A System of Rhetoric

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A. S. Barnes & Company, 1884 - 673 pages
 

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Page 270 - Sink or swim, live or die, survive or perish, I give my hand, and my heart, to this vote.
Page 471 - The Puritan hated bearbaiting, not because it gave pain to the bear, but because it gave pleasure to the spectators.
Page 246 - And what is so rare as a day in June ? Then, if ever, come perfect days; Then Heaven tries the earth if it be in tune, And over it softly her warm ear lays : Whether we look, or whether we listen, We hear life murmur, or see it glisten ; Every clod feels a stir of might. An instinct within it that reaches and towers, And, groping blindly above it for light, Climbs to a soul in grass and flowers...
Page 136 - We see in needle-works and embroideries, it is more pleasing to have a lively work upon a sad and solemn ground, than to have a dark and melancholy work upon a lightsome ground : judge therefore of the pleasure of the heart by the pleasure of the eye. Certainly virtue is like precious odours, most fragrant when they are incensed or crushed: for Prosperity doth best discover vice, but Adversity doth best discover virtue.
Page 79 - Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you make of me. You would play upon me ; you would seem to know my stops ; you would pluck out the heart of my mystery ; you would sound me from my lowest note to the top of my compass : and there is much music, excellent voice, in this little organ ; yet cannot you make it speak. 'Sblood, do you think I am easier to be played on than a pipe ? Call me what instrument you will, though you can fret me, you cannot play upon me.
Page 216 - Many of the greatest men that ever lived have written biography. Boswell was one of the smallest men that ever lived, and he has beaten them all.
Page 592 - The use of this feigned history hath been to give some shadow of satisfaction to the mind of man in those points wherein the nature of things doth deny it, the world being in proportion inferior to the soul ; by reason whereof there is, agreeable to the spirit of man, a more ample greatness, a more exact goodness, and a more absolute variety, than can be found in the nature of things.
Page 85 - In the midst of this sublime and terrible storm, Dame Partington, who lived upon the beach, was seen at the door of her house with mop and pattens, trundling her mop, squeezing out the sea-water, and vigorously pushing away the Atlantic Ocean. The Atlantic was roused. Mrs Partington's spirit was up ; but I need not tell you that the contest was unequal. The Atlantic Ocean beat Mrs Partington. She was excellent at a slop or a puddle, but she should not have meddled with a tempest.
Page 592 - For he doth not only show the way, but giveth so sweet a prospect into the way as will entice any man to enter into it; nay, he doth, as if your journey should lie through a » fair vineyard, at the very first give you a cluster of grapes, that full of that taste you may long to pass further.
Page 218 - But these men attained literary eminence in spite of their weaknesses. Boswell attained it by reason of his weaknesses. If he had not been a great fool, he would never have been a great writer.

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