There are who ask not if thine eye
Be on them; who, in love and truth,
Where no misgiving is, rely

Upon the genial sense of youth:
Glad Hearts! without reproach or blot,
Who do thy work, and know it not:
O, if through confidence misplaced

They fail, thy saving arms, dread Power! around them cast.

Serene will be our days and bright,

And happy will our nature be,

When love is an unerring light,
And joy its own security.

And they a blissful course may hold
Even now, who, not unwisely bold,

Live in the spirit of this creed;

Yet seek thy firm support, according to their need.

I, loving freedom, and untried;
No sport of every random gust,
Yet being to myself a guide,

Too blindly have reposed my trust:
And oft, when in my heart was heard

Thy timely mandate, I deferred

The task, in smoother walks to stray;

But thee I now would serve more strictly, if I may.

Through no disturbance of my soul,

Or strong compunction in me wrought,
I supplicate for thy control;
But in the quietness of thought:
Me this unchartered freedom tires;
I feel the weight of chance-desires;

My hopes no more must change their name,
I long for a repose that ever is the same.

Stern Lawgiver! yet thou dost wear
The Godhead's most benignant grace;
Nor know we anything so fair

As is the smile upon thy face:

ANT ROYAL OF HIGH VIRTUE

o lives in suit of armor pent,
nd hides himself behind a wall,
him is not the great event,
he garland, nor the Capitol.
is God's guerdon less than they?
7, moral man, I tell thee Nay:
shall the flaming forts be won
sneaking negatives alone,

y Lenten fast or Ramazan,
by the challenge proudly thrown--
irtue is that beseems a Man!

, in his Palace resident
of Bliss, beheld our sinful ball,
charged His own Son innocent
Us to redeem from Adam's fall.
Yet must it be that men Thee slay."
Yea, though it must, must I obey,"
d Christ, and came, His royal Son,
die, and dying to atone

For harlot and for publican.
ad on that rood He died upon~~
Virtue is that beseems a Man!

And by that rood where He was bent
I saw the world's great captains all
Go riding to the tournament-

Cyrus the Great and Hannibal,
Cæsar of Rome and Attila,
Lord Charlemagne and his array,
Lord Alisaundre of Macedon-
With flaming lance and habergeon
They passed, and to the rataplan
Of drums gave salutation—

Virtue is that beseems a Man!

Had tall Achilles lounged in tent

For aye, and Xanthus neighed in stall,
The towers of Troy had ne'er been shent,
Nor stayed the dance in Priam's hall.
Bend o'er thy book till thou be gray,
Read, mark, perpend, digest, survey—
Instruct thee deep as Solomon—
One only chapter thou shalt con,

One lesson learn, one sentence scan,

One title and one colophon

Virtue is that beseems a Man!

High Virtue's hest is eloquent

With spur and not with martingall:

Sufficeth not thou'rt continent:

BE COURTEOUS, BRAVE, AND LIBERAL. God fashioned thee of chosen clay

For service, nor did ever say

“Deny thee this,"

""Abstain from yon,"

Save to inure thee, thew and bone,

To be confirmèd of the clan That made immortal MarathonVirtue is that beseems a Man!

ENVOY

Young Knight, the lists are set to-day:
Hereafter shall be long to pray

In sepulture with hands of stone.
Ride, then! outride the bugle blown!

The Splendid Spur

And gaily dinging down the van arge with a cheer-Set on! Set on! Virtue is that beseems a Man!

Arthur T. Quiller-Couch [1863

2819

THE SPLENDID SPUR

on the neck of prince or hound, or on a woman's finger twined, gold from the deriding ground eep sacred that we sacred bind: Only the heel

Of splendid steel

hall stand secure on sliding fate,
Then golden navies weep their freight.

scarlet hat, the laureled stave

re measures, not the springs, of worth; wife's lap, as in a grave,

Ian's airy notions mix with earth.

Seek other spur

Bravely to stir

'he dust in this loud world, and tread lp-high among the whispering dead.

st in thyself, then spur amain: o shall Charybdis wear a grace, n Ætna laugh, the Libyan plain ake roses to her shriveled face. This orb-this round

Of sight and sound

ount it the lists that God hath built

or haughty hearts to ride a-tilt.

Arthur T. Quiller-Couch [1863

THE TRANSCENDENTALISTS

CONSCIENCE

From "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers

CONSCIENCE is instinct bred in the house,
Feeling and Thinking propagate the sin
By an unnatural breeding in and in.
I say, Turn it out of doors,

Into the moors.

I love a life whose plot is simple,

And does not thicken with every pimple,

A soul so sound no sickly conscience binds it,

That makes the universe no worse than 't finds it.

I love an earnest soul,

Whose mighty joy and sorrow

Are not drowned in a bowl,

And brought to life to-morrow;
That lives one tragedy,
And not seventy;

A conscience worth keeping,

Laughing not weeping;

A conscience wise and steady,

And forever ready;

Not changing with events,
Dealing in compliments;

A conscience exercised about

Large things, which one may doubt.
I love a soul not all of wood,

Predestined to be good,

But true to the backbone

Unto itself alone,

And false to none;

Born to its own affairs,

Its own joys and own cares;

By whom the work which God begun

Is finished, and not undone;