A philosophical enquiry [&c.].

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Page 54 - The other shape, If shape it might be call'd, that shape had none Distinguishable in member, joint, or limb, Or substance might be call'd that shadow seem'd, For each seem'd either; black it stood as night, Fierce as ten furies, terrible as hell And shook a dreadful dart; what seem'd his head The likeness of a kingly crown had on.
Page 119 - And ever, against eating cares, Lap me in soft Lydian airs, Married to immortal verse, Such as the meeting soul may pierce, In notes with many a winding bout Of linked sweetness long drawn out With wanton heed and giddy cunning, The melting voice through mazes running, Untwisting all the chains that tie The hidden soul of harmony; That Orpheus...
Page 56 - Less than archangel ruined, and the excess Of glory obscured ; as when the sun, new risen, Looks through the horizontal misty air Shorn of his beams, or from behind the moon, In dim eclipse, disastrous twilight sheds On half the nations, and with fear of change Perplexes monarchs.
Page 58 - In thoughts from the visions of the night, When deep sleep falleth on men, Fear came upon me, and trembling, Which made all my bones to shake. Then a spirit passed before my face; The hair of my flesh stood up : It stood still, but I could not discern the form thereof: An image was before mine eyes, There was silence, and I heard a voice, saying, Shall mortal man be more just than God?
Page 52 - And to things of great dimensions, if we annex an adventitious idea of terror, they become without comparison greater. A level plain of a vast extent on land, is certainly no mean idea...
Page 65 - Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the God of Jacob; 8.
Page 56 - Here is a very noble picture; and in what does this poetical picture consist? in images of a tower, an archangel, the sun rising through mists, or in an eclipse, the ruin of monarchs, and the revolutions of kingdoms. The mind is hurried out of itself by a crowd of great and confused images, which affect because they are crowded and confused.
Page 109 - There is a wide difference between admiration and love. The sublime, which is the cause of the former, always dwells on great objects, and terrible ; the latter on small ones, and pleasing ; we submit to what we admire, but we love what submits to us; in one case we are forced, in the other we are nattered, into compliance.
Page 34 - When danger or pain press too nearly, they are incapable of giving any delight, and are simply terrible ; but at certain distances, and with certain modifications, they may be, and they are, delightful, as we every day experience.
Page 33 - WHATEVER is fitted in any sort to excite the ideas of pain and danger, that is to say, whatever is in any sort terrible, or is conversant about terrible objects, or operates in a manner analogous to terrour, is a source of the sublime ; that is, it is productive of the strongest emotion which the mind is capable of feeling.

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