THE CHILD OF THE FLAXEN LOCKS. HILD of the flaxen locks | But ever, when thou rovest from his side, and laughing eye, Culling with hasty glee the flowerets gay, Or chasing with light foot the butterfly, I love to mark thee at Near thee I see thy tender His anxious eye pursues And oft with warning voice and beckoning love. LOV LOVE IS MADNESS. MRS. ABDY. OVE is that madness which all lovers But yet 'tis sweet and pleasing so to rave; But Paradise is in th' enchanted ground; He checks thy speed and gently draws Is but to send me into misery, Why dost thou meekly yield to his decree? He does not check thy joys from tyranny; own. When worldly lures, in manhood's coming hours, Tempt thee to wander from discretion's way, Oh, grasp not eagerly the offered flowers: Pause if thy heavenly Father bid thee stay And prudence, of whose cure so much you boast, Restores those pains which that sweet folly lost. JOHN DRYDEN. LAST HOUR OF DR. FAUSTUS. Now hast thou but one bare hour to live, And then thou must be damned perpetually. Stand still, you ever-moving spheres of heaven, That time may cease and midnight never come. Fair Nature's eye, rise, rise again, and make Pause, and in him revere a Friend and Perpetual day, or let this hour be but A year, a month, a week, a natural day, The stars move still, time runs, the clock | Or why is this immortal that thou hast? will strike, The devil will come, and Faustus must be damned. Oh, I will leap to heaven who pulls me down? true, This soul should fly from me, and I be changed Into some brutish beast. See where Christ's blood streams in the fir- All beasts are happy; for when they die, mament; Their souls are soon dissolved in elements, One drop of blood will save me. O my But mine must live still to be plagued in Christ Rend not my heart for naming of my Christ, Yet will I call on him. Oh, spare me, Lucifer! Where is it now? Tis gone! hell. Curst be the parents that engendered me: And see! a threatening arm and angry brow. It strikes, it strikes! Now, body, turn to Mountains and hills, come, come, and fall on . me, air, Or Lucifer will bear thee quick to hell. And hide me from the heavy wrath of O soul, be changed into small water-drops Heaven. No? Then I will headlong run into the earth. Gape, earth! Oh no, it will not harbor me. Now draw up Festus like a foggy mist But let my soul mount and ascend to heaven. And fall into the ocean; ne'er be found. [Thunder, and enter the devils. Oh mercy, Heaven! Look not so fierce on me; Adders and serpents, let me breathe a while; Ugly hell, gape not; come not, Lucifer. FIRST SCHOLAR. Come, gentlemen, let us go visit Faustus, For such a dreadful night was never seen Since first the world's creation did begin; Such fearful shrieks and cries were never heard. Pray Heaven the doctor have escaped the danger. SECOND SCH. Oh, help us, heavens! See, here are Faustus' limbs All torn asunder by the hand of Death. THIRD SCH. The devil whom Festus served hath torn him thus, For 'twixt the hours of twelve and one me thought I'LL LOVE NO MORE. I heard him shriek and call aloud for I'LL love no more, said I, in sullen mood; help, At which same time the house seemed all on fire With dreadful horror of these damned fiends. SEC. SCH. Well, gentlemen, though Faustus' end be such As every Christian heart laments to think on, Yet for he was a scholar once admired For wondrous knowledge in our German schools We'll give his mangled limbs due burial, And all the scholars, clothed in mourning black, Shall wait upon his heavy funeral. CHRISTOPHER MARLOW. The world is wholly selfish, false and vain ; The generous heart but courts ingratitude, And friendship woos but insult and dis dain. Far from a cold and worthless world I'll haste : Why should my best affections unrequited waste? I fled the busy throng and turned my feet Where towering trees in sunny dells rejoice, But all things seemed, amid my lone retreat, To mourn my stern resolve and chide my choice; All urged me, so methought, to turn again, And with a hopeful trust to love my fellow-. men. T There's not on earth a jewel That's worth one grief-born tear. Long may the heart be silent If sorrow's touch alone, Upon the chords descending, Has power to wake its tone. I'd never be a poet, My bounding heart to hush And lay down at the altar For sorrow's foot to crush. For coming evening's hours, I fain would learn the music To waste my heartfelt mirth: EMILY C. Judson. TWO LOVERS. WO lovers by a moss-grown spring: They leaned soft cheeks together there, Mingled the dark and sunny hair, And heard the wooing thrushes sing. O budding time! Two wedded from the portal stept: O pure-eyed bride! |