And so, the rapid sketch winneth more praise to the painter, Than the consummate work elaborated on his easel: And so, the Helvetic lion caverned in the living rock Hath more of majesty and force, than if upon a marble pedestal. What hath charmed thine ear in music? Is it the labored theme, the curious fugue or cento, Nor rather the sparkles of intelligence flashing from some strange note Is it the volume of detail, where all is orderly set down, The book carefully accurate, that counteth thee no better than a fool, Nor rather the half-suggested thoughts, the riddles thou mayest solve; The light analogy, or deep allusion, trusted to thy learning, The confidence implied in thy skill to unravel meaning mysteries? For ideas are ofttimes shy of the close furniture of words, And thought, wherein only is power, may be best conveyed by a suggestion. The flash that lighteth up a valley, amid the dark midnight of a storm, Coineth the mind with that scene sharper than fifty summers. [From Names.] ILL-CHRISTENED. WHO would call the tench a whale, or style a torch, Orion? Yet many a silly parent hath dealt likewise with his nursling. Give thy child a fit distinguishment, making him sole tenant of a name, For it were sore hindrance to hold it in common with a hundred; In the Babel of confused identities fame is little feasible, The felon shall detract from the philanthropist, and the sage share honors with the simple: Still, in thy title of distinguishment, fall not into arrogant assumption. There were nine Homers, all goodly sons of song; but where is any record of the eight? One grew to fame, an Aaron's rod, and swallowed up his brethren. Art thou named of a family, the same in successive generations ? It is open to thee still to earn for epithets, such an one, the good or great. Art thou named foolishly? show that thou art wiser than thy fathers, Live to shame their vanity or sin by dutiful devotion to thy sphere. Art thou named discreetly? it is well, the course is free; No competitor shall claim thy colors, neither fix his faults upon thee: And win a blessing from the world, that men may love thy name; [From Indirect Influences.] THE FORCE OF TRIFLES. A SENTENCE hath formed a character, and a character subdued a kingdom; A picture hath ruined souls, or raised them to commerce with the skies. Planets govern not the soul, nor guide the destinies of man, But trifles, lighter than straws, are levers in the building up of character. [From Neglect.] TO MURMURERS. YET once more, griever at Neglect, hear me to thy comfort, or rebuke; For, after all thy just complaint, the world is full of love. For human benevolence is large, though many matters dwarf it, Prudence, ignorance, imposture, and the straitenings of circumstance and time. And if to the body, so to the mind, the mass of men are generous: Be sure the fault is thine, as pride, or shallowness, or vanity, If all around thee, good and bad, neglect thy seeming merit. Therefore examine thy state, O self-accounted martyr of Neglect, For that thou art, be grateful; go humbly even in thy confidence; [From Memory.] HINTS OF PRE-EXISTENCE. WERE I at Petra, could I not declare, My soul hath been here before me? Is it then a dream, that I remember the faces of them of old? Be ye my judges, imaginative minds, full-fledged to soar into the sun, Whose grosser natural thoughts the chemistry of wisdom hath sublimed, Have ye not confessed to a feeling, a consciousness, strange and vague, That ye have gone this way before, and walk again your daily life, Tracking an old routine, and on some foreign strand, Where bodily ye have never stood, finding your own footsteps? Hath not at times some recent friend looked out an old familiar, Some newest circumstance or place teemed as with ancient memories? A startling sudden flash lighteth up all for an instant, And then it is quenched, as in darkness, and leaveth the cold spirit trembling. [From Neglect.] LATE VALUATION. GOOD men are the health of the world, valued only when it perisheth; Who hath considered the blessing of his breath, till the poison of an asthma struck him? Who hath regarded the just pulses of his heart, till spasm or paralysis have stopped them? Even thus, an unobserved routine of daily grace and wisdom, When no more here, had worship of a world, whose penitence atoned for its neglect. [From Mystery.] FOREKNOWLEDGE UNDESIRABLE. FOR mystery is man's life; we wake to the whisperings of novelty: Sweeten or embitter daily life with the honey-gall of mystery. For we walk blindfold, — and a minute may be much, -a step may reach the precipice; What earthly loss, what heavenly gain, may not this day produce? Levelled of Alps and Andes, without its valleys and ravines, How dull the face of earth, unfeatured of both beauty and sublimity: How flat the prospect of existence, mapped by intuitive foreknowledge ? [From To-Day.] LIFE. A MAN'S life is a tower, with a staircase of many steps, That, as he toileth upward, crumble successively behind him: No going back, the past is an abyss; no stopping, for the present perisheth; But ever hasting on, precarious on the foothold of To-day. [From To-Morrow.] THE WORD OF BANE AND BLESSING. OFTEN, the painful present is comforted by flattering the future. To-morrow, whispereth weakness; and To-morrow findeth him the weaker and trap to catch the honest, Thou wealth to many poor, disgrace to many noble, Thou hope and fear, thou weal and woe, thou remedy, thou ruin, [From To-Morrow.] PROCRASTINATION. Lo, it is the even of To-day, -a day so lately a To-morrow; O faint heart, still shall thy whisper be, To-morrow, And must the growing avalanche of sin roll down that easy slope ? Alas, it is ponderous, and moving on in might, that a Sisyphus may not stop it; But haste thee with the lever of a prayer, and stem its strength To-day. HENRY VAUGHAN. THE SEED GROWING SECRETLY. | Then bless thy secret growth, nor And moons, though full, would get Their very memory is fair and bright, them down. Let glory be their bait whose minds The poor bee in her hive must Glory, the crowd's cheap tinsel, still To what most takes them is a drudge; And they too oft take good for ill, And thriving vice for virtue judge. What needs a conscience calm and bright Within itself an outward test ? Who breaks his glass to take more light, Makes way for storms into his rest. And my sad thoughts doth clear. It glows and glitters in my cloudy breast, Like stars upon some gloomy grove, Or those faint beams in which this hill is drest After the sun's remove. I see them walking in an air of glory, Whose light doth trample on my days; My days, which are at best but dull and hoary, Mere glimmering and decays. O holy hope! and high humility! To kindle my cold love. |