The Works of the English Poets: With Prefaces, Biographical and Critical, Volume 65 |
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Common terms and phrases
Addifon afterwards allowed appear attention beauties called cenfure character common confidered copies defire Dryden early edition Effay effect elegance employed English epitaph equally excellence expected faid fame father fault fays feems fhew fhould firft fome fometimes foon formed frequent fubject fuch fufficient fuppofed gain gave give given hands himſelf Homer honour hope hundred Iliad improved kind King knowledge known laft language Latin learning lefs Letters lines living longer Lord mean ment mention mind muft nature never notes numbers once opinion original performances perhaps poem poet poetry Pope Pope's powers praife praiſe prefent printed produce publick publiſhed readers reafon received regard remarks Swift tell thefe things thofe thoſe thought tion told tranflation true ufed verfes verfion virtue volume whofe write written wrote
Popular passages
Page 347 - As Gay was the favourite of our author, this epitaph was probably written with an uncommon degree of attention ; yet it is not more successfully executed than the rest, for it will not always happen that the success of a poet is proportionate to his labour.
Page 212 - His legs were so slender, that he enlarged their bulk with three pair of stockings, which were drawn on and off by the maid; for he was not able to dress or undress himself, and neither went to bed nor rose without help.
Page 256 - Dryden it must be said, that if he has brighter paragraphs, he has not better poems.
Page 246 - Of composition there are different methods. Some employ at once memory and invention, and, with little intermediate use of the pen, form and polish large masses by continued meditation, and write their productions only when, in their own opinion, they have completed them.
Page 76 - O'er Heaven's clear azure spreads her sacred light, When not a breath disturbs the deep serene, And not a cloud o'ercasts the solemn scene ; Around her throne the vivid planets roll, And stars unnumber'd gild the glowing pole, O'er the dark trees a yellower verdure shed, And tip with silver...
Page 315 - To circumscribe poetry by a definition will only shew the narrowness of the definer, though a definition which shall exclude Pope will not easily be made. Let us look round upon the present time, and back upon the past; let us...
Page 255 - The style of Dryden is capricious and varied; that of Pope is cautious and uniform. Dryden obeys the motions of his own mind; Pope constrains his mind to his own rules of composition. Dryden is sometimes vehement and rapid; Pope is always smooth, uniform, and gentle.
Page 252 - ... none to himself. He examined lines and words with minute and punctilious observation, and retouched every part with indefatigable diligence, till he had left nothing to be forgiven.
Page 85 - ... me to live agreeably in the town, or contentedly in the country, which is really all the difference I set between an easy fortune and a small one.
Page 252 - Thirty-eight; of which Dodsley told me, that they were brought to him by the author, that they might be fairly copied. "Almost every line...
Bibliographic information
| Title | The Works of the English Poets: With Prefaces, Biographical and Critical, Volume 65 The Works of the English Poets: With Prefaces, Biographical and Critical, Samuel Johnson |
| Author | Samuel Johnson |
| Publisher | H. Hughs, 1781 |
| Original from | the New York Public Library |
| Digitized | Oct 21, 2005 |
| Export Citation | BiBTeX EndNote RefMan |