Prefaces, Biographical and Critical, to the Works of the English Poets: Young. Dyer. Mallet. Shenstone. Akenside. Lyttelton. West. Gray

Capa
J. Nichols, 1781

No interior do livro

Outras edições - Ver tudo

Palavras e frases frequentes

Passagens conhecidas

Página 5 - of Northern and Welih Poetry deferve praife; the imagery is preferved, perhaps often improved; but the language is unlike the language of other poets. In the character of his Elegy I rejoice to concur with the common reader; for by the common fenfe of readers uncorrupted with literary prejudices, after all the refinements of fubtilty and the dogmatifm of learning,
Página 4 - firm and perfuaded believer of " the Chriftian religion. I have made " it the rule of my life, and it is the " ground of my future hopes. I have " erred and finned; but have repented, " and never indulged any vicious habit. " In politicks, and publick life, I have " made publick good the rule of my
Página 14 - it has no acquaintance with love or nature : I priz'd every hour that went by, Beyond all that had pleas'd me before ; But now they are paft, and I figh, And I grieve that I priz'd them no more. When forc'd the fair nymph to forgo, What anguifh I felt in my
Página 6 - have never feen the notions in any other place; yet he that reads them here, perfuades himfelf that he has always felt them. Had Gray written often thus, it had been vain to blame, and ufelefs to praife him.
Página 9 - of Eaton College fuggefts nothing to Gray, which every beholder does not equally think and feel. His fupplication to father Thames, to tell him who drives the hoop or tofles the ball, is ufelefs and puerile. Father Thames has no better means of knowing than himfelf. His epithet buxom
Página 113 - His verfes are formed by no certain model; for he is no more like himfelf in his different productions than he is like others. He feems never to have ftudied profody, nor to have had any direction but from his own ear. But, with all his defects, he was a man of genius and a poet.
Página 4 - walks, and to wind his waters ; which he did with fuch judgement and fuch fancy, as made his little domain the envy of the great, and the admiration of the fkilful; a place to be vifited by travellers, and copied by defigners. Whether to plant a walk in undulating curves, and to place a bench at every turn where there is an object
Página 5 - have feen that I was fometimes in '•' the wrong, but I did not err defigned" ly. I have endeavoured, in private " life, to do all the good in my power, " and never for a moment could in" dulge malicious or unjuft defigns " upon any perfon whatfoever." " At another time he faid, " I muft
Página 13 - rich; But wealth came too late to be long enjoyed: nor could it fecure him from the calamities of life; he loft (1755) his only fon; and the year after (March 26), a ftroke of the palfy brought to the grave one of the few poets' to whom the grave needed not to be terrible.
Página 13 - defcribes well' enough the univerfal prevalence of Poetry •, but I am afraid that the conclufion will not rife from the premifes. The caverns of the North and the plains of Chili are not the refidences of Glory and generous Shame. But that Poetry and Virtue go always together is an opinion fo pleafing, that I

Informação bibliográfica