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And gaily dinging down the van Charge with a cheer-Set on! Set on! Virtue is that beseems a Man!

Arthur T. Quiller-Couch [1863

THE SPLENDID SPUR

NOT on the neck of prince or hound,
Nor on a woman's finger twined,
May gold from the deriding ground
Keep sacred that we sacred bind:
Only the heel

Of splendid steel

Shall stand secure on sliding fate,

When golden navies weep their freight.

The scarlet hat, the laureled stave

Are measures, not the springs, of worth; In a wife's lap, as in a grave,

Man's airy notions mix with earth.
Seek other spur

Bravely to stir

The dust in this loud world, and tread
Alp-high among the whispering dead.

Trust in thyself,—then spur amain:
So shall Charybdis wear a grace,
Grim Ætna laugh, the Libyan plain
Take roses to her shriveled face.
This orb-this round

Of sight and sound

Count it the lists that God hath built

For haughty hearts to ride a-tilt.

Arthur T. Quiller-Couch [1863

THE TRANSCENDENTALISTS

CONSCIENCE

From "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers"

CONSCIENCE is instinct bred in the house,
Feeling and Thinking propagate the sin
By an unnatural breeding in and in.
I say, Turn it out of doors,

Into the moors.

I love a life whose plot is simple,

And does not thicken with every pimple,

A soul so sound no sickly conscience binds it,

That makes the universe no worse than 't finds it.

I love an earnest soul,

Whose mighty joy and sorrow

Are not drowned in a bowl,

And brought to life to-morrow;
That lives one tragedy,

And not seventy;

A conscience worth keeping,

Laughing not weeping;

A conscience wise and steady,

And forever ready;

Not changing with events,
Dealing in compliments;

A conscience exercised about

Large things, which one may doubt.
I love a soul not all of wood,

Predestined to be good,
But true to the backbone

Unto itself alone,

And false to none;

Born to its own affairs,

Its own joys and own cares;

By whom the work which God begun

Is finished, and not undone;

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Taken up where he left off,

Whether to worship or to scoff;
If not good, why then evil,

If not good god, good devil.

Goodness!-you hypocrite, come out of that,
Live your life, do your work, then take your

I have no patience towards
Such conscientious cowards.
Give me simple laboring folk,

Who love their work,

Whose virtue is a song

To cheer God along.

hat.

Henry David Thoreau [1817–1862]

MY PRAYER

GREAT God, I ask thee for no meaner pelf
Than that I may not disappoint myself;
That in my action I may soar as high
As I can now discern with this clear eye.

And next in value, which thy kindness lends,
That I may greatly disappoint my friends,
Howe'er they think or hope that it may be,
They may not dream how thou'st distinguished me.

That my weak hand may equal my firm faith,
And my life practise more than my tongue saith;
That my low conduct may not show,

Nor my relenting lines,

That I thy purpose did not know,

Or overrated thy designs.

Henry David Thoreau [1817-1862]

INSPIRATION

IF with light head erect I sing,

Though all the Muses lend their force,

From my poor love of anything,

The verse is weak and shallow as its source.

But if with bended neck I grope
Listening behind me for my wit,
With faith superior to hope,

More anxious to keep back than forward it,—

Making my soul accomplice there

Unto the flame my heart hath lit,

Then will the verse forever wear,—

Time cannot bend the line which God has writ.

I hearing get, who had but ears,

And sight, who had but eyes before;

I moments live, who lived but years,

And truth discern, who knew but learning's lore.

Now chiefly is my natal hour,

And only now my prime of life;

Of manhood's strength it is the flower,

'Tis peace's end, and war's beginning strife.

It comes in summer's broadest noon,

By a gray wall, or some chance place,
Unseasoning time, insulting June,

And vexing day with its presuming face.

I will not doubt the love untold

Which not my worth nor want hath bought,
Which wooed me young, and wooes me old,
And to this evening hath me brought.

Henry David Thoreau [1817-1862]

EACH AND ALL

LITTLE thinks, in the field, yon red-cloaked clown
Of thee from the hill-top looking down;

The heifer that lows in the upland farm,
Far-heard, lows not thine ear to charm;
The sexton, tolling his bell at noon,
Deems not that great Napoleon

Stops his horse, and lists with delight,

Whilst his files sweep round yon Alpine height;

Nor knowest thou what argument
Thy life to thy neighbor's creed has lent.
All are needed by each one;

Nothing is fair or good alone.

I thought the sparrow's note from heaven,
Singing at dawn on the alder bough;

I brought him home, in his nest, at even;
He sings the song, but it cheers not now,
For I did not bring home the river and sky;-
He sang to my ear,-they sang to my eye.

The delicate shells lay on the shore;
The bubbles of the latest wave
Fresh pearls to their enamel gave,
And the bellowing of the savage sea
Greeted their safe escape to me.
I wiped away the weeds and foam,
I fetched my sea-born treasures home;
But the poor, unsightly, noisome things
Had left their beauty on the shore,

With the sun and the sand and the wild uproar.

The lover watched his graceful maid,

As 'mid the virgin train she strayed;

Nor knew her beauty's best attire

Was woven still by the snow-white choir.

At last she came to his hermitage,

Like the bird from the woodlands to the cage;

The gay enchantment was undone,

A gentle wife, but fairy none.

Then I said, "I covet truth;

Beauty is unripe childhood's cheat;

I leave it behind with the games of youth:"

As I spoke, beneath my feet

The ground-pine curled its pretty wreath,

Running over the club-moss burrs;

I inhaled the violet's breath;

Around me stood the oaks and firs;

Pine-cones and acorns lay on the ground;

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