Life

And can I ever bid these joys farewell? Yes, I must pass them for a nobler life, Where I may find the agonies, the strife Of human hearts.

Nothing in the world is single, All things by a law divine In one spirit meet and mingle.

Man, who wert once a despot and a slave; A dupe and a deceiver; a decay; A traveler from the cradle to the grave Through the dim light of this immortal day.

That happiness for man—the hungry sinner!— Since Eve ate apples, much depends on dinner.

Man, being reasonable, must get drunk; The best of life is but intoxication.

Sorrow is knowledge: they who know the most Must mourn the deepest o’er the fatal truth, The Tree of Knowledge is not that of Life.

My boat is on the shore, And my bark is on the sea; But, before I go, Tom Moore, Here’s a double health to thee! Here’s a sigh to those who love me, And a smile to those who hate; And, whatever sky’s above me, Here’s a heart for every fate.

Fire from the mind as vigor from the limb; And life’s enchanted cup but sparkles near the brim.

O the one life within us and abroad, Which meets all motion and becomes its soul, A light in sound, a sound-like power in light, Rhythm in all thought, and joyance everywhere— Methinks, it should have been impossible Not to love all things in a world so filled.

Small service is true service while it lasts: Of humblest friends, bright creature! scorn not one: The daisy, by the shadow that it casts, Protects the lingering dewdrop from the sun.

Enough, if something from our hands have power To live, and act, and serve the future hour.

And now I see with eye serene The very pulse of the machine.

The clouds that gather round the setting sun Do take a sober coloring from an eye That hath kept watch o’er man’s mortality; Another race hath been, and other palms are won. Thanks to the human heart by which we live, Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears, To me the meanest flower that blows can give Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.

To perish never.

My heart leaps up when I behold So was it when my life began; So is it now I am a man; So be it when I shall grow old, The child is father of the man; And I could wish my days to be Bound each to each by natural piety. 3

Prophets of Nature, we to them will speak A lasting inspiration, sanctified By reason, blest by faith: what we have loved, Others will love, and we will teach them how; Instruct them how the mind of man becomes A thousand times more beautiful than the earth On which he dwells.

Green grow the rashes, O; Green grow the rashes, O; The sweetest hours that e’er I spend Are spent among the lasses, O.

The best laid schemes o’ mice and men Gang aft a-gley.

Great things are done when men and mountains meet; This is not done by jostling in the street.

Little Fly, Thy summer’s play My thoughtless hand Has brushed away. Am not I A fly like thee? Or art not thou A man like me? For I dance And drink and sing, Till some blind hand Shall brush my wing.

He who binds to himself a joy Does the winged life destroy; But he who kisses the joy as it flies Lives in eternity’s sunrise.

Eternity is in love with the production of time.

The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.

Of freedom and of life he only is deserving Who every day must conquer them anew. 13