First Essays on Literature

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W. Collins sons & Company Limited, 1923 - 267 páginas

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Página 248 - Out of the night that covers me, Black as the Pit from pole to pole, I thank whatever gods may be For my unconquerable soul.
Página 240 - Those that I fight I do not hate, Those that I guard I do not love ; My country is Kiltartan Cross, My countrymen Kiltartan 's poor, No likely end could bring them loss Or leave them happier than before. Nor law, nor duty bade me fight, Nor public men, nor cheering crowds, A lonely impulse of delight...
Página 223 - Emily, A ship is floating in the harbour now ; A wind is hovering o'er the mountain's brow ; There is a path on the sea's azure floor, — No keel has ever ploughed that path before ; The halcyons brood around the foamless isles ; The treacherous ocean has forsworn its wiles ; The merry mariners are bold and free : Say, my heart's sister, wilt thou sail with me...
Página 236 - May there not be superior beings amused with any graceful, though instinctive attitude my mind may fall into, as I am entertained with the alertness of a Stoat or the anxiety of a Deer?
Página 68 - Come to me in the silence of the night; Come in the speaking silence of a dream; Come with soft rounded cheeks and eyes as bright As sunlight on a stream; Come back in tears, O memory, hope, love of finished years. O dream how sweet, too sweet, too bitter sweet, Whose wakening should have been in Paradise, Where souls brim-full of love abide and meet; Where thirsting longing eyes...
Página 235 - There is but one thing to prevent me. I know nothing — I have read nothing — and I mean to follow Solomon's directions, " Get learning — get understanding." I find earlier days are gone by — I find that I can have no enjoyment in the world but continual drinking of knowledge. I find there is no worthy pursuit but the idea of doing some good to the world.
Página 223 - I cannot tell my joy, when o'er a lake Upon a drooping bough with nightshade twined, I saw two azure halcyons clinging downward And thinning one bright bunch of amber berries, With quick long beaks, and in the deep there lay Those lovely forms imaged as in a sky; So with my thoughts full of these happy changes.
Página 76 - For he suddenly smote on the door, even Louder, and lifted his head: "Tell them I came, and no one answered That I kept my word," he said. Never the least stir made the listeners, Though every word he spake Fell echoing through the shadowiness of the still house From the one man left awake: Ay, they heard his foot upon the stirrup, And the sound of iron on stone, And how the silence surged softly backward, When the plunging hoofs were gone.
Página 81 - twixt the sleep and wake of Helen's dream, Silence wherein to sing love's requiem? No, no. Nor earth, nor air, nor fire, nor deep Could lull poor mortal longingness asleep. Somewhere there Nothing is; and there lost Man Shall win what changeless vague of peace he can.
Página 84 - ... things Thy hand hath made : The smooth-plumed bird In its emerald shade, The seed of the grass, The speck of stone Which the wayfaring ant Stirs — and hastes on ! Though I should sit By some tarn in thy hills Using its ink As the spirit wills To write of Earth's wonders, Its live, willed things, Flit would the ages On soundless wings Ere unto Z My pen drew nigh ; Leviathan told, And the honey-fly : And still would remain My wit to try — My worn reeds broken, The dark tarn dry, All words forgotten...

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