With glorious truth the charms of earth,
While yet the trusting fool I taught,
To scoff at Him who gave it birth--
Or if I filled the soul with light,
And bore its buoyant wing in air--
To plunge it down in deeper night,
And mock its maniac wanderings there--
I did but wield the wand of power,
That God intrusted to my clasp,
And not, the tyrant of an hour--
Will I resign it to Death's grasp!
The despot with his iron chain,
In idle bonds the limbs may bind--
He who would hold a sterner reign,
Must twine the links around the mind.
Thus I have thrown upon my race,
A chain that ages cannot rend--
And mocking Harold stays to trace,
The slaves that to my sceptre bend."




The Teacher's Lesson.


I saw a child some four years old,
Along a meadow stray;
Alone she went--unchecked--untold--
Her home not far away.