after him in vain. His pow'rful strokes presiding Truth impress'd, And unresisted Passion storm'd the breast.
Page 506 - The applause, delight, the wonder of our stage! My Shakespeare, rise! I will not lodge thee by Chaucer, or Spenser, or bid Beaumont lie A little further, to make thee a room: Thou art a monument without a tomb, And art alive still while thy book doth live And we have wits to read and praise to give.
Page 521 - Hence when lightning fires The arch of Heaven, and thunders rock the ground, When furious whirlwinds rend the howling air, And Ocean, groaning from his lowest bed, Heaves his tempestuous billows to the sky ; Amid the mighty uproar, while below The nations tremble, SHAKSPEARE looks abroad From some high cliff, superior, and enjoys The elemental war.

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