Comus: A Mask

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proprietors, under the direction of John Bell, 1791 - English drama - 66 pages
 

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Page 45 - Hence, loathed Melancholy, Of Cerberus and blackest Midnight born In Stygian cave forlorn 'Mongst horrid shapes, and shrieks, and sights unholy ! Find out some uncouth cell, Where brooding Darkness spreads his jealous wings, And the night-raven sings ; There, under ebon shades and low-browed rocks, As ragged as thy locks, In dark Cimmerian desert ever dwell.
Page 64 - Mortals, that would follow me, Love Virtue ; she alone is free. She can teach ye how to climb Higher than the sphery chime; Or, if Virtue feeble were, Heaven itself would stoop to her.
Page 33 - But when lust, By unchaste looks, loose gestures, and foul talk, But most by lewd and lavish act of sin, Lets in defilement to the inward parts, The soul grows clotted by contagion, Imbodies and imbrutes, till she quite lose The divine property of her first being.
Page 31 - Some say no evil thing that walks by night. In fog or fire, by lake or moorish fen, Blue meagre hag, or stubborn unlaid ghost, That breaks his magic chains at curfew time, No goblin or swart faery of the mine, Hath hurtful power o'er true virginity.
Page 20 - The star that bids the shepherd fold Now the top of heaven doth hold ; And the gilded car of day His glowing axle doth allay In the steep Atlantic stream : And the slope sun his upward beam Shoots against the dusky pole, Pacing toward the other goal Of his chamber in the east.
Page 32 - So dear to Heaven is saintly chastity, that, when a soul is found sincerely so, a thousand. liveried angels lackey her, driving far off each thing of sin and guilt, and, in clear dream and solemn vision, tell her of things that no gross ear can hear...
Page 29 - Virtue could see to do what Virtue would By her own radiant light, though sun and moon Were in the flat sea sunk.
Page 46 - Haste thee, nymph, and bring with thee Jest, and youthful Jollity, Quips, and cranks,* and wanton* wiles, Nods, and becks, and wreathed smiles, Such as hang on Hebe's cheek, And love to live in dimple sleek; Sport that wrinkled Care derides, And Laughter holding both his sides. Come,- and trip it as you go On the light fantastic toe...
Page 63 - All amidst the gardens fair Of Hesperus and his daughters three That sing about the golden tree. Along the crisped shades and bowers Revels the spruce and jocund Spring; The Graces and the rosy-bosom'd Hours Thither all their bounties bring...
Page 25 - Was I deceived, or did a sable cloud Turn forth her silver lining on the night? I did not err: there does a sable cloud Turn forth her silver lining on the night, And casts a gleam over this tufted grove.

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