Beauty, wit, high birth, desert of service,
Love, friendship, charity, are subject all
To envious and calumniating time.

Shakspere.

Virtue itself 'scapes not calumnious strokes.

Shakspere.

With calumnious art

Of counterfeited truth thus held their ears. Milton.

From mighty wrongs to petty perfidy,

Have I not seen what human things could do?
From the loud roar of foaming calumny,
To the small whisper of the paltry few,
And subtle venom of the reptile crew?

Saw ye the sun, obscured at noon,

Burst through the mist, and fiercer blaze? Saw ye at eve the clouded moon

Shine out, and shed soul-soothing rays? Oh! thus shall truth's eternal beam

Consume foul falsehood's venomed shroud: Thus, thus shall lovely virtue gleam Through calumny's malignant cloud!

Byron.

Anon.

CAN-CANNOT.

IF she can make me blest, she only can;
Empire and wealth, and all she brings beside,
Are but the train and trappings of her love.

Do I not in plainest truth Tell you-I do not, nor I cannot love you?

I cannot love him;

Dryden.

Shakspere.

Yet I suppose him virtuous, know him noble,
Of great estate, of fresh and stainless youth,
In voices well divulged; learned and valiant,
And in dimensions and the shape of nature,
A gracious person: but yet I cannot love him.

Shakspere.

CANDOUR. CANE.

CANDOUR.

155

A candid judge will read each piece of wit
With the same spirit that its author writ.-Pope.

No haughty gesture marks his gait,
No pompous tone his word,
No studied attitude is seen,
No palling nonsense heard;
He'll suit his bearing to the hour,
Laugh, listen, learn, or teach,
With joyous freedom in his mirth,
And candour in his speech.

Eliza Cook.

CANE.

ABENUMAR, thy youth these sports has known,
Of which thy age has now spectator grown;
Judge-like thou sitt'st, to praise or to arraign,
The flying skirmish of the darted cane.

Sir Plume of amber snuff-box, justly vain,
And the nice conduct of a clouded cane.

Dryden.

Pope.

And the sweet liquor on the cane bestow,
From which prepared the luscious sugars flow.
Blackmore.

Let beaux their canes with amber tipt produce;
Be theirs for empty show, but thine for use.
Imprudent men Heaven's choicest gifts profane;
Thus some beneath their arm support the cane,
The dirty point oft checks the careless pace,
And muddy spots the clean cravat disgrace.
Oh! may never such misfortune meet!

May no such vicious persons walk the street! Gay.

Oh! for the lessons learned by heart!
Ay, though the very birch's smart
Should mark those hours again;
I'd "kiss the rod," and be resigned
Beneath the stroke-and even find
Some sugar in the cane.

Thos. Hood.

As when the devilish iron engine wrought
In deepest hell, and framed by furies skill,
With windy nitre and quick sulphur fraught,
And rammed with bullet round ordain'd to kill,
Conceiveth fire, the heavens it doth fill

With thund'ring noise, and all the aire doth choke, That none can breathe, nor see, nor hear at will, Thro' smouldry cloud of duskish stinking smoke, That th' only breath him daunts who hath escapt his Spenser.

stroke.

The cannons have their bowels full of wrath;
And ready mounted are they to spit forth

Their iron indignation 'gainst your walls.-Shakspere.

The tumult of each sacked and burning village,
The shout that every prayer for mercy drowns;
The soldiers' revels in the midst of pillage,
The wail of famine in beleaguered towns;

The bursting shell, the gateway wrench'd asunder,
The rattling musketry, the clashing blade;
And ever and anon, in tones of thunder,
The diapason of the cannonade.

Is it, O man! with such discordant voices,
With such accursed instruments as these,
Thou drownest nature's sweet and kindly voices,
And jarrest the celestial harmonies?

Longfellow.

Did ye not hear it? No! 't was but the wind,
Or the car rattling o'er the stony street;
On with the dance! let joy be unconfined;
No sleep till morn, when youth and pleasure meet
To chase the glowing hours with flying feet-
But, hark!-that heavy sound breaks in once more,
As if the clouds its echo would repeat,
And nearer, clearer, deadlier than before;

Arm! arm! it is-it is-the cannon's opening roar.

Byron.

CAPABLE. CARE.

157

CAPABLE-CAPACITY.

FAIR, gentle, sweet,

Your wit makes wise things foolish: when we greet With eyes best seeing Heaven's fiery eye.

By light we lose light: your capacity

Is of that nature, as to your huge store

Wise things seem foolish, and rich things but poor.

Notwithstanding thy capacity,

Receiveth as the sea, nought enters there,

Of what validity and pitch soe'er,

Shakspere.

But falls into abatement and low price.

Shakspere.

What secret springs their eager passions move;

How capable of death for injured love.

Dryden.

Prior.

The soul, immortal substance, to remain
Conscious of joy, and capable of pain.

For they that most and greatest things embrace,
Enlarge thereby their mind's capacity,

As streams enlarged, enlarge the channel's space.

Since the world's wide frame does not include
A cause with such capacities endued,
Some other cause o'er nature must preside.

Davies.

Blackmore.

CARE.

RUDE was his garment, and to rags all rent, Ne better had he, ne for better cared; With blist'red hands amongst the cinders brent, And fingers filthy, with long nayles unpared, Right fit to rend the food on which he fared: His name was Care; a blacksmith by his trade, That neither day nor night from working spared, But to small purpose yron wedges made: Those be unquiet thoughts that careful minds invade. Spenser.

Care keeps his watch in every old man's eye,
And where care lodgeth sleep will never lie.
Shakspere.

Thus sometimes hath the brightest day a cloud,
And after summer ever more succeeds
Barren winter, with his wrathful nipping cold;
So cares and joys abound as seasons fleet.

Care is no care, but rather corrosive,
For things that are not to be remedied.

Care that is enter'd once into the breast,

Shakspere.

Shakspere.

Will have the whole possession ere it rest Jonson.

Care that in cloisters only seals her eyes,

Which youth thinks folly, age and wisdom owns;
Fools, by not knowing her, outlive the wise;
She visits cities, but she dwells on thrones.

Sir W. Davenant.

In care they live, and must for many care;
And such the best and greatest ever are.

Lord Brook.

All creatures else a time of love possess,
Man only clogs with cares his happiness;
And while he should enjoy his part of bliss,
With thoughts of what may be, destroys what is.

Dryden.

What bliss, what wealth, did e'er the world bestow
On man, but cares and fears attended it.

In all proceedings in this great affair,
We must not use our fortunes, but our care.

Although my cares do hang upon my soul
Like mines of lead, the greatness of my spirit
Shall shake the sullen weight off.

May.

Clapthorne.