ASPIRATION.
Oh! could I throw aside these earthly bands
That tie me down where wretched mortals sigh—
To join blest spirits in celestial lands!
To Laura in Death. PETRARCH.
Happy the heart that keeps its twilight hour,
And, in the depths of heavenly peace reclined,
Loves to commune with thoughts of tender power,—
Thoughts that ascend, like angels beautiful,
A shining Jacob's ladder of the mind!
Sonnet IX. P.H. HAYNE.
The desire of the moth for the star,
Of the night for the morrow,
The devotion to something afar
From the sphere of our sorrow.
To ——: One word is too often profaned. P.B. SHELLEY.
I held it truth, with him who sings
To one clear harp in divers tones,
That men may rise on stepping-stones
Of their dead selves to higher things.
In Memoriam, I. A. TENNYSON.