Vulgar words in The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Volume III (Page 1)

This book at a glance

ass x 1
bastard x 1
blockhead x 2
damn x 4
make love x 1
            
piss x 1
whore x 2
            

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~   ~   ~   Sentence 362   ~   ~   ~

The Lover's Watch; or the Art of making love.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 679   ~   ~   ~

Laureat who was both learn'd and florid, Was damn'd long since for silence horrid: Nor had there been such clutter made, But that his silence did invade.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 724   ~   ~   ~

If God has not blessed you with the talent of rhiming, make use of my poor stock and welcome; let your verses run upon my feet, and for the utmost refuge of notorious blockheads, reduced to the last extremity of sense, turn my own lines against me, and in utter despair of my own satire, make me satirize myself.'

~   ~   ~   Sentence 909   ~   ~   ~

This play, Mr. Langbain tells us, was damned on the stage, or as the author expresses it in the epistle dedicatory, succeeded ill in the representation; but whether the fault was in the play itself, or in the lameness of the action, or in the numbers of its enemies, who came resolved to damn it for the title, he will not pretend any more than the author to determine.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 1,094   ~   ~   ~

At that dear name I feel my heart rebound, Like the old steed, at the fierce trumpet's sound; I grow impatient of the least delay, No bastard swain shall bear the prize away.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 1,411   ~   ~   ~

Dame Dobson, or the Cunning Woman, a Comedy; acted and damn'd at the duke's theatre, printed in quarto, 1684.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 2,017   ~   ~   ~

The various remarks I made (some dancing, some prancing; some clapping, some knapping; some drinking, some winking; some kissing, some pissing; some reeling, some stealing) urged my curiosity to enquire for what it was possible those noble sports might be ordained, and was soon satisfied it was the Anniversary Feast of their Great Lady Proserpine's birth-day.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 2,036   ~   ~   ~

there is still an old proverb to cross us, I found there no room for the sons of Parnassus; And therefore contented like others to fare, To the shades of Elizium I strait did repair; Where Dryden and other great wits o' the town, To reward all their labours, are damn'd to write on.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 2,317   ~   ~   ~

Mr. Dennis, in his Letters quoted above, has given a particular relation of the beginning of his acquaintance with this celebrated beauty of the times, which is singular enough.--One day Mr. Wycherley riding in his chariot through St. James's Park, he was met by the duchess, whose chariot jostled with his, upon which she looked out of her chariot, and spoke very audibly, "You Wycherley, you are a son of a whore," and then burst into a fit of laughter.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 2,395   ~   ~   ~

Johnson's Eastward Hoe or the Devil is an Ass.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 2,981   ~   ~   ~

Blockheads with reason wicked wits abhor, But fool with fool is barb'rous civil war.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 3,151   ~   ~   ~

'There are many lines (says Jacob) in this play, above the genius which generally appears in the other works of this author; but he has perverted the characters of Ovid, in making Daphne, the chaste favourite of Diana, a whore, and a jilt; and fair Syrene to lose her reputation, in the unknown ignominy of an envious, mercenary, infamous woman.'

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