Quotations on Benevolence

BENEVOLENCE.

41

Then get thee gone and dig my grave thyself,
And bid the merry bells ring to thine ear
That thou art crowned, not that I am dead.
a. Henry IV. Pt. II. Act IV. Sc. 5.


L. 111.

Hark, how chimes the passing bell!
There's no music to a knell;
All the other sounds we hear,
Flatter, and but cheat our ear.
This doth put us still in mind
That our flesh must be resigned,
And, a general silence made,
The world be muffled in a shade.
[Orpheus' lute, as poets tell,
Was but moral of this bell,
And the captive soul was she,
Which they called Eurydice,
Rescued by our holy groan,
A loud echo to this tone.]
6. Shirley— The Patting Bell.


Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand ;
Ring out the darkness of the land ;


Ring in the Christ that is to be.
0. Tennyson—In Meinoriam. Pt. CVI.


Ring out old shapes of foul disease;

Ring out the narrowing lust of gold ;

Ring out the thousand wars of old, Ring in the thousand years of peace.

rf. Tennyson—fit Memoriam. Ft. CVI.

Ring out the old. ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow.


e. Tennyson—In Memoriam. Pt. CVI.

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky, The flying cloud, the frosty light. /. Tennyson—In Menwriam. Pt, CVI.

Hark ! the loud-voiced bells

Stream on the world around With the full wind, as it swells,

Seas of sound!

g. Frederick Tennyson—The Bridal.

Softly the loud peal dies,

In passing winds it drowns, But breathes, like perfect joys,

Tender tones,

h. Frederick Tennyson— The Bridal.

How like the leper, with his own sad cry
Enforcing his own solitude, it tolls!
That lonely bell set in the rushing shoals,
To warn us from the place of jeopardy !


f. Charles Tennyson Turner—Tlie

Buoy Bell.

BENEVOLENCE.

A kind and gentle heart he had,

To comfort friends and foes; The naked every day he clad

When he put on his clothes.

j. Goldsmith—Elegy on the Death of a.

Mad Dog.

Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride,

And e'en his failings lean'd to virtue's side.

k. Goldsmith—The Deserted Village.

L. 163.

Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere,
Heaven did a recompense as largely send ;
He gave to misery (all he had) a tear,
He gain'd from Heaven ('twas all he wish'd)


a friend.
/. OR.\\—Eltgy. The Epitaph.


Scatter plenty o'er a smiling land. »t. Gray—Elegy in a Country Churchyard.

St. 16.

By Jove the stranger and the poor are sent,

And what to those we give, to Jove is lent.

n. Homer— Odyssey. Bk. 6. L. 247.

Pope's trans.

In every sorrowing soul I pour'd delight,
And poverty stood smiling in my sight.


0. Homer— Odyssey. Bk. 17. I,.506.

Pope's trans.

It never was our guise

To slight the poor, or aught humane despise. p. HoxER—Odyisey. Bk. 14. L. 05.

Pope's trans.

In misery's darkest cavern known,

His useful care was ever nigh,
Where hopeless anguish pour'd his groan,


And lonely want retir'd to die.

q. Sam'l Johnson—On the Death of

Mr. Robert Level. St. 5.

Who gives himself with his alms feeds three, Himself, his hungering neighbor, and me. r. Lowell—The Vision of Sir Launfal.

Pt. II. VIII.

For his bounty

There was no winter in't; an autumn 'twas That grew the more by reaping: his delights Were dolphin-like.

1. Antony and Cleopatra. Act V. Sc. 2.

L. 87.

The poor must be wisely visited and liberally oared for, so that mendicity shall not be tempted into mendacity, nor want exasperated into crime.

t. Robert 0. Wisthrop—Yorktoum

Oration in 1881. 42

BIRDS.

BIRDS-BLACKBIRD.

BIRDS.

Come, all ye feathery people of mid-air,
Who sleep 'midst rocks, or on the mountain


summits Lie down with the wild winds; and ye who

build Your homes amidst green leaves by grottoes

cool;

And ye who on the flat sands hoard your eggs For suns to ripen, come! a. Barry Cornwall—An Invocation to

Birds.

When the swallows homeward fly,
When the roses scattered lie.
When from neither hill or dale,
Chants the silvery nightingale :
In these words my bleeding heart
Would to thee its grief impart;
When I thus thy image lose
Can I, ah ! can I, e'er know repose?
6. Karl Herrlossohn—When the


Swallows Homeward Fly.

I was always a lover of soft-winged things.

c. Victor Huoo—/ Was Always a Lover.

Do you ne'er think what wondrous beings

these? Do you ne'er think who made them, and who

taught

The dialect they speak, where melodies
Alone are the interpreters of thought?
Whose household words are songs in many


keys, Sweeter than instrument of man e'er caught!

d. Longfellow—Tales of a Wayside Inn.

The Poet's Tale. The Birds of
Killingworth.


Hear how the birds, on ev'ry blooming spray, With joyous musick wake the dawning day! «. Pope—Pastorals. Spring. L. 23.

Albatross.

And a good south wind sprung up behind,

The Albatross did follow,
And every day, for food or play,


Came to the mariner's hollo!

In mist or cloud, on mast or shroud,

It perched for vespers nine; Whiles all the night, through fog-smoke white,

Glimmered the white moonshine.

" Ood save thee, ancient Mariner!

From the fiends that plague thee thus!— Why look'st thou so?"—" With my cross-bow

I shot the Albatross."

/. Colebidgi—Ancient Manner. Pt. I.

St. IS.

Great albatross!—the meanest birds

Spring up and flit away,
While thou must toil to gain a flight,


And spread those pinions grey ;
But when they once are fairly poised,


Far o'er each chirping thing
Thou sailest wide to other lands,


E'en sleeping on the wing.

g. Chas. G. Leland—Perseverando.

Bat.

The sun was set; the night came on apace, And falling dews bewet around the place; The bat takes airy rounds on leathern wings, And the hoarse owl his woeful dirges sings. h. Gat—Shepherd's Week. Wednesday; or, The Dumps.

Far different there from all that charm'd

before,

The various terrors of that horrid shore; **** Those matted woods where birds forget to sing. But silent bats in drowsy clusters cling. t. Goldsmith—The Deserted Village.

L. 345.

Ere the bat hath flown
His cloister'd flight.
j. Macbeth. Act III. Sc. 2. L. 40.


On the bat's back I do fly
After summer merrily.
k. Tempest. Act V. Sc. 1. L. 91.


Beach Bird.

Thou little bird, thou dweller by the sea.
Why takest thou its melancholy voice,


And with that boding cry
Along the waves dost thou fly ?
Oh! rather, bird, with me


Through this fair land rejoice!

1. R. H. Dana— The Little Beach Bird.

Blackbird.

The birds have ceased their songs.

All save the blackbird, that from yon tall ash,

'Mid Pinkie's greenery, from his mellow

throat,

In adoration of the setting sun, Chants forth his evening hymn. m. Moir—An Evening Sketch.

Golden Bill I Golden Bill!

Lo, the peep of day;
All the air is cool and still,
From the elm-tree on the hill,
Chant away:


****>*
Let thy loud and welcome lay
Pour alway
Few notes but strong.


71. Montgomery—The Blackbird.

BIRDS—BLACKBIRD.

BIRDS—CANARY.

43

A slender young Blackbird built in a thorn- tree:

A spruce little fellow as ever could be;
His bill was so yellow, his feathers so black,
So long was his tail, and so glossy his back,
That good Mrs. B., who sat hatching her eggs,
And only just left them to stretch her poor


And pick for a minute the worm she preferred, Thought there never was seen such a beautiful

bin!.

a. D. M. Mulock—The Blackbird and the

Rooks.

O Blackbird ! sing me something well: While all the neighbors shoot thee round, I keep smooth plats of fruitful ground,

Where thou may'st warble, eat and dwell. 6. Tennyson— The Blackbird.

How sweet the harmonies of the afternoon !

The Blackbird sings along the sunny breeze His ancient song of leaves, and summer boon ; Rich breath of hayfields streams thro' whispering trees; And birds of morning trim their bustling

wings, And listen fondly—while the Blackbird sings.

c. Frederick Tennyson—The Blackbird.

Bluebird.

" So the Bluebirds have contracted, have they,

for a house? And a nest is under way for little Mr.

Wren?" "Hush, dear, hush! Be quiet, dear! quiet as a

mouse.

These are weighty secrets, and we must whisper them."

d. Susak Coolidoe—Secrets.

In the thickets and the meadows
Piped the bluebird, the Owaissa.
On the summit of the lodges
Sang the robin, the Opechee.
«. Lohgfkllow—Hiawatha. Pt. XXI.


Whither away, Bluebird,

Whither away?

The blast is chill, yet in the upper sky
Thou still canst find the color of thy wing,


The hue of May.
Warbler, why speed thy southern flight? ah,


why,

Thou too, whose song first told us of the Spring?

Whither a way? /. B.C. Stedman— The Flight of the Birds.

Bobolink.

Modest and shy as a nun is she;

One weak chirp is her only note; Braggarts and prince of braggarts is he,

Pouring boasts from his little throat.

g. Bryant—Robert of Lincoln.

Robert of Lincoln is gayly drest,
Wearing a bright black wedding-coat;


White are his shoulders and white his crest.
A. Bey Ant—Robert of Lincoln.


Robert of Lincoln's Quaker wife.

Pretty and quiet, with plain brown wings, Passing at home a patient life,

Broods in the grass while her husband sings.

t. Bryant—Robert of Lincoln.

One day in the bluest of summer weather,
Sketching under a whispering oak,


I heard five bobolinks laughing together,
Over some ornithological joke.
/. C. P. Cranch—Bird Language.


When Nature had made all her birds,
With no more cares to think on,


She gave a rippling laugh and out
There flew a Bobolinkon.
*. C. P. Chanch— The Bobolink*.


Bobolink ! that in the meadow,
Or beneath the orchard's shadow,
Keepest up a constant rattle
Joyous as my children's prattle,
Welcome to the north again.
I. Thos. Hill— The Bobolink.


The crack-brained bobolink courts his crazy

mate,

Poised on a bulrush tipsy with his weight. in. 0. W. Holmes—Spring.

Out of the fragrant heart of bloom,

The bobolinks are singing;
Out of the fragrant heart of bloom
The apple-tree whispers to the room,
" Why art thou but a nest of gloom
While the bobolinks are singing? "


n. W. D. Howells—The Bobolinks are

Singing.

The broad blue mountains lift their brows

Barely to bathe them in the blaze;
The bobolinks from silence rouse
And flash along melodious ways!
o. Harriet Phescott Spofford—


Daybreak.
Canary.


Thoushould'st be carolling thy Maker's praise.
Poor bird ! now fetter'd, and here set to draw,
With graceless toil of beak and added claw,
The meagre food that scarce thy want allays!
And this—to gratify the gloating gaze
Of fools, who value Nature not a straw,
But know to prize the infraction of her law
And hard perversion of her creatures' ways!
Thee the wild woods await, in leaves attired.
Where notes of liquid utterance should engage
Thy bill, that now with pain scant forage earns.
p. Julian Fane—Poems. Second Edition,
with Additional Poems. To a
Canary Bird.


BIRDS—CANARY.

BIRDS—CUCKOO.

Sing away, ay, sing away,

Merry little bird
Always gayest of the gay,
Though a woodland roundelay


You ne'er sung nor heard ;
Though your life from youth to age
Passes in a narrow cage,
a. D. M. Mulock—The Canary in hit Cage.


Bird of the amber beak,
Bird of the golden wing!
Thy dower is thy carolling;
Thou hast not far to seek
Thy bread, nor needest wine
To make thy utterance divine;
Thou art canopied and clothed
And unto Song "betrothed.
b. E. C. Stedman— The Songster.


St. 2.

Cock.

Good-morrow to thy sable beak,
And glossy plumage, dark and sleek.
Thy crimson moon and azure eye,
Cock of the heath, so wildly shy !


c. Joanna Baillie—The Black Cock.

St. 1.

While the cock with lively din
Scatters the rear of darkness thin,
And to the stack or the barn door
Stoutly struts his dames before.


d. Milton—I? Allegro.

Hark, hark ! I hear

The strain of strutting chanticleer

Cry, cock-a-diddle-dow.

e. Tempett. Act I. 8c. 2. L. 384.

The cock, that is the trumpet to the morn,
Doth with his lofty and shrill-sounding throat
Awake the god of day.
/. Samlet. Act I. Sc. I. L. 150.


The early village cock Hath twice done salutation to the morn. g. Richard III. ActV. Sc. 3. L. 309.

The morning cock crew loud,
And at the sound it shrunk in haste away,
And vanish'd from our sight.
h. Hamlet. Actl. Sc. 2. L. 217.


Crow.

To shoot at crows is powder flung away. ». Gay. Ep. IV. Last line.

Only last night he felt deadly sick, and, after a great deal of pain, two black crows flew out of his mouth and took wing from the room.

j. Gesta Romanorum—Ttie XLV.

Even the blackest of them all, the crow,
Kenders good service as your man-at-arms,
Crushing the beetle in his coat of mail,
And crying havoc on the slug and snail.
k. Longfellow—Tales of a Wayside Inn.
Tlte Poet's Tale. Birdt of
Killingworth. St. 19.


Light thickens; and the crow
Makes wing to the rooky wood.


1. Macbeth. Act III. Sc. 2. L. 49.

The crow doth sing as sweetly as the lark
When neither is attended,
wt. Merchant of Venice. Act V. Sc. 1.


L. 102.

As the many-winter'd crow that leads the

clanging rookery home. «. Tennyson— Locksley Hall. St. 34.

Cuckoo.

The Attic warbler pours her throat
Responsive to the cuckoo's note.
o. Gray—Ode on the Spring.


And now I hear its voice again,
And still its message is of peace,
It sings of love that will not cease,


For me it never sings in vain.
p. Fhed'k Locker—The Cuckoo.


Oh, could I fly, I 'd fly with thee!

We'd make, with joyful wing, Our annual visit o'er the globe,

Companions of the spring.

q. John Logan—To the Cuckoo.

Sweet bird ! thy bower is ever green,

Thy sky is ever clear;
Thou hast no sorrow in thy song,


No winter in thy yeur!

r. John Logan—To the Cuckoo.

And being fed by vis you used us so
As that ungentle gull, the cuckoo's bird,
Useth the sparrow.
s. Henry IV. Pt. I. ActV. Sc. 1.


L. 59.

The cuckoo builds not for himself. t. Antony and Cleopatra. Act II. Sc. 6.

L. 28.

The cuckoo then on'every tree,
Mocks married men; for thus sings he,


Cuckoo!

Cuckoo! Cuckoo! O word of fear,
Unpleasing to a married ear.
u Love's lAiboiir's Ltixt. Act V. Sc. 2.


L. 908.

The merry cuckow, messenger of Spring, His trumpet shrill hatli thrice alreadysounded. «'. Spenser—Sonnet 19.

BIRDS-CUCKOO.

BIRDS—DOVE.

While I deduce,

From the first note the hollow cuckoo sings, The symphony of spring, a. Thomson—The Seasons. Spring.

L. 576.

List—'twas the cuckoo—O, with what delight Heard I that voice! and catch it now, though

faint,

Far off and faint, and melting into air,
Yet not to he mistaken. Hark again!
Those louder cries give notice that the bird,
Although invisible as Echo's self,
Is wheeling hitherward.
6. Wordsworth—The Cuckoo at Laverna.


0 blithe New-comer! I have heard,

1 hear thee and rejoice;

O Cuckoo! shall I call thee Bird,
Or but a wandering Voice?
c. Wordsworth—To the Cuckoo


Cygnet.

Their cygnet- following through the foamy

wake,

Picking the leaves of plants, pursuing insects.
Canto IV. L. 236.

A golden chariot in the midst is set, And silver signets seem to feel its weight. e. Prior—Salomon. Bk. II. Pleasure.

L. 643.

lam the cygnet to this pale faint swan, Who chants a doleful hymn to his own death ; And, from the organ-pipe of frailty, sings His soul and body to their lasting rest. /. King John. Act V. Sc. 7. L. 21.

So doth the swan her downy cygnets save, Keeping them prisoner underneath her wings. g. Henry VI. Pt. I. Act V. Sc. 3.

L. 56.

Dove.

Oh ! when 'tis summer weather,
And the yellow bee, with fairy sound,
The waters clear is humming round,
And the cuckoo sings unseen,
And the leaves are waving green—


Oh ! then 'tis sweet,

In some retreat, To hear the murmuring dove. With those whom on earth alone we love, And to wind through the greenwood together. A. Rev. Wm. Lisle Bowles—TV

Greenwood.

And there my little doves did sit

With feathers softly brown
And glittering eyes that showed their right
To general Nature's deep delight.


i. E. B. Browning—My Dove*.

The thrustelcok made eek hir lay,
The wode dove upon the spray
She sang ful loude and cleere.
j. Chaucer—The Rime of Sir Thopas.


As when the dove returning bore the mark
Of earth restored to the long labouring ark ;
The relics of mankind, secure of rest,
Oped every window to receive the guest,
And the fair bearer of the message bless'd.
k. Drydex—To Her Grace of Ormond.


L. 70.

Shatter'd and torn, before the flag they fly
Like doves, that the exalted eagle spy
Ready to stoop and seize them from on high.
1. , Duke—On the Death of Charles II.


Listen, sweet Dove, unto my song,
And spread thy golden wings in me;


Hatching my tender heart so long, Till it get wing, and flie away with Thee. m. Herbert—The Church. Whitsunday.

See how that pair of billing doves
With open murmurs own their loves
And, heedless of censorious eyes,
Pursue their unpolluted joys :
No fears of future want molest
The downy quiet of their neat.
n. Lady Mohtaou—Veries. Written in a
Garden. St. 1.


The Dove,

On silver pinions, winged her peaceful way. o. Montgomery—Pelican Island.

Canto I. L. 173.

Not half so swift the trembling doves can fly,
When the fierce eagle cleaves the liquid sky ;
Not half so swiftly the fierce eagle moves,
When thro' the clouds he drives the trem-
bling doves.
p. Pope— Windsor Forest. L. 185.


Anon, as patient as the female dove.
When that her golden couplets are disclosed,
His silence will sit drooping.
q. Hamlet. Act V. Sc. 1. L. 309.


But I will aggravate my voice so that I will roar you as gently as any sucking dove. r. A. Midsummer Nights Dream. Act I.

Sc. 2. L. 83.

So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows. 3. Romeo and Juliet. Act I. Sc. 5.

L. 50.

The dove and very blessed spirit of peace. t. Henry IV. Pt. II. Act IV. Sc. 1.

L. 46.

And oft I heard the tender dove
In firry woodlands making moan.
v. Tennyson—Miller's Daughter.