Like those loved links of old! Ere the last old friendly feelings Had taught one tear to flow! Though hopes we shared-the early beams Have fled, dear friend, like morning dreams Still we've kept the kind old feelings THE BLESSINGS OF FRIENDSHIP. BY YOUNG. KNOW'ST thou, Lorenzo! what a friend contains? As bees mixed nectar draw from fragrant flowers, So men from friendship wisdom and delight; Twins tied by nature, if they part they die. Hast thou no friend to set thy mind`abroach? Good sense will stagnate: thoughts shut up want air, And spoil, like bales unopened to the sun. Had thought been all, sweet speech, had been denied ; Speech, thought's canal! speech, thought's criterion too! Thought in the mine may come forth gold or dross; push Of waves conflicting, breaks the learned scum, And defectates the student's standing pool. In contemplation is his proud resource? 'Tis poor, as proud, by converse unsustained. Rude thought runs wild in contemplation's field: Converse, the manége, breaks it to the bit Of due restraint; and emulation's spur 1 Gives graceful energy, by rivals awed. By that untutored, contemplation raves; Denies or damps an undivided joy. Joy is an important; joy is an exchange; Joy flies monopolists: it calls for two; Rich fruit! Heaven planted! never plucked by one. Celestial Happiness, whene'er she stoops Beware the counterfeit : in passion's flame Hearts melt but melt like ice, soon harder froze. True love strikes root in reason; passion's foe: Virtue alone entenders us for life; I wrong her much-entenders us for ever. Of Friendship's fairest fruits, the fruit most fair Is virtue kindling at a rival fire, And, emulously, rapid in her race. O the soft enmity! endearing strife! This carries friendship to her noontide point, PERFECT FRIENDSHIP. BY DRYDEN. I HAD a friend that loved me; I was his soul; he lived not but in me; If I have any joy when thou art absent, PAST TIMES. BY BARRY CORNWALL. OLD acquaintance, shall the nights We were young, when you and I Talked of golden things together- Twenty years have fled, we know, Bringing care and changing weather; But hath the heart no backward flights, That we again may see those nights, And laugh together? Jove's eagle, soaring to the sun, Renews the past year's mouldering feather: Ah, why not you and I, then, soar From age to youth-and dream once more Long nights together? |