SLEEP AND THE MONARCH
(FROM "2 HENRY IV.")
The great elemental blessings cannot be "cornered." Indeed they cannot be bought at all, but are the natural property of the man whose ways of life are such as to retain them. In this passage a disappointed and harassed king comments on the slumber which he cannot woo to his couch, yet which his humblest subject enjoys.
How many thousand of my poorest subjects
Are at this hour asleep! O sleep! O gentle sleep!
Nature's soft nurse, how have I frighted thee,
That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down
And steep my senses in forgetfulness?
Why rather, sleep, liest thou in smoky cribs,
Upon uneasy pallets stretching thee,
And hushed with buzzing night-flies to thy slumber,
Than in the perfumed chambers of the great,
Under the canopies of costly state,
And lulled with sound of sweetest melody?
O thou dull god! why liest thou with the vile
In loathsome beds, and leav'st the kingly couch
A watch-case or a common 'larum bell?
Wilt thou upon the high and giddy mast
Seal up the ship-boy's eyes, and rock his brains
In cradle of the rude imperious surge,
And in the visitation of the winds,
Who take the ruffian billows by the top,
Curling their monstrous heads, and hanging them
With deafning clamor in the slippery clouds,
That with the hurly death itself awakes?
Canst thou, O partial sleep! give thy repose
To the wet sea-boy in an hour so rude,
And in the calmest and most stillest night,
With all appliances and means to boot,
Deny it to a king? Then, happy low, lie down!
Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.
William Shakespeare.
NEVER TROUBLE TROUBLE
To borrow trouble is to contract a debt that any man is better without. If your troubles are not borrowed, they are not likely to be many or great.
I used to hear a saying
That had a deal of pith;
It gave a cheerful spirit
To face existence with,
Especially when matters
Seemed doomed to go askew,
'Twas Never trouble trouble
Till trouble troubles you.
Not woes at hand, those coming
Are hardest to resist;
We hear them stalk like giants,
We see them through a mist.
But big things in the brewing
Are small things in the brew;
So never trouble trouble
Till trouble troubles you.
Just look at things through glasses
That show the evidence;
One lens of them is courage,
The other common sense.
They'll make it clear, misgivings
Are just a bugaboo;
No more you'll trouble trouble
Till trouble troubles you.