Vulgar words in The Battle of the Books and other Short Pieces (Page 1)
This book at a glance
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~ ~ ~ Sentence 162 ~ ~ ~
At length, in the borrowed shape of an ass, the regent mistook him for a Modern; by which means he had time and opportunity to escape to the Ancients, just when the spider and the bee were entering into their contest; to which he gave his attention with a world of pleasure, and, when it was ended, swore in the loudest key that in all his life he had never known two cases, so parallel and adapt to each other as that in the window and this upon the shelves.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 203 ~ ~ ~
The goddess herself had claws like a cat; her head, and ears, and voice resembled those of an ass; her teeth fallen out before, her eyes turned inward, as if she looked only upon herself; her diet was the overflowing of her own gall; her spleen was so large as to stand prominent, like a dug of the first rate; nor wanted excrescences in form of teats, at which a crew of ugly monsters were greedily sucking; and, what is wonderful to conceive, the bulk of spleen increased faster than the sucking could diminish it.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 288 ~ ~ ~
And Æsop dreamed that as he and the Ancient were lying on the ground, a wild ass broke loose, ran about, trampling and kicking in their faces.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 307 ~ ~ ~
As a young lion in the Libyan plains, or Araby desert, sent by his aged sire to hunt for prey, or health, or exercise, he scours along, wishing to meet some tiger from the mountains, or a furious boar; if chance a wild ass, with brayings importune, affronts his ear, the generous beast, though loathing to distain his claws with blood so vile, yet, much provoked at the offensive noise, which Echo, foolish nymph, like her ill-judging sex, repeats much louder, and with more delight than Philomela's song, he vindicates the honour of the forest, and hunts the noisy long-eared animal.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 327 ~ ~ ~
And yet, with all his faults, he sets up to be a universal reformer and corrector of abuses, a remover of grievances, rakes into every slut's corner of nature, bringing hidden corruptions to the light, and raises a mighty dust where there was none before, sharing deeply all the while in the very same pollutions he pretends to sweep away.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 389 ~ ~ ~
On the 23rd a famous buffoon of the playhouse will die a ridiculous death, suitable to his vocation.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 512 ~ ~ ~
Thus Dædalus and Ovid too, That man's a blockhead have confessed, Powel and Stretch [1] the hint pursue; Life is the farce, the world a jest.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 514 ~ ~ ~
What Momus was of old to Jove The same harlequin is now; The former was buffoon above, The latter is a Punch below.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 678 ~ ~ ~
When miss delights in her spinnet, A fiddler may a fortune get; A blockhead, with melodious voice In boarding-schools can have his choice; And oft the dancing-master's art Climbs from the toe to touch the heart.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 784 ~ ~ ~
But, lest we should for honour take The drunken quarrels of a rake, Or think it seated in a scar, Or on a proud triumphal car, Or in the payment of a debt, We lose with sharpers at piquet; Or, when a whore in her vocation, Keeps punctual to an assignation; Or that on which his lordship swears, When vulgar knaves would lose their ears: Let Stella's fair example preach A lesson she alone can teach.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 931 ~ ~ ~
I confess, if it were certain that so great an advantage would redound to the nation by this expedient, I would submit, and be silent; but will any man say, that if the words, whoring, drinking, cheating, lying, stealing, were, by Act of Parliament, ejected out of the English tongue and dictionaries, we should all awake next morning chaste and temperate, honest and just, and lovers of truth?
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,027 ~ ~ ~
This great town is usually provided with some player, mimic, or buffoon, who hath a general reception at the good tables; familiar and domestic with persons of the first quality, and usually sent for at every meeting to divert the company, against which I have no objection.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,171 ~ ~ ~
Augustus meeting an ass with a lucky name foretold himself good fortune.