text,updated_at,metaphor,created_at,context,theme,reviewed_on,dictionary,comments,provenance,id,work_id
"As all the passions of the human breast
Impel to action, or compose to rest;
Inflame, or cool, excite, or soothe the soul,
Conspiring to preserve, and guard, the whole;
As will goads on, by pure affections led,
Heav'n heaves the heart, and reason rules the head:
But if rebellion vex each vital part,
The head made dark by demons in the heart,
The will runs riot, while the passions rule,
The soul a slave, and reason quite a tool.
When reason governs, as her Maker meant,
Each subject passion feels its proper bent:
None hurries on to urge injurious strife;
None loiters to relax the springs of life:
None chills with agues, or with fevers fires;
Represses right, or raises wrong desires:
But, firm, in friendship and affiance join'd,
All help true happiness throughout mankind;
While, seeking pleasures, and avoiding pains,
Will whips, or curbs, as reason holds the reins.
",2009-09-14 19:33:35 UTC,"""While, seeking pleasures, and avoiding pains, / Will whips, or curbs, as reason holds the reins.""",2004-06-22 00:00:00 UTC,"","",,"",•REVISIT. See Pickering & Chatto's edition of English Labouring-Class Poets. It lists two editions of Woodhouse's work: Poems on Several Occasions (1766); from Poems on Several Occasions (1788). See volume ii. of the P&C set.
,"",8453,3216
" Painters and Poets never should be fat--
Sons of Apollo! listen well to that.
Fat is foul weather--dims the fancy's sight:
In poverty, the wits more nimbly muster:
Thus stars, when pinch'd by frost, cast keener lustre
On the black blanket of old mother night.
Your heavy fat, I will maintain,
Is perfect birdlime of the brain;
And, as to goldfinches the birdlime clings--
Fat holds ideas by the legs and wings.
Fat flattens the most brilliant thoughts,
Like the buff-stop on harpsichords, or spinets--
Muffling their pretty little tuneful throats,
That would have chirp'd away like linnets.
(cf. pp. 12-13 in 1787 ed.)",2014-03-03 19:52:38 UTC,"""Your heavy fat, I will maintain, / Is perfect birdlime of the brain; / And, as to goldfinches the birdlime clings-- / Fat holds ideas by the legs and wings.""",2005-06-01 00:00:00 UTC,"","",2012-06-27,Beasts,"INTEREST: crazy imagery...
Reviewed 2009-07-31. Went looking for metaphor in Google Books and ECCO, discovered it was first printed in 1787…
FIXED TYPO in C-H (sat/fat in first line).","Searching in HDIS (Poetry); found again searching ""idea"" and ""bird;"" confirmed in ECCO.",14891,5574
" Painters and Poets never should be fat--
Sons of Apollo! listen well to that.
Fat is foul weather--dims the fancy's sight:
In poverty, the wits more nimbly muster:
Thus stars, when pinch'd by frost, cast keener lustre
On the black blanket of old mother night.
Your heavy fat, I will maintain,
Is perfect birdlime of the brain;
And, as to goldfinches the birdlime clings--
Fat holds ideas by the legs and wings.
Fat flattens the most brilliant thoughts,
Like the buff-stop on harpsichords, or spinets--
Muffling their pretty little tuneful throats,
That would have chirp'd away like linnets.
(cf. pp. 12-13 in 1787 edition)",2014-03-03 19:52:06 UTC,"""Fat flattens the most brilliant thoughts, / Like the buff-stop on harpsichords, or spinets-- / Muffling their pretty little tuneful throats, / That would have chirp'd away like linnets.""",2005-06-01 00:00:00 UTC,"","",2012-06-27,"",•I've included twice: Bird and Harpsichord/Spinet,Searching in HDIS (Poetry); confirmed in ECCO.,14892,5574
"Like caterpillars dangling under trees
By slender threads, and swinging in the breeze,
Which filthily bewray and sore disgrace
The boughs in which are bred the unseemly race,
While every worm industriously weaves
And winds his web about the rivell'd leaves;
So numerous are the follies that annoy
The mind and heart of every sprightly boy,
Imaginations noxious and perverse,
Which admonition can alone disperse.
The encroaching nuisance asks a faithful hand,
Patient, affectionate, of high command,
To check the procreation of a breed
Sure to exhaust the plant on which they feed.
'Tis not enough that Greek or Roman page
At stated hours his freakish thoughts engage,
Even in his pastimes he requires a friend
To warn, and teach him safely to unbend,
O'er all his pleasures gently to preside,
Watch his emotions and controul their tide,
And levying thus, and with an easy sway,
A tax of profit from his very play,
To impress a value not to be erased
On moments squander'd else, and running all to waste.
And seems it nothing in a father's eye
That unimproved those many moments fly?
And is he well content, his son should find
No nourishment to feed his growing mind
But conjugated verbs, and nouns declined?
For such is all the mental food purvey'd
By public hackneys in the schooling trade,
Who feed a pupil's intellect with store
Of syntax truly, but with little more,
Dismiss their cares when they dismiss their flock,
Machines themselves, and govern'd by a clock.
Perhaps a father blest with any brains
Would deem it no abuse or waste of pains,
To improve this diet at no great expense,
With savoury truth and wholesome common sense,
To lead his son for prospects of delight
To some not steep though philosophic height,
Thence to exhibit to his wondering eyes
Yon circling worlds, their distance, and their size,
The moons of Jove and Saturn's belted ball,
And the harmonious order of them all;
To show him in an insect or a flower,
Such microscopic proofs of skill and power,
As hid from ages past, God now displays
To combat Atheists with in modern days;
To spread the earth before him, and commend,
With designation of the finger's end,
Its various parts to his attentive note,
Thus bringing home to him the most remote;
To teach his heart to glow with generous flame
Caught from the deeds of men of ancient fame,
And more than all, with commendation due
To set some living worthy in his view,
Whose fair example may at once inspire
A wish to copy what he must admire.
Such knowledge gain'd betimes, and which appears,
Though solid, not too weighty for his years,
Sweet in itself, and not forbidding sport,
When health demands it, of athletic sort,
Would make him what some lovely boys have been,
And more than one perhaps that I have seen,
An evidence and reprehension both
Of the mere school-boy's lean and tardy growth.
(ll. 109-168, pp. 263-5)",2010-01-07 04:58:22 UTC,"""Like caterpillars dangling under trees / By slender threads, and swinging in the breeze, / Which filthily bewray and sore disgrace / The boughs in which are bred the unseemly race, / While every worm industriously weaves / And winds his web about the rivell'd leaves; / So numerous are the follies that annoy / The mind and heart of every sprightly boy, / Imaginations noxious and perverse, / Which admonition can alone disperse.""",2003-12-29 00:00:00 UTC,"","",2009-01-06,"","Hilarious passage -- on masturbation, I take it.",HDIS (Poetry),15026,5615
"Thus mouru'd the youth--'till sunk in pensive grief,
He woo'd his handkerchief for soft relief;
In either pocket, either hand he threw;
When lo! from each a precious tablet flew.
Thus--his sage patron's wond'rous speech on trade!
This--his own book of sarcasms, ready made!
Tremendous book!--thou motley magazine
Of stole severities, and pilter'd spleen!
Oh! rich in ill!--within thy leaves entwin'd,
What glittering adders lurk to sting the mind!
Satire's Museum--with Sir Ashton's lore,
The Naturalist of malice, eyes thy store;
Ranging with fell Virtu his poisonous tribes
Of embryo sneers, and animalcule gibes.
Here insect puns their feeble wings expand,
To speed, in little flights, their Lord's command;
There, in their paper chrysalis, he sees,
Specks of bon mots, and eggs of repartees.
In modern spirit ancient wit he steeps;
If not its gloss, the reptile's venom keeps:
Thy quaintness, Dunning;--but without thy sense,
And just enough of Bearcroft, for offence.",2009-09-14 19:43:01 UTC,"""What glittering adders lurk to sting the mind!""",2006-01-24 00:00:00 UTC,"","",,"","",Searching in HDIS (Poetry),15204,5702
"And thou, O INT'REST! dark, insidious power,
Whose sanction'd arts waste nations in an hour;
Whose mining frauds, more fatal still, destroy
Hope's tender blossom, and the fruits of joy;
Thou, to whom all the coward slights belong,
Thy heart too cruel for a generous wrong,
For fierce Revenge, that fever of the soul,
Hate that defies, and Love that spurns controul,
Or mad'ning Jealousy when Reason bends,
Or Zeal, extravagant to liberal ends,
Thou, who, for noble faults like these, too cold,
Whose vices n'er aspire, but stoop to gold,
That groveling passion of the sordid breast,
Like Aaron's serpent swallowing up the rest;
Theft, rapine, plunder, fraud, and murder, stand,
Fell ministers! to wait thy dire command.
Yes thou, the founder of this impious trade,
Mad'st him a slave, that nature never made,
Tore the poor Indian from his native soil,
And chain'd him down to never-ending toil.
(pp. 15-6)",2011-07-18 20:36:59 UTC,"""Thou, who, for noble faults like these, too cold, / Whose vices n'er aspire, but stoop to gold, / That groveling passion of the sordid breast, / Like Aaron's serpent swallowing up the rest.""",2011-07-18 20:36:06 UTC,"",Ruling Passion,,Animals,"CROSS-REFERENCE: Pope -- ""And hence one Master Passion in the breast, / Like Aaron's serpent, swallows up the rest.""
",Reading,18917,5687
"Above the noise and stir of yonder fields
Uplifted, on this height I feel the mind
Expand itself in wider liberty.
The distant sounds break gently on my sense,
Soothing to meditation: so methinks,
Even so, sequester'd from the noisy world,
Could I wear out this transitory being
In peaceful contemplation and calm ease.
But Conscience, which still censures on our acts,
That awful voice within us, and the sense
Of an Hereafter, wake and rouse us up
From such unshaped retirement; which were else
A blest condition on this earthly stage.
For who would make his life a life of toil
For wealth, o'erbalanced with a thousand cares;
Or power, which base compliance must uphold;
Or honour, lavish'd most on courtly slaves;
Or fame, vain breath of a misjudging world;
Who for such perishable gaudes would put
A yoke upon his free unbroken spirit,
And gall himself with trammels and the rubs
Of this world's business; so he might stand clear
Of judgment and the tax of idleness
In that dread audit, when his mortal hours
(Which now with soft and silent stealth pace by)
Must all be counted for? But, for this fear,
And to remove, according to our power,
The wants and evils of our brother's state,
'Tis meet we justle with the world; content,
If by our sovereign Master we be found
At last not profitless: for worldly meed,
Given or withheld, I deem of it alike.
(pp. 4-6)",2011-09-06 16:45:40 UTC,"""Who for such perishable gaudes would put / A yoke upon his free unbroken spirit, / And gall himself with trammels and the rubs / Of this world's business; so he might stand clear / Of judgment and the tax of idleness / In that dread audit, when his mortal hours / (Which now with soft and silent stealth pace by) / Must all be counted for?""",2011-09-06 16:43:48 UTC,"","",,Beasts and Fetters,"","Searching ""trammel"" in HDIS (Poetry)",19140,6264
"Tho' the Law's potent letter Ability puzzles,
We all know too well that it Innocence muzzles;
Like Loretto's old fane, it yields varlets a living,
And fools give it wealth, for the sake of the giving;
The Inns of Court tenants at random abuse it,
And turn it and twist it whenever they use it;
As children at fairs use their gingerbread breeches,
They lick off its gilding, and bite off its riches;
Its frame wants a head, like John Lade or the torso,
'Tis so hideous no effort can e'er make it more so;
'Tis the birdlime of reason to fasten our senses,
'Tis an engine to punish our moral offences;
Tho' 'tis cover'd with filth like the stairs of St. Peter's,
The senate are daily encrusting its features:
Tho' Wisdom and Worth bade gaunt Exigence send it,
Yet the more we survey it, the less comprehend it;
It is crooked, 'tis straight, it is square, it is round,
Like Gibbons' odd visage, or Salisbury pound:
'Tis a thing which rewards not the beings who find it,
And Hope and Despair play at bo-peep behind it:
'Tis more difficult far to be right ascertain'd,
Than the murrane inscription which Daniel explain'd:
Some tell you 'tis sable, and some swear 'tis white,
Some aver 'tis polluted, some big with delight;
But Truth owns it wond'rously guts every purse,
And proves Knavery's comfort, and Equity's curse.",2012-04-30 16:28:59 UTC,"""'Tis [the letter of the law] the birdlime of reason to fasten our senses.""",2012-04-30 16:28:59 UTC,"","",,Beasts,"","Searching ""reason"" and ""bird"" in HDIS (Poetry)",19747,7247
"Thee only, sober Goddess! I attest,
In smiles chastis'd, and decent graces drest.
Not that unlicens'd monster of the crowd,
Whose roar terrific bursts in peals so loud,
Deaf'ning the ear of Peace: fierce Faction's tool;
Of rash Sedition born, and mad Misrule;
Whose stubborn mouth, rejecting Reason's rein,
No strength can govern, and no skill restrain;
Whose magic cries the frantic vulgar draw
To spurn at Order, and to outrage Law;
To tread on grave Authority and Pow'r,
And shake the work of ages in an hour:
Convuls'd her voice, and pestilent her breath,
She raves of mercy, while she deals out death:
Each blast is fate; she darts from either hand
Red conflagration o'er th' astonish'd land;
Clamouring for peace, she rends the air with noise,
And to reform a part, the whole destroys.
(ll. 19-36, pp. 101-2 in Wood)",2012-08-14 13:08:52 UTC,"""Not that unlicens'd monster of the crowd, / Whose roar terrific bursts in peals so loud, / Deaf'ning the ear of Peace: fierce Faction's tool; / Of rash Sedition born, and mad Misrule; / Whose stubborn mouth, rejecting Reason's rein, / No strength can govern, and no skill restrain.""",2012-08-14 13:08:52 UTC,"","",,Animals,"",Reading,19909,5681
"Sonnet XLII.
Composed During a Walk on the Downs, in November 1787
The dark and pillowy cloud; the sallow trees,
Seem o'er the ruins of the year to mourn;
And cold and hollow, the inconstant breeze
Sobs thro' the falling leaves and wither'd fern.
O'er the tall brow of yonder chalky bourn,
The evening-shades their gather'd darkness fling,
While, by the lingering light, I scarce discern
The shrieking night-jar, sail on heavy wing.
Ah! yet a little--and propitious Spring
Crown'd with fresh flowers, shall wake the woodland strain;
But no gay change revolving seasons bring,
To call forth pleasure from the soul of pain,
Bid Syren Hope resume her long lost part,
And chase the vulture Care--that feeds upon the heart.",2013-06-13 15:41:23 UTC,"""Bid Syren Hope resume her long lost part, / And chase the vulture Care--that feeds upon the heart.""",2013-06-13 15:41:23 UTC,"","",,Animals,"",Reading,20616,7426