Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches

The Praise of Shakespeare: An English Anthology

1596 Francis Meres 35 1598 Richard Barnfield 36 1599 John Weever 37 1610 John Davies 38 1614 Thomas Freeman 39 1622 William Basse 40 1623 Anonymous 41 1623 Ben Jonson 42 1623 Hugh Holland 45 1623 John Heminge and Henrie Condell 46 1623 Leonard Digges 47 1627 Michael Drayton 48...

Chapters

5. Book vi. Epig. 17, pp. 150, 152, 154.

He was an eminent instance of the truth of that rule, _Poeta non fit sed nascitur_; one is not _made_, but _born_ a poet. Indeed, his learning was very little, so that, as Corni...

9. Chapter viii. _Miscellanies_, 1743.

CANON I. A Professed Critic has a right to declare that his Author wrote whatever He thinks he ought to have written, with as much positiveness as if he had been at his elbow.

3. PART III

1664 Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle 277 1711 Joseph Addison 278 1743 Henry Fielding 279 1747 Thomas Edwards 281 1749 Mark Akenside 284 1751 Robert Lloyd 288 1765 Olive...

4. PART I

When wasteful war shall statues overturn, And broils root out the work of masonry, Nor Mars his sword nor war’s quick fire shall burn The living record of your memory. ’Gainst d...

6. PART II

Shakespeare, we must be silent in thy praise, ’Cause our encomions will but blast thy bays, Which envy could not, that thou didst so well, Let thine own histories prove thy chro...

8. Letter CLXII. _CCXI Sociable Letters written by the

Some years ago I was at the tragedy of “Macbeth,” and unfortunately placed myself under a woman of quality, that is since dead; who, as I found by the noise she made, was newly...

1. PART I

1596 Francis Meres 35 1598 Richard Barnfield 36 1599 John Weever 37 1610 John Davies 38 1614 Thomas Freeman 39 1622 William Basse 40 1623 Anonymous 41 1623 Ben Jonson 42 1623 Hu...

2. PART II

1639 Anonymous 219 1681 John Crowne 220 1737 Alexander Pope 221 1745 James Thomson 222 1767 Anonymous 223 _a._ 1767 George Colman 224 1776 Richard Graves 225 1778 Horace Walpole...

7. PART III

Remember, when we were very young maids, one day we were discoursing about lovers, and we did enjoin each other to confess who professed to love us, and whom we loved, and I con...