The works of Alexander Pope. With a selection of explanatory notes, and the account of his life by dr. Johnson, Volume 41812 |
Common terms and phrases
abused Addison admire Æneid Ambrose Philips ancient bard Bavius Behold Ben Jonson booksellers called cause character Cibber Codrus Concanen court Curl Daily Journal declare Dennis divine Dryden dull Dulness Dunce Dunciad epic epigram Essay on Criticism ev'ry eyes fool former edit genius gentleman Gildon Goddess hath head Heav'n hero Homer honour Ibid Iliad JOHN DENNIS King labour Laureate learned Leonard Welsted Letter LEWIS THEOBALD Lintot living Lord manner Matthew Concanen Mist's Journal moral muse nature never o'er octavo Ogilby Oldmixon once Ovid persons plays poem poet poetry POPE Pope's praise Pref printed prose published Queen reader reign saith satire scene SCRIBLERUS sense Shakespear shew sons soul Swift thee Theobald thine thing thou thought thro Tibbald tion translation verse Virgil virtue WARBURTON Welsted whole words writ writing
Popular passages
Page 193 - For thee we dim the eyes, and stuff the head With all such reading as was never read : For thee explain a thing till all men doubt it, And write. about it, goddess, and about it : So spins the silk-worm small its slender store, And labours till it clouds itself all o'er.
Page 219 - Wit shoots in vain its momentary fires, The meteor drops, and in a flash expires. As one by one, at dread Medea's strain, The sick'ning stars fade off th' ethereal plain ; As Argus
Page 191 - The critic Eye, that microscope of Wit, Sees hairs and pores, examines bit by bit...
Page 294 - How fluent nonsense trickles from his tongue ! How sweet the periods, neither said, nor sung! Still break the benches, Henley ! with thy strain, While Sherlock, Hare, and Gibson preach in vain. Oh, great restorer of the good old stage, Preacher at once, and zany of thy age ! Oh, worthy thou of Egypt's wise abodes, A decent priest, where monkeys were the gods...
Page 278 - To where Fleet-ditch with disemboguing streams Rolls the large tribute of dead dogs to Thames, The king of dykes ! than whom no sluice of mud With deeper sable blots the silver flood.
Page 224 - This gave Mr Pope the thought, that he had now some opportunity of doing good, by detecting and dragging into light these common enemies of mankind; since to invalidate this universal slander, it sufficed to show what contemptible men were the authors of it.
Page 259 - There motley images her fancy strike, Figures ill pair'd, and similes unlike, She sees a mob of metaphors advance, Pleased with the madness of the mazy dance : How Tragedy and Comedy embrace ; How Farce and Epic get a jumbled race ; How Time himself stands still at her command, Realms shift their place, and ocean turns to land.
Page 158 - Till one wide conflagration swallows all. Thence a new world, to nature's laws unknown, Breaks out refulgent, with a heaven its own: Another Cynthia her new journey runs, And other planets circle other suns. The forests dance, the rivers upward rise, Whales sport in woods, and dolphins in the skies; And last, to give the whole creation grace, Lo! one vast egg produces human race. Joy fills his soul, joy innocent of thought; What power, he cries, what power these wonders wrought?
Page 189 - Where Bentley late tempestuous wont to sport In troubled waters, but now sleeps in port.
Page 349 - ... nature at one glance, and to be the only author that gives ground for a very new opinion, that the philosopher, and even the man of the world, may be born, as well as the poet. It must be owned, that with all these great excellencies, he has almost as great defects ; and that as he has certainly written better, so he has perhaps written worse, than any other.