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Centlivre.

Steele.

249

Cibber continued.]

Perish that thought! No, never be it said
That Fate itself could awe the soul of Richard.
Hence, babbling dreams; you threaten here in

vain ;

Conscience, avaunt, Richard 's himself again! Hark! the shrill trumpet sounds, to horse, away, My soul's in arms, and eager for the fray.

A weak invention of the enemy.1

Act v. Sc. 3.

SUSANNAH CENTLIVRE.

Act v. Sc. 3.

1667-1723.

The real Simon Pure.

A Bold Stroke for a Wife. Act v. Sc. I.

SIR RICHARD STEELE.

1671-1729.

(Lady Elizabeth Hastings.) Though her mien carries much more invitation than command, to behold her is an immediate check to loose behavior; to love her was a liberal education.2

The Tatler. No. 49.

Will Honeycomb calls these over-offended ladies the outrageously virtuous.

The Spectator. No. 266.

1 A thing devised by the enemy. - Shakespeare, Richard III, Act v. Sc. 3.

2 Leigh Hunt incorrectly ascribes this expression to Congreve.

JOSEPH ADDISON. 1672 - 1719.

САТО.

The dawn is overcast, the morning lowers,
And heavily in clouds brings on the day,
The great, the important day, big with the fate
Of Cato, and of Rome.

Act i. Sc. I.

Thy steady temper, Portius, Can look on guilt, rebellion, fraud, and Cæsar, In the calm lights of mild philosophy.

Act i. Sc. I.

'T is not in mortals to command success, But we'll do more, Sempronius; we'll deserve

it.

Blesses his stars and thinks it luxury.

Act i. Sc. 2.

Act i. Sc. 4.

'Tis pride, rank pride, and haughtiness of soul;

I think the Romans call it stoicism.

Act i. Sc. 4.

Were you with these, my prince, you'd soon forget The pale, unripened beauties of the north.

Acti Sc. 4.

Beauty soon grows familiar to the lover,
Fades in his eye, and palls upon the sense.
The virtuous Marcia towers above her sex.
Acti. Sc. 4.

My voice is still for war.

Gods! can a Roman senate long debate

Which of the two to choose, slavery or death?

Act ii. Sc. 1.

Cato continued.]

A day, an hour, of virtuous liberty
Is worth a whole eternity in bondage.

The woman that deliberates is lost.

Act ii. Sc. 1.

Act iv. Sc. I.

When vice prevails, and impious men bear sway, The post of honour is a private station.

It must be so

Act iv. Sc. 4.

Plato, thou reasonest well!
Else whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire,
This longing after immortality?

Or whence this secret dread, and inward horror,
Of falling into naught? Why shrinks the soul
Back on herself, and startles at destruction?
'Tis the divinity that stirs within us;

'Tis heaven itself that points out an hereafter, And intimates eternity to man.

Eternity! thou pleasing, dreadful thought!

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Thus am I doubly armed: my death and life,

My bane and antidote, are both before me:
This in a moment brings me to an end;
But this informs me I shall never die.
The soul, secured in her existence, smiles
At the drawn dagger, and defies its point.
The stars shall fade away, the sun himself
Grow dim with age, and nature sink in years,
But thou shalt flourish in immortal youth,
Unhurt amidst the war of elements,

The wrecks of matter, and the crush of worlds.
Act v. Sc. 1.

[Cato continued.

From hence, let fierce contending nations know What dire effects from civil discord flow.

Act v. Sc. 4.

Unbounded courage and compassion joined,
Tempering each other in the victor's mind,
Alternately proclaim him good and great,
And make the hero and the man complete.
The Campaign. Line 219.

And, pleased the Almighty's orders to perform,
Rides in the whirlwind and directs the storm.1
Ibid. Line 291.

And those that paint them truest praise them

most.2

Ibid. Line ult.

For wheresoe'er I turn my ravished eyes,

Gay gilded scenes and shining prospects rise, Poetic fields encompass me around.

And still I seem to tread on classic ground.3

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1 This line is frequently ascribed to Pope, as it is found in the Dunciad, Book iii. Line 261.

2 Cf. Pope, Eloisa to Abelard, Lin. ult.

8 Malone states that this was the first time the phrase "classic ground," since so common, was ever used.

Addison continued.]

And nightly to the listening earth
Repeats the story of her birth;

While all the stars that round her burn,
And all the planets in their turn,

Confirm the tidings as they roll,

And spread the truth from pole to pole. Ibid.

For ever singing, as they shine,

The hand that made us is divine.

Ibid.

SIR ROBERT WALPOLE. 1676 1745.

Flowery oratory he despised. He ascribed to the interested views of themselves or their rela tives the declarations of pretended patriots, of whom he said, All those men have their price.1

From Coxe's Memoirs of Walpole. Vol. iv. p. 369. Anything but history, for history must be false. Walpoliana. No. 141.

The gratitude of place-expectants is a lively sense of future favours.2

AMBROSE PHILIPS. 1671–1749.

Studious of ease and fond of humble things. From Holland to a Friend in England.

1 The political axiom, All men have their price, is commonly ascribed to Walpole.

2 Hazlitt, in his Wit and Humour, says, “This is Walpole's phrase."

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