And in the after-silence sweet,
Now strife is hush'd, our ears doth meet, Ascending pure, the bell-like fame, Of this or that down-trodden name, Delicate spirits, push'd away
In the hot-press of the noon-day.
And o'er the plain, where the dead age Did its now silent warfare wage,-
O'er that wide plain, now wrapt in gloom, Where many a splendour finds its tomb, Many spent fames and fallen mights,- The one or two immortal lights, Rise slowly up into the sky To shine there everlastingly, Like stars over the bounding hill. The epoch ends, the world is still.
THUNDERING and bursting In torrents, in waves,- Carolling and shouting Over tombs, amid graves,— See on the cumber'd plain Clearing a stage, Scattering the past about, Comes the new age! Bards make new poems, Thinkers new schools,
Statesmen new systems,
All things begin again;
Life is their prize;
Earth with their deeds they fill,
Fill with their cries !-Matthew Arnold.
102. AGE. Accompaniments of
I HAVE lived long enough: my way of life Is fall'n into the sear, the yellow leaf: And that which should accompany old age, As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends, I must not look to have.-Shakespeare.
SIX years had pass'd, and forty ere the six, When Time began to play his usual tricks ; The locks once comely in a virgin's sight, Locks of pure brown, display'd the encroaching white;
The blood, once fervid, now to cool began, And Time's strong pressure to subdue the man. I rode or walk'd as I was wont before, But now the bounding spirit was no more;
A moderate pace would now my body heat, A walk of moderate length distress my feet. I show'd my stranger guest those hills sublime, But said, 'The view is poor, we need not climb.' At a friend's mansion I began to dread The cold neat parlour, and the gay glazed bed; At home I felt a more decided taste,
And must have all things in my order placed. I ceased to hunt; my horses pleased me less, My dinner more; I learn'd to play at chess. I took my dog and gun, but saw the brute Was disappointed that I did not shoot. My morning walks I now could bear to lose, And bless'd the shower that gave me not to choose. In fact, I felt a languor stealing on;
The active arm, the agile hand, were gone; Small daily actions into habits grew,
And new dislike to forms and fashions new. I loved my trees in order to dispose;
I number'd peaches, look'd how stocks arose ; Told the same story oft,-in short, began to prose. Crabbe.
So mayst thou live, till, like ripe fruit, thou drop Into thy mother's lap; or be with ease Gather'd, not harshly pluck'd.— Milton.
So peaceful shalt thou end thy blissful days, And steal thyself from life by slow decays.-Pope. The remnant of his days he safely past,
Nor found they lagg'd too slow, nor flew too fast; He made his wish with his estate comply, Joyful to live, yet not afraid to die.—Prior.
An age that melts in unperceived decay, And glides in modest innocence away.
YOUTH no less becomes
The light and careless livery that it wears, Than settled age his sables and his weeds, Importing health and graveness.-Shakespeare.
I know thee not, old man : fall to thy prayers: How ill white hairs become a fool and jester! Shakespeare.
Now leave these joys, unsuiting to thy age, To a fresh comer, and resign the stage.-Dryden. You season still with sports your serious hours, For age but tastes of pleasures, youth devours. Dryden.
Learn to live well, or fairly make your will; You've play'd, and loved, and ate, and drank your fill:
Walk sober off before a sprightlier age
Comes tittering on, and shoves you from the stage: Leave such to trifle with more grace and ease, Whom folly pleases, and whose follies please.-Pope.
Those trifles wherein children take delight Grow nauseous to the young man's appetite ; And from those gaieties our youth requires To exercise their minds, our age retires.
AGE sits with decent grace upon his visage, And worthily becomes his silver locks;
AND may at last my weary age Find out the peaceful hermitage, The hairy gown and mossy cell, Where I may sit and rightly spell Of every star that heaven doth show And every herb that sips the dew; Till old experience do attain
To something like prophetic strain. -Milton.
The seas are quiet when the winds are o'er ; So calm are we when passions are no more! For then we know how vain it is to boast Of fleeting things, so certain to be lost. Clouds of affection from our younger eyes Conceal that emptiness which age descries: The soul's dark cottage, batter'd and decay'd, Lets in new light through chinks that time has made. Stronger by weakness, wiser men become
As they draw near to their eternal home; Leaving the old, both worlds at once they view, That stand upon the threshold of the new.-Waller.
'Tis the sunset of life gives me mystical lore, And coming events cast their shadows before. Campbell.
112. AGE. Youth and
WHEN I was young! Ah, woeful When ! Ah, for the change 'twixt Now and Then! This breathing house, not built with hands, This body, that does me grievous wrong, O'er airy cliffs and glittering sands How lightly then it flash'd along! Like those trim skiffs, unknown of yore, On winding lakes and rivers wide,
That ask no aid of sail or oar, That fear no spite of wind or tide.
Nought cared this body for wind or weather, When Youth and I lived in't together.
Ere I was old! Ah, woeful Ere! Which tells me Youth's no longer here. Oh Youth! For years so many and sweet 'Tis known that thou and I were one: I'll think it but a fond conceit; It cannot be that thou art gone! Thy vesper bell hath not yet toll'd; And thou wert aye a masker bold. What strange disguise hast now put on, To make believe that thou art gone? I see these locks in silvery slips, This drooping gait, this alter'd size; But springtide blossoms on thy lips, And tears take sunshine from thine eyes! Life is but thought; so think I will That Youth and I are house-mates still. Dew-drops are the gems of morning, But the tears of mournful eve, Where no hope is, life's a warning That only serves to make us grieve,
That only serves to make us grieve With oft and tedious taking leave; Like some poor nigh-related guest That may not rudely be dismiss'd, Yet hath outstay'd his welcome while,
And tells the jest without the smile.-Coleridge.
113. AGED. Absurdities of the
O MY coevals! remnants of ourselves!
Poor human ruins tottering o'er the grave! Shall we, shall aged men, like aged trees, Strike deeper their vile root, and closer cling, Still more enamour'd of this wretched soil! Shall our pale, wither'd hands be still stretch'd out, Trembling, at once, with eagerness and age? With avarice, and convulsions, grasping hard? Grasping at air; for what has earth beside? Man wants but little; nor that little long; How soon must he resign his very dust, Which frugal nature lent him for an hour!-Young.
Absurd longevity! More, more, it cries; More life, more wealth, more trash of every kind. And wherefore mad for more, when relish fails? Object and appetite must club for joy- Baubles, I mean, that strike us from without. Shall folly labour hard to mend the bow, While Nature is relaxing every string?
Ask thought for joy: grow rich, and hoard within. Think you the soul, when this life's rattles cease, Has nothing of more manly to succeed? Contract the taste immortal; learn e'en now To relish what alone subsists hereafter. Divine or none, henceforth, your joys for ever.
Of age, the glory is to wish to die : That wish is praise and promise; it applauds Past life, and promises our future bliss. What weakness see not children in their sires! Grand-climacterical absurdities!
Grey-hair'd authority, to faults of youth, How shocking! it makes folly thrice a fool; And our first childhood might our last despise. Peace and esteem is all that age can hope: Nothing but wisdom gives the first; the last Nothing but the repute of being wise. Folly bars both our age is quite undone.
What folly can be ranker? Like our shadows, Our wishes lengthen as our sun declines. No wish should loiter, then, this side the grave. Our hearts should leave the world before the knell Calls for our carcasses to mend the soil: Enough to live in tempest, die in port. Age should fly concourse, cover in retreat Defects of judgment, and the will subdue; Walk thoughtful on the silent, solemn shore Of that vast ocean it must sail so soon,
And put good works on board, and wait the wind That shortly blows us into worlds unknown: If unconsider'd, too, a dreadful scene!— Young.
114. AGED. Afflictions and Infirmities of the
THE sixth age shifts Into the lean and slipper'd pantaloon; With spectacles on nose, and pouch on side, His youthful hose well saved, a world too wide For his shrunk shank; and his big manly voice, Turning again towards childish treble, pipes And whistles in his sound.—Shakespeare.
That ends this strange eventful history, Is second childishness, and mere oblivion; Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything. Shakespeare.
And sedentary numbness, craze my limbs To a contemptible old age obscure.-Milton. To what can I be useful, wherein serve, But to sit idle on the household hearth,
A burd'nous drone, to visitants a gaze?-Milton.
Thou must outlive Thy youth, thy strength, thy beauty, which will change
To wither'd, weak, and grey.-Milton.
Behold where age's wretched victim lies,
See his head trembling, and his half-closed eyes,
AGE, like ripe apples, on earth's bosom drops; While force our youth, like fruits, untimely crops.
117. AGED. Death Song for the IN age and feebleness extreme Who shall a sinful worm redeem? Jesus, my only hope Thou art, Strength of my failing flesh and heart; Oh, could I catch a smile from Thee, And drop into eternity!-Charles Wesley.
118. AGED. Example of the
OUR green youth copies what grey sinners act, When age commends the fact.-Dryden.
119. AGED. Flattery of the
HERE is one that wishes to live longer; Feels not his gout, nor palsy ; feigns himself Younger by scores of years; flatters his age With confident belying, with hopes he may With charms, like Eson, have his youth restored; And with those thoughts so battens, as if fate Would be as easily cheated on as he.-Ben Jonson.
120. AGED. Happiness of the
BEHOLD a patriarch of years, who leaneth on the staff of religion;
Lofty aspirations, deep affections, holy hopes, are his delight;
His abhorrence is to strip from life its charitable garment of ideal.
The shrewd world laughed at him for honesty, the vain world mouthed at him for honour, The false world hated him for truth, the cold world despised him for affection.
Still he kept his treasure, the warm and noble heart, And in that happy old man survive the child and lover.-Tupper.
121. AGED. Hope in the
OLD husbandmen I at Sabinum know, Who for another year dig, plough, and sow;
For never any man was yet so old,
But hoped his life one winter more would hold. Denham.
Fresh hopes are hourly sown
In furrow'd brows: To gentle life's descent, We shut our eyes, and think it is a plain : We take fair days in winter for the spring; And turn our blessings into bane. - Young.
127. AGRICULTURE. Treasure of
A VINTNER at the point of death, Spake to his sons with parting breath : 'A treasure in our vineyard lies. Dig for it!'-'Say, where is the prize?' Aloud they to their father cried. 'Dig, dig!' he said, when lo! he died.
Ere in his grave he long had lain,
They search'd and dug with might and main. With spade, and mattock, and with hoe The vineyard o'er and o'er they throw. No clod escaped their zealous toil, E'en through a sieve they pass'd the soil, And drew the rakes across, around, For ev'ry stone upon the ground; But of the treasure saw no trace; Each thought 'twas but a wild-goose chase. But scarce the sun its yearly round Had made, when they with wonder found Each vine-tree bore a three-fold prize. Then grew, at length, the children wise, And, year on year revolving round, Dug greater treasures from the ground. Gottfried August Bürger.
128. AIM. The Christian's
AIM at the highest prize; if there thou fail, Thou'lt haply reach to one not far below. Strive first the goal to compass: if too slow Thy speed, the attempt may ne'ertheless avail The next best post to conquer. Let not quail
Eye, heart, or limb: but still right onward go; The Judge shall heed thee, and a crown bestow, And bid thy name the loud-voiced herald hail. To the wish'd mark one racer only came
Of old victorious: to intwine his brow One only grasp'd the crown, and won the game, Isthmian or proud Olympian. Happier thou Pursu'st thy course with no uncertain aim, Secure to seize an amaranthine bough.-Mant.
129. ALLOTMENT. Diversities of
ANOTHER feature in the ways of God,
That wondrous seem'd, and made some men complain,
Was the unequal gift of worldly things. Great was the difference, indeed, of men Externally, from beggar to the prince. The highest take, and lowest-and conceive The scale between. A noble of the earth, One of its great, in splendid mansion dwelt ;
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