The Influence of Literature Upon Society: To which is Prefixed, a Memoir of the Life and Writings of the AuthorW. Pearson, 1835 - 112 páginas |
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The Influence of Literature Upon Society, Volume 1 Madame de Staël (Anne-Louise-Germaine) Visualização integral - 1812 |
The Influence of Literature Upon Society, Volume 1 Madame de Staël (Anne-Louise-Germaine) Visualização integral - 1812 |
The Influence of Literature Upon Society, Volume 1 Madame de Staël (Anne-Louise-Germaine) Visualização integral - 1813 |
Palavras e frases frequentes
acquired actions admiration amongst ancients appears Ariosto beauties cause character Cicero considered death degree Demosthenes destiny dignity effect elevation eloquence emotion endeavor English enlightened Ennius enthusiasm esteem exalted excite existence expression faculties feel France French gayety genius give glory Greeks happiness human mind ideas imagination imitation impressions influence inspired interest Italian Italian literature knowledge language Latin literature liberty ligion literary literature lively Louis XIV Madame de Stael Madame Necker mankind manners melancholy ment metaphysics misfortune modern Montesquieu moral nation nature Necker never nevertheless object opinion Ossian ourselves passions perfection Petrarch philosophy Plato pleasantry poetry poets political possessed principles produced progress reason reflection religion religious rendered republic republican respect revolution ridicule Romans sciences sensibility senti sentiments Shakspeare society sophisms soul spect spirit style suicide superior Tacitus talents taste thing thought tion tragedies truth virtue Voltaire wish women writings
Passagens conhecidas
Página 50 - twas wondrous pitiful : She wish'd she had not heard it ; yet she wish'd That heaven had made her such a man : she thank'd me; And bade me, if I had a friend that lov'd her, I should but teach him how to tell my story, And that would woo her. Upon this hint I spake"; She lov'd me for the dangers I had pass'd, And I lov'd her, that she did pity them.
Página 104 - Consider the lilies of the field; they toil not, neither do they spin: yet Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
Página 51 - Shakspeare, when he wrote the parts of vulgar minds in his tragedies, sheltered himself from the judgment of taste by rendering himself the object of popular admiration: he then conducted himself like an able chief, but not like a good writer. The people of the North existed during many centuries, in a state that was at once both social and barbarous; which left for a long time the vestiges of the rude and ferocious. Traces of this recollection are to be found in many of Shakspeare's characters,...
Página 49 - German authors, was the first who painted moral affliction in the highest degree : the bitterness of those sufferings of which he gives us the idea, might pass for the phantoms of imagination, if Nature did not recognise her own picture in them. The ancients believed in a fatality, which came upon them with the rapidity of lightning, and destroyed them like a thunderbolt. The moderns, and more especially Shakspeare, found a much deeper source of emotion in a philosophical distress, which was often...
Página 50 - Macbeth," admits of fatality, which was necessary in order to procure a pardon for the criminal; but he does not, on account of this fatality, dispense with the philosophical gradations of the sentiments of the mind. This piece would be still more admirable if its grand effects were produced without the aid of the marvellous, although this marvellous consists, as one may say, only of phantoms of the imagination, which are made to appear before the eyes of the spectators.
Página 7 - Stael had the noble firmness to say to him : ' You are giving me a cruel celebrity ; I shall occupy a line in your history.' Madame de Stael at first retired to Auxerre ; but not meeting with suitable society, she thought she might settle at Rouen ; and as this city is only thirtytwo leagues from Paris, she...
Página 49 - ... which draws from nature; that immediate genius, if I may so express myself, which so particularly characterizes Shakspeare. From the times of the Greeks, down to this time, we see every species of literature derived one from another, and all arising from the same source. Shakspeare...
Página 42 - ... absurd affectation. Their recollection of past grandeur, without one idea of present greatness, must necessarily produce the stupendous. The Italians might possess dignity, if there were any mixture of the gloomy or melancholy in their characters; but when the successors of the Romans, deprived of all national splendor, and all political liberty, are yet the gayest people on earth, it shows that there is a natural want of elevation of soul. It was perhaps from antipathy to the Italian bombast,...
Página 51 - Nevertheless, can there be any thing,more difficult in an elevated style, or more nearly allied to ridicule, than the imitation of an ill-shaped man upon the stage? Every thing in nature may interest the mind; but upon the stage, the illusion of sight must be treated with the most scrupulous caution, or every serious effect will be irreparably destroyed. Shakspeare also represented physical sufferings much too often. Philoctetes is the only example of any theatrical effect being produced by it; and...
Página 15 - ... 1 For my own part, I have, throughout this work, incessantly adverted to every circumstance that tends to evince the perfectibility of the human species. \ Nor is this to be confounded with visionary theories" it is the result of observation, and stands on the evidence of facts. It is wise, indeed, to guard against that species of metaphysics which derives no support from experience : but at the same time, it should not be forgotten that, in times of degeneracy and corruption, the name of METAPHYSICS...