"In stepping to the instrument some motion or appearance awakened a thought in my mind, which affected my feelings like the shock of an earthquake"
— Brown, Charles Brockden (1771-1810)
Place of Publication
Philadelphia
Publisher
Hugh Maxwell
Date
1799
Metaphor
"In stepping to the instrument some motion or appearance awakened a thought in my mind, which affected my feelings like the shock of an earthquake"
Metaphor in Context
Breakfast being finished, Welbeck cast an eye of invitation to the piano forte. The lady rose to comply with his request. My eye chanced to be, at the moment, fixed on her. In stepping to the instrument some motion or appearance awakened a thought in my mind, which affected my feelings like the shock of an earthquake.
I have too slight an acquaintance with the history of the passions to truly explain the emotion which now throbbed in my veins. I had been a stranger to what is called love. From subsequent reflection, I have contracted a suspicion, that the sentiment with which I regarded this lady was not untinctured from this source, and that hence arose the turbulence of my feelings, on observing what I construed inot marks of pregnancy. The evidence afforded me was slight; yet it exercised an absolute sway over my belief.
(Part I, chapter 8, p. 297)
I have too slight an acquaintance with the history of the passions to truly explain the emotion which now throbbed in my veins. I had been a stranger to what is called love. From subsequent reflection, I have contracted a suspicion, that the sentiment with which I regarded this lady was not untinctured from this source, and that hence arose the turbulence of my feelings, on observing what I construed inot marks of pregnancy. The evidence afforded me was slight; yet it exercised an absolute sway over my belief.
(Part I, chapter 8, p. 297)
Categories
Provenance
Reading
Citation
First part published in 1799; second in 1800. Reading and transcribing text from Charles Brockden Brown, Three Gothic Novels. New York: Library of America,1998.
Date of Entry
07/16/2003
Date of Review
06/26/2007
