This, indeed, makes all the institutions of America, civil and religious, little better than a solemn mockery, a tragical jest for the passers-by of other nations, who, seeing two millions and a half of slaves held in fetters by vaunting freemen and ostentatious patriots, wag the head at the disgusting sight, and cry out deridingly to degraded America, 'The worm is spread under thee, and the worms cover thee.'

An honourable member, Mr. Smith, had done well to introduce those tragical stories which had made such an impression upon the House.

"I should much commend," says the excellent Sir Henry Wotton in a letter to Milton, "the tragical part if the lyrical did not ravish me with a certain Dorique delicacy in your songs and odes, whereunto, I must plainly confess to you, I have seen yet nothing parallel in our language."

The first criminal and murderer, Cain, who acquired a knowledge of guilt, and through guilt acquired a knowledge of virtue by repentance, and so came to understand the meaning of life, is a tragical figure more significant, and almost more respectable, than all the innocent fools in the world put together.

If they hear, or read, or see any tragical object, it sticks by them, they are afraid of death, and yet weary of their lives, in their discontented humours they quarrel with all the world, bitterly inveigh, tax satirically, and because they cannot otherwise vent their passions or redress what is amiss, as they mean, they will by violent death at last be revenged on themselves.

So tragical an event seemed to Wilkes to furnish him with exactly such an opportunity as he desired to push himself into farther notoriety.

The tragical as well as "fantastic tricks" which "Man, proud man, Drest in a little brief authority," plays with his energy and bad passions under the guise of duty, is among the most perplexing of those spectacles, which, according to a greater understanding than Dante's, "make the angels weep."

The notion of himself in a situation as valet was half ridiculous and half tragical.

The tragical death of the Duke of Orleans no more alleviated the ills of France than did that of the Duke of Burgundy sixteen years laterfor he in his turn was the victim of a conspiracy, and was assassinated on the bridge of Montereau in the presence of the Dauphin (Fig. 283).

For my own part, I had already congratulated myself on the tragical stories I should be able to present to my readers; I beheld them shedding tears at the narration of the sufferings we had experienced, and I already appeared to myself half a martyr.

At 9 o'clock he went on board the boat, set off at 10, and a quarter of an hour afterwards, in the midst of thousands of schampans and other craft, met his tragical end.

Confounded by the tragical event that had taken place, Leonard remained with his eyes fixed upon the blood-stained pavement, until he was roused by an arm which gently drew him away, while the voice of the Earl of Rochester breathed in his ear, "This is a sad occurrence, Leonard; and yet it is most fortunate for you, for it removes the only obstacle to your union with the Lady Isabella.

But a tragical fate, alas, Us, poor mortals, constrains to bear

he would have one believe that it has a most tragical record of capture and recapture.

And now right greedily All hands are stretching forth the songs to buy, That are so tragical; which She, and She, Deals out, and sings the while; nor can there be A breast so obdurate here, that will hold back His contribution from the gentle rack Of Music's pleasing torture.

But perhaps a young mother with her new-born babe on her breast is the most tragical of all pictures of unsuspecting joy, for none of all the trusting sons and daughters of men is destined in the end to find herself so tragically, one might say cynically, fooled.

The blank verse is well adapted to her realism, though it does not always answer well to the more dramatic and tragical and impassioned portions of the story.

Here he witnessed the tragical event that gave rise to his romance of the Sorrows of Werter.

"This biography of that tragical family whose private lives far transcended the gloom of the magnificent work they produced, is a matter of interest to all who have read and loved Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights.

The tragical comedy or comical tragedy of Punch and Judy.

For its refutation, it is unnecessary to appeal to the great tragical compositions of the poet, which, for overpowering effect, leave far behind them almost everything that the stage has seen besides; a few of their less celebrated scenes would be quite sufficient.

If the effeminacy of the present day is to serve as a general standard of what tragical composition may properly exhibit to human nature, we shall be forced to set very narrow limits indeed to art, and the hope of anything like powerful effect must at once and forever be renounced.

And this tragical Titan, who storms the heavens and threatens to tear the world off its hinges, who, more terrible than Æschylus, makes our hair stand on end and congeals our blood with horror, possessed at the same time the insinuating loveliness of the sweetest poesy; he toys with love like a child, and his songs die away on the ear like melting sighs.

The comic intervals everywhere serve to prevent the pastime from being converted into a business, to preserve the mind in the possession of its serenity, and to keep off that gloomy and inert seriousness which so easily steals upon the sentimental, but not tragical, drama.

Whatever the event should be, it would be tragical for him.