Everytime we say that god is the author of some phenomenon, that signifies that we are ignorant of how such a phenomenon was caused by the forces of nature.
Ah! what a divine religion might be found out if charity were really made the principle of it instead of faith.
The old laws of England they Whose reverend heads with age are gray, Children of a wiser day; And whose solemn voice must be Thine own echo Liberty!
Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere; Destroyer and preserver; hear, oh, hear!
Swiftly walk o’er the western wave, Spirit of Night! Out of the misty eastern cave, Where, all the long and lone daylight, Thou wovest dreams of joyand fear, Which make thee terrible and dear, Swift be thy flight!
I see the waves upon the shore, Like light dissolved in star-showers, thrown.
One nightingale in an interfluous wood Satiate the hungry dark with melody.
O’er Egypt’s land of memory floods are level, And they are thine, O Nile! and well thou knowest The soul-sustaining airs and blasts of evil, And fruits, and poisons spring where’er thou flowest.
The world’s great age begins anew, The golden years return, The earth doth like a snake renew Her winter weeds outworn; Heaven smiles, and faiths and empires gleam, Like wrecks of a dissolving dream.
So is Hope Changed for Despair-one laid upon the shelf, We take the other. Under heaven’s high cope Fortune is god-all you endure and do Depends on circumstance as much as you.
O cease! must hate and death return, Cease! must men kill and die? Cease! drain not to its dregs the urn Of bitter prophecy. The world is weary of the past, Oh, might it die or rest at last!
I pant, I sink, I tremble, I expire!
Jealousy’s eyes are green.
Necessity, thou mother of the world!
Death will come when thou art dead, soon, too soon.
Lie bills and calculations much perplexed, With steam-boats, frigates, and machinery quaint Traced over them in blue and yellow paint.
Revenge and wrong bring forth their kind; The foul cubs like their parents are.
Oh that simplicity and innocence its own unvalued work so seldom knows!
We know not what we do When we speak words.
Where art thou, beloved To-morrow? When young and old, and strong and weak, Rich and poor, through joy and sorrow, Thy sweet smiles we ever seek, – In thy place – ah! well-a-day! We find the thing we fled – To-day!