_There_ gentle Charity who knows how frail
The bark of Virtue, even in summer's gale,
Sits by the nightly fire whose beacon glows
For all who wander, whether friends or foes.
_There_ Faith retires and keeps her white sail furled,
Till called to spread it for a better world;
While Patience watching on the weedy shore,
And mutely waiting till the storm be o'er,
Oft turns to Hope who still directs her eye
To some blue spot just breaking in the sky!
Such are the mild, the blest associates given
To him who doubts,--and trusts in naught but Heaven!
[1] "The particular bulk, number, figure, and motion of the parts of fire
or snow are really in them, whether any one perceives them or not, and
therefore they may be called real qualities because they really exist in
those bodies; but light, heat, whiteness or coldness are no more really in
them than sickness or pain is in manna. Take away the sensation of them;
let not the eye see light or colors, nor the ears hear sounds; let the
palate not taste nor the nose smell, and all colors, tastes, odors and
sounds, as they are such particular ideas, vanish and
cease."--_Locke_, book ii. chap 8.
[2] This was the creed also of those modern Epicureans, whom Ninon de
l'Enclos collected around her in the Rue des Tournelles, and whose object
seems to have been to decry the faculty of reason, as tending only to
embarrass our wholesome use of pleasures, without enabling us, in any
degree, to avoid their abuse.
Pages:
1001
1002
1003
1004
1005
1006
1007
1008
1009
1010
1011
1012
1013
1014
1015
1016
1017
1018
1019
1020
1021
1022
1023
1024
1025