Life of Jonathan Swift

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Wells and Lilly, 1829 - 364 pàgines

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Pàgina 300 - I HAVE been very miserable all night, and to-day extremely deaf and full of pain. I am so stupid and confounded, that I cannot express the mortification I am under both in body and mind. All I can say is, that I am not in torture ; but I daily and hourly expect it. Pray let me know how your health is and your family. I hardly understand one word I write. I am sure my days will be very few ; few and miserable they must be. I am, for those few days, yours entirely, JON. SWIFT. If I do not blunder,...
Pàgina 305 - So soon as that spare Cassius. He reads much ; He is a great observer and he looks Quite through the deeds of men ; he loves no plays, As thou dost, Antony ; he hears no music ; Seldom he smiles, and smiles in such a sort As if he mock'd himself and scorn'd his spirit That could be moved to smile at any thing.
Pàgina 171 - But what success Vanessa met, Is to the world a secret yet. Whether the nymph, to please her swain, Talks in a high romantic strain ; Or whether he at last descends To act with less seraphic ends ; Or to compound the business, whether They temper love and books together ; Must never to mankind be told, Nor shall the conscious Muse unfold.
Pàgina 119 - At my first coming, I thought I should have died with discontent, and was horribly melancholy while they were installing me ; but it begins to wear off, and change to dulness.
Pàgina 329 - That he has in his works no metaphor, as has been said, is not true; but his few metaphors seem to be received rather by necessity than choice.
Pàgina 238 - ... they had not cohabited in that state, in order to put it out of the power of slander to be busy with her fame after death, she adjured him by their friendship to let her have the satisfaction of dying at least, though she had not lived, his acknowledged wife.
Pàgina 328 - 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. It is of a mode so distinct and peculiar, that it must be considered by itself; what is true of that, is not true of any thing else which he has written.
Pàgina 291 - I remember," says he, in that letter, speaking of Swift, "as I and others were taking with him an evening walk, about a mile out of Dublin, he stopped short; we passed on; but perceiving he did not follow us, I went back, and found him fixed as a statue, and earnestly gazing upward at a noble elm, which in its uppermost branches was much withered and decayed. Pointing at it, he said, 'I shall be like that tree, I shall die at top.
Pàgina 16 - Ah, sir, I was mad and violent. It was bitterness which they mistook for frolic. I was miserably poor, and I thought to fight my way by my literature and my wit; so I disregarded all power and all authority.
Pàgina 155 - Oh ! that you may have but so much regard for me left that this complaint may touch your soul with pity. I say as little as ever I can ; did you but know what I thought, I am sure it would move you to forgive me ; and believe I cannot help telling you this and live.

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