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All love is sweet,

Given or returned. Common as light is love, And its familiar voice wearies not ever.

They who inspire it most are fortunate,
As I am now; but those who feel it most
Are happier still.1

Prometheus Unbound. Act ii. Sc. 5.

Those who inflict must suffer, for they see

The work of their own hearts, and that must be

Our chastisement or recompense.

Julian and Maddalo.

Most wretched men

Are cradled into poetry by wrong;

They learn in suffering what they teach in song.

I could lie down like a tired child,

Ibid.

And weep away the life of care Which I have borne, and yet must bear. Stanzas, written in Dejection, near Naples.

That orbed maiden, with white fire laden,

Whom mortals call the moon.

The Cloud. iv.

A pard-like spirit, beautiful and swift.

Adonais xxxii.

Life, like a dome of many-coloured glass, Stains the white radiance of eternity. Ibid. lii.

1 The pleasure of love is in loving. We are happier in the passion we feel than in that we excite. - Rochefoucauld, Maxim 78.

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Odours, when sweet violets sicken,
Live within the sense they quicken.

Poems written in 1821. To

The desire of the moth for the star,
Of the night for the morrow,
The devotion to something afar

From the sphere of our sorrow!

Poems written in 1821. To

EATON STANNARD BARRETT.
1785-1820.

Not she with trait'rous kiss her Saviour stung,
Not she denied him with unholy tongue;

She, while apostles shrank, could danger brave, Last at his cross, and earliest at his grave. Woman. Part i. Ed. 1822.1

MISS FANNY STEERS.

The last link is broken

That bound me to thee,

And the words thou hast spoken

Have rendered me free.

1 Not she with trait'rous kiss her Master stung,
Not she denied him with unfaithful tongue :
She, when apostles fled, could danger brave,
Last at his cross, and earliest at his grave.

Song.

From the original edition of 1810.

JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE.

1795-1820.

When Freedom from her mountain height

Unfurled her standard to the air,

She tore the azure robe of night,
And set the stars of glory there.
She mingled with its gorgeous dyes
The milky baldric of the skies,
And striped its pure, celestial white,
With streakings of the morning light.

Flag of the free heart's hope and home!
By angel hands to valour given ;
Thy stars have lit the welkin dome,

And all thy hues were born in heaven.

Forever float that standard sheet !

Where breathes the foe but falls before us, With Freedom's soil beneath our feet,

And Freedom's banner streaming o'er us?

The American Flag.

FELICIA HEMANS.

1794-1835.

Leaves have their time to fall,

And flowers to wither at the North-wind's breath,

And stars to set ;- but all,

Thou hast all seasons for thine own, O Death!

The Hour of Death.

Alas! for love, if thou art all,
And naught beyond, O Earth!

The Graves of a Household.

Hemans continued.]

The breaking waves dash'd high

On a stern and rock-bound coast; And the woods, against a stormy sky, Their giant branches toss'd.

The Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers in New England.

Ay, call it holy ground,

The soil where first they trod,

They have left unstain'd what there they found,

Freedom to worship God.

The boy stood on the burning deck,
Whence all but him had fled;

The flame that lit the battle's wreck

Shone round him o'er the dead.

Ibid.

MISS

WROTHER.

Casabianca.

Hope tells a flattering tale,1

Delusive, vain, and hollow,

Ah let not Hope prevail,

Lest disappointment follow.
From The Universal Songster. Vol. ii. p. 86.

1 Hope told a flattering tale,

That Joy would soon return;

Ah, naught my sighs avail,

For love is doomed to mourn.

Anon. Vol. i. p. 320.2

2 Air by Giovanni Paisiello (1741 - 1816).

FF

JOHN KEATS. 1795-1821.

A thing of beauty is a joy forever ;
Its loveliness increases; it will never

Pass into nothingness.

Endymion. Line 1.

Philosophy will clip an angel's wings.

Lamia. Part ii.

Music's golden tongue

Flatter'd to tears this aged man and poor.

The Eve of St. Agnes. St. 3.

As though a rose should shut, and be a bud

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Those green-robed senators of mighty woods, Tall oaks, branch-charmed by the earnest stars, Dream, and so dream all night without a stir.

Ibid.

Thou foster-child of Silence and slow Time. Ode on a Grecian Urn.

Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard

Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on ; Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear'd,

Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone.

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