Part i
. Act ii. Sc. 6._
Clothing the palpable and familiar With golden exhalations of the dawn.
_The Death of Wallenstein. Act i. Sc. 1._
Often do the spirits Of great events stride on before the events, And in to-day already walks to-morrow.[504-1]
_The Death of Wallenstein. Act v. Sc. 1._
Our myriad-minded Shakespeare.[504-2]
_Biog. Lit. Chap. xv._
A dwarf sees farther than the giant when he has the giant's shoulder to mount on.[504-3]
_The Friend. Sec. i. Essay 8._
An instinctive taste teaches men to build their churches in flat countries, with spire steeples, which, as they cannot be referred to any other object, point as with silent finger to the sky and star.[504-4]
_Ibid., No. 14._
Reviewers are usually people who would have been poets, historians, biographers, if they could; they have tried their talents at one or the other, and have failed; therefore they turn critics.[505-1]
_Lectures on Shakespeare and Milton, p. 36. Delivered 1811-1812._
Schiller has the material sublime.
_Table Talk._
I wish our clever young poets would remember my homely definitions of prose and poetry; that is, prose,--words in their best order; poetry,--the best words in their best order.
_Table Talk._
That passage is what I call the sublime dashed to pieces by cutting too close with the fiery four-in-hand round the corner of nonsense.
_Table Talk._
Iago's soliloquy, the motive-hunting of a motiveless malignity--how awful it is!
_Notes on some other Plays of Shakespeare._
FOOTNOTES:
[498-1] Wordsworth, in his Notes to "We are Seven," claims to have written this line.
[498-2] Coleridge says: "For these lines I am indebted to Mr. Wordsworth."
[501-1] His favourite sin Is pride that apes humility.
SOUTHEY: _The Devil's Walk._
[503-1] See Shakespeare, page 57.
[503-2] And Iliad and Odyssey Rose to the music of the sea.
_Thalatta, p. 133._ (From the German of Stolberg.)
[504-1] Sed ita a principio inchoatum esse mundum ut certis rebus certa signa præcurrerent (Thus in the beginning the world was so made that certain signs come before certain events).--CICERO: _Divinatione, liber i. cap. 52._
Coming events cast their shadows before.--CAMPBELL: _Lochiel's Warning._
Poets are the hierophants of an unapprehended inspiration; the mirrors of the gigantic shadows which futurity casts upon the present.--SHELLEY: _A Defence of Poetry._
[504-2] "A phrase," says Coleridge, "which I have borrowed from a Greek monk, who applies it to a patriarch of Constantinople."
[504-3] See Burton, page 185.
[504-4] See Wordsworth, page 481.
[505-1] Reviewers, with some rare exceptions, are a most stupid and malignant race. As a bankrupt thief turns thief-taker in despair, so an unsuccessful author turns critic.--SHELLEY: _Fragments of Adonais._
You know who critics are? The men who have failed in literature and art.--DISRAELI: _Lothair, chap. xxxv._
JOSIAH QUINCY. 1772-1864
If this bill [for the admission of Orleans Territory as a State] passes, it is my deliberate opinion that it is virtually a dissolution of the Union; that it will free the States from their moral obligation; and, as it will be the right of all, so it will be the duty of some, definitely to prepare for a separation,--amicably if they can, violently if they must.[505-2]
_Abridged Cong. Debates, Jan. 14, 1811. Vol. iv. p. 327._
FOOTNOTES:
[505-2] The gentleman [Mr. Quincy] cannot have forgotten his own sentiment, uttered even on the floor of this House, "Peaceably if we can, forcibly if we must."--HENRY CLAY: _Speech, Jan. 8, 1813._
ROBERT SOUTHEY. 1774-1843.
"You are old, Father William," the young man cried, "The few locks which are left you are gray; You are hale, Father William, a hearty old man,-- Now tell me the reason I pray."
_The Old Man's Comforts, and how he gained them._
The march of intellect.[506-1]
_Colloquies on the Progress and Prospects of Society. Vol. ii. p. 360. The Doctor, Chap. Extraordinary._
The laws are with us, and God on our side.
_On the Rise and Progress of Popular Disaffection_ (1817), _Essay viii. Vol. ii. p. 107._
Agreed to differ.
_Life of Wesley._
My days among the dead are passed; Around me I behold, Where'er these casual eyes are cast, The mighty minds of old; My never-failing friends are they, With whom I converse day by day.
_Occasional Pieces. xxiii._
How does the water Come down at Lodore?
_The Cataract of Lodore._
So I told them in rhyme, For of rhymes I had store.
_The Cataract of Lodore._
Through moss and through brake.
_The Cataract of Lodore._
Helter-skelter, Hurry-scurry.
_The Cataract of Lodore._
A sight to delight in.
_The Cataract of Lodore._
And so never ending, but always descending.
_The Cataract of Lodore._
And this way the water comes down at Lodore.
_The Cataract of Lodore._
From his brimstone bed, at break of day, A-walking the Devil is gone, To look at his little snug farm of the World, And see how his stock went on.
_The Devil's Walk. Stanza 1._
He passed a cottage with a double coach-house,-- A cottage of gentility; And he owned with a grin, That his favourite sin Is pride that apes humility.[507-1]
_The Devil's Walk. Stanza 8._
Where Washington hath left His awful memory A light for after times!
_Ode written during the War with America, 1814._
How beautiful is night! A dewy freshness fills the silent air; No mist obscures; nor cloud, or speck, nor stain, Breaks the serene of heaven: In full-orbed glory, yonder moon divine Rolls through the dark blue depths; Beneath her steady ray The desert circle spreads Like the round ocean, girdled with the sky. How beautiful is night!
_Thalaba.