Spare diet is my fare, My clothes more fit than fine; I envy not their hap, Whom favour doth advance; To rise by others' fall I deem a losing gain; All states with others' ruin built To ruin run amain. No change of Fortune's calm Can cast my comforts down: When Fortune smiles, I smile to think How quickly she will frown. And when, in froward mood, She prov'd an angry foe, Small gain I found, to let her come Less loss, to let her go. SOUTHWELL. SPEECH is morning to the mind; It spreads the beauteous images abroad, Which else lie furl'd and clouded in the soul. T LEE. THE EMIGRANT'S GRAVE. WHY mourn ye, why strew ye these flow rets around, To yon new sodded grave, as your slow steps advance? In yon new sodded grave (ever dear be the ground,) Lies the stranger we loved, the poor exile from France. And is the poor exile at rest from his woe, France. Oh! kind was his nature, tho' bitter his fate; And gay was his converse, tho' broken his heart; No comfort, no hope, his own heart could elate, Tho' comfort and hope he to all could impart. Ever joyless himself, in the joy of the plain One pleasure he knew,-in his straw-cover'd shed For the snowbeaten beggar, his faggot to trim; One tear of delight he could drop on his bread, Which he shared with the poor who were poorer than him! And when 'round his death-bed, profusely we cast Every gift, every solace, our hamlets could bring, He blest us with sighs which we thought were his last; But he still had a prayer for his country and king. Poor exile, adieu! undisturbed be thy sleep! From the feast, from the wake, from the village green dance! How oft shall we wander, by moonlight to weep, O'er the stranger we loved, the poor exile from France. To the church-going bride shall thy mem'ry impart One pang, as her eyes on thy cold relics glance; One rose from her garland, one tear from her heart, Shall drop on the grave of the exile from France. THE life of man is a journey, a journey which must be travelled however bad the roads or the accommodation. If in the beginning it is found dangerous, narrow, and difficult, it must either grow better in the end, or we shall by custom learn to bear its inequality:-I am mounted upon a wretched ass; I see another man before me upon a sprightly horse, at which I feel some uneasiness; I look behind me, and see numbers on foot stooping under heavy burdens: let me learn to pity their estate, and thank Heaven for my own. AND when angry,-for e'en in the tranquillest climes, shaken. MOORE. POWER and wealth supply the place of each other. Power confers the ability of gratifying our desires without the consent of others. Wealth enables us to obtain the consent of others to our gratification. Power, simply considered, whatever it confers on one, must take from another. Wealth enables its owner to give to others, by taking only from himself. Power pleases the violent and proud: wealth delights the placid and timorous. Youth, therefore, flies at power, and age grovels after riches. JOHNSON. THEN Came The disappointment of the barren bed, SOUTHEY. ALL the sentiments which spring from gratitude, possess a religious character; they elevate the soul of him who feels them. If thou be one whose heart the holy forms Howe'er disguised in its own majesty, Is littleness; that he who feels contempt Which he has never used; that Thought with him Is ever on himself, doth look on one, The least of Nature's works, one who might move Instructed that true knowledge leads to love; Who, in the silent hour of inward thought, WORDSWORTH. THERE is abundant room for impartiality, for candour, for large and correct views of agents, and the circumstances under which they act, before we pronounce a sentence of condemnation upon our fellow men. Oн, would some power the gift but gie us, BURNS. |