Such was Zuleika! such around her shone
The nameless charms unmarked by her alone;
The light of love, the purity of grace,
The mind, the music breathing from her face,
The heart whose softness harmonized the whole,
And oh! that eye was in itself a Soul.
_Bride of Abydos, Canto I_. LORD BYRON.
There's nothing ill can dwell in such a temple;
If the ill spirit have so fair a house,
Good things will strive to dwell with 't.
_The Tempest, Act i. Sc_. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Exceeding fair she was not; and yet fair
In that she never studied to be fairer
Than Nature made her; beauty cost her nothing,
Her virtues were so rare.
_All Fools, Act i. Sc_. 1. G. CHAPMAN.
Her glossy hair was clustered o'er a brow
Bright with intelligence, and fair and smooth;
Her eyebrow's shape was like the aërial bow,
Her cheek all purple with the beam of youth,
Mounting, at times, to a transparent glow,
As if her veins ran lightning.
_Don Juan, Canto I_. LORD BYRON.
The glass of fashion, and the mould of form,
The observed of all observers!
_Hamlet, Act_ iii _Sc_. 1. SHAKESPEARE.
They brought one Pinch, a hungry lean-faced villain,
A mere anatomy, a mountebank,
A threadbare juggler, and a fortune-teller,
A needy, hollow-eyed, sharp-looking wretch,
A living-dead man.
_Comedy of Errors, Act v. Sc_. 1. SHAKESPEARE.
Falstaff sweats to death,
And lards the lean earth as he walks along;
Were't not for laughing, I should pity him.
_K. Henry IV., Pt. I. Act ii. Sc_. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Yond' Cassius has a lean and hungry look;
He thinks too much: such men are dangerous.
_Julius Cæsar, Act i. Sc_. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Seemed washing his hands with invisible soap
In imperceptible water.
_Miss Kilmansegg_. T. HOOD.
Her pretty feet
Like snailes did creep
A little out, and then,
As if they played at bo-peep,
Did soon draw in agen.
_Upon her Feet_. R. HERRICK.
Who the silent man can prize,
If a fool he be or wise?
Yet, though lonely seem the wood,
Therein may lurk the beast of blood;
Often bashful looks conceal
Tongue of fire and heart of steel;
And deem not thou in forest gray,
Every dappled skin thy prey,
Lest thou rouse, with luckless spear,
The tiger for the fallow-deer!
_The Gulistan_. BISHOP HEBER.
HORATIO. I saw him once: he was a goodly king.
HAMLET. He was a man, take him for all in all,
I shall not look upon his like again.
_Hamlet, Act_ i. _Sc_. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
On his bold visage middle age
Had slightly pressed his signet sage,
Yet had not quenched the open truth,
And fiery vehemence of youth;
Forward and frolic glee was there,
The will to do, the soul to dare,
The sparkling glance, soon blown to fire
Of hasty love or headlong ire.
_The Lady of the Lake, Canto I_. SIR W. SCOTT.
Mislike me not for my complexion,
The shadowed livery of the burnished sun,
To whom I am a neighbor, and near bred.
Bring me the fairest creature northward born,
Where Phoebus' fire scarce thaws the icicles,
And let us make incision for your love,
To prove whose blood is reddest, his or mine.
_Merchant of Venice, Act_ ii. _Sc. 1_. SHAKESPEARE.
Incensed with indignation Satan stood
Unterrified, and like a comet burned,
That fires the length of Ophiucus huge
In th' arctic sky, and from his horrid hair
Shakes pestilence and war.
_Paradise Lost, Bk. II_. MILTON.
Look here, upon this picture, and on this;
The counterfeit presentment of two brothers.
See, what a grace was seated on this brow:
Hyperion's curls; the front of Jove himself;
An eye like Mars, to threaten and command;
A station like the herald Mercury,
New lighted on a heaven-kissing hill;
A combination, and a form, indeed,
Where every god did seem to set his seal,
To give the world assurance of a man.
_Hamlet, Act_ iii. _Sc_. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
Ay, every inch a king.
_King Lear, Act_ iv. Sc. 6. SHAKESPEARE.