Dim the sweet look that Nature wears.
_Sunrise on the Hills._
No one is so accursed by fate,
No one so utterly desolate,
But some heart, though unknown,
Responds unto his own.
_Endymion._
For Time will teach thee soon the truth,
There are no birds in last year's nest![613-2]
_It is not always May._
Into each life some rain must fall,
Some days must be dark and dreary.
_The Rainy Day._
The prayer of Ajax was for light.[614-1]
_The Goblet of Life._
O suffering, sad humanity!
O ye afflicted ones, who lie
Steeped to the lips in misery,
Longing, yet afraid to die,
Patient, though sorely tried!
_The Goblet of Life._
Standing with reluctant feet
Where the brook and river meet,
Womanhood and childhood fleet!
_Maidenhood._
O thou child of many prayers!
Life hath quicksands; life hath snares!
_Maidenhood._
She floats upon the river of his thoughts.[614-2]
_The Spanish Student. Act ii. Sc. 3._
A banner with the strange device.
_Excelsior._
This is the place. Stand still, my steed,--
Let me review the scene,
And summon from the shadowy past
The forms that once have been.
_A Gleam of Sunshine._
The day is done, and the darkness
Falls from the wings of Night,
As a feather is wafted downward
From an eagle in his flight.
_The Day is done._
A feeling of sadness and longing
That is not akin to pain,
And resembles sorrow only
As the mist resembles the rain.
_The Day is done._
And the night shall be filled with music,
And the cares that infest the day
Shall fold their tents like the Arabs,
And as silently steal away.
_The Day is done._
Sail on, O Ship of State!
Sail on, O Union, strong and great!
Humanity with all its fears,
With all the hopes of future years,
Is hanging breathless on thy fate!
_The Building of the Ship._
Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee,--
Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears,
Our faith triumphant o'er our fears,
Are all with thee,--are all with thee!
_The Building of the Ship._
The leaves of memory seemed to make
A mournful rustling in the dark.
_The Fire of Drift-wood._
There is no flock, however watched and tended,
But one dead lamb is there;
There is no fireside, howsoe'er defended,
But has one vacant chair.
_Resignation._
The air is full of farewells to the dying,
And mournings for the dead.
_Resignation._
But oftentimes celestial benedictions
Assume this dark disguise.
_Resignation._
What seem to us but sad, funereal tapers
May be heaven's distant lamps.
_Resignation._
There is no death! What seems so is transition;
This life of mortal breath
Is but a suburb of the life elysian,
Whose portal we call Death.
_Resignation._
Safe from temptation, safe from sin's pollution,
She lives whom we call dead.
_Resignation._
In the elder days of Art,
Builders wrought with greatest care
Each minute and unseen part;
For the gods see everywhere.
_The Builders._
This is the forest primeval.
_Evangeline. Part i._
When she had passed, it seemed like the ceasing of exquisite music.
_Evangeline. Part i. 1._
Blossomed the lovely stars, the forget-me-nots of the angels.
_Evangeline. Part i. 3._
And as she looked around, she saw how Death the consoler,
Laying his hand upon many a heart, had healed it forever.
_Evangeline. Part ii. 5._
God had sifted three kingdoms to find the wheat for this planting.[616-1]
_The Courtship of Miles Standish. iv._
Into a world unknown,--the corner-stone of a nation![616-2]
_The Courtship of Miles Standish. iv._
Saint Augustine! well hast thou said,
That of our vices we can frame
A ladder, if we will but tread
Beneath our feet each deed of shame.[616-3]
_The Ladder of Saint Augustine._
The heights by great men reached and kept
Were not attained by sudden flight,
But they while their companions slept
Were toiling upward in the night.
_The Ladder of Saint Augustine._
The surest pledge of a deathless name
Is the silent homage of thoughts unspoken.
_The Herons of Elmwood._
He has singed the beard of the king of Spain.[616-4]
_The Dutch Picture._
The love of learning, the sequestered nooks,
And all the sweet serenity of books.
_Morituri Salutamus._
With useless endeavour
Forever, forever,
Is Sisyphus rolling
His stone up the mountain!
_The Masque of Pandora. Chorus of the Eumenides._
All things come round to him who will but wait.[617-1]
_Tales of a Wayside Inn. The Student's Tale._
Time has laid his hand
Upon my heart gently, not smiting it,
But as a harper lays his open palm
Upon his harp, to deaden its vibrations.
_The Golden Legend. iv._
Hospitality sitting with Gladness.
_Translation from Frithiof's Saga._
Who ne'er his bread in sorrow ate,
Who ne'er the mournful midnight hours
Weeping upon his bed has sate,
He knows you not, ye Heavenly Powers.
_Motto, Hyperion. Book i._[617-2]
Something the heart must have to cherish,
Must love and joy and sorrow learn;
Something with passion clasp, or perish
And in itself to ashes burn.
_Hyperion. Book ii._
Alas! it is not till time, with reckless hand, has torn out half
the leaves from the Book of Human Life to light the fires of
passion with from day to day, that man begins to see that the
leaves which remain are few in number.
_Hyperion. Book iv. Chap. viii._
Hold the fleet angel fast until he bless thee.[618-1]
_Kavanagh._
There is no greater sorrow
Than to be mindful of the happy time
In misery.[618-2]
_Inferno. Canto v. Line 121._
FOOTNOTES:
[612-1] See Philip Sidney, page 34.
[612-2] Things are not always what they seem.--PHÆDRUS: _Fables,
book iv. Fable 2._
[612-3] See Chaucer, page 6.
Art is long, life is short.--GOETHE: _Wilhelm Meister, vii. 9._
[612-4] Our lives are but our marches to the grave.-BEAUMONT AND
FLETCHER: _The Humorous Lieutenant, act iii. sc. 5._
[612-5] See Byron, page 553.
[613-1] There is a Reaper whose name is death.--ARNIM AND
BRENTANO: _Erntelied._ (From "Des Knaben Wunderhorn," ed. 1857,
vol. i. p. 59.)
[613-2] Never look for birds of this year in the nests of the
last.--CERVANTES: _Don Quixote, part ii. chap. lxxiv._
[614-1]
The light of Heaven restore;
Give me to see, and Ajax asks no more.
POPE: _The Iliad, book xvii. line 730._
[614-2] See Byron, page 553.
[616-1] See Stoughton, page 266.
[616-2] Plymouth rock.
[616-3]
I held it truth, with him who sings
To one clear harp in divers tones,
That men may rise on stepping-stones
Of their dead selves to higher things.
TENNYSON: _In Memoriam, i._
[616-4] Sir Francis Drake entered the harbour of Cadiz, April 19,
1587, and destroyed shipping to the amount of ten thousand tons
lading. To use his own expressive phrase, he had "singed the
Spanish king's beard."--KNIGHT: _Pictorial History of England,
vol. iii. p. 215._
[617-1] See Emerson, page 601.
[617-2]
Wer nie sein Brod mit Thränen ass,
Wer nicht die kummervollen Nächte
Auf seinem Bette weinend sass,
Der kennt euch nicht, ihr himmlischen Mächte.
GOETHE: _Wilhelm Meister, book ii. chap. xiii._
[618-1] Quoted from Cotton's "To-morrow." See Genesis xxx. 3.
[618-2] See Chaucer, page 5.
In omni adversitate fortunæ, infelicissimum genus est infortunii
fuisse felicem (In every adversity of fortune, to have been happy
is the most unhappy kind of misfortune).--BOETHIUS: _De
Consolatione Philosophiæ, liber ii._
This is truth the poet sings,
That a sorrow's crown of sorrow is remembering happier things.
TENNYSON: _Locksley Hall, line 75._
JOHN G. WHITTIER. 1807- ----.
So fallen! so lost! the light withdrawn
Which once he wore;
The glory from his gray hairs gone
For evermore!
_Ichabod!_
Making their lives a prayer.
_To A. K. On receiving a Basket of Sea-Mosses._
And step by step, since time began,
I see the steady gain of man.
_The Chapel of the Hermits._
For still the new transcends the old
In signs and tokens manifold;
Slaves rise up men; the olive waves,
With roots deep set in battle graves!
_The Chapel of the Hermits._
Give lettered pomp to teeth of Time,
So "Bonnie Doon" but tarry;
Blot out the epic's stately rhyme,
But spare his "Highland Mary!"
_Lines on Burns._
For of all sad words of tongue or pen,
The saddest are these: "It might have been!"
_Maud Muller._
Low stir of leaves and dip of oars
And lapsing waves on quiet shores.
_Snow Bound._
The hope of all who suffer,
The dread of all who wrong.
_The Mantle of St. John de Matha._
I know not where His islands lift
Their fronded palms in air;
I only know I cannot drift
Beyond His love and care.
_The Eternal Goodness._
SALMON P. CHASE. 1808-1873.
The Constitution, in all its provisions, looks to an
indestructible Union composed of indestructible States.
_Decision in Texas v. White, 7 Wallace, 725._
No more slave States; no slave Territories.
_Platform of the Free Soil National Convention, 1848._
The way to resumption is to resume.
_Letter to Horace Greeley, March 17, 1866._
SAMUEL FRANCIS SMITH. 1808- ----.
My country, 't is of thee,
Sweet land of liberty,
Of thee I sing:
Land where my fathers died,
Land of the pilgrims' pride,
From every mountain-side
Let freedom ring.
_National Hymn._
Our fathers' God, to thee;
Author of liberty,
To thee I sing;
Long may our land be bright
With freedom's holy light;
Protect us by thy might,
Great God, our King!
_National Hymn._
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 1809-1861.
There Shakespeare, on whose forehead climb
The crowns o' the world; oh, eyes sublime
With tears and laughter for all time!
_A Vision of Poets._
And Chaucer, with his infantine
Familiar clasp of things divine.
_A Vision of Poets._
And Marlowe, Webster, Fletcher, Ben,
Whose fire-hearts sowed our furrows when
The world was worthy of such men.
_A Vision of Poets._
Knowledge by suffering entereth,
And life is perfected by death.
_A Vision of Poets. Conclusion._
Oh, the little birds sang east, and the little birds sang west.
_Toll slowly._
And I smiled to think God's greatness flowed around our incompleteness,
Round our restlessness His rest.
_Rhyme of the Duchess._
Or from Browning some "Pomegranate," which if cut deep down the middle
Shows a heart within blood-tinctured, of a veined humanity.
_Lady Geraldine's Courtship. xli._
But since he had
The genius to be loved, why let him have
The justice to be honoured in his grave.
_Crowned and buried. xxvii._
Thou large-brain'd woman and large-hearted man.
_To George Sand. A Desire._
By thunders of white silence.
_Hiram Power's Greek Slave._
And that dismal cry rose slowly
And sank slowly through the air,
Full of spirit's melancholy
And eternity's despair;
And they heard the words it said,--
"Pan is dead! great Pan is dead!
Pan, Pan is dead!"[621-1]
_The Dead Pan._
Death forerunneth Love to win
"Sweetest eyes were ever seen."
_Catarina to Camoens. ix._
She has seen the mystery hid
Under Egypt's pyramid:
By those eyelids pale and close
Now she knows what Rhamses knows.
_Little Mattie. Stanza ii._
But so fair,
She takes the breath of men away
Who gaze upon her unaware.
_Bianca among the Nightingales. xii._
God answers sharp and sudden on some prayers,
And thrusts the thing we have prayed for in our face,
A gauntlet with a gift in 't.
_Aurora Leigh. Book ii._
The growing drama has outgrown such toys
Of simulated stature, face, and speech:
It also peradventure may outgrow
The simulation of the painted scene,
Boards, actors, prompters, gaslight, and costume,
And take for a worthier stage the soul itself,
Its shifting fancies and celestial lights,
With all its grand orchestral silences
To keep the pauses of its rhythmic sounds.
_Aurora Leigh. Book v._
FOOTNOTES:
[621-1] Thamus . . . uttered with a loud voice his message, "The
great Pan is dead."--PLUTARCH: _Why the Oracles cease to give
Answers._
ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 1809-1865.
I believe this government cannot endure permanently half slave
and half free.
_Speech, June 16, 1858._
Let us have faith that right makes might; and in that faith let
us dare to do our duty as we understand it.
_Address, New York City, Feb. 21, 1859._
In giving freedom to the slave we assure freedom to the
free,--honorable alike in what we give and what we preserve.
_Second Annual Message to Congress, Dec. 1, 1862._
That this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom,
and that government of the people, by the people, for the people,
shall not perish from the earth.[622-1]
_Speech at Gettysburg, Nov. 19, 1863._
With malice towards none, with charity for all, with firmness in
the right, as God gives us to see the right.[622-2]
_Second Inaugural Address, March 4, 1865._
FOOTNOTES:
[622-1] See Daniel Webster, page 532.
[622-2] See J. Q. Adams, page 458.
CHARLES DARWIN. 1809-1882.
I have called this principle, by which each slight variation, if
useful, is preserved, by the term Natural Selection.
_The Origin of Species. Chap. iii._
We will now discuss in a little more detail the Struggle for
Existence.[622-3]
_The Origin of Species. Chap. iii._
The expression often used by Mr. Herbert Spencer of the Survival
of the Fittest is more accurate, and is sometimes equally
convenient.[622-4]
_The Origin of Species. Chap. iii._
FOOTNOTES:
[622-3] The perpetual struggle for room and food.--MALTHUS: _On
Population. chap. iii. p. 48_ (1798).
[622-4] This survival of the fittest which I have here sought to
express in mechanical terms, is that which Mr. Darwin has called
"natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the
struggle for life."--HERBERT SPENCER: _Principles of Biology.
Indirect Equilibration._
ALFRED TENNYSON. 1809- ----.
(_From the edition of 1884._)
This laurel greener from the brows
Of him that utter'd nothing base.
_To the Queen._
And statesmen at her council met
Who knew the seasons, when to take
Occasion by the hand, and make
The bounds of freedom wider yet.
_To the Queen._
Broad based upon her people's will,
And compassed by the inviolate sea.
_To the Queen._
For it was in the golden prime
Of good Haroun Alraschid.
_Recollections of the Arabian Nights._
Dowered with the hate of hate, the scorn of scorn,
The love of love.
_The Poet._
Like glimpses of forgotten dreams.
_The Two Voices. Stanza cxxvii._
Across the walnuts and the wine.
_The Miller's Daughter._
O love! O fire! once he drew
With one long kiss my whole soul through
My lips, as sunlight drinketh dew.[623-1]
_Fatima. Stanza 3._
Self-reverence, self-knowledge, self-control,--
These three alone lead life to sovereign power.
_OEnone._
Because right is right, to follow right
Were wisdom in the scorn of consequence.
_OEnone._
I built my soul a lordly pleasure-house,
Wherein at ease for aye to dwell.
_The Palace of Art._
Her manners had not that repose
Which stamps the caste of Vere de Vere.
_Lady Clara Vere de Vere. Stanza 5._
From yon blue heaven above us bent,
The grand old gardener and his wife[624-1]
Smile at the claims of long descent.
_Lady Clara Vere de Vere. Stanza 7._
Howe'er it be, it seems to me,
'T is only noble to be good.[624-2]
Kind hearts are more than coronets,
And simple faith than Norman blood.
_Lady Clara Vere de Vere. Stanza 7._
You must wake and call me early, call me early, mother dear;
To-morrow 'll be the happiest time of all the glad New Year,--
Of all the glad New Year, mother, the maddest, merriest day;
For I 'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I 'm to be queen o' the May.
_The May Queen._
Ah, why
Should life all labour be?
_The Lotus-Eaters. iv._
A daughter of the gods, divinely tall,
And most divinely fair.[624-3]
_A Dream of Fair Women. Stanza xxii._
God gives us love. Something to love
He lends us; but when love is grown
To ripeness, that on which it throve
Falls off, and love is left alone.
_To J. S._
Sleep sweetly, tender heart, in peace!
Sleep, holy spirit, blessed soul,
While the stars burn, the moons increase,
And the great ages onward roll.
_To J. S._
Sleep till the end, true soul and sweet!
Nothing comes to thee new or strange.
Sleep full of rest from head to feet;
Lie still, dry dust, secure of change.
_To J. S._
More black than ash-buds in the front of March.
_The Gardener's Daughter._
Of love that never found his earthly close,
What sequel? Streaming eyes and breaking hearts;
Or all the same as if he had not been?
_Love and Duty._
The long mechanic pacings to and fro,
The set, gray life, and apathetic end.
_Love and Duty._
Ah, when shall all men's good
Be each man's rule, and universal peace
Lie like a shaft of light across the land,
And like a lane of beams athwart the sea,
Thro' all the circle of the golden year?
_The Golden Year._
I am a part of all that I have met.[625-1]
_Ulysses._
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use,--
As tho' to breathe were life!
_Ulysses._
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles whom we knew.
_Ulysses._
Here at the quiet limit of the world.
_Tithonus._
In the spring a livelier iris changes on the burnish'd dove;
In the spring a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love.
_Locksley Hall. Line 19._
Love took up the harp of Life, and smote on all the chords with might;
Smote the chord of Self, that, trembling, pass'd in music out of sight.
_Locksley Hall. Line 33._
He will hold thee, when his passion shall have spent its novel force,
Something better than his dog, a little dearer than his horse.
_Locksley Hall. Line 49._
This is truth the poet sings,
That a sorrow's crown of sorrow is remembering happier things.[626-1]
_Locksley Hall. Line 75._
Like a dog, he hunts in dreams.
_Locksley Hall. Line 79._
With a little hoard of maxims preaching down a daughter's heart.
_Locksley Hall. Line 94._
But the jingling of the guinea helps the hurt that Honour feels.
_Locksley Hall. Line 105._
Men, my brothers, men the workers, ever reaping something new.
_Locksley Hall. Line 117._
Yet I doubt not through the ages one increasing purpose runs,
And the thoughts of men are widen'd with the process of the suns.
_Locksley Hall. Line 137._
Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers.
_Locksley Hall. Line 141._
I will take some savage woman, she shall rear my dusky race.
_Locksley Hall. Line 168._
I, the heir of all the ages, in the foremost files of time.
_Locksley Hall. Line 178._
Let the great world spin forever down the ringing grooves of change.
_Locksley Hall. Line 182._
Better fifty years of Europe than a cycle of Cathay.
_Locksley Hall. Line 184._
I waited for the train at Coventry;
I hung with grooms and porters on the bridge,
To watch the three tall spires; and there I shaped
The city's ancient legend into this.
_Godiva._
And on her lover's arm she leant,
And round her waist she felt it fold,
And far across the hills they went
In that new world which is the old.
_The Day-Dream. The Departure, i._
And o'er the hills, and far away
Beyond their utmost purple rim,
Beyond the night, across the day,
Thro' all the world she follow'd him.
_The Day-Dream. The Departure, iv._
We are ancients of the earth,
And in the morning of the times.
_L'Envoi._
As she fled fast through sun and shade
The happy winds upon her play'd,
Blowing the ringlet from the braid.
_Sir Launcelot and Queen Guinevere._
For now the poet cannot die,
Nor leave his music as of old,
But round him ere he scarce be cold
Begins the scandal and the cry.
_To ----, after reading a Life and Letters._
But oh for the touch of a vanish'd hand,
And the sound of a voice that is still!
_Break, break, break._
But the tender grace of a day that is dead
Will never come back to me.
_Break, break, break._
For men may come and men may go,
But I go on forever.
_The Brook._
Mastering the lawless science of our law,--
That codeless myriad of precedent,
That wilderness of single instances.
_Aylmer's Field._
Rich in saving common-sense,
And, as the greatest only are,
In his simplicity sublime.
_Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington. Stanza 4._
Oh good gray head which all men knew!
_Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington. Stanza 4._
That tower of strength
Which stood four-square to all the winds that blew.
_Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington. Stanza 4._
For this is England's greatest son,
He that gain'd a hundred fights,
And never lost an English gun.
_Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington. Stanza 6._
Not once or twice in our rough-island story
The path of duty was the way to glory.
_Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington. Stanza 8._
All in the valley of death
Rode the six hundred.
_The Charge of the Light Brigade. Stanza 1._
Some one had blunder'd:
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die.
_The Charge of the Light Brigade. Stanza 2._
Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them.
. . . .
Into the jaws of death,[628-1]
Into the mouth of hell
Rode the six hundred.
_The Charge of the Light Brigade. Stanza 3._
That a lie which is half a truth is ever the blackest of lies;
That a lie which is all a lie may be met and fought with outright;
But a lie which is part a truth is a harder matter to fight.
_The Grandmother. Stanza 8._
O Love! what hours were thine and mine,
In lands of palm and southern pine;
In lands of palm, of orange-blossom,
Of olive, aloe, and maize and vine!
_The Daisy. Stanza 1._
So dear a life your arms enfold,
Whose crying is a cry for gold.
_The Daisy. Stanza 24._
Read my little fable:
He that runs may read.[629-1]
Most can raise the flowers now,
For all have got the seed.
_The Flower._
In that fierce light which beats upon a throne.
_Idylls of the King. Dedication._
It is the little rift within the lute
That by and by will make the music mute,
And ever widening slowly silence all.
_Idylls of the King. Merlin and Vivien._
His honour rooted in dishonour stood,
And faith unfaithful kept him falsely true.
_Idylls of the King. Launcelot and Elaine._
The old order changeth, yielding place to new;
And God fulfils himself in many ways,
Lest one good custom should corrupt the world.
_The Passing of Arthur._
I am going a long way
With these thou seëst--if indeed I go
(For all my mind is clouded with a doubt)--
To the island-valley of Avilion,
Where falls not hail or rain or any snow,
Nor ever wind blows loudly; but it lies
Deep-meadow'd, happy, fair with orchard lawns
And bowery hollows crown'd with summer sea,
Where I will heal me of my grievous wound.
_The Passing of Arthur._
With prudes for proctors, dowagers for deans,
And sweet girl-graduates in their golden hair.
_The Princess. Prologue. Line 141._
A rosebud set with little wilful thorns,
And sweet as English air could make her, she.
_The Princess. Part i. Line 153._
Jewels five-words-long,
That on the stretch'd forefinger of all Time
Sparkle forever.
_The Princess. Part ii. Line 355._
Blow, bugle, blow! set the wild echoes flying!
Blow, bugle! answer, echoes! dying, dying, dying.
_The Princess. Part iii. Line 352._
O Love! they die in yon rich sky,
They faint on hill or field or river:
Our echoes roll from soul to soul,
And grow forever and forever.
Blow, bugle, blow! set the wild echoes flying!
And answer, echoes, answer! dying, dying, dying.
_The Princess. Part iii. Line 360._
There sinks the nebulous star we call the sun.
_The Princess. Part iv. Line 1._
Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean.
Tears from the depth of some divine despair
Rise in the heart and gather to the eyes,
In looking on the happy autumn-fields,
And thinking of the days that are no more.
_The Princess. Part iv. Line 21._
Unto dying eyes
The casement slowly grows a glimmering square.
_The Princess. Part iv. Line 33._
Dear as remember'd kisses after death,
And sweet as those by hopeless fancy feign'd
On lips that are for others; deep as love,--
Deep as first love, and wild with all regret.
Oh death in life, the days that are no more!
_The Princess. Part iv. Line 36._
Sweet is every sound,
Sweeter thy voice, but every sound is sweet;
Myriads of rivulets hurrying thro' the lawn,
The moan of doves in immemorial elms,
And murmuring of innumerable bees.
_The Princess. Part vii. Line 203._
Happy he
With such a mother! faith in womankind
Beats with his blood, and trust in all things high
Comes easy to him; and tho' he trip and fall,
He shall not blind his soul with clay.
_The Princess. Part vii. Line 308._
Faultily faultless, icily regular, splendidly null.
_Maud. Part i. ii._
That jewell'd mass of millinery,
That oil'd and curl'd Assyrian Bull.
_Maud. Part i. vi. Stanza 6._
Gorgonized me from head to foot,
With a stony British stare.
_Maud. Part i. xiii. Stanza 2._