There is a pleasure sure In being mad, which none but madmen know. Spanish Friar. Ere the base laws of servitude began, Act 1. Scene 1. Great wits are sure to madness near allied, And thin partitions do their bounds divide.* Absalom and Achitophel. Part 1. Lines 163, 164. A man so various that he seem'd to be, Ibid. Lines 545-550. * "What thin partitions sense from thought divide.” Pope's Essay on Man, Epistle i. Line 226. † In these celebrated lines, George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, the profligate companion of Charles the Second, is referred to. Dryden satirizes him in the poem under the name of Zimri. The Duke was not devoid of talent in "The Rehearsal," an entertainment written by him, he introduces the poet under the name of Bayes, and PALAMON AND ARCITE. Love endures no tie, And Jove but laughs at lovers' perjury. Book 11. Lines 148, 149. The love of liberty with life is given, Lines 291, 292. Since every man, who lives, is born to die, With equal mind, what happens, let us bear, Nor joy, nor grieve too much for things beyond our care ; Like pilgrims to th' appointed place we tend ; The world's an inn, and death the journey's end. Book III. Lines 883-888. Then t'is our best, since thus ordained to die, handles him severely. Pope's lines (see Quotations from Pope) describing the death-bed of "this lord of useless thousands," though by no means correctly narrating the event, have obtained great popularity. * To make a virtue of necessity. This is a line frequently used by the old authors.-See Quotations from Shakspere's Two Gentlemen of Verona. Chaucer also uses it in The Squier's Tale, Part ii. line 244. Take what He gives, since to rebel is vain, The bad grows better, which we well sustain ; And could we choose the time, and choose aright, 'Tis best to die, our honour at the height. Book III. Lines 1084-1089. Three poets in three distant ages born, Lines written under a Portrait of Milton. Ill news is wing'd with fate, and flies apace.† Threnodia Augustalis. Line 49. For friendship, of itself an holy tie, Is made more sacred by adversity. The Hind and the Panther. Part III. Lines 47, 48. Murder may pass unpunish'd for a time, But tardy justice will o'ertake the crime, The Cock and the Fox. Lines 285, 286. * The two other poets here referred to are Homer and Virgil. "For evil news rides post, while good news bates." See Quotations from Milton. Virtue in distress, and vice in triumph, Make atheists of mankind. Kings, who are fathers, live but in their people. Don Sebastian. Act 1. Scene I. This is the porcelain clay of human kind. Ibid. Johnson. When Learning's triumph o'er her barb'rous foes (Prologue spoken by Garrick) at the opening of Drury Lane Theatre, 1747. Ah! let not censure term our fate our choice, "for just *Boswell, speaking of this Prologue, says, and manly dramatic criticism on the whole range of the English stage, as well as for poetical excellence, it is unrivalled; it was, during the season, often called for by the audience." |