Vol VII – Society and Solitude (1870)

DAUGHTERS of Time, the hypocritic Days, Muffled and dumb like barefoot dervishes, And marching single in an endless file, Bring diadems and fagots in their hands. To each they offer gifts after his will, Bread, kingdoms, stars and sky that holds them all. I, in my pleached garden, watched the pomp, Forgot my morning wishes,…

YET Saadi loved the race of men, – No churl, immured in cave or den; In bower and hall He wants them all; But he has no companion; Come ten, or come a million, Good Saadi dwells alone. Too long shut in strait and few, Thinly dieted on dew, I will use the world, and…

I REACHED the middle of the mount Up which the incarnate soul must climb, And paused for them, and looked around, With me who walked through space and time. Five rosy boys with morning light Had leaped from one fair mother's arms, Fronted the sun with hope as bright, And greeted God with childhood's psalms….

So nigh is grandeur to our dust, So near is God to man, When Duty whispers low, Thou must, The youth replies, I can. PERIL around, all else appalling, Cannon in front and leaden rain, Him duty, through the clarion calling To the van, called not in vain. COURAGE I OBSERVE that there are three…

I FRAMED his tongue to music, I armed his hand with skill, I moulded his face to beauty And his heart the throne of Will. ART ALL departments of life at the present day – Trade, Politics, Letters, Science, or Religion – seem to feel, and to labor to express, the identity of their law….

For whom the Muses smile upon, And touch with soft persuasion, His words, like a storm-wind, can bring Terror and beauty on their wing; In his every syllable Lurketh nature veritable; And though he speak in midnight dark, – In heaven no star, on earth no spark, – Yet before the listener's eye Swims the…