ODE TO DUTY. 219 ODE TO DUTY. — Wordsworth. STERN daughter of the voice of God! And calm'st the weary strife of frail humanity! There are who ask not if thine eye Upon the genial sense of youth; Glad hearts! without reproach or blot; Who do thy work and know it not; Long may the kindly impulse last! But thou, if they should totter, teach them to stand fast! Serene will be our days and bright, And happy will our nature be, When love is an unerring light, And joy its own security. And they a blissful course may hold, Even now, who, not unwisely bold, Live in the spirit of this creed ; Yet find that other strength, according to their nced. I, loving freedom, and untried, 220 ODE TO DUTY. And oft, when in my heart was heard The task, in smoother walks to stray; But thee I now would serve more strictly, if I may. Through no disturbance of my soul, Or strong compunction in ine wrought, But in the quietness of thought: Stern Lawgiver! yet thou dost wear And Fragrance in thy footing treads; Thou dost preserve the stars from wrong; And the most ancient heavens, through thee, arf fresh and strong. To humbler functions, awful Power! And in the light of truth thy bondman let me live! DEATH'S FINAL CONQUEST. 221 FAMILIAR LOVE.- Milnes. WE read together, reading the same book, In its half slumbering harmony, More like a bee, that in the noon rejoices, In which our powers of thought stood separate, DEATH'S FINAL CONQUEST.- Shirley. THE glories of our birth and state Are shadows, not substantial things; There is no armor against fate; Death lays his icy hand on kings. 222 THE WIDOW TO HER HOUR-GLASS. Sceptre and crown Must tumble down, And in the dust be equal made With the poor, crooked scythe and spade. Some men with swords may reap the field, They stoop to fate, And must give up their murmuring breath, The garlands wither on your brow; See where the victor victim bleeds To the cold tomb, Only the actions of the just s; Smell sweet and blossom in the dust. THE WIDOW TO HER HOUR-GLASS. - Bloomfield. COME, friend, I'll turn thee up again ; Spring thirty times hath fed with rain In frame of wood, On chest or window by my side; At every birth still thou wert near, And when my husband died. THE WIDOW TO HER HOUR-GLASS. I've often watched thy streaming sand, Still sliding down, Again heaped up, then down again; While thus I spin and sometimes sing, Still shalt thou flow, And jog along thy destined way; Steady as truth, on either end Thy lengthened day Shall gild once more my native plain; I'll turn thee up again. 223 |