This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
To Spring - O Thou with dewy locks, who lookest down Through the clear windows of the morning, turn Thine angel eyes upon our western isle, Which in full choir hails thy approach, O Spring! The hills tell one another, and the listening Valleys hear; all our longing eyes are turn'd Up to thy bright pavilions: issue forth And let thy holy feet visit our clime! Come o'er the eastern hills, and let our winds Kiss thy perfumèd garments; let us taste Thy morn and evening breath; scatter thy pearls Upon our lovesick land that mourns for thee. O deck her forth with thy fair fingers; pour Thy soft kisses on her bosom; and put Thy golden crown upon her languish'd head, Whose modest tresses are bound up for thee.
Edward Dyer, fully Sir Edward Dyer
I woulde it were not as it is Or that I cared not yea or no; I woulde I thoughte it not amiss, Or that amiss mighte blamles goo; I woulde I were, yet woulde I not, I mighte be gladd yet coulde I not. I coulde desire to know the meane Or that the meane desyre soughte; I woulde I coulde my fancye weane From suche sweet joyes as Love hathe wroughte; Onlye my wishe is leaste of all A badge whereby to know a thrall. O happy man whiche doste aspire To that whiche semeleye thou dost crave! Thrise happy man, if thy desyre Maye winn with hope good happ to have; But woe to me unhappy man Whom hope nor happ acquiet cann. The budds of hope are starvde with feare And still his foe presents his face; My state, if hope the palme shoulde beare Unto my happ woulde be disgrace. As diamond in woode were set Or Irus raggs in goulde I frett. For loe my tyrèd shoulders beare Desyre's weery beatinge winges; And at my feet a clogg I weare Tyde one wth selfe disdayning stringes. My wings to mounte aloft make hast. My clog doth sinke me downe as faste. This is our state, loe thus we stande They ryse to fall that climbe to hye; The boye that fled kynge Minos lande Maye learne the wise more love to flye. What gaynde his poynte agaynste the sonne He drownde in seas himself, that wonne. Yet Icarus more happy was, By present deathe his cares to ende Than I, pore mann, on whom alas Tenn thousande deathes theire paynes do sende. Now greife, now hope, now loue, now spyghte Longe sorrows mixte withe shorte delyghte. The pheere and fellowe of thy smarte Prometheus I am indeede; Upon whose ever livinge harte The greedy gryphes do daylye feede; But he that lyfts his harte so hye Muste be contente to pine and dye.
Sweet stream that winds through yonder glade, Apt emblem of a virtuous maid Silent and chaste she steals along, Far from the world's gay busy throng: With gentle yet prevailing force, Intent upon her destined course; Graceful and useful all she does, Blessing and blest where'er she goes; Pure-bosom'd as that watery glass, And Heaven reflected in her face.
Age | Better | God | Grief | Happy | Joy | Longing | Love | Men | Peace | Providence | Receive | Sacred | Story | Troubles | Weakness | God | Child |
God Hides His People - To lay the soul that loves him low, Becomes the Only–wise: To hide beneath a veil of woe, The children of the skies. Man, though a worm, would yet be great; Though feeble, would seem strong; Assumes an independent state, By sacrilege and wrong. Strange the reverse, which, once abased, The haughty creature proves! He feels his soul a barren waste, Nor dares affirm he loves. Scorned by the thoughtless and the vain, To God he presses near; Superior to the world's disdain, And happy in its sneer. Oh welcome, in his heart he says, Humility and shame! Farewell the wish for human praise, The music of a name! But will not scandal mar the good That I might else perform? And can God work it, if he would, By so despised a worm? Ah, vainly anxious!—leave the Lord To rule thee, and dispose; Sweet is the mandate of his word, And gracious all he does. He draws from human littleness His grandeur and renown; And generous hearts with joy confess The triumph all his own. Down, then, with self–exalting thoughts; Thy faith and hope employ, To welcome all that he allots, And suffer shame with joy. No longer, then, thou wilt encroach On his eternal right; And he shall smile at thy approach, And make thee his delight.
Age | Better | God | Grief | Happy | Joy | Longing | Love | Men | Peace | Providence | Receive | Sacred | Story | Troubles | Weakness | God | Child |
Love to faults is always blind; Always is to joy inclin’d, Lawless, wing’d and unconfin’d, And breaks all chains from every mind. Deceit to secrecy confin’d, Lawful, cautious and refin’d; To anything but interest blind, And forges fetters for the mind.
Benevolence | Burial | Divinity | Enemy | God | Man | Marriage | Men | Murder | Receive | Smile | Time | Will | Wishes | Worship | Friendship | God | Murder | Forgive | Friends |
Infant joy. I have no name I am but two days old.- what shall I call thee? I happy am joy is my name,- sweet joy befell thee! Pretty joy! Sweet joy but two days old. Sweet joy I call thee: thou dost smile. I sing the while sweet joy befell thee.
Each sinner transformed into a saint is a new token of a redeeming power among men. That token declares to observers, not that there is a King in heaven, not that there is a "Father of Lights," but that there is a Savior. And this is the testimony that the world especially needs.
The angel that presided o'er my birth said `little creature, formed of joy and mirth, go, love without the help of anything on earth.'
Human nature is said by many to be good; if so, where have social evils come from? For human nature is the only moral nature in that corrupting thing called "society." Every example set before the child of to-day is the fruit of human nature. It has been planted on every possible field — among the snows that never melt; in temperate regions, and under the line; in crowded cities, in lonely forests; in ancient seats of civilization, in new colonies; and in all these fields it has, without once failing, brought forth a crop of sins and troubles.
Church | Excellence | Glory | World | Excellence |
No enumeration of the fruits of the Spirit will be found which excludes peace and joy, much less love; and from these graces, if, indeed, not from the last alone, spring the various fruits which unitedly constitute righteousness.
Church |
The machine can free man or enslave him; it can make of this world something resembling a paradise or a purgatory. Men have it within their power to achieve a security hitherto dreamed of only by the philosophers, or they may go the way of the dinosaurs, actually disappearing from the earth because they fail to develop the social and political intelligence to adjust to the world which their mechanical intelligence has created.
When the voices of children are heard on the green and laughing is heard on the hill, my heart is at rest within my breast and everything else is still.
The power which money gives is that of brute force; it is the power of the bludgeon and the bayonet.
The faults of our neighbors with freedom we blame, But tax not ourselves, though we practice the same.
The man to solitude accustom'd long, perceives in everything that lives a tongue; not animals alone, but shrubs and trees have speech for him, and understood with ease, after long drought when rains abundant fall, he hears the herbs and flowers rejoicing all.