Peculiarities of L. E. L.’s Works

"affection can resignIts own best happiness for one dear sake;*****And doth prefer another to itself:Unchangeable and generous, what like LoveCan melt away the dross of worldliness,—Can elevate, refine, and make the heartOf that pure gold which is the fitting shrineFor fire, as sacred as e'er came from heaven?"History of the Lyre.

"Made of every fine emotion,Of generous impulses and noble thoughts;—It looketh to the stars, and dreams of heaven;It nestles 'mid the flowers, and sweetens earth :Love is aspiring, yet is humble too;It doth exalt another o'er itself,With sweet heart-homage which delights to raiseIts object?"

"There is in life no blessing like affection;It soothes, it hallows, elevates, subdues,And bringeth down to earth its native heaven:It sits beside the cradle patient hours,Whose sole contentment is to watch and love:It bendeth o'er the death-bed, and concealsIts own despair with words of faith and hope:Life has nought else that may supply its place;Void is ambition, cold is vanity,And wealth an empty glitter without love?"Ethel Churchill, vol. i.

"Oh dream of fame, what hast thou been to me,But the destroyer of life's calm content!"

"Mortal, nor pleasure, nor wealth nor powerAre more than the toys of a passing hour;Earth's flowers bear the foul taint of earth,Lassitude, sorrow, are their's by their birth:One only pleasure will last—to fulfilWith some shadow of good the Holy One's will;The only steadfast hope to us given,Is the one which looks in its trust to heaven."Golden Violet.

"One word may read his heart,And that one word is utter weariness."

"My very heart is filled with tears! I seemAs I were struggling under some dark dream,Which roughly bore me down life's troubled stream.

The past weighs heavily upon my soul,A tyrant mastering me with stern control,The present has no rest—the future has no goal;

For what can be again, but what has been?Soon the young leaf forgets its early green,And shadows with our sunshine intervene.

Quenched is the spirit's morning wing of fire,We calculate where once we could aspire,And the high hope sets in some low desire.**** ***** *Alas! our kindest feelings are the rootOf all experience's most bitter fruit,They waste the life whose charm they constitute.

At length they harden, and we feel no moreAll that we felt so bitterly before,But with the softness is the sweetness o'er.

Of things we once enjoyed how few remain!Youth's flowers are flung behind us, and in vainWe would stoop down to gather them again.

Why do we think of this? bind the red wreath,Float down time's waters to the viol's breath,Wot not what those cold waters hide beneath.

We cannot do this: from the sparkling brinkDrops the glad rose, and the bright waters shrink;While in the midst of mirth we pause to think.

And if we think we sadden—thought and griefAre vowed companions:—while we turn the leafIt darkens, for the brilliant is the brief.*****Our better nature pineth,—let it be!Thou human soul,—earth is no home for thee;Thy starry rest is in eternity!"