The moon is at her full, and riding high, Floods the calm fields with light. The airs that hover in the summer sky Are all asleep to-night.
And suns grow meek, and the meek suns grow brief, and the year smiles as it draws near its death.
Self-interest is the most ingenious and persuasive of all the agents that deceive our consciences, while by means of it our unhappy and stubborn prejudices operate in their greatest force.
Difficulty, my brethren, is the nurse of greatness – a harsh nurse, who roughly rocks her foster children into strength and athletic proportion.
Alas! to seize the moment When the heart inclines to heart, And press a suit with passion, Is not a woman’s part. If man come not to gather The roses where they stand, They fade among their foliage, They cannot seek his hand.
The hushed winds their Sabbath keep.
Is not thy home among the flowers?
I grieve for life’s bright promise, just shown and then withdrawn.