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And taste of nectar's suckets,

At those clear wells

Where sweetness dwells,

Drawn up by saints in crystal buckets.

And when our bottles and all we
Are filled with immortality,

Then the blessed paths we 'll travel,
Strewed with rubies thick as gravel;
Ceilings of diamonds, sapphire floors,
High walls of coral and pearly bowers.
From thence to Heaven's bribeless hall,
Where no corrupted voices brawl;
No conscience molten into gold,
No forged accuser, bought or sold,
No cause deferred, no vain-spent journey,
For there Christ is the King's Attorney,
Who pleads for all without degrees,
And He hath angels, but no fees.
And when the grand twelve-million jury
Of our sins, with direful fury,

'Gainst our souls black verdicts give,
Christ pleads His death, and then we live
Be Thou my speaker, taintless pleader,
Unblotted lawyer, true proceeder!
Thou giv'st salvation even for alms;
Not with a bribed lawyer's palms.
And this is mine eternal plea

To Him that made heaven, earth, and sea,
That, since my flesh must die so soon,
And want a head to dine next noon,

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Just at the stroke, when my veins start and spread,

Set on my soul an everlasting head!

Then am I ready, like a palmer fit,

To tread those blest paths which before

I writ.

Of death and judgment, heaven and hell,
Who oft doth think, must needs die well.
Sir Walter Raleigh.

1603?

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A BALLAD OF TREES AND THE MASTER

INTO the woods my Master went,

Clean forspent, forspent.

Into the woods my Master came,

Forspent with love and shame.

But the olives they were not blind to Him;

The little gray leaves were kind to Him;
The thorn-tree had a mind to Him

When into the woods He came.

Out of the woods my Master went,
And He was well content.

Out of woods my Master came,
Content with death and shame.

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1884.

1633.

When Death and Shame would woo

Him last,

From under the trees they drew Him last : 'T was on a tree they slew Him-last, When out of the woods He came.

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Sidney Lanier.

A HYMN

DROP, drop, slow tears,

And bathe those beauteous feet,
Which brought from Heaven

The news and Prince of Peace:
Cease not, wet eyes,

His mercy to entreat;

To cry for vengeance

Sin doth never cease:

In your deep floods

Drown all my faults and fears;
Nor let His eye

See sin, but through my tears.

Phineas Fletcher.

QUA CURSUM VENTUS

As ships, becalmed at eve, that lay
With canvas drooping, side by side,

Two towers of sail at dawn of day
Are scarce long leagues apart descried;

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When fell the night, up sprung the breeze, And all the darkling hours they plied, Nor dreamt but each the self-same seas By each was cleaving, side by side:

E'en so-but why the tale reveal
Of those, whom year by year unchanged,
Brief absence joined anew to feel,

Astounded, soul from soul estranged?

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At dead of night their sails were filled,
And onward each rejoicing steered-
Ah, neither blame, for neither willed,
Or wist, what first with dawn appeared! 15

To veer, how vain! On, onward strain, Brave barks! In light, in darkness too, Through winds and tides one compass

guides

To that, and your own selves, be true.

But O blithe breeze; and O great seas,
Though ne'er, that earliest parting past,
On your wide plain they join again,
Together lead them home at last.

One port, methought, alike they sought,
One purpose hold where'er they fare,-
O bounding breeze, O rushing seas!
At last, at last, unite them there!

1849.

Arthur Hugh Clough.

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MY LADY'S GRAVE

THE linnet in the rocky dells,
The moor-lark in the air,
The bee among the heather bells
That hide my lady fair:

The wild deer browse above her breast;
The wild birds raise their brood;

And they, her smiles of love caress'd,
Have left her solitude!

I ween that when the grave's dark wall
Did first her form retain,

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They thought their hearts could ne'er recall The light of joy again.

They thought the tide of grief would flow
Uncheck'd through future years;

But where is all their anguish now,
And where are all their tears?

Well, let them fight for honour's breath,

Or pleasure's shade pursue

The dweller in the land of death

Is changed and careless too.

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