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Spares but the cloudy border of his base

To the foil'd searching of mortality;

      And thou, who didst the stars and sunbeams know,

       Self-school'd, self-scann'd, self-honour'd, self-secure,

       Didst tread on earth unguess'd at.—Better so!

      All pains the immortal spirit must endure,

       All weakness which impairs, all griefs which bow,

       Find their sole speech in that victorious brow.

WRITTEN IN EMERSON'S ESSAYS

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      "O monstrous, dead, unprofitable world,

       That thou canst hear, and hearing, hold thy way!

       A voice oracular hath peal'd to-day,

       To-day a hero's banner is unfurl'd;

      Hast thou no lip for welcome?"—So I said.

       Man after man, the world smiled and pass'd by;

       A smile of wistful incredulity

       As though one spake of life unto the dead—

      Scornful, and strange, and sorrowful, and full

       Of bitter knowledge. Yet the will is free;

       Strong is the soul, and wise, and beautiful;

      The seeds of godlike power are in us still;

       Gods are we, bards, saints, heroes, if we will!—

       Dumb judges, answer, truth or mockery?

WRITTEN IN BUTLER'S SERMONS

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      Affections, Instincts, Principles, and Powers,

       Impulse and Reason, Freedom and Control—

       So men, unravelling God's harmonious whole,

       Rend in a thousand shreds this life of ours.

      Vain labour! Deep and broad, where none may see,

       Spring the foundations of that shadowy throne

       Where man's one nature, queen-like, sits alone,

       Centred in a majestic unity;

      And rays her powers, like sister-islands seen

       Linking their coral arms under the sea,

       Or cluster'd peaks with plunging gulfs between

      Spann'd by aërial arches all of gold,

       Whereo'er the chariot wheels of life are roll'd

       In cloudy circles to eternity.

TO THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON

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ON HEARING HIM MISPRAISED

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      Because thou hast believed, the wheels of life

       Stand never idle, but go always round;

       Not by their hands, who vex the patient ground,

       Moved only; but by genius, in the strife

      Of all its chafing torrents after thaw,

       Urged; and to feed whose movement, spinning sand,

       The feeble sons of pleasure set their hand;

And, in this vision of the general law,

      Hast labour'd, but with purpose; hast become

       Laborious, persevering, serious, firm—

       For this, thy track, across the fretful foam

      Of vehement actions without scope or term,

       Call'd history, keeps a splendour; due to wit,

       Which saw one clue to life, and follow'd it.

IN HARMONY WITH NATURE

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TO A PREACHER

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      "In harmony with Nature?" Restless fool,

       Who with such heat dost preach what were to thee,

       When true, the last impossibility—

       To be like Nature strong, like Nature cool!

      Know, man hath all which Nature hath, but more,

       And in that more lie all his hopes of good. Nature is cruel, man is sick of blood; Nature is stubborn, man would fain adore;

      Nature is fickle, man hath need of rest;

       Nature forgives no debt, and fears no grave;

       Man would be mild, and with safe conscience blest.

      Man must begin, know this, where Nature ends;

       Nature and man can never be fast friends.

       Fool, if thou canst not pass her, rest her slave!

TO GEORGE CRUIKSHANK

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ON SEEING, IN THE COUNTRY, HIS PICTURE OF "THE BOTTLE"

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      Artist, whose hand, with horror wing'd, hath torn

       From the rank life of towns this leaf! and flung

       The prodigy of full-blown crime among

       Valleys and men to middle fortune born,

      Not innocent, indeed, yet not forlorn—

       Say, what shall calm us when such guests intrude

       Like comets on the heavenly solitude?

       Shall breathless glades, cheer'd by shy Dian's horn,

      Cold-bubbling springs, or caves?—Not so! The soul

       Breasts her own griefs; and, urged too fiercely, says:

       "Why tremble? True, the nobleness of man

      May be by man effaced; man can control

       To pain, to death, the bent of his own days.

       Know thou the worst! So much, not more, he can."

TO A REPUBLICAN FRIEND, 1848

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      God knows it, I am with you. If to prize

       Those virtues, prized and practised by too few,

      

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