Crabbe

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Macmillan, 1903 - Poets, English - 210 pages

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Page 132 - O Lady! we receive but what we give, And in our life alone does Nature live: Ours is her wedding-garment, ours her shroud! And would we aught behold, of higher worth, Than that inanimate cold world allowed To the poor loveless ever-anxious crowd, Ah ! from the soul itself must issue forth A light, a glory, a fair luminous cloud Enveloping the Earth...
Page 51 - Careless their merits or their faults to scan, His pity gave ere charity began. Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride, And e'en his failings lean'd to virtue's side; But in his duty prompt at every call, He watch'd and wept, he pray'd and felt, for all.
Page 49 - On Mincio's banks, in Caesar's bounteous reign, If Tityrus found the Golden Age again, Must sleepy bards the flattering dream prolong, Mechanic echoes of the Mantuan song? From Truth and Nature shall we widely stray, Where Virgil, not where Fancy, leads the way? Yes, thus the Muses sing of happy swains, Because the Muses never knew their pains. They boast their peasants...
Page 50 - Rank weeds, that every art and care defy, Reign o'er the land and rob the blighted rye : There thistles stretch their prickly arms afar, And to the ragged infant threaten war ; There poppies nodding, mock the hope of toil; There the blue bugloss paints the sterile soil; Hardy and high, above the slender sheaf, The slimy mallow waves her silky leaf...
Page 50 - Where the thin harvest waves its wither'd ears; Rank weeds, that every art and care defy, Reign o'er the land and rob the blighted rye : There thistles stretch their prickly arms afar, And to the ragged infant threaten war ; There poppies nodding, mock the hope of toil...
Page 46 - I have sent you back Mr. Crabbe's poem; which " I read with great delight. It is original, vigorous, and elegant. " The alterations which I have made, I do not require him to " adopt ; for my lines are, perhaps, not often better [than] his " own : but he may take mine and his own together, and " perhaps, between them, produce something better than "either. — He is not to think his copy wantonly defaced; a " wet sponge will wash all the red lines away, and leave the "pages clean.
Page 133 - And well-feign'd apprehension in her eyes ; Train'd but yet savage in her speaking face, He mark'd the features of her vagrant race ; When a light laugh and roguish leer express...
Page 161 - Across the threshold led, And every tear kissed off" as soon as shed, His house she enters — there to be a light, Shining within, when all without is night ; A guardian- angel o'er his life presiding, Doubling his pleasures, and his cares dividing...
Page 52 - The holy stranger to these dismal walls ; And doth not he, the pious man, appear, He, "passing rich with forty pounds a year?
Page 101 - I feel his absence in the hours of prayer, And view his seat and sigh for Isaac there : I see no more those white locks thinly spread Round the bald polish of that honour'd head ; No more that awful glance on playful wight, Compell'd to kneel and tremble at the sight, To fold his fingers, all in dread the while, Till Mister Ashford soften'd to a smile; No more that meek and suppliant look in prayer.

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