The King's English (2nd ed, 1906)

• He was so carried away by his discovery that he ventured on the assertion that the similarity between the two languages was so great that an educated German could understand whole strophes of Persian poetry.—H. SWEET.
• I may fairly claim to have no personal interest in defending the council, although I believe, though I am not certain, that ...— Times.

6. METRICAL PROSE

The novice who is conscious of a weakness for the high-flown and the inflated should watch narrowly for metrical snatches in his prose; they are a sure sign that the fit is on him.

• Oh, moralists, who treat of happiness / and self-respect, innate in every sphere / of life, and shedding light on every grain / of dust in God's highway, so smooth below / your carriage-wheels, so rough beneath the tread / of naked feet, bethink yourselves / in looking on the swift descent /of men who have lived in their own esteem, / that there are scores of thousands breathing now, / and breathing thick with painful toil, who in / that high respect have never lived at all, / nor had a chance of life! Go ye, who rest / so placidly upon the sacred Bard / who had been young, and when he strung his harp / was old, ... / go, Teachers of content and honest pride, / into the mine, the mill, the forge, / the squalid depths of deepest ignorance, / and uttermost abyss of man's neglect, / and say can any hopeful plant spring up / in air so foul that it extinguishes / the soul's bright torch as fast as it is kindled! /—DICKENS.
• But now,—now I have resolved to stand alone,— / fighting my battle as a man should fight, / seeking for neither help nor sympathy, / and trusting not in self ... —CORELLI.
• And the gathering orange stain / upon the edge of yonder western peak, / reflects the sunsets of a thousand years.—RUSKIN.
• His veins were opened; but he talked on still / while life was slowly ebbing, and was calm / through all the agony of lingering death.—W. W. CAPES.
• Can I then trust the evidence of sense? / And art thou really to my wish restored? / Never, oh never, did thy beauty shine / with such bewitching grace, as that which now / confounds and captivates my view! / ... Where hast thou lived? where borrowed this perfection? / ... Oh! I am all amazement, joy and fear! / Thou wilt not leave me! No! we must not part / again. By this warm kiss! a thousand times / more sweet than all the fragrance of the East! / we never more will part. O! this is rapture! / ecstasy! and what no language will explain! —SMOLLETT. ...
  

Important: This work is reproduced for readers in countries where the work is in the public domain. To the best of our knowledge, this includes Australia, the US, and the UK. For other countries, you must check your local copyright laws before accessing this work or any part of it.