With gain and joy, she bribes thee to be wise.
Night opes the noblest scenes, and sheds an awe
Which gives those venerable scenes full weight,
And deep reception, in the entendered heart.
This theatre! what eye can take it in ?
By what divine enchantment was it raised,
For minds of the first magnitude to launch
In endless speculations, and adore?
One sun by day, by night ten thousand shine,
And light us deep into the Deity;
How boundless in magnificence and might!
Oh! what a confluence of ethereal fires,
From urns unnumbered, down the steep of heaven,
Streams to a point, and centres in my sight!
Nor tarries there; I feel it in my heart:
My heart, at once, it humbles and exalts;
Lays it in dust, and calls it to the skies!
Who sees it unexalted or unawed?
Who sees it, and can stop at what is seen?
Material offspring of Omnipotence!
Inanimate, all-animating birth!
Work worthy Him who made it !-worthy praise!
All praise!-praise more than human! nor denied
Thy praise divine!
But though man, drowned in sleep,
Withholds his homage, not alone I wake;
Bright legions swarm unseen, and sing, unheard
By mortal ear, the glorious Architect,
In this His universal temple, hung
With lustres, with innumerable lights,
That shed religion on the soul; at once
The temple and the preacher! Oh! how loud
It calls Devotion!-genuine growth of Night!
To him who, in the love of Nature, holds
Communion with her visible forms, she speaks
A various language; for his gayer hours
She has a voice of gladness, and a smile,
And eloquence of beauty, and she glides
Into his darker musings, with a mild
And gentle sympathy, that steals away
Their sharpness, ere he is aware.
Of the last bitter hour come like a blight
Over thy spirit, and sad images
Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,
And breathless darkness, and the narrow house,
Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart;-
Go forth under the open sky, and list
To Nature's teachings, while from all around
Earth and her waters, and the depths of air-
Comes a still voice-Yet a few days, and thee
The all-beholding sun shall see no more
In all his course; nor yet in the cold ground,
Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears,
Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist
Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim
Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again;
And, lost each human trace, surrendering up
Thine individual being, shalt thou go
To mix for ever with the elements,
To be a brother to the insensible rock,
And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain
Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak
Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mould.
Yet not to thy eternal resting-place
Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down
With patriarchs of the infant world, with kings,
The powerful of the earth, the wise, the good,
Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past,
All in one mighty sepulchre. The hills
Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun,
Stretching in pensive quietness between ;-
The venerable woods, - rivers that move
In majesty, and the complaining brooks
That make the meadows green; and poured round all,
Old Ocean's gray and melancholy waste, -
Are but the solemn decorations all
Of the great tomb of man. The golden sun,
The planets, all the infinite host of heaven,
Are shining on the sad abodes of death,
Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread
The globe are but a handful to the tribes
That slumber in its bosom. Take the wings
Of morning, and the Barcan desert pierce,
Or lose thyself in the continuous woods
Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound,
Save his own dashings, — yet—the dead are there;
And millions in those solitudes, since first
The flight of years began, have laid them down
In their last sleep, — the dead reign there alone.
So shalt thou rest;· -and what if thou shalt fall
Unnoticed by the living, and no friend
Take note of thy departure? All that breathe
Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh
When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care
Plod on, and each one, as before, will chase
His favorite phantom; yet all these shall leave
Their mirth and their employments, and shall come
And make their bed with thee. As the long train
Of ages glide away, the sons of men,
The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes
In the full strength of years, matron, and maid,
The bowed with age, the infant in the smiles
And beauty of its innocent age cut off, —
Shall, one by one, be gathered to thy side,
By those who in their turn shall follow them.
So live, that, when thy summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan, that moves
To that mysterious realm where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of death,
Thou go not, like the quarry-slave, at night,
Scourged to his dungeon; but, sustained and soothed
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave,
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.
The more we possess, the more we desire.
He was offered three thousand dollars.
Hard by a cottage chimney smokes
From betwixt two aged oaks.
Sweet and beautiful it is to die for our country.
He acted during the day as President.
And from before the brightness of her face,
White break the clouds away.
Sweet is the coming on of evening mild.
What! can ye lull the winged winds asleep?
This circumstance makes him doubly in fault.
He went almost to Philadelphia.
Twanged short and sharp, like the shrill swallow's cry.
He, being a worthy man, was promoted.
Say, first, of God above, or man below,
What can we reason but from what we know?
All men cannot receive this saying, save they to whom
Oh that I had wings like a dove!
All are but parts of one stupendous whole.
Thus shall mankind his guardian care engage,
The promised father of the future age.
Lambeth is over against Westminister Abbey.
There's nothing bright, above, below,
From flowers that bloom, to stars that glow,
But in its light my soul can see
Some feature of the Deity!
Where thy true treasure? Gold says, "Not in me;"
And, "Not in me," the diamond. Gold is poor.
The articles were purchased at the following prices,
namely.
Love, and love only, is the loan for love.
Generally speaking, the examination was satisfactory.
All nature is but art unknown to thee.
For who but He who arched the skies,
Could raise the daisy's purple bud?
Whether he is rich or poor, makes little difference.
This did not prevent John's being acknowledged and 30
solemnly inaugurated Duke of Normandy.
Delightful task! to rear the tender thought,
To teach the young idea how to shoot,
And pour the fresh instruction o'er the mind.
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