A Survey of English Literature 1780-1880, Volume 2

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Macmillan, 1920
 

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Page 208 - That light whose smile kindles the universe, That beauty in which all things work and move, That benediction which the eclipsing curse Of birth can quench not, that sustaining Love Which, through the web of being blindly wove By man and beast and earth and air and sea, Burns bright or dim, as each are mirrors of The fire for which all thirst, now beams on me, Consuming the last clouds of cold mortality.
Page 262 - Where low-browed baseness wafts perfume to pride. No ! Men, high-minded men, With powers as far above dull brutes endued, In forest, brake or den, As beasts excel cold rocks and brambles rude ; Men who their duties know, But know their rights, and, knowing, dare maintain, Prevent the long-aimed blow, And crush the tyrant while they rend the chain, — These constitute a State ; And sovereign law, that State's collected will, • O'er thrones and globes elate Sits empress, crowning good, repressing...
Page 68 - Remember the old Man, and what he was Years after he had heard this heavy news. His bodily frame had been from youth to age Of an unusual strength. Among the rocks He went, and still looked up...
Page 196 - To suffer woes which Hope thinks infinite; To forgive wrongs darker than death or night; To defy Power, which seems omnipotent; To love, and bear; to hope till Hope creates From its own wreck the thing it contemplates...
Page 256 - She dwells with Beauty - Beauty that must die; And Joy, whose hand is ever at his lips Bidding adieu; and aching Pleasure nigh, Turning to poison while the bee-mouth sips: Ay, in the very temple of Delight Veil'd Melancholy has her sovran shrine...
Page 121 - He who binds to himself a joy Does the winged life destroy; But he who kisses the joy as it flies Lives in eternity's sunrise.
Page 80 - Better than such discourse doth silence long, Long, barren silence, square with my desire ; To sit without emotion, hope, or aim, In the loved presence of my cottage-fire, And listen to the flapping of the flame, Or kettle whispering its faint undersong.
Page 152 - Ran over with the glad surprise, And they that moment could not see I was the mate of misery ; But then by dull degrees came back My senses to their wonted track ; I saw the dungeon walls and floor Close slowly round me as before...
Page 351 - Bastile, suddenly let loose after a forty years' confinement. I could scarce trust myself with myself. It was like passing out of Time into Eternity — for it is a sort of Eternity for a man to have his Time all to himself. It seemed to me that I had more time on my hands than I could ever manage. From a poor man, poor in Time, I was suddenly lifted up into a vast revenue ; I could see no end of my possessions ; I wanted some steward, or judicious bailiff, to manage my estates in Time for me.
Page 84 - I had beheld — in front, The sea lay laughing at a distance ; near, The solid mountains shone, bright as the clouds, Grain-tinctured, drenched in empyrean light ; And in the meadows and the lower grounds Was all the sweetness of a common dawn-- Dews, vapours, and the melody of birds, And labourers going forth to till the fields.

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