For her angel face is lustrous and beloved, even as the moon in heaven. Therefore is she kind unto her kin, yearning in affection on her neighbours, But the counterfeit of charity, an hypocrite of earth, not a grace of heaven, Seeketh not to bless at home, for her nearer aspect is ill-favoured : nerefote hideth she for shame, counting that pride humility, nd none of those around her hearth are gladdened by her gifts: Rather, with an overreaching zeal, flingeth she her bounty to the stranger, And scattered prodigalities abroad compensate for meanness in her home; For benefits showered on the distant shine in unmixed beauty, So that even she may reap their undiscerning praise : Therefore native want hath pined, where foreign need was fattened; Woman been crushed by the tyrannous hand that upheld the flag of liberality; Poverty been prisoned up and starved by hearts that are maudlin upon crime And freeborn babes been manacled by men who liberate the sturdy slave. Policy counselleth a gift, given wisely and in season, And policy afterward approveth it, for great is the influence of gifts. The lover, unsmiled upon before, is welcomed for his jewelled bauble; The righteous cause without a fee must yield to bounteous guilt : How fair is a man in thine esteem whose just discrimination seeketh thee, And so, discerning merit, honoureth it with gifts! Yea, let the cause appear sufficient, and the motive clear and unsuspicious, As given unto one who cannot help, or proving honest thanks, There liveth not one among a million who is proof against the charm ol liberality, And flattery, that boon of praise, hath power with the wisest. Man is of three natures, craving all for charity: t is not enough to give him meats, withholding other comfort; For the mind starveth, and the soul is scorned, and so the human animal Sympathy sank into his soul, and the pitied one felt happier : Anou passed by a cavalcade, children of wealth and gayety ; They laughed and looked upon the beggar, and the gallants flung him Fold; He, poor spirit-humbled wretch, gathered up their givings with a curse And went to share it with his brother, the beggar who had pitied him' OF BEAUTY. THOU mightier than Manoah's son, whence is thy great strength, Folly's shallow lip can ask the deepest question, And many wise in many words should answer, what is beauty? For beauty is intangible, vague, ill to be defined: She hath the coat of a chameleon, changing while we watch it. A glistening robe of mingled mesh, that may not be unravelled. A coat of many colours, running curiously together. There is threefold beauty for man; twofold beauty for the animal; Yea, from the worst in favour shineth out a fitness of design, For the great Creator's seal is set to all his works; Its quarterings are Attributes of praise, and all the shield is beauty. And the universal family of life goeth in the colours of its Lord; But each one, as a several son, shall bear those arms with a difference: Beauty various in phase, and similar in seeming oppositions. The coins of old Rome were struck with a diversity for each, Barely two be found alike in every Cæsar's image: So, note thou the seals, ranged around the charters of the Universe, variety. Beauty, theme of innocence, how may guilt discourse thee? Let holy angels sing thy praise, for man hath marred thy visage. Still, the maimed torso of a Theseus can gladden taste with its proportions. For beauty hideth every where, that Reason's child may seek her, Beauty nestleth in the rosebud, or walketh the firmament with planets, the sun; The cheek of the peach is glowing with her smile, her splendour biazeth in the lightning, She is the dryad of the woods, the naiad of the streams; She, with the might of a Briareus, is dragging down the clouds upon the mountain, Men look upon the grandeur,—and lo, it is excellent in glory. For I judge that beauty and sublimity be but the lesser and the great, It were a lowering thought to expound sublimity by dread. And careless men, at summer's eve, have loved the dimpled waves; Dost thou nothing know of this,—to be awed at woman's beauty? Show me an enthusiast in aught; he hath noted one thing narrowly; And lo, his keenness hath detected the one dear hiding-place of beauty. Then he boasteth, simple soul, flattered by discovery, Fancying that no science else can show so fair and precious: He hath found a ray of light, and cherisheth the treasure in his closet, Exclusive thought is all the cause of this particular zeal. From the waking minute of a chrysalis to the perfect cycle of chronology From the kingfisher's shrill note to the cataract's thundering bass, From the greensward's grateful hues to the fascinating eye of woman. Beauty, various in all things, setteth up her home in each, Shedding graciously around an omnipresent smile. There is beauty in the rolling clouds, and placid shingle beach, There is beauty in the gullies, beauty on the cliffs, beauty in sun and shade, In rocks and rivers, seas and plains,-the earth is drowned in beauty. Beauty coileth with the water-snake, and is cradled in the shrewmouse's nest, She Pitteth out with evening bats, and the soft mole hid her in his tunnel; The limpet is encamped upon the shore, and beauty not a stranger to hi tent; The silvery dace and golden carp thread the rushes with her: She saileth into clouds with an eagle, she fluttereth into tulips with a humming-bird; The pasturing kine are of her company, and she prowleth with the leopard in his jungle. Moreover, for the reasonable world, its words, and acts, and speculation, For frail and fallen manhood, in every work and way Beauty, wrecked and stricken, lingereth still among us, And morsels of that shattered sun are dropt upon the darkness. Beauty is as crystal in the torchlight, sparkling on the poet's page; She is seen in the tear of sorrow, and heard in the exuberance of mirth; disease. Science, in his secret laws, hath found out latent beauty, Sphere and square, and cone and curve, are fashioned by her rules: Beauty is dependence in the babe, a toothless tender nursling; |