Suckling's Brennoralt. This is a cause which our ambition fills; Heat not a furnace for your foe so hot A cause, in which our strength we should not For oaths are straws, men's faiths are wafer cakes, waste CEREMONY-CHALLENGE-CHANGE. If I am fair, 't is for myself alone; I do not wish to have a sweetheart near me, Nor would I call another's heart my own, Nor have a gallant lover to revere me; For surely I would plight my faith to none, Then ceremony leads her bigots forth, Prepar'd to fight for shadows of no worth; Though many an amorous wit might jump to They learn to bow, to kneel, to sit, to stand; hear me; For I have heard that lovers prove deceivers, Mrs. Welby. I'm an old maid!—and though I suffer by it I Must change my style, and leave off gay society. Willis. O many a summer's morning glow Happy to fill religion's vacant place 61 O. W. Holmes. What are thy rents? What are thy comings in? I know thou hast told me O ceremony, show me but thy worth: What is thy toll, O adoration? Art thou aught else but place, degree, and form, To love thee no more, And I still must obey Where I once did adore. Bryant. Tennyson. Hoffman In bower and garden rich and rare What drink'st thou oft, instead of homage sweet, But poison'd flattery? O be sick, great greatness, And bid thy ceremony give thee cure. CHARACTER. Mrs. Osgood. Good name, in man and woman, dear Is the immediate jewel of their souls: my lord, Southey And though, as you have said, the vernal bloom Of his first spirits fading, leaves him changed'Tis not to worse. His mind is as a meadow Who steals my purse, steals trash; 't is something, of various grasses, rich and fresh beneath, nothing, 'Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands; Shakspeare. Stand free and fast, And judge him by no more than what you know Ingenuously, and by the right laid line Of truth, he truly will all styles deserve, Of wise, good, just; a man both soul and nerve. Shirley's Admiral of France. She can't be parallel'd by art, much less By nature: she'd battle painters to decypher Her exactly, as bad as agues puzzle doctors. Robert Neville's Poor Scholar. As through the hedgerows'shade the violet steals, And the sweet air its modest leaf reveals, Her softer charms, but by their influence known, Surprise all hearts, and mould them to her own. Rogers. Though gay as mirth, as curious thoughts sedate; As elegance polite, as power elate; Profound as reason, and as justice clear; Soft as compassion, yet as truth severe. But o'er the surface some that come to seed Have cast a colour of sobriety. Taylor's Edwin His talk is like a stream which runs With rapid change from rocks to roses; He slips from politics to puns, Passes from Mahomet to Moses; Beginning with the laws that keep The planets in their radiant courses, It is not mirth, for mirth she is too still; Savage. The angels sang in heaven when she was born. With more capacity for love than earth Longfellow. Devoted, anxious, generous, void of guile, A gentle maiden, whose large, loving eyes Enshrine a tender, melancholy light, Like the soft radiance of the starry skies, Or autumn sunshine, mellow'd when most bright; She is not sad, yet in her gaze appears Something that makes the gazer think of tears. Mrs. Embury. She has a glowing heart, they say, Though time her bloom is stealing, There's still beyond his artThe wild flower wreath of feeling, The sunbeam of the heart. Mrs. Osgood. Bold in the cause of God he stood Like Templar in the Holy Land; And never knight of princely blood In lady's bower more bland. His high broad forehead, marble fair, The gentle deeds of mercy thou hast done, Told of the power of thought within; And strength was in his raven hairBut when he smiled a spell was there That more than strength or power could win. Mrs. Hale's Vigil of Love. CHARITY. Good is no good, but if it be spend; God giveth good for none other end. Though the ungrateful subjects of their favours Are barren in return. Rowe's Tamerlane. The secret pleasure of a generous act Spenser's Shepherd's Calendar. Is the great mind's great bribe. Charity ever Finds in the act reward, and needs no trumpet Beaumont and Fletcher's Sea Voyage. There was no winter in 't; an autumn 't was Shaks. Ant. and Cleo. Middleton. Dryden's Don Sebastian Is there a variance? enter but his door, Balk'd are the courts, and contest is no more. Despairing quacks with curses left the place, And vile attorneys, now an useless race. Pope's Moral Essays. Self-love thus push'd to social,-to divine, Pope's Essay on Man The generous pride of virtue, Thomson's Coriolanus. Thomson's Seasons. Home's Douglas. Goldsmith's Deserted Village. Pleas'd with his guests, the good man learn'd to glow, And quite forgot their vices in their woe; Goldsmith's Deserted Village. There are, while human miseries abound, Armstrong's Art of Preserving Health. True charity, a plant divinely nurs'd, Cowper's Charity. Couper's Charity. | There seems but worthy one-to do men good. O, rich man's son! there is a toil, But only whitens soft white hands;- When poverty, with mien of shame, J. R. Lowell. The sense of pity seeks to touch,— That, I have nothing, you have much,— That bids you close the opening hand, Why not believe the homely letter R. M. Milnes. That all you give will God restore? |