Quick Excerpts, from a Library of 492 Titles

Generated 2022-07-28 13:25:02

Excerpt #1, from Vision and Design, by Roger Fry

…An interesting characteristic of these late frescoes is the revival which they declare of Giotto’s early love for classical architecture. He may well have recognised the pictorial value of the large untroubled rectangular spaces which it allowed. In the “Salome” he has approached even more nearly to purely classic forms than in his earliest frescoes at Assisi. The building has an almost Palladian effect with its square parapets surmounted by statues, some of which are clearly derived from the antique. In the soldier who brings in the Baptist’s head he has reverted to the costume of the Roman soldier, whereas, in the allegory of Chastity, the soldiers wear mediæval winged helmets. The fact that there is a free copy of this fresco by the Lorenzetti at Siena made in 1331 gives us the period before which this must have been finished. Here again the mood is singularly placid, but the intensity with which Giotto realised a particularly dramatic moment is shown by a curious detail in which this differs from the usual rendering of the scene. Most artists, wishing to express the essentials of the story, make Salome continue her dance while the head is brought in. But Giotto was too deep a psychologist to make such an error. At the tragic moment she stops dancing and makes sad music on her lyre, to show that she, too, is not wanting in proper sensibility. There is evidence in these frescoes of an artistic quality which we…

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Excerpt #2, from Symbolic Logic, by Lewis Carroll

…Representing these on a Triliteral Diagram, we get ·—————· |(O) | (O)| | ·—|—· | | |(O)|(I)| | |—|—|—|—| | |(O)| | | | ·—|—· | |(I) | | ·—————· And this information, transferred to a Biliteral Diagram, is ·——-· |(O)|(I)| |—|—| |(I)| | ·——-· Here we get two Conclusions, viz. “All x are y’; All y are x’.” pg063 And these, translated into concrete form, are…

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Excerpt #3, from A Guide to the Scientific Knowledge of Things Familiar, by Ebenezer Cobham Brewer

…if, after this, the weather clear up, you may expect very severe cold. Q. How can you know if the MERCURY of the barometer be RISING? A. If it be convex (i. e. higher in the middle than at the sides;) it is in a rising state. Q. How can you tell if the MERCURY of the barometer be about to FALL? A. If it be concave (i. e. hollow in the middle) it is in a falling state. Q. Why is the mercury CONVEX when it is RISING? A. The sides of the mercury rub against the glass tube, and are delayed by it, so that the middle part rises faster than the sides. Q. Why is the mercury CONCAVE when it is FALLING? A. The sides of the mercury rub against the glass tube, and are delayed by it, so that the middle part sinks faster than the sides. Q. What effect does a THUNDER-STORM produce on the weather? A. Thunder is generally preceded by hot weather, and followed by cold and showery weather. Q. What effect does a SUDDEN CHANGE produce on the weather? A. A great and sudden change (either from hot to cold, or from cold to…

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Excerpt #4, from Frankenstein; Or, The Modern Prometheus, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

…In this description of our domestic circle I include Henry Clerval; for he was constantly with us. He went to school with me, and generally passed the afternoon at our house; for being an only child, and destitute of companions at home, his father was well pleased that he should find associates at our house; and we were never completely happy when Clerval was absent. I feel pleasure in dwelling on the recollections of childhood, before misfortune had tainted my mind, and changed its bright visions of extensive usefulness into gloomy and narrow reflections upon self. But, in drawing the picture of my early days, I must not omit to record those events which led, by insensible steps to my after tale of misery: for when I would account to myself for the birth of that passion, which afterwards ruled my destiny, I find it arise, like a mountain river, from ignoble and almost forgotten sources; but, swelling as it proceeded, it became the torrent which, in its course, has swept away all my hopes and joys. Natural philosophy is the genius that has regulated my fate; I desire therefore, in this narration, to state those facts which led to my predilection for that science. When I was thirteen years of age, we all went on a party of pleasure to the baths near Thonon: the inclemency of the weather obliged us to remain a day confined to the inn. In this…

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Excerpt #5, from Macbeth, by William Shakespeare

…Clamour’d the live-long night. Some say the earth Was feverous, and did shake. MACBETH. ’Twas a rough night. LENNOX…. My young remembrance cannot parallel A fellow to it. Enter Macduff. MACDUFF. O horror, horror, horror! Tongue nor heart cannot conceive nor name thee! MACBETH, LENNOX. What’s the matter? MACDUFF. Confusion now hath made his masterpiece! Most sacrilegious murder hath broke ope The Lord’s anointed temple, and stole thence The life o’ th’ building. MACBETH. What is’t you say? the life? LENNOX….

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Excerpt #6, from A Humorous History of England, by Charles Harrison

…Give Wolsey then a tender thought. His main ambition that the King Should be supreme in everything; Thomas And Thomas Cromwell followed suit Cromwell To make his master absolute Head of the Church within his realm. These two most able at the helm; But not with skill enough endued To ‘scape their King’s ingratitude. Despotical the King’s power grew. He’s England’s Pope by Act of Su- Premacy; as, to gain divorce, The foreign Pope is banned perforce. 1537 Now Bluff King Harry gives the Monks A series of most awful funks; Three thousand odd of their domains He ’collars’ for his Courtiers’ gains. Edward VI. Edward Six to the throne succeeds 1547-1553 A pious youth of goodly deeds; One, well known in the Capital, The Blue Coat School (Christ’s Hospital)….

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Excerpt #7, from The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne

…object which would fain have been, or at least ought to be, concealed. In this little, lonesome dwelling, with some slender means that she possessed, and by the license of the magistrates, who still kept an inquisitorial watch over her, Hester established herself, with her infant child. A mystic shadow of suspicion immediately attached itself to the spot. Children, too young to comprehend wherefore this woman should be shut out from the sphere of human charities, would creep nigh enough to behold her plying her needle at the cottage-window, or standing in the doorway, or laboring in her little garden, or coming forth along the pathway that led townward; and, discerning the scarlet letter on her breast, would scamper off with a strange, contagious fear. Lonely as was Hester’s situation, and without a friend on earth who dared to show himself, she, however, incurred no risk of want. She possessed an art that sufficed, even in a land that afforded comparatively little scope for its exercise, to supply food for her thriving infant and herself. It was the art—then, as now, almost the only one within a woman’s grasp—of needlework. She bore on her breast, in the curiously embroidered letter, a specimen of her delicate and imaginative skill, of which the dames of a court might gladly have availed themselves, to add the richer and more spiritual…

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Excerpt #8, from A System of Logic, Ratiocinative and Inductive, by John Stuart Mill

…only of one individual thing; but to describe it is to affirm a connection between it and every other thing which is either denoted or connoted by any of the terms used. To begin with an example, than which none can be conceived more elementary: I have a sensation of sight, and I endeavor to describe it by saying that I see something white. In saying this, I do not solely affirm my sensation; I also class it. I assert a resemblance between the thing I see, and all things which I and others are accustomed to call white. I assert that it resembles them in the circumstance in which they all resemble one another, in that which is the ground of their being called by the name. This is not merely one way of describing an observation, but the only way. If I would either register my observation for my own future use, or make it known for the benefit of others, I must assert a resemblance between the fact which I have observed and something else. It is inherent in a description, to be the statement of a resemblance, or resemblances. We thus see that it is impossible to express in words any result of observation, without performing an act possessing what Dr. Whewell considers to be characteristic of Induction. There is always something introduced which was not included in the observation itself; some conception common to the phenomenon with other phenomena to which it is compared. An observation can not be spoken of in language at all without…

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Excerpt #9, from Now It Can Be Told, by Philip Gibbs

…One officer and one hundred and thirteen men surrendered. The officer was glad to escape from the death to which he had resigned himself when our bombardment began. “I knew how it would be,” he said. “We had orders to take this ground, and took it; but we knew you would come back again. You had to do so. So here I am.” Parts of the line were deserted, except by the dead. In one place the stores which had been buried by the Canadians before they left were still there, untouched by the enemy. Our bombardment had made it impossible for his troops to consolidate their position and to hold the line steady. They had just taken cover in the old bits of trench, in shell-holes and craters, and behind scattered sand-bags, and had been pounded there. The Canadians were back again. PART FIVE. THE HEART OF A CITY AMIENS IN TIME OF WAR I During the battles of the Somme in 1916, and afterward in periods of progress and retreat over the abominable fields, the city of Amiens was the capital of the British army. When the battles began in July of that year it was only a short distance away from the fighting-lines; near…

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Excerpt #10, from The Black Arrow: A Tale of the Two Roses, by Robert Louis Stevenson

…mansion, framed in carven oak, and covered by a low-pitched roof of thatch. To the back there stretched a garden, full of fruit-trees, alleys, and thick arbours, and overlooked from the far end by the tower of the abbey church. The house might contain, upon a pinch, the retinue of a greater person than Sir Daniel; but even now it was filled with hubbub. The court rang with arms and horseshoe-iron; the kitchens roared with cookery like a bees’-hive; minstrels, and the players of instruments, and the cries of tumblers, sounded from the hall. Sir Daniel, in his profusion, in the gaiety and gallantry of his establishment, rivalled with Lord Shoreby, and eclipsed Lord Risingham. All guests were made welcome. Minstrels, tumblers, players of chess, the sellers of relics, medicines, perfumes, and enchantments, and along with these every sort of priest, friar, or pilgrim, were made welcome to the lower table, and slept together in the ample lofts, or on the bare boards of the long dining-hall. On the afternoon following the wreck of the Good Hope, the buttery, the kitchens, the stables, the covered cartshed that surrounded two sides of the court, were all crowded by idle people, partly belonging to Sir Daniel’s establishment, and attired in his livery of murrey and blue, partly nondescript strangers attracted to the town by greed, and received…

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Excerpt #11, from Right Ho, Jeeves, by P. G. Wodehouse

…“A liberal tumblerful, sir.” “Would that be a normal dose for an adult defeatist, do you think?” “I fancy it should prove adequate, sir.” “I wonder. We must not spoil the ship for a ha’porth of tar. I think I’ll add just another fluid ounce or so.” “I would not advocate it, sir. In the case of Lord Brancaster’s parrot—-” “You are falling into your old error, Jeeves, of thinking that Gussie is a parrot. Fight against this. I shall add the oz.” “Very good, sir.”… “And, by the way, Jeeves, Mr. Fink-Nottle is in the market for bright, clean stories to use in his speech. Do you know any?” “I know a story about two Irishmen, sir.” “Pat and Mike?” “Yes, sir.” “Who were walking along Broadway?” “Yes, sir.” “Just what he wants. Any more?” “No, sir.” “Well, every little helps. You had better go and tell it to him.” “Very good, sir.”…

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Excerpt #12, from On War, by Carl von Clausewitz

…For Generals and Armies whose reputation is not made, this is in itself one of the difficulties in many operations, justified by circumstances when a succession of combats, each ending in retreat, may appear as a succession of defeats, without being so in reality, and when that appearance may exercise a very depressing influence. It is impossible for the retreating General by making known his real intentions to prevent the moral effect spreading to the public and his troops, for to do that with effect he must disclose his plans completely, which of course would run counter to his principal interests to too great a degree. In order to draw attention to the special importance of this conception of victory we shall only refer to the battle of Soor,(*) the trophies from which were not important (a few thousand prisoners and twenty guns), and where Frederick proclaimed his victory by remaining for five days after on the field of battle, although his retreat into Silesia had been previously determined on, and was a measure natural to his whole situation. According to his own account, he thought he would hasten a peace by the moral effect of his victory. Now although a couple of other successes were likewise required, namely, the battle at Katholisch Hennersdorf, in Lusatia, and the battle of Kesseldorf, before this peace took place, still we cannot say that the moral effect…

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