Lectures on Greek Prose Composition: With Exercises

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Rivingtons, 1889 - 170 pages

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Page 99 - All this, I know well enough, will sound wild and chimerical to the profane herd of those vulgar and mechanical politicians who have no place among us ; a sort of people who think that nothing exists but what is gross and material ; and who, therefore, far from being qualified to be directors of the great movement of empire, are not fit to turn a wheel in the machine.
Page 101 - Magnanimity in politics is not seldom the truest wisdom, and a great empire and little minds go ill together.
Page 131 - Three kings protested to me that, in their whole reigns, they never did once prefer any person of merit, unless by mistake or treachery of some minister in whom they confided ; neither would they do it if they were to live again ; and they showed, with great strength of reason, that the royal throne could not be supported without corruption, because that positive, confident, restive temper which virtue infused into a man was a perpetual clog to public business.
Page 103 - We ought to elevate our minds to the greatness of that trust to which the order of Providence has called us. By adverting to the dignity of this high calling, our ancestors have turned a savage wilderness into a glorious empire ; and have made the most extensive and the only honourable conquests, not by destroying, but by promoting, the wealth, the number, the happiness of the human race.
Page 91 - I might almost say of despair, for the light and sunshine of my house had been extinguished. All that was left on earth of my young wife, except the memory of a sainted life and of a too brief happiness, was lying still and cold in the chamber above us.
Page 92 - There are thousands of houses in England at this moment where wives, mothers, and children are dying of hunger. Now/ he said, ' when the first paroxysm of your grief is past, I would advise you to come with me and we will never rest till the Corn Law is repealed.
Page 99 - ... have no place among us ; a sort of people who think that nothing exists but what is gross and material ; and who, therefore, far from being qualified to be directors of the great movement of empire, are not fit to turn a wheel in the machine. But to men truly initiated and rightly taught, these ruling and master principles which, in the opinion of such men as I have mentioned, have no substantial existence, are in truth everything, and all in all.
Page 167 - But being very desirous to get out of this world of magic, which had almost turned my brain, I left the temple, and crossed over the fields that lay about it with all the speed I could make. I was not gone far before I heard the sound of trumpets and alarms, which seemed to proclaim the march of an enemy ; and, as I afterwards found, was in reality what I apprehended it. There appeared at a great distance a very shining light, and in the midst of it a person of a most beautiful aspect ; her name...
Page 99 - ... conquests, not by destroying, but by promoting the wealth, the number, the happiness of the human race. Let us get an American revenue as we have got an American empire. English privileges have made it all that it is; English privileges alone will make it all it can be.
Page 95 - The wicked industry of some libellers, joined to the intrigues of a few disappointed politicians, have, in their opinion, been able to produce this unnatural ferment in the nation. " Nothing, indeed, can be more unnatural than the present convulsions of this country, if the above account be a true one. I confess I shall assent to it with great reluctance, and only on the compulsion of the clearest and firmest proofs ; because their account resolves itself into this short but discouraging proposition...

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