YET more, be careful that, unworthily, thou gain not an

advantage over weakness,

Unstable souls, fervent and profuse, fluttered by the feeling

of the moment;

For eloquence swayeth to its will the feeble and the conscious of defect:

Rashly give they, and afterward are sad,—a gift that doubly erred.

It was the worldliness of priestcraft that accounted almsgiving for charity;

And many a father's penitence hath steeped his son in penury:

Yet, considered he lightly the guilt of a deathbed selfishness That strove to take with him, for gain, the gold no longer his : So he died in a false peace, and dying robbed his kindred; The cunning friar at his side having cheated both the living and the dead.

CHARITY Sitteth on a fair hill-top, blessing far and near,
But her garments drop ambrosia, chiefly on the violets around

her:

She gladdeneth indeed the map-like scene, stretching to the verge of the horizon,

For her angel face is lustrous and beloved, even as the moon in heaven.

Tut the light of that beatific vision gloweth in serener concentration

The nearer to her heart, and nearer to her home,-that hilltop where she sitteth:

Therefore is she kind unto her kin, yearning in affection on her neighbors,

Giving gifts to those around who know and love her well. But the counterfeit of charity, an hypocrite of earth, not a grace of heaven,

Seeketh not to bless at home, for her nearer aspect is illfavored.

Therefore hideth she for shame, counting that pride humility, And none of those around her hearth are gladdened by her

gifts:

Rather, with an overreaching zeal, flingeth she her bounty to the stranger,

And scattered prodigalities abroad compensate for meanness

in her home:

For benefits showered on the distant shine in unmixed

beauty,

So then even she may reap their undiscerning praise:

Therefore native want hath pined, where foreign need was

fattened;

Woman been crushed by the tyrannous hand that upheld the flag of liberality;

Poverty been prisoned up and starved by hearts that are maudlin upon crime;

And freeborn babes been manacled by men who liberate the sturdy slave.

POLICY Counselleth a gift, given wisely and in season,

And policy afterward approveth it, for great is the influence of gifts.

The lover, unsmiled upon before, is welcomed for his jewelled bauble:

The righteous cause without a fee must yield to bounteous

guilt:

How fair is a man in thine esteem whose just discrimination seeketh thee,

And so, discerning merit, honoreth it with gifts!

Yea, let the cause appear sufficient, and the motive clear and

unsuspicious,

As given unto one who cannot help, or proving honest

thanks,

There liveth not one among a million who is proof against the charm of liberality,

And flattery, that boon of praise, hath power with the wisest.

MAN is of three natures, craving all for charity;

It is not enough to give him meats, withholding other comfort; For the mind starveth, and the soul is scorned, and so the human animal

Eateth its unsatisfying pittance, a thankless, heartless pauper. Yet would he bless thee and be grateful, didst thou feed his

spirit,

And teach him that thine almgivings are charities, are loves: I saw a beggar in the street, and another beggar pitied him; Sympathy sank into his soul, and the pitied one felt happier: Anon passed by a cavalcade, children of wealth and gaiety; They laughed, and looked upon the beggar, and the gallants flung him gold;

He, poor spirit-humbled wretch, gathered up their givings with a curse,

And went to share it with his brother, the beggar who had pitied-him'

OF BEAUTY

THOU mightier than Manoah's son, whence is thy great strength,

And wherein the secret of thy craft, O charmer charming

wisely?

For thou art strong in weakness, and in artlessness well

skilled,

Constant in the multitudes of change, and simple amidst intricate complexity.

Folly's shallow lip can ask the deepest question,

And many wise in many words should answer, what is beauty?

Who shall separate the hues that flicker on a dying dolphin, Or analyse the jewelled lights that deck the peacock's train, Or shrewdly mix upon a palette the tints of an iridescent

spar,

Or set in rank the wandering shades about a watered silk?

FOR beauty is intangible, vague, ill to be defined:
She hath the coat of a chameleon, changing while we watch it,
Strangely woven is the web, disorderly yet harmonious,
A glistering robe of mingled mesh, that may not be unra-
velled.

It is shot with heaven's blue, the soul of summer skies,
And twisted strings of light, the mind of noonday suns.
And ruddy gleams of life, that roll along the veins,

A coat of many colors, running curiously together.

There is threefold beauty for man; twofold beauty for the animal;

And the beauty of inanimates is single: body, temper, spirit. Multiplied in endless combination, issue the changeable results;

Each class verging on the other twain, with imperceptible gradation;

And every individual in each having his propriety of differ

ence,

So that the meanest of creation bringeth in a tribute of the beautiful.

Yea, from the worst in favor shineth out a fitness of design,
The patent mark of beauty, its Maker's name imprest.
For the great Creator's seal is set to all his works;

Its quarterings are Attributes of praise, and all the shield is beauty.

So, that heraldic blazon is Creation's common signet;
And the universal family of life goeth in the colors of its

Lord;

But each one, as a scveral son, shall bear those arms with a difference:

Beauty, various in phase, and similar in seeming oppositions. The coins of old Rome were struck with a diversity for

each,

Barely two be found alike in every Cæsar's image:

So, note thou the seals, ranged around the charters of the

Universe,

The finger of God is the stamp upon them all, but each hath its separate variety.

BEAUTY, theme of innocence, how may guilt discourse thee? Let holy angels sing thy praise, for man hath marred thy

visage.

Still, the maimed torso of a Theseus can gladden taste with its proportions;

Though sin hath shattered every limb, how comely are the fragments!

And music leaveth on the ear a memory of sweet sounds; And broken arches charm the sight with hints of fair com

pleteness.

So, while humbled at the ruin, be thou grateful for the relics;
Go forth, and look on all around with kind uncaptious eye:
Freely let us wander through these unfrequented ways,
And talk of glorious beauty filling all the world.

1

FOR beauty hideth everywhere, that Reason's child may

seek her,

And having found the gem of price, may set it in God's

crown.

Beauty nestleth in the rosebud, or walketh the firmament with planets,

She is heard in the beetle's evening hymn, and shouteth in the matins of the sun;

The cheek of the peach is glowing with her smile, her splendor blazeth in the lightning,

She is the dryad of the woods, the naiad of the streams;
Her golden hair hath tapestried the silkworm's silent cham-

ber,

And to her measured harmonies the wild waves beat in

time:

With twinkling feet at eventide she danceth in the meadow,