But equity demandeth recompense; for high-place, calumny and care; For state, comfortless splendour eating out the heart of home;
For warrior fame, dangers and death; for a name among the learned, a spirit overstrained;
For honour of all kinds, the goad of ambition; on every acquirement, the tax of anxiety.
He that would change with another, must take the cup as it is mixed:
Poverty, with largeness of heart; or a full purse, with a sordid spirit:
Wisdom, in an ailing body; or a common mind with health :
Godliness, with man's scorn; or the welcome of the mighty, with guilt:
Beauty, with a fickle heart; or plainness of face, with affection.
For so hath Providence determined, that a man shall not easily discover
Unmingled good or evil, to quicken his envy or abhorrence.
A bold man or a fool must he be, who would change his lot with another; It were a fearful bargain, and mercy hath lovingly refused it ;
For we know the worst of ourselves, but the secrets of another we see not, And better is certain bad, than the doubt and dread of worse.
Just, and strong, and opportune is the moral rule of God;
Ripe in its times, firm in its judgments, equal in the measure of its gifts;
Yet men, scanning the surface, count the wicked happy:
Nor heed the compensating peace which gladdeneth the good in his afflictions.
They see not the frightful dreams that crowd a bad man's pillow,
Like wreathed adders crawling round his midnight conscience;
They hear not the terrible suggestions, that knock at the portal of his will,
Provoking to wipe away from life the one weak witness of the deed;
They know not the torturing suspicions that sting his panting breast,
When the clear eye of penetration quietly readeth off the truth.
Likewise of the good what know they? the memories bringing pleasure,
Shrined in the heart of the benevolent, and glistening from his eye;
The calm self-justifying reason that establisheth the upright in his purpose;
The warm and gushing bliss that floodeth all the thoughts of the religious.
Many a beggar at the cross-way, or gray-haired shepherd on the plain,
Hath more of the end of all wealth, than hundreds who multiply the means.
Moreover, a moral compensation reacheth to the secrecy of thought;
For if thou wilt think evil of thy neighbour, soon shalt thou have him for thy
And yet he may know nothing of the cause that maketh thee distasteful to his soul,
The cause of unkind suspicion, for which thou hast thy punishment:
And if thou think of him in charity, wishing or praying for his weal,
He shall not guess the secret charm that lureth his soul to love thee.
For just is retributive ubiquity: Samson did sin with Dalilah,
And his eyes and captive strength were forfeit to the Philistine:
Jacob robbed his brother, and sorrow was his portion to the grave:
David must fly before his foes, yea, though his guilt is covered:
And He, who seeming old in youth, (°) was marred for others' sin,
For every special crime must bear its special penalty:
By luxury, or rashness, or vice, the member that hath erred suffereth,
And therefore the Sacrifice for all was pained at every pore.
Alike to the slave and his oppressor cometh night with sweet refreshment, And half of the life of the most wretched is gladdened by the soothings of
Pain addeth zest unto pleasure, and teacheth the luxury of health:
There is a joy in sorrow, which none but a mourner can know ;
Madness hath imaginary bliss, and most men have no more;
Age hath its quiet calm, and youth enjoyeth not for haste;
Daily, in the midst of its beatitude, the righteous soul is vexed;
And even the misery of guilt doth attain to the bliss of pardon.
Who, in the face of the born-blind, ever looked on other than content?
And the deaf ear listeneth within to the silent music of the heart.
There is evil poured upon the earth from the overflowings of corruption,-
Sickness, and poverty, and pain, and guilt, and madness, and sorrow;
But, as the water from a fountain riseth and sinketh to its level,
Ceaselessly toileth justice to equalize the lots of men :
For, habit, and hope, and ignorance, and the being but one of a multitude,
And strength of reason in the sage, and dulness of feeling in the fool,
And the light elasticity of courage, and the calm resignation of meekness,
And the stout endurance of decision, and the weak carelessness of apathy,
And helps invisible but real, and ministerings not unfelt,
Angelic aid with worldly discomfiture, bodily loss with the soul's gain,
Secret griefs, and silent joys, thorns in the flesh, and cordials for the spirit,
(-Short of the insuperable barrier dividing innocence from guilt,-)
Go far to level all things, by the gracious rule of Compensation.
FACE thy foe in the field, and perchance thou wilt meet thy master,
For the sword is chained to his wrist, and his armour buckled for the battle;
But find him when he looketh not for thee, aim between the joints of his
And the crest of his pride will be humbled, his cruelty will bite the dust.
Beard not a lion in his den, but fashion the secret pitfall,
So shalt thou conquer the strong, thyself triumphing in weakness.
The hurricane rageth fiercely, and the promontory standeth in its might,
Breasting the artillery of heaven, as darts glance from the crocodile ;
But the small continual creeping of the silent footsteps of the sea
Mineth the wall of adamant, and stealthily compasseth its ruin.
The weakness of accident is strong, where the strength of design is weak:
And a casual analogy convinceth, when a mind beareth not argument.
Will not a man listen? be silent; and prove thy maxim by example:
Never fear, thou losest not thy hold, though thy mouth doth not render a
Contend not in wisdom with a fool, for thy sense maketh much of his conceit; And some errors never would have thriven, had it not been for learned
Yea, much evil hath been caused by an honest wrestler for truth,
And much of unconscious good, by the man that hated wisdom:
For the intellect judgeth closely, and if thou overstep thy argument,
Or seem not consistent with thyself, or fail in thy direct purpose,
The mind that went along with thee, shall stop and return without thee,
And thou shalt have raised a foe, where thou mightest have won a friend.
Hints, shrewdly strown, mightily disturb the spirit,
Where a barefaced accusation would be too ridiculous for calumny:
The sly suggestion toucheth nerves, and nerves contract the fronds,
And the sensitive mimosa of affection trembleth to its root;
And friendships, the growth of half a century, those oaks that laugh at
Have been cankered in a night by a worm, even as the prophet's gourd. Hast thou loved, and not known jealousy? for a sidelong look
Can please or pain thy heart more than the multitude of proofs:
Hast thou hated, and not learned that thy silent scorn
Doth deeper aggravate thy foe than loud-cursing malice ?—
A wise wise man prevaileth in power, for he screeneth his battering engine, But a fool tilteth headlong, and his adversary is aware.
Behold those broken arches, that oriel all unglazed,
That crippled line of columns bleaching in the sun,
The delicate shaft stricken midway, and the flying buttress
Idly stretching forth to hold up tufted ivy:
Thinkest thou the thousand eyes that shine with rapture on a ruin,
Would have looked with half their wonder on the perfect pile?
And wherefore not-but that light hints, suggesting unseen beauties,
Fill the complacent gazer with self-grown conceits?
And so, the rapid sketch winneth more praise to the painter,
Than the consummate work elaborated on his easel :
And so, the Helvetic lion caverned in the living rock
Hath more of majesty and force, than if upon a marble pedestal.
Tell me, daughter of taste, what hath charmed thine ear in music?
Is it the laboured theme, the curious fugue or cento,—
Nor rather the sparkles of intelligence flashing from some strange note, Or the soft melody of sounds far sweeter for simplicity?
Tell me, thou son of science, what hath filled thy mind in reading?
Is it the volume of detail where all is orderly set down,
And they that read may run, nor need to stop and think;
The book carefully accurate, that counteth thee no better than a fool,
Gorging the passive mind with annotated notes;—
Nor rather the half-suggested thoughts, the riddles thou mayest solve,
The fair ideas, coyly peeping like young loves out of roses,
The quaint arabesque conceptions, half cherub and half flower,
The light analogy, or deep allusion, trusted to thy learning,
The confidence implied in thy skill to unravel meaning mysteries?
For ideas are ofttimes shy of the close furniture of words,
And thought, wherein only is power, may be best conveyed by a suggestion;
The flash that lighteth up a valley, amid the dark midnight of a storm,
Coineth the mind with that scene sharper than fifty summers.
A worldly man boasteth in his pride that there is no power but of money: And he judgeth the characters of men by the differing measures of their
He stealeth all goodly names, as worth, and value, and substance,
Which be the ancient heritage of Virtue, but such an one ascribeth unto
He spurneth the needy sage, whose wisdom hath enriched nations,
And the sons of poverty and learning, without whom earth were a desert: Music, the soother of cares, the tuner of the dank discordant heart-strings, It is nought unto such an one but sounds, whereby some earn their living: The poem, and the picture, and the statue, to him seem idle baubles, Which wealth condescendeth to favour, to gain him the name of patron. But little wotteth he the might of the means his folly despiseth;
He considereth not that these be the wires which move the puppets of the world.
A sentence hath formed a character, () and a character subdued a
A picture hath ruined souls, or raised them to commerce with the skies:
The pen hath shaken nations, and stablished the world in peace;
And the whole full horn of plenty been filled from the vial of science.
He regardeth man as sensual, the monarch of created matter,
And careth not aught for mind, that linketh him with spirits unseen:
He feedeth his carcass and is glad, though his soul be faint and famished,
And the dull brute power of the body bindeth him a captive to himself.
Man liveth from hour to hour, and knoweth not what may happen;
Influences circle him on all sides, and yet must he answer for his actions,
For the being that is master of himself, bendeth events to his will,
But a slave to selfish passion is the wavering creature of circumstance.
To this man temptation is a poison, to that man it addeth vigour;
And each may render to himself influences good or evil.
As thou directest the power, harm or advantage will follow;
And the torrent that swept the valley, may be led to turn a mill;
The wild electric flash, that could have kindled comets,
May by the ductile wire give ease to an ailing child.
For outward matter or event, fashion not the character within,
But each man, yielding or resisting, fashioneth his mind for himself.
Some have said, What is in a name?-most potent plastic influence;
A name is a word of character, and repetition stablisheth the fact;
A word of rebuke, or of honour, tending to obscurity or fame;
And greatest is the power of a name, when its power is least suspected.
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