Where go the poet's lines? Answer, ye evening tapers! The Poet's Lot. Thine eye was on the censer, And not the hand that bore it. Lines by a Clerk. Their discords sting through Burns and Moore, Like hedgehogs dressed in lace. The Music-Grinders. You think they are crusaders, sent From some infernal clime, To crack the voice of Melody, And, since, I never dare to write As funny as I can. Ibid. The Height of the Ridiculous. Yes, child of suffering, thou mayst well be sure, He who ordained the Sabbath loves the poor! Urania. And, when you stick on conversation's burrs, Don't strew your pathway with those dreadful urs. Ibid. You hear that boy laughing?-you think he's all fun; But the angels laugh, too,at the good he has done; The children laugh loud as they troop to his call, And the poor man that knows him laughs loudest of all ! The Boys. Holmes.-Lincoln.-Parker. 591 Boston State-house is the hub of the Solar System. You could n't pry that out of a Boston man if you had the tire of all creation straightened out for a crowbar. The Autocrat of the Breakfast-table, p. 143. ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 1809-1865. With malice towards none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right. Second Inaugural Address. That this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth. Speech at Gettysburg, Nov. 19th, 1863. THEODORE PARKER. 1810 - 1860. There is what I call the American idea. . . . This idea demands, as the proximate organization thereof, a democracy, that is, a government of all the people, by all the people, for all the people; of course, a government of the principles of eternal justice, the unchanging law of God: for shortness' sake I will call it the idea of Freedom. Speech at the New England Anti-Slavery Convention, Boston, May 29, 1850. JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. "T is heaven alone that is given away, 'Tis only God may be had for the asking. The Vision of Sir Launfal And what is so rare as a day in June? Then, if ever, come perfect days; Then heaven tries the earth if it be in tune, Ibid. This child is not mine as the first was, I cannot sing it to rest, I cannot lift it up fatherly And bless it upon my breast; The Changeling. Be noble! and the nobleness that lies Sonnet iv. Ed. 1865. To win the secret of a weed's plain heart. Sonnet xxv. Two meanings have our lightest fantasies, Sonnet xxxiv. Ed. 1844. Earth's noblest thing, a woman perfected. Once to every man and nation comes the mo ment to decide, In the strife of Truth with Falsehood, for the good or evil side; Some great cause, God's new Messiah offering each the bloom or blight, Parts the goats upon the left hand, and the sheep upon the right; And the choice goes by forever 'twixt that darkness and that light. The Present Crisis. Truth forever on the scaffold, Wrong forever on the throne. Ibid. Then to side with Truth is noble when we share her wretched crust, Ere her cause bring fame and profit, and 't is prosperous to be just; Then it is the brave man chooses, while the coward stands aside, Doubting in his abject spirit, till his Lord is crucified. Ibid. Before man made us citizens, great Nature made us men. Ez fer war, I call it murder, There you hev it plain an' flat; I don't want to go no furder The Capture. The Biglow Papers. No. i. An' you've gut to git up airly Ibid. Laborin' man an' laborin' woman Hev one glory an' one shame, Ev'y thin' thet 's done inhuman Injers all on 'em the same. The Biglow Papers. No.i. We kind o' thought Christ went agin war an' pillage. Ibid. No. iii. But John P. Robinson he Sez they didn't know everythin' down in Judee. Of my merit On thet point you yourself may jedge; All is, I never drink no sperit, Nor I haint never signed no pledge. Under the yaller-pines I house, Ibid. Ibid. No. vii. When sunshine makes 'em all sweet-scented, An' hear among their furry boughs The baskin' west-wind purr contented. Ibid. No. x. Second Series. Wut 's words to them whose faith an' truth Zekle crep' up quite unbeknown An' peeked in thru' the winder, An' there sot Huldy all alone, 'Ith no one nigh to hender. Ibid. The Courtin'. |