waiting Justice sleeps.
—Josiah Gilbert Holland.
———
TO THINE OWN SELF BE TRUE
By thine own soul's law learn to live,
And if men thwart thee take no heed;
And if men hate thee have no care;
Sing thou thy song, and do thy deed;
Hope thou thy hope, and pray thy prayer,
And claim no crown they will not give,
Nor bays they grudge thee for thy hair.
Keep thou thy soul-won, steadfast oath,
And to thy heart be true thy heart;
What thy soul teaches learn to know,
And play out thine appointed part,
And thou shalt reap as thou shalt sow,
Nor helped nor hardened in thy growth,
To thy full stature thou shalt grow.
Fix on the future's goal thy face,
And let thy feet be lured to stray
Nowhither, but be swift to run,
And nowhere tarry by the way,
Until at last the end is won,
And thou mayst look back from thy place
And see thy long day's journey done.
—Pakenham Beatty.
———
LORD OF HIMSELF
How happy is he born and taught
That serveth not another's will;
Whose armor is his honest thought,
And simple truth his utmost skill.
Whose passions not his masters are,
Whose soul is still prepared for death;
Not tied unto the world with care
Of public fame or private breath.
Who envies none that chance doth raise,
Or vice; who never understood
How deepest wounds are given by praise,
Nor rules of state but rules of good.
Who hath his life from rumors freed,
Whose conscience is his strong retreat;
Whose state can neither flatterers feed,
Nor ruin make accusers great.
Who God doth late and early pray
More of his grace than gifts to lend;
And entertains the harmless day
With a well-chosen book or friend.
This man is freed from servile bands,
Of hope to rise or fear to fall;
Lord of himself, though not of lands,
And having nothing, yet hath all.
—Henry Wotton.
———
High above hate I dwell;
O storms, farewell!
———
UNCONQUERED
Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud;
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll;
I am the master of my fate,
I am the captain of my soul.
—William Ernest Henley.
———
RELIGION AND DOCTRINE
He stood before the Sanhedrim:
The scowling rabbis gazed at him.
He recked not of their praise or blame;
There was no fear, there was no shame,
For one upon whose dazzled eyes
The whole world poured its vast surprise.
The open heaven was far too near
His first day's light too sweet and clear,
To let him waste his new-gained ken
On the hate-clouded face of men.
But still they questioned, Who art thou?
What hast thou been? What art thou now?
Thou art not he who yesterday
Sat here and begged beside the way,
For he was blind.
"And
