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C.N. Douglas, comp. Forty Thousand Quotations: Prose and Poetical. 1917.

Lee

  • Am I to blame, if nature threw my body
  • In so perverse a mould! yet when she cast
  • Her envious hand upon my supple joints,
  • Unable to resist, and rumpled them
  • On heaps in their dark lodging; to revenge
  • Her bungled work, she stamped my mind more fair,
  • And as from chaos, huddled and deform’d,
  • The gods struck fire, and lighted up the lamps
  • That beautify the sky; so she inform’d
  • This ill-shap’d body with a daring soul,
  • And, making less than man, she made me more.
  • As well the noble savage of the field
  • Might tamely couple with the fearful ewe;
  • Tigers might engender with the timid deer;
  • Wild, muddy boars defile the cleanly ermine,
  • Or vultures sort with doves; as I with thee.
  • By heavens, my love, thou dost distract my soul!
  • There’s not a tear that falls from those dear eyes,
  • But makes my heart weep blood.
  • I could perceive with joy, a silent show’r
  • Run down his silver beard.
  • I found her on the floor
  • In all the storm of grief; yet beautiful!
  • Sighing such a breath of sorrow, that her lips,
  • Which late appear’d like buds, were now o’er-blown!
  • Pouring forth tears, at such a lavish rate,
  • That were the world on fire, they might have drown’d
  • The wrath of heaven, and quench’d the mighty ruin.
  • I weep, ’tis true; but Machiavel, I swear
  • They’re tears of vengeance; drops of liquid fire!
  • So marble weeps, when flames surround the quarry,
  • And the pil’d oaks spout forth such scalding bubbles,
  • Before the general blaze.
  • If we must pray,
  • Rear in the streets bright altars to the gods,
  • Let virgin’s hands adorn the sacrifice;
  • And not a grey-beard forging priest come here,
  • To pry into the bowels of their victim,
  • And with their dotage mad the gaping world.
  • In taking leave,
  • Thro’ the dark lashes of her darting eyes,
  • Methought she shot her soul at ev’ry glance,
  • Still looking back, as if she had a mind
  • That you should know she left her soul behind her.
  • Nature herself started back when thou wert born,
  • And cried, “the work’s not mine.”
  • The midwife stood aghast; and when she saw
  • Thy mountain back and thy distorted legs,
  • Thy face itself,
  • Half-minted with the royal stamp of man,
  • And half o’ercome with beast, she doubted long
  • Whose right in thee were more;
  • And know not if to burn thee in the flames
  • Were not the holier work.
  • Oh! I will curse thee till thy frighted soul
  • Runs mad with horror.
  • When Greeks join’d Greeks, then was the tug of war;
  • The labor’d battle sweat, and conquest bled.
  • When the sun sets, shadows that show’d at noon
  • But small, appear most long and terrible:
  • So when we think fate hovers o’er our heads,
  • Our apprehensions shoot beyond all bounds;
  • Owls, ravens, crickets, seem the watch of death:
  • Nature’s worst vermin scare her godlike sons.
  • Echoes, the very leaving of a voice,
  • Grow babbling ghosts, and call us to our graves.
  • Each mole-hill thought swells to a huge Olympus,
  • While we, fantastic dreamers, heave and puff,
  • And sweat with an imagination’s weight.