And in her work of man, prefers not names
Of ancestors; she sometimes forms a piece
For admiration from the basest earth,
That holds a soul; and to a beggar's issue
Gives those perfections make a beauty up;
When purer moulds, polish'd and gloss'd with titles,
Honours and wealth bestow upon their bloods
Deform'd impressions, objects only fit
For sport or pity.
By viewing nature, nature's handmaid, art,
Makes mighty things from small beginnings grow
Thus fishes first to shipping did impart,
Their tail the rudder, and their head the prow.
Dryden's Annus Mirabilus.
How mean the order and perfection sought
In the best product of the human thought,
Compar'd to the great harmony that reigns
In what the spirit of the world ordains!
A frirer red stands blushing in the rose
Than that which on the bridegroom's vestment
flows,
Take but the humblest lily of the field,
And, if our pride will to our reason yield,
It must, by sure comparison, be shown
That on the regal seat great David's scn,
Array'd in all his robes and types of power,
Shines with less glory than that simple flower.
Prior's Soloman.
Who lives to nature rarely can be poor;
Who lives to fancy, never can be rich.
Young's Night Thoughts.
Man's rich with little, were his judgment true;
Nature is frugal, and her wants are few.
Young's Love of Fame.
All are but parts of one stupendous whole,
Whose body Nature is, and God the soul;
That, changed through all, is yet in all the same;
Great in the earth, as in the ethereal frame;
Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze,
Glows in the stars, and blossoms in the trees;
Lives through all life, extends through all extent;
Spreads undivided, operates unspent ;
Breathes in our soul, informs our mortal part,
As full, as perfect, in a hair as heart,
As full, as perfect, in vile man that mourns,
As the rapt seraph that adores and burns;
To him no high, no low, no great, no small;
He fills, he bounds, connects, and equals all.
Pope's Essay on Man.
See through this air, this ocean, and this earth,
All matter quick, and bursting into birth.
Above, how high! progressive life may go!
Around, how wide! how deep extend below!
Vast chain of being! which from God began,
Nature's ethereal, human, angel, man,
Beast, bird, fish, insect, what no eye can see,
No glass can reach, from infinite to thee,
From thee to nothing.
Pope's Essay on Man.
Who can paint
Like nature? can imagination boast,
Amid its gay creation, hues like her's?
Or can it mix them with that matchless skill,
And lose them in each other, as appears
In every bud that blows.
Nature! great parent! whose unceasing hand
Rolls round the seasons of the changeful year,
How mighty, how majestic, are thy works!
With what a pleasing dread they swell the soul!
That sees astonish'd! and astonish'd sings!
Thomson's Seasons
Who journeys homeward from a summer day's
Long labour, why, forgetful of his toils
And due repose, he loiters to behold
The sunshine gleaming as through amber clouds,
O'er all the western sky; full soon,
I ween,
His rude expression and untutor❜d airs,
Beyond the power of language, will unfold
The form of beauty smiling at his heart,
How lovely! how commanding!
Akenside's Pleasures of Imagination
Thus nature works as if to mock at art,
And in defiance of her rival powers;
By these fortuitous and random strokes
Performing such inimitable feats,
As she with all her rules can never reach.
Cowper's Task.
How oft upon yon eminence, our pace
Has slacken'd to a pause, and we have borne
The ruffling wind scarce conscious that it blew
While admiration feeding at the eye,
And still unsated, dwelt upon the scene!
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Liberal, not lavish, is kind nature's hand;
Nor was perfection made for man below.
Yet all her schemes with nicest art are plann'd,
Good counteracting ill, and gladness woe.
With gold and gems if Chilian mountains glow,
If bleak and barren Scotia's hills arise,
There plague and poison, lust and rapine grow;
Here peaceful are the vales, and pure the skies,
And freedom fires the soul, and sparkles in the
eyes.
Beattie's Minstrel.
O nature, how in every charm supreme!
Whose votaries feast on raptures ever new!
O for the voice and fire of seraphim,
To sing thy glories with devotion due!
Blest be the day I 'scaped the wrangling crew,
From Pyrrho's maze, and Epicurus' sty;
And held high converse with the godlike few,
Who to th' enraptur'd heart, and ear, and eye,
Teach beauty, virtue, truth, and love, and melody.
Beattie's Minstrel.
Nature makes her happy home with man
Where many a gorgeous flower is duly fed,
With its own rill, on its own spangled bed.
Coleridge. Where rose the mountains, there to him were friends;
Where roll'd the ocean, thereon was his home;
Where a blue sky, and glowing clime extends,
He had the passion and the power to roam;
The desert, forest, cavern, breaker's foam,
Were unto him companionship; they spake
A mutual language, clearer than the tome
Of his land's tongue, which he would oft forsake
For nature's pages glaz'd by sun-beams on the lake.
Byron's Childe Harold.
Live not the stars and mountains? are the waves
Without a spirit? are the dropping caves
Without a feeling in their silent tears?
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Not vainly did the early Persian make
His altar the high places and the peak
Of earth-o'er gazing mountains, and thus take
A fit and unwall'd temple, there to seek
The spirit, in whose honour shrines are weak,
Uprear'd of human hands. Come, and compare,
Columns and idol-dwellings, Goth or Greek,
With nature's realms of worship, carth and air,
Nor fix on fond abodes to circumscribe thy prayer!
Byron's Childe Harold.
'Tis nature's law
That none, the meanest of created things,
Of forms created the most vile and brutish
The dullest and most noxious, should exist
Divorc'd from good a spirit and pulse of good,
A life and soul to every mode of being
Inseparably link'd.
Nothing is lost on him who sees
Stretch'd in the shade of those old cedar-trees,
Watching the sunshine like a blessing fall, —
The breeze like music wandering o'er the boughs,
Each tree a natural harp,- each different leaf
A different note, blent in one vast thanksgiving.
Miss Landon.
Within the sun-lit forest,
Our roof the bright blue sky,
Where streamlets flow, and wild flowers blow,
We lift our hearts on high;
Our country's strength is bowing;
But, thanks to God, they can't prevent The lone wild-flower from blowing!
Oft have I listen'd to a voice that spake
Of cold and dull realities of life.
Deem we not thus of life; for we may fetch
Light from a hidden glory, which shall clothe
The meanest thing that is with hues of heaven.
Our light should be the broad and open day;
And as we lose its shining, we shall look
Still on the bright and daylight face of things.
Henry Alford.
Well I remember, in my boyish days,
How deep the feeling, when my eye look'd forth
On Nature, in her loveliness, and storms;
How my heart gladden'd, as the light of spring
Came from thee, with zephyrs and with showers,
Waking the earth to beauty, and the woods
To music, and the atmosphere blew,
Sweetly and calmly, with its breath of balm.
Percival's Poems
How patient Nature smiles at Fame!
The weeds that strew'd the victor's way, Feed on his dust to shroud his fame, Green where proudest towers decay.
If man would but his finer nature learn,
And not in life fantastic lose the sense
Of simpler things; could Nature's features stern
Teach him be thoughtful, then, with soul intense
I should not yearn for God to take me hence.
Dana's Poems.
If thou art worn and hard beset
With sorrows, that thou wouldst forget,
If thou wouldst read a lesson, that will keep
Thy heart from fainting, and thy soul from sleep,
Go to the woods and hills! no tears
Dim the sweet look that Nature wears.
Longfellow's Poems. Nature faint emblem of Omnipotence! Shap'd by His hand-the shadow of His lightThe veil in which He wraps His majesty,
Upon the paths of nature, and when all
Its voices whisper, and its silent things
Are breathing the deep beauty of the world.
Kneel at its simple altar, and the God,
Who hath the living waters, shall be there.
The book of nature, and the print
Give aye to me some lineament
Of beauty on the whispering sea,
Of what I have been taught to be.
My heart is harder, and perhaps
My manliness hath drunk up tears; And there's a mildew in the lapse
Of a few swift and chequer'd yearsBut nature's book is even yet With all my mother's lessons writ.
I thought the sparrow's note from heaven, Singing at dawn from the alder bough;
I brought him home, in his nest, at even; He sings the song, but it pleases not now,
And through whose mantling folds He deigns to For I did not bring home the river and sky;
Nature is man's best teacher. She unfolds
Her treasures to his search, unseals his eye, Illumes his mind, and purifies his heart,
He sang to my ear, they sang to my eye. Ralph Waldo Emerson,
The green earth sends its incense up
From every mountain shrine From every flower and dewy cup
That greeteth the sunshine. The mists are lifted from the rills,
Like the white wing of prayer;
An influence breathes from all the sights and They lean above the ancient hills,
As doing homage there. The forest-tops are lowly cast
O'er breezy hill and glen,
As if a prayerful spirit pass'd
O'er all the homes of men.
The clouds weep o'er the fallen world,
E'en as repentant love;
Ere, to the blessed breeze unfurl'd,
They fade in light above.
Whittier's Worship of Nature
NECESSITY.
Fatal necessity is never known,
Until it strike; and till that blow be come,
Who falls, is by false visions overthrown.
Lord Brooke's Mustapha
Mrs. Hale's Poems. To which the gods must yield; and I obey,
Till I redeem it by some glorious way.
Is this a time to be cloudy and sad,
When our mother Nature laughs around;
When even the blue deep heavens look glad,
And gladness blooms from the blossoming
ground?
Bryant's Poems.
Beaumont and Fletcher's False One. When fear admits no hope of safety, then Necessity makes dastards valiant men.
We will and act and talk of liberty;
And all our wills and all our doings both
Are limited within this little life.
Free will is but necessity in play, —
The clattering of the golden reins which guide
The thunder-footed coursers of the sun.
Bailey's Festus.
The ship which goes to sea inform'd with fire,—
Obeying only its own iron force,
Reckless of adverse tides, breeze dead, or weak
As infant's sporting breath, too faint to stir
The feather held before it, is as much
The appointed thrall of all the elements,
As the white-bosom'd bark which wooes the wind,
And when it dies desists. And thus with man;
However contrary he set his heart
To God, he is but working out His will,
And, at an infinite angle, more or less
Obeving his own soul's necessity.
What news, Lord Bardolph? every minute now
Should be the father of some stratagem:
The times are wild; contention, like a horse
Full of high feeding, madly hath broke loose,
And bears down all before him.
Shaks. Henry IV. Part II.
That of an hour's age doth hiss the speaker;
Each minute teems a new one.
There needs no ghost, my lord, come from the
grave,
To tell us this.
I saw a smith stand with his hammer, thus,
The whilst his iron did on the anvil cool,
With open mouth swallowing a tailor's news;
Who, with his shears and measure in his hand,
Standing on slippers (which his nimble haste
Had falsely thrust upon contrary feet);
Told of a many thousand warlike French,
That were embattled and rank'd in Kent:
Another lean unwash'd artificer
Cuts off his tale, and talks of Arthur's death.
Shaks. King John.
Let me speak, to the yet unknowing world,
How these things came about: so shall you hear
Of carnal, bloody, and unnatural acts;
Of accidental judgments, casual slaughters;
Of deaths put on by cunning, and forc'd cause;
And, in this upshot, purposes mistook
Fall'n on the inventors' heads: all this can I
Truly deliver.
The rabble gather round the man of news,
And listen with their mouths wide open; some
Tell, some hear, some judge of news, some make
it,
And he that lies most loud, is most believed.
Dryden's Spanish Friar.
Cat'racts of declamation thunder here:
There forests of no meaning spread the page,
In which all comprehension wanders lost:
While fields of pleasantry amuse us there
With merry descants on a nation's woes.
The rest appear a wilderness of strange
But gay confusion; roses for the cheeks,
And lilies for the brows of faded age,
Teeth for the toothless, ringlets for the bald,
Heaven, earth, and ocean, plunder'd of their sweels,
Nectareous essences, Olympian dews,
Sermons, and city feasts, and fav'rite alter,
Ethereal journeys, submarine exploits,
With news the time's in labour, and throws forth And Katerfelto, with his hair on end
At his own wonders, wond'ring for his bread.
Cowper's Task.
This folio of four pages, happy work;
Which not e'en critics criticise that holds
Inquisitive attention, while I read,
Fast bound in chains of silence, which the fair,
Though eloquent themselves, yet fear to break;
What is it but a map of busy life,
Its fluctuations, and its vast concerns?
Cowper's Task.
The news! our morning, noon, and evening cry,
Day after day repeats it till we die.
For this the cit, the critic, and the fop,
Dally the hour away in Tonsor's shop;
For this the gossip takes her daily route,
Now 'gan the noble Phœbus for to steep
His fiery face in billows of the west,
And his faint steeds watered in ocean deep,
Whiles from their journal labours they did rest.
Spenser's Fairy Queen
Who can express the horror of that night,
When darkness lent his robes to monster fear?
And heav'n's black mantle banishing the light
Made every thing in ugly form appear.
Brandon's Octavia.
Fair eldest child of love, thou spotless night!
Empress of silence, and the queen of sleep;
Who, with thy black cheek's pure complexion,
And wears your threshold and your patience out; Mak'st lovers' eyes enamour'd of thy beauty.
For this we leave the parson in the lurch,
And pause to prattle on our way to church;
Even when some coffin'd friend we gather round,
We ask-"what news?". then lay him in the
Sprague's Curiosity.
By this the drooping daylight 'gan to fade,
And yield his room to sad succeeding night,
Who with her sable mantle 'gan to shade
The face of earth and ways of living wight,
And high her burning torch set up in heaven
bright.
Spenser's Fairy Queen.
Grisly night, with visage deadly sad,
That Phoebus' cheerful face durst never view,
And in a foul black pitchy mantle clad,
She finds forthcoming from her darksome mew;
Where she all day did hide her hated hue;
Before the door her iron chariot stood
Already harnessed for a journey new;
And coal black-steeds yborne of hellish brood,
That on their rusty bits did champ as they were
Spenser's Fairy Queen.
But well I wot that to a heavy heart
Thou art the root and nurse of bitter cares,
Breeder of new, renewer of old smarts:
Instead of rest thou lendest railing tears,
Instead of sleep thou sendest troublous fears:
And dreadful visions, in the which alive
The dreary image of sad death appears:
So from the weary spirit thou dost drive
Desired rest, and men of happiness deprive.
Spenser's Fairy Queen.
Under thy mantle black there hidden lie,
Light-shaming theft, and traitorous intent,
Abhorred bloodshed, and vile felony,
Shameful deceit, and danger imminent,
Foul horror and eke hellish dreriment.
Spenser's Fairy Queen.
Now o'er the one half world Nature seems dead; and wicked dreams abuse The curtain'd sleep; now witchcraft celebrates Pale Hecate's offerings; and wither'd murder, Alarmed by his sentinel the wolf,
Whose howl's his watch, thus with his stealthy
The gaudy, babbling, and remorseful day
Is crept into the bosom of the sea;
And now loud-howling wolves arouse the jades
That drag the tragic melancholy night;
Who, with their drowsy, slow and flagging wings,
Clip dead men's graves, and from their misty jaws
Breathe foul contagious darkness in the air
Shaks. Henry VI. Part II.
Dark night, that from the eye his function takes,
The ear more quick of apprehension makes;
Wherein it doth impair the seeing sense,
It pays the hearing double recompense.
Shaks. Midsummer Night's Dream
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