It was this influence, without doubt, which saved
him from utter absorption in his world of rare, noble, and
elevated, but ever-increasingly unattainable ideas. But for it,
the serene sea of abstract thought might have held him becalmed
for life; and in the absence of all utterance of definite
knowledge of his conclusions, the world might have been left to an
ignorant and mysterious wonder about the unprofitable scholar."
CHAPTER XII--THE DISCIPLINE OF EXPERIENCE.
"I would the great would grow like thee.
Who grewest not alone in power
And knowledge, but by year and hour
In reverence and in charity."--TENNYSON.
"Not to be unhappy is unhappynesse,
And misery not t'have known miserie;
For the best way unto discretion is
The way that leades us by adversitie;
And men are better shew'd what is amisse,
By th'expert finger of calamitie,
Than they can be with all that fortune brings,
Who never shewes them the true face of things."--DANIEL.
"A lump of wo affliction is,
Yet thence I borrow lumps of bliss;
Though few can see a blessing in't,
It is my furnace and my mint."
--ERSKINE'S GOSPEL SONNETS.
"Crosses grow anchors, bear as thou shouldst so
Thy cross, and that cross grows an anchor too."--DONNE.
"Be the day weary, or be the day long,
At length it ringeth to Evensong.
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