A Tale of a Tub: To which is Added The Battle of the Books, and the Mechanical Operation of the SpiritClarendon Press, 1920 - 370 pages |
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Account allegory allowed answer Antient Apology appeared Author Battle Bentley Body Book Bookseller Brothers called certain Church Coats common Compare concerning contains copy Criticks Design Discourse edition England English Essay Father Friend give given hand hath Head History Human intended Invention Italy Jack John kind known late Learning least letter Lives London Lord Martin Matter mean Method MICHIGAN mind Nature never Number observed Occasion Original passage Pate Person Peter Piece Place Point Preface present pretend printed publication published Reader Reason reference Religion says seems sometimes Spirit story Subject Swift taken Tale tell Temple thing Thomas thought tion Tooke Treatise true turn universal volume whole World Wotton writing written
Popular passages
Page 40 - ... seamen have a custom, when they meet a whale, to fling him out an empty tub by way of amusement, to divert him from laying violent hands upon the ship.
Page 230 - Beelzebub, with all his legions, was come to revenge the death of many thousands of his subjects whom his enemy had slain and devoured. However, he at length valiantly resolved to issue forth and meet his fate. Meanwhile the bee had acquitted himself of his toils, and, posted securely at some distance, was employed in cleansing his wings, and disengaging them from the ragged remnants of the cobweb. By this time the spider was adventured out, when, beholding the chasms, the ruins, and dilapidations...
Page 158 - Whether a tincture of malice in our natures makes us fond of furnishing every bright idea with its reverse; or whether reason, reflecting upon the sum of things, can, like the sun, serve only to enlighten one half of the globe, leaving the other half, by necessity, under shade and darkness...
Page 171 - But when a man's fancy gets astride on his reason, when imagination is at cuffs with the senses, and common understanding, as well as common sense, is kickt out of doors; the first proselyte he makes, is himself, and when that is once compassed, the difficulty is not so great in bringing over others; a strong delusion always operating from without, as vigorously as from within.
Page 173 - In the proportion that credulity is a more peaceful possession of the mind than curiosity ; so far preferable is that wisdom, which converses about the surface, to that pretended philosophy, which enters into the depth of things, and then comes gravely back with the informations and discoveries, that in the inside they are good for nothing.
Page 135 - Because memory, being an employment of the mind upon things past, is a faculty for which the learned in our illustrious age have no manner of occasion, who deal entirely with invention, and strike all things out of themselves, or at least by collision from each other...
Page xvii - His Tale of a Tub has little resemblance to his other pieces. It exhibits a vehemence and rapidity of mind, a copiousness of images, and vivacity of diction, such as he afterwards never possessed or never exerted.
Page 165 - The very same principle that influences a bully to break the windows of a whore who has jilted him, naturally stirs up a great prince to raise mighty armies, and dream of nothing but sieges, battles, and victories.
Page 9 - Maevius is as well known as Virgil, and Gildon will be as well known as you, if his name gets into your verses : and as to the difference between good and bad fame, * it is a perfect trifle.
Page 51 - But satire being levelled at all is never resented for an offence by any, since every individual person makes bold to understand it of others, and very wisely removes his particular part of the burden upon the shoulders of the world, which are broad enough and able to bear it.