The collected works of William Hazlitt, Vol. 12 (of 12)Hazlitt, William
General
The collected works of William Hazlitt, Vol. 12 (of 12)
Hazlitt, William
English essays -- 19th century
powder and pomatum, a long cue at his back, and tricked out in the
loathsome finery of the profession of blood.
‘Such were the notes our once-lov’d poet sung.’
And for myself, I could not have been more delighted if I had heard the
music of the spheres. Poetry and Philosophy had met together. Truth and
Genius had embraced, under the eye and with the sanction of Religion.
This was even beyond my hopes. I returned home well satisfied. The sun
that was still labouring pale and wan through the sky, obscured by thick
mists, seemed an emblem of the _good cause_; and the cold dank drops of
dew that hung half melted on the beard of the thistle, had something
genial and refreshing in them; for there was a spirit of hope and youth
in all nature, that turned every thing into good. The face of nature had
not then the brand of JUS DIVINUM on it:
‘Like to that sanguine flower inscrib’d with woe.’
On the Tuesday following, the half-inspired speaker came. I was called
down into the room where he was, and went half-hoping, half-afraid. He
received me very graciously, and I listened for a long time without
uttering a word. I did not suffer in his opinion by my silence. ‘For
those two hours,’ he afterwards was pleased to say, ‘he was conversing
with W. H.’s forehead! ‘His appearance was different from what I had
anticipated from seeing him before. At a distance, and in the dim light
of the chapel, there was to me a strange wildness in his aspect, a dusky
obscurity, and I thought him pitted with the small-pox. His complexion
was at that time clear, and even bright—
‘As are the children of yon azure sheen.’
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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