"WHO HATH GIVEN MAN SPEECH? OR WHO HATH SET THEREIN A THORN FOR PERIL AND A SNARE FOR SIN?
"WITH CHARMED WORDS AND SONGS HAVE MEN PUT OUT
ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE.
The eyes not curious to the right or left, And reading in a book, his hands unbound,
With short fleet smiles. The whole place catches breath,
Looking at him; she seems at point to speak; Now she lies back, and laughs, with her brows drawn And her lips drawn too. Now they read his crime- I see the laughter tightening her chin:
Why do you bend your body and draw breath? They will not slay him in her sight; I am sure She will not have him slain.
I was just praying to myself--one word, A prayer I have to say for her to God. Now he looks her side; Something he says, if one could hear thus far: She leans out, lengthening her throat to hear,
FOR IN THE WORD HIS LIFE IS AND HIS BREATH, AND IN THE WORD HIS DEATH."-ALGERNON C. SWINBURNE.
And his smile great; and like another smile The blood fills all his face. Her cheek and neck
Work fast and hard; He looks so merrily.
she must have pardoned him,
Now he comes forth
Out of that ring of people and kneels down; Ah, how the helve and edge of the great axe Turn in the sunlight as the man shifts hands- It must be for a show: because she sits And hardly moves her head this way—I see Her chin and lifted lips. Now she stands up,
Puts out her hand, and they fall muttering ;- Ah!
WILD EVIL, AND THE FIRE OF TYRANNIES."-SWINBURNE.
"FOR SILENCE AFTER GRIEVOUS THINGS IS GOOD, AND REVERENCE, AND THE FEAR THAT MAKES MEN WHOLE,
LOVE THOU THE LAW, AND CLEAVE TO THINGS ORDAINED."-SWINBURNE.
For Heaven's love, stay there;
Do not look out. Nay, he is dead by this; But gather up yourself from off the floor;
Will she die too? I shut mine eyes and heard—
Sweet, do not beat your face upon the ground, Nay, he is dead and slain.
I knew he would be slain.
What, slain indeed? Ay, through the neck:
I knew one must be smitten through the neck To die so quick if one were stabbed to the heart, He would die slower.
Will you behold him dead?
Yea: must a dead man not be looked upon That living one was fain of?—give me way. Lo you, what sort of hair this fellow had; The doomsman gathers it into his hand To grasp the head by for all men to see. [From "Chastelard: a Tragedy," act v., scene 3.]
AND SHAME, and righteous goverNANCE OF BLOOD, AND Lordship of THE SOUL."-algernon C. SWINBURNE.
"" THINGS GAINED ARE GONE, but GREAT THINGS DONE ENDURE."-IBID.
THAT HOLDS THE DATE OF ALL OF US; WE ARE BORN WITH TRAVAIL AND STRONG CRYING,
"A LITTLE SORROW, A LITtle pleasure,
ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE.
And the high gods took on hand
Fire, and the falling of tears; And a measure of sliding sand
From under the feet of the years; And froth and drift of the sea;
And dust of the labouring earth; And bodies of things to be
In the houses of death and of birth; And wrought with weeping and laughter, And fashioned with loathing and love,
With life before and after, *
And death beneath and above, For a day, and a night, and a morrow, That his strength might endure for a span, With travail and heavy sorrow, The holy spirit of man.
From the winds of the north and the south
They gathered as unto strife; They breathed upon his mouth, They filled his body with life; Eyesight and speech they wrought For the veils of the soul therein, † A time for labour and thought,
A time to serve and to sin; They gave him light in his ways, And love and a space for delight, And beauty, and length of days,
And night, and sleep in the night. His speech is a burning fire; With his lips he travaileth;
"Looking before and after."-SHELLEY.
+"Speech was given to man to conceal his thoughts."—Attributed to Tallyrand; but a similar sentiment is found in Goldsmith.
FATE METES US FROM THE DUSTY MEASURE
AND FROM THE BIRTH-DAY TO THE DYING THE LIKENESS OF OUR LIFE IS THUS."-SWINBURNE.
"THIS IS SURE: MAN SINKS NOT BY A MORE UNMANLY VICE THAN IS THAT SIN
"CIVIL AND MORAL LIBERTY ARE TWAIN."-HENRY TAYLOR.
[SIK HENRY TAYLOR was born early in the present century. His works are:-"Isaac Comnenus," a drama, published in 1832; "Philip van Arte- velde," a drama, 1834; "Edwin the Fair," 1842; "The Virgin Widow," 1850, "A Sicilian Summer," and "St. Clement's Eve," 1862. His prose writings include, "The Statesman," "Notes from Life," and "Notes from Books." As a poet he has not attained any wide popularity, but he is known and admired by those best capable of appreciating genuine poetical inspiration. His versification is vigorous, his style condensed, his imagina- tion lofty, and his analysis of character acute and penetrating. His " "Philip van Artevelde" may justly be pronounced one of the finest dramatic poems of the century; and the same felicity of diction and depth of thought are to be found in "St. Clement's Eve." 66 'Henry Taylor," says a recent critic, "is terse in expressions; his thought finds the right word at once, and does not exhaust its energy by a needless expansion. He is there- fore never tedious."-St. Paul's Magazine, i., 706.
Sir Henry Taylor has recently received the honour of knighthood, in ac- knowledgment of his long and useful official services.]
[The French have invaded Flanders, and Philip van Artevelde, at the head of the Flemish forces, prepares to resist their advance. The night before the great battle (in which he perished) he is disturbed by a vision of his dead wife, under circumstances which he describes to the lady of his later love, Elena, an Italian beauty.]
*"Our little life is rounded with a sleep."-SHAKESPEARE.
66 LIFE HATH FOR ME A PURPOSE AND A DRIFT."-TAYLOR.
OF PRODIGALITY; MAN FINDS NOT MORE DISHONOUR THAN IN DEBT."-TAYLOR.
"MORN, THAT LOOK'ST SO GRIM AND GRAY, TELL ME TRULY, TELL ME TRULY,
66 WHAT MAKES A HERO? AN HEROIC MIND,-(TAYLOR)
What took you from your bed ere break of day? Where have you been? I know you're vexed with
Tell me, now, what has happened.
No accident, save of the world within ; Occurrences of thought; 'tis nothing more. Elena. It is of such that love most needs to know. The loud transactions of the outlying world Tell to your masculine friends: tell me your thoughts. Artev. They stumbled in the dusk 'twixt night and day. I dreamed distressfully, and waking knew How an old sorrow had stolen upon my sleep, Molesting midnight and that short repose Which industry had earned, so to stir up About my heart remembrances of pain Least sleeping when I sleep, least sleeping then When reason and the voluntary powers That turn and govern thought are laid to rest. Those powers by this nocturnal inroad wild Surprised and broken, vainly I essayed To rally, and the mind, unsubjugate, Took its direction from a driftless dream. Then passed I forth.
I knew it not, and wondered when I woke. Artev. The gibbous moon was in a wan decline, And all was silent as a sick man's chamber. Mixing its small beginnings with the dregs Of the pale moonshine and a few faint stars, The cold uncomfortable daylight dawned; And the white tents, topping a low ground-fog, Showed like a fleet becalmed. I wandered far, Till reaching to the bridge I sate me down
EXPRESSED IN ACTION, IN ENDURANCE PROVED."-TAYLOR.
"WHAT WILT THOU BE ERE MID-DAY? WHO CAN SAY, WHO CAN SAY?"-TAYLOR.
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