Let's whip these stragglers o'er the seas again; Lash hence these over-weening rags of France, These famish'd beggars, weary of their lives; Who, but for dreaming on this fond exploit, For want of means, poor rats, had hang'd them- selves. Shaks. Richard III. England hath long been mad and scarr'd herself; The brother blindly shed the brother's blood, The father rashly slaughter'd his own son, The son compell'd been butcher to the sire.
Our soldiers, like the night-owl's lazy flight Or like a lazy thresher with a flail,— Fell gently down, as if they struck their friends. Shaks. Henry VI. Part III.
Shall we go throw away our coats of steel, And wrap our bodies in black mourning gowns, Numb'ring our ave-marias with our beads? Or shall we on the helmets of our foes Tell our devotion with revengeful arms?
Shaks. Henry VI. Part III.
Hence, therefore, thou nice scratch;
A scaly gauntlet now, with joints of steel, Must glove this hand: and hence, thou sickly grief;
Thou art a guard too wanton for the head, Which princes, flesh'd with conquest, aim to hit. Shaks. Henry IV. Part II.
My sentence is for open war: of wiles, More unexpert, I boast not: then let those Contrive, who need, or when they need, not now.
Milton's Paradise Lost. Where cattle pastur'd late, now scatter'd lies With carcasses and arms th' ensanguin'd field Deserted.
Milton's Paradise Lost.
One to destroy is murder by the law, And gibbets keep the lifted hand in awe;
Are made, not mark'd; where violent sorrow To murder thousands takes a specious name,
A modern ecstasy; and the dead man's knell Is there scarce ask'd, for whom; and good men's lives
Expire before the flowers in their caps.
O war! begot in pride and luxury, The child of malice and revengeful hate; Thou impious good, and good impiety! Thou art the foul refiner of a state, Unjust scourge of men's iniquity,
Sharp easer of corruptions desperate!
Is there no means but that a sin-sick land Must be let blood with such a boist'rous hand?
He is unwise that to a market goes, Where there is nothing to be sold but blows. Aleyn's Henry VII.
War's glorious art, and gives immortal fame. Young's Love of Fame.
But what most show'd the vanity of life, Was to behold the nations all on fire, In cruel broils engag'd, and deadly strife: Most christian kings, inflam'd by black desire, With honourable ruffians in their hire, Cause war to rage, and blood around to pour; Of this sad work when each begins to tire, They sit them down just where they were before, Till for new scenes of woe, peace shall their force
Thomson's Castle of Indolence
Let such as deem it glory to destroy, Rush into blood, the sack of cities seek; Unpierc'd, exulting in the widow's wail, The virgin's shriek, and infant's trembling cry Thomson's Seasons
Rash, fruitless war, from wanton glory wag'd, Is only splendid murder.
Thomson's Edward and Eleanora. I ne'er approv'd this rash, romantic war, Begot by hot-brain'd bigots, and fomented By the intrigues of proud designing priests. All ages have their madness, this is ours.
Is death more cruel from a private dagger Than in the field, from murdering swords of thousands?
Or does the nuinber slain make slaughter glorious? Cibber's King John. Onward they march embattled, to the sound Of martial harmony; fifes, cornets, drums, That rouse the sleepy soul to arms, and bold Heroic deeds.
Extended empire, like expanded gold, Exchanges solid strength for feeble splendour. Dr. Johnson's Irene.
Is of eternal use to human kind
It was a dread, yet spirit-stirring sight! The billows foam'd beneath a thousand oars. Fast as they land, the red-cross ranks unite, Legions on legions brightening all the shores. Then banners rise, and cannon-signal roars, Then peals the warlike thunder of the drum, Thrills the loud fife, the trumpet-flourish pours, And patriot hopes awake, and doubts are dumb; Jeffery's Edwin. For bold in freedom's cause, the bands of ocean
For ever and anon when you have pass'd A few dull years in peace and propagation, The world is overstock'd with fools, and wants A pestilence at least if not a hero.
Scott's Vision of Don Roderick.
'Twas bustle in the court below, "Mount and march forward!" forth they go; Steeds neigh and trample all around, Steel rings, spears glimmer, trumpets sound. Scott's Rokeby Thus while they look'd, a flourish proud, Where mingled trump, and clarion loud, And fife, and kettle-drum, And war-pipe with discordant cry, And sackbut deep, and psaltery,
And cymbal clattering to the sky, Making wild music bold and high, Did up the mountain come.
The autumnal rains had beaten to the earth The unreap'd harvest, from the village church No eve-song-bell was heard, the shepherd's dog Prey'd on the scatter'd flock, for there was now No hand to feed him, and upon the hearth, Where he had slumber'd at his master's feet, The rank weed flourish'd.
Southey's Joan of Arc.
War is honourable
In those who do their native rights maintain; In those whose swords an iron barrier are Between the lawless spoiler and the weak; But is in those who draw the offensive blade For added power or gain, sordid and despicable As meanest office of the worldly churl.
Joanna Baillie's Ethwald.
O war! - what, what art thou?
At once the proof and scourge of man's fall'n state!
After the brightest conquest, what appears
Of all thy glories? for the vanquish'd, chains! For the proud victors, what? alas! to reign O'er desolated nations!
Hannah More's David and Goliah. While desolation, snatching from the hand Of time the scythe of ruin, sits aloft, Or stalks in dreadful majesty abroad.
Hannah More's Belshazzar. While men are what they are; while they have
I own my natural weakness; I have not Yet learn'd to think of indiscriminate murder Without some sense of shuddering; and the sight Of blood which spouts through hoary scalps is not To me a thing of triumph, nor the death Of men surpris'd, a glory.
Byron's Doge of Venice. What boots the oft-repeated tale of strife, The feast of vultures, and the waste of life? The varying fortune of each separate field, The fierce that vanquish, and the faint that yield? The smoking ruin and the crumbled wall? In this the struggle was the same with all!
Passions to be rous'd up; while rul'd by men; While all the powers and treasures of a land Are at the beck of the ambitious crowd; While injuries can be inflicted, or Insults be offer'd; yea, while rights are worth Maintaining, freedom keeping, or life having, So long the sword shall shine; so long shall war Continue, and the need of war remain.
A crash — as when some swollen cloud Cracks o'er the tangled trees! With side to side, and spar to spar, Whose smoking decks are these? I know Saint George's blood-red cross, Thou mistress of the seas,- But what is she, whose streaming bars Roll out before the breeze?
Desire of wine and all delicious drinks, Which many a famous warrior overturns, Thou could'st repress, nor did the dancing ruby Sparkling, out-pour'd, the flavour or the smell, Or taste that cheers the heart of gods and men, Allure thee from the cool crystalline stream. Milton's Samson Agonistes
Where fountain or fresh current flow'd
Against the eastern ray, translucent, pure, With torch etherial of heaven's fiery rod, I drank, from the clear milky juice allaying Thirst, and refreshed; nor envied them the grape,
Hark! that sudden blast of bugles! there the Whose heads that turbulent liquor fills with fumes.
There the Northern horses thunder, with the cannon at their heels.
Jesu, pity! how it thickens! now retreat, and now advance!
Right against the blazing cannon shivers Puebla's charging lance!
Down they go, the brave young riders; horse and foot together fall;
Milton's Samson Agonistes.
Bright, bright in many a rocky urn, The waters of our deserts lie.
Water, water, every where, And all the boards did shrink; Water, water, every where, Nor any drop to drink!
Like a ploughshare in the fallow, through them | Wine, wine, thy power and praise
ploughs the Northern ball.
Hath ever been echo'd in minstrel lays; Whittier's Poems. But water, I deem, hath a mightier claim To fill up a niche in the temple of Fame. Miss Eliza Cook. Traverse the desert, and then ye can tell What treasures exist in the cold deep well; Sink in despair on the red parch'd earth, And then ye may reckon what water is worth. Miss Eliza Cook.
O, war is cruel-hearted! ay, the man That in the private walks of life was kind, Even to the nursing mother's tender fears; Who started at a funeral knell and walk'd With slow, sad step, and sympathizing eye, When the hearse pass'd with one he never knew- Why he, when war's stern strength is on his soul, Will stalk in apathy o'er slaughter'd friends, Counting the dead and dying, as their loss Was all computed in the numbers slain.
Mrs. Hale's Ormond Grosvenor.
While this COLD WATER fills my cup, Duns dare not assail me;
Sheriffs shall not lock me up, Nor my neighbours bail me.
See what money can do: that can change Men's manners; alter their conditions! How tempestuous the slaves are without it! O thou powerful metal! what authority
John Pierpont. Is in thee! thou art the key to all men's Mouths: with thee, a man may lock up the jaws Of an informer; and without thee, he Cannot open the lips of a lawyer.
For the cool water we have quaff'd, Source of all Good, we owe thee much; Our lips have touch'd no burning draught This day, -nor shall they ever touch.
Why dost thou heap up wealth, which thou must quit,
Or what is worse, be left by it?
Why dost thou load thyself when thou 'rt to fly, Oh, man! ordain'd to die?
Why dost thou build up stately rooms on high, fall-Thou who art under ground to lie?
John Pierpont. Pour the bright lymph that Heaven itself let In one fair bumper let us toast them all!
O. W. Holmes. Joy smiles in the fountain, health flows in the rills, And the ribands of silver unwind from the hills; They breathe not the mist of the bacchanal's
But the lilies of innocence float on their streams. O. W. Holmes.
Thou sow'st and plantest, but no fruit must see, For death, alas! is reaping thee.
Men venture necks to gain a fortune: The soldier does it every day, (Eight to the week) for sixpence pay: Your pettifoggers damn their souls, To share with knaves in cheating fools: And merchants vent'ring through the main Slight pirates, rocks, and horns, for gain.
WEALTH. — (See also GOLD and RICHES.) T is virtue, wit, and worth, and all
That men divine and sacred call: For what is worth in any thing But so much money as 't will bring?
Love-passions are like parables, By which men still mean something else, Though love be all the world's pretence, Money's the mythologic sense;
The real substance of the shadow, Which all address and courtship's made to. Butler's Hudibras
'Tis not those orient pearls our teeth, That you are so transported with: But those we wear about our necks, Produce those amorous effects.
Butler's Hudibras What makes all doctrines plain and clear? About two hundred pounds a year, And that which was prov'd true before, Prove false again? two hundred more.
What makes y' encroach upon our trade, And damn all others?-to be paid.
Butler's Hudibras What makes the breaking of all oaths A holy duty?-food and clothes.
What's orthodox, and true believing Against a conscience? -a good living.
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