A manual of essays, selected from various authors, Volume 2F.C. and J. Rivington, 1809 |
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Popular passages
Page 224 - Our present race of ephemerae will in a course of minutes become corrupt, like those of other and older bushes, and consequently as wretched : and in philosophy how small our progress ! Alas ! art is long, and life is short ! My friends would comfort me with the idea of a name, they say, I shall leave behind me ; and they tell me I have lived long enough to nature and to glory. But what will fame be to an ephemera who no longer exists ? and what will become of all history in the eighteenth hour,...
Page 131 - Two of far nobler shape, erect and tall, Godlike erect, with native honour clad, In naked majesty seem'd lords of all : And worthy seem'd ; for in their looks divine The image of their glorious Maker shone, Truth, wisdom, sanctitude severe and pure (Severe, but in true filial freedom placed), Whence true authority in men...
Page 103 - The other Shape — If shape it might be called that shape had none Distinguishable in member, joint, or limb; Or substance might be called that shadow seemed, For each seemed either — black it stood as Night, Fierce as ten Furies, terrible as Hell, And shook a dreadful dart: what seemed his head The likeness of a kingly crown had on.
Page 104 - I have been very jealous for the Lord God of hosts: for the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altars, and slain thy prophets with the sword; and I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.
Page 104 - In thoughts from the visions of the night, when deep sleep falleth on men, fear came upon me, and trembling, which made all my bones to shake. Then a spirit passed before my face ; the hair of my flesh stood up : it stood still, but I could not discern the form thereof : an image was before mine eyes ; there was silence, and I heard a voice...
Page 55 - Words, indeed, like glaring colours, are the first beauties that arise and strike the sight; but, if the draught...
Page 189 - I might have bought with the rest of the money; and laughed at me so much for my folly, that I cried with vexation; and the reflection gave me more chagrin than the whistle gave me pleasure.
Page 190 - When I saw another fond of popularity, constantly employing himself in political bustles, neglecting his own affairs, and ruining them by that neglect, He pays, indeed, said I, too much for his whistle.
Page 71 - Sickness is a sort of early old age ; it teaches us a diffidence in our earthly state, and inspires us with the thoughts of a future, better than a thousand volumes of philosophers and divines. It gives so warning a concussion to those props of our vanity, our strength and youth, that we think of fortifying ourselves within, when there is so little dependence upon our outworks.
Page 223 - the opinion of learned philosophers of our race, who lived and flourished long before my time, that this vast world, the Moulin Joly, could not itself subsist more than eighteen hours ; and I think there was some foundation for that opinion; since, by the apparent motion of the great luminary that gives life to all nature, and which in my time has evidently...