KNOWLEDGE.
Shall any teach God knowledge?—Job, xxi. 22.
He that teacheth man knowledge, shall not he know?
The Lord knoweth the thoughts of man, that they are vanity.—Psalm xciv. 10, 11.
Wise men lay up knowledge.—Proverbs, x. 14.
Many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.—Daniel, xii. 4.
According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue.—II. Peter, i. 3.
O Lord! in me there lieth nought,
But to Thy search revealed lies;
For when I sit
Thou markest it,
No less Thou notest when I rise;
Yea, closest closet of my thought
Hath open windows to Thine eyes.
Thou walkest with me when I walk,
When to my bed for rest I go,
I find Thee there,
And every where;
Not youngest thought in me doth grow,
No, not one word I cast to talk,
But yet unuttered thou dost know.
To shun Thy notice, leave Thine eye,
O whither might I take my way?
To starry sphere?
Thy throne is there.
To dead men’s undelightsome stay?
There is Thy walk, and there to lie
Unknown, in vain I should essay.
O sun! whom light nor flight can match,
Suppose Thy lightful, flightful wings
Thou lend to me,
And I could flee,
As far as Thee the evening brings;
Ev’n led to west He would me catch,
Nor should I lurk with western things.
Do thou thy best, O secret night
In sable vail to cover me;
The sable vail
Shall vainly fail:
With day unmask’d my night shall be:
For night is day, and darkness light,
O Father of all lights to Thee.
Countess of Pembroke.
Almighty Being,
Cause and support of all things, can I view
These objects of my wonder: can I feel
These fine sensations, and not think of Thee?
Thou who dost through th’eternal round of time,
Dost through th’ immensity of space exist
Alone, shalt Thou excluded be
From this Thy universe? Shall feeble man
Think it beneath his proud philosophy
To call for Thy assistance, and pretend
To frame a world, who cannot frame a clod?
Not to know Thee, is not to know ourselves—
Is to know nothing—worth the care
Of man’s exalted spirit.
Stillingfleet.
O for the coming of that glorious time
When, prizing knowledge as her noblest wealth
And best protection, this imperial realm,
While she exacts allegiance, shall admit
An obligation, on her part, to teach
Them who are born to serve her and obey;
Binding herself by statute to secure
For all the children whom her soil maintains,
The rudiments of letters, and inform
The mind with moral and religious truth,
Both understood and practised,—so that none,
However destitute, be left to droop
By culture unsustained; or run
Into a wild disorder: or be forced
To drudge through a weary life without the help
Of intellectual implements and tools;
A savage horde among the civilized,
A servile band among the lordly free.
Wordsworth.
What hast thou, Man, that thou dar’st call thine own?
What is there in thee, Man, that can be known?—
Dark fluxion, all unfixable by thought,
Vain sister of the worm,—life, death, soul, clod—
Ignore thyself, and strive to know thy God!
Coleridge.
What is true knowledge? is it with keen eye
Of lucre’s sons to thread the mazy way?
Is it of civil rights, and royal sway,
And wealth political, the depth to try?
Is it to delve the earth, to soar the sky?
To marshal nations, tribes in just array;
To mix, and analyze, and mete, and weigh
Her elements, and all her powers descry?
These things, who will may know them, if to know
Breed not vain glory; but, o’er all, to scan
God in His works, and word shown forth below,
Creation’s wonders; and Redemption’s plan
Whence came we; what to do, and whither go;
This is true knowledge, and the whole of man.
Bishop Mant.
Let him stand who will on the giddy height
Of the palace-top in his pride of place!
In a humbler home may my heart delight,
Where my couch is low, and my pillow,—peace.
Be it known to few how my life flows on,
As I silent sail on its noiseless tide!
When its days and years are expired and gone,
Let my record be that,—I lived and died!
For sadly he meets the stroke of death,
(At the ends of earth though his name be known,)
Who laments, when yielding his final breath,
That he’s known to all but himself alone.
Mordaunt Barnard.
View all around the works of Power Divine,
Inquire, explore, admire, extol, resign;
This is the whole of human kind below;
’Tis only given beyond the grave to know.
W. Hamilton.
Who loves not knowledge? who shall rail
Against her beauty? May she mix
With men and prosper! Who shall fix
Her pillars? Let her work prevail.
But on her forehead sits a fire;
She sets her forward countenance,
And leaps into the future chance,
Submitting all things to desire.
Half-grown as yet, a child, and vain,
She cannot fight the fear of death.
What is she, cut from love and faith,
But some wild Pallas from the brain
Of Demons? fiery hot to burst
All barriers in her onward race
For power. Let her know her place,
She is the second, not the first.
A higher hand must make her mild,
If all be not in vain; and guide
Her footsteps moving side by side
With wisdom, like the younger child.
For she is earthly of the mind,
But wisdom heavenly of the soul.
O friend, who earnest to thy goal
So early, leaving me behind,
I would the great world grew like thee,
Who grewest not alone in power
And knowledge, but from hour to hour
In reverence and in charity.
Tennyson.
Knowledge holdeth by the hilt, and heweth out a road to conquest;
Ignorance graspeth the blade, and is wounded by its own good sword.
Knowledge distilleth health from the virulence of opposite poisons;
Ignorance mixeth wholesomes unto the breeding of disease.
Knowledge is leagued with the universe, and findeth a friend in all things;
But ignorance is everywhere a stranger, unwelcome, ill at ease, and out of place.
M. F. Tupper.