Familiar Sayings

Otago Witness, Issue 1548, 9 July 1881, Page 26

Familiar Sayings

Quotations from tne best Authors. (Our 'readers are invited to contribute quotations of not more than eight or nine lines.) Selected by James Neale, Livingstone :— Let every man be occupied, and occupied in the highest employment of wbioh his nature is oapable, and die with the consciousness that he has done his bmb.— Sydney Smith.

Men must know that in this theatre of manß* life it remained only to God and angels to be lookers on.— Bacon, The talent of Bucoess is nothing mora than doing what you can as well without a tlnught of fame.— Henry W. Longfellow. Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.— Confucius.

Dost thou love life, then do not squander time, for that is the stuff life is made of.— Franklin.

Believe me when I tell you that thrift of time will repay jou in after life with a usury of profit beyond your moßt sanguine dreams, and thai; the waste of it will make you dwindle, alike in intellectual and in moral stature, beyond your darkest reckoning.— W. E. Glad stone.

No man can end with being superior who will not begin with being inferior.— Sydney Smith.

Selected by J. Davidson, Kaihiku :— Howe'er it be, it seems to me 'Tis only noble to be good ; Kind hearts are more than coronets, And simple faith than Norman blood. — Tennyton.

White as a white sail on a dusky sea, When half the horizon's clouded and half free, Fluttering between the dun wave and the sky, Is hope's last gleam in man's extremity. —Byron.

He that does good to another man does also goodgto himself, not only in the consequence, but m the very act of doing it } for the consciousness of well-doing is an ample reward. — Seneca. Absence of occupation is not rest ; A mind quite vacant is a mind distressed. —Covoper. ... To thine ovrn self be true ; And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man. —Shakespeare. No man ever offended his own conscience but first or last it was avenged upon him for it. South. He that has light within his own clear breast May sit i' th' centre and enjoy bright day ; But he that hides a dark soul and foul thoughts, Benighted walks under the midday sun : Himself is his own dungeon. —Milton. Man's life's a book of history ; The leaves thereof are days ; The letters, mercies closely joined ; The title is God's praise. —John Masson. Be fearful only of thyself, and 'stand in awe of none more than of thine own conscience. There is in every man a severe censor of his manners; and he that reverences this judge will seldom do anything he need repent of.— Fuller. Look not mournfully iato the paßt ; it copes not again. Wisely improve the present ; it is thine. Go forth to meet the shadowy future without tear.— Longfellow's Hyperion. Selected by P. Nolan, Ngapara :— Nor all that heralds rake from coffin'd clay, Nor florid prose, nor honied lies of rhyme, 'Can blazon evil deeds, or consecrate a crime. Maidens, like moths, are ever caught by glare, And mammon wins his way where Seraphs might despair. Poor, paltry slaves ! yet born 'midst nobler scenesWhy, nature, waste thy wonders on such men ? Vain are the pleasaunces on earth supplied ; Swept into wrecks avon by Time's ungentle tide ! Oh ! there is sweetness in the mountain air, And life, that bloated ease can never hope to Bhare. Pride I bend thine eye from heaven to thine estate, See how the mighty shrink into a song ! Can volume, pillar, pile, preserve thee great ? Or must thou trust tradition's simple tongue, When flattery Bleeps with thee, and history does thee

■wrong? Ah, monarchs 1 could ye taste the mirth ye mar, Not in the toils of glory would ye fret, The hoarse dull drum would sleep, and man be happy

yet. Ah, vice ! how soft are thy voluptuous ways ! While boyish blcod is mantling who can 'scape The fascination of thy magic gaze ? A cherub-hydra round us dost thou gape, And mould to" every taste thy dear delusive shape. 'Tis an old lesson, Time approves it true, And those_ who know it best, deplore it most ; When all is won that all desire to woo, The paltry prize is hardly worth the cost. See, all forgotten— and shall man repine That his frail bonds to fleeting life are broke ? Cease fool ! the fate of gods may well be thine, Wouldat thou survive the marble or the oak ? When nations, tongues, and worlds must sink beneath the stroke ! What is the worst of woes that wait on age ? What stamps the wrinkle deeper on the brow? To view each loved one blotted from life's page, And be alone on earth, as I am now. Still must I on ; for lamas a weed, riunsf from the rock, on ocean's foam to sail Where'er the surge may sweep, the tempest's breath prevail. et must I think less wildly :— I have thought 00 long and darkly, till my brain became In its own eddy boiling and o'erwrought, A whirling gulf of phantasy and flame. Yet am I changed ; though still enough the same In strength to learn what time cannot abate, And feed on bitter fruits without accusing fate. —From Childe Harold's Pilgrimage.

Soleotea by X. Y. Z , Wnnganui .■— With thee were the dreams of my earliest love, Every thonght of my reason was thine : In my last humble prayer to the spirit above Thy name shall be mingled with mine ! Oh ! blest are the lovers and friends who shall live The days of thy glory to see ; But the next dearest blessing that Heaven can give Is the pride of thus dying for thee.

— Moore. Oh 1 breathe not his name, let it sleep in the shade, Where cold and unhonour'd his relics are laid ; Sad, silent, and dark be the tears that we shed, -As the night dew that falls on the grass o'er his head. The sea hath its pearls, The heaven hath its stars ; But my heart, my heart, My heart bm its Jove, _j

Great are the sea and the heavens, Yet greater is my heart ; And fairer t*an pearls and stars Flashes and beams my love. —Longfellow. I like that ancient Saxon phrase which calls The burial ground God's Acre ! It is just ; It consecrates each grave within its walls, And breathes abenis&n o'er the sleeping dust. Selected by Eebert Kempseed, Sawyer's Bay : Aurringzebe, who, in the same month in which Oliver Cromwell died, assumed the magnificent title of ' Conquerer of the World,' continued to reign until Anne had been long on the English throne. He waa the sovereign of a larger territory than had obeyed any of his predeces sors, His name was great in the farthest regions of the West. There he had been made by Dryden the hero of a tragedy onoe rapturously applauded by orowded theatres, and known by heart to fine gentlemen and fine ladies, but now forgotten. One noble passage still live 3, and is repeated by thousands who know not whence it comes :-- Trust on, and think to-morrow will repay : To-morrow's falser than the former day ; Lies worse and while it says we shall be blest With some new joys, cuts off what we possess'd. Strange cozenage ! None would live past years again, Yet all hope pleasure in what yet remain ; And from tho dregs of life think to receive What the first sprightly running could not give. —Aurringzebe, act iv, scene 1. Macaulay says of this noble passage, there are not eight finer lines in Lucretius.