Poets and Puritans

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Methuen, 1915 - 323 pages

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Page 42 - I was confirmed in this opinion ; that he who would not be frustrate of his hope to write well hereafter in laudable things, ought himself to be a true poem...
Page 102 - ... a Liberty to Tender Consciences and that no man shall be disquieted or called in question for differences of opinion in matters of religion which do not disturb the peace of the kingdom...
Page 64 - Floats as they pass, fann'd with unnumber'd plumes : From branch to branch the smaller birds with song Solaced the woods, and spread their painted wings Till even ; nor then the solemn nightingale Ceased warbling, but all night tuned her soft lays : Others, on silver lakes and rivers, bathed Their downy breast ; the swan with arched neck, Between her white wings, mantling proudly, rows Her state with oary feet...
Page 270 - The man of science seeks truth as a remote and unknown benefactor ; he cherishes and loves it in his solitude ; the poet, singing a song in which all human beings join with him, rejoices in the presence of truth as our visible friend and hourly companion.
Page 47 - Rather admire; or if they list to try Conjecture, he his fabric of the Heavens Hath left to their disputes, perhaps to move His laughter at their quaint opinions wide Hereafter, when they come to model Heaven And calculate the stars, how they will wield The mighty frame; how build, unbuild, contrive To save appearances; how gird the sphere With centric and eccentric scribbled o'er, Cycle and epicycle, orb in orb...
Page 94 - I can never forget the inexpressible luxury and profaneness, gaming, and all dissoluteness, and as it were total forgetfulness of God, (it being Sunday evening,) which this day se'nnight I was witness of, the King sitting and toying with his concubines, Portsmouth, Cleveland, and...
Page 24 - I cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue, unexercised and unbreathed, that never sallies out and sees her adversary, but slinks out of the race where that immortal garland is to "be run for, not without dust and heat.
Page 251 - 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.
Page 108 - I found myself a man encompassed with infirmities ; the parting with my wife and poor children hath often been to me in this place as the pulling the flesh from the bones, and that not only because I am somewhat too fond of these great mercies, but also because I should have often brought to my mind the many hardships, miseries, and wants that my poor family was like to meet with, should I be taken from them, especially my poor blind child, who lay nearer my heart than all beside. Oh ! the thoughts...
Page 35 - Justice in defence of beleaguered truth, than there be pens and heads there, sitting by their studious lamps, musing, searching, revolving new notions and ideas wherewith to present, as with their homage and their fealty, the approaching Reformation : others as fast reading, trying all things, assenting to the force of reason and convincemcnt.

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