J. T. FIELDS.-PARK BENJAMIN.
Away in beauty where the stars
In tropic brightness gleam, Where'er the sea-bird wets her beak, Or blows the stormy gale; On to the water's furthest verge Our ships majestic sail.
They dip their keels in every stream That swells beneath the sky; And where old ocean's billows roll Their lofty pennants fly:
They furl their sheets in threatening clouds
That float across the main,
To link with love earth's distant bays,
In many a golden chain.
PRESS on! surmount the rocky steeps, Climb boldly o'er the torrent's arch: He fails alone who feebly creeps,
He wins who dares the hero's march. Be thou a hero! let thy might Tramp on eternal snows its way, And, through the ebon walls of night, Hew down a passage unto day.
Press on! if once and twice thy feet
Slip back and stumble, harder try ; From him who never dreads to meet Danger and death, they're sure to fly. To coward ranks the bullet speeds, While on their breasts who never quail Gleams, guardian of chivalric deeds, Bright courage, like a coat of mail.
Press on! if Fortune play thee false To-day, to-morrow she'll be true; Whom now she sinks, she now exalts. Taking old gifts and granting new.
The wisdom of the present hour
Makes up for follies past and gone : To weakness strength succeeds, and power From frailty springs-press on! press on! Therefore, press on! and reach the goal, And gain the prize, and wear the crown: Faint not! for to the steadfast soul
Come wealth, and honor, and renown. To thine own self be true, and keep Thy mind from sloth, thy heart from soil; Press on! and thou shalt surely reap
A heavenly harvest for thy toil!
How cheery are the mariners,
Those lovers of the sea!
Their hearts are like its yesty waves, As bounding and as free.
They whistle when the storm-bird wheels In circles round the mast;
And sing when, deep in foam, the ship Ploughs onward to the blast.
What care the mariners for gales? There's music in their roar, When wide the berth along the lee, And leagues of room before. Let billows toss to mountain heights, Or sink to chasms low; The vessel stout will ride it out,
Nor reel beneath the blow.
With streamers down and canvas furled,
The gallant hull will float
Securely as on inland lake A silken-tasselled boat; And sound asleep some mariners, And some with watchful eyes, Will fearless be of dangers dark, That roll along the skies.
PARK BENJAMIN.-ANONYMOUS.
God keep these cheery mariners! And temper all the gales,
That sweep against the rocky coast, To their storm-shattered sails; And men on shore will bless the ship That could so guided be,
Safe in the hollow of his hand,
To brave the mighty sea!
122. WHAT THE END SHALL BE.
WHEN another life is added
To the heaving turbid mass; When another breath of being
Stains creation's tarnished glass; When the first cry, weak and piteous, Heralds long-enduring pain, And a soul from non-existence Springs, that ne'er can die again; When the mother's passionate welcome Sorrow-like bursts forth in tears, And the sire's self-gratulation Prophecies of future years—
It is well we cannot see
What the end shall be.
When across the infant features
Trembles the faint dawn of mind; When the heart looks from the windows Of the eyes that were so blind; When the incoherent murmurs Syllable each swaddled thought, To the fond ear of affection
With a boundless promise fraught, Kindling great hopes for to-morrow, From that dull uncertain ray, As by glimmering of the twilight Is foreshown the perfect day-
It is well we cannot see What the end shall be.
When the boy upon the threshold Of his all-comprising home, Parts aside the arm maternal
That unlocks him ere he roam; When the canvas of his vessel Flutters to the favoring gales, Years of solitary exile
Hid behind its sunny sails; When his pulses beat with ardor, And his sinews stretch for toil, And a hundred bold emprises Lure him to that eastern soil-
It is well we cannot see What the end shall be.
Whatsoever is beginning
That is wrought by human skill, Every daring emanation
Of the mind's ambitious will; · Every first impulse of passion,
Gush of love, or twinge of hate; Every launch upon the waters, Wide horizoned by our fate; Every venture in the chances Of life's sad, oft desperate, game, Whatsoever be our motive,
Whatsoever be our aim
It is well we cannot see
OH! give me sweet rest, from ambition's wild dream, From a world that's all heartless and vain; Give me rest from the tempests that rage o'er life's stream— From temptation, from sorrow, and pain!
Oh! if mine were the power, undaunted by fear, I'd unroll the great volume of fate,
And there find a reprieve to my wanderings here, In this dark and inconstant estate.
Is there rest far away on the ocean's blue wave, O'er the path of the wide-rolling deep,
Where the white-crested billows unceasingly lave, And the winds their hoarse revellings keep?
I'll plunge in the surge, and I'll breast the wild foam- I'll brave, in the storm, the cloud-rack;
No voice of fond love shall then whisper of home, No larum shall frighten me back.
Is it rest, all alone on the bosom of earth, 'Neath the deep and blue vault of the sky, To awake the sweet musings of heavenly birth, And feel that our Father is nigh?
I'll away to the mount-contemplation's And, alone in the realms of the air,
My freed spirit I'll lave in those floods of pure light, And my life shall be aye a long prayer.
No true rest shall there be, the Almighty has said, In the days of man's pilgrimage here;
For, by striving still onward and upward, he's led To the prize of his earthly career.
But the bliss of sweet rest shall return once again, In the mansions on high of the blest:
The wicked shall cease aye from troubling him then, And the weary shall win a long rest.
124. ANOTHER LIFE.
A BRUISED sea-weed on the strand, Vile and worthless lay,
Tossed by the surges on the land, Sport of the angry spray.
Such is man on the beach of life- Son of toil and care,
Tossed on the sea of angry strife, Of pain and sorrow heir.
The bruised sea-weed wastes away; Its atoms on the breezes ride; They are wafted far on a sunny day, To a smiling mountain side.
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