Playwrights From England

"Who worships Cupid doth adore a boy; Boys' earnest are at first in their delight, But for a new soon leave their dearest toy, And out of mind as soon as out of sight;"

"If Nature did not take delight in blood, She would have made more easy ways to good. We that are bound by vows and by promotion, With pomp of holy sacrifice and rites, To teach belief in good and still devotion, To preach of heaven's wonders and delights — Yet, when each of us in his own heart looks, He finds the God there far unlike his books."

"Oh wearisome Condition of Humanity! Born under one law, to another bound: Vainly begot and yet forbidden vanity, Created sick, commanded to be sound: What meaneth Nature by these diverse laws? Passion and reason, self-division cause. Is it the mark, or Majesty of Power To make offences that it may forgive?"

"Her neck is like a stately tower, Where Love himself imprison'd lies"

"Heigh, ho, fair Rosalynde!"

"With orient pearl, with ruby red, With marble white, with sapphire blue, Her body every way is fed, Yet soft in touch, and sweet in view:"

"What a dark world—who knows?— Ours to inhabit is! One touch and what a strange Glory might burst on us, What a hid universe!"

"Hard-hearted minds relent and rigor's tears abound, And envy strangely rues his end, in whom no fault was found. Knowledge her light hath lost, valor hath slain her knight, Sidney is dead, dead is my friend, dead is the world's delight."

"Now rime, the son of rage, which art no kin to skill, And endless grief, which deads my life, yet knows not how to kill, Go seek that hapless tomb, which if ye hap to find, Salute the stones that keep the bones that held so good a mind."

"How full and rich a world Theirs to inhabit is— Sweet scent of grass and bloom, Playmates’ glad symphony, Cool touch of western wind, Sunshine’s divine caress. How should they know or feel They are in darkness? But, oh, the miracle! If a Redeemer came, Laid finger on their eyes— One touch and what a world, New-born in loveliness!"

"The past is our cradle, not our prison, and there is danger as well as appeal in its glamour. The past is for inspiration, not imitation, for continuation, not repetition."

"An Edward's England spat us out - a band Foredoomed to redden Vistula or Rhine, And leaf-like toss with every wind malign. All mocked the faith they could not understand."

"Scratch the Christian and you find the pagan — spoiled."

"No Jew was ever fool enough to turn Christian unless he was a clever man."

"No... the real American has not yet arrived. He is only in the Crucible, I tell you—he will be the fusion of all races, perhaps the coming superman."

"America is God's Crucible, the great Melting-Pot where all the races of Europe are melting and re-forming!"

"Oh, for the simple life, For tents and starry skies!"

"How many times do I love thee, dear? Tell me how many thoughts there be In the atmosphere Of a new-fall’n year, Whose white and sable hours appear The latest flake of Eternity: So many times do I love thee, dear.How many times do I love again? Tell me how many beads there are In a silver chain Of evening rain, Unravell’d from the tumbling main, And threading the eye of a yellow star: So many times do I love again."

"The swallow leaves her nest, The soul my weary breast; But therefore let the rain On my grave Fall pure; for why complain? Since both will come again O’er the wave.The wind dead leaves and snow Doth hurry to and fro; And, once, a day shall break O’er the wave, When a storm of ghosts shall shake The dead, until they wake In the grave."

"A ghost, that loved a lady fair, Ever in the starry air Of midnight at her pillow stood; And, with a sweetness skies above The luring words of human love, Her soul the phantom wooed. Sweet and sweet is their poisoned note, The little snakes of silver throat, In mossy skulls that nest and lie, Ever singing, “Die, oh! die.”Young soul put off your flesh, and come With me into the quiet tomb, Our bed is lovely, dark and sweet; The earth will swing us, as she goes, Beneath our coverlid of snows, And the warm leaden sheet. Dear and dear is their poisoned note, The little snakes of silver throat, In mossy skulls that nest and lie, Ever singing, “Die, oh! die.”"

"If there were dreams to sell, What would you buy? Some cost a passing bell; Some a light sigh, That shakes from Life’s fresh crown Only a rose-leaf down. If there were dreams to sell, Merry and sad to tell, And the crier rang the bell, What would you buy?A cottage lone and still, With bowers nigh, Shadowy, my woes to still, Until I die. Such pearl from Life’s fresh crown Fain would I shake me down. Were dreams to have at will, This would best heal my ill, This would I buy."

"A cypress-bough, and a rose-wreath sweet, A wedding-robe, and a winding-sheet, A bridal bed and a bier. Thine be the kisses, maid, And smiling Love’s alarms; And thou, pale youth, be laid In the grave’s cold arms. Each in his own charms, Death and Hymen both are here; So up with scythe and torch, And to the old church porch, While all the bells ring clear: And rosy, rosy the bed shall bloom, And earthy, earthy heap up the tomb."

"Shivering in fever, weak, and parched to sand, My ears, those entrances of word-dressed thoughts, My pictured eyes, and my assuring touch, Fell from me, and my body turned me forth From its beloved abode: then I was dead; And in my grave beside my corpse I sat, In vain attempting to return: meantime There came the untimely spectres of two babes, And played in my abandoned body’s ruins; They went away; and, one by one, by snakes My limbs were swallowed; and, at last, I sat With only one, blue-eyed, curled round my ribs, Eating the last remainder of my heart, And hissing to himself. O sleep, thou fiend! Thou blackness of the night! how sad and frightful Are these thy dreams!"

"I’ll take that fainting rose Out of his breast; perhaps some sigh of his Lives in the gyre of its kiss-coloured leaves. O pretty rose, hast thou thy flowery passions? Then put thyself into a scented rage, And breathe on me some poisonous revenge. For it was I, thou languid, silken blush, Who orphaned thy green family of thee, In their closed infancy: therefore receive My life, and spread it on thy shrunken petals, And give to me thy pink, reclining death."

"Hard by the lilied Nile I saw A duskish river-dragon stretched along, The brown habergeon of his limbs enamelled With sanguine almandines and rainy pearl: And on his back there lay a young one sleeping No bigger than a mouse; with eyes like beads, And a small fragment of its speckled egg Remaining on its harmless, pulpy snout; A thing to laugh at, as it gaped to catch The baulking, merry flies. In the iron jaws Of the great devil-beast, like a pale soul Fluttering in rocky hell, lightsomely flew A snowy troculus, with roseate beak Tearing the hairy leeches from his throat."

"Is it not sweet to die? for, what is death, But sighing that we ne’er may sigh again, Getting a length beyond our tedious selves; But trampling the last tear from poisonous sorrow, Spilling our woes, crushing our frozen hopes, And passing like an incense out of man? Then, if the body felt, what were its sense, Turning to daisies gently in the grave, If not the soul’s most delicate delight When it does filtrate, through the pores of thought, In love and the enamelled flowers of song?"

"Why, Rome was naked once, a bastard smudge, Tumbled on straw, the denfellow of whelps, Fattened on roots, and, when a-thirst for milk, He crept beneath and drank the swagging udder Of Tyber’s brave she-wolf; and Heaven’s Judea Was folded in a pannier."

"A lake Is a river curled and asleep like a snake."

"To sea, to sea! The calm is o’er; The wanton water leaps in sport, And rattles down the pebbly shore; The dolphin wheels, the sea-cows snort, And unseen Mermaids’ pearly song Comes bubbling up, the weeds among. Fling broad the sail, dip deep the oar: To sea, to sea! the calm is o’er.To sea, to sea! our wide-wing’d bark Shall billowy cleave its sunny way, And with its shadow, fleet and dark, Break the caved Tritons’ azure day, Like mighty eagle soaring light O’er antelopes on Alpine height. The anchor heaves, the ship swings free, The sails swell full. To sea, to sea!"

"Johnson says, most judiciously, that the grand merit [of Cecilia] is in the general Power of the whole."

"It is clear enough, however, that the work of Miss Burney, the mother of English fiction, was not inspired by any single wish to redress a grievance: the richness of the human scene as Dr Burney's daughter had the chance of observing it provided a sufficient stimulus."

"It's writ by somebody that knows the top and the bottom, the highest and lowest of mankind—It's very good language, and there's an infinite deal of fun in it."

"Unused to the situations in which I find myself, and embarrassed by the slightest difficulties, I seldom, till too late, discover how I ought to act."

"Madame D'Arblay is, on the contrary, quite of the old school, a mere common observer of manners, and also a very woman. It is this last circumstance which forms the peculiarity of her writings, and distinguishes them from those masterpieces which I have before mentioned. She is a quick, lively, and accurate observer of persons and things; but she always looks at them with a consciousness of her sex, and in that point of view in which it is the particular business and interest of women to observe them. There is little in her works of passion or character, or even manners, in the most extended sense of the word, as implying the sum-total of our habits and pursuits; her forte is in describing the absurdities and affectations of external behaviour, or the manners of people in company. Her characters, which are ingenious caricatures, are, no doubt, distinctly marked, and well kept up; but they are slightly shaded, and exceedingly uniform. Her heroes and heroines, almost all of them, depend on the stock of a single phrase or sentiment, and have certain mottoes or devices by which they may always be known. They form such characters as people might be supposed to assume for a night at a masquerade. She presents, not the whole-length figure, nor even the face, but some prominent feature."

"To despise riches may, indeed, be philosophic; but to dispense them worthily must, surely, be more beneficial to mankind."

"Remember, my dear Evelina, nothing is so delicate as the reputation of a woman; it is at once the most beautiful and most brittle of all human things."

"Henry Fielding, too, would have been afraid of her: there is nothing so delicately finished in all of Harry Fieldings works as Evelina."

"Tired, ashamed, and mortified, I begged to sit down till we returned home, which I did soon after. Lord Orville did me the honour to hand me to the coach, talking all the way of the honour I had done him! O these fashionable people!"

"'No, Madam,' cried I, '—only—only I did not know that gentleman,—and so,—and so I thought—I intended—I—' Overpowered by all that had passed, I had not strength to make my mortifying explanation; — my spirits quite failed me, and I burst into tears."

"he said, 'Madam—may I presume?'—and stopped, offering to take my hand. I...could scarce forbear laughing. 'Allow me, Madam,' continuing he, affectedly breaking off every half moment, 'the honour and happiness...the happiness and honor...'"

"I looked about for some of my acquaintance, but in vain, for I saw not one person that I knew, which is very odd, for all the world seemed there."

"Doctor Johnson returned home last night full of the praises of the book [Evelina] I had lent him; protesting there were passages in it that might do honour to Richardson. We talk of it for ever; and he, Doctor Johnson, feels ardent after the denouement. He could not get rid of the Rogue! he said. I then lent him the second volume, which he instantly read; and he is, even now, busy with the third... Sir Joshua Reynolds had been fed while reading the little work, from refusing to quit it at table! and that Edmund Burke had sat up a whole night to finish it!!!"

"A private ball this was called...but Lord! my dear Sir, I believe I saw half the world!"

"I am too inexperienced and ignorant to conduct myself with propriety in this town, where every thing is new to me, and many things are unaccountable and perplexing."

"When once—which every body must be—you are convinced of the wickedness and deceit of men, it is impossible to preserve untainted your own innocence of heart. Experience will prove the depravity of mankind, and the conviction of it only serves to create distrust, suspicion—caution—and sometimes causelessly."

"Money is the source of the greatest vice, & that Nation which is most rich, is most wicked."

"Look at your [English] ladies of quality—are they not forever parting with their husbands—forfeiting their reputations—and is their life aught but dissipation? In common genteel life, indeed, you may now and then meet with very fine girls—who have politeness, sense and conversation—but these are few—and then look at your trademen's daughters—what are they?—poor creatures indeed! all pertness, imitation and folly."

"Old Adam, the carrion crow, The old crow of Cairo; He sat in the shower, and let it flow Under his tail and over his crest; And through every feather Leak’d the wet weather; And the bough swung under his nest; For his beak it was heavy with marrow. Is that the wind dying? O no; It’s only two devils, that blow Through a murderer’s bones, to and fro, In the ghosts’ moonshine.Ho! Eve, my grey carrion wife, When we have supped on kings’ marrow, Where shall we drink and make merry our life? Our nest it is queen Cleopatra’s skull, ’Tis cloven and crack’d, And batter’d and hack’d, But with tears of blue eyes it is full: Let us drink then, my raven of Cairo! Is that the wind dying? O no; It’s only two devils, that blow Through a murderer’s bones, to and fro, In the ghosts’ moonshine."

"A youthful mind is seldom totally free from ambition; to curb that, is the first step to contentment, since to diminish expectation is to increase enjoyment."

"To have some account of my thoughts, manners, acquaintance and actions, when the hour arrives in which time is more nimble than memory, is the reason which induces me to keep a journal: a journal in which I must confess my every thought, must open my whole heart!"