A School History of English Literature, Volume 1

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Blackie & Son, Limited, 1896 - English literature - 206 pages

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Page 11 - Three years she grew in sun and shower, Then Nature said, " A lovelier flower On earth was never sown ; This Child I to myself will take ; She shall be mine, and I will make A Lady of my own. " Myself will to my darling be Both law and impulse : and with me The Girl, in rock and plain, In earth and heaven, in glade and bower, Shall feel an overseeing power To kindle or restrain.
Page 144 - AND is there care in heaven ? and is there love In heavenly spirits to these creatures base, That may compassion of their evils move ? There is...
Page 145 - How oft do they their silver bowers leave, To come to succour us that succour want ! How oft do they with golden pinions cleave The flitting skies like flying pursuivant, Against foul fiends to aid us militant ! They for us fight ; they watch and duly ward, And their bright squadrons round about us plant ; And all for love and nothing for reward : Oh why should heavenly God to men have such regard) THE SEASONS.
Page 190 - Had fed the feeling of their masters' thoughts, And every sweetness that inspired their hearts, Their minds, and muses on admired themes ; If all the heavenly quintessence they still From their immortal flowers of poesy, Wherein, as in a mirror, we perceive The highest reaches of a human wit ; If these had made one poem's period, And all combined in beauty's worthiness, Yet should there hover in their restless heads One thought, one grace, one wonder, at the least, Which into words no virtue can...
Page 164 - ... cometh to you with words set in delightful proportion, either accompanied with, or prepared for, the well-enchanting skill of music; and with a tale, forsooth, he cometh unto you, with a tale which holdeth children from play and old men from the chimney corner...
Page 61 - Or call up him that left half told The story of Cambuscan bold, Of Camball, and of Algarsife, And who had Canace to wife, That own'd the virtuous ring and glass, And of the wondrous horse of brass, On which the Tartar king did ride...
Page 121 - Gamoens soothed an exile's grief; The Sonnet glittered a gay myrtle leaf Amid the cypress with which Dante crowned His visionary brow : a glow-worm lamp, It cheered mild Spenser, called from Faery-land To struggle through dark ways ; and when a damp Fell round the path of Milton, in his hand...
Page 193 - I must have wanton poets, pleasant wits, Musicians, that with touching of a string May draw the pliant king which way I please: Music and poetry is his delight; Therefore I'll have Italian masks by night, Sweet speeches, comedies, and pleasing shows...
Page 164 - Only the poet, disdaining to be tied to any such subjection, lifted up with the vigour of his own invention, doth grow in effect into another nature, in making things either better than Nature bringeth forth, or, quite anew - forms such as never were in Nature...
Page 67 - Is lightened ; that serene and blessed mood In which the affections gently lead us on, Until the breath of this corporeal frame, And even the motion of our human blood Almost suspended, we are laid asleep In body, and become a living soul : While with an eye made quiet by the power Of harmony and the deep power of joy, We see into the life of things.

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