Imagini ale paginilor
PDF
ePub

NIGHTINGALE NOBILITY—OATHS.

239

NIGHTINGALE.

The melancholy Philomel

Thus perch'd all night alone in shady groves,
Tunes her soft voice to sad complaints of love,
Making her life one great harmonious woe.

Southern's Disappointment.

NOBILITY.

Whoe'er amidst the sons

Of reason, valour, liberty, and virtue,

Displays distinguish'd merit, is a noble

Of nature's own creating. Such have risen,

Sprung from the dust; or where had been our honors ?

Thomson's Coriolanus, a. 3, s. 3.

Look round

Among the titled great ones of the world,

Do they not spring from some proud monarch's flat

terer,

Some favorite mistress, or ambitious minister,

The ruin of his country, while their blood

Rolls down thro' many a fool, thro' many a villain, To its now proud possessors ?

Frances's Eugenia.

O.

OATHS.

An oath is a recognizance to Heaven,
Binding us over in the courts above

To plead to the indictment of our crimes,

That those who 'scape this world should suffer there.

Southern's Oroonoko.

:

240 OATHS OBEDIENCE-OMENS OPINIONS.

Nay, but weigh well what you presume to swear! Oaths are of dreadful weight-and, if they are false, Draw down damnation.

Savage's Sir Thomas Overbury.

OBEDIENCE.

Son of Heav'n and Earth,

Attend that thou art happy, owe to God;
That thou continuest such, owe to thyself,
That is, to thy obedience; therein stand.

Milton's Paradise Lost, b. 5.

OMENS.

I know not how it is;

But a foreboding presses on my heart,
At times, until I sicken.-I have heard,
And from men learned, that before the touch
(The common, coarser touch) of good, or ill,-
That oftentimes a subtler sense informs

Some spirits of the approach of things to be."
Proctor's Mirandola, a. 1, s. 1.

'Tis credible on record that great men

Have awful warnings-that their souls, sublimed
From all mean matter, have held communion

With disembodied beings-Brutus met

Dead Cæsar at Philippi.

OPINION.

Sir A. Hunt's Julian.

We all, my lords, have err'd.

Men may, I find, be honest, tho' they differ.

Thomson's Tancred and Sigismunda, a. 2, s. 4.

For still the world prevail'd, and its dread laugh,
Which scarce the firm philosopher can scorn.

Thomson's Seasons—Autumn.

OPPORTUNITY-PAIN-PARTING,

OPPORTUNITY,

The old Scythians

Painted blind Fortune's powerful hands with wings,
To show her gift comes swift and suddenly,
Which if her fav'rite be not swift to take,

241

He loses them for ever. Chapman's Bussy D'Ambois. Accurs'd opportunity!

The midwife and the bawd to all our vices :

That work'st our thoughts into desires: desires
To resolutions and these being ripe and quicken'd,
Thou giv'st 'em birth, and bring'st 'em forth to action.
· Denham's Sophy

P.

PAIN.

Sense of pleasure we may well

Spare out of life perhaps, and not repine,
But live content, which is the calmest life:
But pain is perfect misery, the worst

Of evils, and excessive, overturns

All patience.

Milton's Paradise Lost, b. 6.

PARTING.

In taking leave,

Thro' the dark lashes of her darting eyes,
Methought she shot her soul at ev'ry glance,
Still looking back, as if she had a mind,

That you

should know she left her soul behind her. Lee's Theodosius.

My eyes wont lose the sight of thee,

But languish after thine, and ache with gazing.

Otway's Venice Preserved.

M

I part with thee

As wretches that are doubtful of hereafter,

Part with their lives, unwilling, loth and fearful,

And trembling, at futurity.

Rowe's Tamerlane,

Oh! wherefore dost thou sooth me with thy softness? Why dost thou wind thyself about my heart,

And make this separation painful to us?

Rowe's Lady Jane Grey, a. 5, s. 1.

Oh, had he ever lov'd, he would have thought
The worst of tortures bliss, to silent parting.

Cibber's Casar in Egypt.

Have not all past human beings parted, And must not all the present one day part?

Byron's Sardanapalus, a. 4, s. 1.

Let's not unman each other-part at once :
All farewells should be sudden, when for ever,
Else they make an eternity of moments,
And clog the last sad sands of life with tears.

PASSIONS.

Ibid. a. 5, s. 1,

Our passions always fatal counsels give,
Thro' a fallacious glass our wrongs appear,

Still greater than they are.

Higgon's Generous Conqueror.

When head-strong passion gets the reins of reason,
The force of nature, like too strong a gale,
For want of ballast, oversets the vessel.

Ibid.

While passions glow, the heart, like heated steel,
Takes each impression, and is worked at pleasure.
Young's Busiris, a. 4.

When reason, like the skilful charioteer,
Can break the fiery passions to the bit,

And, spite of their licentious sallies, keep
The radiant tract of glory; passions, then,
Are aids and ornaments. Triumphant reason,
Firm in her seat, and swift in her career,
Enjoys their violence, and, smiling, thanks
Their formidable flame, for high renown.

Young's Brothers, a. 3.

How terrible is passion! how our reason
Falls down before it! whilst the tortur'd frame,
Like a ship dash'd by fierce encount'ring tides,
And of her pilot spoil'd, drives round and round,
The sport of wind and wave.

Barford's Virgin Queen.

The worst of slaves is he whom passion rules,
Uncheck'd by reason, and the pow'rful voice

Of friendship.

Brooke's Earl of Warwick.

Exalted souls,

Have passions in proportion violent,

Resistless, and tormenting: they're a tax
Impos'd by nature on pre-eminence;

And fortitude, and wisdom must support them.

Lillo's Elmerick.

But anxious study, discontent, and care,
Love without hope, and hate without revenge,
And fear, and jealousy, fatigue the soul,
Engross the subtle ministers of life,

And spoil the lab'ring functions of their share.
Hence the lean gloom that melancholy wears;
The lover's paleness; and the sallow hue
Of envy, jealousy; the meagre stare
Of sore revenge: the canker'd body hence
Betrays the fretful motion of the mind.

Armstrong's Art of Preserving Health, b. 4.

« ÎnapoiContinuă »