POETRY.

By poetry we mean the art of employing words in such a manner as to produce an illusion on the imagination; the art of doing by means of words, what the painter does by means of colors.-Macaulay.

Truth shines the brighter clad in verse.Pope.

Poetry reveals to us the loveliness of nature, brings back the freshness of youthful feeling, revives the relish of simple pleasures, keeps unquenched the enthusiasm which warmed the spring-time of our being, refines youthful love, strengthens our interest in human nature, by vivid delineations of its tenderest and softest feelings, and, through the brightness of its prophetic visions, helps faith to lay hold on the future life.-Channing.

Poetry is the sister of sorrow; every man that suffers and weeps, is a poet; every tear is a verse; and every heart a poem. Andre.

It is a shallow criticism that would define poetry as confined to literary productions in rhyme and metre. The written poem is only poetry talking, and the statue, the picture, and the musical composition are poetry acting. Milton and Goethe, at their desks, were not more truly poets than Phidias with his chisel, Raphael at his easel, or deaf Beethoven bending over his piano, inventing and producing strains which he himself could never hope to hear.-Ruskin.

Poetry, good sir, in my opinion, is like a tender virgin, very young, and extremely beautiful, whom divers other virginsnamely, all the other sciences-make it their business to enrich, polish, and adorn; and to her it belongs to make use of them all, and on her part to give a lustre to them all.-Cervantes.

Poetry and consumption are the most flattering of diseases.-Shenstone.

A poet ought not to pick nature's pocket. Let him borrow, and so borrow as to repay by the very act of borrowing. Examine nature accurately, but write from recollection, and trust more to the imagination than the memory.-Coleridge.

Poets utter great and wise things which they do not themselves understand.— Plato.

An artist that works in marble or colors has them all to himself and his tribe, but the man who moulds his thoughts in verse has to employ the materials vulgarized by everybody's use, and glorify them by his handling.-O. W. Holmes.

Poetry has been to me its own exceeding great reward: it has given me the habit of

wishing to discover the good and beautiful in all that meets and surrounds me.—Coleridge.

There are so many tender and holy emotions flying about in our inward world, which, like angels, can never assume the body of an outward act; so many rich and lovely flowers spring up which bear no seed, that it is a happiness poetry was invented, which receives into its limbus all those incorporeal spirits, and the perfume of all these flowers.—Richter.

Perhaps there are no warmer lovers of the muse than those who are only permitted occasionally to gain her favors. The shrine is more reverently approached by the pilgrim from afar than the familiar worshipper. Poetry is often most beloved by one whose daily vocation is amid the bustle of the world.-Tuckerman.

Poetry is the utterance of deep and heartfelt truth.-The true poet is very near the oracle.-E. H. Chapin.

Superstition is the poetry of life, so that it does not injure the poet to be superstitious.-Goethe.

Some scrap of a childish song hath often been a truer alms than all the benevolent societies could give. This is the best missionary, knowing when she may knock at the door of the most curmudgeonly hearts, without being turned away unheard. For poesy is love's chosen apostle, and the very almoner of God. She is the home of the outcast, and the wealth of the needy.-J. R. Lowell.

You arrive at truth through poetry; I arrive at poetry through truth.—Joubert.

As nightingales feed on glow-worms, so poets live upon the living light of nature and beauty.-Bailey.

The poet, whether in prose or verse, the creator, can only stamp his images forcibly on the page, in proportion as he has forcibly felt, ardently nursed, and long brooded over them.-Bulwer.

Poetry is in itself strength and joy, whether it be crowned by all mankind, or left alone in its own magic hermitage.Sterling.

Poets are never young in one sense. Their delicate ear hears the far-off whispers of eternity, which coarser souls must travel toward for scores of years before their dull sense is touched by them.-0. W. Holmes.

In poetry, which is all fable, truth still is the perfection.-Shaftesbury.

Whatever the poets pretend, it is plain they give immortality to none but them

POETRY.

selves it is Homer and Virgil we reverence and admire, not Achilles or Æneas.-Swift. I have met with most poetry on trunks; so that I am apt to consider the trunkmaker as the sexton of authorship.-Byron.

We have more poets than judges and interpreters of poetry.-It is easier to write an indifferent poem than to understand a good one.-Montaigne.

In the hands of genius, the driest stick becomes an Aaron's rod, and buds and blossoms out in poetry. Is he a Burns? the sight of a mountain daisy unseals the fountains of his nature, and he embalms the "bonny gem" in the beauty of his spirit. Is he a Wordsworth? at his touch all nature is instinct with feeling; the spirit of beauty springs up in the footsteps of his going, and the darkest, nakedest grave becomes a sunlit bank empurpled with blossoms of life.-H. N. Hudson.

Poetry is itself a thing of God.-He made his prophets poets; and the more we feel of poesie do we become like God in love and power.-Bailey.

All poets pretend to write for immortality, but the whole tribe have no objection to present pay and present praise. Lord Burleigh is not the only statesman who has thought one hundred pounds too much for a song, though sung by Spenser ; although Oliver Goldsmith is the only poet who ever considered himself to have been overpaid.-Colton.

How different is the poet from the mystic. -The former uses symbols, knowing they are symbols; the latter mistakes them for realities.-F. W. Robertson.

Poetry is the record of the best and happiest moments of the happiest and best minds.-Shelley.

Poesy is of so subtle a spirit, that in the pouring out of one language into another it will evaporate.-Denham.

Poetry is the art of substituting shadows, and of lending existence to nothing.Burke.

The best of poetry is ever in alliance with real uncorrupted Christianity; and with the degeneracy of the one always comes the decline of the other: for it is to Christianity that we owe the fullest inspirations of the celestial spirit of charity. — J. A. St. John.

The world is full of poetry.—The air is living with its spirit; and the waves dance to the music of its melodies, and sparkle in its brightness.-Percival.

Poetry is most just to its divine origin,

when it administers the comforts and breathes the thoughts of religion.— Wordsworth.

Poetry is the intellect colored by feelings.-Prof. Wilson.

Thoughts that breathe, and words that burn.-Gray.

He who finds clevated and lofty pleasure in the feeling of poetry is a true poet, though he never composed a line of verse in his entire lifetime.—Mad. Dudevant.

Poets are all who love and feel great truths, and tell them.-Bailey.

Poetry is something to make us wiser and better, by continually revealing those types of beauty and truth which God has set in all men's souls.-J. R. Lowell.

Poetry, with all its obscurity, has a more general as well as a more powerful dominion over the passions than the art of painting.-Burke.

All that is best in the great poets of all countries, is not what is national in them, but what is universal.-Longfellow.

Poetry begotten of passion is ever debasing; poetry born of real heartfulness, always ennobles and uplifts.-A. A. Hopkins.

Poetry comes nearer to vital truth than history.-Plato.

One merit of poetry few persons will deny; it says more, and in fewer words, than prose.-Voltaire.

He who, in an enlightened and literary society, aspires to be a great poet, must first become a little child.-Macaulay.

They learn in suffering what they teach in song.-Shelley.

POLICY.-Policy consists in serving God in such a manner as not to offend the devil.-Fuller.

To manage men one ought to have a sharp mind in a velvet sheath. George Eliot.

A statesman makes the occasion, but the occasion makes the politician.-G. S. Hillard.

The devil knew not what he did when he made man politic; he crossed himself by it. -Shakespeare.

A politician, Proteus like, must alter his face and habit, and like water seem of the same color that the vessel is that doth contain it, varying his form with the chameleon at each object's change.-Ma

son.

Let go thy hold when a great wheel runs down the hill, lest it break thy neck with

POLITENESS.

following it; but the great one that goes up the hill, let him draw thee after. Shakespeare.

At court one becomes a sort of human ant-eater, and learns to catch one's prey by one's tongue.—Bulwer.

Measures, not men, have always been my mark.-Goldsmith.

Turn him to any cause of policy, the Gordian knot of it he will unloose, familiar as his garter.-Shakespeare.

It is not juggling that is to be blamed, but much juggling; for the world cannot be governed without it.-Selden.

By a kind of fashionable discipline, the eye is taught to brighten, the lip to smile, and the whole countenance to emanate with the semblance of friendly welcome, while the bosom is unwarmed by a single spark of genuine kindness and good-will.— Washington Irving.

Were the king at noonday to say, "This day is night," it would behoove us to reply, "Lo! there are the moon and seven stars! -Saadi.

An thou canst not smile as the wind sets, thou wilt catch cold shortly.-Shakespeare.

A few drops of oil will set the political machine at work, when a ton of vinegar would only corrode the wheels and canker the movements.-Colton.

If thou be strong enough to encounter with the times, keep thy station; if not, shift a foot to gain advantage of the times. He that acts a beggar to prevent a thief is never the poorer; it is a great part of wisdom sometimes to seem a fool.-Quarles.

Men must learn now with pity to dispense, for policy sits above conscience.Shakespeare.

POLITENESS.-(See ING" and "MANNERS.")

GOOD-BREED

There is no policy like politeness; and a good manner is the best thing in the world, either to get a good name, or supply the want of it.-Bulwer.

As charity covers a multitude of sins before God, so does politeness before men. -Gréville.

True_politeness is perfect ease and freedom. It simply consists in treating others just as you love to be treated yourself.— Chesterfield.

"Politeness," says Witherspoon, "is real kindness kindly expressed "; an admirable definition, and so brief that all may easily remember it. This is the sum and substance of all true politeness. Put it in

POLITENESS.

practice, and all will be charmed with your manners.-Mrs. Sigourney.

The polite of every country seem to have but one character. A gentleman of Sweden differs but little, except in trifles, from one of any other country. It is among the vulgar we are to find those distinctions which characterize a people.-Goldsmith.

Politeness is like an air-cushion; there may be nothing in it, but it eases our jolts wonderfully.

Politeness is fictitious benevolence. It supplies the place of it among those who see each other only in public, or but little. The want of it never fails to produce something disagreeable to one or other.-John

son.

Self-command is the main elegance.

Emerson.

True politeness requires humility, good sense, and benevolence. To think more highly of ourselves than we ought to think, destroys its quickening principle.-Mrs. Sigourney.

Politeness smoothes wrinkles.-Joubert. Politeness is as natural to delicate natures as perfume is to flowers.-De Finod.

Discourtesy does not spring merely from one bad quality, but from several-from foolish vanity, from ignorance of what is due to others, from indolence, from stupidity, from distraction of thought, from contempt of others, from jealousy.-Bruyère.

Politeness is but kind feeling toward others, acted out in our intercourse with them. We are always polite to those we respect and esteem.

Good-breeding is the result of much good sense, some good nature, and a little selfdenial for the sake of others.-Chesterfield.

Do not press your young children into book learning; but teach them politeness, including the whole circle of charities which spring from the consciousness of what is due to their fellow-beings.-Spurzheim.

Politeness is the result of good sense and good nature. A person possessed of these qualities, though he has never seen a court, is truly agreeable; and if without them, would continue a clown, though he had been all his lifetime a gentleman usher.Goldsmith.

There is no policy like politeness, since a good manner often succeeds where the best tongue has failed.-Magoon.

Mutual complaisances, attentions, and sacrifices of little conveniences, are as natural an implied compact between civil

POLITENESS.

ized people, as protection and obedience are between kings and subjects; whoever, in either case, violates that compact, justly forfeits all advantages arising from it.Chesterfield.

Politeness comes from within, from the heart but if the forms of politeness are. dispensed with, the spirit and the thing itself soon die away.-John Hall.

Politeness is good nature regulated by good sense.-Sidney Smith.

Politeness has been well defined as benevolence in small things.—Macaulay.

A polite man is one who listens with interest to things he knows all about, when they are told him by a person who knows nothing about them.-De Morny.

There is no outward sign of politeness which has not a deep, moral reason. Behavior is a mirror in which every one shows his own image. There is a politeness of the heart akin to love, from which springs the easiest politeness of outward behavior.

Politeness is not always the sign of wisdom, but the want of it always leaves room for the suspicion of folly.-Landor.

There are two kinds of politeness; one says, "See how polite I am"; the other, "I would make you happy."-Tomlinson.

The true effect of genuine politeness seems to be rather ease than pleasure.Johnson.

Bowing, ceremonious, formal compliments, stiff civilities, will never be politeness; that must be easy, natural, unstudied; and what will give this but a mind benevolent and attentive to exert that amiable disposition in trifles to all you converse and live with ?-Chatham.

The only true source of politeness is consideration,-that vigilant moral sense which never loses sight of the rights, the claims, and the sensibilities of others. This is the one quality, over all others, necessary to make a gentleman.-Simms.

Men, like bullets, go farthest when they are smoothest.-Richter.

Not to perceive the little weaknesses and the idle but innocent affectations of the company may be allowable as a sort of polite duty. The company will be pleased with you if you do, and most probably will not be reformed by you if you do not.Chesterfield.

Politeness is nothing more than an elegant and concealed species of flattery, tending to put the person to whom it is addressed in good-humor and respect with himself but if there is a parade and dis

POLITENESS.

play affected in it, if a man seems to saylook how condescending and gracious I am!-whilst he has only the common offices of civility to perform, such politeness seems founded in mistake, and this mistake I have observed frequently to occur in French manners.-Cumberland.

To the acquisition of the rare quality of politeness, so much of an enlightened understanding is necessary that I cannot but consider every book in every science, which tends to make us wiser, and of course better men, as a treatise on a more enlarged system of politeness.—Monro.

In all the affairs of life, social as well as political, courtesies of a small and trivial character are the ones which strike deepest to the grateful and appreciating heart.Henry Clay.

Politeness does not always evince goodness, equity, complaisance, or gratitude, but it gives at least the appearance of these qualities, and makes man appear outwardly as he should be within.-Bruyère.

Politeness is to goodness what words are to thought. It tells not only on the manners, but on the mind and the heart; it renders the feelings, the opinions, the words, moderate and gentle.-Joubert.

Politeness is a mixture of discretion, civility, complaisance, and circumspection spread over all we do and say.—St. Evremond.

The spirit of politeness is a desire to bring about by our words and manners, that others may be pleased with us and with themselves.-Montesquieu.

It is because gold is rare that gilding has been invented, which, without having its solidity, has all its brilliancy.-Thus, to replace the kindness we lack, we have devised politeness, which has all its appearance.-De Levis.

The wise are polite all the world over; fools are polite only at home.—Bacon.

That politeness which we put on to keep the assuming and the presumptuous at a proper distance, will generally succeed, But it sometimes happens that these obtrusive characters are on such excellent terms with themselves, that they put down this very politeness to the score of their own great merits and high pretensions, meeting the coldness of our reserve with a ridiculous condescension of familiarity, in order to set us at ease with ourselves.Colton.

Whoever pays you more court than he is accustomed to pay, either intends to deceive you or finds you necessary to him.— Courtenay.

POLITICS:

There are few defects in our nature so glaring as not to be veiled from observation by politeness and good-breeding.-Stanislaus.

Great talent and success render a man famous; great merit procures respect; great learning, veneration; but politeness alone ensures love and affection.

To be over-polite is to be rude.-Japanese Proverb.

POLITICS. (See “PARTY.”)

If ever this free people-if this government itself is ever utterly demoralized, it will come from this incessant human wriggle and struggle for office, which is but a way to live without work.-Abraham Lincoln.

Politics is the art of being wise for others -policy of being wise for self.-Bulwer.

There is no gambling like politics.—Disraeli.

All the great and noble authors of the ancient world, meant, by the science of politics, the intelligent comprehension of man's position, and of all his relations as a member of a great nation.-In this sense, politics subordinate to themselves every department of earthly science.-A man who understands nothing of agriculture, of trade, of human nature, of past history, of the principles of law, cannot pretend to be more than a mere empiric in political legislation.-F. W. Robertson.

When connected with morality and the character and interest of a country, politics is a subject second only to religion in importance.-Charles Hodge.

To let politics become a cesspool, and then avoid it because it is a cesspool, is a double crime.-No man should be a partisan in the sense of one who votes for his party, right or wrong.-Howard Crosby. Nothing is politically right which is morally wrong.-Daniel O'Connell.

Politics, however they make the intellect active, sagacious, and inventive, within a certain sphere, generally extinguish its thirst for universal truth, paralyse sentiment and imagination, corrupt the simplicity of the mind, destroy that confidence in human virtue which lies at the foundation of philanthropy and generous sacrifices, and end in cold and prudent selfishness.—Channing.

It is the misfortune of all miscellaneous political combinations, that with the purest motives of their more generous members are ever mixed the most sordid interests and the fiercest passions of mean confederates.-Bulwer.

POLITICS.

How little do politics affect the life, the moral life of a nation. One single good book influences the people a vast deal more. -Gladstone.

Responsibility educates, and politics is but another name for God's way of teaching the masses ethics, under the responsibility of great present interests.- Wendell Phillips.

Politics in practice too often mean all for party, nothing for the people; all for policy, nothing for principle; all for office, nothing for honor; all for power, nothing for progress.

There is an infinity of political errors which, being once adopted, become principles.-Abbé Raynal.

The amelioration of the condition of mankind, and the increase of human happiness ought to be the leading objects of every political institution, and the aim of every individual, according to the measure of his power, in the situation he occupies.A. Hamilton.

A politician-one that would circumvent God-Shakespeare.

To be a chemist you must study chemistry; to be a lawyer or a physician you must study law or medicine; but to be a politician you need only to study your own interests.-Max O’Rell.

The man who can make two ears of corn, or two blades of grass, grow on the spot where only one grew before, would deserve better of mankind, and render more essential service to the country, than the whole race of politicians put together.—Swift.

I hate all bungling as I do sin, but particularly bungling in politics, which leads to the misery and ruin of many thousands and millions of people.-Goethe.

Politics is the science of exigencies.Theodore Parker.

Some have said that it is not the business of private men to meddle with government, -a bold and dishonest saying, which is fit to come from no mouth but that of a tyrant or a slave. To say that private men have nothing to do with government is to say that private men have nothing to do with their own happiness or misery; that people ought not to concern themselves whether they be naked or clothed, fed or starved, deceived or instructed, protected or destroyed.- Cato.

The politics of courts are so mean that private people would be ashamed to act in the same way; all is trick and finesse, to which the common cause is sacrificed.Lord Nelson.