FORMING THE ELEMENTS.
HAMLET TO THE PLAYERS.
1. Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you,
trippingly on the tongue: but if you mouth it, as many of our
players do, I had as lief the town-crier spoke my lines. Nor do
not saw the air too much with your hand, thus; but use all gently:
for in the very torrent, tempest, and (as I may say) whirlwind of
your passion, you must acquire and beget a temperance, that may
give it smoothness.
2. Oh, it offends me to the soul, to hear a robustious periwig-
pated fellow tear a passion to tatters, to very rags, to split the
ears of the groundlings, who, for the most part, are capable of
nothing but inexplicable dumb shows, and noise: I would have such
a fellow whipped for o'erdoing Termagant; it out-herods Herod:
pray you, avoid it.
3. Be not too tame neither, but let your own discretion be your
tutor: suit the action to the word, the word to the action; with
this special observance, that you o'erstep not the modesty of
nature; for anything so overdone is from the purpose of playing,
whose end, both at the first, and now, was, and is, to hold, as
'twere, the mirror up to nature; to show virtue her own feature,
scorn her own image, and the very age and body of the time, his
form and pressure.
4. Now this, overdone, or come tardy off, though it make the
unskilful laugh, cannot but make the judicious grieve; the censure
of which one, must, in your allowance, o'erweigh a whole theatre
of others. Oh, there be players, that I have seen play, and heard
others praise, and that highly, not to speak it profanely, that,
neither having the accent of Christians, nor the gait of
Christian, Pagan, nor man, have so strutted, and bellowed, that I
have thought some of nature's journeymen had made men, and not
made them well, they imitated humanity so abominably.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE.
THE BOY AND THE ANGEL.
Morning, evening, noon and night,
"Praise God!" sang Theocrite.
Then to his poor trade he turned,
Whereby the daily meal was earned.
Hard he labored, long and well;
O'er his work the boy's curls fell.
But ever, at each period,
He stopped and sang, "Praise God!"
II.
Then back again his curls he threw,
And cheerful turned to work anew.
Said Blaise, the listening monk, "Well done;
I doubt not thou art heard, my son:
As well as if thy voice to-day
Were praising God, the Pope's great way.
This Easter Day, the Pope at Rome
Praises God from Peter's dome."
III.
Said Theocrite, "Would God that I
Might praise him, that great way, and die!"
Night passed, day shone,
And Theocrite was gone.
With God a day endures alway,
A thousand years are but a day.
God said in heaven, "Nor day nor night
Now brings the voice of my delight."
IV.
Then Gabriel, like a rainbow's birth,
Spread his wings and sank to earth;
Entered, in flesh, the empty cell,
Lived there, and played the craftsman well;
And morning, evening, noon and night,
Praised God in place of Theocrite.
And from a boy, to youth he grew:
The man put off the stripling's hue:
V.
The man matured and fell away
Into the season of decay:
And ever o'er the trade he bent,
And ever lived on earth content.
(He did God's will; to him, all one
If on the earth or in the sun.)
God said, "A praise is in mine ear;
There is no doubt in it, no fear:
VI.
"So sing old worlds, and so
New worlds that from my footstool go.
Clearer loves sound other ways;
I miss my little human praise."
Then forth sprang Gabriel's wings, off fell
The flesh disguise, remained the cell.
'Twas Easter Day: he flew to Rome,
And paused above Saint Peter's dome.
VII.
In the tiring-room close by
The great outer gallery,
With his holy vestments dight,
Stood the new Pope, Theocrite;
And all his past career
Came back upon him clear,
Since when, a boy, he plied his trade,
Till on his life the sickness weighed;
VIII.
And in his cell, when death drew near,
An angel in a dream brought cheer:
And rising from the sickness drear,
He grew a priest, and now stood here.
To the East with praise he turned,
And on his sight the angel burned.
"I bore thee from thy craftsman's cell,
And set thee here; I did not well,
IX.
"Vainly I left my angel-sphere,
Vain was thy dream of many a year.
Thy voice's praise seemed weak: it dropped--
Creation's chorus stopped!
Go back and praise again
The early way, while I remain.
With that weak voice of our disdain,
Take up creation's pausing strain.
X.
"Back to the cell and poor employ;
Resume the craftsman and the boy!"
Theocrite grew old at home;
A new Pope dwelt at Peter's dome.
One vanished as the other died:
They sought God side by side.
ROBERT BROWNING.
SPEECH AND SILENCE.
1. He who speaks honestly cares not, needs not care, though his
words be preserved to remotest time. The dishonest speaker, not he
only who purposely utters falsehoods, but he who does not
purposely, and with sincere heart, utter Truth, and Truth alone;
who babbles he knows not what, and has clapped no bridle on his
tongue, but lets it run racket, ejecting chatter and futility--is
among the most indisputable malefactors omitted, or inserted, in
the Criminal Calendar.
2. To him that will well consider it, idle speaking is precisely
the beginning of all Hollowness, Halfness, Infidelity (want of
Faithfulness); it is the genial atmosphere in which rank weeds of
every kind attain the mastery over noble fruits in man's life, and
utterly choke them out: one of the most crying maladies of these
days, and to be testified against, and in all ways to the
uttermost withstood.
3. Wise, of a wisdom far beyond our shallow depth, was that old
precept, "Watch thy tongue; out of it are the issues of Life!" Man
is properly an incarnated word: the word that he speaks is the man
himself. Were eyes put into our head, that we might see, or that
we might fancy, and plausibly pretend, we had seen? Was the tongue
suspended there, that it might tell truly what we had seen, and
make man the soul's brother of man; or only that it might utter
vain sounds, jargon, soul-confusing, and so divide man, as by
enchanting walls of Darkness, from union with man?
4. Thou who wearest that cunning, heaven-made organ, a Tongue,
think well of this. Speak not, I passionately entreat thee, till
thy thought have silently matured itself, till thou have other
than mad and mad-making noises to emit: hold thy tongue till some
meaning lie behind, to set it wagging.
5. Consider the significance of SILENCE: it is boundless, never by
meditating to be exhausted, unspeakably profitable to thee! Cease
that chaotic hubbub, wherein thy own soul runs to waste, to
confused suicidal dislocation and stupor; out of Silence comes thy
strength. "Speech is silvern, silence is golden; speech is human,
silence is divine."
6. Fool! thinkest thou that because no one stands near with
parchment and blacklead to note thy jargon, it therefore dies and
is harmless? Nothing dies, nothing can die. No idlest word thou
speakest but is a seed cast into Time, and grows through all
Eternity! The Recording Angel, consider it well, is no fable, but
the truest of truths: the paper tablets thou canst burn; of the
"iron leaf" there is no burning.
THOMAS CARLYLE.
THE RICH MAN AND THE POOR MAN.
I.
So goes the world;--if wealthy, you may call
THIS friend, THAT brother;--friends and brothers all;
Though you are worthless--witless--never mind it:
You may have been a stable-boy--what then?
'Tis wealth, good sir, makes HONORABLE MEN.
You seek respect, no doubt, and YOU will find it.
II.
But if you are poor, Heaven help you! though your sire
Had royal blood within him, and though you
Possess the intellect of angels, too,
'Tis all in vain;--the world will ne'er inquire
On such a score:--Why should it take the pains?
'Tis easier to weigh purses, sure, than brains.
III.
I once saw a poor fellow, keen and clever,
Witty and wise:--he paid a man a visit,
And no one noticed him, and no one ever
Gave him a welcome. "Strange!" cried I, "whence is
it?"
He walked on this side, then on that,
He tried to introduce a social chat;
Now here, now there, in vain he tried;
Some formally and freezingly replied,
And some
Said by their silence--"Better stay at home."
IV.
A rich man burst the door;
As Croesus rich, I'm sure
He could not pride himself upon his wit,
And as for wisdom, he had none of it;
He had what's better; he had wealth.
What a confusion!--all stand up erect--
These crowd around to ask him of his health;
These bow in HONEST duty and respect;
And these arrange a sofa or a chair,
And these conduct him there.
"Allow me, sir, the honor;"--Then a bow
Down to the earth--Is't possible to show
Meet gratitude for such kind condescension?
V.
The poor man hung his head,
And to himself he said,
"This is indeed beyond my comprehension;"
Then looking round,
One friendly face he found,
And said, "Pray tell me why is wealth preferred
To wisdom?"--"That's a silly question, friend!"
Replied the other--"have you never heard,
A man may lend his store
Of gold or silver ore,
But wisdom none can borrow, none can lend?"
KHEMNITZER.
THE GATHERING OF THE FAIRIES.
I.
'Tis the middle watch of a summer's night--
The earth is dark, but the heavens are bright;
Naught is seen in the vault on high
But the moon, and the stars, and the cloudless sky,
And the flood which rolls its milky hue,
A river of light on the welkin blue.
The moon looks down on old Cro'nest;
She mellows the shades on his craggy breast;
And seems his huge gray form to throw
In a silver cone on the waves below.
His sides are broken by spots of shade,
By the walnut-bough and the cedar made,
And through their clustering branches dark
Glimmers and dies the fire-fly's spark,
Like starry twinkles that momently peak
Through the rifts of the gathering tempest's rack.
II.
The stars are on the moving stream,
And fling, as its ripples gently flow,
A burnished length of wavy beam
In an eel-like, spiral line below;
The winds are whist, and the owl is still,
The bat in the shelvy rock is hid.
And naught is heard on the lonely hill
But the cricket's chirp, and the answer shrill
Of the gauze-winged katy-did,
And the plaint of the wailing whippoorwill,
Who moans unseen, and ceaseless sings,
Ever a note of wail and woe,
Till the morning spreads her rosy wings,
And earth and sky in her glances glow.
III.
'Tis the hour of fairy ban and spell;--
The wood-tick has kept the minutes well;
He has counted them all with click and stroke
Deep in the heart of the mountain-oak;
And he has awakened the sentry Elve
Who sleeps with him in the haunted tree,
To bid him ring the hour of twelve,
And call the Fays to their revelry;
Twelve small strokes on his tinkling bell--
'Twas made of the white snail's pearly shell.
"Midnight comes, and all is well!
Hither, hither wing your way!
'Tis the dawn of the fairy-day!"
IV.
They come from beds of lichen green,
They creep from the mullein's velvet screen,
Some on the backs of beetles fly
From the silver tops of moon-touched trees,
Where they swing in their cobweb hammocks
high,
And rocked about in the evening breeze;
Some from the hum-bird's downy nest--
They had driven him out by elfin power,
And, pillowed on plumes of his rainbow breast,
Had slumbered there till the charmed hour;
Some had lain in the scoop of the rock,
With glittering rising-stars inlaid;
And some had opened the four-o'clock,
And stole within its purple shade.
And now they throng the moonlight glade,
Above--below--on every side,
Their little minim forms arrayed
In the tricksy pomp of fairy pride.
V.
They come not now to print the lea,
In freak and dance around the tree,
Or at the mushroom board to sup,
And drink the dew from the buttercup;--
A scene of sorrow waits them now.
For an Ouphe has broken his vestal vow;
He has loved an earthly maid,
And left for her his woodland shade;
He has lain upon her lip of dew,
And sunned him in her eyes of blue,
Fanned her cheek with his wing of air,
Played in the ringlets of her hair,
And, nestling on her snowy breast,
Forgot the Lily-King's behest,--
For this the shadowy tribes of air
To the Elfin Court must haste away!--
And now they stand expectant there,
To hear the doom of the Culprit Fay.
VI.
The throne was reared upon the grass,
Of spice-wood and of sassafras;
On pillars of mottled tortoise-shell
Hung the burnished canopy,
And o'er it gorgeous curtains fell
Of the tulip's crimson drapery.
The monarch sat on his judgment-seat,
On his brow the crown imperial shone,
The prisoner Fay was at his feet,
And his Peers were ranged around the throne.
JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE.
THE SONG OF THE RAIN.
Lo! the long, slender spears, bow they quiver and flash
Where the clouds send their cavalry down!
Rank and file by the million the rain-lancers dash
Over mountain and river and town:
Thick the battle-drops fall--but they drip not in blood;
The trophy of war is the green fresh bud:
Oh, the rain, the plentiful rain!
II.
The pastures lie baked, and the furrow is bare,
The wells they yawn empty and dry;
But a rushing of waters is heard in the air,
And a rainbow leaps out in the sky.
Hark! the heavy drops pelting the sycamore leaves,
How they wash tha wide pavement, and sweep from
the eaves!
Oh, the rain, the plentiful rain!
III.
See, the weaver throws wide his own swinging pane,
The kind drops dance in on the floor;
And his wife brings her flower-pots to drink the sweet
rain
On the step by her half-open door;
At the tune on the skylight, far over his head,
Smiles their poor crippled lad on his hospital bed.
Oh, the rain, the plentiful rain!
IV.
And away, far from men, where high mountains tower,
The little green mosses rejoice,
And the bud-heated heather nods to the shower,
And the hill-torrents lift up their voice:
And the pools in the hollows mimic the fight
Of the rain, as their thousand points dart up in the
light;
Oh, the rain, the plentiful rain!
V.
And deep in the fir-wood below, near the plain,
A single thrush pipes full and sweet,
How days of clear shining will come after rain,
Waving meadows, and thick growing wheat;
So the voice of Hope sings, at the heart of our fears,
Of the harvest that springs from a great nation's tears:
Oh, the rain, the plentiful rain!
SPECTATOR.
HEARTY READING.
1. Curiosity is a passion very favorable to the love of study, and
a passion very susceptible of increase by cultivation. Sound
travels so many feet in a second; and light travels so many feet
in a second. Nothing more probable: but you do not care how light
and sound travel. Very likely: but make yourself care; get up,
shake yourself well, pretend to care, make believe to care, and
very soon you will care, and care so much that you will sit for
hours thinking about light and sound, and be extremely angry with
any one who interrupts you in your pursuits; and tolerate no other
conversation but about light and sound; and catch yourself
plaguing everybody to death who approaches you, with the
discussion of these subjects.
2. I am sure that a man ought to read as he would grasp a nettle:
do it lightly, and you get molested; grasp it with all your
strength, and you feel none of its asperities. There is nothing so
horrible as languid study, when you sit looking at the clock,
wishing the time was over, or that somebody would call on you and
put you out of your misery. The only way to read with any efficacy
is to read so heartily that dinner-time comes two hours before
you expected it.
3. To sit with your Livy before you, and hear the geese cackling
that saved the Capitol: and to see with your own eyes the
Carthaginian sutlers gathering up the rings of the Roman knights
after the battle of Cannae, and heaping them into bushels; and to
be so intimately present at the actions you are reading of that
when anybody knocks at the door it will take you two or three
seconds to determine whether you are in your own study, or in the
plains of Lombardy, looking at Hannibal's weather-beaten face, and
admiring the splendor of his single eye.
4. This is the only kind of study which is not tiresome; and
almost the only kind which is not useless: this is the knowledge
which gets into the system, and which a man carries about and uses
like his limbs, without perceiving that it is extraneous, weighty,
or inconvenient.
SYDNEY SMITH.
IVRY.
I.
Now glory to the Lord of Hosts, from whom all glories
are!
And glory to our sovereign liege, King Henry of
Navarre!
Now let there be the merry sound of music and of
dance,
Through the corn-fields green, and sunny vines, O
pleasant land of France!
And thou Rochelle, our own Rochelle, proud city of
the waters,
Again let rapture light the eyes of all thy murmuring
daughters;
As thou wert constant in our ills, be joyous in our joy;
For cold and stiff and still are they who wrought thy
walls annoy.
Hurrah! hurrah! a single field hath turned the chance
of war!
Hurrah! hurrah! for Ivry, and Henry of Navarre!
II.
Oh! how our hearts were beating, when, at the dawn
of day,
We saw the army of the League drawn out in long
array;
With all its priest-led citizens, and all its rebel peers,
And Appenzel's stout infantry, and Egmont's Flemish
spears,
There rode the brood of false Lorraine, the curses of our
land;
And dark Mayenne was in the midst, a truncheon in his
hand;
And, as we looked on them, we thought of Seine's
empurpled flood,
And good Coligni's hoary hair all dabbled with his blood;
And we cried unto the living God, who rules the fate
of war,
To fight for his own holy name, and Henry of Navarre.
III.
The king is come to marshal us, in all his armor dressed;
And he has bound a snow white plume upon his gallant
crest.
He looked upon his people, and a tear was in his eye,
He looked upon the traitors, and his glance was stern
and high.
Right graciously he smiled on us, as rolled from wing
to wing,
Down all our line, a deafening shout, "God save our
Lord the King!"
"And if my standard bearer fall, as fall full well he
may--
For never I saw promise yet of such a bloody fray--
Press where you see my white plume shine amidst the
ranks of war,
And be your oriflamme to-day the helmet of Navarre."
IV.
Hurrah! the foes are moving. Hark to the mingled din,
Of fife, and steed, and trump, and drum, and roaring
culverin.
The fiery duke is pricking fast across Saint-Andre's
plain,
With all the hireling chivalry of Guelders and Almayne
Now by the lips of those ye love, fair gentlemen of
France,
Charge for the golden lilies--upon them with the lance!
A thousand spurs are striking deep, a thousand spears
in rest,
A thousand knights are pressing close behind the snow-
white crest;
And in they burst, and on they rushed, while, like a
guiding star,
Amidst the thickest carnage blazed the helmet of
Navarre.
V.
Now God be praised, the day is ours; Mayenne hath
turned his rein;
D'Aumale hath cried for quarter; the Flemish count is
slain;
Their ranks are breaking like thin clouds before a Biscay
gale;
The field is heaped with bleeding steeds, and flags, and
cloven mail.
And then we thought on vengeance, and all along our
van,
Remember Saint Bartholomew! was passed from man
to man.
But out spake gentle Henry--"No Frenchman is my
foe;
Down, down with every foreigner, but let your brethren
go."
Oh! was there ever such a knight, in friendship or in war,
As our sovereign lord, King Henry, the soldier of
Navarre?
VI.
Right well fought all the Frenchmen who fought for
France to-day;
And many a lordly banner God gave them for a prey.
But we of the religion have borne us best in fight;
And the good Lord of Rosny hath ta'en the cornet
white--
Our own true Maximilian the cornet white hath ta'en,
The cornet white with crosses black, the flag of false
Lorraine,
Up with it high; unfurl it wide--that all the host
may know
How God hath humbled the proud house which wrought
his church such woe.
Then on the ground, while trumpets sound their loudest
point of war,
Fling the red shreds, a foot-cloth meet for Henry of
Navarre.
VII.
Ho! maidens of Vienna! ho! matrons of Lucerne--
Weep, weep, and rend your hair for those who never
shall return.
Ho! Philip, send, for charity, thy Mexican pistoles,
That Antwerp monks may sing a mass for thy poor
spearmen's souls.
Ho! gallant nobles of the league, look that your arms
be bright;
Ho! burghers of St. Genevieve, keep watch and ward
to-night;
For our God hath crushed the tyrant, our God hath
raised the slave,
And mocked the counsel of the wise, and the valor of
the brave.
Then glory to His holy name, for whom all glories are;
And glory to our sovereign lord, King Henry of Navarre!
LORD MACAULAY
THE DAFFODILS.
I.
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
II.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretch'd in never-ending line
Along the margin of the bay;
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
III.
The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee;
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company;
I gazed--and gazed--but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought;
IV.
For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.
WORDSWORTH
CHEERFULNESS.
1. A cheerful man is pre-eminently a useful man. He knows that
there is much misery, but that misery is not the rule of life. He
sees that in every state people may be cheerful; the lambs skip,
birds sing and fly joyously, puppies play, kittens are full of
joy, the whole air is full of careering and rejoicing insects--
that everywhere the good outbalances the bad, and that every evil
that there is has its compensating balm.
2. Then the brave man, as our German cousins say, possesses the
world, whereas the melancholy man does not even possess his share
of it.
Exercise, or continued employment of some kind, will make a man
cheerful; but sitting at home, brooding and thinking, or doing
little, will bring gloom. The reaction of this feeling is
wonderful. It arises from a sense of duty done, and it also
enables us to do our duty.
3. Cheerful people live long in our memory. We remember joy more
readily than sorrow, and always look back with tenderness on the
brave and cheerful.
We can all cultivate our tempers, and one of the employments of
some poor mortals is to cultivate, cherish, and bring to
perfection, a thoroughly bad one; but we may be certain that to do
so is a very grave error and sin, which, like all others, brings
its own punishment; though, unfortunately, it does not punish
itself only.
4. Addison says of cheerfulness, that it lightens sickness,
poverty, affliction; converts ignorance into an amiable
simplicity, and renders deformity itself agreeable; and he says no
more than the truth.
5. "Give us, therefore, oh! give us"--let us cry with Carlyle--
"the man who sings at his work! He will do more in the same time,
--he will do it better,--he will persevere longer. One is scarcely
sensible of fatigue whilst he marches to music. The very stars are
said to make harmony as they revolve in their spheres.
6. "Wondrous is the strength of cheerfulness, altogether past
calculation its powers of endurance. Efforts, to be permanently
useful, must be uniformly joyous,--a spirit all sunshine,
graceful from very gladness, beautiful because bright."
7. Such a spirit is within everybody's reach. Let us but get out
into the light of things. The morbid man cries out that there is
always enough wrong in the world to make a man miserable.
Conceded; but wrong is ever being righted; there is always enough
that is good and right to make us joyful.
8. There is ever sunshine somewhere; and the brave man will go on
his way rejoicing, content to look forward if under a cloud, not
bating one jot of heart or hope if for a moment cast down:
honoring his occupation, whatever it may be; rendering even rags
respectable by the way he wears them; and not only being happy
himself, but causing the happiness of others.
J. H. FRISWELL.
"APRIL IN THE HILLS."
I.
To-day the world is wide and fair
With sunny fields of lucid air,
And waters dancing everywhere;
The snow is almost gone;
The noon is builded high with light,
And over heaven's liquid height,
In steady fleets serene and white,
The happy clouds go on.
II.
The channels run, the bare earth steams,
And every hollow rings and gleams
With jetting falls and dashing streams;
The rivers burst and fill;
The fields are full of little lakes,
And when the romping wind awakes
The water ruffles blue and shakes,
And the pines roar on the hill.
III.
The crows go by, a noisy throng;
About the meadows all day long
The shore-lark drops his brittle song;
And up tihe leafless tree
The nut-hatch runs, and nods, and clings;
The bluebird dips with flashing wings,
The robin flutes, the sparrow sings,
And the swallows float and flee.
IV.
I break the spirit's cloudy bands,
A wanderer in enchanted lands,
I feel the sun upon my hands;
And far from care and strife
The broad earth bids me forth, I rise
With lifted brow and upward eyes.
I bathe my spirit in blue skies,
And taste the springs of life
V.
I feel the tumult of new birth;
I waken with the wakening earth;
I match the bluebird in her mirth;
And wild with wind and sun,
A treasurer of immortal days,
I roam the glorious world with praise,
The hillsides and the woodland ways,
Till the earth and I are one.
ARCHIBALD LAMPMAN.