The works of Samuel Johnson [ed. by F.P. Walesby].Talboys and Wheeler, 1825 |
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Results 1-5 of 73
Page 2
... once happened to an epick poet of France , by raising the reputation of the attempt , obstruct the reception of the work . I imagine what the world will expect from a scheme , prosecuted under your Lordship's influence ; and I know that ...
... once happened to an epick poet of France , by raising the reputation of the attempt , obstruct the reception of the work . I imagine what the world will expect from a scheme , prosecuted under your Lordship's influence ; and I know that ...
Page 4
... once by a single act , permitted them by degrees to settle themselves among the natives , with little opposition ; and it would surely be no proof of judgment to imitate them in an errour which they have now retracted , and deprive the ...
... once by a single act , permitted them by degrees to settle themselves among the natives , with little opposition ; and it would surely be no proof of judgment to imitate them in an errour which they have now retracted , and deprive the ...
Page 19
... once in doubt whether I should not attribute too much to myself , in attempting to decide them , and whether my province was to extend beyond the proposition of the question , and the display of the suffrages on each side ; but I have ...
... once in doubt whether I should not attribute too much to myself , in attempting to decide them , and whether my province was to extend beyond the proposition of the question , and the display of the suffrages on each side ; but I have ...
Page 24
... once unnecessary , must be tolerated among the imperfections of human things ; and which re- quire only to be registered , that they may not be increased , and ascertained , that they may not be confounded : but every language has ...
... once unnecessary , must be tolerated among the imperfections of human things ; and which re- quire only to be registered , that they may not be increased , and ascertained , that they may not be confounded : but every language has ...
Page 25
... once incorporated , can never be afterwards dismissed or re- formed . Of this kind are the derivatives length from long , strength from strong , darling from dear , breadth from broad , from dry , drought , and from high , height ...
... once incorporated , can never be afterwards dismissed or re- formed . Of this kind are the derivatives length from long , strength from strong , darling from dear , breadth from broad , from dry , drought , and from high , height ...
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Popular passages
Page 107 - His first defect is that to which mav be imputed most of the evil in books or in men. He sacrifices virtue to convenience, and is so much more careful to please than to instruct, that he seems to write without any moral purpose.
Page 97 - Nothing can please many, and please long, but just representations of general nature. Particular manners can be known to few, and therefore few only can judge how nearly they are copied. The irregular combinations of fanciful invention may delight...
Page 145 - I cannot say he is everywhere alike; were he so, I should do him injury to compare him with the greatest of mankind. He is many times flat, insipid; his comic wit degenerating into clenches, his serious swelling into bombast. But he is always great when some great occasion is presented to him...
Page 105 - His comedy pleases by the thoughts and the language, and his tragedy for the greater part by incident and action. His tragedy seems to be skill, his comedy to be instinct.
Page 48 - To deny the possibility, nay, actual existence, of witchcraft and sorcery is at once flatly to contradict the revealed word of God, in various passages both of the Old and New Testament : and the thing itself is a truth to which every nation in the world hath in its turn borne testimony, either by examples seemingly well attested or by prohibitory laws; which at least suppose the possibility of commerce with evil spirits.
Page 113 - The truth is that the spectators are always in their senses and know from the first act to the last that the stage is only a stage and that the players are only players.
Page 82 - She should have died hereafter ; There would have been a time for such a word. To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, Creeps in this petty pace from day to day To the last syllable of recorded time, And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death.
Page 65 - The night has been unruly : where we lay, Our chimneys were blown down : and, as they say, Lamentings heard i...
Page 102 - Shakespeare's plays are not in the rigorous and critical sense either tragedies or comedies, but compositions of a distinct kind; exhibiting the real state of sublunary nature, which partakes of good and evil, joy and sorrow, mingled with endless variety of proportion and innumerable modes of combination ; and expressing the course of the world, in which the loss of one is the gain of another; in which, at the same time, the reveller is hasting to his wine, and the mourner burying his friend...
Page 107 - When he found himself near the end of his work and in view of his reward, he shortened the labour to snatch the profit. He therefore remits his efforts where he should most vigorously exert them, and his catastrophe is improbably produced or imperfectly represented.