392

MATRIMONY - WEDLOCK.

7. Are we not one? Are we not join'd by heaven?
Each interwoven with the other's fate?

Are we not mix'd like streams of meeting rivers,
Whose blended waters are no more distinguish'd,
But roll into the sea one common flood?

8. Though fools spurn Hymen's gentle powers,

1

We, who improve his golden hours,

By sweet experience know

That marriage, rightly understood,

Gives to the tender and the good

A Paradise below.

9. O marriage! marriage! what a curse is thine, Whose hands alone consent, and hearts abhor!

ROWE.

COTTON.

AARON HILL.

10. There have been wedlock's joys of swift decay,
Like lightning, seen at once, and shot away;
But theirs were hopes, which, all unfit to pair,
Like fire and powder, kiss'd, and flash'd to air.
Thy soul and mine, by mutual courtship won,
Meet like two mingling flames, and make but one.
Union of hearts, not hands, does marriage make,
And sympathy of mind keeps love awake.

11. Then let Hymen oft appear,

In saffron robes, with taper clear,
With pomp, and feast, and revelry,
With mask, and antique pageantry.

12. Wedded love is founded on esteem,

AARON HILL.

Which the fair merits of the mind engage,
For those are charms which never can decay;
But time, which gives new whiteness to the swan,
Improves their lustre.

MILTON.

FENTON.

13. As spiders never seek the fly,

But leaves him of himself t' apply,
So men are by themselves employ'd
To quit the freedom they enjoy'd,
And run their necks into a noose,
They'd break 'em after to get loose.

14. And after matrimony's over,

He, that remains but half a lover,
Deserves, for every minute, more
Than half a year of love before.

BUTLER'S Hudibras.

BUTLER'S Hudibras.

15. But happy they, the happiest of their kind! Whom gentle stars unite, and in one fate

16.

Their hearts, their fortunes, and their beings blend.

What is the world to them,

THOMSON'S Seasons.

Its pomp, its pleasure, and its nonsense all,

Who in each other clasp whatever fair

High fancy forms, and lavish hearts can wish?

THOMSON'S Seasons.

17. Thou art the nurse of virtue. In thine arms She smiles, appearing, as in truth she is, Heaven-born, and destin'd to the skies again.

COWPER'S Task.

18. Wedlock's a saucy, sad, familiar state, Where folks are very apt to scold and hate.

DR. WOLCOT's Peter Pindar.

19. No jealousy their dawn of love o'ercast,
Nor blasted were their wedded days with strife;

Each season look'd delightful as it past,

To the fond husband, and the faithful wife.

BEATTIE'S Minstrel.

20. The bloom or blight of all men's happiness.

BYRON'S Bride of Abydos.

394

MATRIMONY - WEDLOCK.

21. To cheer thy sickness, watch thy health,
Partake, but never waste thy wealth,
Or stand with smile unmurmuring by,
And lighten half thy poverty.

BYRON'S Bride of Abydos.

22. They liv'd together as most people do, Suffering each other's foibles by accord, And not exactly either one or two.

BYRON'S Don Juan.

23. Wishing each other, not divorc'd, but dead, They liv'd respectably as man and wife.

BYRON'S Don Juan.

24. No power in death shall tear our names apart, As none in life could rend thee from my heart.

BYRON'S Lament of Tasso.

25. There's a bliss beyond all that the minstrel has told,
When two, that are link'd in one heavenly tie,

With heart never changing, and brow never cold,
Love on thro' all ills, and love on till they die.
One hour of a passion so sacred is worth

Whole ages of heartless and wandering bliss ;
And Oh! if there be an Elysium on earth,

It is this it is this!

MOORE'S Lalla Rookh.

26. To love, to bliss, their blended souls were given, And each, too happy, ask'd no brighter heaven.

DR. DWIGHT.

27. And if division come, it soon is past,
Too sharp, too strange an agony to last!
And, like some river's bright, abundant tide,
Which art or accident hath forc'd aside,
The well-springs of affection, gushing o'er,
Back to their natural channels flow once more.

MRS. NORTON's Dream.

MECHANIC-MEDICINE - MEEKNESS, &c.

28. Then come the wild weather

come sleet or come snow,

We will stand by each other, however it blow;
Oppression, and sickness, and sorrow and pain,
Shall be to our true love as links to the chain.
LONGFELLOW

29. Oh, pleasant is the welcome kiss
When day's dull round is o'er,
And sweet the music of the step
That meets us at the door.

395

From the German.

J. R. DRAKE.

30. Tho' close the link that bound them, yet hath heaven A closer tie to the true-hearted given.

2. Though sprightly, gentle; though polite, sincere ; And only of thyself a judge severe.

BEATTIE.

3. She was a soft landscape of mild earth, Where all was harmony and calm and quiet, Luxuriant, budding..

BYRON.

4. With a spirit as meek as the gentlest of those
Who in life's sunny valley lie shelter'd and warm.

MOORE.

5. Her bonnie face it was as meek

As ony lamb upon a lee;

The evening sun was ne'er sae sweet
As was the blink o' Phemie's e'e.

BURNS.

6.

She bore herself

So gently, that the lily on its stalk
Bends not so easily its dewy head.

7. The one presiding feature in her mind
Was the pure meekness of a will resign'd,
A tender spirit, freed from all pretence
Of wit, and pleas'd in mild benevolence.

J. G. PERCIVAL.

MEETING.

1. Sir, you are very welcome to our house; It must appear in other ways than words, Therefore I scant this breathing courtesy.

SHAKSPEARE.

2. A hundred thousand welcomes! I could weep,
And I could laugh; I'm light and heavy welcome!

3.

I sware

By the simplicity of Venus' doves!

SHAKSPEARE.

By that which knitteth souls, and prospers loves!
In the same place thou hast appointed me,
To-morrow truly will I meet with thee.

SHAKSPEARE.

4. The joy of meeting pays the pangs of absence;

5.

Else who could bear it?

Absence, with all its pains,

Rowe's Tamerlane.

Is by this charming moment wiped away.

THOMSON.