Hours In A Library (4 Volumes) (BCL1-PR English Literature)

ISBN 10: 0781270200 ISBN 13: 9780781270205

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1904 Excerpt: ...of that width of sympathy which should result from the pantheistic view. The tenderness, for example, with which he always speaks of the brute creation is pleasant in a writer so little distinguished as a rule by an interest in what we popularly call nature. The "scale of being" argument may be illogical, but we pardon it when it is applied to strengthen our sympathies with our unfortunate dependants on the lower steps of the ladder. The lamb who Vol. I.--ia. Licks the hand just raised to shed his blood is a second-hand lamb, and has, like so much of Pope's writing, acquired a certain tinge of banality, which must limit quotation; and the same must be said of the poor Indian, who thinks, admitted to that equal sky, His faithful dog will bear him company. But the sentiment is as right as the language (in spite of its familiarity we can still recognise the fact) is exquisite. Tolerance of all forms of faith, from that of the poor Indian upwards, is so characteristic of Pope as to have offended some modern critics who might have known better. We may pick holes in the celebrated antithesis: For forms of government let fools contest: Whate'er is best administered is best; For forms of faith let graceless zealots fight, He can't be wrong whose life is in the right. Certainly, they are not mathematically accurate formulae; but they are generous, if imperfect, statements of great truths, and not unbecoming in the mouth of the man who, as the member of an unpopular sect, learnt to be cosmopolitan rather than bitter, and expressed his convictions in the well-known words addressed to Swift: "I am of the religion of Erasmus, a Catholic; so I live, so I shall die; and hope one day to meet you, Bishop Atterbury, the younger Craggs, Dr. Garth, Dean Berkeley...

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Product Description

This three-volume set brings together a diverse selection of essays by Sir Leslie Stephen (1832–1904), author, philosopher and literary critic. Educated at Eton and Cambridge, he was the founding editor of the Dictionary of National Biography and father of Virginia Woolf and Vanessa Bell. He wrote critiques of many authors and works, which were published in periodicals such as the Cornhill Magazine (of which he was editor from 1871), Fraser's Magazine and the Fortnightly Review. The Second Series, first published in 1876, includes commentaries on the works of Sir Thomas Browne, Samuel Johnson, Benjamin Disraeli and Horace Walpole, and the poetry of George Crabbe. Stephen sets each writer's work in its historical context, comparing it to that of other significant authors of its era and evaluating its philosophical and moral qualities. His articles remain of great interest to scholars of early modern, Romantic and Victorian literature.

Book Description

This three-volume set brings together a diverse selection of articles by the literary critic Sir Leslie Stephen (1832–1904). The Second Series, first published in 1876, includes commentaries on the works of Sir Thomas Browne, Samuel Johnson, Benjamin Disraeli and Horace Walpole, and the poetry of George Crabbe.

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