Works, Volume 8W. Durell, 1811 |
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afford Americans ancient appearance authority believe better called cause chief claim common consequence considered continued danger desire distance easily effect England English equal evil expected force give given greater ground hand happiness heard Highlands honour hope human hundred ignorance inhabitants inquire island kind king knowledge known labour laird land lately learned less live longer Maclean means miles mind nature necessary never observed obtained once opinion original parliament passed patriot perhaps pleasure political possession present probably produce question raised reason remains represented rich rock Scotland seems seen sent side sometimes standing stone subjects suffered sufficient supposed sure taken tell thing thought tion told travelled true universal whole wish
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Page 355 - We were now treading that illustrious island, which was once the luminary of the Caledonian regions, whence savage clans and roving barbarians derived the benefits of knowledge, and the blessings of religion. To abstract the mind from all local emotion would be impossible, if it were endeavoured, and would be foolish, if it were possible.
Page 114 - The life of a modern soldier is ill represented by heroic fiction. War has means of destruction more formidable than the cannon and the sword. Of the thousands and ten thousands that perished in our late contests with France and Spain, a very small part ever felt the stroke of an enemy ; the rest languished in tents and ships, amidst damps and putrefaction ; pale, torpid, spiritless and helpless ; gasping and groaning, unpitied among men, made obdurate by long continuance of hopeless misery ; and...
Page 273 - Whatever is imaged in the wildest tale, if giants, dragons, and enchantment be excepted, would be felt by him, who, wandering in the mountains without a guide, or upon the sea without a pilot, should be carried amidst his terror and uncertainty, to the hospitality and elegance of Raasay or Dunvegan.
Page 188 - We are told, that the subjection of Americans may tend to the diminution of our own liberties ; an event, which none but very perspicacious politicians are able to foresee. If slavery be thus fatally contagious, how is it that we hear the loudest yelps for liberty among the drivers of negroes ? But let us interrupt awhile this dream of conquest, settlement, and supremacy.
Page 177 - Those who wrote the Address, though they have shown no great extent or profundity of mind, are yet probably wiser than to believe it: but they have been taught by some master of mischief, how to put in motion the engine of political electricity; to attract by the sounds of Liberty and Property, to repel by those of Popery and Slavery; and to give the great stroke by the name of Boston.
Page 190 - HAD desired to visit the Hebrides, or Western Islands of Scotland, so long, that I scarcely remember how the wish was originally excited ; and was in the autumn of the year 1773 induced to undertake the journey, by finding in Mr. Boswell a companion, whose acuteness would help my inquiry, and whose gaiety of conversation and civility of manners are sufficient to counteract the inconveniencies of travel, in countries less hospitable than we have passed.
Page 230 - Regions mountainous and wild, thinly inhabited, and little cultivated make a great part of the earth, and he that has never seen them must live unacquainted with much of the face of nature and with one of the great scenes of human existence.
Page 260 - Raasay has little that can detain a traveller, except the laird and his family ; but their power wants no auxiliaries. Such a seat of hospitality, amidst the winds and waters, fills the imagination with a delightful contrariety of images. Without is the rough ocean and the rocky land, the beating billows and the howling storm : within is plenty and elegance, beauty and gaiety, the song and the dance.
Page 114 - It is wonderful with what coolness and indifference the greater part of mankind see war commenced. Those that hear of it at a distance or read of it in books, but have never presented its evils to their minds, consider it as little more than a splendid game, a proclamation, an army, a battle, and a triumph.
Page 194 - ... necessity there is reason to complain. It is surely not without just reproach, that a nation, of which the commerce is hourly extending, and the wealth increasing, denies any participation of its prosperity to its literary societies ; and while its merchants or its nobles are raising palaces, suffers its Universities to moulder into dust.