The Critical and Miscellaneous Prose Works of John Dryden, Now First Collected ...

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H. Baldwin and Son, 1800

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Page xviii - They have not the formality of a settled style, in which the first half of the sentence betrays the other. The clauses are never balanced, nor the periods modelled; every word seems to drop by chance, though it falls into its proper place. Nothing is cold or languid ; the whole is airy, animated, and vigorous : what is little is gay; what is great is splendid.
Page x - To judge rightly of an author, we must transport ourselves to his time, and examine what were the wants of his contemporaries, and what were his means of supplying; them.
Page 283 - This is troublesome, and no way beneficial; but I could not deny the Stewards of the Feast, who came in a body to me to desire that kindness, one of them being Mr. Bridgeman, whose parents are your mother's friends.
Page viii - Whoever wishes to attain an English style, familiar but not coarse, and elegant but not ostentatious, must give his days and nights to the volumes of Addison...
Page 177 - Either in the Customs, or the Appeals of the Excise, or some other way, means cannot be wanting, if you please to have the will. 'Tis enough for one age to have neglected Mr. Cowley, and starved Mr. Butler ; but neither of them had the happiness to live till your Lordship's ministry.
Page 390 - He sought the storms ; but for a calm unfit, Would steer too nigh the sands, to boast his wit Great wits are sure to madness near allied, And thin partitions do their bounds divide; Else, why should he, with wealth and honour blest, Refuse his age the needful hours of rest?
Page 143 - With public zeal to cancel private crimes. How safe is treason and how sacred ill, Where none can sin against the people's will, "Where crowds can wink and no offence be known, Since in another's guilt they find their own ! Yet fame deserved no enemy can grudge ; The statesman we abhor, but praise the judge.
Page 132 - I have sent you herewith a libel, in which my own share is not the least. The king having perused it, is no way dissatisfied with his. The author is apparently Mr Dr[yden], his patron, Lord M[ulgrave,] having a panegyric in the midst.
Page 255 - At last divine Cecilia came, Inventress of the vocal frame; The sweet enthusiast from her sacred store Enlarged the former narrow bounds, And added length to solemn sounds, With Nature's mother-wit and arts unknown before. Let old Timotheus yield the prize, Or both divide the crown : He...
Page 195 - The Hind and the Panther transversed to the story of the Country Mouse and the City Mouse,' printed in 1687, in 4to, in answer to Dryden's ' Hind and Panther,

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