Part 42 (1/2)

Swift to the breach his comrades fly, ”Make way for liberty!” they cry, And through the Austrian phalanx dart, As rushed the spears through Arnold's heart.

While instantaneous as his fall, Rout, ruin, panic, seized them all; An earthquake could not overthrow A city with a surer blow.

Thus Switzerland again was free; Thus Death made way for Liberty!

JAMES MONTGOMERY.

LIFE, I KNOW NOT WHAT THOU ART.

Life! I know not what thou art.

But know that thou and I must part; And when, or how, or where we met, I own to me's a secret yet.

Life! we've been long together Through pleasant and through cloudy weather; Tis hard to part when friends are dear-- Perhaps 'twill cost a sigh, a tear; --Then steal away, give little warning, Choose thine own time; Say not Good Night,--but in some brighter clime Bid me Good Morning.

A.L. BARBAULD.

MERCY.

”Mercy,” an excerpt from ”The Merchant of Venice,” ”Polonius' Advice,”

from ”Hamlet,” and ”Antony's Speech,” from ”Julius Caesar” (all fragments from Shakespeare, 1564-1616), find a place in this book because a well-known New York teacher--one who is unremitting in his efforts to raise the good taste and character of his pupils--says: ”A book of poetry could not be complete without these extracts.”

The quality of mercy is not strain'd; It droppeth as the gentle rain from Heaven Upon the place beneath: it is twice bless'd; It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes: 'Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes The throned monarch better than his crown: His scepter shows the force of temporal power, The attribute to awe and majesty, Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings; But mercy is above his sceptered sway; It is enthroned in the hearts of kings, It is an attribute to G.o.d himself; And earthly power doth then show likest G.o.d's When mercy seasons justice.

SHAKESPEARE (”Merchant of Venice”).

POLONIUS' ADVICE.

See thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue, Nor any unproportion'd thought his act.

Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar: The friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel; But do not dull thy palm with entertainment Of each new-hatch'd, unfledg'd comrade. Beware Of entrance to a quarrel; but, being in, Bear 't that th' opposed may beware of thee.

Give every man thine ear, but few thy voice: Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgment.

Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy But not expressed in fancy; rich, not gaudy: For the apparel oft proclaims the man.

Neither a borrower nor a lender be; For loan oft loses both itself and friend, And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.

This above all: to thine own self be true; And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man.

SHAKESPEARE (”Hamlet”).

A FRAGMENT FROM MARK ANTONY'S SPEECH.

This was the n.o.blest Roman of them all: All the conspirators, save only he, Did that they did in envy of great Caesar; He only, in a general honest thought And common good to all, made one of them.

His life was gentle; and the elements So mix'd in him, that Nature might stand up, And say to all the world, ”This was a man!”

SHAKESPEARE (”Julius Caesar”).

THE SKYLARK.

Bird of the wilderness, Blithesome and c.u.mberless, Sweet be thy matin o'er moorland and lea!