The Elements of English Composition |
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Page vi
... characters of style , it was attended with more difficulty and hazard . In estimating the merits and defects of any composition , there is much room for variety and opposition of opinion ; nor is it to be expected that different ...
... characters of style , it was attended with more difficulty and hazard . In estimating the merits and defects of any composition , there is much room for variety and opposition of opinion ; nor is it to be expected that different ...
Page vii
... character of a compiler . I have accordingly attempted to avail myself of the previous labours of many different authors , distinguished for their learning or judgment . For the more valuable instruction contained in this volume , the ...
... character of a compiler . I have accordingly attempted to avail myself of the previous labours of many different authors , distinguished for their learning or judgment . For the more valuable instruction contained in this volume , the ...
Page 11
... character drawn by a most competent judge . As an English critic , his character may be learned from Bishop Pearce's “ Review of the Text of Milton's Paradise Lost : in which the chief of Dr. Bentley's Emendations are consider'd ...
... character drawn by a most competent judge . As an English critic , his character may be learned from Bishop Pearce's “ Review of the Text of Milton's Paradise Lost : in which the chief of Dr. Bentley's Emendations are consider'd ...
Page 15
... character of his mistress , he will tell you that he is at a loss for words to describe her charms , and will ask you seriously , if ever you was acquainted with a goddess or an angel . - Hume's Essays . As the word you is confessedly ...
... character of his mistress , he will tell you that he is at a loss for words to describe her charms , and will ask you seriously , if ever you was acquainted with a goddess or an angel . - Hume's Essays . As the word you is confessedly ...
Page 25
... character , which I , or any other writer may now value our- selves by ( upon ) drawing , will probably be dropt , on account of the antiquated style and manner they are delivered in . - Swift on the English Tongue . The discovery he ...
... character , which I , or any other writer may now value our- selves by ( upon ) drawing , will probably be dropt , on account of the antiquated style and manner they are delivered in . - Swift on the English Tongue . The discovery he ...
Common terms and phrases
Addison Æneid allegory ancient appears Aristotle attention beauty Beggar's Opera Born CHAP character Cicero circumstances composition consider critics degree Demosthenes diction died discourse Dissertation edit effect elegant eloquence employed Encyclopædia Britannica endeavour English English language Essay examples expression fancy figure genius grace Greek harmony hath haue Hist Homer honour human humour ideas imagination instances introduced Johnson kind labour language learned Lond Lord Lord Shaftesbury Macedon mankind manner means ment metaphor mind nature nerally never object observed occasion opinion ornament passage passion period person personification perspicuity phrases Plato pleasure Plutarch poet poetry possessed proper propriety prose reader reason religion remarkable resemblance Roman Roman Empire Roman Republic sense sentence sentiments Sermons shew simile simplicity Sir William Temple soul sound speak style taste tence things thou thought tion tragedy truth verse Virgil virtue words writers Xenophon
Popular passages
Page 189 - Thou hast brought a vine out of Egypt : thou hast cast out the heathen, and planted it. Thou preparedst room before it, and didst cause it to take deep root, and it filled the land. The hills were covered with the shadow of it, and the boughs thereof were like the goodly cedars. She sent out her boughs unto the sea, and her branches unto the river.
Page 344 - He was the man who of all modern, and perhaps ancient poets, had the largest and most comprehensive soul. All the images of nature were still present to him, and he drew them not laboriously, but luckily: when he describes anything, you more than see it, you feel it too.
Page 192 - What could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it ? wherefore, when I looked that it should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes...
Page 161 - Fir'd at first sight with what the Muse imparts, In fearless youth we tempt the heights of arts, While from the bounded level of our mind, Short views we take, nor see the lengths behind; But more advanc'd, behold with strange surprise, New distant scenes of endless science rise!
Page 327 - Methinks I see her as an eagle mewing her mighty youth, and kindling her undazzled eyes at the full mid-day beam ; purging and unsealing her long abused sight at the fountain itself of heavenly radiance, while the whole noise of timorous and flocking birds, with those also that love the twilight, flutter about, amazed at what she means, and in their envious gabble would prognosticate a year of sects and schisms.
Page 15 - To know but this, that Thou art good, And that myself am blind ; Yet gave me, in this dark estate, To see the good from ill ; And binding nature fast in fate, Left free the human will.
Page 150 - Me miserable ! which way shall I fly Infinite wrath, and infinite despair? Which way I fly is Hell; myself am Hell; And, in the lowest deep, a lower deep Still threatening to devour me opens wide, To which the Hell I suffer seems a Heaven.
Page 192 - Great lords, wise men ne'er sit and wail their loss, But cheerly seek how to redress their harms.
Page 101 - Homer was the greater genius; Virgil, the better artist; in the one, we most admire the man; in. the other, the work. Homer hurries us with a commanding impetuosity; Virgil leads us with an attractive majesty. Homer scatters with a generous profusion; Virgil bestows with a careful magnificence. Homer, like the Nile, pours out his riches with a sudden overflow; Virgil, like a river in its banks, with a constant stream.
Page 149 - Lift up now thine eyes, and look from the place where thou art northward, and southward, and eastward, and westward : for all the land which thou seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed for ever.