book ii
. chap. xiii._
[618-1] Quoted from Cotton's "To-morrow." See Genesis xxx. 3.
[618-2] See Chaucer, page 5.
In omni adversitate fortunæ, infelicissimum genus est infortunii fuisse felicem (In every adversity of fortune, to have been happy is the most unhappy kind of misfortune).--BOETHIUS: _De Consolatione Philosophiæ, liber ii._
This is truth the poet sings, That a sorrow's crown of sorrow is remembering happier things.
TENNYSON: _Locksley Hall, line 75._
JOHN G. WHITTIER. 1807- ----.
So fallen! so lost! the light withdrawn Which once he wore; The glory from his gray hairs gone For evermore!
_Ichabod!_
Making their lives a prayer.
_To A. K. On receiving a Basket of Sea-Mosses._
And step by step, since time began, I see the steady gain of man.
_The Chapel of the Hermits._
For still the new transcends the old In signs and tokens manifold; Slaves rise up men; the olive waves, With roots deep set in battle graves!
_The Chapel of the Hermits._
Give lettered pomp to teeth of Time, So "Bonnie Doon" but tarry; Blot out the epic's stately rhyme, But spare his "Highland Mary!"
_Lines on Burns._
For of all sad words of tongue or pen, The saddest are these: "It might have been!"
_Maud Muller._
Low stir of leaves and dip of oars And lapsing waves on quiet shores.
_Snow Bound._
The hope of all who suffer, The dread of all who wrong.
_The Mantle of St. John de Matha._
I know not where His islands lift Their fronded palms in air; I only know I cannot drift Beyond His love and care.
_The Eternal Goodness._
SALMON P. CHASE. 1808-1873.
The Constitution, in all its provisions, looks to an indestructible Union composed of indestructible States.
_Decision in Texas v. White, 7 Wallace, 725._
No more slave States; no slave Territories.
_Platform of the Free Soil National Convention, 1848._
The way to resumption is to resume.
_Letter to Horace Greeley, March 17, 1866._
SAMUEL FRANCIS SMITH. 1808- ----.
My country, 't is of thee, Sweet land of liberty, Of thee I sing: Land where my fathers died, Land of the pilgrims' pride, From every mountain-side Let freedom ring.
_National Hymn._
Our fathers' God, to thee; Author of liberty, To thee I sing; Long may our land be bright With freedom's holy light; Protect us by thy might, Great God, our King!
_National Hymn._
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 1809-1861.
There Shakespeare, on whose forehead climb The crowns o' the world; oh, eyes sublime With tears and laughter for all time!
_A Vision of Poets._
And Chaucer, with his infantine Familiar clasp of things divine.
_A Vision of Poets._
And Marlowe, Webster, Fletcher, Ben, Whose fire-hearts sowed our furrows when The world was worthy of such men.
_A Vision of Poets._
Knowledge by suffering entereth, And life is perfected by death.
_A Vision of Poets. Conclusion._
Oh, the little birds sang east, and the little birds sang west.
_Toll slowly._
And I smiled to think God's greatness flowed around our incompleteness, Round our restlessness His rest.
_Rhyme of the Duchess._
Or from Browning some "Pomegranate," which if cut deep down the middle Shows a heart within blood-tinctured, of a veined humanity.
_Lady Geraldine's Courtship. xli._
But since he had The genius to be loved, why let him have The justice to be honoured in his grave.
_Crowned and buried. xxvii._
Thou large-brain'd woman and large-hearted man.
_To George Sand. A Desire._
By thunders of white silence.
_Hiram Power's Greek Slave._
And that dismal cry rose slowly And sank slowly through the air, Full of spirit's melancholy And eternity's despair; And they heard the words it said,-- "Pan is dead! great Pan is dead! Pan, Pan is dead!"[621-1]
_The Dead Pan._
Death forerunneth Love to win "Sweetest eyes were ever seen."
_Catarina to Camoens. ix._
She has seen the mystery hid Under Egypt's pyramid: By those eyelids pale and close Now she knows what Rhamses knows.
_Little Mattie. Stanza ii._
But so fair, She takes the breath of men away Who gaze upon her unaware.
_Bianca among the Nightingales. xii._
God answers sharp and sudden on some prayers, And thrusts the thing we have prayed for in our face, A gauntlet with a gift in 't.
_Aurora Leigh.