The World of Literature

William Shakespeare Silvia     WHO is Silvia? What is she?

   That all our swains commend her? Holy, fair, and wise is she;    The heaven such grace did lend her, That she might admired be.

Is she kind as she is fair?    For beauty lives with kindness: Love doth to her eyes repair,    To help him of his blindness; And, being help'd, inhabits there.

Then to Silvia let us sing,    That Silvia is excelling; She excels each mortal thing    Upon the dull earth dwelling: To her let us garlands bring. William Shakespeare

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Robert Browning A Face   If one could have that little head of hers

Painted upon a background of pure gold,Such as the Tuscan's early art prefers!No shade encroaching on the matchless mouldOf those two lips, which should be opening softIn the pure profile; not as when she laughs,For that spoils all: but rather as if aloftYon hyacinth, she loves so, leaned its staff'sBurden of honey-colored buds to kissAnd capture 'twixt the lips apart for this.Then her little neck, three fingers might surround,How it should waver on the pale gold groundUp to the fruit-shaped, perfect chin it lifts!I know, Correggio loves to mass, in riftsOf heaven, his angel faces, orb on orbBreaking its outline, burning shades absorb:But these are only massed there, I should think,Waiting to see some wonder momentlyGrow out, stand full, fade slow against the sky(That's the pale ground you'd see this sweet face by),All heaven, meanwhile, condensed into one eyeWhich fears to lose the wonder, should it wink.

Robert Browning

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Alfred Tennyson A Farewell   Flow down, cold rivulet, to the sea,

Thy tribute wave deliver:No more by thee my steps shall be,For ever and for ever.

Flow, softly flow, by lawn and lea,A rivulet then a river:Nowhere by thee my steps shall beFor ever and for ever.

But here will sigh thine alder treeAnd here thine aspen shiver;And here by thee will hum the bee,For ever and for ever.

A thousand suns will stream on thee,A thousand moons will quiver;But not by thee my steps shall be,For ever and for ever.

Alfred Lord Tennyson

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Robert Burns MY BONNIE MARY by: Robert Burns (1759-1796) O fetch to me a pint o' wine, An' fill it in

a silver tassie, That I may drink, before I go, A service to my bonnie lassie. The boat rocks at the pier o' Leith, Fu' loud the wind blaws frae the ferry, The ship rides by the Berwick-law, And I maun leave my bonnie Mary.   The trumpets sound, the banners fly, The glittering spears are rankèd ready; The shouts o' war are heard afar, The battle closes thick and bloody; But it's no the roar o' sea or shore Wad mak me langer wish to tarry; Nor shout o' war that's heard afar-- It's leaving thee, my bonnie Mary!

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Edgar Allan Poe A Dream Within A Dream

by Edgar Allan Poe(published 1850)

  Take this kiss upon the brow!And, in parting from you now,Thus much let me avow --You are not wrong, who deemThat my days have been a dream;Yet if hope has flown awayIn a night, or in a day,In a vision, or in none,Is it therefore the less gone?All that we see or seemIs but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roarOf a surf-tormented shore,And I hold within my handGrains of the golden sand --How few! yet how they creepThrough my fingers to the deep,While I weep -- while I weep!O God! can I not graspThem with a tighter clasp?O God! can I not saveOne from the pitiless wave?Is all that we see or seemBut a dream within a dream?

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John Keats Bright Star

Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art-- Not in lone splendour hung aloft the nightAnd watching, with eternal lids apart,Like nature's patient, sleepless Eremite,The moving waters at their priestlike taskOf pure ablution round earth's human shores,Or gazing on the new soft-fallen maskOf snow upon the mountains and the moors--No--yet still stedfast, still unchangeable,Pillow'd upon my fair love's ripening breast,To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,And so live ever--or else swoon to death.

John Keats

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John Milton On Shakespear

  What needs my Shakespear for his honour'd Bones,The labour of an age in piled Stones,Or that his hallow'd reliques should be hidUnder a Star-ypointing Pyramid?Dear son of memory, great heir of Fame,What need'st thou such weak witnes of thy name?Thou in our wonder and astonishmentHast built thy self a live-long Monument.For whilst toth' shame of slow-endeavouring art,Thy easie numbers flow, and that each heartHath from the leaves of thy unvalu'd Book,Those Delphick lines with deep impression tookThen thou our fancy of it self bereaving,Dost make us Marble with too much conceaving;And so Sepulcher'd in such pomp dost lie,That Kings for such a Tomb would wish to die. John Milton

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Friedrich von Schiller Evening

  Oh! thou bright-beaming god, the plains are thirsting,Thirsting for freshening dew, and man is pining;Wearily move on thy horses--Let, then, thy chariot descend!

Seest thou her who, from ocean's crystal billows,Lovingly nods and smiles?--Thy heart must know her!Joyously speed on thy horses,--Tethys, the goddess, 'tis nods!

Swiftly from out his flaming chariot leaping,Into her arms he springs,--the reins takes Cupid,--Quietly stand the horses,Drinking the cooling flood.

Now from the heavens with gentle step descending,Balmy night appears, by sweet love followed;Mortals, rest ye, and love ye,--Phoebus, the loving one, rests!

Friedrich von Schiller

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Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

IT IS GOOD by: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe N Paradise while moonbeams played,

Jehovah found, in slumber deep, Adam fast sunk; He gently laid Eve near him -- she, too, fell asleep. There lay they now, on earth's fair shrine, God's two most beauteous thoughts divine-- When this He saw, He cried: 'Tis good! And scarce could move from where He stood.   No wonder, that our joy's complete While eye and eye responsive meet, When this blest thought of rapture moves us-- That we're with Him who truly loves us, And if He cries -- Good, let it be! 'Tis so for both, it seems to me. Thou'rt clasped within these arms of mine, Dearest of all God's thoughts divine!

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