Date: 1704

"The following Treatise is but a small part of a Volume of Criticism intended to be publish'd in Folio, in which in Treating of the works of the most Celebrated English Poets Deceas'd, I design'd to shew both by Reason and Examples, that the use of Religion in Poetry was absolutely necessary to r...

— Dennis, John (1658-1734)

Date: 1704

"It is plain then that these Persons by designing totally to suppress the Stage, which is the only encouragement that we have in these Islands of Poetry, manifestly intended to drive out so noble and useful an Art from among us, and by that means endeavour'd with all their might to weaken the pow...

— Dennis, John (1658-1734)

Date: 1704

"Nay, wise Men and great Philosophers, have accounted it as the Archet or Musical Bow of the Mind. And certainly it is most true, and as it were a Secret of Nature, that the Minds of Men are more patent to Affections, and Impressions Congregate than Solitary."

— Dennis, John (1658-1734)

Date: 1704

"For the Spirits being set in a violent emotion, and the Imagination being fir'd by that agitation; and the Brain being deeply penetrated by those Impressions, the very Objects themselves are set as it were before us, and consequently we are sensible of the same Passion that we should feel from t...

— Dennis, John (1658-1734)

Date: 1704

"But as soon as Religion was sufficiently imprinted in the Minds of Men, and they had leisure to Treat of Human things in their writings they invented Prose, and invented it in Imitation of Verse, as Strabo tells us in the first Book of his Geography; but after that Prose was invented by them; ne...

— Dennis, John (1658-1734)