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

Mary Clemmer

A shining isle in a stormy sea,

We seek it ever with smiles and sighs;

To-day is sad, In the bland To-be,

Serene and lovely To-morrow lies.

Down through the starry intervals,

Upon this weary-laden world,

How soft the soul of Silence falls!

How deep the spell wherewith she thralls,

How wide her mantle is unfurled.

I lie amid the Goldenrod,

I love to see it lean and nod;

I love to feel the grassy sod

Whose kindly breast will hold me last,

Whose patient arms will fold me fast!—

Fold me from sunshine and from song,

Fold me from sorrow and from wrong:

Through gleaming gates of Goldenrod

I’ll pass into the rest of God.

Of all our loving Father’s gifts

I often wonder which is best,

And cry: Dear God, the one that lifts

Our soul from weariness to rest,

The rest of silence—that is best.

Only a newspaper! Quick read, quick lost,

Who sums the treasure that it carries hence?

Torn, trampled under feet, who counts thy cost,

Star-eyed Intelligence.

Pray thou for me. The common air

Will stronger, purer seem to be,

And all the world will grow more fair,—

Pray thou for me.

Something beyond! The immortal morning stands

Above the night, clear shines her prescient brow;

The pendulous star in her transfigured hands

Lights up the Now.

The way is short, O friend,

That reaches out before us;

God’s tender heavens above us bend,

His love is smiling o’er us;

A little while is ours

For sorrow or for laughter;

I’ll lay the hand you love in yours

On the shore of the Hereafter.

To serve thy generation, this thy fate:

“Written in water,” swiftly fades thy name;

But he who loves his kind does, first and late,

A work too great for fame.

What shall I do, my friend,

When you are gone forever?

My heart its eager need will send

Through the years to find you never,

And how will it be with you,

In the weary world, I wonder,

Will you love me with a love as true,

When our paths lie far asunder?

Always man needs woman for his friend. He needs her clearer vision, her subtler insight, her softer thought, her winged soul, her pure and tender heart. Always woman needs man to be her friend. She needs the vigor of his purpose, the ardor of his will, his calmer judgment, his braver force of action, his reverence and his devotion.

Most people carry an ideal man and woman in their head, and when the practical relations of the men and women of every day are discussed with reference only to these impossible ideals, we need not marvel at any ridiculous conclusions.

The Indian summer—the dead summer’s soul.

What is love at first sight but a proof of the powerful but silent language of physiognomy.

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