Biographia Literaria, Or, Biographical Sketches of My Literary Life and Opinions, Volume 2 |
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Page 443
... criticism of thirty years since in their own place . I think it right , however , to preserve the Editor's comment ... critics had not risen above the level of the mass of their age , -but for the purpose of demonstrating that immediate ...
... criticism of thirty years since in their own place . I think it right , however , to preserve the Editor's comment ... critics had not risen above the level of the mass of their age , -but for the purpose of demonstrating that immediate ...
Page 444
... criticism . Ed . Agreeing as I do with these remarks in the main , I venture to observe that in my mind they ascribe too much influence upon the early fate of Mr. W.'s poems to the E. Review . That those poems were not generally admired ...
... criticism . Ed . Agreeing as I do with these remarks in the main , I venture to observe that in my mind they ascribe too much influence upon the early fate of Mr. W.'s poems to the E. Review . That those poems were not generally admired ...
Page 445
... criticisms excited " a great laugh , " this shows with how little expenditure of wit a great laugh may be excited ... critics have pronounced Homer a barbarian , others have decried Shak- * For some considerable evidence on these points ...
... criticisms excited " a great laugh , " this shows with how little expenditure of wit a great laugh may be excited ... critics have pronounced Homer a barbarian , others have decried Shak- * For some considerable evidence on these points ...
Page 446
... criticism , which would of itself have borne up the poems by the violence with which it whirled them round and round . With many parts of this preface , in the sense attributed to them and which the words undoubtedly seem to authorize ...
... criticism , which would of itself have borne up the poems by the violence with which it whirled them round and round . With many parts of this preface , in the sense attributed to them and which the words undoubtedly seem to authorize ...
Page 449
... critics of all ages coincide with the ultimate judgment of all countries , in equally denying the praises of a just poem , on the one hand , to a series of striking lines or distiches , each of which , absorbing the whole attention of ...
... critics of all ages coincide with the ultimate judgment of all countries , in equally denying the praises of a just poem , on the one hand , to a series of striking lines or distiches , each of which , absorbing the whole attention of ...
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Common terms and phrases
admiration appeared beautiful believe blank verse boys Bristol brother called character Charles Lamb Charles Lloyd child Christian Coleridge's common composition criticism Dane dear delight diction drama Edinburgh Review edition effect English essays excellence excitement expression eyes fancy Father feelings genius German ground heart heaven human Iamus images imagination instance Klopstock Kotzebue language least less letter lines literary look Lyrical Ballads mean metre Milton mind moral Morning Post Mother Muse nature never object Paradise Lost passage passion person philosophical Pindar play pleasure poem poet poet's poetic poetry Poole preface present prose published racter Ratzeburg reader rhyme S. T. COLERIDGE says seems sense Shakspeare Sonnet soul Southey speak specimens spirit stanzas style taste thee things thou thought tion translation truth verse Watchman whole words Wordsworth writings written wrote
Popular passages
Page 588 - Not for these I raise The song of thanks and praise; But for those obstinate questionings Of sense and outward things, Fallings from us, vanishings; Blank misgivings of a Creature Moving about in worlds not realised, High instincts before which our mortal Nature Did tremble like a guilty Thing surprised...
Page 490 - At her feet he bowed he fell, he lay down at her feet he bowed, he fell where he bowed, there he fell down dead...
Page 587 - Delight and liberty, the simple creed Of Childhood, whether busy or at rest, With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his breast: Not for these I raise The song of thanks and praise...
Page 451 - What is poetry? — is so nearly the same question with, what is a poet? — that the answer to the one is involved in the solution of the other.
Page 576 - The blackbird in the summer trees, The lark upon the hill, Let loose their carols when they please, Are quiet when they will. "With Nature never do they wage A foolish strife : they see A happy youth, and their old age Is beautiful and free...
Page 524 - Sweet day, so cool, so calm, so bright, The bridal of the earth and sky, The dew shall weep thy fall to-night ; For thou must die. Sweet rose, whose hue angry and brave Bids the rash gazer wipe his eye : Thy root is ever in its grave, And thou must die. Sweet spring, full of sweet days and roses, A box, where sweets compacted lie : My music shows, ye have your closes, And all must die.
Page 586 - Upon whose grassless floor of red-brown hue, By sheddings from the pining umbrage tinged Perennially — beneath whose sable roof Of boughs, as if for festal purpose decked With unrejoicing berries — ghostly Shapes May meet at noontide; Fear and trembling Hope, Silence and Foresight; Death the Skeleton And Time the Shadow ; — there to celebrate, As in a natural temple scattered o'er With altars undisturbed of mossy stone, United worship ; or in mute repose To lie, and listen to the mountain flood...
Page 481 - He had so often climbed ; which had impressed So many incidents upon his mind Of hardship, skill or courage, joy or fear ; Which, like a book, preserved the memory Of the dumb animals, whom he had saved, Had fed or sheltered, linking to such acts The certainty of honourable gain ; Those fields, those hills, what could they less?
Page 451 - The poet, described in ideal perfection, brings the whole soul of man into activity, with the subordination of its faculties to each other, according to their relative worth and dignity. He diffuses a tone and spirit of unity, that blends, and (as it were) fuses, each into each, by that synthetic and magical power, to which I would exclusively appropriate the name of imagination.
Page 578 - O lyric song, there will be few, think I, Who may thy import understand aright : Thou art for them so arduous and so high ! ' But the Ode was intended for such readers only as had been accustomed to watch the flux and reflux of their inmost nature, to venture at times into the twilight realms of consciousness, and to feel a deep interest in modes of inmost being, to which they know that the attributes of time and space are inapplicable and alien, but which yet cannot be conveyed, save in symbols...