Rasselas, Prince of AbyssiniaCassell, Limited, 1909 - 192 pages |
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Common terms and phrases
able Abyssinia afford afraid amuse answered Imlac Arab astronomer attention Bassa began Cairo cavern CHAPTER choice companions condition considered continued conversation curiosity danger delight desire discovered dreadful easily endeavoured enjoy entered envy escape evil expected eyes fancy father favour favourite fear feel felicity folly Happy Valley hear heard hermit honour hope hope and fear hour human imagination inquire Johnson knowledge labour lady learned lence less live looked maids mankind marriage mind misery mountains nature Nekayah ness never Nile observed once opinion palace Palestine passed passions Pekuah Persia pleased pleasure poet possessed Prince Princess Pyramid Rasselas reason Red Sea resolved rest retired retreat returned rich sage SAMUEL JOHNSON scrupulosity silent solitude sometimes soon sorrow sound of music suffer supposed thou thought tion travelled turbed virtue weary wisdom wonder youth
Popular passages
Page 6 - Come unto me, all ye that travail and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
Page 47 - The business of a poet, said Imlac, is to examine, not the individual, but the species; to remark general properties and large appearances ; he does not number the streaks of the tulip, or describe the different shades in the verdure of the forest. He is to exhibit in his portraits of nature such prominent and striking features as recall the original to every mind ; and must neglect the minuter discriminations, which one may have remarked, and another have neglected, for those characteristicks which...
Page 50 - By what means (said the prince) are the Europeans thus powerful ; or why, since they can so eas'ily visit Asia and Africa for trade or conquest, cannot the Asiaticks and Africans invade their coasts, plant colonies in their ports, and give laws to their natural princes? The same wind that carries them back would bring us thither.
Page 91 - Let me only know what it is to live according to Nature." "When 1 find yonng men so humble and so docile," said the philosopher, " I can deny them no information which my studies have enabled me to afford. To live according to Nature is to act always with due regard to the fitness arising from the relations and qualities of causes and effects ; to concur with the great and unchangeable scheme of universal felicity ; to co-operate with the general disposition and tendency of the present system of...
Page 46 - Being now resolved to be a poet, I saw everything with a now purpose ; my sphere of attention was suddenly magnified ; no kind of knowledge was to be overlooked. I ranged mountains and deserts for images and resemblances, and pictured upon my mind every tree of the forest and flower of the valley.
Page 190 - Those that lie here stretched before us, the wise and the powerful of ancient times, warn us to remember the shortness of our present state : they were, perhaps, snatched away while they were busy, like us, in the choice of life." "To me," said the princess, "the choice of life is become less important ; I hope hereafter to think only on the choice of eternity.
Page 48 - He must write as the interpreter of nature and the legislator of mankind, and consider himself as presiding over the thoughts and manners of future generations — as a being superior to time and place.
Page 10 - The only passage by which it could be entered was a cavern that passed under a rock, of which it has long been disputed whether it was the work of nature or of human industry. The...
Page 44 - ... me with wonder, that, in almost all countries, the most ancient poets are considered as the best : whether it be that every other kind of knowledge is an acquisition gradually attained, and poetry is a gift conferred at once ; or that the first poetry of every nation surprised them as a novelty, and retained the credit by consent which, it received by accident at first ; or whether, as the province of poetry is to describe nature and passion, which are always the same...
Page 19 - That I want nothing," said the prince, "or that I know not what I want, is the cause of my complaint; if I had any known want, I should have a certain wish; that wish would excite endeavour, and I should not then repine to see the sun move so slowly towards the western mountain, or lament when the day breaks and sleep will no longer hide me from myself. When I see the kids and the lambs chasing one another, I fancy that I should be happy if I had something to pursue.