Various

“ Petrarch's fountain, for here every thing is Petrarch's, springs and expands itself beneath an artificial arch, a little below the church, and abounds plentifully, in the driest season, with that soft water which was the ancient wealth of the Euganean Hills. ”

“ A little wild, irregular walk runs, serpent like, all round the garden, which, situated at the head of the valley, is shut in by the hills—itself a wilderness of luxuriance and beauty. It was a glorious evening, and every thing in agreement with our quiet feeling. I am not an enthusiast, and to you I need not affect to be other than I am ”

“ If it is not a well of English undefiled to which the poet as well as the philologist must repair, if they would drink of the living waters, it is a clear stream of current English—the vernacular speech of his age, sometimes indeed in its rusticity and coarseness, but always in its plainness and its strength. ”

“ Every evil effect about Swansea, however, is ascribed to the copper smoke. The houses in this district are remarkable for clean exterior: the custom of whitewashing the roofs, as well as the walls, produces a pleasing effect, and is a relief to the eye in such a desert. There are eight large copper smelting establishments, besides several rolling-mills, now at work; the whole country is covered with tram-roads and coal-pits, many of which vomit forth their mineral treasures close to the road side. ”

“ The last stage of this painful, though glorious, course, in which fresh power was, at every step, wrung from out of his soul, was that at which we are now arrived, his marriage and its results,—without which, dear as was the price paid by him in peace and character, his career would have been incomplete, and the world still left in ignorance of the full compass of his genius. ”

“ There is more healthful exercise for the mind in the uneven paths of middling life, than there is on the Macadamized road of fortune. Were the year all summer, how tiresome would be the green leaves and the bright sunshine—as, indeed, those will admit, who have lived in climates where vegetation is always at work. ”

“ Thus surrounded by vexations, and thus deeply feeling them, it is not too much to say, that any other spirit but his own would have sunk under the struggle, and lost, perhaps, irrecoverably, that level of self-esteem which alone affords a stand against the shocks of fortune. ”

“ He knows why a family, who hate the French with all the fervour of British prejudice, visits Paris, and remains there for a year or two; he can give a good reason why a man who delights in a well preserved property in a sporting country, with a house well built and beautifully situated, consents to "spare it," at a reduced price, to a man for whom he cares nothing upon earth: and looks at the world fully alive to the motives, and perfectly aware of the circumstances, of three-fourths of the unconscious actors by whom he is surrounded. ”

“ That love is no more made by talking of it, than a black pudding would be. Habit, association, assimilation of tastes, communion of thought, kindness without pretension, solicitude without effort, a tacit agreement and a silent sympathy; these are the excitements and stimulants of the only sort of love that is worth thinking of. ”

“ Every thing is preserved with a reverential care that does honour to the people; and his chair, like less holy and less credible relics, is inclosed in a wire-frame, to prevent the dilapidations of the curious. I believe these things to be genuine. I believe in the local traditions that point out his study, and his kitchen, and his dying chamber.—Petrarch was all but idolized in his own time, and his fame has known no diminution ”

“ There are with all great affairs smaller affairs connected, so that in the watch-work of society, the most skilful artist is sometimes puzzled to fix upon the very little wheel by which the greater wheels are worked. ”

“ Not only would such an excitement have been insufficient to waken up the new energies still dormant in him, but that consciousness of his own errors, which was for ever livelily present in his mind, would, under such circumstances, have been left, undisturbed by any unjust provocation, to work its usual softening and, perhaps, humbling influences on his spirit. ”

“ What an extraordinary triumph of the ingenuity of man, when it is considered that one of these gigantic engines can be stopped in an instant, by the mere application of the fingers and thumb of the engineer to a screw! The quantity of coals consumed by the copper-works is enormous. We have heard that Messrs. Vivians, who have the largest works on the river, alone consume 40,000 tons annually: this coal is all small, and not fit for exportation. The copper trade may be considered as comparatively of modern date. The first smelting works were erected at Swansea, about a century ago ”

“ He, too, by witnessing the frequently recurring scenes of death, beholds the genuine sorrow of the bereaved wife, or the devoted husband—and can, by the constant unpremeditated exhibitions of fondness and feeling, appreciate the affection which exists in such and such places, and understand, with an almost magical power, the value of the links by which society is held together. ”

“ Even the adult becomes himself like the child who cannot be satisfied with the repetition of a favourite tale, but harasses the story-telling aunt or nurse, to know more of the incidents and characters. In this respect Bunyan has contrived a contrast, which, far from exhausting his subject, opens new sources of attraction, and adds to the original impression. ”

“ Our music is the finest in the world, and the German come after; you other English have no music; and if you had some, you have no language to sing with. It is necessary that you may avow your language is not useful for the purpose ordinary of the world. ”

“ None of our fellow-creatures enjoy life more than the successful member of one of the learned professions. There is, it is true, constant toil; but there are constant excitement, activity, and enthusiasm; at least, where there is not enthusiasm in a profession, success will never come—and as to the affairs of the world in general, the divine, the lawyer, and the medical man, are more conversant and mixed up with them, than any other human beings—cabinet ministers themselves, not excepted. ”

“ The whole academy were affected at this contretems; they had received a little before, as member, a court wit, whose eloquence, light and lively, was the admiration of the populace, and saw themselves obliged to refuse Doctor Zeb, who was the very scourge of chatterers, and with a head so well formed and furnished. ”

“ Christian, for example, a man, and a bold one, is represented as enduring his fatigues, trials, and combats, by his own stout courage, under the blessing of heaven: but to express that species of inspired heroism by which women are supported in the path of duty, notwithstanding the natural feebleness and timidity of their nature, Christiana and Mercy obtain from the interpreter their guide, called Great-heart, by whose strength and valour their lack of both is supplied, and the dangers and distresses of the way repelled and overcome. ”

“ Selden says, "Nature must be the ground work of wit and art, otherwise whatever is done will prove but Jack-pudding's work.
"Wit must grow like fingers; if it be taken from others, 'tis like plums stuck upon black thorns; they are there for awhile, but they come to nothing.
"Women ought not to know their own wit, because they will be showing it, and so spoil it; like a child that will constantly be showing its fine new coat, till at length it all bedaubs it with its pah hands. ”

“ Brighton will be as good a residence as any other; there's nobody there knows much of either of you; and the place has got so big, that you may be as snug as you please; a large town and a large party, are the best possible shelters for love matters. ”

“ The eminent medical man stands, if not upon higher ground, at least in a more interesting position. As he mingles with the gay assembly, or visits the crowded ball, he knows the latent ills, the hidden, yet incurable disorders of the laughing throng by which he is encircled ”

“ In all the relations of son, brother, father, he is deserving all honour; and I know not another instance of such long-continued, sincere, and graceful friendships, through all varieties of fortune, from the Cardinal of Cabassole, to the poor fisherman at Vaucluse, as his life offers ”

“ The divine, by the sacred nature of his calling, and the higher character of his duties, is, perhaps, farther removed from an immediate contact with society; his labours are of a more exalted order, and the results of those labours not open to ordinary observation ”

“ Vale of Tawy—Copper Works, &c.—Coal Trade.—In our former paper2 we gave a description of the Vale of Tawy, as it appears by night; we will now again revisit it. The stranger who explores this vale must expect to return with a bad headache. We have described it as a desolate looking place, when seen at night, but the darkness only throws a veil over its barrenness. The face of the country, which would otherwise have been beautiful, is literally scorched by the desolating effects of the copper smoke ”

“ The annual import of ore into Swansea in 1812 was 53,353 tons; in 1819, 70,256 tons were brought coastwise: besides which, several thousand tons of copper ore are imported from America every year. Since this period there has been a large increase. Most of the ships which are freighted with copper ore load back with coal, for the Cornish and Irish markets. Of bituminous, in 1812, 43,529 chalders, and in 1819, 46,457 chalders were shipped coastwise, besides a foreign trade of about 5,000 chalders every year. ”

“ The jokes, bon-mots, the little adventures, which may do very well (says Chesterfield) in one company will seem flat and tedious when related in another—they are often ill-timed, and prefaced thus: 'I will tell you an excellent thing.' This raises expectations, which when absolutely disappointed, make the relator of this excellent thing look, very deservedly, like a fool. ”

“ A canal runs up the vale into the country for sixteen miles, to an elevation of 372 feet: it is flanked near the copper-works by many millions of tons of copper slag; and there are no less than thirty-six locks on the line. It is a fact, that in spite of the infernal atmosphere, a great many of the people employed in these works attain old age. ”

“ Indeed, whosoever will take the trouble of comparing the two works which, turning upon nearly the same allegory, and bearing very similar titles, came into existence at or about the very same time, will plainly see their total dissimilarity. Bunyan's is a close and continued allegory, [pg 11] in which the metaphorical fiction is sustained with all the minuteness of a real story. In Dr. Patrick's the same plan is generally announced as arising from the earnest longing of a traveller, whom he calls Philotheus or Theophilus, whose desires are fixed on journeying to Jerusalem as a pilgrim. ”

“ They are the chaps "wot" makes time-bargains—they speculate for thousands, having nothing in the world—and then at the wind-up of a week or two, pay each other what they call the difference: that is to say, the change between what they cannot get, and what they have not got. ”

“ But he left to another and very inferior hand the task of composing a third part, containing the adventures of one Tender Conscience, far unworthy to be bound up, as it sometimes is, with John Bunyan's matchless parable."
'Tis necessary a writing critic should understand how to write. And though every writer is not bound to show himself in the capacity of critic, every writing critic is bound to show himself capable of being a writer. ”

“ I never saw such a mode to walk; they take steps long like the man! Very pretty women! but not equal to ours! White skins, and the tint fresh, but they have no mouths nor no eyes. Our women have lips like rose-buttons ”

“ Great hopes are now entertained here that government will abolish the oppressive duty on sea-borne coal. In the stone-coal and culm3 trade, Swansea and Neath almost supply the whole kingdom. Independent of foreign trade, 55,066 chalders of culm and 10,319 tons of stone-coal were shipped coastwise in 1819: last year the ports of Swansea and Neath shipped 123,000 chalders of stone-coal and culm. Stone-coal improves in quality as it advances westward. ”

“ All his sonnets together do not shed a lustre on him equal to the sincere, single-hearted, mild, yet uncompromising spirit that breathes throughout the letters of advice and remonstrance, which, not idly or obstrusively, but under the sanction and authority of his great name, and the affectionate regard professed for him, he addressed to all whom he believed influential either for good or ill ”

“ The climate of these volcanic hills is warmer, and the vintage begins a week sooner than in the plains of Padua. Petrarch is laid, for he cannot be said to be buried, in a sarcophagus of red marble, raised on four pilasters on an elevated base, and preserved from an association with meaner tombs. ”

“ In the year 1822 the produce of the Cornish copper mines amounted to 106,723 tons of ore, which produced 9,331 tons of copper, and 676,285l. in money. In the same year, the quantity of tin ore raised was only 20,000 tons. The Irish and Welsh ores are generally much richer than those of [pg 6] Cornwall; but occasionally they strike on a very rich lode (or vein) in that county. Last spring, some ore from the Penstruthal mine was ticketed at Truro, at the enormous price of 54l. ”