Proverbial Philosophy / The First and Second Series

FIRST SERIES.

Martin Farquhar Tupper

PREFATORY.

Thoughts, that have tarried in my mind, and peopled its inner chambers,

The sober children of reason, or desultory train of fancy;

Clear running wine of conviction, with the scum and the lees of speculation;

Corn from the sheaves of science, with stubble from mine own garner:

Searchings after Truth, that have tracked her secret lodes,

And come up again to the surface-world, with a knowledge grounded deeper;

Arguments of high scope, that have soared to the key-stone of heaven,

And thence have swooped to their certain mark, as the falcon to its quarry;

The fruits I have gathered of prudence, the ripened harvest of my musings,

These commend I unto thee, O docile scholar of Wisdom,

These I give to thy gentle heart, thou lover of the right.

What, though a guilty man renew that hallowed theme,

And strike with feebler hand the harp of Sirach's son?

What, though a youthful tongue take up that ancient parable,

And utter faintly forth dark sayings as of old?

Sweet is the virgin honey, though the wild bee have stored it in a reed,

And bright the jewelled band, that circleth an Ethiop's arm;

Pure are the grains of gold in the turbid stream of Ganges,

And fair the living flowers, that spring from the dull cold sod.

Wherefore, thou gentle student, bend thine ear to my speech,

For I also am as thou art; our hearts can commune together:

To meanest matters will I stoop, for mean is the lot of mortal;

I will rise to noblest themes, for the soul hath an heritage of glory:

The passions of puny man; the majestic characters of God;

The feverish shadows of time, and the mighty substance of eternity.

Commend thy mind unto candour, and grudge not as though thou hadst a teacher,

Nor scorn angelic Truth for the sake of her evil herald;

Heed not him, but hear his words, and care not whence they come;

The viewless winds might whisper them, the billows roar them forth,

The mean unconscious sedge sigh them in the ear of evening,

Or the mind of pride conceive, and the mouth of folly speak them.

Lo now, I stand not forth laying hold on spear and buckler,

I come a man of peace, to comfort, not to combat;

With soft persuasive speech to charm thy patient ear,

Giving the hand of fellowship, acknowledging the heart of sympathy:

Let us walk together as friends in the shaded paths of meditation,

Nor Judgment set his seal until he hath poised his balance;

That the chastenings of mild reproof may meet unwitting error,

And Charity not be a stranger at the board that is spread for brothers.

THE WORDS OF WISDOM.

Few and precious are the words which the lips of Wisdom utter:

To what shall their rarity be likened? What price shall count their worth?

Perfect and much to be desired, and giving joy with riches,

No lovely thing on earth can picture all their beauty.

They be chance pearls, flung among the rocks by the sullen waters of Oblivion,

Which Diligence loveth to gather, and hang around the neck of Memory;

They be white-winged seeds of happiness, wafted from the islands of the blessed,

Which Thought carefully tendeth, in the kindly garden of the heart;

They be sproutings of an harvest for eternity, bursting through the tilth of time,

Green promise of the golden wheat, that yieldeth angels' food;

They be drops of the crystal dew, which the wings of seraphs scatter,

When on some brighter sabbath, their plumes quiver most with delight:

Such, and so precious, are the words which the lips of Wisdom utter.

Yet more, for the half is not said, of their might, and dignity, and value;

For life-giving be they and glorious, redolent of sanctity and heaven:

As fumes of hallowed incense, that veil the throne of the Most High;

As beaded bubbles that sparkle on the rim of the cup of immortality;

As wreaths of the rainbow spray, from the pure cataracts of truth:

Such, and so precious, are the words which the lips of Wisdom utter.

Yet once again, loving student, suffer the praises of thy teacher,

For verily the sun of the mind, and the life of the heart is Wisdom:

She is pure and full of light, crowning grey hairs with lustre,

And kindling the eye of youth with a fire not its own;

And her words, whereunto canst thou liken them? for earth cannot show their peers:

They be grains of the diamond sand, the radiant floor of heaven,

Rising in sunny dust behind the chariot of God;

They be flashes of the dayspring from on high, shed from the windows of the skies;

They be streams of living waters, fresh from the fountain of Intelligence:

Such, and so precious, are the words which the lips of Wisdom utter.

For these shall guide thee well, and guard thee on thy way;

And wanting all beside, with these shalt thou be rich:

Though all around be woe, these shall make thee happy;

Though all within be pain, these shall bring thee health:

Thy good shall grow into ripeness, thine evil wither and decay,

And Wisdom's words shall sweetly charm thy doubtful into virtues:

Meanness shall then be frugal care; where shame was, thou art modest;

Cowardice riseth into caution, rashness is sobered into courage;

The wrathful spirit, rendering a reason, standeth justified in anger;

The idle hand hath fair excuse, propping the thoughtful forehead.

Life shall have no labyrinth but thy steps can track it,

For thou hast a silken clue, to lead thee through the darkness:

The rampant Minotaur of ignorance shall perish at thy coming,

And thine enfranchised fellows hail thy white victorious sails.

Wherefore, friend and scholar, hear the words of Wisdom;

Whether she speaketh to thy soul in the full chords of revelation;

In the teaching earth, or air, or sea; in the still melodies of thought;

Or, haply, in the humbler strains that would detain thee here.

OF TRUTH IN THINGS FALSE.

Error is a hardy plant; it flourisheth in every soil;

In the heart of the wise and good, alike with the wicked and foolish.

For there is no error so crooked, but it hath in it some lines of truth:

Nor is any poison so deadly, that it serveth not some wholesome use:

And the just man, enamoured of the right, is blinded by the speciousness of wrong;

And the prudent, perceiving an advantage, is content to overlook the harm.

On all things created remaineth the half-effaced signature of God,

Somewhat of fair and good, though blotted by the finger of corruption:

And if error cometh in like a flood, it mixeth with streams of truth;

And the Adversary loveth to have it so, for thereby many are decoyed.

Providence is dark in its permissions; yet one day, when all is known,

The universe of reason shall acknowledge how just and good were they;

For the wise man leaneth on his wisdom, and the righteous trusteth to his righteousness,

And those, who thirst for independence, are suffered to drink of disappointment.

Wherefore?—to prove and humble them; and to teach the idolaters of Truth,

That it is but the ladder unto Him, on whom only they should trust.

There is truth in the wildest scheme that imaginative heat hath engendered,

And a man may gather somewhat from the crudest theories of fancy:

The alchymist laboureth in folly, but catcheth chance gleams of wisdom,

And findeth out many inventions, though his crucible breed not gold;

The sinner, toying with witchcraft, thinketh to delude his fellows,

But there be very spirits of evil, and what if they come at his bidding?

He is a bold bad man who dareth to tamper with the dead;

For their whereabout lieth in a mystery—that vestibule leading to Eternity,

The waiting-room for unclad ghosts, before the presence-chamber of their King:

Mind may act upon mind, though bodies be far divided;

For the life is in the blood, but souls communicate unseen:

And the heat of an excited intellect, radiating to its fellows,

Doth kindle dry leaves afar off, while the green wood around it is unwarmed.

The dog may have a spirit, as well as his brutal master;

A spirit to live in happiness: for why should he be robbed of his existence?

Hath he not a conscience of evil, a glimmer of moral sense,

Love and hatred, courage and fear, and visible shame and pride?

There may be a future rest for the patient victims of the cruel;

And a season allotted for their bliss, to compensate for unjust suffering.

Spurn not at seeming error, but dig below its surface for the truth;

And beware of seeming truths, that grow on the roots of error:

For comely are the apples that spring from the Dead Sea's cursed shore,

But within are they dust and ashes, and the hand that plucked them shall rue it.

A frequent similar effect argueth a constant cause:

Yet who hath counted the links that bind an omen to its issue?

Who hath expounded the law that rendereth calamities gregarious,

Pressing down with yet more woes the heavy-laden mourner?

Who knoweth wherefore a monsoon should swell the sails of the prosperous,

Blithely speeding on their course the children of good luck?

Who hath companied a vision from the horn or ivory gate?

Or met another's mind in his, and explained its presence?

There is a secret somewhat in antipathies; and love is more than fancy;

Yea, and a palpable notice warneth of an instant danger;

For the soul hath its feelers, cobwebs floating on the wind,

That catch events in their approach with sure and apt presentiment;

So that some halo of attraction heraldeth a coming friend,

Investing in his likeness the stranger that passed on before;

And while the word is in thy mouth, behold thy word fulfilled,

And he of whom we spake can answer for himself.

O man, little hast thou learnt of truth in things most true,

How therefore shall thy blindness wot of truth in things most false?

Thou hast not yet perceived the causes of life or motion,

How then canst thou define the subtle sympathies of mind?

For the spirit, sharpest and strongest when disease hath rent the body,

Hath welcomed kindred spirits in nightly visitations,

Or learnt from restless ghosts dark secrets of the living,

And helped slow justice to her prey by the dreadful teaching of a dream.

Verily, there is nothing so true, that the damps of error have not warped it;

Verily, there is nothing so false, that a sparkle of truth is not in it.

For the enemy, the father of lies, the giant Upas of creation,

Whose deadly shade hath blasted this once green garden of the Lord,

Can but pervert the good, but may not create the evil;

He destroyeth, but cannot build; for he is not antagonist deity:

Mighty is his stolen power, yet is he a creature and a subject;

Not a maker of abstract wrong, but a spoiler of concrete right:

The fiend hath not a royal crown; he is but a prowling robber,

Suffered, for some mysterious end, to haunt the King's highway;

And the keen sword he beareth, once was a simple ploughshare;

Yea, and his panoply of error is but a distortion of the truth:

The sickle that once reaped righteousness, beaten from its useful curve,

With axe, and spike, and bar, headeth the marauder's halbert.

Seek not further, O man, to solve the dark riddle of sin;

Suffice it, that thine own bad heart is to thee thine origin of evil.

OF ANTICIPATION.

Thou hast seen many sorrows, travel-stained pilgrim of the world,

But that which hath vexed thee most hath been the looking for evil;

And though calamities have crossed thee, and misery been heaped on thy head,

Yet ills, that never happened, have chiefly made thee wretched.

The sting of pain and the edge of pleasure are blunted by long expectation,

For the gall and the balm alike are diluted in the waters of patience:

And often thou sippest sweetness, ere the cup is dashed from thy lip;

Or drainest the gall of fear, while evil is passing by thy dwelling.

A man too careful of danger liveth in continual torment,

But a cheerful expecter of the best hath a fountain of joy within him:

Yea, though the breath of disappointment should chill the sanguine heart,

Speedily gloweth it again, warmed by the live embers of hope;

Though the black and heavy surge close above the head for a moment,

Yet the happy buoyancy of Confidence riseth superior to Despair.

Verily, evils may be courted, may be wooed and won by distrust:

For the wise Physician of our weal loveth not an unbelieving spirit;

And to those giveth He good, who rely on His hand for good;

And those leaveth He to evil, who fear, but trust Him not.

Ask for good, and hope it, for the ocean of good is fathomless;

Ask for good, and have it, for thy Friend would see thee happy;

But to the timid heart, to the child of unbelief and dread,

That leaneth on his own weak staff, and trusteth the sight of his eyes,

The evil he feared shall come, for the soil is ready for the seed,

And suspicion hath coldly put aside the hand that was ready to help him.

Therefore look up, sad spirit; be strong, thou coward heart,

Or fear will make thee wretched, though evil follow not behind:

Cease to anticipate misfortune; there are still many chances of escape;

But if it come, be courageous; face it, and conquer thy calamity.

There is not an enemy so stout, as to storm and take the fortress of the mind,

Unless its infirmity turn traitor, and Fear unbar the gates.

The valiant standeth as a rock, and the billows break upon him;

The timorous is a skiff unmoored, tost and mocked at by a ripple:

The valiant holdeth fast to good, till evil wrench it from him;

The timorous casteth it aside, to meet the worst half way:

Yet oftentimes is evil but a braggart, that provoketh and will not fight;

Or the feint of a subtle fencer, who measureth his thrust elsewhere:

Or perchance a blessing in a masque, sent to try thy trust,

The precious smiting of a friend, whose frowns are all in love:

Often the storm threateneth, but is driven to other climes,

And the weak hath quailed in fear, while the firm hath been glad in his confidence.

OF HIDDEN USES.

The sea-wort floating on the waves, or rolled up high along the shore,

Ye counted useless and vile, heaping on it names of contempt:

Yet hath it gloriously triumphed, and man been humbled in his ignorance,

For health is in the freshness of its savour, and it cumbereth the beach with wealth;

Comforting the tossings of pain with its violet-tinctured essence,

And by its humbler ashes enriching many proud.

Be this, then, a lesson to thy soul, that thou reckon nothing worthless,

Because thou heedest not its use, nor knowest the virtues thereof.

And herein, as thou walkest by the sea, shall weeds be a type and an earnest

Of the stored and uncounted riches lying hid in all creatures of God:

There be flowers making glad the desert, and roots fattening the soil,

And jewels in the secret deep, scattered among groves of coral,

And comforts to crown all wishes, and aids unto every need,

Influences yet unthought, and virtues, and many inventions,

And uses above and around, which man hath not yet regarded.

Not long to charm away disease hath the crocus yielded up its bulb,

Nor the willow lent its bark, nor the nightshade its vanquished poison;

Not long hath the twisted leaf, the fragrant gift of China,

Nor that nutritious root, the boon of far Peru,

Nor the many-coloured dahlia, nor the gorgeous flaunting cactus,

Nor the multitude of fruits and flowers, ministered to life and luxury:

Even so, there be virtues yet unknown in the wasted foliage of the elm,

In the sun-dried harebell of the downs, and the hyacinth drinking in the meadow,

In the sycamore's winged fruit, and the facet-cut cones of the cedar;

And the pansy and bright geranium live not alone for beauty,

Nor the waxen flower of the arbute, though it dieth in a day,

Nor the sculptured crest of the fir, unseen but by the stars;

And the meanest weed of the garden serveth unto many uses,

The salt tamarisk, and juicy flag, the freckled orchis, and the daisy.

The world may laugh at famine, when forest-trees yield bread,

When acorns give out fragrant drink, and the sap of the linden is as fatness:

For every green herb, from the lotus to the darnel,

Is rich with delicate aids to help incurious man.

Still, Mind is up and stirring, and pryeth in the corners of contrivance,

Often from the dark recesses picking out bright seeds of truth:

Knowledge hath clipped the lightning's wings, and mewed it up for a purpose,

Training to some domestic task the fiery bird of heaven;

Tamed is the spirit of the storm, to slave in all peaceful arts,

To walk with husbandry and science; to stand in the vanguard against death:

And the chemist balanceth his elements with more than magic skill,

Commanding stones that they be bread, and draining sweetness out of wormwood.

Yet man, heedless of a God, counteth up vain reckonings,

Fearing to be jostled and starved out, by the too prolific increase of his kind;

And asketh, in unbelieving dread, for how few years to come

Will the black cellars of the world yield unto him fuel for his winter.

Might not the wide waste sea be pent within narrower bounds?

Might not the arm of diligence make the tangled wilderness a garden?

And for aught thou canst tell, there may be a thousand methods

Of comforting thy limbs in warmth, though thou kindle not a spark.

Fear not, son of man, for thyself nor thy seed:—with a multitude is plenty;

God's blessing giveth increase, and with it larger than enough.

Search out the wisdom of nature, there is depth in all her doings;

She seemeth prodigal of power, yet her rules are the maxims of frugality:

The plant refresheth the air, and the earth filtereth the water,

And dews are sucked into the cloud, dropping fatness on the world:

She hath, on a mighty scale, a general use for all things;

Yet hath she specially for each its microscopic purpose:

There is use in the prisoned air, that swelleth the pods of the laburnum;

Design in the venomed thorns, that sentinel the leaves of the nettle;

A final cause for the aromatic gum, that congealeth the moss around a rose:

A reason for each blade of grass, that reareth its small spire.

How knoweth discontented man what a train of ills might follow,

If the lowest menial of nature knew not her secret office?

If the thistle never sprang up to mock the loose husbandry of indolence,

Or the pestilence never swept away an unknown curse from among men?

Would ye crush the buzzing myriads that float on the breath of evening?

Would ye trample the creatures of God that people the rotting fruit?

Would ye suffer no mildew forest to stain the unhealthy wall,

Nor a noisome savour to exhale from the pool that breedeth disease?

Pain is useful unto man, for it teacheth him to guard his life,

And the fetid vapours of the fen warn him to fly from danger:

And the meditative mind, looking on, winneth good food for its hunger,

Seeing the wholesome root bring forth a poisonous berry;

For otherwhile falleth it out that truth, driven to extremities,

Yieldeth bitter folly as the spoilt fruit of wisdom.

O, blinded is thine eye, if it see not just aptitude in all things:

O, frozen is thy heart, if it glow not with gratitude for all things:

In the perfect circle of creation not an atom could be spared,

From earth's magnetic zone to the bindweed round a hawthorn.

The sage, and the beetle at his feet, hath each a ministration to perform:

The briar and the palm have the wages of life, rendering secret service.

Neither is it thus alone with the definite existences of matter;

But motion and sound, circumstance and quality, yea, all things have their office.

The zephyr playing with an aspen-leaf,—the earthquake that rendeth a continent;

The moon-beam silvering a ruined arch,—the desert-wave dashing up a pyramid;

The thunder of jarring icebergs,—the stops of a shepherd's pipe;

The howl of the tiger in the glen,—and the wood-dove calling to her mate;

The vulture's cruel rage,—the grace of the stately swan;

The fierceness looking from the lynx's eye, and the dull stupor of the sloth:

To these, and to all, is there added each its USE, though man considereth it lightly;

For Power hath ordained nothing which Economy saw not needful.

All things being are in concord with the ubiquity of God;

Neither is there one thing overmuch, nor freed from honourable servitude.

Were there not a need-be of wisdom, nothing would be as it is;

For essence without necessity argueth a moral weakness.

We look through a glass darkly, we catch but glimpses of truth;

But, doubtless, the sailing of a cloud hath Providence to its pilot,

Doubtless, the root of an oak is gnarled for a special purpose,

The foreknown station of a rush is as fixed as the station of a king,

And chaff from the hand of the winnower, steered as the stars in their courses.

Man liveth only in himself, but the Lord liveth in all things;

And His pervading unity quickeneth the whole creation.

Man doeth one thing at once, nor can he think two thoughts together;

But God compasseth all things, mantling the globe like air:

And we render homage to His wisdom, seeing use in all His creatures,

For, perchance, the universe would die, were not all things as they are.

OF COMPENSATION.

Equal is the government of heaven in allotting pleasures among men,

And just the everlasting law, that hath wedded happiness to virtue:

For verily on all things else broodeth disappointment with care,

That childish man may be taught the shallowness of earthly enjoyment.

Wherefore, ye that have enough, envy ye the rich man his abundance?

Wherefore, daughters of affluence, covet ye the cottager's content?

Take the good with the evil, for ye all are pensioners of God,

And none may choose or refuse the cup His wisdom mixeth.

The poor man rejoiceth at his toil, and his daily bread is sweet to him:

Content with present good, he looketh not for evil to the future:

The rich man languisheth with sloth, and findeth pleasure in nothing,

He locketh up care with his gold, and feareth the fickleness of fortune.

Can a cup contain within itself the measure of a bucket?

Or the straitened appetites of man drink more than their fill of luxury?

There is a limit to enjoyment, though the sources of wealth be boundless:

And the choicest pleasures of life lie within the ring of moderation.

Also, though penury and pain be real and bitter evils,

I would reason with the poor afflicted, for he is not so wretched as he seemeth.

What right hath an offender to complain, though others escape punishment,

If the stripes of earned misfortune overtake him in his sin?

Wherefore not endure with resignation the evils thou canst not avert?

For the coward pain will flee, if thou meet him as a man:

Consider, whatever be thy fate, that it might and ought to have been worse,

And that it lieth in thy hand to gather even blessing from afflictions:

Bethink thee, wherefore were they sent? and hath not use blunted their keenness?

Need hope, and patience, and courage, be strangers to the meanest hovel?

Thou art in an evil case, it were cruel to deny to thee compassion,

But there is not unmitigated ill in the sharpest of this world's sorrows:

I touch not the sore of thy guilt; but of human griefs I counsel thee,

Cast off the weakness of regret, and gird thee to redeem thy loss:

Thou hast gained, in the furnace of affliction, self-knowledge, patience, and humility,

And these be as precious ore, that waiteth the skill of the coiner:

Despise not the blessings of adversity, nor the gain thou hast earned so hardly,

And now thou hast drained the bitter, take heed that thou lose not the sweet.

Power is seldom innocent, and envy is the yoke-fellow of eminence;

And the rust of the miser's riches wasteth his soul as a canker.

The poor man counteth not the cost at which such wealth hath been purchased;

He would be on the mountain's top, without the toil and travail of the climbing.

But equity demandeth recompense: for high-place, calumny and care;

For state, comfortless splendour eating out the heart of home;

For warrior fame, dangers and death; for a name among the learned, a spirit overstrained;

For honour of all kinds, the goad of ambition; on every acquirement, the tax of anxiety.

He that would change with another, must take the cup as it is mixed:

Poverty, with largeness of heart; or a full purse, with a sordid spirit;

Wisdom, in an ailing body; or a common mind, with health:

Godliness, with man's scorn; or the welcome of the mighty, with guilt:

Beauty, with a fickle heart; or plainness of face, with affection.

For so hath Providence determined, that a man shall not easily discover

Unmingled good or evil, to quicken his envy or abhorrence.

A bold man or a fool must he be, who would change his lot with another;

It were a fearful bargain, and mercy hath lovingly refused it:

For we know the worst of ourselves, but the secrets of another we see not,

And better is certain bad, than the doubt and dread of worse.

Just, and strong, and opportune is the moral rule of God;

Ripe in its times, firm in its judgments, equal in the measure of its gifts:

Yet men, scanning the surface, count the wicked happy,

Nor heed the compensating peace, which gladdeneth the good in his afflictions.

They see not the frightful dreams that crowd a bad man's pillow,

Like wreathed adders crawling round his midnight conscience;

They hear not the terrible suggestions, that knock at the portal of his will,

Provoking to wipe away from life the one weak witness of the deed;

They know not the torturing suspicions that sting his panting breast,

When the clear eye of penetration quietly readeth off the truth.

Likewise of the good what know they? The memories bringing pleasure,

Shrined in the heart of the benevolent, and glistening from his eye;

The calm self-justifying reason that establisheth the upright in his purpose;

The warm and gushing bliss that floodeth all the thoughts of the religious.

Many a beggar at the cross-way, or grey-haired shepherd on the plain,

Hath more of the end of all wealth, than hundreds who multiply the means.

Moreover, a moral compensation reacheth to the secrecy of thought;

For if thou wilt think evil of thy neighbour, soon shalt thou have him for thy foe:

And yet he may know nothing of the cause that maketh thee distasteful to his soul,—

The cause of unkind suspicion, for which thou hast thy punishment:

And if thou think of him in charity, wishing or praying for his weal,

He shall not guess the secret charm that lureth his soul to love thee.

For just is retributive ubiquity: Samson did sin with Dalilah,

And his eyes and captive strength were forfeit to the Philistine:

Jacob robbed his brother, and sorrow was his portion to the grave:

David must fly before his foes, yea, though his guilt is covered:

And He who, seeming old in youth, was marred for others' sin,

For every special crime must bear its special penalty:

By luxury, or rashness, or vice, the member that hath erred suffereth,—

And therefore the Sacrifice for all was pained at every pore.

Alike to the slave and his oppressor cometh night with sweet refreshment,

And half of the life of the most wretched is gladdened by the soothings of sleep.

Pain addeth zest unto pleasure, and teacheth the luxury of health;

There is a joy in sorrow, which none but a mourner can know:

Madness hath imaginary bliss, and most men have no more;

Age hath its quiet calm, and youth enjoyeth not for haste:

Daily, in the midst of its beatitude, the righteous soul is vexed;

And even the misery of guilt doth attain to the bliss of pardon.

Who, in the face of the born-blind, ever looked on other than content?

And the deaf ear listeneth within to the silent music of the heart.

There is evil poured upon the earth from the overflowings of corruption,—

Sickness, and poverty, and pain, and guilt, and madness, and sorrow;

But, as the water from a fountain riseth and sinketh to its level,

Ceaselessly toileth justice to equalize the lots of men:

For, habit and hope and ignorance, and the being but one of a multitude,

And strength of reason in the sage, and dulness of feeling in the fool,

And the light elasticity of courage, and the calm resignation of meekness,

And the stout endurance of decision, and the weak carelessness of apathy,

And helps invisible but real, and ministerings not unfelt,

Angelic aid with worldly discomfiture, bodily loss with the soul's gain,

Secret griefs, and silent joys, thorns in the flesh, and cordials for the spirit,

(—Short of the insuperable barrier dividing innocence from guilt,—)

Go far to level all things, by the gracious rule of Compensation.

OF INDIRECT INFLUENCES.

Face thy foe in the field, and perchance thou wilt meet thy master,

For the sword is chained to his wrist, and his armour buckled for the battle;

But find him when he looketh not for thee, aim between the joints of his harness,

And the crest of his pride will be humbled, his cruelty will bite the dust.

Beard not a lion in his den, but fashion the secret pitfall;

So shall thou conquer the strong, thyself triumphing in weakness.

The hurricane rageth fiercely, and the promontory standeth in its might,

Breasting the artillery of heaven, as darts glance from the crocodile:

But the small continual creeping of the silent footsteps of the sea

Mineth the wall of adamant, and stealthily compasseth its ruin.

The weakness of accident is strong, where the strength of design is weak:

And a casual analogy convinceth, when a mind beareth not argument.

Will not a man listen? be silent; and prove thy maxim by example:

Never fear, thou losest not thy hold, though thy mouth doth not render a reason.

Contend not in wisdom with a fool, for thy sense maketh much of his conceit;

And some errors never would have thriven, had it not been for learned refutation:

Yea, much evil hath been caused by an honest wrestler for truth,

And much of unconscious good, by the man that hated wisdom:

For the intellect judgeth closely, and if thou overstep thy argument,

Or seem not consistent with thyself, or fail in thy direct purpose,

The mind that went along with thee, shall stop and return without thee,

And thou shalt have raised a foe, where thou mightest have won a friend.

Hints, shrewdly strown, mightily disturb the spirit,

Where a bare-faced accusation would be too ridiculous for calumny:

The sly suggestion toucheth nerves, and nerves contract the fronds,

And the sensitive mimosa of affection trembleth to its root;

And friendships, the growth of half a century, those oaks that laugh at storms,

Have been cankered in a night by a worm, even as the prophet's gourd.

Hast thou loved, and not known jealousy? for a sidelong look

Can please or pain thy heart more than the multitude of proofs:

Hast thou hated, and not learned that thy silent scorn

Doth deeper aggravate thy foe than loud-cursing malice?—

A wise man prevaileth in power, for he screeneth his battering engine,

But a fool tilteth headlong, and his adversary is aware.

Behold those broken arches, that oriel all unglazed,

That crippled line of columns bleaching in the sun,

The delicate shaft stricken midway, and the flying buttress

Idly stretching forth to hold up tufted ivy:

Thinkest thou the thousand eyes that shine with rapture on a ruin,

Would have looked with half their wonder on the perfect pile?

And wherefore not—but that light hints, suggesting unseen beauties,

Fill the complacent gazer with self-grown conceits?

And so, the rapid sketch winneth more praise to the painter,

Than the consummate work elaborated on his easel:

And so, the Helvetic lion caverned in the living rock

Hath more of majesty and force, than it upon a marble pedestal.

Tell me, daughter of taste, what hath charmed thine ear in music?

Is it the laboured theme, the curious fugue or cento,—

Nor rather the sparkles of intelligence flashing from some strange chord,

Or the soft melody of sounds far sweeter for simplicity?

Tell me, thou son of science, what hath filled thy mind in reading?

Is it the volume of detail where all is orderly set down,

And they that read may run, nor need to stop and think;

The book carefully accurate, that counteth thee no better than a fool,

Gorging the passive mind with annotated notes;—

Nor rather the half-suggested thoughts, the riddles thou mayst solve,

The fair ideas, coyly peeping like young loves out of roses,

The quaint arabesque conceptions, half cherub and half flower,

The light analogy, or deep allusion, trusted to thy learning,

The confidence implied in thy skill to unravel meaning mysteries?

For ideas are ofttimes shy of the close furniture of words,

And thought, wherein only is power, may be best conveyed by a suggestion:

The flash that lighteth up a valley, amid the dark midnight of a storm,

Coineth the mind with that scene sharper than fifty summers.

A worldly man boasteth in his pride, that there is no power but of money;

And he judgeth the characters of men by the differing measures of their means:

He stealeth all goodly names, as worth, and value, and substance,

Which be the ancient heritage of Virtue, but such an one ascribeth unto Wealth:

He spurneth the needy sage, whose wisdom hath enriched nations,

And the sons of poverty and learning, without whom earth were a desert:

Music, the soother of cares, the tuner of the dank discordant heart-strings,

It is nought unto such an one but sounds, whereby some earn their living:

The poem, and the picture, and the statue, to him seem idle baubles,

Which wealth condescendeth to favour, to gain him the name of patron.

But little wotteth he the might of the means his folly despiseth;

He considereth not that these be the wires which move the puppets of the world.

A sentence hath formed a character, and a character subdued a kingdom;

A picture hath ruined souls, or raised them to commerce with the skies:

The pen hath shaken nations, and stablished the world in peace;

And the whole full horn of plenty been filled from the vial of science.

He regardeth man as sensual, the monarch of created matter,

And careth not aught for mind, that linketh him with spirits unseen;

He feedeth his carcase and is glad, though his soul be faint and famished,

And the dull brute power of the body bindeth him a captive to himself.

Man liveth from hour to hour, and knoweth not what may happen;

Influences circle him on all sides, and yet must he answer for his actions:

For the being that is master of himself, bendeth events to his will,

But a slave to selfish passion is the wavering creature of circumstance.

To this man temptation is a poison, to that man it addeth vigour;

And each may render to himself influences good or evil.

As thou directest the power, harm or advantage will follow,

And the torrent that swept the valley, may be led to turn a mill;

The wild electric flash, that could have kindled comets,

May by the ductile wire give ease to an ailing child.

For outward matter or event fashion not the character within,

But each man, yielding or resisting, fashioneth his mind for himself.

Some have said, What is in a name?—most potent plastic influence;

A name is a word of character, and repetition stablisheth the fact:

A word of rebuke, or of honour, tending to obscurity or fame;

And greatest is the power of a name, when its power is least suspected.

A low name is a thorn in the side, that hindereth the footman in his running;

But a name of ancestral renown shall often put the racer to his speed.

Few men have grown unto greatness whose names are allied to ridicule,

And many would never have been profligate, but for the splendour of a name.

A wise man scorneth nothing, be it never so small or homely,

For he knoweth not the secret laws that may bind it to great effects.

The world in its boyhood was credulous, and dreaded the vengeance of the stars,

The world in its dotage is not wiser, fearing not the influence of small things:

Planets govern not the soul, nor guide the destinies of man,

But trifles, lighter than straws, are levers in the building up of character.

A man hath the tiller in his hand, and may steer against the current,

Or may glide down idly with the stream, till his vessel founder in the whirlpool.

Helvetiorum Fidei ac Virtuti
Die X Augusti II et III
Septembris MDCCXCII

OF MEMORY.

Where art thou, storehouse of the mind, garner of facts and fancies,—

In what strange firmament are laid the beams of thine airy chambers?

Or art thou that small cavern, the centre of the rolling brain,

Where still one sandy morsel testifieth man's original?

Or hast thou some grand globe, some common hall of intellect,

Some spacious market-place for thought, where all do bring their wares,

And gladly rescued from the littleness, the narrow closet of a self,

The privileged soul hath large access, coming in the livery of learning?

Live we as isolated worlds, perfect in substance and spirit,

Each a sphere, with a special mind, prisoned in its shell of matter?

Or rather, as converging radiations, parts of one majestic whole,

Beams of the Sun, streams from the River, branches of the mighty Tree,

Some bearing fruit, some bearing leaves, and some diseased and barren,—

Some for the feast, some for the floor, and some—how many—for the fire?

Memory may be but a power of coming to the treasury of Fact,

A momentary self-desertion, an absence in spirit from the Now,

An actual coursing hither and thither, by the mind, slipped from its leash,

A life, as in the mystery of dreams, spent within the limits of a moment.

A brutish man knoweth not this, neither can a fool comprehend it,

But there be secrets of the Memory, deep, wondrous, and fearful.

Were I at Petra, could I not declare, My soul hath been here before me?

Am I strange to the columned halls, the calm dead grandeur of Palmyra?

Know I not thy mount, O Carmel! Have I not voyaged on the Danube,

Nor seen the glare of Arctic snows,—nor the black tents of the Tartar?

Is it then a dream, that I remember the faces of them of old,

While wandering in the grove with Plato, and listening to Zeno in the porch?

Paul have I seen, and Pythagoras, and the Stagyrite hath spoken me friendly,

And His meek eye looked also upon me, standing with Peter in the palace.

Athens and Rome, Persepolis and Sparta, am I not a freeman of you all?

And chiefly can my yearning heart forget thee, O Jerusalem?—

For the strong magic of conception, mingled with the fumes of memory,

Giveth me a life in all past time, yea, and addeth substance to the future.

Be ye my judges, imaginative minds, full-fledged to soar into the sun,

Whose grosser natural thoughts the chemistry of wisdom hath sublimed,

Have ye not confessed to a feeling, a consciousness strange and vague,

That ye have gone this way before, and walk again your daily life,

Tracking an old routine, and on some foreign strand,

Where bodily ye have never stood, finding your own footsteps?

Hath not at times some recent friend looked out an old familiar,

Some newest circumstance or place teemed as with ancient memories?

A startling sudden flash lighteth up all for an instant,

And then it is quenched, as in darkness, and leaveth the cold spirit trembling.

Memory is not wisdom; idiots can rote volumes:

Yet, what is wisdom without memory? a babe that is strangled in its birth,

The path of the swallow in the air, the path of the dolphin in the waters,

A cask running out, a bottomless chasm: such is wisdom without memory.

There be many wise, who cannot store their knowledge;

Yet from themselves are they satisfied, for the fountain is within:

There be many who store, but have no wisdom of their own,

Lumbering their armoury with weapons their muscles cannot lift:

There be many thieves and robbers, who glean and store unlawfully,

Calling in to memory's help some cunningly devised Cabala:

But to feed the mind with fatness, to fill thy granary with corn,

Nor clog with chaff and straw the threshing-floor of reason,

Reap the ideas, and house them well; but leave the words high stubble:

Strive to store up what was thought, despising what was said.

For the mind is a spirit, and drinketh in ideas, as flame melteth into flame;

But for words it must pack them as on floors, cumbrous and perishable merchandize.

To be pained for a minute, to fear for an hour, to hope for a week—how long and weary!

But to remember fourscore years, is to look back upon a day.

An avenue seemeth to lengthen in the eyes of the wayfaring man,

But let him turn, those stationed elms crowd up within a yard;

Pace the lamp-lit streets of some sleeping city,

The multitude of cressets shall seem one, in the false picture of perspective;

Even so, in sweet treachery, dealeth the aged with himself,

He gazeth on the green hill-tops, while the marshes beneath are hidden;

And the partial telescope of memory pierceth the blank between,

To look with lingering love at the fair star of childhood.

Life is as the current spark on the miner's wheel of flints;

Whiles it spinneth there is light; stop it, all is darkness:

Life is as a morsel of frankincense burning in the hall of Eternity;

It is gone, but its odorous cloud curleth to the lofty roof:

Life is as a lump of salt, melting in the temple-laver;

It is gone,—yet its savour reacheth to the farthest atom:

Even so, for evil or for good, is life the criterion of a man,

For its memories of sanctity or sin pervade all the firmament of being.

There is but the flitting moment, wherein to hope or to enjoy,

But in the calendar of Memory, that moment is all time.

THE DREAM OF AMBITION.

I left the happy fields that smile around the village of Content,

And sought with wayward feet the torrid desert of Ambition.

Long time, parched and weary, I travelled that burning sand,

And the hooded basilisk and adder were strewed in my way for palms;

Black scorpions thronged me round, with sharp uplifted stings,

Seeming to mock me as I ran; (then I guessed it was a dream,—

But life is oft so like a dream, we know not where we are.)

So I toiled on, doubting in myself, up a steep gravel cliff,

Whose yellow summit shot up far into the brazen sky;

And quickly, I was wafted to the top, as upon unseen wings

Carrying me upward like a leaf: (then I thought it was a dream,—

Yet life is oft so like a dream, we know not where we are.)

So I stood on the mountain, and behold! before me a giant pyramid,

And I clomb with eager haste its high and difficult steps;

For I longed, like another Belus, to mount up, yea, to heaven,

Nor sought I rest until my feet had spurned the crest of earth.

Then I sat on my granite throne under the burning sun,

And the world lay smiling beneath me, but I was wrapt in flames;

(And I hoped, in glimmering consciousness, that all this torture was a dream,—

Yet life is oft so like a dream, we know not where we are.)

And anon, as I sat scorching, the pyramid shuddered to its root,

And I felt the quarried mass leap from its sand foundations:

Awhile it tottered and tilted, as raised by invisible levers,—

(And now my reason spake with me; I knew it was a dream:

Yet I hushed that whisper into silence, for I hoped to learn of wisdom,

By tracking up my truant thoughts, whereunto they might lead.)

And suddenly, as rolling upon wheels, adown the cliff it rushed,

And I thought, in my hot brain, of the Muscovites' icy slope;

A thousand yards in a moment we ploughed the sandy seas,

And crushed those happy fields, and that smiling village,

And onward, as a living thing, still rushed my mighty throne,

Thundering along, and pounding, as it went, the millions in my way:

Before me all was life, and joy, and full-blown summer,

Behind me death and woe, the desert and simoom.

Then I wept and shrieked aloud, for pity and for fear;

But might not stop, for, comet-like, flew on the maddened mass

Over the crashing cities, and falling obelisks and towers,

And columns, razed as by a scythe, and high domes, shivered as an egg-shell,

And deep embattled ranks, and women, crowded in the streets,

And children, kneeling as for mercy, and all I had ever loved,

Yea, over all, mine awful throne rushed on with seeming instinct,—

And over the crackling forests, and over the rugged beach,

And on with a terrible hiss through the foaming wild Atlantic

That roared around me as I sat, but could not quench my spirit,—

Still on, through startled solitudes we shattered the pavement of the sea,

Down, down, to that central vault, the bolted doors of hell;

And these, with horrid shock, my huge throne battered in,

And on to the deepest deep, where the fierce flames were hottest,

Blazing tenfold as conquering furiously the seas that rushed in with me,—

And there I stopped: and a fearful voice shouted in mine ear,

"Behold the home of Discontent; behold the rest of Ambition!"

OF SUBJECTION.

Law hath dominion over all things, over universal mind and matter;

For there are reciprocities of right, which no creature can gainsay.

Unto each was there added by its Maker, in the perfect chain of being,

Dependencies and sustentations, accidents, and qualities, and powers:

And each must fly forward in the curve, unto which it was forced from the beginning;

Each must attract and repel, or the monarchy of Order is no more.

Laws are essential emanations from the self-poised character of God,

And they radiate from that sun to the circling edges of creation.

Verily, the mighty Lawgiver hath subjected Himself unto Laws,

And God is the primal grand example of free unstrained obedience;

His perfection is limited by right, and cannot trespass into wrong,

Because He hath established Himself as the fountain of only good,

And in thus much is bounded, that the evil hath He left unto another,

And that dark other hath usurped the evil which Omnipotence laid down.

Unto God there exist impossibilities; for the True One cannot lie,

Nor the Wise One wander from the track which He hath determined for Himself:

For His will was purposed from eternity, strong in the love of order;

And that will altereth not, as the law of the Medes and Persians.

God is the origin of order, and the first exemplar of His precept;

For there is subordination of His Essence, self-guided unto holiness;

And there is subordination of His Persons, in due procession of dignity;

For the Son, as a son, is subject; and to Him doth the Spirit minister:

But these things be mysteries to man, he cannot reach nor fathom them,

And ever must he speak in paradox, when labouring to expound his God;

For, behold, God is alone, mighty in unshackled freedom;

And with those wondrous Persons abideth eternal equality.

So then, start ye from the fountain, and follow the river of existence;

For its current is bounded throughout by the banks of just subordination:

Thrones, and dominions, and powers, Archangels, Cherubim, and Seraphim,

Angels, and flaming ministers, and breathing chariots and harps.

For there are degrees in heaven, and varied capabilities of bliss,

And steps in the ladder of Intelligence, and ranks in approaches to Perfection:

Doubtless, reverence is given, as their due, to the masters in wisdom;

Doubtless, there are who serve; or a throne would have small glory.

Regard now the universe of matter, the substance of visible creation,

Which of old, with well-observing truth, the Greek hath surnamed, Order:

Where is there an atom out of place? or a particle that yieldeth not obedience?

Where is there a fragment that is free? or one thing the equal of another?—

The chain is unbroken down to man, and beyond him the links are perfect:

But he standeth solitary sin, a marvel of permitted chaos.

And shall this seeming error in the scale of due subordination

Be a spot of desert unreclaimed, in the midst of the vineyard of the Lord?

Shall his presumptuous pride snap the safe tether of connexion,

And his blind selfish folly refuse the burden of maintenance?

O man, thou art a creature; boast not thyself above the law:

Think not of thyself as free: thou art bound in the trammels of dependence.

What is the sum of thy duty, but obedience to righteous rule;

To the great commanding Oracle, uttered by delegated organs?

Thou canst not render homage to abstract Omnipresent Power,

Save through the concrete symbol of visible ordained authority.

Those who obey not man, are oftenest found rebels against God;

And seldom is the delegate so bold, as to order what he knoweth to be wrong.

Yet mark me, proud gainsayer! I say not, obey unto sin;

But, where the Principal is silent, take heed thou despise not the Deputy:

And He that loveth order, will bless thee for thy faith,

If thou recognize His sanction in the powers that fashion human laws.

Thou, the vicegerent of the Lord, His high anointed image,

Towards whom a good man's loyalty floweth from the heart of his religion,

Thou, whose deep responsibilities are fathomed by a nation's prayers,

Whom wise men fear for while they love, and envy thee nothing but thy virtues,

From thy dizzy pinnacle of greatness, remember thou also art a subject,

And the throne of thine earthly glory is itself but the footstool of thy God.

The homage thy kingdoms yield thee, regard thou as yielded unto Him;

And while girt with all the majesty of state, consider thee the Lord's chief servant:

So shalt thou prosper, and be strong, grafted on the strength of Another;

So shall thy royal heart be happy, in being humble.

And thou shalt flourish as an oak, the monarch of thine island forests,

Whose deep-dug roots are twisted around the stout ribs of the globe,

That mocketh at the fury of the storm, and rejoiceth in summer sunshine,

Glad in the smiles of heaven, and great in the stability of earth.

A ruler hath not power for himself, neither is his pomp for his pride;

But beneath the ermine of his office should he wear the rough hair-cloth of humility.

Nevertheless, every way obey him, so thou break not a higher commandment;

For Nero was an evil king, yet Paul prescribeth subjection.

If the rulers of a nation be holy, the Lord hath blessed that nation;

If they be lewd and impious, chastisement hath come upon that people:

For the bitterest scourge of a land is ungodliness in them that govern it,

And the guilt of the sons of Josiah drove Israel weeping into Babylon.

Yet be thou resolute against them, if they change the mandates of thy God,

If they touch the ark of His covenant, wherein all His mercies are enshrined:

Be resolute, but not rebellious; lest thou be of the company of Korah:

Set thy face against them as a flint: but be not numbered with Abiram.

Daniel nobly disobeyed; but not from a spirit of sedition:

And Azarias shouted from the furnace,—I will not bow down, O KING.

If truth must be sacrificed to unity, then faithfulness were folly;

If man must be obeyed before God, the martyrs have bled in vain:

Yet none of that blessed army reviled the rulers of the land,

They were loud and bold against the sin, but bent before the ensign of authority.

Honesty, scorning compromise, walketh most suitably with Reverence;

Otherwise righteous daring may show but as obstinate rebellion:

Therefore, suffer not thy censure to lack the savour of courtesy,

And remember, the mortal sinneth, but the staff of his power is from God.

Man, thou hast a social spirit, and art deeply indebted to thy kind:

Therefore claim not all thy rights; but yield, for thine own advantage.

Society is a chain of obligations, and its links must support each other;

The branch can not but wither, that is cut from the parent vine.

Wouldst thou be a dweller in the woods, and cast away the cords that bind thee,

Seeking, in thy bitterness or pride, to be exiled from thy fellows?

Behold, the beasts shall hunt thee, weak, naked, houseless outcast,

Disease and Death shall track thee out, as bloodhounds in the wilderness:

Better to be vilest of the vile, in the hated company of men,

Than to live a solitary wretch, dreading and wanting all things;

Better to be chained to thy labour, in the dusky thoroughfares of life,

Than to reign monarch of Sloth, in lonesome savage freedom.

Whence then cometh the doctrine, that all should be equal and free?—

It is the lie that crowded hell, when Seraphs flung away subjection.

No man is his neighbour's equal, for no two minds are similar,

And accidents, alike with qualities, have every shade but sameness:

The lightest atom of difference shall destroy the nice balance of equality,

And all things, from without and from within, make one man to differ from another.

We are equal and free! was the watchword that spirited the legions of Satan;

We are equal and free! is the double lie that entrappeth to him conscripts from earth:

The messengers of that dark despot will pander to thy licence and thy pride,

And draw thee from the crowd where thou art safe, to seize thee in the solitary desert.

Woe unto him whose heart the syren-song of Liberty hath charmed;

Woe unto him whose mind is bewitched by her treacherous beauty;

In mad zeal flingeth he away the fetters of duty and restraint,

And yieldeth up the holocaust of self to that fair Idol of the Damned.

No man hath freedom in aught, save in that from which the wicked would be hindered,

He is free toward God and good; but to all else a bondman.

Thou art in a middle sphere, to render and receive honour;

If thy king commandeth, obey; and stand not in the way with rebels:

But if need be, lay thy hand upon thy sword, and fear not to smite a traitor,

For the universe acquitteth thee with honour, fighting in defence of thy king.

If a thief break thy dwelling, and thou take him, it were sin in thee to let him go;

Yea, though he pleadeth to thy mercy, thou canst not spare him and be blameless:

For his guilt is not only against thee, it is not thy moneys or thy merchandize,

But he hath done damage to the Law, which duty constraineth thee to sanction.

Feast not thine appetite of vengeance, remembering thou also art a man,

But weep for the sad compulsion, in which the chain of Providence hath bound thee:

Mercy is not thine to give; wilt thou steal another's privilege?

Or send abroad, among thy neighbours, a felon whom impunity hath hardened?

Remember the Roman father, strong in his stern integrity,

And let not thy slothful self-indulgence make thee a conniver at the crime.

Also, if the knife of the murderer be raised against thee or thine,

And through good providence and courage, thou slay him that would have slain thee,

Thou losest not a tittle of thy rectitude, having executed sudden justice;

Still mayst thou walk among the blessed, though thy hands be red with blood.

For thyself, thou art neither worse nor better; but thy fellows should count thee their creditor:

Thou hast manfully protected the right, and the right is stronger for thy deed.

Also, in the rescuing of innocence, fear not to smite the ravisher;

What though he die at thy hand? for a good name is better than the life;

And if Phineas had everlasting praise in the matter of Salu's son,

With how much greater honour standeth such a rescuer acquitted?

Uphold the laws of thy country, and fear not to fight in their defence:

But first be convinced in thy mind; for herein the doubter sinneth.

Above all things, look thou well around, if indeed stern duty forceth thee

To draw the sword of justice, and stain it with the slaughter of thy fellows.

She, that lieth in thy bosom, the tender wife of thy affections,

Must obey thee, and be subject, that evil drop not on thy dwelling.

The child that is used to constraint, feareth not more than he loveth;

But give thy son his way, he will hate thee and scorn thee together.

The master of a well-ordered home knoweth to be kind to his servants;

Yet he exacteth reverence, and each one feareth at his post.

There is nothing on earth so lowly, but duty giveth it importance;

No station so degrading, but it is ennobled by obedience:

Yea, break stones upon the highway, acknowledging the Lord in thy lot,

Happy shalt thou be, and honourable, more than many children of the mighty.

Thou that despisest the outward forms, beware thou lose not the inward spirit;

For they are as words unto ideas, as symbols to things unseen.

Keep then the form that is good; retain, and do reverence to example;

And in all things observe subordination, for that is the whole duty of man.

A horse knoweth his rider, be he confident or timid,

And the fierce spirit of Bucephalus stoopeth unto none but Alexander;

The tigress, roused in the jungle by the prying spaniels of the fowler,

Will quail at the eye of man, so he assert his dignity;

Nay, the very ships, those giant swans breasting the mighty waters,

Roll in the trough, or break the wave, to the pilot's fear or courage:

How much more shall man, discerning the Fountain of authority,

Bow to superior commands, and make his own obeyed.

And yet, in travelling the world, hast thou not often known

A gallant host led on to ruin by a feeble Xerxes?

Hast thou not often seen the wanton luxury of indolence

Sullying with its sleepy mist the tarnished crown of headship?

Alas! for a thousand fathers, whose indulgent sloth

Hath emptied the vial of confusion over a thousand homes:

Alas! for the palaces and hovels, that might have been nurseries for heaven,

By hot intestine broils blighted into schools for hell:

None knoweth his place, yet all refuse to serve,

None weareth the crown, yet all usurp the sceptre;

And perchance some fiercer spirit, of natural nobility of mind,

That needed but the kindness of constraint to have grown up great and good,

Now—the rich harvest of his heart choked by unweeded tares,—

All bold to dare and do, unchecked by wholesome fear,

A scoffer about bigotry and priestcraft, a rebel against government and God,

And standard-bearer of the turbulent, leading on the sons of Belial,

Such an one is king of that small state, head tyrant of the thirty,

Brandishing the torch of discord in his village home:

And the timid Eli of the house, yon humble parish-priest,

Liveth in shame and sorrow, fearing his own handywork;

The mother, heart-stricken years agone, hath dropped into an early grave;

The silent sisters long to leave a home they cannot love;

The brothers, casting off restraint, follow their wayward wills;

And the chance-guest, early departing, blesseth his kind stars,

That on his humbler home hath brooded no domestic curse!

Yet is that curse the fruit; wouldest thou the root of the evil?

A kindness—most unkind, that hath always spared the rod;

A weak and numbing indecision in the mind that should be master;

A foolish love, pregnant of hate, that never frowned on sin;

A moral cowardice of heart, that never dared command.

A kingdom is a nest of families, and a family a small kingdom;

And the government of whole or part differeth in nothing but extent.

The house, where the master ruleth, is strong in united subjection,

And the only commandment with promise, being honoured, is a blessing to that house:

But and if he yieldeth up the reins, it is weak in discordant anarchy,

And the bonds of love and union melt away, as ropes of sand.

The realm, that is ruled with vigour, lacketh neither peace nor glory,

It dreadeth not foes from without, nor the sons of riot from within:

But the meanness of temporizing fear robbeth a kingdom of its honour,

And the weakness of indulgent sloth ravageth its bowels with discord.

The best of human governments is the patriarchal rule;

The authorized supremacy of one, the prescriptive subjection of many:

Therefore, the children of the East have thriven from age to age,

Obeying, even as a god, the royal father of Cathay:

Therefore, to this our day, the Rechabite wanteth not a man,

But they stand before the Lord, forsaking not the mandate of their sire:

Therefore shall Magog among nations arise from his northern lair,

And rend, in the fury of his power, the insurgent world beneath him:

For the thunderbolt of concentrated strength can be hurled by the will of one,

While the dissipated forces of many are harmless as summer lightning.

OF REST.

In the silent watches of the night, calm night that breedeth thoughts,

When the task-weary mind disporteth in the careless play-hours of sleep,

I dreamed; and behold, a valley, green and sunny and well watered,

And thousands moving across it, thousands and tens of thousands:

And though many seemed faint and toil-worn, and stumbled often, and fell,

Yet moved they on unresting, as the ever-flowing cataract.

Then I noted adders in the grass, and pitfalls under the flowers,

And chasms yawned among the hills, and the ground was cracked and slippery:

But Hope and her brother Fear suffered not a foot to linger;

Bright phantoms of false joys beckoned alluringly forward,

While yelling grisly shapes of dread came hunting on behind:

And ceaselessly, like Lapland swarms, that miserable crowd sped along

To the mist-involved banks of a dark and sullen river.

There saw I, midway in the water, standing a giant fisher,

And he held many lines in his hand, and they called him Iron Destiny.

So I tracked those subtle chains, and each held one among the multitude:

Then I understood what hindered, that they rested not in their path:

For the fisher had sport in his fishing, and drew in his lines continually,

And the new-born babe, and the aged man, were dragged into that dark river:

And he pulled all those myriads along, and none might rest by the way,

Till many, for sheer weariness, were eager to plunge into the drowning stream.

So I knew that valley was Life, and it sloped to the waters of Death.

But far on the thither side spread out a calm and silent shore,

Where all was tranquil as a sleep, and the crowded strand was quiet:

And I saw there many I had known, but their eyes glared chillingly upon me,

As set in deepest slumber; and they pressed their fingers to their lips.

Then I knew that shore was the dwelling of Rest, where spirits held their Sabbath,

And it seemed they would have told me much, but they might not break that silence;

For the law of their being was mystery: they glided on, hushing as they went.

Yet further, under the sun, at the roots of purple mountains,

I noted a blaze of glory, as the night-fires on northern skies;

And I heard the hum of joy, as it were a sea of melody;

And far as the eye could reach, were millions of happy creatures

Basking in the golden light; and I knew that land was Heaven.

Then the hill whereon I stood split asunder, and a crater yawned at my feet,

Black and deep and dreadful, fenced round with ragged rocks;

Dimly was the darkness lit up by spires of distant flame:

And I saw below a moving mass of life, like reptiles bred in corruption,

Where all was terrible unrest, shrieks and groans and thunder.

So I woke, and I thought upon my dream; for it seemed of Wisdom's ministration.

What man is he that findeth Rest, though he hunt for it year after year?

As a child he had not yet been wearied, and cared not then to court it;

As a youth he loved not to be quiet, for excitement spurred him into strife;

As a man he tracketh rest in vain, toiling painfully to catch it,

But still is he pulled from the pursuit, by the strong compulsion of his fate:

So he hopeth to have peace in old age, as he cannot rest in manhood,

But troubles thicken with his years, till Death hath dodged him to the grave.

There remaineth a rest for the spirit on the shadowy side of life;

But unto this world's pilgrim no rest for the sole of his foot.

Ever, from stage to stage, he travelleth wearily forward,

And though he pluck flowers by the way, he may not sleep among the flowers.

Mind is the perpetual motion; for it is a running stream

From an unfathomable source, the depth of the Divine Intelligence:

And though it be stopped in its flowing, yet hath it a current within,

The surface may sleep unruffled, but underneath are whirlpools of contention.

Seekest thou rest, O mortal?—seek it no more on earth,

For destiny will not cease from dragging thee through the rough wilderness of life;

Seekest thou rest, O immortal?—hope not to find it in heaven,

For sloth yieldeth not happiness: the bliss of a spirit is action.

Rest dwelleth only on an island in the midst of the ocean of existence,

Where the world-weary soul for a while may fold its tired wings,

Until, after short sufficient slumber, it is quickened unto deathless energy,

And speedeth in eagle flight to the Sun of unapproachable Perfection.

OF HUMILITY.

Vice is grown aweary of her gawds, and donneth russet garments,

Loving for change to walk as a nun, beneath a modest veil:

For Pride hath noted how all admire the fairness of Humility,

And to clutch the praise he coveteth, is content to be drest in hair-cloth;

And wily Lust tempteth the young heart, that is proof against the bravery of harlots,

With timid tears and retiring looks of an artful seeming maid;

And indolent Apathy, sleepily ashamed of his dull lack-lustre face,

Is glad of the livery of meekness, that charitable cloak and cowl;

And Hatred hideth his demon frown beneath a gentle mask;

And Slander, snake-like, creepeth in the dust, thinking to escape recrimination.

But the world hath gained somewhat from its years, and is quick to penetrate disguises,

Neither in all these is it deceived, but divideth the true from the false.

Yet there is a meanness of spirit, that is fair in the eyes of most men,

Yea, and seemeth fair unto itself, loving to be thought Humility.

Its choler is not roused by insolence, neither do injuries disturb it:

Honest indignation is strange unto its breast, and just reproof unto its lip.

It shrinketh, looking fearfully on men, fawning at the feet of the great;

The breath of calumny is sweet unto its ear, and it courteth the rod of persecution.

But what! art thou not a man, deputed chief of the creation?

Art thou not a soldier of the right, militant for God and good?

Shall virtue and truth be degraded, because thou art too base to uphold them?

Or Goliath be bolder in blaspheming for want of a David in the camp?

I say not, avenge injuries; for the ministry of vengeance is not thine:

But wherefore rebuke not a liar? wherefore do dishonour to thyself?

Wherefore let the evil triumph, when the just and the right are on thy side?

Such Humility is abject, it lacketh the life of sensibility,

And that resignation is but mock, where the burden is not felt:

Suspect thyself and thy meekness: thou art mean and indifferent to sin;

And the heart that should grieve and forgive, is case-hardened and forgetteth.

Humility mainly becometh the converse of man with his Maker,

But oftentimes it seemeth out of place in the intercourse of man with man:

Yea, it is the cringer to his equal, that is chiefly seen bold to his God,

While the martyr, whom a world cannot brow-beat, is humble as a child before Him.

Render unto all men their due, but remember thou also art a man,

And cheat not thyself of the reverence which is owing to thy reasonable being.

Be courteous, and listen, and learn: but teach and answer if thou canst:

Serve thee of thy neighbour's wisdom, but be not enslaved as to a master.

Where thou perceivest knowledge, bend the ear of attention and respect;

But yield not further to the teaching, than as thy mind is warranted by reasons.

Better is an obstinate disputant, that yieldeth inch by inch,

Than the shallow traitor to himself, who surrendereth to half an argument.

Modesty winneth good report, but scorn cometh close upon servility;

Therefore, use meekness with discretion, casting not pearls before swine.

For a fool will tread upon thy neck, if he seeth thee lying in the dust;

And there be companies and seasons where a resolute bearing is but duty.

If a good man discloseth his secret failings unto the view of the profane,

What doeth he but harm unto his brother, confirming him in his sin?

There is a concealment that is right, and an open-mouthed humility that erreth;

There is a candour near akin to folly, and a meekness looking like shame.

Masculine sentiments, vigorously holden, well become a man;

But a weak mind hath a timorous grasp, and mistaketh it for tenderness of conscience.

Many are despised for their folly, who put it to the account of their religion,

And because men treat them with contempt, they look to their God for glory;

But contempt shall still be their reward, who betray their Master unto ridicule,

Reflecting on Him in themselves, meanness and ignorance and cowardice.

A Christian hath a royal spirit, and need not be ashamed but unto One:

Among just men walketh he softly, but the world should see him as a champion.

His humbleness is far unlike the shame that covereth the profligate and weak,

When the sober reproof of virtue hath touched their tingling ears;

It is born of love and wisdom, and is worthy of all honour,

And the sweet persuasion of its smile changeth contempt into reverence.

A man of a haughty spirit is daily adding to his enemies:

He standeth as the Arab in the desert, and the hands of all men are against him:

A man of a base mind daily subtracteth from his friends,

For he holdeth himself so cheaply, that others learn to despise him:

But where the meekness of self-knowledge veileth the front of self-respect,

There look thou for the man, whom none can know but they will honour.

Humility is the softening shadow before the stature of Excellence,

And lieth lowly on the ground, beloved and lovely as the violet:

Humility is the fair-haired maid, that calleth Worth her brother,

The gentle silent nurse, that fostereth infant virtues:

Humility bringeth no excuse; she is welcome to God and to man:

Her countenance is needful unto all, who would prosper in either world:

And the mild light of her sweet face is mirrored in the eyes of her companions,

And straightway stand they accepted, children of penitence and love.

As when the blind man is nigh unto a rose, its sweetness is the herald of its beauty,

So when thou savourest Humility, be sure thou art nigh unto merit.

A gift rejoiceth the covetous, and praise fatteneth the vain,

And the pride of man delighteth in the humble bearing of his fellow;

But to the tender benevolence of the unthanked Almoner of good,

Humility is queen among the graces, for she giveth Him occasion to bestow.

OF PRIDE.

Deep is the sea, and deep is hell, but Pride mineth deeper;

It is coiled as a poisonous worm about the foundations of the soul.

If thou expose it in thy motives, and track it in thy springs of thought,

Complacent in its own detection, it will seem indignant virtue;

Smoothly will it gratulate thy skill, O subtle anatomist of self,

And spurn at its very being, while it nestleth the deeper in thy bosom.

Pride is a double traitor, and betrayeth itself to entrap thee,

Making thee vain of thy self-knowledge; proud of thy discoveries of Pride.

Fruitlessly thou strainest for humility, by darkly diving into self;

Rather look away from innate evil, and gaze upon extraneous good:

For in sounding the deep things of the heart, thou shalt learn to be vain of its capacities,

But in viewing the heights above thee, thou shalt be taught thy littleness:

Could an emmet pry into itself, it might marvel at its own anatomy,

But let it look on eagles, to discern how mean a thing it is.

And all things hang upon comparison; to the greater, great is small:

Neither is there anything so vile, but somewhat yet is viler:

On all sides is there an infinity: the culprit at the gallows hath his worse,

And the virgin martyr at the stake need not look far for a better.

Therefore see thou that thine aim reacheth unto higher than thyself:

Beware that the standard of thy soul wave from the loftiest battlement:

For Pride is a pestilent meteor, flitting on the marshes of corruption,

That will lure thee forward to thy death, if thou seek to track it to its source:

Pride is a gloomy bow, arching the infernal firmament,

That will lead thee on, if thou wilt hunt it, even to the dwelling of despair.

Deep calleth unto deep, and mountain overtoppeth mountain,

And still shalt thou fathom to no end the depth and the height of Pride:

For it is the vast ambition of the soul, warped to an idol object,

And nothing but a Deity in Self can quench its insatiable thirst.

Be aware of the smiling enemy, that openly sheatheth his weapon,

But mingleth poison in secret with the sacred salt of hospitality:

For Pride will lie dormant in thy heart, to snatch his secret opportunity,

Watching, as a lion-ant, in the bottom of his toils.

Stay not to parley with thy foe, for his tongue is more potent than his arm;

But be wiser, fighting against Pride in the simple panoply of prayer.

As one also of the poets hath said, let not the Proteus escape thee;

For he will blaze forth as fire, and quench himself in likeness of water;

He will fright thee as a roaring beast, or charm thee as a subtle reptile.

Mark, amid all his transformations, the complicate deceitfulness of Pride,

And the more he striveth to elude thee, bind him the closer in thy toils.

Prayer is the net that snareth him; prayer is the fetter that holdeth him:

Thou canst not nourish Pride, while waiting as an almsman on thy God,—

Waiting in sincerity and trust, or Pride shall meet thee even there;

Yea, from the palaces of Heaven, hath Pride cast down his millions.

Root up the mandrake from thy heart, though it cost thee blood and groans,

Or the cherished garden of thy graces will fade and perish utterly.

OF EXPERIENCE.

I knew that age was enriched with the hard-earned wages of knowledge,

And I saw that hoary wisdom was bred in the school of disappointment:

I noted that the wisest of youth, though provident and cautious of evil,

Yet sailed along unsteadily, as lacking some ballast of the mind:

And the cause seemed to lie in this, that while they considered around them,

And warded off all dangers from without, they forgat their own weakness within.

So steer they in self-confidence, until, from the multitude of perils,

They begin to be wary of themselves, and learn the first lesson of Experience.

I knew that in the morning of life, before its wearisome journey,

The youthful soul doth expand, in the simple luxury of being;

It hath not contracted its wishes, nor set a limit to its hopes;

The wing of fancy is unclipt, and sin hath not seared the feelings:

Each feature is stamped with immortality, for all its desires are infinite,

And it seeketh an ocean of happiness, to fill the deep hollow within.

But the old and the grave look on, pitying that generous youth,

For they also have tasted long ago the bitterness of hope destroyed:

They pity him, and are sad, remembering the days that are past,

But they know he must taste for himself, or he will not give ear to their wisdom.

For Experience hath another lesson, which a man will do well if he learn,

By checking the flight of expectation, to cheat disappointment of its pain.

Experience teacheth many things, and all men are his scholars:

Yet is he a strange tutor, unteaching that which he hath taught.

Youth is confident, manhood wary, and old age confident again:

Youth is kind, manhood cold, and age returneth unto kindness.

For youth suspecteth nought, till manhood, bitterly learned,

Mistrusteth all, overleaping the mark; and age correcteth his excess.

Suspicion is the scaffold unto faith, a temporary needful eyesore,

By which the strong man's dwelling is slowly builded up behind;

But soon as the top-stone hath been set to the well-proved goodly edifice,

The scaffold is torn down, and timely trust taketh its long leave of suspicion.

A thousand volumes in a thousand tongues enshrine the lessons of Experience,

Yet a man shall read them all, and go forth none the wiser:

For self-love lendeth him a glass, to colour all he conneth,

Lest in the features of another he find his own complexion.

And we secretly judge of ourselves as differing greatly from all men,

And love to challenge causes to show how we can master their effects:

Pride is pampered in expecting that we need not fear a common fate,

Or wrong-headed prejudice exulteth, in combating old Experience;

Or perchance caprice and discontent are the spurs that goad us into danger,

Careless, and half in hope to find there an enemy to joust with.

Private Experience is an unsafe teacher, for we rarely learn both sides,

And from the gilt surface reckon not on steel beneath:

The torrid sons of Guinea think scorn of icy seas,

And the frostbitten Greenlander disbelieveth suns too hot.

But thou, student of Wisdom, feed on the marrow of the matter:

If thou wilt suspect, let it be thyself; if thou wilt expect, let it not be gladness.

OF ESTIMATING CHARACTER.

Rashly, nor ofttimes truly, doth man pass judgment on his brother;

For he seeth not the springs of the heart, nor heareth the reasons of the mind.

And the world is not wiser than of old, when justice was meted by the sword,

When the spear avenged the wrong, and the lot decided the right,

When the footsteps of blinded innocence were tracked by burning plough-shares,

And the still condemning water delivered up the wizard to the stake:

For we wait, like the sage of Salamis, to see what the end will be,

Fixing the right or the wrong, by the issues of failure or success.

Judge not of things by their events: neither of character by providence;

And count not a man more evil, because he is more unfortunate:

For the blessings of a better covenant lie not in the sunshine of prosperity,

But pain and chastisement the rather show the wise Father's love.

Behold that daughter of the world: she is full of gaiety and gladness;

The diadem of rank is on her brow, uncounted wealth is in her coffers:

She tricketh out her beauty like Jezebel, and is welcome in the courts of kings:

She is queen of the fools of fashion, and ruleth the revels of luxury:

And though she sitteth not as Tamar, nor standeth in the ways as Rahab,

Yet in the secret of her chamber, she shrinketh not from dalliance and guilt.

She careth not if there be a God, or a soul, or a time of retribution;

Pleasure is the idol of her heart: she thirsteth for no purer heaven.

And she laugheth with light good humour, and all men praise her gentleness;

They are glad in her lovely smile, and the river of her bounty filleth them.

So she prospered in the world: the worship and desire of thousands;

And she died even as she had lived, careless and courteous and liberal.

The grave swallowed up her pomp, the marble proclaimed her virtues,

For men esteemed her excellent, and charities soundeth forth her praise:

But elsewhere far other judgment setteth her—with infidels and harlots!

She abused the trust of her splendour: and the wages of her sin shall be hereafter.

Look again on this fair girl, the orphan of a village pastor

Who is dead, and hath left her his all,—his blessing, and a name unstained.

And friends, with busy zeal, that their purses be not taxed,

Place the sad mourner in a home, poor substitute for that she hath lost.

A stranger among strange faces she drinketh the wormwood of dependence;

She is marked as a child of want: and the world hateth poverty.

Prayer is not heard in that house; the day she hath loved to hallow

Is noted but by deeper dissipation, the riot of luxury and gaming:

And wantonness is in her master's eye, and she hath nowhere to flee to;

She is cared for by none upon earth, and her God seemeth to forsake her.

Then cometh, in fair show, the promise and the feint of affection,

And her heart, long unused to kindness, remembereth her father, and loveth.

And the villain hath wronged her trust, and mocked, and flung her from him,

And men point at her and laugh; and women hate her as an outcast:

But elsewhere, far other judgment seateth her—among the martyrs!

And the Lord, who seemed to forsake, giveth double glory to the fallen.

Once more, in the matter of wealth: if thou throw thine all on a chance,

Men will come around thee, and wait, and watch the turning of the wheel:

And if, in the lottery of life, thou hast drawn a splendid prize,

What foresight hadst thou, and skill! yea, what enterprize and wisdom!

But if it fall out against thee, and thou fail in thy perilous endeavour,

Behold, the simple did sow, and hath reaped the right harvest of his folly:

And the world will be gladly excused, nor will reach out a finger to help;

For why should this speculative dullard be a whirlpool to all around him?

Go to, let him sink by himself: we knew what the end of it would be:—

For the man hath missed his mark, and his fellows look no further.

Also, touching guilt and innocence: a man shall walk in his uprightness

Year after year without reproach, in charity and honesty with all:

But in one evil hour the enemy shall come in like a flood;

Shall track him, and tempt him, and hem him,—till he knoweth not whither to fly.

Perchance his famishing little ones shall scream in his ears for bread,

And, maddened by that fierce cry, he rusheth as a thief upon the world;

The world that hath left him to starve, itself wallowing in plenty,—

The world, that denieth him his rights,—he daringly robbeth it of them.

I say not, such an one is innocent; but, small is the measure of his guilt

To that of his wealthy neighbour, who would not help him at his need;

To that of the selfish epicure, who turned away with coldness from his tale;

To that of unsuffering thousands, who look with complacence on his fall.

Or perchance the continual dropping of the venomed words of spite,

Insult and injury and scorn, have galled and pierced his heart;

Yet, with all long-suffering and meekness, he forgiveth unto seventy times seven:

Till, in some weaker moment, tempted beyond endurance,

He striketh, more in anger than in hate; and, alas! for his heavy chance,

He hath smitten unto instant death his spiteful life-long enemy!

And none was by to see it; and all men knew of their contentions:

Fierce voices shout for his blood, and rude hands hurry him to judgment.

Then man's verdict cometh,—Murderer, with forethought malice;

And his name is a note of execration; his guilt is too black for devils.

But to the Righteous Judge, seemeth he the suffering victim;

For his anger was not unlawful, but became him as a Christian and a man;

And though his guilt was grievous when he struck that heavy bitter blow,

Yet light is the sin of the smiter, and verily kicketh the beam,

To the weight of that man's wickedness, whose slow relentless hatred

Met him at every turn, with patient continuance in evil.

Doubtless, eternal wrath shall be heaped upon that spiteful enemy.

It is vain, it is vain, saith the preacher; there be none but the righteous and the wicked,

Base rebels, and staunch allies, the true knight, and the traitor:

And he beareth strong witness among men, There is no neutral ground,

The broad highway and narrow path map out the whole domain;

Sit here among the saints, these holy chosen few,

Or grovel there a wretched condemned, to die among the million.

And verily for ultimate results, there be but good and bad;

Heaven hath no dusky twilight; hell is not gladdened with a dawn.

Yet looking round among his fellows, who can pass righteous judgment,

Such an one is holy and accepted, and such an one reprobate and doomed?

There is so much of good among the worst, so much of evil in the best,

Such seeming partialities in providence, so many things to lessen and expand,

Yea, and with all man's boast, so little real freedom of his will,—

That, to look a little lower than the surface, garb or dialect or fashion,

Thou shalt feebly pronounce for a saint, and faintly condemn for a sinner.

Over many a good heart and true, fluttereth the Great King's pennant;

By many an iron hand, the pirate's black banner is unfurled:

But there be many more besides, in the yacht and the trader and the fishing-boat,

In the feathered war-canoe, and the quick mysterious gondola:

And the army of that Great King hath no stated uniform;

Of mingled characters and kinds goeth forth the countless host;

There is the turbaned Damascene, with his tattooed Zealand brother,

There the slim bather in the Ganges, with the sturdy Russian boor,

The sluggish inmate of a Polar cave, with the fire-souled daughter of Brazil,

The embruted slave from Cuba, and the Briton of gentle birth.

For all are His inheritance, of all He taketh tithe:

And the church, His mercy's ark, hath some of every sort.

Who art thou, O man, that art fixing the limits of the fold?

Wherefore settest thou stakes to spread the tent of heaven?

Lay not the plummet to the line: religion hath no landmarks:

No human keenness can discern the subtle shades of faith:

In some it is as earliest dawn, the scarce diluted darkness;

In some as dubious twilight, cold and grey and gloomy:

In some the ebon east is streaked with flaming gold:

In some the dayspring from on high breaketh in all its praise.

And who hath determined the when, separating light from darkness?

Who shall pluck from earliest dawn the promise of the day?

Leave that care to the Husbandman, lest thou garner tares;

Help thou the Shepherd in His seeking, but to separate be His:

For I have often seen the noble erring spirit

Wrecked on the shoals of passion, and numbered of the lost;

Often the generous heart, lit by unhallowed fire,

Counted a brand among the burning, and left uncared for in his sin:

Yet I waited a little year, and the mercy thou hadst forgotten

Hath purged that noble spirit, washing it in waters of repentance;

That glowing generous heart, having burnt out all its dross,

Is as a golden censer, ready for the aloes and cassia:

While thou, hard-visaged man, unlovely in thy strictness,

Who turned from him thy sympathies with self-complacent pride,

How art thou shamed by him! his heart is a spring of love,

While the dry well of thine affections is choked with secret mammon.

Sometimes at a glance thou judgest well; years could add little to thy knowledge:

When charity gloweth on the cheek, or malice is lowering in the eye,

When honesty's open brow, or the weasel-face of cunning is before thee,

Or the loose lip of wantonness, or clear bright forehead of reflection.

But often, by shrewd scrutiny, thou judgest to the good man's harm:

For it may be his hour of trial, or he slumbereth at his post,

Or he hath slain his foe, but not yet levelled the stronghold,

Or barely recovered of the wounds, that fleshed him in his fray with passion.

Also, of the worst, through prejudice, thou loosely shalt think well:

For none is altogether evil, and thou mayst catch him at his prayers:

There may be one small prize, though all beside be blanks;

A silver thread of goodness in the black serge-cloth of crime.

There is to whom all things are easy; his mind, as a master-key,

Can open, with intuitive address, the treasuries of art and science:

There is to whom all things are hard; but industry giveth him a crow-bar,

To force, with groaning labour, the stubborn lock of learning:

And often, when thou lookest on an eye, dim in native dulness,

Little shalt thou wot of the wealth diligence hath gathered to its gaze;

Often, the brow that should be bright with the dormant fire of genius,

Within its ample halls, hath ignorance the tenant.

Yet are not the sons of men cast as in moulds by the lot?

The like in frame and feature have much alike in spirit;

Such a shape hath such a soul, so that a deep discerner

From his make will read the man, and err not far in judgment:

Yea, and it holdeth in the converse, that growing similarity of mind

Findeth or maketh for itself an apposite dwelling in the body:

Accident may modify, circumstance may bevil, externals seem to change it,

But still the primitive crystal is latent in its many variations:

For the map of the face, and the picture of the eye, are traced by the pen of passion;

And the mind fashioneth a tabernacle suitable for itself.

A mean spirit boweth down the back, and the bowing fostereth meanness;

A resolute purpose knitteth the knees, and the firm tread nourisheth decision;

Love looketh softly from the eye, and kindleth love by looking;

Hate furroweth the brow, and a man may frown till he hateth:

For mind and body, spirit and matter, have reciprocities of power,

And each keepeth up the strife; a man's works make or mar him.

There be deeper things than these, lying in the twilight of truth;

But few can discern them aright, from surrounding dimness of error.

For perchance, if thou knewest the whole, and largely with comprehensive mind

Couldst read the history of character, the chequered story of a life,

And into the great account, which summeth a mortal's destiny,

Wert to add the forces from without, dragging him this way and that,

And the secret qualities within, grafted on the soul from the womb,

And the might of other men's example, among whom his lot is cast,

And the influence of want or wealth, of kindness or harsh ill-usage,

Of ignorance he cannot help, and knowledge found for him by others,

And first impressions, hard to be effaced, and leadings to right or to wrong,

And inheritance of likeness from a father, and natural human frailty,

And the habit of health or disease, and prejudices poured into his mind,

And the myriad little matters none but Omniscience can know,

And accidents that steer the thoughts, where none but Ubiquity can trace them;—

If thou couldst compass all these, and the consequents flowing from them,

And the scope to which they tend, and the necessary fitness of all things,

Then shouldst thou see as He seeth, who judgeth all men equal,—

Equal, touching innocence and guilt; and different alone in this,

That one acknowledged his evil, and looketh to his God for mercy;

Another boasteth of his good, and calleth on his God for justice;

So He, that sendeth none away, is largely munificent to prayer,

But, in the heart of presumption, sheatheth the sword of vengeance.

OF HATRED AND ANGER.

Blunted unto goodness is the heart which anger never stirreth,

But that which hatred swelleth, is keen to carve out evil.

Anger is a noble infirmity, the generous failing of the just,

The one degree that riseth above zeal, asserting the prerogatives of virtue:

But hatred is a slow continuing crime, a fire in the bad man's breast,

A dull and hungry flame, for ever craving insatiate.

Hatred would harm another; anger would indulge itself:

Hatred is a simmering poison; anger, the opening of a valve:

Hatred destroyeth as the upas-tree; anger smiteth as a staff:

Hatred is the atmosphere of hell; but anger is known in heaven.

Is there not a righteous wrath, an anger just and holy,

When goodness is sitting in the dust, and wickedness enthroned on Babel?

Doth pity condemn guilt?—is justice not a feeling but a law

Appealing to the line and to the plummet, incognizant of moral sense?

Thou that condemnest anger, small is thy sympathy with angels,

Thou that hast accounted it for sin, cold is thy communion with heaven.

Beware of the angry in his passion; but fear not to approach him afterward;

For if thou acknowledge thine error, he himself will be sorry for his wrath:

Beware of the hater in his coolness; for he meditateth evil against thee:

Commending the resources of his mind calmly to work thy ruin.

Deceit and treachery skulk with hatred, but an honest spirit flieth with anger:

The one lieth secret, as a serpent; the other chaseth, as a leopard.

Speedily be reconciled in love, and receive the returning offender,

For wittingly prolonging Anger, thou tamperest unconsciously with Hatred.

Patience is power in a man, nerving him to rein his spirit:

Passion is as palsy to his arm, while it yelleth on the coursers to their speed:

Patience keepeth counsel, and standeth in solid self-possession,

But the weakness of sudden passion layeth bare the secrets of the soul.

The sentiment of anger is not ill, when thou lookest on the impudence of vice,

Or savourest the breath of calumny, or hast earned the hard wages of injustice;

But see that thou curb it in expression, rendering the mildness of rebuke,

So shall thou stand without reproach, mailed in all the dignity of virtue.

OF GOOD IN THINGS EVIL.

I heard the man of sin reproaching the goodness of Jehovah,

Wherefore, if He be Almighty Love, permitteth He misery and pain?

I saw the child of hope vexed in the labyrinth of doubt,

Wherefore, O holy One and just, is the horn of Thy foul foe so high exalted?

And, alas! for this our groaning world, for that grief and guilt are here;

Alas! for that Earth is the battle-field, where good must combat with evil:

Angels look on and hold their breath, burning to mingle in the conflict,

But the troops of the Captain of Salvation may be none but the soldiers of the cross:

And that slender band must fight alone, and yet shall triumph gloriously,

Enough shall they be for conquest, and the motto of their standard is, Enough.

Thou art sad, O denizen of earth, for pains and diseases and death,

But remember, thy hand hath earned them; grudge not at the wages of thy doings:

Thy guilt, and thy fathers' guilt, must bring many sorrows in their company,

And if thou wilt drink sweet poison, doubtless it shall rot thee to the core.

What art thou but the heritor of evil, with a right to nothing good?

The respite of an interval of ease were a boon which Justice might deny thee:

Therefore lay thy hand upon thy mouth, O man much to be forgiven,

And wait, thou child of hope, for time shall teach thee all things.

Yet hear, for my speech shall comfort thee: reverently, but with boldness,

I would raise the sable curtain, that hideth the symmetry of Providence.

Pain and sin are convicts, and toil in their fetters for good;

The weapons of evil are turned against itself, fighting under better banners:

The leech delighteth in stinging, and the wicked loveth to do harm,

But the wise Physician of the Universe useth that ill tendency for health.

Verily, from others' griefs are gendered sympathy and kindness;

Patience, humility, and faith, spring not seldom from thine own:

An enemy, humbled by his sorrows, cannot be far from thy forgiveness;

A friend, who hath tasted of calamity, shall fan the dying incense of thy love:

And for thyself, is it a small thing, so to learn thy frailty,

That from an aching bone thou savest the whole body?

The furnace of affliction may be fierce, but if it refineth thy soul,

The good of one meek thought shall outweigh years of torment.

Nevertheless, wretched man, if thy bad heart be hardened in the flame,

Being earth-born, as of clay, and not of moulded wax,

Judge not the hand that smiteth, as if thou wert visited in wrath:

Reproach thyself, for He is Justice; repent thee, for He is Mercy.

Cease, fond caviller at wisdom, to be satisfied that everything is wrong:

Be sure there is good necessity, even for the flourishing of evil.

Would the eye delight in perpetual noon? or the ear in unqualified harmonics?

Hath winter's frost no welcome, contrasting sturdily with summer?

Couldst thou discern benevolence, if there were no sorrows to be soothed?

Or discover the resources of contrivance, if nothing stood opposed to the means?

What were power without an enemy? or mercy without an object?

Or truth, where the false were impossible? or love, where love were a debt?

The characters of God were but idle, if all things around Him were perfection,

And virtues might slumber on like death, if they lacked the opportunities of evil.

There is One all-perfect, and but one; man dare not reason of His essence:

But there must be deficiencies in heaven, to leave room for progression in bliss:

A realm of unqualified BEST were a stagnant pool of being,

And the circle of absolute perfection, the abstract cipher of indolence.

Sin is an awful shadow, but it addeth new glories to the light;

Sin is a black foil, but it setteth off the jewelry of heaven:

Sin is the traitor that hath dragged the majesty of mercy into action;

Sin is the whelming argument, to justify the attribute of vengeance.

It is a deep dark thought, and needeth to be diligently studied,

But perchance evil was essential, that God should be seen of His creatures:

For where perfection is not, there lacketh possible good,

And the absence of better that might be, taketh from the praise of it is well:

And creatures must be finite, and finite cannot be perfect:

Therefore, though in small degree, creation involveth evil,

He chargeth His angels with folly, and the heavens are not clean in His sight:

For every existence in the universe hath either imperfection or Godhead:

And the light that blazeth but in One, must be softened with shadow for the many.

There is then good in evil; or none could have known his Maker;

No spiritual intellect or essence could have gazed on His high perfections,

No angel harps could have tuned the wonders of His wisdom,

No ransomed souls have praised the glories of His mercy,

No howling fiends have shown the terrors of His justice,

But God would have dwelt alone, in the fearful solitude of holiness.

Nevertheless, O sinner, harden not thine heart in evil;

Nor plume thee in imaginary triumph, because thou art not valueless as vile;

Because thy dark abominations add lustre to the clarity of Light;

Because a wonder-working alchemy draineth elixir out of poisons;

Because the same fiery volcano that scorcheth and ravageth a continent,

Hath in the broad blue bay cast up some petty island;

Because to the full demonstration of the qualities and accidents of good

The swarthy legions of the Devil have toiled as unwitting pioneers.

For sin is still sin; so hateful Love doth hate it;

A blot on the glory of creation, which Justice must wipe out.

Sin is a loathsome leprosy, fretting the white robe of innocence;

A rottenness, eating out the heart of the royal cedars of Lebanon;

A pestilential blast, the terror of that holy pilgrimage;

A rent in the sacred veil, whereby God left His temple.

Therefore, consider thyself, thou that dost not sorrow for thy guilt:

Fear evil, or face its Enemy: dread sin, or dare Justice.

Yea, saith the Spirit: and their works do follow them;

Habits, and thoughts, and deeds, are shadows and satellites of self.

What! shall the claimant to a throne stand forward with a rabble rout,—

Meanness, impiety, and lust; riot and indolence and vanity?

Nay, man! the train wherewith thou comest attend whither thou shalt go:

A throne for a king's son, but an inner dungeon for the felon.

For a man's works do follow him: bodily, standing in the judgment,

Behold the false accuser, behold the slandered saint;

The slave, and his bloody driver; the poor, and his generous friend;

The simple dupe, and the crafty knave: the murderer, and—his victim!

Yet all are in many characters; the best stand guilty at the bar;

And he that seemed the worst may have most of real excuse.

The talents unto which a man is born, be they few or many,

Are dropped into the balance of account, working unlooked-for changes;

And perchance the convict from the galleys may stand above the hermit in his cell,

For that, the obstacles in one outweigh the propensions in the other.

There be, who have made themselves friends, yea, by unrighteous mammon,—

Friends, ready waiting as an escort to those everlasting habitations;

Embodied in living witnesses, thronging to meet them in a cloud,

Charity, meekness and truth, zeal, sincerity and patience,

There be, who have made themselves foes, yea, by honest gain,

Foes, whose plaint must have its answer, before the bright portal is unbarred:

Pride, and selfishness, and sloth, apathy, wrath and falsehood,

Bind to their everlasting toil many that must weary in the fires.

Love hath a power and a longing to save the gathered world,

And rescue universal man from the hunting hell-hounds of his doings:

Yet few, here one and there one, scanty as the gleaning after harvest,

Are glad of the robes of praise which Mercy would fling around the naked;

But wrapping closer to their skin the poisoned tunic of their works,

They stand in self-dependence, to perish in abandonment of God.

A wicked man scorneth prayer, in the shallow sophistry of reason,

He derideth the silly hope that God can be moved by supplication:—

Shall the Unchangeable be changed, or waver in His purpose?

Can the weakness of pity affect Him? Should He turn at the bidding of a man?

Methought He ruled all things, and ye called His decrees immutable,

But if thus He listeneth to words, wherein is the firmness of His will?—

So I heard the speech of the wicked, and, lo, it was smoother than oil;

But I knew that his reasonings were false, for the promise of the Scripture is true:

Yet was my soul in darkness, for his words were too hard for me;

Till I turned to my God in prayer: for I know He heareth always.

Then I looked abroad on the earth, and, behold, the Lord was in all things;

Yet saw I not His hand in aught, but perceived that He worketh by means;

Yea, and the power of the mean proveth the wisdom that ordained it,

Yea, and no act is useless, to the hurling of a stone through the air.

So I turned my thoughts to supplication, and beheld the mercies of Jehovah,

And I saw sound argument was still the faithful friend of godliness;

For as the rock of the affections is the solid approval of reason,

Even so the temple of Religion is founded on the basis of Philosophy.

Scorner, thy thoughts are weak, they reach not the summit of the matter;

Go to, for the mouth of a child might show thee the mystery of prayer:

Verily, there is no change in the counsels of the Mighty Ruler:

Verily, His purpose is strong, and rooted in the depths of necessity:

But who hath shown thee His purpose, who hath made known to thee His will?

When, O gainsayer! hast thou been schooled in the secrets of wisdom?

Fate is a creature of God, and all things move in their orbits,

And that which shall surely happen is known unto Him from eternity;

But as, in the field of nature, He useth the sinews of the ox,

And commandeth diligence and toil, Himself giving the increase;

So, in the kingdom of His grace, granteth He omnipotence to prayer,

For He knoweth what thou wilt ask, and what thou wilt ask aright.

No man can pray in faith, whose prayer is not grounded on a promise:

Yet a good man commendeth all things to the righteous wisdom of his God:

For those, who pray in faith, trust the immutable Jehovah,

And they, who ask blessings unpromised, lean on uncovenanted mercy.

Man, regard thy prayers as a purpose of love to thy soul;

Esteem the providence that led to them as an index of God's good will;

So shalt thou pray aright, and thy words shall meet with acceptance.

Also, in pleading for others, be thankful for the fulness of thy prayer:

For if thou art ready to ask, the Lord is more ready to bestow.

The salt preserveth the sea, and the saints uphold the earth;

Their prayers are the thousand pillars that prop the canopy of nature.

Verily, an hour without prayer, from some terrestrial mind,

Were a curse in the calendar of time, a spot of the blackness of darkness.

Perchance the terrible day, when the world must rock into ruins,

Will be one unwhitened by prayer,—shall He find faith on the earth?

For there is an economy of mercy, as of wisdom, and power, and means;

Neither is one blessing granted, unbesought from the treasury of good:

And the charitable heart of the Being, to depend upon whom is happiness,

Never withholdeth a bounty, so long as His subject prayeth;

Yea, ask what thou wilt, to the second throne in heaven,

It is thine, for whom it was appointed; there is no limit unto prayer:

But and if thou cease to ask, tremble, thou self-suspended creature,

For thy strength is cut off as was Samson's: and the hour of thy doom is come.

Frail art thou, O man, as a bubble on the breaker,

Weak and governed by externals, like a poor bird caught in the storm;

Yet thy momentary breath can still the raging waters,

Thy hand can touch a lever that may move the world.

O Merciful, we strike eternal covenant with thee,

For man may take for his ally the King who ruleth kings:

How strong, yet how most weak, in utter poverty how rich,

What possible omnipotence to good is dormant in a man!

Behold that fragile form of delicate transparent beauty,

Whose light-blue eye and hectic cheek are lit by the bale-fires of decline:

All droopingly she lieth, as a dew-laden lily,

Her flaxen tresses, rashly luxuriant, dank with unhealthy moisture;

Hath not thy heart said of her, Alas! poor child of weakness?

Thou hast erred; Goliah of Gath stood not in half her strength:

Terribly she fighteth in the van as the virgin daughter of Orleans,

She beareth the banner of Heaven, her onset is the rushing cataract,

Seraphim rally at her side, and the captain of that host is God,

And the serried ranks of evil are routed by the lightning of her eye;

She is the King's remembrancer, and steward of many blessings,

Holding the buckler of security over her unthankful land:

For that weak fluttering heart is strong in faith assured,

Dependence is her might, and behold—she prayeth.

Angels are round the good man, to catch the incense of his prayers,

And they fly to minister kindness to those for whom he pleadeth;

For the altar of his heart is lighted, and burneth before God continually,

And he breatheth, conscious of his joy, the native atmosphere of heaven:

Yea, though poor, and contemned, and ignorant of this world's wisdom,

Ill can his fellows spare him, though they know not of his value.

Thousands bewail a hero, and a nation mourneth for its king,

But the whole universe lamenteth the loss of a man of prayer.

Verily, were it not for One, who sitteth on His rightful throne,

Crowned with a rainbow of emerald, the green memorial of earth,—

For One, a mediating man, that hath clad His Godhead with mortality,

And offereth prayer without ceasing, the royal priest of Nature,

Matter and life and mind had sunk into dark annihilation,

And the lightning frown of Justice withered the world into nothing.

Thus, O worshipper of reason, thou hast heard the sum of the matter:

And woe to his hairy scalp that restraineth prayer before God.

Prayer is a creature's strength, his very breath and being;

Prayer is the golden key that can open the wicket of Mercy:

Prayer is the magic sound that saith to Fate, So be it;

Prayer is the slender nerve that moveth the muscles of Omnipotence.

Wherefore, pray, O creature, for many and great are thy wants;

Thy mind, thy conscience, and thy being, thy rights commend thee unto prayer,

The cure of all cares, the grand panacea for all pains,

Doubt's destroyer, ruin's remedy, the antidote to all anxieties.

So then, God is true, and yet He hath not changed:

It is He that sendeth the petition, to answer it according to His will.

THE LORD'S PRAYER.

Inquirest thou, O man, wherewithal may I come unto the Lord?

And with what wonder-working sounds may I move the majesty of Heaven?

There is a model to thy hand; upon that do thou frame thy supplication;

Wisdom hath measured its words; and redemption urgeth thee to use them.

Call thy God thy Father, and yet not thine alone,

For thou art but one of many, thy brotherhood is with all:

Remember His high estate, that He dwelleth King of Heaven;

So shall thy thoughts be humbled, nor love be unmixed with reverence:

Be thy first petition unselfish, the honour of Him who made thee,

And that in the depths of thy heart His memory be shrined in holiness:

Pray for that blessed time, when good shall triumph over evil,

And one universal temple echo the perfections of Jehovah:

Bend thou to His good will, and subserve His holy purposes,

Till in thee, and those around thee, grow a little heaven upon earth:

Humbly, as a grateful almsman, beg thy bread of God,—

Bread for thy triple estate, for thou hast a trinity of nature:

Humility smootheth the way, and gratitude softeneth the heart,

Be then thy prayer for pardon mingled with the tear of penitence;

Yea, and while, all unworthy, thou leanest on the hand that should smite,

Thou canst not from thy fellows withhold thy less forgiveness.

To thy Father thy weaknesses are known, and thou hast not hid thy sin,

Therefore ask Him, in all trust, to lead thee from the dangers of temptation;

While the last petition of the soul, that breatheth on the confines of prayer,

Is deliverance from sin and the evil one, the miseries of earth and hell.

And wherefore, child of hope, should the rock of thy confidence be sure?

Thou knowest that God heareth and promiseth an answer of peace;

Thou knowest that He is King, and none can stay His hand;

Thou knowest His power to be boundless, for there is none other:

And to Him thou givest glory, as a creature of His workmanship and favour,

For the never-ending term of thy saved and bright existence.

OF DISCRETION.

For what then was I born?—to fill the circling year

With daily toil for daily bread, with sordid pains and pleasures?—

To walk this chequered world, alternate light and darkness,

The day-dreams of deep thought followed by the night-dreams of fancy?—

To be one in a full procession?—to dig my kindred clay?—

To decorate the gallery of art?—to clear a few acres of forest?

For more than these, my soul, thy God hath lent thee life.

Is then that noble end to feed this mind with knowledge,

To mix for mine own thirst the sparkling wine of wisdom,

To light with many lamps the caverns of my heart,

To reap, in the furrows of my brain, good harvest of right reasons?—

For more than these, my soul, thy God hath lent thee life.

Is it to grow stronger in self-government, to check the chafing will,

To curb with tightening rein the mettled steeds of passion,

To welcome with calm heart, far in the voiceless desert,

The gracious visitings of heaven that bless my single self?—

For more than these, my soul, thy God hath lent thee life.

To aim at thine own happiness, is an end idolatrous and evil;

In earth, yea in heaven, if thou seek it for itself, seeking thou shalt not find.

Happiness is a road-side flower, growing on the highway of Usefulness;

Plucked, it shall wither in thy hand; passed by, it is fragrance to thy spirit:

Love not thine own soul, regard not thine own weal,

Trample the thyme beneath thy feet; be useful, and be happy!

Thus unto fair conclusions argueth generous youth,

And quickly he starteth on his course, knight-errant to do good.

His sword is edged with arguments, his vizor terrible with censures;

He goeth full mailed in faith, and zeal is flaming at his heart.

Yet one thing he lacketh, the Mentor of the mind,

The quiet whisper of Discretion—Thy time is not yet come.

For he smiteth an oppressor; and vengeance for that smiting

Is dealt in doubled stripes on the faint body of the victim:

He is glad to give and to distribute; and clamorous pauperism feasteth,

While honest labour, pining, hideth his sharp ribs:

He challengeth to a fair field that subtle giant Infidelity,

And, worsted in the unequal fight, strengtheneth the hands of error;

He hasteth to teach and preach, as the war-horse rusheth to the battle,

And to pave a way for truth, would break up the Apennines of prejudice:

He wearieth by stale proofs, where none looked for a reason,

And to the listening ear will urge the false argument of feeling.

So hath it often been, that, judging by results,

The hottest friends of truth have done her deadliest wrong.

Alas! for there are enemies without, glad enough to parley with a traitor,

And a zealot will let down the drawbridge, to prove his own prowess:

Yea, from within will he break away a breach in the citadel of truth,

That he may fill the gap, for fame, with his own weak body.

Zeal without judgment is an evil, though it be zeal unto good;

Touch not the ark with unclean hand, yea, though it seem to totter.

There are evil who work good, and there are good who work evil,

And foolish backers of wisdom have brought on her many reproaches.

Truth hath more than enough to combat in the minds of all men,

For the mist of sense is a thick veil, and sin hath warped their wills;

Yet doth an officious helper awkwardly prevent her victory,—

These thy wounded hands were smitten in the house of friends:—

To point out a meaning in her words, he will blot those words with his finger;

And winnow chaff into the eyes, before he hath wheat to show:

He will heap sturdy logs on a faint expiring fire,

And with a room in flames, will cast the casement open;

By a shoulder to the wheel down hill harasseth the labouring beast,

And where obstruction were needed, will harm by an ill-judged thrusting-on.

A vessel foundereth at sea, if a storm hath unshipped the rudder;

And a mind with much sail shall require heavy ballast.

Take a lever by the middle, thou shalt seem to prove it powerless,

Argue for truth indiscreetly, thou shalt toil for falsehood.

There is plenty of room for a peaceable man in the most thronged assembly;

But a quarrelsome spirit is straitened in the open field:

Many a teacher, lacking judgment, hindereth his own lessons;

And the savoury mess of pottage is spoiled by a bitter herb:

The garment woven of a piece is rashly torn by schism,

Because its unwise claimants will not cast lots for its possession.

Discretion guide thee on thy way, noble-minded youth,

Help thee to humour infirmities, to wink at innocent errors,

To take small count of forms, to bear with prejudice and fancy:

Discretion guard thine asking, discretion aid thine answer,

Teach thee that well-timed silence hath more eloquence than speech,

Whisper thee, thou art Weakness, though thy cause be Strength,

And tell thee, the key-stone of an arch can be loosened with least labour from within.

The snows of Hecla lie around its troubled smoking Geysers;

Let the cool streams of prudence temper the hot spring of zeal:

So shalt thou gain thine honourable end, nor lose the midway prize:

So shall thy life be useful, and thy young heart happy.

OF TRIFLES.

Yet once more, saith the fool, yet once, and is it not a little one?

Spare me this folly yet an hour, for what is one among so many?

And he blindeth his conscience with lies, and stupifieth his heart with doubts;—

Whom shall I harm in this matter? and a little ill breedeth much good;

My thoughts, are they not mine own? and they leave no mark behind them;

And if God so pardoneth crime, how should these petty sins affect Him?—

So he transgresseth yet again, and falleth by little and little,

Till the ground crumble beneath him, and he sinketh in the gulf despairing.

For there is nothing in the earth so small that it may not produce great things,

And no swerving from a right line, that may not lead eternally astray.

A landmark tree was once a seed; and the dust in the balance maketh a difference;

And the cairn is heaped high by each one flinging a pebble:

The dangerous bar in the harbour's mouth is only grains of sand;

And the shoal that hath wrecked a navy is the work of a colony of worms:

Yea, and a despicable gnat may madden the mighty elephant;

And the living rock is worn by the diligent flow of the brook.

Little art thou, O man, and in trifles thou contendest with thine equals,

For atoms must crowd upon atoms, ere crime groweth to be a giant.

What, is thy servant a dog?—not yet wilt thou grasp the dagger,

Not yet wilt thou laugh with the scoffers, not yet betray the innocent;

But, if thou nourish in thy heart the reveries of injury or passion,

And travel in mental heat the mazy labyrinths of guilt,

And then conceive it possible, and then reflect on it as done,

And use, by little and little, thyself to regard thyself a villain,

Not long will crime be absent from the voice that doth invoke him to thy heart,

And bitterly wilt thou grieve, that the buds have ripened into poison.

A spark is a molecule of matter, yet may it kindle the world:

Vast is the mighty ocean, but drops have made it vast.

Despise not thou a small thing, either for evil or for good;

For a look may work thy ruin, or a word create thy wealth:

The walking this way or that, the casual stopping or hastening,

Hath saved life, and destroyed it, hath cast down and built up fortunes.

Commit thy trifles unto God, for to Him is nothing trivial;

And it is but the littleness of man that seeth no greatness in a trifle.

All things are infinite in parts, and the moral is as the material,

Neither is anything vast, but it is compacted of atoms.

Thou art wise, and shalt find comfort, if thou study thy pleasure in trifles,

For slender joys, often repeated, fall as sunshine on the heart:

Thou art wise, if thou beat off petty troubles, nor suffer their stinging to fret thee;

Thrust not thine hand among the thorns, but with a leathern glove.

Regard nothing lightly which the wisdom of Providence hath ordered;

And therefore, consider all things that happen unto thee or unto others.

The warrior that stood against a host, may be pierced unto death by a needle;

And the saint that feareth not the fire, may perish the victim of a thought:

A mote in the gunner's eye is as bad as a spike in the gun;

And the cable of a furlong is lost through an ill-wrought inch.

The streams of small pleasures fill the lake of happiness:

And the deepest wretchedness of life is continuance of petty pains.

A fool observeth nothing, and seemeth wise unto himself;

A wise man heedeth all things, and in his own eyes is a fool:

He that wondereth at nothing hath no capabilities of bliss:

But he that scrutinizeth trifles hath a store of pleasure to his hand.

If pestilence stalk through the land, ye say, This is God's doing;

Is it not also His doing when an aphis creepeth on a rosebud?

If an avalanche roll from its Alp, ye tremble at the will of Providence:

Is not that will concerned when the sear leaves fall from the poplar?—

A thing is great or little only to a mortal's thinking,

But abstracted from the body, all things are alike important:

The Ancient of Days noteth in His book the idle converse of a creature,

And happy and wise is the man to whose thought existeth not a trifle.

OF RECREATION.

To join advantage to amusement, to gather profit with pleasure,

Is the wise man's necessary aim, when he lieth in the shade of recreation.

For he cannot fling aside his mind, nor bar up the flood-gates of his wisdom;

Yea, though he strain after folly, his mental monitor shall check him:

For knowledge and ignorance alike have laws essential to their being,—

The sage studieth amusements, and the simple laugheth in his studies.

Few, but full of understanding, are the books of the library of God,

And fitting for all seasons are the gain and the gladness they bestow:

The volume of mystery and Grace, for the hour of deep communings,

When the soul considereth intensely the startling marvel of itself:

The book of destiny and Providence, for the time of sober study,

When the mind gleaneth wisdom from the olive grove of history:

And the cheerful pages of Nature, to gladden the pleasant holiday,

When the task of duty is complete, and the heart swelleth high with satisfaction.

The soul may not safely dwell too long with the deep things of futurity;

The mind may not always be bent back, like the Parthian, straining at the past;

And, if thou art wearied with wrestling on the broad arena of science,

Leave awhile thy friendly foe, half vanquished in the dust,

Refresh thy jaded limbs, return with vigour to the strife,—

Thou shalt easier find thyself his master, for the vacant interval of leisure.

That which may profit and amuse is gathered from the volume of creation,

For every chapter therein teemeth with the playfulness of wisdom.

The elements of all things are the same, though nature hath mixed them with a difference,

And Learning delighteth to discover the affinity of seeming opposites:

So out of great things and small draweth he the secrets of the universe,

And argueth the cycles of the stars, from a pebble flung by a child.

It is pleasant to note all plants, from the rush to the spreading cedar,

From the giant king of palms, to the lichen that staineth its stem;

To watch the workings of instinct, that grosser reason of brutes,—

The river horse browsing in the jungle, the plover screaming on the moor,

The cayman basking on a mud-bank, and the walrus anchored to an iceberg,

The dog at his master's feet, and the milch-kine lowing in the meadow;

To trace the consummate skill that hath modelled the anatomy of insects,

Small fowls that sun their wings on the petals of wild flowers;

To learn a use in the beetle, and more than a beauty in the butterfly;

To recognize affections in a moth, and look with admiration on a spider.

It is glorious to gaze upon the firmament, and see from far the mansions of the blest,

Each distant shining world, a kingdom for one of the redeemed;

To read the antique history of earth, stamped upon those medals in the rocks

Which Design hath rescued from decay, to tell of the green infancy of time;

To gather from the unconsidered shingle mottled starlike agates,

Full of unstoried flowers in the bubbling bloom-chalcedony:

Or gay and curious shells, fretted with microscopic carving,

Corallines, and fresh seaweeds, spreading forth their delicate branches.

It is an admirable lore, to learn the cause in the change,

To study the chemistry of Nature, her grand, but simple secrets,

To search out all her wonders, to track the resources of her skill,

To note her kind compensations, her unobtrusive excellence.

In all it is wise happiness to see the well-ordained laws of Jehovah,

The harmony that filleth all His mind, the justice that tempereth His bounty,

The wonderful all-prevalent analogy that testifieth one Creator,

The broad arrow of the Great King, carved on all the stores of His arsenal.

But beware, O worshipper of God, thou forget not Him in His dealings,

Though the bright emanations of His power hide Him in created glory;

For if, on the sea of knowledge, thou regardest not the pole-star of religion,

Thy bark will miss her port, and run upon the sand-bar of folly:

And if, enamoured of the means, thou considerest not the scope to which they tend,

Wherein art thou wiser than the child, that is pleased with toys and baubles?

Verily, a trifling scholar, thou heedest but the letter of instruction:

For, as motive is spirit unto action, as memory endeareth place,

As the sun doth fertilize the earth, as affection quickeneth the heart,

So is the remembrance of God in the varied wonders of creation.

Man hath found out inventions, to cheat him of the weariness of life,

To help him to forget realities, and hide the misery of guilt.

For love of praise, and hope of gain, for passion and delusive happiness,

He joineth the circle of folly, and heapeth on the fire of excitement;

Oftentimes sadly out of heart at the tiresome insipidity of pleasure,

Oftentimes labouring in vain, convinced of the palpable deceit:

Yet a man speaketh to his brother, in the voice of glad congratulation,

And thinketh others happy, though he himself be wretched:

And hand joineth hand to help in the toil of amusement,

While the secret aching heart is vacant of all but disappointment.

The cheapest pleasures are the best; and nothing is more costly than sin;

Yet we mortgage futurity, counting it but little loss:

Neither can a man delight in that which breedeth sorrow,

Yet do we hunt for joy even in the fires that consume it.

Whoso would find gladness may meet her in the hovel of poverty,

Where benevolence hath scattered around the gleanings of the horn of plenty;

Whoso would sun himself in peace, may be seen of her in deeds of mercy,

When the pale lean cheek of the destitute is wet with grateful tears.

If the mind is wearied by study, or the body worn with sickness,

It is well to lie fallow for a while, in the vacancy of sheer amusement;

But when thou prosperest in health, and thine intellect can soar untired,

To seek uninstructive pleasure is to slumber on the couch of indolence.

THE TRAIN OF RELIGION.

Stay awhile, thou blessed band! be entreated, daughters of heaven!

While the chance-met scholar of Wisdom learneth your sacred names:

He is resting a little from his toil, yet a little on the borders of earth,

And fain would he have you his friends, to bid him glad welcome hereafter.

Who among the glorious art thou, that walkest a Goddess and a Queen,

Thy crown of living stars, and a golden cross thy sceptre?

Who among flowers of loveliness is she, thy seeming herald,

Yet she boasteth not thee nor herself, and her garments are plain in their neatness?

Wherefore is there one among the train, whose eyes are red with weeping,

Yet is her open forehead beaming with the sun of ecstasy?

And who is that bloodstained warrior, with glory sitting on his crest?

And who that solemn sage, calm in majestic dignity?

Also, in the lengthening troop see I some clad in robes of triumph,

Whose fair and sunny faces I have known and loved on earth:

Welcome, ye glorified Loves, Graces, and Sciences, and Muses,

That, like sisters of charity, tended in this world's hospital;

Welcome, for verily I knew, ye could not but be children of the light,

Though earth hath soiled your robes, and robbed you of half your glory;

Welcome, chiefly welcome, for I find I have friends in heaven,

And some I might scarce have looked for, as thou, light-hearted Mirth;

Thou also, star-robed Urania; and thou, with the curious glass,

That rejoicedst in tracking wisdom where the eye was too dull to note it:

And art thou too among the blessed, mild, much-injured Poetry?

Who quickenest with light and beauty the leaden face of matter,

Who not unheard, though silent, fillest earth's gardens with music,

And not unseen, though a spirit, dost look down upon us from the stars,—

That hast been to me for oil and for wine, to cheer and uphold my soul,

When wearied, battling with the surge, the stunning surge of life:

Of thee, for well have I loved thee, of thee may I ask in hope,

Who among the glorious is she, that walketh a Goddess and a Queen?

And who that fair-haired herald, and who that weeping saint?

And who that mighty warrior, and who that solemn sage?

Son, happy art thou that Wisdom hath led thee hitherward:

For otherwise never hadst thou known the joy-giving name of our Queen.

Behold her, the life of men, the anchor of their shipwrecked hopes:

Behold her, the shepherdess of souls, who bringeth back the wanderers to God.

And for that modest herald, she is named on earth, Humility:

And hast thou not known, my son, the tearful face of Repentance?

Faith is yon time-scarred hero, walking in the shade of his laurels:

And Reason, the serious sage, who followeth the footsteps of Faith:

And we, all we, are but handmaids, ministers of minor bliss,

Who rejoice to be counted servants in the train of a Queen so glorious:

But for her name, son of man, it is strange to the language of heaven,

For those who have never fallen need not and may not learn it:

Ligeance we swear to our God, and ligeance well have we kept;

It is only the band of the redeemed who can tell thee the fulness of that name;

Yet will I comfort thee, my son, for the love wherewith thou hast loved me,

And thou shalt touch for thyself the golden sceptre of Religion.

So that blessed train passed by me; but the vision was sealed upon my soul;

And its memory is shrined in fragrance, for the promise of the Spirit was true:

I learn from the silent poem of all creation round me,

How beautiful their feet, who follow in that train.

OF A TRINITY.

Despise not, shrewd reckoner, the God of a good man's worship,

Neither let thy calculating folly gainsay the unity of three:

Nor scorn another's creed, although he cannot solve thy doubts;

Reason is the follower of faith, where he may not be precursor:

It is written, and so we believe, waiting not for outward proof,

Inasmuch as mysteries inscrutable are the clear prerogatives of godhead.

Reason hath nothing positive, faith hath nothing doubtful;

And the height of unbelieving wisdom is to question all things.

When there is marvel in a doctrine, faith is joyful and adoreth;

But when all is clear, what place is left for faith?

Tell me the sum of thy knowledge,—is it yet assured of anything?

Despise not what is wonderful, when all things are wonderful around thee.

From the multitude of like effects, thou sayest, Behold a law:

And the matter thou art baffled in unmaking, is to thy mind an element.

Then look abroad, I pray thee, for analogy holdeth everywhere,

And the Maker hath stamped His name on every creature of His hand:

I know not of a matter or a spirit, that is not three in one,

And truly should account it for a marvel, a coin without the image of its CÆsar.

Man talketh of himself as ignorant, but judgeth by himself as wise:

His own guess counteth he truth, but the notions of another are his scorn;

But bear thou yet with a brother, whose thought may be less subtle than thine own,

And suffer the passing speculation suggested by analogies to faith.

Like begetteth like, and the great sea of Existence

In each of its uncounted waves holdeth up a mirror to its Maker:

Like begetteth like, and the spreading tree of being

With each of its trefoil leaves pointeth at the Trinity of God.

Let him whose eyes have been unfilmed, read this homily in all things,

And thou, of duller sight, despise not him that readeth:

There be three grand principles; life, generation, and obedience;

Shadowing in every creature, the Spirit, and the Father, and the Son.

There be three grand unities, variously mixed in trinities,

Three catholic divisors of the million sums of matter:

Yea, though science hath not seen it, climbing the ladder of experiment,

Let faith, in the presence of her God, promulgate the mighty truth;

Of three sole elements all nature's works consist:

The pine, and the rock to which it clingeth, and the eagle sailing around it:

The lion, and the northern whale, and the deeps wherein he sporteth;

The lizard sleeping in the sun; the lightning flashing from a cloud;

The rose, and the ruby, and the pearl; each one is made of three;

And the three be the like ingredients, mingled in diverse measures.

Thyself hast within thyself body, and life, and mind:

Matter, and breath, and instinct, unite in all beasts of the field;

Substance, coherence, and weight, fashion the fabrics of the earth;

The will, the doing, and the deed, combine to frame a fact:

The stem, the leaf, and the flower; beginning, middle, and end;

Cause, circumstance, consequent: and every three is one.

Yea, the very breath of man's life consisteth of a trinity of vapours,

And the noonday light is a compound, the triune shadow of Jehovah.

Shall all things else be in mystery, and God alone be understood?

Shall finite fathom infinity, though it sound not the shallows of creation?

Shall a man comprehend his Maker, being yet a riddle to himself?

Or time teach the Lesson that eternity cannot master?

If God be nothing more than one, a child can compass the thought;

But seraphs fail to unravel the wondrous unity of three.

One verily He is, for there can be but one who is all mighty;

Yet the oracles of nature and religion proclaim Him three in one.

And where were the value to thy soul, O miserable denizen of earth,

Of the idle pageant of the cross, where hung no sacrifice for thee?

Where the worth to thine impotent heart, of that stirred Bethesda,

All numbed and palsied as it is, by the scorpion stings of sin?

No, thy trinity of nature, enchained by treble death,

Helplessly craveth of its God, Himself for three salvations:

The soul to be reconciled in love, the mind to be glorified in light,

While this poor dying body leapeth into life.

And if indeed for us all the costly ransom hath been paid,

Bethink thee, could less than Deity have owned so vast a treasure?

Could a man contend with God, and stand against the bosses of His buckler,

Rendering the balance for guilt, atonement to the uttermost?

Thou art subtle to thine own thinking, but wisdom judgeth thee a fool,

Resolving thou wilt not bow the knee to a Being thou canst not comprehend:

The mind that could compass perfection were itself perfection's equal;

And reason refuseth its homage to a God who can be fully understood.

Thou that despiseth mystery, yet canst expound nothing,

Wherefore rejectest thou the fact that solveth the enigma of all things?

Wherefore veilest thou thine eyes, lest the light of revelation sun them,

And puttest aside the key that would open the casket of truth?

The mind and the nature of God are shadowed in all His works,

And none could have guessed of His essence, had He not uttered it Himself.

Therefore, thou child of folly, that scornest the record of His wisdom,

Learn from the consistencies of nature the needful miracle of Godhead:

Yea, let the heathen be thy teacher, who adoreth many gods,

For there is no wide-spread error that hath not truth for its beginning.

Be content; thine eye cannot see all the sides of a cube at one view,

Nor thy mind in the self-same moment follow two ideas:

There are now many marvels in thy creed, believing what thou seest,

Then let not the conceit of intellect hinder thee from worshipping mystery.

OF THINKING.

Reflection is a flower of the mind, giving out wholesome fragrance,

But reverie is the same flower, when rank and running to seed.

Better to read little with thought, than much with levity and quickness;

For mind is not as merchandize, which decreaseth in the using,

But liker to the passions of man, which rejoice and expand in exertion:

Yet live not wholly on thine own ideas, lest they lead thee astray;

For in spirit, as in substance, thou art a social creature;

And if thou leanest on thyself, thou rejectest the guidance of thy betters,

Yea, thou contemnest all men,—Am I not wiser than they?—

Foolish vanity hath blinded thee, and warped thy weak judgment:

For, though new ideas flow from new springs, and enrich the treasury of knowledge,

Yet listen often, ere thou think much; and look around thee ere thou judgest.

Memory, the daughter of Attention, is the teeming mother of Wisdom,

And safer is he that storeth knowledge, than he that would make it for himself.

Imagination is not thought, neither is fancy reflection:

Thought paceth like a hoary sage, but imagination hath wings as an eagle:

Reflection sternly considereth, nor is sparing to condemn evil,

But fancy lightly laugheth, in the sun-clad gardens of amusement.

For the shy game of the fowler the quickest shot is the surest;

But with slow care and measured aim the gunner pointeth his cannon:

So for all less occasions, the surface-thought is best,

But to be master of the great take thou heavier metal.

It is a good thing, and a wholesome, to search out bosom sins,

But to be the hero of selfish imaginings, is the subtle poison of pride:

At night, in the stillness of thy chamber, guard and curb thy thoughts,

And in recounting the doings of the day, beware that thou do it with prayer,

Or thinking will be an idle pleasure, and retrospect yield no fruit.

Steer the bark of thy mind from the syren isle of reverie,

And let a watchful spirit mingle with the glance of recollection:

Also, in examining thine heart, in sounding the fountain of thine actions,

Be more careful of the evil than of the good; and humble thyself in thy sin.

The root of all wholesome thought is knowledge of thyself,

For thus only canst thou learn the character of God toward thee.

He made thee, and thou art; He redeemed thee, and thou wilt be:

Thou art evil, yet He loveth thee; thou sinnest, yet He pardoneth thee.

Though thou canst not perceive Him, yet is He in all His works,

Infinite in grand outline, infinite in minute perfection:

Nature is the chart of God, mapping out all His attributes;

Art is the shadow of His wisdom, and copieth His resources.

Thou knowest the laws of matter to be emanations of His will,

And thy best reason for aught is this,—Thou, Lord, wouldst have it so.

Yea, what is any law but an absolute decree of God?

Or the properties of matter and mind, but the arbitrary fiats of Jehovah?

He made and ordained necessity; He forged the chain of reason;

And holdeth in His own right hand the first of the golden links.

A fool regardeth mind as the spiritual essence of matter,

And not rather matter as the gross accident of mind.

Can finite govern infinite, or a part exceed the whole,

Or the wisdom of God sit down at the feet of innate necessity?

Necessity is a creature of His hand: for He can never change;

And chance hath no existence where everything is needful.

Canst thou measure Omnipotence, canst thou conceive Ubiquity,

Which guideth the meanest reptile, and quickeneth the brightest seraph,

Which steereth the particle of dust, and commandeth the path of the comet?

To Him all things are equal, for all things are necessary.

The smith was weary at his forge, and welded the metal carelessly,

And the anchor breaketh in its bed; and the vessel foundereth with her crew:

A word of anger is muttered, engendering the midnight murder:

The sun bursteth from a cloud, and maddeneth the toiling husbandman.

Shall these things be, and God not know it?

Shall He know, and not be in them? shall He see, and not be among them?

And how can they be otherwise than as He knoweth?

Truly, the Lord is in all things; verily, He worketh in all.

Think thus, and thy thoughts are firm, ascribing each circumstance to Him;

Yet know surely, and believe the truth, that God willeth not evil;

For adversities are blessings in disguise, and wickedness the Lord abhorreth:

That He is in all things is an axiom, and that He is righteous in all:

Ascribe holiness to Him, while thou musest on the mystery of sin,

For infinite can grasp that, which finite cannot compass.

In works of art, think justly: what praise canst thou render unto man?

For he made not his own mind, nor is he the source of contrivance.

If a cunning workman make an engine that fashioneth curious works,

Which hath the praise, the machine or its maker,—the engine, or he that framed it?

And could he frame it so subtly as to give it a will and freedom,

Endow it with complicated powers, and a glorious living soul,

Who, while he admireth the wondrous understanding creature,

Will not pay deeper homage to the Maker of master minds?

Otherwise, thou art senseless as the pagan, that adoreth his own handywork;

Yea, while thou boastest of thy wisdom, thy mind is as the mind of the savage,

For he boweth down to his idols, and thou art a worshipper of self,

Giving to the reasoning machine the credit due to its creator.

The key-stone of thy mind, to give thy thoughts solidity,

To bind them as in an arch, to fix them as the world in its sphere,

Is to learn from the book of the Lord, to drink from the well of His wisdom.

Who can condense the sun, or analyse the fulness of the Bible,

So that its ideas be gathered, and the harvest of its wisdom be brought in?

That book is easy to the man who setteth his heart to understand it,

But to the careless and profane it shall seem the foolishness of God;

And it is a delicate test to prove thy moral state;

To the humble disciple it is bread, but a stone to the proud and unbelieving:

A scorner shall find nothing but the husks, wherewith to feed his hunger,

But for the soul of the simple, it is plenty of full-ripe wheat.

The Scripture abideth the same, in the sober majesty of truth;

And the differing aspects of its teaching proceed from diversity in minds.

He that would learn to think may gain that knowledge there;

For the living word, as an angel, standeth at the gate of wisdom,

And publisheth, This is the way, walk ye surely in it.

Religion taketh by the hand the humble pupil of repentance,

And teacheth him lessons of mystery, solving the questions of doubt;

She maketh man worthy of himself, of his high prerogative of reason,

Threadeth all the labyrinths of thought, and leadeth him to his God.

Come hither, child of meditation, upon whose high fair forehead

Glittereth the star of mind in its unearthly lustre:

Hast thou nought to tell us of thine airy joys,—

When, borne on sinewy pinions, strong as the western condor,

The soul, after soaring for a while round the cloud-capped Andes of reflection,

Glad in its conscious immortality, leaveth a world behind,

To dare at one bold flight the broad Atlantic to another?

Hast thou no secret pangs to whisper common men,

No dread of thine own energies, still active day and night,

Lest too ecstatic heat sublime thyself away,

Or vivid horrors, sharp and clear, madden thy tense fibres?

In half-shaped visions of sleep hast thou not feared thy flittings,

Lest reason, like a raking hawk, return not to thy call:

Nor waked to work-day life with throbbing head and heart,

Nor welcomed early dawn to save thee from unrest?

For the wearied spirit lieth as a fainting maiden,

Captive and borne away on the warrior's foam-covered steed,

And sinketh down wounded, as a gladiator on the sand,

While the keen faulchion of Intellect is cutting through the scabbard of the brain.

Imagination, like a shadowy giant looming on the twilight of the Hartz,

Shall overwhelm judgment with affright, and scare him from his throne:

In a dream thou mayst be mad, and feel the fire within thee;

In a dream thou mayst travel out of self, and see thee with the eyes of another;

Or sleep in thine own corpse: or wake as in many bodies;

Or swell, as expanded to infinity; or shrink, as imprisoned to a point;

Or among moss-grown ruins mayst wander with the sullen disembodied,

And gaze upon their glassy eyes until thy heart-blood freeze.

Alone must thou stand, O man! alone at the bar of judgment;

Alone must thou bear thy sentence, alone must thou answer for thy deeds:

Therefore it is well thou retirest often to secresy and solitude,

To feel that thou art accountable separately from thy fellows:

For a crowd hideth truth from the eyes, society drowneth thought,

And being but one among many, stifleth the chidings of conscience.

Solitude bringeth woe to the wicked, for his crimes are told out in his ear;

But addeth peace to the good, for the mercies of his God are numbered.

Thou mayst know if it be well with a man,—loveth he gaiety or solitude?

For the troubled river rusheth to the sea, but the calm lake slumbereth among the mountains.

How dear to the mind of the sage are the thoughts that are bred in loneliness;

For there is as it were music at his heart, and he talketh within him as with friends:

But guilt maddeneth the brain, and terror glareth in the eye,

Where, in his solitary cell, the malefactor wrestleth with remorse.

Give me but a lodge in the wilderness, drop me on an island in the desert,

And thought shall yield me happiness, though I may not increase it by imparting:

For the soul never slumbereth, but is as the eye of the Eternal,

And mind, the breath of God, knoweth not ideal vacuity:

At night, after weariness and watching, the body sinketh into sleep,

But the mental eye is awake, and thou reasonest in thy dreams:

In a dream, thou mayst live a lifetime, and all be forgotten in the morning:

Even such is life, and so soon perisheth its memory.

OF SPEAKING.

Speech is the golden harvest that followeth the flowering of thought;

Yet oftentimes runneth it to husk, and the grains be withered and scanty:

Speech is reason's brother, and a kingly prerogative of man,

That likeneth him to his Maker, who spake, and it was done:

Spirit may mingle with spirit, but sense requireth a symbol;

And speech is the body of a thought, without which it were not seen.

When thou walkest, musing with thyself, in the green aisles of the forest,

Utter thy thinkings aloud, that they take a shape and being:

For he that pondereth in silence crowdeth the storehouse of his mind,

And though he hath heaped great riches, yet is he hindered in the using.

A man that speaketh too little, and thinketh much and deeply,

Corrodeth his own heart-strings, and keepeth back good from his fellows:

A man that speaketh too much, and museth but little and lightly,

Wasteth his mind in words, and is counted a fool among men:

But thou, when thou hast thought, weave charily the web of meditation,

And clothe the ideal spirit in the suitable garments of speech.

Uttered out of time, or concealed in its season, good savoureth of evil;

To be secret looketh like guilt, to speak out may breed contention:

Often have I known the honest heart, flaming with indignant virtue,

Provoke unneeded war by its rash ambassador the tongue:

Often have I seen the charitable man go so slily on his mission,

That those who met him in the twilight, took him for a skulking thief:

I have heard the zealous youth telling out his holy secrets

Before a swinish throng, who mocked him as he spake;

And I considered, his openness was hardening them that mocked,

Whereas a judicious keeping-back might have won their sympathy:

I have judged rashly and harshly the hand, liberal in the dark,

Because in the broad daylight, it hath holden it a virtue to be close;

And the silent tongue have I condemned, because reserve hath chained it,

That it hid, yea from a brother, the kindness it had done by comforting.

No need to sound a trumpet, but less to hush a footfall:

Do thou thy good openly, not as though the doing were a crime.

Secresy goeth cowled, and Honesty demandeth wherefore?

For he judgeth—judgeth he not well?—that nothing need be hid but guilt.

Why should thy good be evil spoken of, through thine unrighteous silence?

If thou art challenged, speak, and prove the good thou doest.

The free example of benevolence, unobtruded, yet unhidden,

Soundeth in the ears of sloth, Go, and do thou likewise:

And I wot the hypocrite's sin to be of darker dye,

Because the good man, fearing, thereby hideth his light:

But neither God nor man hath bid thee cloak thy good,

When a seasonable word would set thee in thy sphere, that all might see thy brightness.

Ascribe the honour to thy Lord, but be thou jealous of that honour,

Nor think it light and worthless, because thou mayst not wear it for thyself:

Remember, thy grand prerogative is free unshackled utterance,

And suffer not the flood-gates of secresy to lock the full river of thy speech.

Come, I will show thee an affliction, unnumbered among this world's sorrows,

Yet real and wearisome and constant, embittering the cup of life.

There be, who can think within themselves, and the fire burneth at their heart,

And eloquence waiteth at their lips, yet they speak not with their tongue:

There be, whom zeal quickeneth, or slander stirreth to reply,

Or need constraineth to ask, or pity sendeth as her messengers,

But nervous dread and sensitive shame freeze the current of their speech;

The mouth is sealed as with lead, a cold weight presseth on the heart,

The mocking promise of power is once more broken in performance,

And they stand impotent of words, travailing with unborn thoughts;

Courage is cowed at the portal; wisdom is widowed of utterance;

He that went to comfort is pitied; he that should rebuke, is silent:

And fools who might listen and learn, stand by to look and laugh;

While friends, with kinder eyes, wound deeper by compassion:

And thought, finding not a vent, smouldereth, gnawing at the heart,

And the man sinketh in his sphere, for lack of empty sounds.

There be many cares and sorrows thou hast not yet considered,

And well may thy soul rejoice in the fair privilege of speech;

For at every turn to want a word,—thou canst not guess that want;

It is as lack of breath or bread: life hath no grief more galling.

Come, I will tell thee of a joy, which the parasites of pleasure have not known,

Though earth and air and sea have gorged all the appetites of sense.

Behold, what fire is in his eye, what fervour on his cheek!

That glorious burst of winged words! how bound they from his tongue!

The full expression of the mighty thought, the strong triumphant argument,

The rush of native eloquence, resistless as Niagara,

The keen demand, the clear reply, the fine poetic image,

The nice analogy, the clenching fact, the metaphor bold and free,

The grasp of concentrated intellect wielding the omnipotence of truth,

The grandeur of his speech in his majesty of mind!

Champion of the right,—patriot, or priest, or pleader of the innocent cause,

Upon whose lips the mystic bee hath dropped the honey of persuasion,

Whose heart and tongue have been touched, as of old, by the live coal from the altar,

How wide the spreading of thy peace, how deep the draught of thy pleasures!

To hold the multitude as one, breathing in measured cadence,

A thousand men with flashing eyes, waiting upon thy will;

A thousand hearts kindled by thee with consecrated fire,

Ten flaming spiritual hecatombs offered on the mount of God:

And now a pause, a thrilling pause,—they live but in thy words,—

Thou hast broken the bounds of self, as the Nile at its rising,

Thou art expanded into them, one faith, one hope, one spirit,

They breathe but in thy breath, their minds are passive unto thine,

Thou turnest the key of their love, bending their affections to thy purpose,

And all, in sympathy with thee, tremble with tumultuous emotions:

Verily, O man, with truth for thy theme, eloquence shall throne thee with archangels.

OF READING.

One drachma for a good book, and a thousand talents for a true friend;—

So standeth the market, where scarce is ever costly:

Yea, were the diamonds of Golconda common as shingles on the shore,

A ripe apple would ransom kings before a shining stone:

And so, were a wholesome book as rare as an honest friend,

To choose the book be mine: the friend let another take.

For altered looks and jealousies and fears have none entrance there:

The silent volume listeneth well, and speaketh when thou listest:

It praiseth thy good without envy, it chideth thine evil without malice,

It is to thee thy waiting slave, and thine unbending teacher.

Need to humour no caprice, need to bear with no infirmity;

Thy sin, thy slander, or neglect, chilleth not, quencheth not, its love:

Unalterably speaketh it the truth, warped nor by error nor interest;

For a good book is the best of friends, the same to-day and for ever.

To draw thee out of self, thy petty plans and cautions,

To teach thee what thou lackest, to tell thee how largely thou art blest,

To lure thy thought from sorrow, to feed thy famished mind,

To graft another's wisdom on thee, pruning thine own folly,

Choose discreetly, and well digest the volume most suited to thy case,

Touching not religion with levity, nor deep things when thou art wearied.

Thy mind is freshened by morning air, grapple with science and philosophy;

Noon hath unnerved thy thoughts, dream for a while on fictions:

Grey evening sobereth thy spirit, walk thou then with worshippers:

But reason shall dig deepest in the night, and fancy fly most free.

O books, ye monuments of mind, concrete wisdom of the wisest;

Sweet solaces of daily life; proofs and results of immortality;

Trees yielding all fruits, whose leaves are for the healing of the nations;

Groves of knowledge, where all may eat, nor fear a flaming sword:

Gentle comrades, kind advisers; friends, comforts, treasures:

Helps, governments, diversities of tongues; who can weigh your worth?—

To walk no longer with the just; to be driven from the porch of science;

To bid long adieu to those intimate ones, poets, philosophers, and teachers;

To see no record of the sympathies which bind thee in communion with the good;

To be thrust from the feet of Him who spake as never man spake;

To have no avenue to heaven but the dim aisle of superstition;

To live as an Esquimaux, in lethargy; to die as the Mohawk, in ignorance:

O what were life, but a blank? what were death, but a terror?

What were man, but a burden to himself? what were mind, but misery?

Yea, let another Omar burn the full library of knowledge,

And the broad world may perish in the flames, offered on the ashes of its wisdom!

OF WRITING.

The pen of a ready writer, whereunto shall it be likened?

Ask of the scholar, he shall know,—to the chains that bind a Proteus:

Ask of the poet, he shall say,—to the sun, the lamp of heaven:

Ask of thy neighbour, he can answer,—to the friend that telleth my thought:

The merchant considereth it well, as a ship freighted with wares;

The divine holdeth it a miracle, giving utterance to the dumb.

It fixeth, expoundeth, and disseminateth sentiment;

Chaining up a thought, clearing it of mystery, and sending it bright into the world.

To think rightly, is of knowledge; to speak fluently, is of nature;

To read with profit, is of care; but to write aptly, is of practice.

No talent among men hath more scholars, and fewer masters:

For to write is to speak beyond hearing, and none stand by to explain.

To be accurate, write; to remember, write; to know thine own mind, write;

And a written prayer is a prayer of faith: special, sure, and to be answered.

Hast thou a thought upon thy brain, catch it while thou canst;

Or other thoughts shall settle there, and this shall soon take wing:

Thine uncompounded unity of soul, which argueth and maketh it immortal,

Yieldeth up its momentary self to every single thought;

Therefore, to husband thine ideas, and give them stability and substance,

Write often for thy secret eye; so shalt thou grow wiser.

The commonest mind is full of thoughts; some worthy of the rarest:

And could it see them fairly writ, would wonder at its wealth.

O precious compensation to the dumb, to write his wants and wishes;

O dear amends to the stammering tongue, to pen his burning thoughts!

To be of the college of Eloquence, through these silent symbols;

To pour out all the flowing mind without the toil of speech;

To show the babbling world how it might discourse more sweetly;

To prove that merchandize of words bringeth no monopoly of wisdom;

To take sweet vengeance on a prating crew, for the tongue's dishonour,

By the large triumph of the pen, the homage rendered to a writing.

With such, that telegraph of mind is dearer than wealth or wisdom,

Enabling to please without pain, to impart without humiliation.

Fair girl, whose eye hath caught the rustic penmanship of love,

Let thy bright brow and blushing cheek confess in this sweet hour,—

Let thy full heart, poor guilty one, whom the scroll of pardon hath just reached,—

Thy wet glad face, O mother, with news of a far-off child,—

Thy strong and manly delight, pilgrim of other shores,

When the dear voice of thy betrothed speaketh in the letter of affection,—

Let the young poet, exulting in his lay, and hope (how false) of fame,

While watching at deep midnight, he buildeth up the verse,—

Let the calm child of genius, whose name shall never die,

For that the transcript of his mind hath made his thoughts immortal,—

Let these, let all, with no faint praise, with no light gratitude, confess

The blessings poured upon the earth from the pen of a ready writer.

Moreover, their preciousness in absence is proved by the desire of their presence:

When the despairing lover waiteth day after day,

Looking for a word in reply, one word writ by that hand,

And cursing bitterly the morn ushered in by blank disappointment:

Or when the long-looked-for answer argueth a cooling friend,

And the mind is plied suspiciously with dark inexplicable doubts,

While thy wounded heart counteth its imaginary scars,

And thou art the innocent and injured, that friend the capricious and in fault:

Or when the earnest petition, that craveth for thy needs,

Unheeded, yea, unopened, tortureth with starving delay:

Or when the silence of a son, who would have written of his welfare,

Racketh a father's bosom with sharp-cutting fears.

For a letter, timely writ, is a rivet to the chain of affection,

And a letter, untimely delayed, is as rust to the solder.

The pen, flowing with love, or dipped black in hate,

Or tipped with delicate courtesies, or harshly edged with censure,

Hath quickened more good than the sun, more evil than the sword,

More joy than woman's smile, more woe than frowning fortune;

And shouldst thou ask my judgment of that which hath most profit in the world,

For answer take thou this, The prudent penning of a letter.

Thou hast not lost an hour, whereof there is a record;

A written thought at midnight shall redeem the livelong day.

Idea is as a shadow that departeth, speech is fleeting as the wind,

Reading is an unremembered pastime; but a writing is eternal:

For therein the dead heart liveth, the clay-cold tongue is eloquent,

And the quick eye of the reader is cleared by the reed of the scribe.

As a fossil in the rock, or a coin in the mortar of a ruin,

So the symbolled thoughts tell of a departed soul:

The plastic hand hath its witness in a statue, and exactitude of vision in a picture,

And so, the mind that was among us, in its writings is embalmed.

OF WEALTH.

Prodigality hath a sister Meanness, his fixed antagonist heart-fellow,

Who often outliveth the short career of the brother she despiseth:

She hath lean lips and a sharp look, and her eyes are red and hungry;

But he sloucheth in his gait, and his mouth speaketh loosely and maudlin.

Let a spendthrift grow to be old, he will set his heart on saving,

And labour to build up by penury that which extravagance threw down:

Even so, with most men, do riches earn themselves a double curse;

They are ill-got by tight dealing: they are ill-spent by loose squandering.

Give me enough, saith Wisdom;—for he feareth to ask for more;

And that by the sweat of my brow, addeth stout-hearted Independence:

Give me enough, and not less, for want is leagued with the tempter;

Poverty shall make a man desperate, and hurry him ruthless into crime:

Give me enough, and not more, saving for the children of distress;

Wealth ofttimes killeth, where want but hindereth the budding:

There is green glad summer near the pole, though brief and after long winter,

But the burnt breasts of the torrid zone yield never kindly nourishment.

Wouldst thou be poor, scatter to the rich,—and reap the tares of ingratitude;

Wouldst thou be rich, give unto the poor; thou shalt have thine own with usury:

For the secret hand of Providence prospereth the charitable all ways,

Good luck shall he have in his pursuits, and his heart shall be glad within him;

Yet perchance he never shall perceive, that, even as to earthly gains,

The cause of his weal as of his joy, hath been small givings to the poor.

In the plain of Benares is there found a root that fathereth a forest,

Where round the parent banian-tree drop its living scions;

Thirstily they strain to the earth, like stalactites in a grotto,

And strike broad roots, and branch again, lengthening their cool arcades:

And the dervish madly danceth there, and the faquir is torturing his flesh,

And the calm brahmin worshippeth the sleek and pampered bull:

At the base lean jackals coil, while from above depending

With dull malignant stare watcheth the branch-like boa.

Even so, in man's heart is a sin that is the root of all evil;

Whose fibres strangle the affections, whose branches overgrow the mind:

And oftenest beneath its shadow thou shalt meet distorted piety,—

The clenched and rigid fist, with the eyes upturned to heaven,

Fanatic zeal with miserly severity, a mixture of gain with godliness,

And him, against whom passion hath no power, kneeling to a golden calf:

The hungry hounds of extortion are there, the bond, and the mortgage, and the writ,

While the appetite for gold, unslumbering, watcheth to glut its maw:—

And the heart, so tenanted and shaded, is cold to all things else;

It seeth not the sunshine of heaven, nor is warmed by the light of charity.

For covetousness disbelieveth God, and laugheth at the rights of men;

Spurring unto theft and lying, and tempting to the poison and the knife;

It sundereth the bonds of love, and quickeneth the flames of hate;

A curse that shall wither the brain, and case the heart with iron.

Content is the true riches, for without it there is no satisfying,

But a ravenous all-devouring hunger gnaweth the vitals of the soul.

The wise man knoweth where to stop, as he runneth in the race of fortune,

For experience of old hath taught him, that happiness lingereth midway;

And many in hot pursuit have hasted to the goal of wealth,

But have lost, as they ran, those apples of gold,—the mind and the power to enjoy it.

There is no greater evil among men than a testament framed with injustice:

Where caprice hath guided the boon, or dishonesty refused what was due.

Generous is the robber on the highway, in the open daring of his guilt,

To the secret coward, whose malice liveth and harmeth after him;

Who smoothly sank into the tomb, with the smile of fraud upon his face,

And the last black deed of his existence was injury without redress:

For deaf is the ear of the dead, and can hear no palliating reasons;

The smiter is not among the living, and Right pleadeth but in vain.

Yet shall the curse of the oppressed be as blight upon the grave of the unjust;

Yea, bitterly shall that handwriting testify against him at the judgment.

I saw the humble relation that tended the peevishness of wealth,

And ministered, with kind hand, to the wailings of disease and discontent:

I noted how watchfulness and care were feeding on the marrow of her youth,

How heavy was the yoke of dependence, loaded by petty tyranny;

Yet I heard the frequent suggestion,—It can be but a little longer,

Patience and mute submission shall one day reap a rich reward.

So, tacitly enduring much, waited that humble friend,

Putting off the lover of her youth until the dawn of wealth:

And it came, that day of release, and the freed heart could not sorrow,

For now were the years of promise to yield their golden harvest:

Hope, so long deferred, sickly sparkled in her eye,

The miserable past was forgotten, as she looked for the happier future,

And she checked, as unworthy and ungrateful, the dark suspicious thought

That perchance her right had been the safer, if not left alone with honour:

But, alas, the sad knowledge soon came, that her stern task-master's will

Hath rewarded her toil with a jibe, her patience with utter destitution!—

Shall not the scourge of justice lash that cruel coward,

Who mingled the gall of ingratitude with the bitterness of disappointment?

Shall not the hate of men, and vengeance, fiercely pursuing,

Hunt down the wretched being that sinneth in his grave?

He fancied his idol self safe from the wrath of his fellows,

But Hades rose as he came in, to point at him the finger of scorn;

And again must he meet that orphan-maid to answer her face to face,

And her wrongs shall cling around his neck, to hinder him from rising with the just:

For his last most solemn act hath linked his name with liar,

And the crime of Ananias is branded on his brow!

A good man commendeth his cause to the one great Patron of innocence,

Convinced of justice to the last, and sure of good meanwhile.

He knoweth he hath a Guardian, wise and kind and strong,

And can thank Him for giving, or refusing, the trust or the curse of riches:

His confidence standeth as a rock; he dreadeth not malice nor caprice,

Nor the whisperings of artful men, nor envious secret influence;

He scorneth servile compromise, and the pliant mouthings of deceit;

He maketh not a show of love, where he cannot concede esteem;

He regardeth ill-got wealth, as the root most fruitful of wretchedness,

So he walketh in straight integrity, leaning on God and his right.

No gain, but by its price: labour, for the poor man's meal,

Ofttimes heart-sickening toil, to win him a morsel for his hunger:

Labour, for the chapman at his trade, a dull unvaried round,

Year after year, unto death; yea, what a weariness is it!

Labour, for the pale-faced scribe, drudging at his hated desk,

Who bartereth for needful pittance the untold gold of health;

Labour, with fear, for the merchant, whose hopes are ventured on the sea;

Labour, with care, for the man of law, responsible in his gains;

Labour, with envy and annoyance, where strangers will thee wealth;

Labour, with indolence and gloom, where wealth falleth from a father;

Labour unto all, whether aching thews, or aching head, or spirit,—

The curse on the sons of men, in all their states, is labour.

Nevertheless, to the diligent, labour bringeth blessing:

The thought of duty sweeteneth toil, and travail is as pleasure;

And time spent in doing hath a comfort that is not for the idle,

The hardship is transmuted into joy by the dear alchemy of Mercy.

Labour is good for a man, bracing up his energies to conquest,

And without it life is dull, the man perceiving himself useless:

For wearily the body groaneth, like a door on rusty hinges,

And the grasp of the mind is weakened, as the talons of a caged vulture.

Wealth hath never given happiness, but often hastened misery:

Enough hath never caused misery, but often quickened happiness:

Enough is less than thy thought, O pampered creature of society,

And he that hath more than enough, is a thief of the rights of his brother.

OF INVENTION.

Man is proud of his mind, boasting that it giveth him divinity,

Yet with all its powers can it originate nothing;

For the Great God into all His works hath largely poured out Himself,

Saving one special property, the grand prerogative,—Creation.

To improve and expand is ours, as well as to limit and defeat;

But to create a thought or a thing is hopeless and impossible.

Can a man make matter?—and yet this would-be god

Thinketh to make mind, and form original idea:

The potter must have his clay, and the mason his quarry,

And mind must drain ideas from everything around it.

Doth the soil generate herbs, or the torrid air breed flies,

Or the water frame its monads, or the mist its swarming blight?—

Mediately, through thousand generations, having seed within themselves,

All things, rare or gross, own one common Father.

Truly spake Wisdom, There is nothing new under the sun:

We only arrange and combine the ancient elements of all things.

Invention is activity of mind, as fire is air in motion;

A sharpening of the spiritual sight, to discern hidden aptitudes:

From the basket and acanthus, is modelled the graceful capital;

The shadowed profile on the wall helpeth the limner to his likeness;

The footmarks, stamped in clay, lead on the thoughts to printing;

The strange skin garments cast upon the shore suggest another hemisphere:

A falling apple taught the sage pervading gravitation;

The Huron is certain of his prey, from tracks upon the grass:

And shrewdness, guessing out the hint, followeth on the trail;

But the hint must be given, the trail must be there, or the keenest sight is as blindness.

Behold the barren reef, which an earthquake hath just left dry;

It hath no beauty to boast of, no harvest of fair fruits:

But soon the lichen fixeth there, and, dying, diggeth its own grave,

And softening suns and splitting frosts crumble the reluctant surface;

And cormorants roost there, and the snail addeth its slime,

And efts, with muddy feet, bring their welcome tribute;

And the sea casteth out her dead, wrapped in a shroud of weeds;

And orderly nature arrangeth again the disunited atoms;

Anon, the cold smooth stone is warm with feathery grass,

And the light sporules of the fern are dropt by the passing wind,

The wood-pigeon, on swift wing, leaveth its crop-full of grain,

The squirrel's jealous care planteth the fir-cone and the filbert:

Years pass, and the sterile rock is rank with tangled herbage;

The wild-vine clingeth to the briar, and ivy runneth green among the corn,

Lordly beeches are studded on the down, and willows crowd around the rivulet,

And the tall pine and hazel-thicket shade the rambling hunter.

Shall the rock boast of its fertility? shall it lift the head in pride?—

Shall the mind of man be vain of the harvest of its thoughts?

The savage is that rock; and a million chances from without,

By little and little acting on the mind, heap up the hot-bed of society;

And the soul, fed and fattened on the thoughts and things around it,

Groweth to perfection, full of fruit, the fruit of foreign seeds.

For we learn upon a hint, we find upon a clue,

We yield an hundred-fold; but the great sower is Analogy.

There must be an acrid sloe before a luscious peach,

A boll of rotting flax before the bridal veil,

An egg before an eagle, a thought before a thing,

A spark struck into tinder to light the lamp of knowledge,

A slight suggestive nod to guide the watching mind,

A half-seen hand upon the wall, pointing to the balance of Comparison.

By culture man may do all things, short of the miracle,—Creation;

Here is the limit of thy power,—here let thy pride be stayed:

The soil may be rich, and the mind may be active, but neither yield unsown;

The eye cannot make light, nor the mind make spirit.

Therefore it is wise in man to name all novelty Invention;

For it is to find out things that are, not to create the unexisting:

It is to cling to contiguities, to be keen in catching likeness,

And with energetic elasticity to leap the gulphs of contrast.

The globe knoweth not increase, either of matter or spirit;

Atoms and thoughts are used again, mixing in varied combinations;

And though, by moulding them anew, thou makest them thine own,

Yet have they served thousands, and all their merit is of God.

OF RIDICULE.

Seams of thought for the sage's brow, and laughing lines for the fool's face;

For all things leave their track in the mind; and the glass of the mind is faithful.

Seest thou much mirth upon the cheek? there is then little exercise of virtue;

For he that looketh on the world, cannot be glad and good:

Seest thou much gravity in the eye? be not assured of finding wisdom;

For she hath too great praise, not to get many mimics.

There is a grave-faced folly; and verily, a laughter-loving wisdom;

And what, if surface-judges account it vain frivolity?

There is indeed an evil in excess, and a field may lie fallow too long;

Yet merriment is often as a froth, that mantleth on the strong mind:

And note thou this for a verity,—the subtlest thinker when alone,

From ease of thoughts unbent, will laugh the loudest with his fellows:

And well is the loveliness of wisdom mirrored in a cheerful countenance,

Justly the deepest pools are proved by dimpling eddies;

For that, a true philosophy commandeth an innocent life,

And the unguilty spirit is lighter than a linnet's heart:

Yea, there is no cosmetic like a holy conscience;

The eye is bright with trust, the cheek bloomed over with affection,

The brow unwrinkled by a care, and the lip triumphant in its gladness.

And for yon grave-faced folly, need not far to look for her;

How seriously on trifles dote those leaden eyes,

How ruefully she sigheth after chances long gone by,

How sulkily she moaneth over evils without cure!

I have known a true-born mirth, the child of innocence and wisdom,

I have seen a base-born gravity, mingled of ignorance and guilt:

And again, a base-born mirth, springing out of carelessness and folly;

And again, a true-born gravity, the product of reflection and right fear.

The wounded partridge hideth in a furrow, and a stricken conscience would be left alone;

But when its breast is healed, it runneth gladly with its fellows:

Whereas the solitary heron, standing in the sedgy fen,

Holdeth aloof from the social world, intent on wiles and death.

Need but of light philosophy to dare the world's dread laugh;

For a little mind courteth notoriety, to illustrate its puny self:

But the sneer of a man's own comrades trieth the muscles of courage,

And to be derided in his home is as a viper in the nest:

The laugh of a hooting world hath in it a notion of sublimity,

But the tittering private circle stingeth as a hive of wasps.

Some have commended ridicule, counting it the test of truth,

But neither wittily nor wisely; for truth must prove ridicule:

Otherwise a blunt bulrush is to pierce the proof armour of argument,

Because the stolidity of ignorance took it for a barbed shaft.

Softer is the hide of the rhinoceros, than the heart of deriding unbelief,

And truth is idler there, than the Bushman's feathered reed:

A droll conceit parrieth a thrust, that should have hit the conscience,

And the leering looks of humour tickle the childish mind;

For that the matter of a man is mingled most with folly,

Neither can he long endure the searching gaze of wisdom.

It is pleasanter to see a laughing cheek than a serious forehead,

And there liveth not one among a thousand whose idol is not pleasure.

Ridicule is a weak weapon, when levelled at a strong mind:

But common men are cowards, and dread an empty laugh.

Fear a nettle, and touch it tenderly, its poison shall burn thee to the shoulder;

But grasp it with a bold hand,—is it not a bundle of myrrh?

Betray mean terror of ridicule, thou shalt find fools enough to mock thee;

But answer thou their laughter with contempt, and the scoffers will lick thy feet.

OF COMMENDATION.

The praise of holy men is a promise of praise from their Master;

A fore-running earnest of thy welcome,—Well done, faithful servant;

A rich preludious note, that droppeth softly on thine ear,

To tell thee the chords of thy heart are in tune with the choirs of heaven.

Yet is it a dangerous hearing, for the sweetness may lull thee into slumber,

And the cordial quaffed with thirst may generate the fumes of presumption.

So seek it not for itself, but taste, and go gladly on thy way,

For the mariner slacketh not his sail, though the sandal-groves of Araby allure him;

And the fragrance of that incense would harm thee, as when, on a summer evening,

The honied yellow flowers of the gorse oppress thy charmed sense:

And a man hath too much of praise, for he praiseth himself continually;

Neither lacketh he at any time self-commendation or excuse.

Praise a fool, and slay him: for the canvas of his vanity is spread;

His bark is shallow in the water, and a sudden gust shall sink it:

Praise a wise man, and speed him on his way; for he carrieth the ballast of humility,

And is glad when his course is cheered by the sympathy of brethren ashore.

The praise of a good man is good, for he holdeth up the mirror of Truth,

That Virtue may see her own beauty, and delight in her own fair face:

The praise of a bad man is evil, for he hideth the deformity of Vice,

Casting the mantle of a queen around the limbs of a leper.

Praise is rebuke to the man whose conscience alloweth it not:

And where conscience feeleth it her due, no praise is better than a little.

He that despiseth the outward appearance, despiseth the esteem of his fellows;

And he that overmuch regardeth it, shall earn only their contempt:

The honest commendation of an equal no one can scorn, and be blameless,

Yet even that fair fame no one can hunt for, and be honoured:

If it come, accept it and be thankful, and be thou humble in accepting;

If it tarry, be not thou cast down; the bee can gather honey out of rue:

And is thine aim so low, that the breath of those around thee

Can speed thy feathered arrow, or retard its flight?

The child shooteth at a butterfly, but the man's mark is an eagle;

And while his fellows talk, he hath conquered in the clouds.

Ally thee to truth and godliness, and use the talents in thy charge;

So shall thou walk in peace, deserving, if not having.

With a friend, praise him when thou canst; for many a friendship hath decayed,

Like a plant in a crowded corner, for want of sunshine on its leaves:

With another, praise him not often—otherwise he shall despise thee;

But be thou frugal in commending; so will he give honour to thy judgment:

For thou that dost so zealously commend, art acknowledging thine own inferiority,

And he, thou so highly hast exalted, shall proudly look down on thy esteem.

Wilt thou that one remember a thing?—praise him in the midst of thy advice;

Never yet forgat man the word whereby he hath been praised.

Better to be censured by a thousand fools, than approved but by one man that is wise;

For the pious are slower to help right, than the profane to hinder it:

So, where the world rebuketh, there look thou for the excellent,

And be suspicious of the good, which wicked men can praise.

The captain bindeth his troop, not more by severity than kindness,

And justly, should recompense well doing, as well as be strict with an offender;

The laurel is cheap to the giver, but precious in his sight who hath won it,

And the heart of the soldier rejoiceth in the approving glance of his chief.

Timely given praise is even better than the merited rebuke of censure,

For the sun is more needful to the plant than the knife that cutteth out a canker.

Many a father hath erred, in that he hath withheld reproof,

But more have mostly sinned, in withholding praise where it was due:

There be many such as Eli among men; but these be more culpable than Eli,

Who chill the fountain of exertion by the freezing looks of indifference:

Ye call a man easy and good, yet he is as a two-edged sword;

He rebuketh not vice, and it is strong: he comforteth not virtue, and it fainteth.

There is nothing more potent among men than a gift timely bestowed;

And a gift kept back where it was hoped, separateth chief friends:

For what is a gift but a symbol, giving substance to praise and esteem?

And where is a sharper arrow than the sting of unmerited neglect?

Expect not praise from the mean, neither gratitude from the selfish;

And to keep the proud thy friend, see thou do him not a service:

For, behold, he will hate thee for his debt: thou hast humbled him by giving;

And his stubbornness never shall acknowledge the good he hath taken from thy hand:

Yea, rather will he turn and be thy foe, lest thou gather from his friendship

That he doth account thee creditor, and standeth in the second place.

Still, O kindly feeling heart, be not thou chilled by the thankless,

Neither let the breath of gratitude fan thee into momentary heat:

Do good for good's own sake, looking not to worthiness nor love;

Fling thy grain among the rocks, cast thy bread upon the waters,

His claim be strongest to thy help, who is thrown most helplessly upon thee,—

So shalt thou have a better praise, and reap a richer harvest of reward.

If a man hold fast to thy creed, and fit his thinkings to thy notions,

Thou shalt take him for a man right-minded, yea, and excuse his evil:

But seest thou not, O bigot, that thy zeal is but a hunting after praise,

And the full pleasure of a proselyte lieth in the flattering of self?

A man of many praises meeteth many welcomes,

But he, who blameth often, shall not keep a friend;

The velvet-coated apricot is one thing, and the spiked horse-chestnut is another,

A handle of smooth amber is pleasanter than rough buck-horn.

Show me a popular man; I can tell thee the secret of his power;

He hath soothed them with glozing words, lulling their ears with flattery,

The smile of seeming approbation is ever the companion of his presence,

And courteous looks, and warm regards, earn him all their hearts.

Nothing but may be better, and every better might be best;

The blind may discern, and the simple prove, fault or want in all things;

And a little mind looketh on the lily with a microscopic eye,

Eager and glad to pry out specks on its robe of purity;

But a great mind gazeth on the sun, glorying in his brightness,

And taking large knowledge of his good, in the broad prairie of creation:

What, though he hatch basilisks? what, though spots are on the sun?

In fulness is his worth, in fulness be his praise!

OF SELF-ACQUAINTANCE.

Knowledge holdeth by the hilt, and heweth out a road to conquest;

Ignorance graspeth the blade, and is wounded by its own good sword:

Knowledge distilleth health from the virulence of opposite poisons;

Ignorance mixeth wholesomes, unto the breeding of disease:

Knowledge is leagued with the universe, and findeth a friend in all things;

But ignorance is everywhere a stranger; unwelcome, ill at ease, and out of place.

A man is helpless and unsafe up to the measure of his ignorance,

For he lacketh perception of the aptitudes commending such a matter to his use,

Clutching at the horn of danger, while he judgeth it the handle of security,

Or casting his anchor so widely, that the granite reef is just within the tether.

Untaught in science, he is but half alive, stupidly taking note of nothing,

Or listening with dull wonder to the crafty saws of an empiric:

Simple in the world, he trusteth unto knaves; and then to make amends for folly,

Dealeth so shrewdly with the honest, they cannot but suspect him for a thief;

With an unknown God, he maketh mock of reason, fathering contrivance on chance,

Or doting with superstitious dread on some crooked image of his fancy:

But ignorant of Self, he is weakness at heart; the key-stone crumbleth into sand,

There is panic in the general's tent, the oak is hollow as hemlock;

Though the warm sap creepeth up its bark, filling out the sheaf of leaves,

Though knowledge of all things beside add proofs of seeming vigour,

Though the master-mind of the royal sage feast on the mysteries of wisdom,

Yet ignorance of self shall bow down the spirit of a Solomon to idols;

The storm of temptation, sweeping by, shall snap that oak like a reed,

And the proud luxuriance of its tufted crown drag it the sooner to the dust.

Youth, confident in self, tampereth with dangerous dalliance,

Till the vice his heart once hated hath locked him in her foul embrace:

Manhood, through zeal of doing good, seeketh high place for its occasions,

Unwitting that the bleak mountain-air will nip the tender budding of his motives:

Or painfully, for love of truth, he climbeth the ladder of science,

Till pride of intellect heating his heart, warpeth it aside to delusion:

The maiden, to give shadow to her fairness, plaiteth her raven hair,

Heedlessly weaving for her soul the silken net of vanity:

The grey-beard looketh on his gold, till he loveth its yellow smile,

Unconscious of the bright decoy which is luring his heart unto avarice:

Wrath avoideth no quarrel, jealousy counteth its suspicions,

Pining envy gazeth still, and melancholy seeketh solitude,

The sensitive broodeth on his slights, the fearful poreth over horrors,

The train of wantonness is fired, the nerves of indecision are unstrung;

Each special proneness unto harm is pampered by ignorant indulgence,

And the man, for want of warning, yieldeth to the apt temptation.

A smith at the loom, and a weaver at the forge, were but sorry craftsmen;

And a ship that saileth on every wind never shall reach her port:

Yet there be thousands among men who heed not the leaning of their talents,

But cutting against the grain, toil on to no good end;

And the light of a thoughtful spirit is quenched beneath the bushel of commerce,

While meaner plodding minds are driven up the mountain of philosophy:

The cedar withereth on a wall, while the house-leek is fattening in a hot-bed,

And the dock with its rank leaves hideth the sun from violets.

To everything a fitting place, a proper honourable use;

The humblest measure of mind is bright in its humble sphere:

The glow-worm, creeping in the hedge, lighteth her evening torch,

And her far-off mate, on gossamer sail, steereth his course by that star:

But ignorance mocketh at proprieties, bringing out the glow-worm at noon;

And setteth the faults of mediocrity in the full blaze of wisdom.

Ravens croaking in darkness, and a skylark trilling to the sun,

The voice of a screech-owl from a ruin, and the blackbird's whistle in a wood,

A cushion-footed camel for the sands, and a swift rein-deer for the snows,

A naked skin for Ethiopia, and rich soft furs for the Pole:

In all things is there a fitness: discord with discord hath its music;

And the harmony of nature is preserved by each one knowing his place.

The blind at an easel, the palsied with a graver, the halt making for the goal,

The deaf ear tuning psaltery, the stammerer discoursing eloquence,—

What wonder if all fail? the shaft flieth wide of the mark

Alike if itself be crooked, or the bow be strung awry;

And the mind which were excellent in one way, but foolishly toileth in another,

What is it but an ill-strung bow, and its aim a crooked arrow?

By knowledge of self, thou provest thy powers: put not the racer to the plough,

Nor goad the toilsome ox to wager his slowness with the fleet:

Consider thy failings, heed thy propensities, search out thy latent virtues,

Analyze the doubtful, cultivate the good, and crush the head of evil;

So shalt thou catch with quick hand the golden ball of opportunity,

The warrior armed shall be ready for the fray, beside his bridled steed;

Thou shall ward off special harms, and have the sway of circumstance,

And turn to thy special good the common current of events;

Choosing from the wardrobe of the world, thou shalt suitably clothe thy spirit,

Nor thrust the white hand of peace into the gauntlet of defiance:

The shepherd shall go with a staff, and conquer by sling and stone;

The soldier shall let alone the distaff, and the scribe lay down the sword;

The man unlearned shall keep silence, and earn one attribute of wisdom,

The sage be sparing of his lessons before unhearing ears:

Calm shalt thou be, as a lion in repose, conscious of passive strength,

And the shock that splitteth the globe, shall not unthrone thy self-possession.

Acquaint thee with thyself, O man! so shalt thou be humble:

The hard hot desert of thy heart shall blossom with the lily and the rose;

The frozen cliffs of pride shall melt, as an iceberg in the tropics;

The bitter fountains of self-seeking be sweeter than the waters of the Nile.

But if thou lack that wisdom,—thy frail skiff is doomed,

On stronger eddy whirling to the dreadful gorge;

Untaught in that grand lore, thou standest, cased in steel,

To dare with mocking unbelief the thunderbolts of heaven.

For look now around thee on the universe, behold how all things serve thee;

The teeming soil, and the buoyant sea, and undulating air,

Golden crops, and bloomy fruits, and flowers, and precious gems,

Choice perfumes and fair sights, soft touches and sweet music:

For thee, shoaling up the bay, crowd the finny nations,

For thee, the cattle on a thousand hills live, and labour, and die:

Light is thy daily slave, darkness inviteth thee to slumber;

Thou art served by the hands of Beauty, and Sublimity kneeleth at thy feet:

Arise, thou sovereign of creation, and behold thy glory!

Yet more, thou hast a mind; intellect wingeth thee to heaven,

Tendeth thy state on earth, and by it thou divest down to hell;

Thou hast measured the belts of Saturn, thou hast weighed the moons of Jupiter,

And seen, by reason's eye, the centre of thy globe;

Subtly hast thou numbered by billions the leagues between sun and sun,

And noted in thy book the coming of their shadows;

With marvellous unerring truth, thou knowest to an inch and to an instant,

The where and the when of the comet's path that shall seem to rush by at thy command:

Arise, thou king of mind, and survey thy dignity!

Yet more,—for once believe religion's flattering tale;

Thou hast a soul, yea, and a God,—but be not therefore humbled;

Thy Maker's self was glad to live and die—a man;

The brightest jewel in His crown is voluntary manhood:

By deep dishonour, and great price, bought He that envied freedom,

But thou wast born an heir of all, thy Master scarce could earn.

O climax unto pride, O triumph of humanity,

O triple crown upon thy brow, most high and mighty Self!

Arise, thou Lord of all, thou greater than a God!—

How saidst thou, wretched being?—cast thy glance within;

Regard that painted sepulchre, the hovel of thy heart:

Ha! with what fearful imagery swarmeth that small chamber;

The horrid eye of murder, scowling in the dark,

The bony hand of avarice, filching from the poor,

The lurid fires of lust, the idiot face of folly,

The sickening deed of cruelty, the foul fierce orgies of the drunken,

Weak contemptible vanity, stubborn stolid unbelief,

Envy's devilish sneer, and the vile features of ingratitude,—

Man, hast thou seen enough? or are these full proof

That thou art a miracle of mercy, and all thy dignity is dross?

Well, said the wisdom of earth, O mortal, know thyself;

But better the wisdom of heaven, O man, learn thou thy God:

By knowledge of self thou art conusant of evil, and mailed in panoply to meet it;

By knowledge of God cometh knowledge of good, and universal love is at thy heart.

Every creature knoweth its capacities, running in the road of instinct,

And reason must not lag behind, but serve itself of all proprieties:

The swift to the race, and the strong to the burden, and the wise for right direction;

For self-knowledge filleth with acceptance its niche in the temple of utility:

But vainly wilt thou look for that knowledge, till the clue of all truth is in thy hand,

For the labyrinth of man's heart windeth in complicate deceivings:

Thou canst not sound its depths with the shallow plumb-line of reason,

Till religion, the pilot of the soul, have lent thee her unfathomable coil:

Therefore, for this grand knowledge, and knowledge is the parent of dominion,

Learn God, thou shalt know thyself; yea, and shalt have mastery of all things.

OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALS.

Shame upon thee, savage Monarch-Man, proud monopolist of reason;

Shame upon Creation's lord, the fierce ensanguined despot:

What, man! are there not enough, hunger, and diseases, and fatigue,—

And yet must thy goad or thy thong add another sorrow to existence?

What! art thou not content thy sin hath dragged down suffering and death

On the poor dumb servants of thy comfort, and yet must thou rack them with thy spite?

The prodigal heir of creation hath gambled away his all,—

Shall he add torment to the bondage that is galling his forfeit serfs?

The leader in nature's pÆan himself hath marred her psaltery,

Shall he multiply the din of discord by overstraining all the strings?

The rebel hath fortified his stronghold, shutting in his vassals with him,—

Shall he aggravate the woes of the besieged by oppression from within?

Thou twice deformed image of thy Maker, thou hateful representative of Love,

For very shame be merciful, be kind unto the creatures thou hast ruined;

Earth and her million tribes are cursed for thy sake,

Earth and her million tribes still writhe beneath thy cruelty:

Liveth there but one among the million that shall not bear witness against thee,

A pensioner of land or air or sea, that hath not whereof it will accuse thee?

From the elephant toiling at a launch, to the shrew-mouse in the harvest-field,

From the whale which the harpooner hath stricken, to the minnow caught upon a pin,

From the albatross wearied in its flight, to the wren in her covered nest,

From the death-moth and lace-winged dragon-fly, to the lady-bird and the gnat,

The verdict of all things is unanimous, finding their master cruel:

The dog, thy humble friend, thy trusting, honest friend;

The ass, thine uncomplaining slave, drudging from morn to even;

The lamb, and the timorous hare, and the labouring ox at plough;

The speckled trout, basking in the shallow, and the partridge, gleaning in the stubble,

And the stag at bay, and the worm in thy path, and the wild bird pining in captivity,

And all things that minister alike to thy life and thy comfort and thy pride,

Testify with one sad voice that man is a cruel master.

Verily, they are all thine: freely mayst thou serve thee of them all:

They are thine by gift for thy needs, to be used in all gratitude and kindness;

Gratitude to their God and thine,—their Father and thy Father,

Kindness to them who toil for thee, and help thee with their all:

For meat, but not by wantonness of slaying: for burden, but with limits of humanity;

For luxury, but not through torture; for draught, but according to the strength:

For a dog cannot plead his own right, nor render a reason for exemption,

Nor give a soft answer unto wrath, to turn aside the undeserved lash;

The galled ox cannot complain, nor supplicate a moment's respite;

The spent horse hideth his distress, till he panteth out his spirit at the goal;

Also, in the winter of life, when worn by constant toil,

If ingratitude forget his services, he cannot bring them to remembrance;

Behold, he is faint with hunger; the big tear standeth in his eye;

His skin is sore with stripes, and he tottereth beneath his burden;

His limbs are stiff with age, his sinews have lost their vigour,

And pain is stamped upon his face, while he wrestleth unequally with toil;

Yet once more mutely and meekly endureth he the crushing blow;

That struggle hath cracked his heart-strings,—the generous brute is dead!

Liveth there no advocate for him? no judge to avenge his wrongs?

No voice that shall be heard in his defence? no sentence to be passed on his oppressor?

Yea, the sad eye of the tortured pleadeth pathetically for him;

Yea, all the justice in heaven is roused in indignation at his woes;

Yea, all the pity upon earth shall call down a curse upon the cruel;

Yea, the burning malice of the wicked is their own exceeding punishment.

The Angel of Mercy stoppeth not to comfort, but passeth by on the other side,

And hath no tear to shed, when a cruel man is damned.

OF FRIENDSHIP.

As frost to the bud, and blight to the blossom, even such is self-interest to Friendship:

For Confidence cannot dwell where Selfishness is porter at the gate.

If thou see thy friend to be selfish, thou canst not be sure of his honesty;

And in seeking thine own weal, thou hast wronged the reliance of thy friend.

Flattery hideth her varnished face when Friendship sitteth at his board:

And the door is shut upon Suspicion, but Candour is bid glad welcome.

For Friendship abhorreth doubt, its life is in mutual trust,

And perisheth, when artful praise proveth it is sought for a purpose.

A man may be good to thee at times, and render thee mighty service,

Whom yet thy secret soul could not desire as a friend;

For the sum of life is in trifles, and though, in the weightier masses,

A man refuse thee not his purse, nay his all in thine utmost need,

Yet if thou canst not feel that his character agreeth with thine own,

Thou never wilt call him friend, though thou render him a heartful of gratitude.

A coarse man grindeth harshly the finer feelings of his brother;

A common mind will soon depart from the dull companionship of wisdom;

A weak soul dareth not to follow in the track of vigour and decision;

And the worldly regardeth with scorn the seeming foolishness of faith.

A mountain is made up of atoms, and friendship of little matters,

And if the atoms hold not together, the mountain is crumbled into dust.

Come, I will show thee a friend; I will paint one worthy of thy trust:

Thine heart shall not weary of him: thou shalt not secretly despise him.

Thou art long in learning him, in unravelling all his worth;

And he dazzleth not thine eyes at first, to be darkened in thy sight afterward,

But riseth from small beginnings, and reacheth the height of thine esteem.

He remembereth that thou art only man; he expecteth not great things from thee:

And his forbearance toward thee silently teacheth thee to be considerate unto him.

He despiseth not courtesy of manner, nor neglecteth the decencies of life:

Nor mocketh the failings of others, nor is harsh in his censures before thee:

For so, how couldst thou tell, if he talketh not of thee in ridicule?

He withholdeth no secret from thee, and rejecteth not thine in turn;

He shareth his joys with thee, and is glad to bear part in thy sorrows.

Yet one thing, he loveth thee too well to show thee the corruptions of his heart:

For as an ill example strengthened the hands of the wicked,

So to put forward thy guilt, is a secret poison to thy friend:

For the evil in his nature is comforted, and he warreth more weakly against it,

If he find that the friend whom he honoureth, is a man more sinful than himself.

I hear the communing of friends; ye speak out the fulness of your souls,

And being but men, as men, ye own to all the sympathies of manhood:

Confidence openeth the lips, indulgence beameth from the eye,

The tongue loveth not boasting, the heart is made glad with kindness:

And one standeth not as on a hill, beckoning to the other to follow,

But ye toil up hand in hand, and carry each other's burdens.

Ye commune of hopes and aspirations, the fervent breathings of the heart,

Ye speak with pleasant interchange the treasured secrets of affection,

Ye listen to the voice of complaint, and whisper the language of comfort,

And as in a double solitude, ye think in each other's hearing.

Choose thy friend discreetly, and see thou consider his station,

For the graduated scale of ranks accordeth with the ordinance of Heaven.

If a low companion ripen to a friend, in the full sunshine of thy confidence,

Know, that for old age thou hast heaped up sorrow;

For thou sinkest to that level, and thy kin shall scorn thee,

Yea, and the menial thou hast pampered haply shall neglect thee in thy death:

And if thou reachest up to high estates, thinking to herd with princes,

What art thou but a footstool, though so near a throne?

O rush among the lilies, be taught thou art a weed,

O briar among the cedars, hot contempt shall burn thee.

But thou, friend and scholar, select from thine own caste,

And make not an intimate of one, thy servant or thy master;

For only friendship among men is the true republic,

Where all have equality of service, and all have freedom of command.

And yet, if thou wilt take my judgment, be shy of too much openness with any,

Lest thou repent hereafter, should he turn and rend thee:

For many an apostate friend hath abused unguarded confidence,

And bent to selfish ends the secret of the soul.

Absence strengthened friendship, where the last recollections were kindly;

But it must be good wine at the last, or absence shall weaken it daily.

A rare thing is faith, and friendship is a marvel among men,

Yet strange faces call they friends, and say they believe when they doubt.

Those hours are not lost that are spent in cementing affection;

For a friend is above gold, precious as the stores of the mind.

Be sparing of advice by words, but teach thy lesson by example:

For the vanity of man may be wounded, and retort unkindly upon thee.

There be some that never had a friend, because they were gross and selfish;

Worldliness, and apathy, and pride, leave not many that are worthy:

But one who meriteth esteem, need never lack a friend:

For as thistle-down flieth abroad, and casteth its anchor in the soil,

So philanthropy yearneth for a heart, where it may take root and blossom.

Yet I hear the child of sensibility moaning at the wintry cold,

Wherein the mists of selfishness have wrapped the society of men:

He grieveth, and hath deep reasons; for falsehood hath wronged his trust,

And the breaches in his bleeding heart have been filled with the briars of suspicion.

For, alas, how few be friends, of whom charity hath hoped well!

How few there be among men who forget themselves for other!

Each one seeketh his own, and looketh on his brethren as rivals,

Masking envy with friendship, to serve his secret ends.

And the world, that corrupteth all good, hath wronged that sacred name,

For it calleth any man friend, who is not known for an enemy:

And such be as the flies of summer, while plenty sitteth at thy board:

But who can wonder at their flight from the cold denials of want?

Such be as vultures round a carcase, assembled together for the feast;

But a sudden noise scareth them, and forthwith are they specks among the clouds.

There be few, O child of sensibility, who deserve to have thy confidence;

Yet weep not, for there are some, and such some live for thee:

To them is the chilling world a drear and barren scene,

And gladly seek they such as thou art, for seldom find they the occasion:

For, though no man excludeth himself from the high capability of friendship,

Yet verily the man is a marvel whom truth can write a friend.

Of Love.

There is a fragrant blossom, that maketh glad the garden of the heart;

Its root lieth deep: it is delicate, yet lasting, as the lilac crocus of autumn:

Loneliness and thought are the dews that water it morn and even;

Memory and Absence cherish it, as the balmy breathings of the south:

Its sun is the brightness of Affection, and it bloometh in the borders of Hope;

Its companions are gentle flowers, and the briar withereth by its side.

I saw it budding in beauty; I felt the magic of its smile;

The violet rejoiced beneath it, the rose stooped down and kissed it;

And I thought some cherub had planted there a truant flower of Eden,

As a bird bringeth foreign seeds, that they may flourish in a kindly soil.

I saw, and asked not its name; I knew no language was so wealthy,

Though every heart of every clime findeth its echo within.

And yet what shall I say? Is a sordid man capable of Love?

Hath a seducer known it? Can an adulterer perceive it?

Or he that seeketh strange women, can he feel its purity?

Or he that changeth often, can he know its truth?

Longing for another's happiness, yet often destroying its own;

Chaste, and looking up to God, as the fountain of tenderness and joy:

Quiet, yet flowing deep, as the Rhine among rivers;

Lasting, and knowing not change—it walketh with Truth and Sincerity.

Love:—what a volume in a word, an ocean in a tear,

A seventh heaven in a glance, a whirlwind in a sigh,

The lightning in a touch, a millennium in a moment,

What concentrated joy or woe in blest or blighted love!

For it is that native poetry springing up indigenous to Mind,

The heart's own-country music thrilling all its chords,

The story without an end that angels throng to hear,

The word, the king of words, carved on Jehovah's heart!

Go, call thou snake-eyed malice mercy, call envy honest praise,

Count selfish craft for wisdom, and coward treachery for prudence,

Do homage to blaspheming unbelief as to bold and free philosophy,

And estimate the recklessness of license as the right attribute of liberty,—

But with the world, thou friend and scholar, stain not this pure name;

Nor suffer the majesty of Love to be likened to the meanness of desire:

For love is no more such, than seraphs' hymns are discord,

And such is no more Love, than Etna's breath is summer.

Love is a sweet idolatry enslaving all the soul,

A mighty spiritual force, warring with the dulness of matter,

An angel-mind breathed into a mortal, though fallen yet how beautiful!

All the devotion of the heart in all its depth and grandeur.

Behold that pale geranium, pent within the cottage window;

How yearningly it stretcheth to the light its sickly long-stalked leaves,

How it straineth upward to the sun, coveting his sweet influences,

How real a living sacrifice to the god of all its worship!

Such is the soul that loveth; and so the rose-tree of affection

Bendeth its every leaf to look on those dear eyes,

Its every blushing petal basketh in their light,

And all its gladness, all its life, is hanging on their love.

If the love of the heart is blighted, it buddeth not again:

If that pleasant song is forgotten, it is to be learnt no more:

Yet often will thought look back, and weep over early affection;

And the dim notes of that pleasant song will be heard as a reproachful spirit,

Moaning in Æolian strains over the desert of the heart,

Where the hot siroccos of the world have withered its one oasis.

OF MARRIAGE.

Seek a good wife of thy God, for she is the best gift of His providence;

Yet ask not in bold confidence that which He hath not promised:

Thou knowest not His good will:—be thy prayer then submissive there-unto;

And leave thy petition to His mercy, assured that He will deal well with thee.

If thou art to have a wife of thy youth, she is now living on the earth;

Therefore think of her, and pray for her weal; yea, though thou hast not seen her.

They that love early become like-minded, and the tempter toucheth them not:

They grow up leaning on each other, as the olive and the vine.

Youth longeth for a kindred spirit, and yearneth for a heart that can commune with his own;

He meditateth night and day, doting on the image of his fancy.

Take heed that what charmeth thee is real, nor springeth of thine own imagination;

And suffer not trifles to win thy love; for a wife is thine unto death.

The harp and the voice may thrill thee,—sound may enchant thine ear,

But consider thou, the hand will wither, and the sweet notes turn discord:

The eye, so brilliant at even, may be red with sorrow in the morning;

And the sylph-like form of elegance must writhe in the crampings of pain.

O happy lot, and hallowed, even as the joy of angels,

Where the golden chain of godliness is entwined with the roses of love:

But beware thou seem not to be holy, to win favour in the eyes of a creature,

For the guilt of the hypocrite is deadly, and winneth thee wrath elsewhere.

The idol of thy heart is, as thou, a probationary sojourner on earth;

Therefore be chary of her soul, for that is the jewel in her casket:

Let her be a child of God, that she bring with her a blessing to thy house,—

A blessing above riches, and leading contentment in its train:

Let her be an heir of Heaven; so shall she help thee on thy way:

For those who are one in faith, fight double-handed against evil.

Take heed lest she love thee before God; that she be not an idolater:

Yet see thou that she love thee well: for her heart is the heart of woman;

And the triple nature of humanity must be bound by a triple chain,

For soul and mind and body—godliness, esteem, and affection.

How beautiful is modesty! it winneth upon all beholders:

But a word or a glance may destroy the pure love that should have been for thee.

Affect not to despise beauty: no one is freed from its dominion;

But regard it not a pearl of price:—it is fleeting as the bow in the clouds.

If the character within be gentle, it often hath its index in the countenance:

The soft smile of a loving face is better than splendour that fadeth quickly.

When thou choosest a wife, think not only of thyself,

But of those God may give thee of her, that they reproach thee not for their being:

See that He hath given her health, lest thou lose her early and weep:

See that she springeth of a wholesome stock, that thy little ones perish not before thee:

For many a fair skin hath covered a mining disease,

And many a laughing cheek been bright with the glare of madness.

Mark the converse of one thou lovest, that it be simple and sincere;

For an artful or false woman shall set thy pillow with thorns.

Observe her deportment with others, when she thinketh not that thou art nigh,

For with thee will the blushes of love conceal the true colour of her mind.

Hath she learning? it is good, so that modesty go with it:

Hath she wisdom? it is precious, but beware that thou exceed;

For woman must be subject, and the true mastery is of the mind.

Be joined to thine equal in rank, or the foot of pride will kick at thee;

And look not only for riches, lest thou be mated with misery:

Marry not without means; for so shouldst thou tempt Providence;

But wait not for more than enough; for Marriage is the DUTY of most men:

Grievous indeed must be the burden that shall outweigh innocence and health,

And a well-assorted marriage hath not many cares.

In the day of thy joy consider the poor; thou shall reap a rich harvest of blessing;

For these be the pensioners of One who filleth thy cup with pleasures:

In the day of thy joy be thankful: He hath well deserved thy praise:

Mean and selfish is the heart that seeketh Him only in sorrow.

For her sake who leaneth on thine arm, court not the notice of the world,

And remember that sober privacy is comelier than public display.

If thou marriest, thou art allied unto strangers; see they be not such as shame thee:

If thou marriest, thou leavest thine own; see that it be not done in anger.

Bride and bridegroom, pilgrims of life, henceforward to travel together,

In this the beginning of your journey, neglect not the favour of Heaven:

Let the day of hopes fulfilled be blest by many prayers,

And at eventide kneel ye together, that your joy be not unhallowed:

Angels that are round you shall be glad, those loving ministers of mercy,

And the richest blessings of your God shall be poured on His favoured children.

Marriage is a figure and an earnest of holier things unseen,

And reverence well becometh the symbol of dignity and glory.

Keep thy heart pure, lest thou do dishonour to thy state;

Selfishness is base and hateful; but love considereth not itself.

The wicked turneth good into evil, for his mind is warped within him;

But the heart of the righteous is chaste: his conscience casteth off sin.

If thou wilt be loved, render implicit confidence;

If thou wouldst not suspect, receive full confidence in turn:

For where trust is not reciprocal, the love that trusted withereth.

Hide not your grief nor your gladness; be open one with the other;

Let bitterness be strange unto your tongues, but sympathy a dweller in your hearts:

Imparting halveth the evils, while it doubleth the pleasures of life,

But sorrows breed and thicken in the gloomy bosom of Reserve.

Young wife, be not froward, nor forget that modesty becometh thee:

If it be discarded now, who will not hold it feigned before?

But be not as a timid girl,—there is honour due to thine estate;

A matron's modesty is dignified: she blusheth not, neither is she bold.

Be kind to the friends of thine husband, for the love they have to him:

And gently bear with his infirmities: hast thou no need of his forbearance?

Be not always in each other's company; it is often good to be alone;

And if there be too much sameness, ye cannot but grow weary of each other:

Ye have each a soul to be nourished, and a mind to be taught in wisdom,

Therefore, as accountable for time, help one another to improve it.

If ye feel love to decline, track out quickly the secret cause;

Let it not rankle for a day, but confess and bewail it together:

Speedily seek to be reconciled, for love is the life of marriage;

And be ye co-partners in triumph, conquering the peevishness of self.

Let no one have thy confidence, O wife, saving thine husband:

Have not a friend more intimate, O husband, than thy wife.

In the joy of a well-ordered home be warned that this is not your rest;

For the substance to come may be forgotten in the present beauty of the shadow.

If ye are blessed with children, ye have a fearful pleasure,

A deeper care and a higher joy, and the range of your existence is widened:

If God in wisdom refuse them, thank Him for an unknown mercy:

For how can ye tell if they might be a blessing or a curse?

Yet ye may pray, like Hannah, simply dependent on His will:

Resignation sweeteneth the cup, but impatience dasheth it with vinegar.

Now this is the sum of the matter:—if ye will be happy in marriage,

Confide, love, and be patient: be faithful, firm, and holy.

OF EDUCATION.

A babe in a house is a well-spring of pleasure, a messenger of peace and love:

A resting place for innocence on earth; a link between angels and men:

Yet is it a talent of trust, a loan to be rendered back with interest;

A delight, but redolent of care; honey-sweet, but lacking not the bitter.

For character groweth day by day, and all things aid it in unfolding,

And the bent unto good or evil may be given in the hours of infancy:

Scratch the green rind of a sapling, or wantonly twist it in the soil,

The scarred and crooked oak will tell of thee for centuries to come;

Even so mayst thou guide the mind to good, or lead it to the marrings of evil,

For disposition is builded up by the fashioning of first impressions:

Wherefore, though the voice of instruction waiteth for the ear of reason,

Yet with his mother's milk the young child drinketh Education.

Patience is the first great lesson; he may learn it at the breast:

And the habit of obedience and trust may be grafted on his mind in the cradle:

Hold the little hands in prayer, teach the weak knees their kneeling;

Let him see thee speaking to thy God; he will not forget it afterward:

When old and grey will he feelingly remember a mother's tender piety,

And the touching recollection of her prayers shall arrest the strong man in his sin.

Select not to nurse thy darling one that may taint his innocence,

For example is a constant monitor, and good seed will die among the tares.

The arts of a strange servant have spoiled a gentle disposition:

Mother, let him learn of thy lips, and be nourished at thy breast.

Character is mainly moulded by the cast of the minds that surround it:

Let then the playmates of thy little one be not other than thy judgment shall approve:

For a child is in a new world, and learneth somewhat every moment,

His eye is quick to observe, his memory storeth in secret,

His ear is greedy of knowledge, and his mind is plastic as soft wax.

Beware then that he heareth what is good, that he feedeth not on evil maxims,

For the seeds of first instructions are dropped into the deepest furrows.

That which immemorial use hath sanctioned, seemeth to be right and true;

Therefore, let him never have to recollect the time when good things were strangers to his thought.

Strive not to centre in thyself, fond mother, all his love;

Nay, do not thou so selfishly, but enlarge his heart for others;

Use him to sympathy betimes, that he learn to be sad with the afflicted;

And check not a child in his merriment,—should not his morning be sunny?

Give him not all his desire, so shalt thou strengthen him in hope;

Neither stop with indulgence the fountain of his tears, so shall he fear thy firmness.

Above all things graft on him subjection, yea, in the veriest trifle;

Courtesy to all, reverence to some, and to thee unanswering obedience.

Read thou first, and well approve, the books thou givest to thy child;

But remember the weakness of his thought, and that wisdom for him must be diluted:

In the honied waters of infant tales, let him taste the strong wine of truth:

Pathetic stories soften the heart; but legends of terror breed midnight misery;

Fairy fictions cram the mind with folly, and knowledge of evil tempteth to like evil:

Be not loth to curb imagination, nor be fearful that truths will depress it;

And for evil, he will learn it soon enough; be not thou the devil's envoy.

Induce not precocity of intellect, for so shouldst thou nourish vanity;

Neither can a plant, forced in the hot-bed, stand against the frozen breath of winter.

The mind is made wealthy by ideas, but the multitude of words is a clogging weight:

Therefore be understood in thy teaching, and instruct to the measure of capacity.

Analogy is milk for babes, but abstract truths are strong meat;

Precepts and rules are repulsive to a child, but happy illustration winneth him:

In vain shalt thou preach of industry and prudence, till he learn of the bee and the ant;

Dimly will he think of his soul, till the acorn and the chrysalis have taught him;

He will fear God in thunder, and worship His loveliness in flowers;

And parables shall charm his heart, while doctrines seem dead mystery:

Faith shall he learn of the husbandman casting good corn into the soil;

And if thou train him to trust thee, he will not withhold his reliance from the Lord.

Fearest thou the dark, poor child? I would not have thee left to thy terrors;

Darkness is the semblance of evil, and nature regardeth it with dread:

Yet know thy father's God is with thee still, to guard thee:

It is a simple lesson of dependence; let thy tost mind anchor upon Him.

Did a sudden noise affright thee? lo, this or that hath caused it:

Things undefined are full of dread, and stagger stouter nerves.

The seeds of misery and madness have been sowed in the nights of infancy;

Therefore be careful that ghastly fears be not the night companions of thy child.

Lo, thou art a landmark on a hill; thy little ones copy thee in all things:

Let, then, thy religion be perfect: so shalt thou be honoured in thy house.

Be instructed in all wisdom, and communicate that thou knowest,

Otherwise thy learning is hidden, and thus thou seemest unwise.

A sluggard hath no respect; an epicure commandeth not reverence;

Meanness is always despicable, and folly provoketh contempt.

Those parents are best honoured whose characters best deserve it;

Show me a child undutiful, I shall know where to look for a foolish father:

Never hath a father done his duty, and lived to be despised of his son:

But how can that son reverence an example he dare not follow?

Should he imitate thee in thine evil? his scorn is thy rebuke.

Nay, but bring him up aright, in obedience to God and to thee;

Begin betimes, lest thou fail of his fear; and with judgment, that thou lose not his love:

Herein use good discretion, and govern not all alike,

Yet, perhaps, the fault will be in thee, if kindness prove not all sufficient:

By kindness, the wolf and the zebra become docile as the spaniel and the horse;

The kite feedeth with the starling, under the law of kindness:

That law shall tame the fiercest, bring down the battlements of pride,

Cherish the weak, control the strong, and win the fearful spirit.

Be obeyed when thou commandest; but command not often:

Let thy carriage be the gentleness of love, not the stern front of tyranny.

Make not one child a warning to another; but chide the offender apart:

For self-conceit and wounded pride rankle like poisons in the soul.

A mild rebuke in the season of calmness, is better than a rod in the heat of passion;

Nevertheless, spare not, if thy word hath passed for punishment;

Let not thy child see thee humbled, nor learn to think thee false;

Suffer none to reprove thee before him, and reprove not thine own purposes by change;

Yet speedily turn thou again, and reward him where thou canst,

For kind encouragement in good cutteth at the roots of evil.

Drive not a timid infant from his home, in the early spring-time of his life,

Commit not that treasure to an hireling, nor wrench the young heart's fibres:

In his helplessness leave him not alone, a stranger among strange children,

Where affection longeth for thy love, counting the dreary hours;

Where religion is made a terror, and innocence weepeth unheard;

Where oppression grindeth without remedy, and cruelty delighteth in smiting.

Wherefore comply with an evil fashion? Is it not to spare thee trouble?

Can he gather no knowledge at thy mouth? Wilt thou yield thine honour to another?

What can he gain in learning, to equal what he loseth in innocence?

Alas! for the price above gold, by which such learning cometh!

For emulative pride and envy are the specious idols of the diligent,

Oaths and foul-mouthed sin burn in the language of the idle:

Bolder in that mimic world of boys stareth brazen-fronted vice,

Than thereafter in the haunts of men, where society doth shame her into corners.

My soul, look well around thee, ere thou give thy timid infant unto sorrows.

There be many that say, We were happiest in days long past,

When our deepest care was an ill-conned book,

And when we sported in that merry sunshine of our life,

Sadness a stranger to the heart, and cheerfulness its gay inhabitant.

True, ye are now less pure, and therefore are more wretched:

But have ye quite forgotten how sorely ye travailed at your tasks,

How childish griefs and disappointments bowed down the childish mind?

How sorrow sat upon your pillow, and terror hath waked you up betimes,

Dreading the strict hand of justice, that would not wait for a reason,

Or the whims of petty tyrants, children like yourselves,

Or the pestilent extract of evil poured into the ear of innocence?

Behold the coral island, fresh from the floor of the Atlantic,

It is dinted by every ripple, and a soft wave can smooth its surface;

But soon its substance hardeneth in the winds and tropic sun,

And weakly the foaming billows break against its adamantine wall:

Even thus, though sin and care dash upon the firmness of manhood,

The timid child is wasted most by his petty troubles;

And seldom, when life is mature, and the strength proportioned to the burden,

Will the feeling mind, that can remember, acknowledge to deeper anguish,

Than when, as a stranger and a little one, the heart first ached with anxiety,

And the sprouting buds of sensibility were bruised by the harshness of a school.

My soul, look well around thee, ere thou give thine infant unto sorrows.

Yet there be boisterous tempers, stout nerves, and stubborn hearts,

And there is a riper season, when the mind is well disciplined in good,

And a time, when youth may be bettered by the wholesome occasions of knowledge,

Which rarely will he meet with so well, as among the congregation of his fellows.

Only for infancy, fond mother, rend not those first affections;

Only for the sensitive and timorous, consign not thy darling unto misery.

A man looketh on his little one, as a being of better hope;

In himself ambition is dead, but it hath a resurrection in his son:

That vein is yet untried,—and who can tell if it be not golden?

While his, well nigh worked out, never yielded aught but lead:

And thus is he hurt more sorely, if his wishes are defeated there,

He has staked his all upon a throw, and lo! the dice have foiled him.

All ways, and at all times, men follow on in flocks,

And the rife epidemic of the day shall tincture the stream of education.

Fashion is a foolish watcher posted at the tree of knowledge,

Who plucketh its unripe fruit to pelt away the birds;

But, for its golden apples,—they dry upon the boughs,

And few have the courage or the wisdom to eat in spite of fashion.

One while, the fever is to learn, what none will be wiser for knowing,

Exploded errors in extinct tongues, and occasions for their use are small;

And the bright morning of life, for years of misspent time,

Wasted in following sounds, hath tracked up little sense,

Till at noon a man is thrown upon the world, with a mind expert in trifles,

Having yet everything to learn that can make him good or useful:

The curious spirit of youth is crammed with unwholesome garbage,

While starving for the mother's milk the breasts of nature yield;

And high-coloured fables of depravity lure with their classic varnish,

While truth is holding out in vain her mirror much despised.

Of olden time, the fashion was for arms, to make an accomplished slayer,

And set gregarious man a-tilting with his fellows;

Thereafter, occult sciences, and mystic arts, and symbols,

How to exorcise a wizard, and how to lay a ghost;

Anon, all for gallantry and presence, the minuet, the palfrey, and the foil,

And the grand aim of education was to produce a coxcomb;

Soon came scholastical dispute with hydra-headed argument,

And the true philosophy of mind confounded in a labyrinth of words;

Then the Pantheon, and its orgies, initiating docile childhood,

While diligent youth strove hard to render his all unto CÆsar;

And now is seen the passion for utility, when all things are accounted by their price,

And the wisdom of the wise is busied in hatching golden eggs:

Perchance, not many moons to come, and all will again be for abstrusity,

Unravelling the figured veil that hideth Egypt's gods;

Or in those strange Avatars seeking benignant Vishnu,

Kali, and Kamala the fair, and much invoked Ganesa.

The mines of knowledge are oft laid bare through the forked hazel wand of chance,

And in a mountain of quartz we find a grain of gold.

Of a truth, it were well to know all things, and to learn them all at once,

And what, though mortal insufficiency attain to small knowledge of any?

Man loveth exclusions, delighting in the sterile trodden path,

While the broad green meadow is jewelled with wild flowers:

And whether is it better with the many to follow a beaten track,

Or by eccentric wanderings to cull unheeded sweets?

When his reason yieldeth fruit, make thy child thy friend;

For a filial friend is a double gain, a diamond set in gold.

As an infant, thy mandate was enough, but now let him see thy reasons;

Confide in him, but with discretion: and bend a willing ear to his questions.

More to thee than to all beside, let him owe good counsel and good guidance;

Let him feel his pursuits have an interest, more to thee than to all beside.

Watch his native capacities; nourish that which suiteth him the readiest;

And cultivate early those good inclinations wherein thou fearest he is most lacking:

Is he phlegmatic and desponding? let small successes comfort his hope:

Is he obstinate and sanguine? let petty crosses accustom him to life:

Showeth he a sordid spirit? be quick, and teach him generosity:

Inclineth he to liberal excess? prove to him how hard it is to earn.

Gather to thy hearth such friends as are worthy of honour and attention;

For the company a man chooseth is a visible index of his heart:

But let not the pastor whom thou hearest be too much a familiar in thy house,

For thy children may see his infirmities, and learn to cavil at his teaching.

It is well to take hold on occasions, and render indirect instruction;

It is better to teach upon a system, and reap the wisdom of books:

The history of nations yieldeth grand outlines: of persons, minute details:

Poetry is polish to the mind, and high abstractions cleanse it.

Consider the station of thy son, and breed him to his fortune with judgment:

The rich may profit in much which would bring small advantage to the poor.

But with all thy care for thy son, with all thy strivings for his welfare,

Expect disappointment, and look for pain: for he is of an evil stock, and will grieve thee.

OF TOLERANCE.

A wise man in a crowded street winneth his way with gentleness,

Nor rudely pusheth aside the stranger that standeth in his path;

He knoweth that blind hurry will but hinder, stirring up contention against him,

Yet holdeth he steadily right on, with his face to the scope of his pursuit:

Even so, in the congress of opinions, the bustling highway of intelligence,

Each man should ask of his neighbour, and yield to him again, concession.

Terms ill-defined, and forms misunderstood, and customs, where their reasons are unknown,

Have stirred up many zealous souls to fight against imaginary giants:

But wisdom will hear the matter out, and often, by keenness of perception,

Will find in strange disguise the precious truth he seeketh;

So he leaveth unto prejudice or taste the garb and the manner of her presence,

Content to see so nigh the mistress of his love.

There is no similitude in nature that owneth not also to a difference,

Yea, no two berries are alike, though twins upon one stem;

No drop in the ocean, no pebble on the beach, no leaf in the forest, hath its counterpart,

No mind in its dwelling of mortality, no spirit in the world unseen:

And therefore, since capacity and essence differ alike with accident,

None but a bigot partizan will hope for impossible unity.

Wilt thou ensue peace, nor buffet with the waters of contention,

Wilt thou be counted wise and gain the love of men,

Let unobtruded error escape the frown of censure,

Nor lift the glass of truth alway before thy fellows:

I say not, compromise the right, I would not have thee countenance the wrong,

But hear with charitable heart the reasons of an honest judgment;

For thou also hast erred, and knowest not when thou art most right,

Nor whether to-morrow's wisdom may not prove thee simple to-day:

Perchance thou art chiding in another what once thou wast thyself;

Perchance thou sharply reprovest what thou wilt be hereafter.

A man that can render a reason, is a man worthy of an answer;

But he that argueth for victory, deserveth not the tenderness of Truth.

Whiles a man liveth he may mend: count not thy brother reprobate;

When he is dead his chance is gone: remember not his faults in bitterness.

A man, till he dieth, is immortal in thy sight; and then he is as nothing:

Make not the living thy foe, nor take weak vengeance of the dead.

For life is as a game of chess, where least causeth greatest,

And an ill move bringeth loss, and a pawn may ensure victory.

Dost thou suspect? seek out certainty: for now, by self-inflicted pain,

Or ill-directed wrath, thou wrongest thyself or thy neighbour:

Suspicion is an early lesson, taught in the school of experience,

Neither shalt thou easily unlearn it, though charity ply thee with her preaching;

Yet look thou well for reasons, or ever mistrust hath marred thee,

Or fear curdled thy blood, or jealousy goaded thee to madness;

For a look, or a word, or an act, may be taken well or ill

As construed by the latitude of love, or the closeness of cold suspicion.

Better is the wrong with sincerity, rather than the right with falsehood:

And a prudent man will not lay siege to the stronghold of ignorant bigotry.

To unsettle a weak mind were an easy inglorious triumph,

And a strong cause taketh little count of the worthless suffrage of a fool:

Lightly he held to the wrong, loosely will he cling to the right;

Weakness is the essence of his mind, and the reed cannot yield an acorn.

Dogged obstinacy is oftentimes the buttress that proppeth an unstable spirit,

But a candid man blusheth not to own, he is wiser to-day than yesterday.

A man of a little wisdom is a sage among fools;

But himself is chief among the fools, if he look for admiration from them.

A heresy is an evil thing, for its shame is its pride:

Its necessary difference of error is the character it most esteemeth:

Give a man all things short of liberty, thou shalt have no thanks,

And little wilt thou speed with thine opponent, by proving points he will concede.

The tost sand darkeneth the waves; and clear had been the pages of truth,

Had not the glosses of men obscured the simplicity of faith.

In all things consider thine own ignorance, and gladly take occasion to be taught;

But suffer not excess of liberality to neutralize thy mental independence.

The faults and follies of most men make their deaths a gain:

But thou also art a man, full of faults and follies:

Therefore sorrow for the dead, or none shall weep for thee,

For the measure of charity thou dealest, shall be poured into thine own bosom.

That which vexeth thee now, provoking thee to hate thy brother,

Bear with it; the annoyance passeth, and may not return for ever:

The same combinations and results which aggravate thy soul to-day,

May not meet again for centuries in the kaleidoscope of circumstance;

For men and matters change, new elements mixing in continually,

And, as with chemical magic, the sour is transmuted into sweetness:

A little explained, a little endured, a little passed over as a foible,

And lo, the jagged atoms fit like smooth mosaic.

Thou canst not shape another's mind to suit thine own body,

Think not, then, to be furnishing his brain with thy special notions.

Charity walketh with a high step, and stumbleth not at a trifle:

Charity hath keen eyes, but the lashes half conceal them:

Charity is praised of all, and fear not thou that praise,

God will not love thee less, because men love thee more.

OF SORROW.

I said, I will seek out Sorrow, and minister the balm of pity;

So I sought her in the house of mourning; but peace followed in her train.

Then I marked her brooding silently in the gloomy cavern of Regret;

But a sunbeam of heavenly hope gleamed on her folded wing.

So I turned to the cabin of the poor, where famine dwelt with disease:

But the bed of the sick was smoothed, and the ploughman whistled at his labour.

So I stopt, and mused within myself, to remember where Sorrow dwelt,

For I sought to see her alone, uncomforted, uncompanioned.

I went to the prison, but penitence was there, and promise of better times;

I listened at the madman's cell, but it echoed with deluded laughter.

Then I turned me to the rich and noble; I noted the sons of fashion:

A smile was on the languid cheek, that had no commerce with the heart;

Unhallowed thoughts, like fires, gleamed from the window of the eye;

And sorrow lived with those whose pleasures add unto their sins.

His infancy wanted not guilt; his life was continued evil:

He drew in pride with his mother's milk, and a father's lips taught him cursing.

I marked him as the wayward boy; I traced the dissolute youth:

I saw him betray the innocent, and sacrifice affection to his lust;

I saw him the companion of knaves, and a squanderer of ill-got gain;

I heard him curse his own misery, while he hugged the chains that galled him:

For well had experience declared the bitterness of guilty pleasure,

But habit, with its iron net, involved him in its folds.

Behind him lowered the thunder-storm, which the caldron of his wickedness had brewed;

Before him was the smooth steep cliff, whose base is ruin and despair.

So he rushed madly on, and tried to forget his being:

The noisy revel and the low debauch, and fierce excitement of play,

With dreary interchange of palling pleasures, filled the dull round of existence:

Memory was to him as a foe, so he flew for false solace to the wine-cup,

And stunned his enemy at even; but she rent him as a giant in the morning.

I turned aside to weep; I lost him a little while:

I looked, and years had past; he was hoar with the winter of his age.

And what was now his hope? where was the balm for his sadness?

The memory of the past was guilt: the feeling of the present, remorse.

Then he set his affections on gold, he worshipped the shrine of Mammon,

And to lay richer gifts before his idol, he starved his own bowels;

So, the youth spent in profligacy ended in the gripings of want:

The miser grudged himself husks to take deeper vengeance of the prodigal.

And I said, this is Sorrow, but pity cannot reach it;

This is to be wretched indeed, to be guilty without repentance.

OF JOY.

My soul was sickened within me, so I sought the dwelling place of Joy:

And I met it not in laughter; I found it not in wealth or power;

But I saw it in the pleasant home, where religion smiled upon content,

And the satisfied ambition of the heart rejoiced in the favour of its God.

Behold the happy man, his face is rayed with pleasure,

His thoughts are of calm delight, and none can know his blessedness.

I have watched him from his infancy, and seen him in the grasp of death,

Yet, never have I noted on his brow the cloud of desponding sorrow.

He hath knelt beside his cradle; his mother's hymn lulled him to sleep:

In childhood he hath loved holiness, and drank from that fountain-head of peace.

Wisdom took him for her scholar, guiding his steps in purity:

He lived unpolluted by the world; and his young heart hated sin.

But he owned not the spurious religion engendered of faction and moroseness,

Neither were the sproutings of his soul seared by the brand of superstition.

His love is pure and single, sincere, and knoweth not change;

For his manhood hath been blest with the pleasant choice of his youth:

Behold his one beloved, she leaneth on his arm,

And he looketh on the years that are past, to review the dawn of her affection.

Memory is sweet unto him, as a perfect landscape to the sight;

Each object is lovely in itself, but the whole is the harmony of nature.

Behold his little ones around him, they bask in the warmth of his smile,

And infant innocence and joy lighten their happy faces;

He is holy, and they honour him: he is loving, and they love him:

He is consistent, and they esteem him: he is firm, and they fear him.

His friends are the excellent among men; and the bands of their friendship are strong:

His house is the palace of peace: for the Prince of Peace is there.

As the wearied man to his couch, as the thoughtful man to his musings,

Even so, from the bustle of life, he goeth to his well-ordered home.

And though he often sin, he returneth with weeping eyes:

For he feeleth the mercies of forgiveness, and gloweth with warmer gratitude.

Thus did he walk in happiness, and sorrow was a stranger to his soul;

The light of affection sunned his heart, the tear of the grateful bedewed his feet,

He put his hand with constancy to good, and angels knew him as a brother,

And the busy satellites of evil trembled as at God's ally:

He used his wealth as a wise steward, making him friends for futurity:

He bent his learning to religion, and religion was with him at the last:

For I saw him after many days, when the time of his release was come,

And I longed for a congregated world, to behold that dying saint.

As the aloe is green and well-liking, till the last best summer of its age,

And then hangeth out its golden bells, to mingle glory with corruption;

As a meteor travelleth in splendour, but bursteth in dazzling light;

Such was the end of the righteous: his death was the sun at its setting.

Look on this picture of joy, and remember that portrait of sorrow:

Behold the beauty of holiness, behold the deformity of sin!

How long, ye sons of men, will ye scorn the words of wisdom?

How long will ye hunt for happiness in the caverns that breed despair?

Will ye comfort yourselves in misery, by denying the existence of delight,

And from experience in woe, will ye reason that none are happy?

Joy is not in your path, for it loveth not that bleak broad road,

But its flowers are hung upon the hedges that line a narrower way;

And there the faint travellers of earth may wander and gather for themselves,

To soothe their wounded hearts with balm from the amaranths of heaven.

T?O????.

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