work_id,theme,provenance,created_at,text,reviewed_on,id,comments,metaphor,dictionary,updated_at,context
5709,Ruling Passion,"Searching ""ruling passion"" in HDIS (Poetry)",2004-05-20 00:00:00 UTC,"Good Lord, what is Man! For as simple he looks,
Do but try to develop his hooks and his crooks!
With his depths and his shallows, his good and his evil,
All in all he's a problem must puzzle the Devil.
On his one ruling passion Sir Pope hugely labors,
That, like th'old Hebrew walking-switch, eats up its neighbours.
Human Nature's his show-box--your friend, would you know him?
Pull the string, Ruling Passion--the picture will show him.
What pity, in rearing so beauteous a system,
One trifling particular--Truth--should have miss'd him!
For, spite of his fine theoretic positions,
Mankind is a science defies definitions.
Some sort all our qualities each to its tribe,
And think Human Nature they truly describe:
Have you found this, or t'other? There's more in the wind,
As by one drunken fellow his comrades you'll find.
But such is the flaw, or the depth of the plan
In the make of that wonderful creature called Man,
No two virtues, whatever relation they claim,
Nor even two different shades of the same,
Though like as was ever twin brother to brother,
Possessing the one shall imply you've the other.
",,15233,"•Great anti-metaphor poem. INTEREST.
•Included twice: once in Animals and once Government.","""On his one ruling passion Sir Pope hugely labors, / That, like th'old Hebrew walking-switch, eats up its neighbours.""",Animals,2013-08-09 22:51:57 UTC,Middle Stanzas
6982,"",Reading,2011-06-25 03:48:02 UTC,"Or, greatly daring in his Country's cause,
Whose heaven-taught soul the aweful plan design'd,
Whence Power stood trembling at the voice of Laws,
Whence soar'd on Freedom's wing th'ethereal mind.
(p. 3)",,18813,"","""Or, greatly daring in his Country's cause, / Whose heaven-taught soul the aweful plan design'd, / Whence Power stood trembling at the voice of Laws, / Whence soar'd on Freedom's wing th'ethereal mind.""",Beasts,2011-06-25 03:48:02 UTC,""
7499,"",C-H Lion (Poetry); confirmed in ECCO.,2013-07-02 15:29:40 UTC,"LI
Thus Heaven enlarged his soul in riper years.
For Nature gave him strength, and fire, to soar,
On Fancy's wing, above this vale of tears;
Where dark cold-hearted sceptics, creeping, pore
Through microscope of metaphysic lore:
And much they grope for truth, but never hit.
For why? their powers, inadequate before,
This art preposterous renders more unfit;
Yet deem they darkness light, and their vain blunders wit.
(Bk I, p. 19, ll. 451-459; cf. p. 27 in 1771 ed.)",,21402,"","""Thus Heaven enlarged his soul in riper years. / For Nature gave him strength, and fire, to soar, / On Fancy's wing, above this vale of tears.""",Animals,2014-03-11 03:21:40 UTC,Book I
7499,"",C-H Lion,2013-07-02 15:41:15 UTC,"LV
Enraptured by the Hermit's strain, the Youth
Proceeds the path of Science to explore.
And now, expanding to the beams of Truth,
New energies, and charms unknown before,
His mind discloses: Fancy now no more
Wantons on fickle pinion through the skies;
But, fix'd in aim, and conscious of her power,
Sublime from cause to cause exults to rise,
Creation's blended stores arranging as she flies.
(Bk II, p. 42, ll. 487-495)",,21411,"","""Fancy now no more / Wantons on fickle pinion through the skies; / But, fix'd in aim, and conscious of her power, / Sublime from cause to cause exults to rise, / Creation's blended stores arranging as she flies.""",Animals,2013-07-02 15:41:15 UTC,Book II
7501,"",C-H Lion (Poetry); confirmed in ECCO.,2013-07-02 15:59:15 UTC,"All cold the hand, that soothed Woe's weary head!
And quench'd the eye, the pitying tear that shed!
And mute the voice, whose pleasing accents stole,
Infusing balm, into the rankled soul!
O Death, why arm with cruelty thy power,
And spare the idle weed, yet lop the flower!
Why fly thy shafts in lawless error driven!
Is Virtue then no more the care of Heaven!---
But peace, bold thought! be still my bursting heart!
We, not Eliza, felt the fatal dart.
Scaped the dark dungeon does the slave complain,
Nor bless the hand that broke the galling chain?
Say, pines not Virtue for the lingering morn,
On this dark wild condemn'd to roam forlorn?
Where Reason's meteor-rays, with sickly glow,
O'er the dun gloom a dreadful glimmering throw?
Disclosing dubious to th' affrighted eye
O'erwhelming mountains tottering from on high,
Black billowy seas in storm perpetual toss'd,
And weary ways in wildering labyrinths lost.
O happy stroke, that bursts the bonds of clay,
Darts through the rending gloom the blaze of day,
And wings the soul with boundless flight to soar,
Where dangers threat, and fears alarm no more.
(p. 51, ll. 63-85)",,21418,"","""O happy stroke, that bursts the bonds of clay, / Darts through the rending gloom the blaze of day, / And wings the soul with boundless flight to soar, / Where dangers threat, and fears alarm no more.""","",2014-03-10 22:02:26 UTC,""
7502,"",C-H Lion,2013-07-02 16:05:20 UTC,"II. 1.
When first on Childhood's eager gaze
Life's varied landscape, stretch'd immense around,
Starts out of night profound,
Thy voice incites to tempt th' untrodden maze.
Fond he surveys thy mild maternal face,
His bashful eye still kindling as he views,
And, while thy lenient arm supports his pace,
With beating heart the upland path pursues:
The path that leads, where, hung sublime,
And seen afar, youth's gallant trophies, bright
In Fancy's rainbow ray, invite
His wingy nerves to climb.
(pp. 54-5, ll. 42-53)",,21420,"","""Fond he surveys thy mild maternal face, / His bashful eye still kindling as he views, / And, while thy lenient arm supports his pace, / With beating heart the upland path pursues: / The path that leads, where, hung sublime, / And seen afar, youth's gallant trophies, bright / In Fancy's rainbow ray, invite / His wingy nerves to climb.""","",2013-07-02 16:05:20 UTC,""