Papers on Literature and Art, Parts 1-2

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Wiley and Putnam, 1846
 

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Page 71 - What thou art we know not: What is most like thee ? From rainbow clouds there flow not Drops so bright to see, As from thy presence showers a rain of melody. Like a poet hidden In the light of thought, Singing hymns unbidden, Till the world is wrought To sympathy with hopes and fears it heeded not...
Page 72 - Teach us, sprite or bird, What sweet thoughts are thine: I have never heard Praise of love or wine That panted forth a flood of rapture so divine.
Page 37 - 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 40 - In speech (which I have not) to make your will Quite clear to such an one, and say, "Just this "Or that in you disgusts me; here you miss, "Or there exceed the mark...
Page 87 - A grief without a pang, void, dark, and drear, A stifled, drowsy, unimpassioned grief, Which finds no natural outlet, no relief, In word, or sigh, or tear O Lady!
Page 74 - Round whose rude shaft dark ivy-tresses grew Yet dripping with the forest's noonday dew, Vibrated, as the ever-beating heart Shook the weak hand that grasped it; of that crew He came the last, neglected and apart; A herd-abandoned deer struck by the hunter's dart.
Page 74 - A love in desolation masked— a Power Girt round with weakness — it can scarce uplift The weight of the superincumbent hour ; It is a dying lamp, a falling shower, A breaking billow ; — even whilst we speak Is it not broken ? On the withering flower The killing sun smiles brightly ; on a cheek The life can burn in blood, even while the heart may break.
Page 157 - Rise the blue Franconian mountains, Nuremberg, the ancient, stands. Quaint old town of toil and traffic, quaint old town of art and song, Memories haunt thy pointed gables, like the rooks that round them throng: Memories of the Middle Ages, when the emperors, rough and bold, Had their dwelling in thy castle, time-defying, centuries old; And thy brave and thrifty burghers boasted, in their uncouth rhyme, That their great imperial city stretched its hand through every clime.
Page 72 - What objects are the fountains Of thy happy strain? What fields or waves or mountains? What shapes of sky or plain? What love of thine own kind? what ignorance of pain? With thy clear keen joyance Languor cannot be; Shadow of annoyance Never came near thee; Thou lovest, but ne'er knew love's sad satiety.
Page 88 - To lift the smothering weight from off my breast? It were a vain endeavour, Though I should gaze for ever On that green light that lingers in the west: I may not hope from outward forms to win The passion and the life, whose fountains are within.

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