With his hard eye the traitor in my breast, That before humbler intellects is cow'd, Silently shrinking from the common crowd, And only with the highest self-possest. ON AN INFANT.* LOOK on this babe; and let thy pride take heed, Thy pride of manhood, intellect, or fame, That thou despise him not: for he indeed, And such as he, in spirit and heart the same, Are God's own children in that kingdom bright Where purity is praise,-and where before The Father's throne, triumphant evermore, The ministering angels, sons of light, Stand unreproved; because they offer there, Mix'd with the Mediator's hallowing pray'r, The innocence of babes in Christ like this: O guardian Spirit, be my child thy care, Lead him to God, obedience and bliss, To God, O fostering cherub, thine and his! * William Knighton Tupper, the Author's second son. EPILOGUE. ARE there no sympathies, no loves between us? Hath seem'd self-praise,-doth it indeed demean us The quick spontaneous fire of thoughts and words, Which is my grace and glory to possess. THE old man he is dead, young heir! And gone to his long account; Come! stand on his hearth, and sit in his chair, The old man's face was a face to be fear'd, But thine both loving and gay; O, who would not choose for that stern white beard A bright young cheek alway? The old man he had outlived them all, But hundreds are wassailing now in the hall, The old man moaned both sore and long Of pleasures past, he said; But pleasures to come are the young heir's song, The living, not the dead! The old man babbled of old regrets. Alack! how much he owed; But the young heir has not a feather of debts His heart withal to load! |