The Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets: With Critical Observations on Their Works, Volume 3

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C. Buzby and B. Warner, 1819 - English poetry

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Page 85 - O'er the dark trees a yellower verdure shed, And tip with silver every mountain's head ; Then shine the vales, the rocks in prospect rise, A flood of glory bursts from all the skies : The conscious swains, rejoicing in the sight, Eye the blue vault, and bless the useful light.
Page 216 - wonders that he never saw before what Thomson shews him, and that he never yet has felt what Thomson impresses.
Page 195 - A poet, blest beyond the poet's fate, Whom Heaven kept sacred from the Proud and Great : Foe to loud praise, and friend to learned ease, Content with science in the vale of peace. Calmly he look'd on either life ; and here Saw nothing to regret, or there to fear ; From Nature's temperate feast rose satisfied, Thank'd Heaven that he had liv'd, and that he died.
Page 164 - Soft is the strain when Zephyr gently blows, And the smooth stream in smoother numbers flows ; But when loud surges lash the sounding shore, The hoarse, rough verse should like the torrent roar. When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to throw, The line too labors, and the words move slow. Not so when swift Camilla scours the plain, Flies o'er the unbending corn, and skims along the main. Hear how Timotheus...
Page 216 - As a writer he is entitled to one praise of the highest kind : his mode of thinking-, and of expressing his thoughts, is original. His blank verse is no more the blank verse of Milton, or of any other poet, than the rhymes of Prior are the rhymes of Cowley. His numbers, his pauses, his diction, are of his own growth, without transcription, without imitation.
Page 94 - Pope's excavation was requisite as an entrance to his garden, and, as some men try to be proud of their defects, he extracted an ornament from an inconvenience, and vanity produced a grotto where necessity enforced a passage.
Page 155 - Dryden knew more of man in his general nature, and Pope in his local manners. The notions of Dryden were formed by comprehensive speculation, and those of Pope by minute attention. There is more dignity in the knowledge of Dryden, and more certainty in that of Pope.
Page 342 - In the character of his Elegy I rejoice to concur with the common reader; for by the common sense of readers uncorrupted with literary prejudices, after all the refinements of subtilty and the dogmatism of learning, must be finally decided all claim to poetical honours.
Page 164 - Waller was smooth; but Dryden taught to join The varying verse, the full resounding line, The long majestic march, and energy divine.
Page 85 - ... rejoicing in the sight, Eye the blue vault, and bless the useful light. So many flames before proud Ilion blaze, And lighten glimmering Xanthus with their rays ; The long reflections of the distant fires Gleam on the walls, and tremble on the spires. A thousand piles the dusky horrors gild, And shoot a shady lustre o'er the field. Full fifty guards each flaming pile attend, Whose umber'd arms by fits thick flashes send ; Loud neigh the coursers o'er their heaps of corn, And ardent warriors wait...

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