Macaulay's Essays on Milton and Addison

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Sibley & Ducker, 1893 - 207 pages
 

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Page 1 - A thousand spurs are striking deep, a thousand spears in rest, A thousand knights are pressing close behind the snow-white crest ; And in they burst, and on they rushed, while, like a guiding star, Amidst the thickest carnage blazed the helmet of Navarre.
Page 72 - It is to be regretted that the prose writings of Milton should, in our time, be so little read. As compositions, they deserve the attention of every man who wishes to become acquainted with the full power of the English language. They abound with passages compared with which the finest declamations of Burke sink into insignificance. They are a perfect field of cloth of gold. The style is stiff with gorgeous embroidery. Not even in the earlier books of the
Page xix - And thou, Rochelle, our own Rochelle, proud city of the waters, Again let rapture light the eyes of all thy mourning daughters. As thou wert constant in our ills, be joyous in our joy, For cold, and stiff, and still are they who wrought thy walls annoy.
Page 1 - ... are pressing close behind the snow-white crest; And in they burst, and on they rushed, while, like a guiding star, Amidst the thickest carnage blazed the helmet of Navarre. Now, God be praised, the day is ours. Mayenne hath turned his rein. D'Aumale hath cried for quarter. The Flemish count is slain. Their ranks are breaking like thin clouds before a Biscay gale; The field is heaped with bleeding steeds, and flags, and cloven mail. And then we thought on vengeance, and, all along our van, "Remember...
Page xx - And Appenzel's stout infantry, and Egmont's Flemish spears. There rode the brood of false Lorraine, the curses of our land ! And dark Mayenne was in the midst, a truncheon in his hand ; And, as we looked on them, we thought of Seine's...
Page 193 - Or the unseen genius of the wood. But let my due feet never fail To walk the studious cloister's pale, And love the high-embowed roof, With antique pillars massy proof, And storied windows richly dight, Casting a dim religious light.
Page 88 - He is taller, by almost the breadth of my nail, than any of his court ; which alone is enough to strike an awe into the beholders.
Page xx - King is come to marshal us, in all his armor drest, And he has bound a snow-white plume upon his gallant crest. He looked upon his people, and a tear was in his eye; He looked upon the traitors, and his glance was stern and high. Right graciously he smiled on us, as rolled from wing to wing, Down all our line, a deafening shout, "God save our Lord the King!
Page 3 - Ho! maidens of Vienna; Ho! matrons of Lucerne ; Weep, weep, and rend your hair for those who never shall return. Ho! Philip, send, for charity, thy Mexican pistoles, That Antwerp monks may sing a mass for thy poor spearmen's souls.
Page 62 - Providence, they habitually ascribed every event to the will of the Great Being, for whose power nothing was too vast, for whose inspection nothing was too minute. To know him, to serve him, to enjoy him, was with them the great end of existence. They rejected with contempt the ceremonious homage which other sects substituted for the pure worship of the soul. Instead of catching occasional glimpses of the Deity through an obscuring veil, they aspired to gaze full on the intolerable brightness, and...

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