Great Throughts Treasury

"Showers and sunshine bring, slowly, the deepening verdure o'er the earth; to put their foliage out, the woods are slack, and one by one the singing-birds come back."

"So gentle and so beautiful, should perish with the flowers."

"So live that when thy summons comes to join the innumerable caravan that moves to that mysterious realm, where each shall take his chamber in the silent halls of death, thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night, scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed by an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave, like one who wraps the drapery of his couch about him, and lies down to pleasant dreams."

"So they, who climb to wealth, forget the friends in darker fortunes tried. I copied them -- but I regret that I should ape the ways of pride."

"Stand here by my side and turn, I pray, on the lake below thy gentle eyes; the clouds hang over it, heavy and gray, and dark and silent the water lies; and out of that frozen mist the snow in wavering flakes begins to flow; flake after flake, they sink in the dark and silent lake."

"Stranger, if thou hast learned a truth which needs No school of long experience, that the world Is full of guilt and misery, and hast seen Enough of all its sorrows, crimes and cares, To tire thee of it, enter this wild wood And view the haunts of Nature. The calm shade Shall bring a kindred calm, and the sweet breeze That makes the green leaves dance, shall waft a balm To thy sick heart."

"Summer wanes; the children are grown; fun and frolic no more he knows."

"Sustained and soothed by an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave, like one who wraps the drapery of his couch about him, and lies down to pleasant dreams."

"Tender pauses speak the overflow of gladness, when words are all too weak."

"That delicate forest flower, with scented breath and look so like a smile, seems, as it issues from the shapeless mold, an emanation of the indwelling Life, a visible token of the upholding Love, that are the soul of this great universe."

"That make the meadows green; and, poured round all, old ocean's gray and melancholy waste, ? are but the solemn decorations all of the great tomb of man."

"That rolls to its appointed end."

"The air was fragrant with a thousand trodden aromatic herbs, with fields of lavender, and with the brightest roses blushing in tufts all over the meadows."

"The august cloud... Suddenly melts into streams of rain."

"The blacks of this region are a cheerful, careless, dirty, race, not hard worked, and in many respects indulgently treated. It is of course the desire of the master that his slaves shall be laborious; on the other hand it is the determination of the slave to lead as easy a life as he can. The master has the power of punishment on his side; the slave, on his, has invincible inclination, and a thousand expedients learned by long practice... Good natured though imperfect and slovenly obedience on one side, is purchased by good treatment on the other."

"The breath of springtime at this twilight hour comes through the gathering glooms, and bears the stolen sweets of many a flower into my silent rooms."

"The calm shade shall bring a kindred calm, and the sweet breeze that makes the green leaves dance, shall waft a balm to thy sick heart."

"The country ever has a lagging Spring, waiting for May to call its violets forth."

"The daffodil is our door-side queen; She pushes upward the sword already, To spot with sunshine the early green."

"The earth may ring, from shore to shore, with echoes of a glorious name, but he, whose loss our tears deplore, has left behind him more than fame."

"The faint old man shall lean his silver head to feel thee; thou shalt kiss the child asleep, and dry the moistened curls that overspread his temples, while his breathing grows more deep."

"The February sunshine steeps your boughs and tints the buds and swells the leaves within."

"The fiercest agonies have shortest reign; And after dreams of horror, comes again The welcome morning with its rays of peace."

"The gay will laugh when thou art gone, the solemn brood of care plod on, and each one as before will chase his favourite phantom; yet all these shall leave their mirth and their employments, and shall come, and make their bed with thee."

"The gentle race of flowers Are lying in their lowly beds."

"The groves were God's first temple. Ere man learned to hew the shaft, and lay the architrave, and spread the roof above them,--ere he framed the lofty vault, to gather and roll back the sound of anthems; in the darkling wood, amidst the cool and silence, he knelt down and offered to the mightiest solemn thanks and supplication."

"The hills, rock-ribbed, and ancient as the sun."

"The horrid tale of perjury and strife, murder and spoil, which men call history."

"The journalist should be on his guard against publishing what is false in taste or exceptionable in morals."

"The linden, in the fervors of July, Hums with a louder concert. When the wind Sweeps the broad forest in its summer prime, As when some master-hand exulting sweeps The keys of some great organ, ye give forth The music of the woodland depths, a hymn Of gladness and of thanks."

"The little wind-flower, whose just opened eye is blue as the spring heaven it gazes at."

"The melancholy days are come, the saddest of the year, of wailing winds and naked woods and meadows brown and sere. Heaped in the hollows of the grove, the autumn leaves lie dead; they rustle to the eddying gust, and to the rabbit's tread. The robin and the wren are flown, and from the shrub the jay, and from the wood-top calls crow, through all the gloomy day."

"The mighty rain holds the vast empire of the sky alone."

"The moon is at her full, and riding high, floods the calm fields with light. The airs that hover in the summer sky are all asleep tonight."

"The praise of those who sleep in earth, the pleasant memory of their worth, the hope to meet when life is past, shall heal the tortured mind at last."

"The right to discuss freely and openly, by speech, by the pen, by the press, all political questions, and to examine and animadvert (speak out) upon all political institutions, is a right so clear and certain, so interwoven with our other liberties, so necessary, in fact to their existence, that without it we must fall at once into depression or anarchy. To say that he who holds unpopular opinions must hold them at the peril of his life, and that, if he expresses them in public, he has only himself to blame if they who disagree with him should rise and put him to death, is to strike at all rights, all liberties, all protection of the laws, and to justify and extenuate all crimes."

"The rugged trees are mingling their flowery sprays in love; the ivy climbs the laurel to clasp the boughs above."

"The sad and solemn night hath yet her multitude of cheerful fires; The glorious host of light walk the dark hemisphere till she retires; All through her silent watches, gliding slow, Her constellations come, and climb the heavens, and go."

"The shad-bush, white with flowers, brightened the glens; the new leaved butternut and quivering poplar to the roving breeze gave a balsamic fragrance."

"The sounds I had heard seemed worthy to mingle with this bright and perfumed atmosphere, and to thrill the beautiful scenery around me."

"The south wind searches for the flowers whose fragrance late he bore, and sighs to find them in the wood and by the stream no more."

"The stormy March has come at last, with wind, and cloud, and changing skies; I hear the rushing of the blast, that through the snowy valley flies."

"The summer day is closed - the sun is set: well they have done their office, those bright hours, the latest of whose train goes softly out in the red west. The green blade of the ground has risen, and herds have cropped it; the young twig has spread its plaited tissues to the sun; flowers of the garden and the waste have blown and withered; seeds have fallen upon the soil, from bursting cells, and in their graves await their resurrection. Insects from the pools have filled the air awhile with humming wings, that now are still forever; painted moths have wandered the blue sky, and died again."

"The summer morn is bright and fresh, the birds are darting by, as if they loved to breast the breeze that sweeps the cool clear sky."

"The sun has drunk the dew that lay upon the morning grass; there is no rustling in the lofty elm that canopies my dwelling, and its shade scarce cools me. All is silent save the faint and interrupted murmur of the bee, settling on the sick flowers, and then again instantly on the wing."

"The sweet calm sunshine of october, now warms the low spot; upon its grassy mold the purple oak-leaf falls; the birchen bough drops its bright spoil like arrow-heads of gold."

"The tulip-tree, high up, opened, in airs of june, her multitude of golden chalices to humming birds and silken-winged insects of the sky."

"The victory of endurance born."

"The visions of my youth are past too bright, too beautiful to last."

"The windflower and the violet, they perished long ago, And the brier-rose and the orchids died amid the summer glow; But on the hills the golden-rod, and the aster in the wood, And the yellow sunflower by the brook, in autumn beauty stood, Till fell the first from the clear cold heaven, as falls the plague on men, And the brightness of their smile was gone, from upland glade and glen."