Passing thoughts in sonnet stanzas : with other poems, original and translated / [Anon., i.e. B.G. Babington].

  • Benjamin Guy Babington
Date:
1854
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Passing thoughts in sonnet stanzas : with other poems, original and translated / [Anon., i.e. B.G. Babington]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

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    however feeble; and they are offered as a small contribution to the common stock of literature, in the hope that they may afford some amusement, and prove of some utility. The author has long thought, and in this volume endeavours to prove, that the sonnet is applicable to a more extended purpose than that to which it is usually restricted—the expression of some senti- ment of love or other strong emotion. In the following pages he has made the experiment of employing it for description—for satire—for criti- cism ; and with reference to subjects light as well as grave; in short for the general service of verse. How far he has succeeded, the reader must judge for himself. The Sonnets will be found for the most part to follow strictly the laws of versification laid down for this species of composition: that is to say, the first eight lines are confined to two measures of four lines each, with only two rhymes in all, accord- ing to the following formula, a. b. b. a. a. b. b. a. In the last six lines there are three rhvines, but