The Plague (1947) by Albert Camus.
… he wished that plague would take one-half the language, and ague the other half.
ague. a fever with successive stages of fever and chills esp when caused by malaria.
He was introduced to the literati by Lord Bolingbroke, and dined with one after another of them, even with the elusive and corrosive Dean Swift. He pretended to no pedigree, and asked none of others.
Literati are well-educated people who are interested in literature.
Someone’s pedigree is their background or their ancestors.
What surprised him was the freedom with which Bolingbroke, Pope, Addison, and Swift wrote whatever they pleased: here was a people that had opinions of its own; a people that had remade its religion, hanged its king, imported another, and built a parliament stronger than any ruler in Europe.
- Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke was an English politician, government official and political philosopher.
- Alexander Pope was an 18th-century English poet. He is best known for his satirical verse and for his translation of Homer, and he is also famous for his use of the heroic couplet.
- A couplet is two lines of poetry which come next to each other, especially two lines that rhyme with each other and are the same length.
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To err is human, to purr is feine.
- When a cat purrs, it makes a low vibrating sound with its throat because it is contented.
- A feline is an animal that belongs to the cat family.
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The world forgetting, by the world forgot.
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Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed.
- Joseph Addison was an English essayist, poet, playwright, and politician.
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Three grand essentials to happiness in this life are something to do, something to love, and something to hope for.
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A contented mind is the greatest blessing a man can enjoy in this world.
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Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body.
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The English Reformation was a series of events in 16th century England by which the Church of England broke away from the authority of the Pope and the Roman Catholic Church. Based on Henry VIII‘s desire for an annulment of his marriage (first requested of Pope Clement VII in 1527), the English Reformation was at the outset more of a political affair than a theological dispute.
Henry VIII
The annulment of a contract or marriage is an official declaration that it is invalid, so that legally it is considered never to have existed.
The Glorious Revolution, also called the Revolution of 1688, was the overthrow of King James II of England by a union of English Parliamentarians with the Dutch stadtholder ((from the 15th century to the late 18th century) the chief magistrate of the United Provinces of the Netherlands) William III, Prince of Orange.
Charles I was monarch of the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland from 27 March 1625 until his execution in 1649.
Charles I
James II
William III
Mary II
There was no Bastille here, and no lettres de cachet by which titled pensioners or royal idlers could send their untitled foes to jail without cause and without trial.
Someone’s foe is their enemy.
Voltaire never to the end of his life ceased to wonder at them: in the Dictionnaire Philosophique he makes one of them say: “Our God, who has bidden us love our enemies and suffer evil without complaint, assuredly has no mind that we should cross the sea to go and cut the throats of our brothers because murderers in red clothes and hats two feet high enlist citizens by making a noise with two sticks on an ass’s skin.”
If you bid someone do something, you ask or invite them to do it.
An ass is an animal which is related to a horse but which is smaller and has long ears.
Quakers (or Friends) are members of a historically Christian group of religious movements generally known as the Religious Society of Friends, a Christian movement founded by George Fox c. 1650 and devoted to peaceful principles. Central to the Quakers’ belief is the doctrine of the “Inner Light,” or sense of Christ’s direct working in the soul. This has led them to reject both formal ministry and all set forms of worship.