work_id,theme,provenance,created_at,text,reviewed_on,id,comments,metaphor,dictionary,updated_at,context
3634,"","Searching ""mind"" and ""stamp"" in HDIS (Drama)",2005-04-11 00:00:00 UTC,"Sir, since I had the happinesse to read
The Siege of Urbin; I heare, others plead
That All may see't, and plead with such successe;
That now you'l wave the Stage, and grace the Presse.
'Twill much oblige the Nation, for they'l finde
Your Play stampt with the Figure of your Minde;
The Poëm's Noble, nothing Vulgar in't;
You coyne not Bullion at the Common Mint,
As wee doe, whose low soules no Art can raise:
Nay ev'n when Lov's infus'd into our Playes,
Slow as a Drug, that in the body lies,
Our Phansy works; yours, like a Spirit, flyes,
Nor does your excellence alone consist
In Love's soft Parleys: you do Souldiers list,
And carry on designes of Warre and State,
Form'd in a Campe and Court which you create.
And though new Poëts, like new Starres, appeare:
Yet still you rise above their highest Sphere.
'Tis true, they write great Characters; but then,
How often speak their Great like meaner men;
You make a Prince do all things like a Prince,
That's Argument sufficient to evince
The Dictates that from deepest Reason flow,
Which learned Poets dreame but of, you know,
If then, He, that has greatest latitude
Of Knowledge merit most; I may conclude
The Laurell's yours, justly transplanted now,
From off the Schollar's, to the Courtier's brow.",,9433,•INTEREST continues with figure of coining and mint.,"""Slow as a Drug, that in the body lies, / Our Phansy works; yours, like a Spirit, flyes""","",2009-09-14 19:34:13 UTC,Front Matter
3721,"",Searching in HDIS (Drama),2005-09-07 00:00:00 UTC,"TRUR.
Into his studious Closet to stuff his Lunatick head, since he can get nothing for his belly.",2009-01-20,9615,"","""Into his studious Closet to stuff his Lunatick head, since he can get nothing for his belly.""","",2013-06-10 18:17:00 UTC,Act I
3626,"",Reading,2012-01-28 20:23:11 UTC,"[...] Plotting and writing in this kind, are certainly more troublesome employments than many which signify more, and are of greater moment in the world: The fancy, memory, and judgment are then extended (like so many limbs) upon the rack; all of them reaching with their utmost stress at nature; a thing so almost infinite and boundless, as can never fully be comprehended, but where the images of all things are always present. Yet I wonder not, your Lordship succeeds so well in this attempt: the knowledge of men is your daily practice in the world; to work and bend their stubborn minds, which go not all after the same grain, but each of them so particular a way, that the same common humours, in several persons, must be wrought upon by several means. Thus, my Lord, your sickness is but the imitation of your health; the poet but subordinate to the statesman in you: you still govern men with the same address, and manage business with the same prudence; allowing it here, as in the world, the due increase and growth, till it comes to the just height; and then turning it when it is fully ripe, and Nature calls out, as it were, to be delivered. With this only advantage of ease to you in your poetry, that you have fortune here at your command; with which, wisdom does often unsuccessfully struggle in the world. Here is no chance which you have not foreseen; all your heroes are more than your subjects, they are your creatures; and though they seem to move freely in all the sallies of their passions, yet you make destinies for them which they cannot shun. They are moved, if I may dare to say so, like the rational creatures of the Almighty Poet, who walk at liberty, in their own opinion, because their fetters are invincible, when indeed the prison of their will is the more sure for being large; and instead of an absolute power over their actions, they have only a wretched desire of doing that, which they cannot choose but do.",,19545,"","""The fancy, memory, and judgment are then extended (like so many limbs) upon the rack; all of them reaching with their utmost stress at nature; a thing so almost infinite and boundless, as can never fully be comprehended, but where the images of all things are always present.""","",2012-01-28 20:23:11 UTC,""
8122,"",Reading,2016-01-13 17:39:52 UTC,"WHat Greece, when Learning flourish'd, onely Knew,
(Athenian Judges,) you this day Renew.
Here too are Annual Rites to Pallas done,
And here Poetique prizes lost or won.
Methinks I see you, Crown'd with Olives sit,
And strike a sacred Horrour from the Pit.
A Day of Doom is this of your Decree,
Where even the Best are but by Mercy free:
A Day which none but Iohnson durst have wish'd to see.
Here they who long have known the usefull Stage,
Come to be taught themselves to teach the Age.
As your Commissioners our Poets goe,
To Cultivate the Virtue which you sow:
In your Lycaeum, first themselves refind,
And Delegated thence to Humane kind.
But as Embassadours, when long from home,
For new Instructions to their Princes come;
So Poets who your Precepts have forgot,
Return, and beg they may be better taught:
Follies and Faults elsewhere by them are shown,
But by your Manners they Correct their Own.
Th' illiterate Writer, Emperique like, applies
To minds diseas'd, unsafe, chance Remedies:
The Learn'd in Schools, where Knowledge first began,
Studies with Care th' Anatomy of Man;
Sees Vertue, Vice, and Passions in their Cause,
And Fame from Science, not from Fortune draws.
So Poetry, which is in Oxford made
An Art, in London onely is a Trade.
There Haughty Dunces whose unlearned Pen
Could ne'er Spell Grammar, would be reading Men.
Such build their Poems the Lucretian way,
So many Huddled Atoms make a Play,
And if they hit in Order by some Chance,
They call that Nature, which is Ignorance.
To such a Fame let mere Town-Wits aspire,
And their Gay Nonsense their own Citts admire.
Our Poet, could he find Forgiveness here
Would wish it rather than a Plaudit there.
He owns no Crown from those Praetorian bands,
But knows that Right is in this Senates hands.
Not Impudent enough to hope your Praise,
Low at the Muses feet, his Wreath he lays,
And where he took it up Resigns his Bays.
Kings make their Poets whom themselves think fit,
But 'tis your Suffrage makes Authentique Wit.
(pp. 263-5)",,24796,"","""Th' illiterate Writer, Emperique like, applies / To minds diseas'd, unsafe, chance Remedies.""","",2016-01-13 17:39:52 UTC,""