POETIC APHORISMS, CREEDS. Lutheran, Popish, Calvinistic, all these creeds and doctrines three THE RESTLESS HEART. A millstone and the human heart are driven ever round; If they have nothing else to grind, they must themselves be ground. CHRISTIAN LOVE. Whilom Love was like a fire, and warmth and comfort it bespoke ; ART AND TACT. Intelligence and courtesy not always are combined; RETRIBUTION. Though the mills of God grind slowly, yet they grind exceeding small; Though with patience he stands waiting, with exactness grinds he all. TRUTH. When by night the frogs are croaking, kindle but a torch's fire, RHYMES. If perhaps these rhymes of mine should sound not well in strangers' cars, They have only to bethink them that it happens so with theirs ; For so long as words, like mortals, call a fatherland their own, They will be most highly valued where they are best and longest known. CURFEW. Dark grow the windows, And quenched is the fire; Sound fades into silence,All footsteps retire. No voice in the chambers, No sound in the hall ! Sleep and oblivion Reign over all! II. The book is completed, And closed, like the day; And the hand that has written it Lays it away. Dim grow its fancies, Forgotten they lie; Like coals in the ashes, They darken and die. Song sinks into silence, The story is told, The windows are darkened, The hearth-stone is cold. Darker and darker The black shadows fall; Sleep and oblivion Reign over all. |