CXCVIII. - CARDINAL WOLSEY AND CROMWELL.* Wolsey. FAREWELL, a long farewell to all my greatness! And when he thinks, good easy man, full surely But far beyond my depth; my high-blown prido Never to hope again. Cromwell. I have no power to speak, sir. Wol. What! amazed At my misfortunes? Can thy spirit wonder, Crom. How does your grace? Wol. Why, well; Never so truly happy, my good Cromwell, I know myself now; and I feel within me A peace above all earthly dignities, A still and quiet conscience. The king has cured me, I humbly thank his grace; and from these shoulders, These ruined pillars, out of pity, taken A load would sink a navy · too much honor: O, 't is a burden, Cromwell, 't is a burden, Too heavy for a man that hopes for heaven. Crom. I am glad, your grace has made that right use of it Thomas Cromwell, a statesman of the time of Henry the Eighth of England. Shakspeare often puts the accent in aspect on the last syllable. (Out of a fortitude of soul I feel), To endure more miseries, and greater far, Crom. The heaviest and the worst Is your displeasure with the king. Crom. The next is, that Sir Thomas More is chosen Wol. That's somewhat sudden : But he's a learned man. May he continue For truth's sake, and his conscience; that his bones, Crom. That Cranmer is returned with welcome, Wol. That's news, indeed. Crom. Last, that the Lady Anne, Whom the king hath in secrecy long married, Going to chapel; and the voice is now Only about her coronation. Wol. There was the weight that pulled me down. O ! Cromwell, The king has gone beyond me; all my glories In that one woman I have lost forever: No sun shall ever usher forth mine honors, Go, get thee from me, Cromwell: I am a poor fallen man, unworthy now To be thy lord and master: seek the king; That sun, I pray, may never set! I have told him Some little memory of me will stir him (I know his noble nature), not to let Thy hopeful service perish too: Good Cromwell, Neglect him not; make use now, For thine own future safety. Crom. O, my lord, and provide Must I, then, leave you? Must I needs forego Bear witness, all that have not hearts of iron, Wol. Cromwell, I did not think to shed a tear Let's dry our eyes: and thus far hear me, Cromwell; And sleep in dull cold marble, where no mention Still in thy right hand carry gentle peace, To silence envious tongues. Be just, and fear not: Let all the ends thou aim'st at be thy country's, Thy God's, and truth's; then, if thou fall'st, O, Cromwell, Thou fall'st a blessed martyr. Serve the king: And, Prithee, lead me in: There take an in'ventory of all I have, To the last penny; 't is the king's: my robe, And my integrity to Heaven, is all I dare now call mine own. O, Cromwell, Cromwell, Had I but served my God with half the zeal I served my king, He would not in mine age Crom. Good sir, have patience. Wol. So I have. Farewell The hopes of court! my hopes in heaven do dwell. SHAKSPEARE. CXCIX. THE TREASURES BY THE WAYSIDE. 1. THE sky was dull, the scene was wild, The man in thought, the child at play. He bounded back to show the treasure; I was not hard enough to chide, Nor wise enough to share, his pleasure. Aroused with pain, my listless eyes 3. Fit stores for science Discontent Had passed unheeding on the wild; And Time blooms back within the stone. Whose wisdom with delight is clad, The golden duty — to be glad! SIR E. BULWER LYTTON CC. · PECULIARITY OF AMERICAN LIBERTY. 1. THIS inheritance which we enjoy to-day is not only an inheritance of liberty, but of our own peculiar American liberty. Liberty has existed in other times, in other countries, and in other forms. There has been a Grecian liberty, bold and powerful, full of spirit, eloquence, and fire; a liberty which produced multitudes of great men, and has transmitted one immortal name, the name of Demosthenes, to posterity. But still it was a liberty of disconnected states, sometimes united, indeed, by temporary leagues and confederacies, but often involved in wars between themselves. The sword of Sparta turned its sharpest edge against Athens, enslaved her and devastated Greece; and, in her turn, Sparta was compelled to bend before the power of Thebes. And let it ever be remembered especially let the truth sink deep into all American minds- that it was the want of union among her several states which finally gave the mastery of all Greece to Philip of Mac'edon. EI 2. And there has also been a Roman liberty, a proud, ambitious, domineering spirit, professing free and popular principles in Rome itself; but, even in the best days of the republic, ready * See Linnæus, in Explanatory Index to carry slavery and chains into her provinces, and through every country over which her eagles could be borne. What was the liberty of Spain, or Gaul, or Germany, or Britain, in the days of Rome? Did true constitutional liberty then exist? As the Roman empire declined, her provinces, not instructed in the principles of free, popular government, one after another declined also; and, when Rome herself fell in the end, all fell together. 3. I have said that our inheritance is an inheritance of American liberty. That liberty is characteristic, peculiar, and alto gether our own. Nothing like it existed in former times, nor was known in the most enlightened states of antiquity; while with us its principles have become interwoven into the minds of individual men, connected with our daily opinions and our daily habits, until it is, if I may so say, an element of social as well as of political life; and the consequence is, that to whatever region an American citizen carries himself, he takes with him, fully developed in his own understanding and experience, our American principles and opinions; and becomes ready at once, in coöperation with others, to apply them to the formation of new govern ments. 4. What has Germany done, learned Germany, fuller of ancient lore than all the world besides? What has Italy done? What have they done who dwell on the spot where Cicero lived? They have not the power of self-government which a common town-meeting with us possesses. Yes, I say that those persons who have gone from our town-meetings to dig gold in California are more fit to make a republican government than any body of men in Germany or Italy, because they have learned this one great lesson that there is no security without law, and that, under the circumstances in which they are placed, where there is no military authority to cut their throats, there is no sovereign will but the will of the majority; that, therefore, if they remain, they must submit to that will. And this I believe to be strictly true. WEBSTER. OCI. THE SOULS OF BOOKS. 1. SIT here and muse!-it is an antique room, Shy as a fearful stranger. There they reign The Kings of Thought! - not crowned until the grave. — |