128. A Poet's Thought. TELL me, what is a poet's thought? Is it on the sudden born? Was it cradled in the brain? Chained awhile, or nursed in night? No more question of its birth: B. W. PROCTER. 129. The False May and the Real May. MAY is a pious fraud of the almanac, A ghastly parody of real Spring Shaped out of snow and breathed with eastern wind; Or if, o'er-confident, she trust the date, And, with her handful of anemones, The season need but turn his hour-glass round, Reels back, and brings the dead May in his arms, Waiting my choice to open with full breast, 130. The Wastefulness of Asceticism. O FOOLISHNESS of men! that lend their ears That in their green shops weave the smooth-haired silk, Be vacant of her plenty, in her own loins She hutched the all-worshipped ore and precious gems, To store her children with. If all the world Should in a pet of temperance, feed on pulse, Drink the clear stream, and nothing wear but frieze, The All-giver would be unthanked, would be unpraised, Not half his riches known, and yet despised; And we should serve him as a grudging master, As a penurious niggard of his wealth, And live like Nature's bastards, not her sons, Who would be quite surcharged with her own weight, The earth cumbered, and the winged air darked with plumes, The herds would over-multitude their lords; The sea o'erfraught would swell, and the unsought diamonds Would so emblaze the forehead of the deep, I Blackbird. 2 Thrush. 3 Rugged. 4 Stoics, so called from the painted Stoa or Porch at Athens, where they taught. Their founder was Zeno. They held that virtue is the only good, and virtue consists in living according to Nature. 5 Diogenes, a philosopher of the Cynic school, lived in a tub. The Cynics despised the body and renounced luxury. And so bestud with stars, that they below 131. J. MILTON. The Passion for Novelty. Ulysses. Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back, Wherein he puts alms for oblivion, A great-sized monster of ingratitudes. Those scraps are good deeds past, which are devoured As fast as they are made, forgot as soon As done. Perseverance, dear my lord, Keeps honour bright. To have done, is to hang In monumental mockery. Take the instant way; Where one but goes abreast: keep then the path; That one by one pursue: If you give way, Or, like a gallant horse fallen in first rank, O'er-run and trampled on. Then what they do in present, Though less than yours in past, must o'ertop yours; That slightly shakes his parting guest by the hand, And farewell goes out sighing. O, let not virtue seek For beauty, wit, High birth, vigour of bone, desert in service, To envious and calumniating time. One touch of nature makes the whole world kin,— More laud than gilt o'er-dusted. 1 Straight forward. W. SHAKESPEARE. 132. The False Worship of Rank. King. 'Tis only title thou disdain'st in her, the which All that is virtuous, save what thou dislikest, From lowest place when virtuous things proceed, Where dust and damned oblivion is the tomb W. SHAKESPEARE. 133. The Inequality of Human Lives. ALAS! what differs more than man from man! And whence that difference? whence but from himself? For see the universal race endowed With the same upright form!—The sun is fixed, And the infinite magnificence of heaven, Into all hearts. Throughout the world of sense, That power, that influence, by impartial law. Reason, and, with that reason, smiles and tears; Conscience to guide and check, and death to be The primal duties shine aloft-like stars; The charities that soothe, and heal, and bless, The generous inclination, the just rule, * Kind wishes, and good actions, and pure thoughts— No mystery is here; no special boon For high and not for low, for proudly graced And not for meek of heart. The smoke ascends To heaven as lightly from the cottage hearth The fields of earth with gratitude and hope; And for the injustice grieving, that hath made W. WORDSWORTH. 134. THE shepherd lad, who in the sunshine carves, The silent hours; and who to that report |