A First View of English Literature |
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Addison Anglo-Saxon Ballads beauty began Ben Jonson Beowulf Browning Browning's Byron called Canterbury Tales Carlyle Celtic character Charles Chaucer chief church classical Coleridge comedy Cynewulf death Defoe Dickens drama Dryden early eighteenth century Elizabeth Elizabethan England essays Faerie Queene famous father Frederick Hollyer French French Revolution George Eliot gives Henry hero human humor ideal influence interest Italy John Johnson Julius Cæsar Keats King King Arthur later Latin Layamon literary lived London Lord lyric Milton miracle plays modern moral nature night Norman Northumbria novel Paradise Lost passion period poem poet poetic poetry political Pope prose published Puritan Queen Reformation reign religious Renaissance Revolution romantic satire Saxon Scott Shakespeare Shelley Shelley's social songs sonnet Spenser spirit story struggle style Swift Tennyson Thackeray Thomas thought throne tion verse volume Wordsworth write written wrote young youth
Popular passages
Page 79 - O eloquent, just, and mighty Death! whom none could advise, thou hast persuaded; what none hath dared, thou hast done; and whom all the world hath flattered, thou only hast cast out of the world and despised: thou hast drawn together all the far-stretched greatness, all the pride, cruelty, and ambition of man, and covered it all over with these two narrow words, Hie jacet.
Page 196 - Sir, a woman's preaching is like a dog's walking on his hind legs. It is not done well ; but you are surprised to find it done at all.
Page 108 - Yes, trust them not ! for there is an upstart crow, beautified with our feathers, that with his " Tiger's heart wrapped in a player's hide," supposes he is as well able to bombast out a blank verse as the best of you ; and, being an absolute Johannes Factotum, is, in his own conceit, the only Shake-scene in a country.
Page 256 - Of aspect more sublime: that blessed mood In which the burthen of the mystery, In which the heavy and the weary weight Of all this unintelligible world, Is lightened; that serene and blessed mood, In which the affections gently lead us on, Until, the breath of this corporeal frame And even the motion of our human blood Almost suspended, we are laid asleep In body, and become a living soul...
Page 280 - I was stared at, hooted at, grinned at, chattered at, by monkeys, by paroquets, by cockatoos. I ran into pagodas : and was fixed for centuries at the summit, or in secret rooms ; I was the idol; I was the priest; I was worshipped; I was sacrificed.
Page 192 - For forms of government let fools contest; Whate'er is best administered is best...
Page 203 - I think it may be necessary to consider distinctly the true nature and the peculiar circumstances of the object which we have before us; because after all our struggle, whether we will or not, we must govern America according to that nature and to those circumstances, and not according to our own imaginations...
Page 136 - Now, since these dead bones have already outlasted the living ones of Methuselah, and, in a yard under ground, and thin walls of clay, outworn all the strong and specious buildings above it, and quietly rested under the drums and tramplings of three conquests...
Page 100 - Was this the face that launched a thousand ships And burnt the topless towers of Ilium ? Sweet Helen, make me immortal with a kiss.
Page 110 - A tedious brief scene of young Pyramus, And his love Thisbe ; very tragical mirth.