Boileau and the French Classical Critics in England (1660-1830) |
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Addison admirable Aeneid ancient appeared Ariosto Aristotle Art of Poetry Art Poétique beauties Boileau Boileau's influence Boileau's satires Bolevian Book Bossu Bouhours burlesque Canto Chalmers chapter character classical Corneille couplet Dacier Dennis dialogue Discourse Dispensary Dryden Dunciad edition eighteenth century England English critics English literature English poetry English Poets epic poem Epic Poetry Epistle Essay fable fame France French critics Garth genius Greek heroic Homer Horace Ibid imitation Italian John Dryden judgment Juvenal Kames Landor Le Bossu Le Lutrin leau leau's Letters lines literary Longinus Lutrin MacFlecknoe mock-heroic modern Molière Monsieur Boileau muse nature neo-classic Oldham original passage poetical Pope Pope's praise Preface Prelate qu'il quoted Rape Rapin references Réflexions remarks Review rhyme Saint-Evremond Satire VIII satirist says seems sense spirit style sublime Tasso taste thought tion translation vers verse Virgil Voltaire Warton writing
Popular passages
Page 413 - For imagination in a poet is a faculty so wild and lawless, that like an high-ranging spaniel, it must have clogs tied to it, lest it outrun the judgment.
Page 321 - The birds their quire apply ; airs, vernal airs, Breathing the smell of field and grove, attune The trembling leaves, while universal Pan, Knit with the Graces and the Hours in dance, Led on the eternal Spring.
Page 196 - Qu'est-ce qu'une pensée neuve, brillante, extraordinaire ? Ce n'est point, comme se le persuadent les ignorants, une pensée que personne n'a jamais eue ni dû avoir ; c'est au contraire une pensée qui a dû venir à tout le monde et que quelqu'un s'avise le premier d'exprimer. Un bon mot n'est bon mot qu'en ce qu'il dit une chose que chacun pensait, et qu'il la dit d'une manière vive, fine et nouvelle.
Page 131 - Enfin Malherbe vint, et, le premier en France, Fit sentir dans les vers une juste cadence. D'un mot mis en sa place enseigna le pouvoir. Et réduisit la muse aux règles du devoir.
Page 201 - Ease, pleasure, virtue, all our sex resign. Methinks already I your tears survey, Already hear the horrid things they say, Already see you a degraded toast, And all your honour in a whisper lost!
Page 93 - Could all this be forgotten ? Yes, a schism Nurtured by foppery and barbarism Made great Apollo blush for this his land. Men were thought wise who could not understand His glories : with a puling infant's force They sway'd about upon a rocking horse, And thought it Pegasus.
Page 196 - whispers through the trees: " If crystal streams " with pleasing murmurs creep," The reader's threatened (not in vain) with " sleep: " Then, at the last and only couplet fraught With some unmeaning thing they call a thought, A needless Alexandrine ends the song That, like a wounded snake, drags its slow length along.
Page 94 - To musty laws lined out with wretched rule And compass vile; so that ye taught a school Of dolts to smooth, inlay, and clip, and fit, Till, like the certain wands of Jacob's wit, Their verses tallied. Easy was the task: A thousand handicraftsmen wore the mask Of Poesy. Ill-fated, impious race! That blasphemed the bright Lyrist to his face, And did not know it, — no, they went about, Holding a poor, decrepit standard out, Mark'd with most flimsy mottoes, and in large The name of one Boileau!
Page 110 - The third way is that of imitation, where the translator (if now he has not lost that name) assumes the liberty not only to vary from the words and sense, but to forsake them both as he sees occasion; and taking only some general hints from the original, to run division on the groundwork, as he pleases.
Page 196 - Nor is Paul's church more safe than Paul's churchyard : Nay, fly to altars, there they'll talk you dead; For fools rush in where angels fear to tread.