Read 2 plays after supper - 'The Guardian' and 'The Devil of a Wife'. Bed 1.
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Gertrude Savile Print: Book
[Marginalia]
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Samuel Taylor Coleridge Print: Book
'I am glad that Cowley takes his turn with you. Cowley has great merit with me; and the greater, as he is out of fashion in this age of taste. And yet I wonder he is so absolutely neglected, as he wants not point and turn, and wit, and fancy, and an imagination very brilliant: nor puts the reader to vast trouble to understand him
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Samuel Richardson Print: Book
'I am glad that Cowley takes his turn with you. Cowley has great merit with me; and the greater, as he is out of fashion in this age of taste. And yet I wonder he is so absolutely neglected, as he wants not point and turn, and wit, and fancy, and an imagination very brilliant: nor puts the reader to vast trouble to understand him.'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Susanna Highmore Print: Book
'I devoured poetry and nothing but poetry until I became insensible to poetry. Take an example; I happened upon some fat volumes of Campbell's "British Poets", the complete works of from four to eight poets in each volume which cost me 6d. apiece. They had shabby worn leather bindings, and the type was on the small side and closely set. But I ploughed through them, doggedly, as if reading for a bet, or an imposed task. One volume I remember contained the poetical works of Samuel Daniel, Browne, Giles and Phineas Fletcher, Ben Jonson, Drummond (of Ha[w]thornden), John Donne, and some more minor ones. Another contained along with "also rans" Cowley, Milton and "Hudibras" Butler. And, I repeat, I ploughed through them with a stout heart, but little sense, and a dwindling understanding.'
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Thomas A. Jackson Print: Book
'At night home and supped; and after reading a little in Cowley's poems, my head being disturbed overmuch with business today, I to bed.'
Century: 1600-1699 Reader/Listener/Group: Samuel Pepys Print: Book
'And here give me Leave to observe, that amongst the Ladies who have taken up the Pen, I never met with but two who deserved the Name of a [italics] Writer [end italics]; the first is Madam [italics] Dacier [end italics], whose Learning Mr [italics] Pope [end italiocs], while he is indebted to for all the notes on [italics] Homer [end italics], endeavours to depreciate; the second is Mrs. [italics] Catherine Philips [end italics], the matchless [italics] Orinda [end italics], celebrated by Mr [italics] Cowly [end italics], Lord [italics] Orrery [end italics], and all the Men of Genius who lived in her Time.
I think this incomparable Lady was one of the first Refiners of the [italics] English[end italics] Numbers; Mr [italics] Cowly [end italics]'s, though full of Wit, have somewhat harsh and uncouth in them, while her Sentiments are great, and virtuous; her Diction natural, easy, flowing, and harmonious.
Love she has wrote upon with Warmth, but then it was such as Angels might share in without injuring their oringinal purity. Her Elegy on her Husband's Daughter, is a Proof of the Excellency and Tenderness of her own Heart, rarely met with in a Stepmother; nor could I ever read it without tears, a Proof it was wrote from her Heart'.
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Laetitia Pilkington Print: Book
Passages transcribed into E. M. Forster, Commonplace Book (1937) include extract from Cowley's Essay No. 5 ('The Garden'), dedicated to John Evelyn, and opening: 'I never had any other Desire so strong, and so like to Covetousness as that one which I have had always. That I might be Master at last of a small House and a large Garden, with very modern Conveniencies joined to them, and there dedicate the remainder of my Life to the Culture of them and the study of Nature.'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Edward Morgan Forster Print: Book
'[Dr Johnson] expressed his disapprobation of Dr. Hurd, for having published a mutilated edition under the title of "Select Works of Abraham Cowley". Mr. Murphy thought it a bad precedent; observing that any authour might be used in the same manner; and that it was pleasing to see the variety of an authour's compositions, at different periods'.
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Mr Murphy Print: Book
'[Dr Johnson] expressed his disapprobation of Dr. Hurd, for having published a mutilated edition under the title of "Select Works of Abraham Cowley". Mr. Murphy thought it a bad precedent; observing that any authour might be used in the same manner; and that it was pleasing to see the variety of an authour's compositions, at different periods'.
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Samuel Johnson Print: Book
'The Simile to the rope Dancer in Prior's Alma is only a good Versification of Dryden's Thought in the preface to Fresnoy's Art of Painting.
"Plac'd on the isthmus of a narrow State"
that Thought, & almost the whole Line is taken from Cowley.'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Hester Lynch Thrale Print: Book
'I love Johnson's Prose better than Addison's, I like the Dunciad beyond all Pope's Poems; I delight in Young's Satires & in Rubens's Painting, Cowley captivates my Heart; & when I read Bruyere, I often catch myself kissing the Book for fondness of the Author['s] strong-marked Characters, glowing Colours, striking Sentiments - to please - H:L: T.'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Hester Lynch Thrale Print: Book
