“If there be, indeed,
A shore where mind survives, ’twill be a mind
All unincorporate.”
We can bear the scorn of man, cold, selfish man, for there is something in the insolent boldness of his sneer, which nerves the heart to endurance, or wakes the slumber of revenge; but the contumely of those, from whose nature’s tenderness, we might have expected pity at least, disarms all resistance. It is as if the elements conspired against you; it sends through the heart a sort of “et tu Brute” feeling, which imparts to it a desperate resignation to fate; this, this burns the brand which shuts out the victim from the sympathy of his race! I once thought that the contempt of all—the ridicule of inferiors—the ingratitude of friends, had steeled my heart to the most cutting scorn; but I lived to learn that there was a chord, deep in the recesses, which could only be reached by the dextrous hand of her who was worshipped there with a whole soul’s devotion. Even her lip curled with disgust, as she turned contemptuously from me to listen to the voice of flattery. Censure her not—she is admired by all—she was never friendless—will she ever know how deep, how exhaustless is a rustic’s love? How often, as he has returned from gazing hours upon her who deigned him not one glance in return, has the heart of the clown flowed forth, if not in the spirit of poetry, at least with that of sincerity.
I gazed on thee, dear one, in the crowd of the gay,
And my long cherished hopes have floated away;
I gazed on thee, dear one,—a glance might have given
My bosom a hope like the martyr’s of heaven;
But the eye which could gladden, was chilling with scorn,
And a heart-nurtured rose is changed to a thorn.