Through the listening night,
With mysterious flight,
Pass those winged intimations:
Like stars shot from heaven, their still voices fall to me;
Far and departing, they signal and call to me,
Strangely beseeching me,
Chiding, yet teaching me
Patience.
Then at times, oh! at times,
To their luminous climes
I pursue as a swallow!
To the river of Peace, and its solacing shades,
To the haunts of my lost ones, in heavenly glades,
With strong aspirations
Their pinions' vibrations
I follow.
O heart, be thou patient!
Though here I am stationed
A season in durance,
The chain of the world I will cheerfully wear;
For, spanning my soul like a rainbow, I bear,
With the yoke of my lowly
Condition, a holy
Assurance,—
That never in vain
Does the spirit maintain
Her eternal allegiance:
Through suffering and yearning, like Infancy learning
Its lesson, we linger; then skyward returning,
On plumes fully grown
We depart to our own
Native regions!
CLEMENCY AND COMMON SENSE.
A CURIOSITY OF LITERATURE; WITH A MORAL.
Instabile est regnum quod non elementia firmat.
Incidis in Scyllam, cupiens vitare Charybdim.
Here are two famous verses, both often quoted, and one a commonplace of literature. That they have passed into proverbs attests their merit both in substance and in form. Something more than truth is needed for a proverb. And so also something more than form is needed. Both must concur. The truth must be expressed in such a form as to satisfy the requirements of art.