Life in Poetry: Law in Taste: Two Series of Lectures Delivered in Oxford, 1895-1900 |
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Page 24
... stage of culture , a stage the positive results of which we must not make of too much importance , but which is nevertheless indis- pensable ; for it brings us on to the platform , where alone the best and highest intellectual work can ...
... stage of culture , a stage the positive results of which we must not make of too much importance , but which is nevertheless indis- pensable ; for it brings us on to the platform , where alone the best and highest intellectual work can ...
Page 37
... stage in the history of society , perhaps after creative energy has ceased , comes the critic , and traces the idea back- ward as far as he can through the artist's mind , always stopping short , however , of the real sources of life ...
... stage in the history of society , perhaps after creative energy has ceased , comes the critic , and traces the idea back- ward as far as he can through the artist's mind , always stopping short , however , of the real sources of life ...
Page 83
... stages of society it is used for two reasons , first because , as writing has not been invented , it is the only way of preserving memorable thoughts , and secondly because in primitive times what may be called the poetical or ideal ...
... stages of society it is used for two reasons , first because , as writing has not been invented , it is the only way of preserving memorable thoughts , and secondly because in primitive times what may be called the poetical or ideal ...
Page 84
... stages can dispense with the poet and the art of metrical composition . The deepest life of society is spiritual , ideal , incapable of analysis . What binds men to each other is the memory of a common origin , the prospects of a common ...
... stages can dispense with the poet and the art of metrical composition . The deepest life of society is spiritual , ideal , incapable of analysis . What binds men to each other is the memory of a common origin , the prospects of a common ...
Page 91
... stage of senility in the sounding emptiness of Erasmus Darwin . Now , this law of progress and decline , which is common to all the fine arts , may , I think , be formulated as follows . In the infancy of poetry or painting the ...
... stage of senility in the sounding emptiness of Erasmus Darwin . Now , this law of progress and decline , which is common to all the fine arts , may , I think , be formulated as follows . In the infancy of poetry or painting the ...
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Common terms and phrases
action æsthetic Apollonius Rhodius Aristotle Aristotle's art of poetry artist audience authority beautiful Ben Jonson Byron cæsura Canterbury Tales century characteristic Chaucer civilisation classical composition criticism Dante Divine Comedy drama dramatist element England English poetry epic epic poetry Euripides example expression external feel feudal France French French poetry genius German Greek harmony Hence Homer Horace human idea of Nature ideal Iliad imagination imitation individual inspiration instinct judge judgment kind language law of taste lecture liberty lyric Matthew Arnold metre metrical Milton mind modern Molière moral movement observe opinion painting Paradise Lost passion perception philosophy pleasure poem poet poet's poetical decadence political Pope Pope's practice Preraphaelite principle produce prose reasoning recognised reflection representative Roman satiric Saxon says self-consciousness sense Shakespeare social society Sophocles soul speak sphere spirit standard style tendency things thought tion tragedy truth unity universal idea verse whole words
Popular passages
Page 407 - Perplext in faith, but pure in deeds, At last he beat his music out. — • There lives more faith in honest doubt, Believe me, than in half the creeds.
Page 353 - Purples the east: still govern thou my song, Urania, and fit audience find, though few. But drive far off the barbarous dissonance Of Bacchus and his revellers, the race Of that wild rout that tore the Thracian bard In Rhodope, where woods and rocks had ears To rapture, till the savage clamour drown'd Both harp and voice; nor could the muse defend Her son.
Page 401 - I live not in myself, but I become Portion of that around me; and to me, High mountains are a feeling, but the hum Of human cities torture...
Page 360 - First follow Nature, and your judgment frame By her just standard, which is still the same: Unerring Nature, still divinely bright, One clear, unchanged, and universal light, Life, force, and beauty, must to all impart, At once the source, and end, and test of Art. Art from that fund each just supply provides; Works without show, and without pomp presides: In some fair body thus th...
Page 54 - Like Cato, give his little senate laws, And sit attentive to his own applause ; 210 While wits and templars every sentence raise, And wonder with a foolish face of praise — Who but must laugh, if such a man there be ? Who would not weep, if Atticus were he...
Page 70 - Haec ubi dicta dedit, lacrimantem et multa volentem 790 dicere deseruit, tenuesque recessit in auras. Ter conatus ibi collo dare bracchia circum ; ter frustra comprensa manus effugit imago, par levibus ventis volucrique simillima somno.
Page 210 - And when the evening mist clothes the riverside with poetry, as with a veil, and the poor buildings lose themselves in the dim sky, and the tall chimneys become campanili, and the warehouses are palaces in the night, and the whole city hangs in the heavens, and fairy-land is before us...
Page 383 - Whose honours with increase of ages grow, As streams roll down, enlarging as they flow; Nations unborn your mighty names shall sound, And worlds applaud that must not yet be found!
Page 401 - Are not the mountains, waves, and skies, a part Of me and of my soul, as I of them ? Is not the love of these deep in my heart With a pure passion?
Page 405 - Cursed be the social wants that sin against the strength of youth! Cursed be the social lies that warp us from the living truth! Cursed be the sickly forms that err from honest Nature's rule! Cursed be the gold that gilds the straiten'd forehead of the fool!