FOOTNOTES:

FOOTNOTES:[4]Robert Burns

[4]Robert Burns

God is our refuge and strength,A very present help in trouble.Therefore will we not fear, though the earth do change,And though the mountains be moved in the heart of the seas;Though the waters thereof roar and be troubled,Though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof.THE LORD OF HOSTS IS WITH US;THE GOD OF JACOB IS OUR REFUGE.There is a river, the streams whereof make glad the city of God,The holy place of the tabernacles of the Most High.God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved:God shall help her at the dawn of morning.The nations raged, the kingdoms were moved:He uttered his voice, the earth melted.THE LORD OF HOSTS IS WITH US;THE GOD OF JACOB IS OUR REFUGE.Come, behold the works of the LORD,What desolations he hath made in the earth.He maketh wars to cease unto the end of the earth;He breaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder;He burneth the chariots in the fire.Be still, and know that I am God:I will be exalted among the nations,I will be exalted in the earth.THE LORD OF HOSTS IS WITH US;THE GOD OF JACOB IS OUR REFUGE.

There is a river, the streams whereof make glad the city of God,The holy place of the tabernacles of the Most High.God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved:God shall help her at the dawn of morning.The nations raged, the kingdoms were moved:He uttered his voice, the earth melted.THE LORD OF HOSTS IS WITH US;THE GOD OF JACOB IS OUR REFUGE.

Come, behold the works of the LORD,What desolations he hath made in the earth.He maketh wars to cease unto the end of the earth;He breaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder;He burneth the chariots in the fire.Be still, and know that I am God:I will be exalted among the nations,I will be exalted in the earth.THE LORD OF HOSTS IS WITH US;THE GOD OF JACOB IS OUR REFUGE.

PsalmXLVI.

A good man out of the good treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things: and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth evil things. But I say unto you that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment.

St. Matthew, XII.

By the purple haze that liesOn the distant rocky height,By the deep blue of the skies,By the smoky amber lightThrough the forest arches streaming,Where Nature on her throne sits dreaming,And the sun is scarcely gleamingThrough the cloudless snowy white,—Winter's lovely herald greets us,Ere the ice-crowned giant meets us.A mellow softness fills the air,—No breeze on wanton wings steals byTo break the holy quiet there,Or make the waters fret and sigh,Or the yellow alders shiver,That bend to kiss the placid river,Flowing on and on forever;But the little waves are sleeping,O'er the pebbles slowly creeping,That last night were flashing, leaping,Driven by the restless breeze,In lines of foam beneath yon trees.Dressed in robes of gorgeous hue,Brown and gold with crimson blent.The forest to the waters blueIts own enchanting tints has lent;—In their dark depths, lifelike glowing,We see a second forest growing,Each pictured leaf and branch bestowingA fairy grace to that twin wood,Mirrored within the crystal flood.'Tis pleasant now in forest shades;The Indian hunter strings his bow,To track through dark entangling gladesThe antlered deer and bounding doe,Or launch at night the birch canoe,To spear the finny tribes that dwellOn sandy bank, in weedy cell,Or pool, the fisher knows right well—Seen by the red and vivid glowOf pine torch at his vessel's bow.This dreamy Indian summer-day,Attunes the soul to tender sadness;We love—but joy not in the ray—It is not summer's fervid gladness,But a melancholy glory,Hovering softly round decay,Like swan that sings her own sad story,Ere she floats in death away.The day declines; what splendid dyes,In fleckered waves of crimson driven,Float o'er the saffron sea that liesGlowing within the western heaven!Oh, it is a peerless even!See, the broad red sun has set,But his rays are quivering yetThrough Nature's vale of violetStreaming bright o'er lake and hill,But earth and forest lie so still,It sendeth to the heart a chill;We start to check the rising tear—'Tis beauty sleeping on her bier.

A mellow softness fills the air,—No breeze on wanton wings steals byTo break the holy quiet there,Or make the waters fret and sigh,Or the yellow alders shiver,That bend to kiss the placid river,Flowing on and on forever;But the little waves are sleeping,O'er the pebbles slowly creeping,That last night were flashing, leaping,Driven by the restless breeze,In lines of foam beneath yon trees.

Dressed in robes of gorgeous hue,Brown and gold with crimson blent.The forest to the waters blueIts own enchanting tints has lent;—In their dark depths, lifelike glowing,We see a second forest growing,Each pictured leaf and branch bestowingA fairy grace to that twin wood,Mirrored within the crystal flood.

'Tis pleasant now in forest shades;The Indian hunter strings his bow,To track through dark entangling gladesThe antlered deer and bounding doe,Or launch at night the birch canoe,To spear the finny tribes that dwellOn sandy bank, in weedy cell,Or pool, the fisher knows right well—Seen by the red and vivid glowOf pine torch at his vessel's bow.

This dreamy Indian summer-day,Attunes the soul to tender sadness;We love—but joy not in the ray—It is not summer's fervid gladness,But a melancholy glory,Hovering softly round decay,Like swan that sings her own sad story,Ere she floats in death away.The day declines; what splendid dyes,In fleckered waves of crimson driven,Float o'er the saffron sea that liesGlowing within the western heaven!Oh, it is a peerless even!

See, the broad red sun has set,But his rays are quivering yetThrough Nature's vale of violetStreaming bright o'er lake and hill,But earth and forest lie so still,It sendeth to the heart a chill;We start to check the rising tear—'Tis beauty sleeping on her bier.

Susanna Moodie

So live, that when thy summons comes to joinThe innumerable caravan which movesTo that mysterious realm, where each shall takeHis chamber in the silent halls of death,Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night,Scourged to his dungeon, but sustained and soothedBy an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave,Like one who wraps the drapery of his couchAbout him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.

Bryant

Bird of the wilderness,Blithesome and cumberless,Sweet be thy matin o'er moorland and lea!Emblem of happiness,Blest is thy dwelling-place—Oh, to abide in the desert with thee!Wild is thy lay and loud,Far in the downy cloud;Love gives it energy, love gave it birth.Where, on thy dewy wing,Where art thou journeying?Thy lay is in heaven, thy love is on earth.O'er fell and fountain sheen,O'er moor and mountain green,O'er the red streamer that heralds the day,Over the cloudlet dim,Over the rainbow's rim,Musical cherub, soar, singing away!Then, when the gloaming comes,Low in the heather blooms,Sweet will thy welcome, and bed of love be!Emblem of happiness,Blest is thy dwelling-place—Oh, to abide in the desert with thee!

Bird of the wilderness,Blithesome and cumberless,Sweet be thy matin o'er moorland and lea!Emblem of happiness,Blest is thy dwelling-place—Oh, to abide in the desert with thee!

Wild is thy lay and loud,Far in the downy cloud;Love gives it energy, love gave it birth.Where, on thy dewy wing,Where art thou journeying?Thy lay is in heaven, thy love is on earth.

O'er fell and fountain sheen,O'er moor and mountain green,O'er the red streamer that heralds the day,Over the cloudlet dim,Over the rainbow's rim,Musical cherub, soar, singing away!

Then, when the gloaming comes,Low in the heather blooms,Sweet will thy welcome, and bed of love be!Emblem of happiness,Blest is thy dwelling-place—Oh, to abide in the desert with thee!

James Hogg

What is war? I believe that half the people that talk about war have not the slightest idea what it is. In a short sentence it may be summed up to be the combination and concentration of all the horrors, atrocities, crimes, and sufferings of which human nature on this globe is capable.

If you go into war now, you will have more banners to decorate your cathedrals and churches. Englishmen will fight now as well as they ever did; and there is ample power to back them, if the country can be but sufficiently excited and deluded. You may raise up great generals. You may have another Wellington, and another Nelson, too; for this country can grow men capable of every enterprise. Then there may be titles, and pensions, and marble monuments to eternize the men who have thus become great;—but what becomes of you, and your country, and your children?

You profess to be a Christian nation. You make it your boast even—though boasting is somewhat out of place in such questions—you make it your boast that you are a Christianpeople, and that you draw your rule of doctrine and practice, as from a well pure and undefiled, from the lively oracles of God, and from the direct revelation of the Omnipotent. You have even conceived the magnificent project of illuminating the whole earth, even to its remotest and darkest recesses, by the dissemination of the volume of the New Testament, in whose every page are written for ever the words of peace. Within the limits of this island alone, every Sabbath-day, twenty thousand, yes, far more than twenty thousand temples are thrown open, in which devout men and women assemble to worship Him who is the "Prince of Peace."

Is this a reality? or is your Christianity a romance, and your profession a dream? No; I am sure that your Christianity is not a romance, and I am equally sure that your profession is not a dream. It is because I believe this that I appeal to you with confidence, and that I have hope and faith in the future. I believe that we shall see, and at no very distant time, sound economic principles spreading much more widely amongst the people; a sense of justice growing up in a soil which hitherto has been deemed unfruitful; and—which will be better than all—the churches of the United Kingdom, thechurches of Britain, awaking as it were from their slumbers, and girding up their loins to more glorious work, when they shall not only accept and believe in the prophecy, but labour earnestly for its fulfilment, that there shall come a time—a blessed time—a time which shall last for ever—when "nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more."

John Bright

The stately homes of England!How beautiful they stand,Amidst their tall ancestral trees,O'er all the pleasant land!The deer across their greensward bound,Through shade and sunny gleam:And the swan glides past them with the soundOf some rejoicing stream.The merry homes of England!Around their hearths by night,What gladsome looks of household loveMeet in the ruddy light!There woman's voice flows forth in song,Or childhood's tale is told,Or lips move tunefully alongSome glorious page of old.The blessed homes of England!How softly on their bowersIs laid the holy quietnessThat breathes from Sabbath hours!Solemn, yet sweet, the church-bell's chimeFloats through their woods at morn;All other sounds, in that still time,Of breeze and leaf are born.The cottage homes of England!By thousands on her plains,They are smiling o'er the silvery brooks,And round the hamlet fanes.Through glowing orchards forth they peep,Each from its nook of leaves;And fearless there the lowly sleep,As the bird beneath the eaves.The free, fair homes of England!Long, long, in hut and hall,May hearts of native proof be rearedTo guard each hallowed wall!And green for ever be the groves,And bright the flowery sod,Where first the child's glad spirit lovesIts country and its God!

The merry homes of England!Around their hearths by night,What gladsome looks of household loveMeet in the ruddy light!There woman's voice flows forth in song,Or childhood's tale is told,Or lips move tunefully alongSome glorious page of old.

The blessed homes of England!How softly on their bowersIs laid the holy quietnessThat breathes from Sabbath hours!Solemn, yet sweet, the church-bell's chimeFloats through their woods at morn;All other sounds, in that still time,Of breeze and leaf are born.

The cottage homes of England!By thousands on her plains,They are smiling o'er the silvery brooks,And round the hamlet fanes.Through glowing orchards forth they peep,Each from its nook of leaves;And fearless there the lowly sleep,As the bird beneath the eaves.

The free, fair homes of England!Long, long, in hut and hall,May hearts of native proof be rearedTo guard each hallowed wall!And green for ever be the groves,And bright the flowery sod,Where first the child's glad spirit lovesIts country and its God!

Felicia Hemans

Whither, midst falling dew,While glow the heavens with the last steps of dayFar, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursueThy solitary way?Vainly the fowler's eyeMight mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong,As, darkly seen against the crimson sky,Thy figure floats along.Seek'st thou the plashy brinkOf weedy lake, or marge of river wide,Or where the rocking billows rise and sinkOn the chafed ocean side?There is a Power whose careTeaches thy way along that pathless coast,—The desert and illimitable air,—Lone wandering, but not lost.All day thy wings have fanned,At that far height, the cold, thin atmosphere,Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land,Though the dark night is near.And soon that toil shall end;Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest,And scream among thy fellows; reeds shall bend,Soon, o'er thy sheltered nest.Thou'rt gone; the abyss of heavenHath swallowed up thy form; yet, on my heartDeeply hath sunk the lesson thou hast given,And shall not soon depart.He who, from zone to zone,Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight,In the long way that I must tread alone,Will lead my steps aright.

Whither, midst falling dew,While glow the heavens with the last steps of dayFar, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursueThy solitary way?

Vainly the fowler's eyeMight mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong,As, darkly seen against the crimson sky,Thy figure floats along.

Seek'st thou the plashy brinkOf weedy lake, or marge of river wide,Or where the rocking billows rise and sinkOn the chafed ocean side?

There is a Power whose careTeaches thy way along that pathless coast,—The desert and illimitable air,—Lone wandering, but not lost.

All day thy wings have fanned,At that far height, the cold, thin atmosphere,Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land,Though the dark night is near.

And soon that toil shall end;Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest,And scream among thy fellows; reeds shall bend,Soon, o'er thy sheltered nest.

Thou'rt gone; the abyss of heavenHath swallowed up thy form; yet, on my heartDeeply hath sunk the lesson thou hast given,And shall not soon depart.

He who, from zone to zone,Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight,In the long way that I must tread alone,Will lead my steps aright.

Bryant

The strange fascination of light takes hold of all animated creatures, and commands a subtle devotion that cannot be set forth in a confession of faith. The delight of a boy in a bonfire is a breath of the heaven that is about us in our infancy. Though it be but a heap of rubbish, revealed by the removal of the mantle of snow, lighting up with flickering, changing glow a rectangular door yard, the children stand and gaze into the dancing flame, their vast, distorted, ghostlike shadows lost in the night, their faces reflecting every evanescent glare, and their spirits charmed by the same spell that took form in the fire-worship of their ancestors. How they delight in stirring up the embers and sending up a fountain spray of sparks! What joy in seeing the big sticks break into glowing coals, darting out new tongues of flame to lick up the escaping embers!

Fire is one of nature's universal fascinations. The wildest and most wary animals approach and gaze at it in the night, and though it sometimes warns them off, it always holds them by a spell. The night migrating birds perish inscores against the plate-glass of coast lighthouses, swerving from the control of the all-powerful migratory instinct toward the fascinating glare that is their destruction. It is not sportsmanlike to hang a lantern in the marsh and shoot the duck that gather under it. But the night, the silent marsh, and the lantern have charms that the sportsman, with his legal and mechanical paraphernalia, can never understand. Fish are devoted fire-worshippers, and that boy who has never speared by a jack-light is an object of compassion.

The earth and the waters under the earth have no more fascinating sight than the gray, silent form of a pike, moving and motionless in the shallow water, a shadow more tangible than himself thrown by a jack-light on the mottled yellow rocks and sands of the bottom. A passing breath of wind, even the slightest motion of the punt, breaks every shadow and indentation into myriad fleeting ripples and waves of light, transforming the slender, silent fish into a sheaf of wriggling glimmers. With the stilling of the surface, the waiting pike and all the shadows and lights of the bottom grow once more still and distinct. There floats the greatest cannibal of the fishes, paying his devotion to the flame, and above him stands the greatest cannibal of all created beings, pointing his deadly spear.

There is no moon. The stars cannot penetrate the thickening clouds. The bay is still and its shores invisible, the distant light of a farmhouse only serving to intensify the lonely silence. The savage joy of that moment repays the boy for all his laborious preparations. He brought two boards down the river from the mill, and toiled at them with all the tools in the woodshed till the ends and edges were made smooth. He collected lumber from all available sources for the ends and bottom, fastening them on with a miscellaneous collection of nails and springs. Then he patiently picked an old piece of tarred rope into oakum, and caulked it into the seams with a sharpened gate-hinge. He notched a pine tree, gathered the gum and boiled it into pitch to make the joints tight. That extraordinary pair of oars he sawed, chopped, and whittled from an old plank. The spear is a family relic which he dug up and fitted with a white-ash pole, and the anchor is a long stone, tied by the slack of a clothes-line. The jack is a basket made of old pail-hoops, and fastened to an upright stickto hold the burning pine knot. Yet we wonder why it is always the country boy who succeeds in the city!

Will he too, be lured by the seductive glimmer? Will he turn away from the conquest of nature and embark in the conquest of his fellow-mortals? Will he go to a resort for his fishing and a preserve for his shooting? Will that bunch of hair protruding from under his hat be worn thin and gray in scrambling after the delights of the vain and the covetous? Will he devote his superb strength of body and mind to outstripping and circumventing his fellows in the pursuit of that transient glimmer, that all-alluringignis fatuuswhich the Babylon world calls success?

S. T. Wood

I wandered lonely as a cloudThat floats on high o'er vales and hills,When all at once I saw a crowd,A host of golden daffodils;Beside the lake, beneath the trees,Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.Continuous as the stars that shineAnd twinkle on the milky way,They stretched in never-ending lineAlong the margin of the bay;Ten thousand saw I at a glance,Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.The waves beside them danced; but theyOutdid the sparkling waves in glee;A poet could not but be gay,In such a jocund company;I gazed—and gazed—but little thoughtWhat wealth the show to me had brought:For oft, when on my couch I lieIn vacant or in pensive mood,They flash upon that inward eyeWhich is the bliss of solitude;And then my heart with pleasure fills,And dances with the daffodils.

I wandered lonely as a cloudThat floats on high o'er vales and hills,When all at once I saw a crowd,A host of golden daffodils;Beside the lake, beneath the trees,Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shineAnd twinkle on the milky way,They stretched in never-ending lineAlong the margin of the bay;Ten thousand saw I at a glance,Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but theyOutdid the sparkling waves in glee;A poet could not but be gay,In such a jocund company;I gazed—and gazed—but little thoughtWhat wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lieIn vacant or in pensive mood,They flash upon that inward eyeWhich is the bliss of solitude;And then my heart with pleasure fills,And dances with the daffodils.

Wordsworth

If thine enemy be hungry, give him bread to eat; and if he be thirsty give him water to drink; for thou shalt heap coals of fire upon his head, and the Lord shall reward thee.

Proverbs, XXV.

Dear common flower, that grow'st beside the way,Fringing the dusty road with harmless gold,First pledge of blithesome May,Which children pluck, and, full of pride, uphold,High-hearted buccaneers, o'erjoyed that theyAn Eldorado in the grass have found,Which not the rich earth's ample roundMay match in wealth—thou art more dear to meThan all the prouder summer-blooms that be.

Lowell

On the evening of the twenty-second of May, 1509, two figures were seated at the wide doorway of a handsome house in Florence. Lillo, a boy of fifteen, sat on the ground, with his back against the angle of the door-post, and his long legs stretched out, while he held a large book open on his knee, and occasionally made a dash with his hand at an inquisitive fly, with an airof interest stronger than that excited by the finely-printed copy of Petrarch which he kept open at one place, as if he were learning something by heart.

Romola sat nearly opposite Lillo, but she was not observing him. Her hands were crossed on her lap, and her eyes were fixed absently on the distant mountains: she was evidently unconscious of anything around her. An eager life had left its marks upon her: the finely-moulded cheek had sunk a little, the golden crown was less massive; but there was a placidity on Romola's face which had never belonged to it in youth. It is but once that we can know our worst sorrows, and Romola had known them while life was new.

Absorbed in this way, she was not at first aware that Lillo had ceased to look at his book, and was watching her with a slightly impatient air, which meant that he wanted to talk to her, but was not quite sure whether she would like that entertainment just now. But persevering looks make themselves felt at last. Romola did presently turn away her eyes from the distance and met Lillo's impatient dark gaze with a brighter and brighter smile. He shuffled along the floor, still keeping the book on his lap, tillhe got close to her and lodged his chin on her knee.

"What is it, Lillo?" said Romola, pulling his hair back from his brow. Lillo was a handsome lad, but his features were turning out to be more massive and less regular than his father's. The blood of the Tuscan peasant was in his veins.

"Mamma Romola, what am I to be?" he said, well contented that there was a prospect of talking till it would be too late to con Petrarch any longer.

"What should you like to be, Lillo? You might be a scholar. My father was a scholar, you know, and taught me a great deal. That is the reason why I can teach you."

"Yes," said Lillo, rather hesitatingly. "But he is old and blind in the picture. Did he get a great deal of glory?"

"Not much, Lillo. The world was not always very kind to him, and he saw meaner men than himself put into higher places because they could flatter and say what was false. And then his dear son thought it right to leave him and become a monk; and after that, my father, being blind and lonely, felt unable to do the things that would have made his learning ofgreater use to men, so that he might still have lived in his works after he was in his grave."

"I should not like that sort of life," said Lillo, "I should like to be something that would make me a great man, and very happy besides—something that would not hinder me from having a good deal of pleasure."

"That is not easy, my Lillo. It is only a poor sort of happiness that could ever come by caring very much about our own narrow pleasures. We can have the highest happiness, such as goes along with being a great man, only by having wide thoughts, and much feeling for the rest of the world as well as ourselves; and this sort of happiness often brings so much pain with it, that we can tell it from pain only by its being what we would choose before everything, because our souls see it is good. There are so many things wrong and difficult in the world, that no man can be great—he can hardly keep himself from wickedness—unless he gives up thinking much about pleasure or rewards, and gets strength to endure what is hard and painful. My father had the greatness that belongs to integrity; he chose poverty and obscurity rather than falsehood. And so, my Lillo, if you mean to act nobly and seek to know the best thingsGod has put within reach of men, you must learn to fix your mind on that end, and not on what will happen to you because of it. And remember, if you were to choose something lower, and make it the rule of your life to seek your own pleasure and escape from what is disagreeable, calamity might come just the same; and it would be calamity falling on a base mind, which is the one form of sorrow that has no balm in it, and that may well make a man say, 'It would have been better for me if I had never been born.' I will tell you something, Lillo."

Romola paused for a moment. She had taken Lillo's cheeks between her hands, and his young eyes were meeting hers.

"There was a man to whom I was very near, so that I could see a great deal of his life, who made almost everyone fond of him, for he was young, and clever, and beautiful, and his manners to all were gentle and kind. I believe, when I first knew him, he never thought of doing anything cruel or base. But because he tried to slip away from everything that was unpleasant, and cared for nothing else so much as his own safety, he came at last to commit some of the basest deeds—such as make men infamous. He denied his father, and left himto misery; he betrayed every trust that was reposed in him, that he might keep himself safe and get rich and prosperous. Yet calamity overtook him."

George Eliot: "Romola."

Last night among his fellows roughHe jested, quaffed, and swore:A drunken private of the Buffs,Who never looked before.To-day, beneath the foeman's frown,He stands in Elgin's place,Ambassador from Britain's crown,And type of all her race.Poor, reckless, rude, low-born, untaught,Bewildered and alone,A heart, with English instinct fraught,He yet can call his own.Ay! tear his body limb from limb;Bring cord, or axe, or flame!—He only knows that not through himShall England come to shame.Far Kentish hopfields round him seemedLike dreams to come and go;Bright leagues of cherry-blossom gleamedOne sheet of living snow:The smoke above his father's doorIn gray, soft eddyings hung:—Must he then watch it rise no more,Doomed by himself, so young?Yes, Honour calls!—with strength like steelHe put the vision by:Let dusky Indians whine and kneel;An English lad must die!And thus, with eyes that would not shrink,With knee to man unbent,Unfaltering on its dreadful brinkTo his red grave he went.Vain, mightiest fleets of iron framed;Vain, those all-shattering guns;Unless proud England keep, untamed,The strong heart of her sons!So, let his name through Europe ring—A man of mean estateWho died, as firm as Sparta's king,Because his soul was great.

Poor, reckless, rude, low-born, untaught,Bewildered and alone,A heart, with English instinct fraught,He yet can call his own.Ay! tear his body limb from limb;Bring cord, or axe, or flame!—He only knows that not through himShall England come to shame.

Far Kentish hopfields round him seemedLike dreams to come and go;Bright leagues of cherry-blossom gleamedOne sheet of living snow:The smoke above his father's doorIn gray, soft eddyings hung:—Must he then watch it rise no more,Doomed by himself, so young?

Yes, Honour calls!—with strength like steelHe put the vision by:Let dusky Indians whine and kneel;An English lad must die!And thus, with eyes that would not shrink,With knee to man unbent,Unfaltering on its dreadful brinkTo his red grave he went.

Vain, mightiest fleets of iron framed;Vain, those all-shattering guns;Unless proud England keep, untamed,The strong heart of her sons!So, let his name through Europe ring—A man of mean estateWho died, as firm as Sparta's king,Because his soul was great.

F. H. Doyle

Two men I honour, and no third. First, the toilworn Craftsman, that, with earth-made Implement, laboriously conquers the Earth, and makes her man's. Venerable to me is the hard Hand; crooked, coarse; wherein, notwithstanding, lies a cunning virtue, indefeasibly royal, as of the Sceptre of this Planet. Venerable, too, is the rugged face, all weather-tanned, besoiled, with its rude intelligence; for it is the face of a Man living manlike. O, but the more venerable for thy rudeness, and even because we must pity as well as love thee! Hardly-entreated Brother! For us was thy back so bent, for us were thy straight limbs and fingers so deformed: thou wert our Conscript, on whom the lot fell, and fighting our battles wert so marred. For in thee, too, lay a god-created Form, but it was not to be unfolded; encrusted must it stand with the thick adhesions and defacements of Labour: and thy body, like thy soul, was not to know freedom. Yet toil on, toil on:thouart in thy duty, be out of it who may; thou toilest for the altogether indispensable, for daily bread.

A second man I honour, and still more highly: him who is seen toiling for the spiritually indispensable; not daily bread, but the bread of Life. Is not he, too, in his duty; endeavouring towards inward Harmony; revealing this, by act or by word, through all his outward endeavours, be they high or low? Highest of all, when his outward and his inward endeavour are one; when we can name him Artist; not earthly Craftsman only, but inspired Thinker, who with heaven-made Implement conquers Heaven for us! If the poor and humble toil that we have Food, must not the high and glorious toil for him in return, that he have Light, have Guidance, Freedom, Immortality?—These two, in all their degrees, I honour: all else is chaff and dust, which let the wind blow whither it listeth.

Unspeakably touching is it, however, when I find both dignities united; and he, that must toil outwardly for the lowest of man's wants, is also toiling inwardly for the highest. Sublimer in this world know I nothing than a Peasant Saint, could such now anywhere be met with. Such a one will take thee back to Nazareth itself; thou wilt see the splendour of Heaven spring forth from the humblest depths of Earth, like a light shining in great darkness.

Carlyle: "Sartor Resartus."

When I consider how my light is spentEre half my days, in this dark world and wide,And that one talent which is death to hideLodged with me useless, though my soul more bentTo serve therewith my Maker, and presentMy true account, lest He returning chide;"Doth God exact day labour, light denied?"I fondly ask. But Patience, to preventThat murmur, soon replies, "God doth not needEither man's work, or His own gifts. Who bestBear His mild yoke, they serve Him best: His stateIs kingly; thousands at His bidding speed,And post o'er land and ocean without rest:They also serve who only stand and wait."

Milton

So shall inferior eyes,That borrow their behaviour from the great,Grow great by your example and put onThe dauntless spirit of resolution.

Shakespeare

Mysterious Night! When our first parent knewThee from report divine, and heard thy name,Did he not tremble for this lovely frame,This glorious canopy of light and blue?Yet 'neath a curtain of translucent dew,Bathed in the rays of the great setting flame,Hesperus with the host of heaven came,And lo! Creation widened in man's view.Who could have thought such darkness lay concealedWithin thy beams, O Sun! or who could find,Whilst flow'r and leaf and insect stood revealed,That to such countless orbs thou mad'st us blind!Why do we, then, shun Death with anxious strife?If Light can thus deceive, wherefore not Life?

Joseph Blanco White

The Future hides in itGladness and sorrow:We press still thorow;Nought that abides in itDaunting us—Onward!

Goethe

(The Torch of Life)

There's a breathless hush in the Close to-night—Ten to make and the match to win—A bumping pitch and a blinding light,An hour to play and the last man in.And it's not for the sake of a ribboned coat,Or the selfish hope of a season's fame,But his Captain's hand on his shoulder smote"Play up! play up! and play the game!"The sand of the desert is sodden red,—Red with the wreck of a square that broke;—The Gatling's jammed and the Colonel dead,And the regiment blind with dust and smoke.The river of death has brimmed his banks,And England's far, and Honour a name,But the voice of a school-boy rallies the ranks:"Play up! play up! and play the game!"This is the word that year by year,While in her place the school is set,Every one of her sons must hear,And none that hears it dare forget.This they all with a joyful mindBear through life like a torch in flame,And falling, fling to the host behind—"Play up! play up! and play the game!"

The sand of the desert is sodden red,—Red with the wreck of a square that broke;—The Gatling's jammed and the Colonel dead,And the regiment blind with dust and smoke.The river of death has brimmed his banks,And England's far, and Honour a name,But the voice of a school-boy rallies the ranks:"Play up! play up! and play the game!"

This is the word that year by year,While in her place the school is set,Every one of her sons must hear,And none that hears it dare forget.This they all with a joyful mindBear through life like a torch in flame,And falling, fling to the host behind—"Play up! play up! and play the game!"

Henry Newbolt

("And he cometh the third time, and saith unto them, Sleep on now, and take your rest; it is enough, the hour is come; behold the Son of man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise up, let us go; lo, he that betrayeth me is at hand." Mark, XIV. 41, 42)

The words of Christ are not like the words of other men. His sentences do not end with the occasion which called them forth: every sentence of Christ's is a deep principle of human life, and it is so with these sentences. The principle contained in "Sleep on now" is this, that the past is irreparable, and after a certain moment waking will do no good. You may improve the future, the past is gone beyond recovery. As to all that is gone by, so far as the hope of altering it goes, you may sleep on and take your rest: there is no power in earth or heaven that can undo what has once been done.

Let us proceed to give an illustration of this. This principle applies to a misspent youth. The young are by God's Providence, exempted in a great measure from anxiety; they are as the apostles were in relation to their Master: their friends stand between them and the struggles of existence. They are not called upon tothink for themselves: the burden is borne by others. They get their bread without knowing or caring how it is paid for: they smile and laugh without a suspicion of the anxious thoughts of day and night which a parent bears to enable them to smile. So to speak, they are sleeping—and it is not a guilty sleep—while another watches.

My young brethren—youth is one of the precious opportunities of life—rich in blessing if you choose to make it so; but having in it the materials of undying remorse if you suffer it to pass unimproved. Your quiet Gethsemane is now. Do you know how you can imitate the apostles in their fatal sleep? You can suffer your young days to pass idly and uselessly away; you can live as if you had nothing to do but to enjoy yourselves: you can let others think for you, and not try to become thoughtful yourselves: till the business and difficulties of life come upon you unprepared, and you find yourselves like men waking from sleep, hurried, confused, scarcely able to stand, with all the faculties bewildered, not knowing right from wrong, led headlong to evil, just because you have not given yourselves in time to learn what is good. All that is sleep.

And now let us mark it. You cannot repair that in after-life. Oh! remember every period of human life has its own lesson, and you cannot learn that lesson in the next period. The boy has one set of lessons to learn, and the young man another, and the grown-up man another. Let us consider one single instance. The boy has to learn docility, gentleness of temper, reverence, submission. All those feelings which are to be transferred afterwards in full cultivation to God, like plants nursed in a hotbed and then planted out, are to be cultivated first in youth. Afterwards, those habits which have been merely habits of obedience to an earthly parent, are to become religious submission to a heavenly parent. Our parents stand to us in the place of God. Veneration for our parents is intended to become afterwards adoration for something higher. Take that single instance; and now suppose thatthatis not learned in boyhood. Suppose that the boy sleeps to the duty of veneration, and learns only flippancy, insubordination, and the habit of deceiving his father,—can that, my young brethren, be repaired afterwards? Humanly speaking not. Life is like the transition from class to class in a school. The school-boy whohas not learned arithmetic in the earlier classes, cannot secure it when he comes to mechanics in the higher: each section has its own sufficient work. He may be a good philosopher or a good historian, but a bad arithmetician he remains for life; for he cannot lay the foundation at the moment when he must be building the superstructure. The regiment which has not perfected itself in its manœuvres on the parade ground, cannot learn them before the guns of the enemy. And just in the same way, the young person who has slept his youth away, and become idle, and selfish, and hard, cannot make up for that afterwards. He may do something, he may be religious—yes; but he cannot be what he might have been. There is a part of his heart which will remain uncultivated to the end. The apostles could share their Master's sufferings—they could not save him. Youth has its irreparable past.

And therefore, my young brethren, let it be impressed upon you,—nowis a time, infinite in its value for eternity, which will never return again. Sleep not; learn that there is a very solemn work of heart which must be done while the stillness of the garden of Gethsemane gives you time. Now, or Never. The treasures atyour command are infinite. Treasures of time—treasures of youth—treasures of opportunity that grown-up men would sacrifice everything they have to possess. Oh for ten years of youth back again with the added experience of age! But it cannot be: they must be content to sleep on now and take their rest.

Rev. F. W. Robertson: "Sermons."

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