The Great Conversers: And Other EssaysS.C. Griggs, 1878 - 304 pages Many of the essays in the present volume have been published before, but all of them have been more or less enlarged and retouched, so far as the author's limited time would allow and, with not a few misgivings as to their merit and probable reception, they are now given to the public in a permanent form. The scholar will find nothing new in them, but they may serve to freshen some of his pleasant recollections; and if the general reader, for whom they are chiefly intended, should find in them enough of interest to cheat a few hours of their ennid or weariness, the writer will not deem his labor wasted It remains only to add, that m writing the essay on the Battle of Waterloo, the author has taken pains to consult many of the best authorities,- among the ablest and most impartial of whom is Lt. Col. Charles C. Chesney, R. E., author of "Waterloo Lectures; a Study of the Campaign of 1815;" and that the map at the end of the present volume is a reduced copy of one attached to that work. |
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Page 96 - 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 258 - WHEN we two parted . In silence and tears, Half broken-hearted, To sever for years, Pale grew thy cheek and cold, Colder thy kiss ; Truly that hour foretold Sorrow to this. The dew of the morning Sunk chill on my brow — It felt like the warning Of what I feel now. Thy vows are all broken, And light is thy fame ; I hear thy name spoken, And share in its shame. They name thee before me, A knell...
Page 20 - What things have we seen Done at the Mermaid! Heard words that have been So nimble and so full of subtle flame As if that every one from whence they came Had meant to put his whole wit in a jest, And had resolved to live a fool the rest Of his dull life.
Page 24 - No man ever spake more neatly, more pressly, more weightily, or suffered less emptiness, less idleness, in what he uttered. No member of his speech but consisted of his own graces. His hearers could not cough or look aside from him without loss. He commanded where he spoke, and had his judges angry and pleased at his devotion.
Page 32 - He always made the best pun and the best remark in the course of the evening. His serious conversation, like his serious writing, is his best. No one ever stammered out such fine, piquant, deep eloquent things in half a dozen half-sentences as he does. His jests scald like tears, and he probes a question with a play upon words.
Page 12 - Addison was the most timorous and awkward man that he ever saw." And Addison, speaking of his own deficience in conversation, used to say of himself, that, with respect to intellectual "wealth, he could draw bills for a thousand pounds, though he had not a guinea in his pocket.
Page 158 - These are deep questions, where great names militate against each other ; where reason is perplexed ; and an appeal to authorities only thickens the confusion. For high and reverend authorities lift up their heads on both sides ; and there is no sure footing in the middle. This point is the great Serbonian bog, Betwixt Damiata and Mount Casius old, Where armies whole have sunk.
Page 4 - THERE are a hundred faults in this thing, and a hundred things might be said to prove them beauties. But it is needless. A book may be amusing with numerous errors, or it may be very dull without a single absurdity.
Page 40 - He sings rather than talks. He pours upon you a kind of satirical, heroical, critical poem, with regular cadences, and generally catching up near the beginning some singular epithet, which serves as a refrain when his song is full, or with which as with a knitting-needle he catches up the stitches if he has chanced now and then to let fall a row.
Page 66 - Ward has no heart, they say; but I deny it ; He has a heart, and gets his speeches by it.