Great Homer sings his epic high;
The hero fronts his dangers;
The brave his duty still doth ply--
And did it while, I won't deny,
Philosophers were strangers:
But grant by heart and brain achiev'd
What Locke and Des Cartes ne'er conceiv'd--
By them yet, as behoved,
It possible was proved.
Strength for the Right is counted still;
Bold laughs the strong hyena;
Who rule not, servants' parts must fill;
It goes quite tolerably ill
Upon this world's arena;
But how it would be, if the plan
Of the universe now first began,
In many a moral system
All men may read who list 'em.
"Man needs with man must linked be
To reach the goal of growing;
In the whole only worketh he;
Many drops go to make the sea;
Much water sets mills going.
Then with the wild wolves do not stand,
But knit the state's enduring band:"
From doctor's chair thus, tranquil,
Herr Pufendorf and swan-quill.
But since to all, what doctors say
Flies not as soon as spoken,
Nature will use her mother-way,
See that her chain fly not in tway,
The circle be not broken:
Meantime, until the world's great round
Philosophy in one hath bound,
She keeps it on the move, sir,
By hunger and by love, sir.
_SAYINGS OF CONFUCIUS_.
I.
Threefold is of Time the tread:
Lingering comes the Future pacing hither;
Dartlike is the Now gone thither;
Stands the Past aye moveless, foot and head.
No impatience wings its idle
Tread of leisurely delay;
Fear or doubt it cannot bridle
Should it headlong run away;
No remorse, no incantation
Moves the standing from its station.
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