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John Bartlett (1820–1905). Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. 1919.

Page 512

 
 
Walter Savage Landor. (1775–1864) (continued)
 
And it remembers its august abodes,
And murmurs as the ocean murmurs there. 1
          Gebir. Book i. (1798).
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    Past are three summers since she first beheld
The ocean; all around the child await
Some exclamation of amazement here.
She coldly said, her long-lasht eyes abased,
Is this the mighty ocean? is this all?
That wondrous soul Charoba once possest,—
Capacious, then, as earth or heaven could hold,
Soul discontented with capacity,—
Is gone (I fear) forever. Need I say
She was enchanted by the wicked spells
Of Gebir, whom with lust of power inflamed
The western winds have landed on our coast?
I since have watcht her in lone retreat,
Have heard her sigh and soften out the name. 2
          vBook ii. (1798).
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    I strove with none, for none was worth my strife;
  Nature I loved; and next to Nature, Art.
I warm’d both hands against the fire of life;
  It sinks, and I am ready to depart.
          Dying Speech of an old Philosopher.
 
Thomas Campbell. (1777–1844)
 
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    ’T is distance lends enchantment to the view,
And robes the mountain in its azure hue. 3
          Pleasures of Hope. Part i. Line 7.
 
Note 1.
See Wordsworth, Quotation 160.

Poor shell! that Wordsworth so pounded and flattened in his marsh it no longer had the hoarseness of a sea, but of a hospital.—Walter Savage Landor: Letter to John Forster. [back]
Note 2.
These lines were specially singled out for admiration by Shelley, Humphrey Davy, Scott, and many remarkable men.—Forster: Life of Landor, vol. i. p. 95. [back]
Note 3.
See John Webster, Quotation 4.

The mountains too, at a distance, appear airy masses and smooth, but seen near at hand they are rough.—Diogenes Laertius: Pyrrho, ix. [back]