No More Learning

He made excursions
into Wordsworth's land, and the spirit of the master interpreter stole
deep into his being: it was the poem Wordsworth's Grave,' in 1892,
that first drew the attention of the English people to an authentic new
voice. Shelley and Keats were passions with him in boyhood, and
their molding influence can be traced in his writing. Mr. Watson
resides with his mother at Southead, a London suburb. A recent
nervous illness due to overwork brought on an unbalanced mind; but
the poet rallied from the attack, and has done some of his finest work
since. This affliction is nobly, touchingly alluded to in the lovely
Vita Nuova.

.


## p. 15706 (#28) ###########################################

15706
WILLIAM WATSON
It was not until his third volume that William Watson received
substantial acknowledgment of his ability. His first work, “The
Prince's Quest' (1880), made no stir, nor did “Epigrams of Art, Life,
and Nature (1884); though the discerning recognized in both books
the sure technique and the purity of quality which denote the true
poet. In the latter volume Mr. Watson's gift for saying much in
little, and giving crystallized and perfect form to some single thought,
was happily illustrated. But when Wordsworth's Grave and Other
Poems) appeared in 1892, it was conceded that here was a poet to
reckon with. The Wordsworth tribute was declared, not without just-
ice, to be the strongest thing on the great nature-poet written of
late years.
Another memorial piece, Lachrymæ Musarum, of which
Tennyson is the subject, and which is a stately and finely conceived
lyric, attracted Gladstone's attention, and resulted in his securing for
the young poet a governmental pension of two hundred pounds, which
has since been increased. This official favor seemed to point towards
the laureateship, and Mr. Watson's chances as a candidate were
regarded as good; many being disappointed at his failure to get the
appointment. In 1893 was published 'The Eloping Angels,' an at-
tempt at the satiric-humorous which was hardly successful. Watson's
forte lies in quite another kind. 'Odes and Other Poems, The
Father of the Forest and Other Poems,' (The Purple East,' and 'The
Year of Shame,' are subsequent volumes which have strengthened
his position and exhibited a healthy growth in power and art. The
title-piece in “The Father of the Forest' is a noble poem, in which
the idealist is plainly published, and Mr. Watson's ability for sus-
tained flight proved once more beyond peradventure. (The Year of
Shame,' which is an amplification of The Purple East,' is devoted
almost exclusively to the poet's arraignment, in a sonnet-sequence, of
the English for their Eastern policy, especially with regard to the
Armenian question. Such leonine, ringing verse has seldom come
from a young poet. Mr. Watson has a notable control of the son-
net form; his indignation is like that of Milton in its resonant ethical
appeal, its impassioned sincerity. Some of these poems are of really
splendid strength and sweep. The poet has not hitherto given the
world anything so striking, and these patriotic poems have much
enhanced his reputation. In them Mr. Watson is a singer of national
significance; and with his age in mind, his future looks big with
promise. He writes verse that will stand the test of time because it
is grounded upon a careful art, inspired by a pure purpose, and vital-
ized by a normal, wholesome feeling.


## p. 15707 (#29) ###########################################

WILLIAM WATSON
15707
[The sonnets
(The Purple East) are copyright 1896, by John Lane. ]
THE TURK IN ARMENIA
From The Purple East)
WH*
AT profits it, О England, to prevail
In camp and mart and council, and bestrew
With argosies thy oceans, and renew
With tribute levied on each golden gale
Thy treasuries, if thou canst hear the wail
Of women martyred by the turbaned crew,
Whose tenderest mercy was the sword that slew,
And lift no hand to wield the purging flail ?
We deemed of old thou held'st a charge from Him
Who watches girdled by his seraphim,
To smite the wronger with thy destined rod.
Wait'st thou his sign? Enough, the unanswered cry
Of virgin souls for vengeance, and on high
The gathering blackness of the frown of God!
REPUDIATED RESPONSIBILITY
From The Purple East)
I
HAD not thought to hear it voiced so plain,
Uttered so forthright, on their lips who steer
This nation's course: I had not thought to hear
That word re-echoed by an English thane,
Guilt's maiden speech when first a man lay slain,-
"Am I my brother's keeper ? ) Yet full near
It sounded, and the syllables rang clear
As the immortal rhetoric of Cain.
“Wherefore should we, sirs, more than they — or they -
Unto these helpless reach a hand to save ? »
An English thane, in this our English air,
Speaking for England? Then indeed her day
Slopes to its twilight, and for Honor there
Is needed but a requiem and a grave.


## p. 15708 (#30) ###########################################

15708
WILLIAM WATSON
ENGLAND TO AMERICA
From The Purple East)
O
TOWERING Daughter, Titan of the West,
Behind a thousand leagues of foam secure;
Thou toward whom our inmost heart is pure
Of ill intent: although thou threatenest
With most unfilial hand thy mother's breast,
Not for one breathing-space may Earth endure
The thought of War's intolerable cure
For such vague pains as vex to-day thy rest!
But if thou hast more strength than thou canst spend
In tasks of Peace, and find'st her yoke too tame,
Help us to smite the cruel, to befriend
The succorless, and put the false to shame.
So shall the ages laud thee, and thy name
Be lovely among nations to the end.
A BIRTHDAY
From "The Purple East)
I
1
Tis the birthday of the Prince of Peace:
Full long ago He lay with steeds in stall,
And universal Nature heard through all
Her borders that the reign of Pan must cease.
The fatness of the land, the earth's increase,
Cumbers the board; the holly hangs in hall;
Somewhat of her abundance Wealth lets fall, -
It is the birthday of the Prince of Peace.
The dead rot by the wayside; the unblest
Who live, in caves and desert mountains lurk
Trembling,— his foldless flock, shorn of their fleece.
Women in travail, babes that suck the breast,
Are spared not. Famine hurries to her work:
It is the birthday of the Prince of Peace.


## p. 15709 (#31) ###########################################

WILLIAM WATSON
15709
THE PLAGUE OF APATHY
From The Purple East
N°
O TEARS are left: we have quickly spent that store!
Indifference like a dewless night hath come.
From wintry sea to sea the land lies numb.
With palsy of the spirit stricken sore,
The land lies numb from iron shore to shore.
The unconcerned, they flourish; loud are some,
And without shame. The multitude stand dumb.
The England that we vaunted is no more.
Only the witling's sneer, the worldling's smile,
The weakling's tremors, fail him not who fain
Would rouse to noble deed. And all the while,
A homeless people, in their mortal pain,
Toward one far and famous ocean isle
Stretch hands of prayer, and stretch those hands in vain.
A TRIAL OF ORTHODOXY
From The Purple East)
TH
He clinging children at their mother's knee
Slain; and the sire and kindred one by one
Flayed or hewn piecemeal; and things nameless
done,
Not to be told: while imperturbably
The nations gaze, where Rhine unto the sea,
Where Seine and Danube, Thames and Tiber run,
And where great armies glitter in the sun,
And great kings rule, and man is boasted free!
What wonder if yon torn and naked throng
Should doubt a Heaven that seems to wink and nod,
And having moaned at noontide, “Lord, how long ? »
Should cry, “Where hidest thou ? ” at evenfall;
At midnight, “Is he deaf and blind, our God ? »
And ere day dawn, «Is he indeed, at all ? ”


## p. 15710 (#32) ###########################################

15710
WILLIAM WATSON
A WONDROUS LIKENESS
From The Purple East
S
TILL on Life's loom, the infernal warp and weft
Woven each hour! Still in august renown,
A great realm watching, under God's great frown!
Ever the same! The little children cleft
In twain; the little tender maidens reft
Of maidenhood! And through a little town
A stranger journeying, wrote this record down,
«In all the place there was not one man left. ”
O friend, the sudden lightning of whose pen
Makes Horror's countenance visible afar,
And Desolation's face familiar,
I think this very England of my ken
Is wondrous like that little town, where are
In all the streets and houses no more men.
STARVING ARMENIA
From “The Purple East)
0
PEN your hearts, ye clothed from head to feet,
Ye housed and whole who listen to the cry
Of them that not yet slain and mangled lie,
Only despoiled of all that made life sweet,–
Only left bare to snow and wind and sleet,
And roofless to the inhospitable sky:
Give them of your abundance, lest they die,
And famine make this mighty woe complete;
And lest if truly, as your creed aver,
A day of reckoning come, it be your lot
To hear the voice of the uprisen dead:
“We were the naked whom ye covered not,
The sick to whom ye did not minister,
And the anhungered whom ye gave not bread. ”
1


## p. 15711 (#33) ###########################################

WILLIAM WATSON
15711
FROM THE TOMB OF BURNS)
Copyright 1895, by Stone & Kimball
N"
of ours to gauge the more or less,
The will's defect, the blood's excess,
The earthy humors that oppress
The radiant mind.
His greatness, not his littleness,
Concerns mankind.
A dreamer of the common dreams,
A fisher in familiar streams,
He chased the transitory gleams
That all pursue;
But on his lips the eternal themes
Again were new.
With shattering ire or withering mirth
He smote each worthless claim to worth;
The barren fig-tree cumbering earth
He would not spare ;
Through ancient lies of proudest birth
He drove his share.
To him the Powers that formed him brave,
Yet weak to breast the fatal wave,
A mighty gift of Hatred gave,-
A gift above
All other gifts benefic, save
The gift of Love.
He saw 'tis meet that Man possess
The will to curse as well as bless,
To pity — and be pitiless,
To make, and mar;
The fierceness that from tenderness
Is never far.
And so his fierce and tender strain
Lives, and his idlest words remain
To flout oblivion, that in vain
Strives to destroy
One lightest record of his pain
Or of his joy.


## p. 15712 (#34) ###########################################

15712
WILLIAM WATSON
THE FATHER OF THE FOREST
Copyright 1895, by Stone & Kimball. Reprinted by permission of John Lane,
publisher
I
O
LD emperor Yew, fantastic sire,
Girt with thy guard of dotard kings,
What ages hast thou seen retire
Into the dusk of alien things ?
What mighty news hath stormed thy shade,
Of armies perished, realms unmade ?
Already wast thou great and wise,
And solemn with exceeding eld,
On that proud morn when England's eyes,
Wet with tempestuous joy, beheld
Round her rough coasts the thundering main
Strewn with the ruined dream of Spain.
Hardly thou count'st them long ago,
The warring faiths, the wavering land,
The sanguine sky's delirious glow,
And Cranmer's scorched, uplifted hand.
Wailed not the woods their task of shame,
Doomed to provide the insensate flame ?
Mourned not the rumoring winds, when she -
The sweet queen of a tragic hour -
Crowned with her snow-white memory
The crimson legend of the Tower ?
Or when a thousand witcheries lay
Felled with one stroke, at Fotheringay ?
Ah, thou hast heard the iron tread
And clang of many an armored age,
And well recall'st the famous dead :
Captains or counselors, brave or sage,
Kings that on kings their myriads hurled,
Ladies whose smile embroiled the world.
Rememberest thou the perfect knight,
The soldier, courtier, bard, in one,-
Sidney, that pensive Hesper-light
O'er Chivalry's departed sun ?


## p. 15713 (#35) ###########################################

WILLIAM WATSON
15713
Knew'st thou the virtue, sweetness, lore,
Whose nobly hapless name was More ?
The roystering prince, that afterward
Belied his madcap youth, and proved
A greatly simple warrior lord,
Such as our warrior fathers loved -
Lives he not still ? for Shakespeare sings
The last of our adventurer kings.
His battles o'er, he takes his ease;
Glory put by, and sceptred toil.
Round him the carven centuries
Like forest branches arch and coil.
In that dim fame, he is not sure
Who lost or won at Azincour!
Roofed by the mother minster vast
That guards Augustine's rugged throne,
The darling of a knightly Past
Sleeps in his bed of sculptured stone,
And Alings, o'er many a warlike tale,
The shadow of his dusky mail.
The monarch who, albeit his crown
Graced an august and sapient head,
Rode rough-shod to a stained renown
O'er Wallace and Llewellyn dead,
And perished in a hostile land,
With restless heart and ruthless hand;
Or that disastrous king, on whom
Fate, like a tempest, early fell,
And the dark secret of whose doom
The Keep of Pomfret kept full well;
Or him that with half-careless words
On Becket drew the dastard swords;
Or Eleanor's undaunted son,
That, starred with idle glory, came
Bearing from leaguered Ascalon
The barren splendor of his fame,
And, vanquished by an unknown bow,
Lies vainly great at Fontevraud;
Or him, the footprints of whose power
Made mightier whom he overthrew,-
XXVII-983


## p. 15714 (#36) ###########################################

15714
WILLIAM WATSON
A man built like a mountain-tower,
A fortress of heroic thew,-
The Conquerer, in our soil who set
This stem of Kinghood flowering yet:
These, or the living fame of these,
Perhaps thou minglest — who shall say ? -
With thrice remoter memories,
And phantoms of the mistier day
Long ere the tanner's daughter's son
From Harold's hands this realm had won.
What years are thine, not mine to guess!
The stars look youthful, thou being by;
Youthful the sun's glad-heartedness;
Witless of time the unaging sky,
And these dim-groping roots around
So deep a human Past are wound,
That, musing in thy shade, for me
The tidings scarce would strangely fall
Of fair-haired despots of the sea
Scaling our eastern island-wall,
From their long ships of norland pine,
Their “surf-deer ” driven o'er wilds of brine.
Nay, hid by thee from Summer's gaze
That seeks in vain this couch of loam,
I should behold, without amaze,
Camped on yon down the hosts of Rome;
Nor start though English woodlands heard
The selfsame mandatory word
As by the cataracts of the Nile
Marshaled the legions long ago,
Or where the lakes are one blue smile
'Neath pageants of Helvetian snow,
Or 'mid the Syrian sands that lie
Sick of the Day's great tearless eye,
Or on barbaric plains afar,
Where, under Asia's fevering ray,
The long lines of imperial war
O’er Tigris passed, and with dismay
In fanged and iron deserts found
Embattled Persia closing round,


## p. 15715 (#37) ###########################################

WILLIAM WATSON
15715
And 'mid their eagles watched on high
The vultures gathering for a feast,
Till, from the quivers of the sky,
The gorgeous star-flight of the East
Flamed, and the bow of darkness bent
O'er Julian dying in his tent.
II
Was it the wind befooling me
With ancient echoes, as I lay?
Was it the antic fantasy
Whose elvish mockeries cheat the day?
Surely a hollow murmur stole
From wizard bough and ghostly bole!
!
“Who prates to me of arms and kings,
Here in these courts of old repose ?
Thy babble is of transient things,
Broils, and the dust of foolish blows.
Thy sounding annals are at best
The witness of a world's unrest.
“Goodly the ostents are to thee,
And pomps of Time: to me more sweet
The vigils of Eternity,
And Silence patient at my feet;
And dreams beyond the deadening range
And dull monotonies of Change.
« Often an air comes idling by
With news of cities and of men;
I hear a multitudinous sigh
And lapse into my soul again.
Shall her great noons and sunsets be
Blurred with thine infelicity ?
“Now from these veins the strength of old,
The warmth and lust of life, depart:
Full of mortality, behold
The cavern that was once my heart !
Me, with blind arm, in season due,
Let the aerial woodman hew.
“For not though mightiest mortals fall,
The starry chariot hangs delayed;


## p. 15716 (#38) ###########################################

15716
WILLIAM WATSON
His axle is uncooled, nor shall
The thunder of His wheels be stayed.
A changeless pace His coursers keep,
And halt not at the wells of sleep.
« The South shall bless, the East shall blight,
The red rose of the dawn shall blow;
The million-lilied stream of night
Wide in ethereal meadows flow;
And autumn mourn, and everything
Dance with the wild pipe of the spring.
«With oceans heedless round her feet,
And the indifferent heavens above,
Earth shall the ancient tale repeat
Of wars and tears, and death and love;
And wise from all the foolish past,
Shall peradventure hail at last
« The advent of that morn divine
When nations may as forests grow,
Wherein the oak hates not the pine,
Nor beeches wish the cedars woe,
But all, in their unlikeness, blend
Confederate to one golden end, -
!
“Beauty: the Vision whereunto
In joy, with pantings, from afar,
Th ugh sound and odor, form and hue,
And mind and clay, and worm and star,-
Now touching goal, now backward hurled, -
Toils the indomitable world. ”


## p. 15717 (#39) ###########################################

15717
ISAAC WATTS
(1674-1748)
N his essay on psalmody, Isaac Watts makes this apology for
possible shortcomings in the hymns of his composition:-
-
“It was hard to restrain my verse always within the bounds of my design;
it was hard to sink every line to the level of a whole congregation, and yet
to keep it above contempt. However, among so great a number of songs, I
hope there will be some found that speak the very language and desires and
sense of the meanest souls. ”

The desire here expressed has been ful-
filled in larger measure than the author,
perhaps, ever dreamed. His hymns have
been so absorbed into the popular con-
sciousness that they are in the widest sense
national; they have ceased to be his, in
becoming the common property of genera-
tion after generation of English-speaking
Christians. They are written, moreover, in
the tongue of the soul, so they belong to
no sect or division of the churches.
Isaac Watts was born in 1674, in South-
ISAAC WATTS
ampton, England, where his father, a Dis-
senter, kept a boarding-school. Both his parents were of a primitive
and fervid piety. The boy was reared in an atmosphere of mental
and moral sincerity. It is recorded that he began the study of the
classics at the age of five years; being ever more devoted to books
than to childish pleasures. On account of his nonconformity he could
not enter either of the universities; but in his sixteenth year he
went to London to pursue his studies in an academy there kept
by the Rev. Thomas Rowe, minister of the Independent Meeting at
Haberdashers' Hall. He became tutor afterwards in the family of
Sir John Hartopp, at Stoke Newington, in the mean time carrying
on his studies in preparation for the ministry. In his twenty-fourth
year he was chosen assistant to Dr. Chauncy, pastor of an Independ-
ent church in Mark Lane, London, Two years later he became sole
pastor; but the state of his health soon made the appointment of an
assistant necessary.
Dr. Watts had undermined his strength in early
boyhood by too great devotion to study; he was never to regain it.


## p. 15718 (#40) ###########################################

15718
ISAAC WATTS
In 1712 he took up his residence with Sir Thomas Abney of Abney
Park; preaching but seldom, and devoting himself to the writing of
theological treatises. He died in 1748.
In 1706 appeared the “Horæ Lyricæ,' or the lyric poems sacred to
devotion and piety. The next year a collection of hymns was pub-
lished. In 1719 appeared the Psalms of David rendered into verse,
and in 1720 the widely known and loved Divine and Moral Songs for
Children. These various collections of devotional and moral verse
embrace the finest work of Watts. His prose writings, including the
treatises on theology and the books designed for educational purposes,
fill eight volumes; but in no case do they rise above the level of
mediocrity.
The genius of Isaac Watts was a genius for worship; especially of
that elemental Christian worship which, as in the days of the early
church, centred itself about the personality of Jesus Christ, feeling
the power of that personality rather than defining it. The temper of
Watts himself was less in accord with the stern puritanic theology of
his day than with the earlier and benigner aspects of Christianity,-
its primitive urbanity and joyousness, its tender love of souls. The
spirit of worship in him found its natural expression in song, in
hymns in which the emphasis is always laid on what is comforting
and simple and hopeful. The greatest of his hymns would not have
been out of place on the lips of the subterranean church of Nero's
day, as the church of to-day can sing them with fitness. Their ab-
stract spirituality is one of their surest claims to endurance.
Dr. Watts's Divine and Moral Songs for Children' are quaint
and loving; most beautiful indeed in their effort to link the life of a
child with the life of God. His works throughout are the works of
a sincere and good man, seeking to translate the unutterable language
of the angelical choirs into the homely speech of the people to
whom he ministered.
OUR GOD, OUR HELP IN AGES PAST
09
UR God, our help in ages past,
Our hope for years to come,
Our shelter from the stormy blast,
And our eternal home,
Under the shadow of thy throne
Thy saints have dwelt secure;
Sufficient is thine arm alone,
And our defense is sure.


## p. 15719 (#41) ###########################################

ISAAC WATTS
15719
Before the hills in order stood,
Or earth received her frame,
From everlasting thou art God,
To endless years the same.
A thousand ages in thy sight
Are like an evening gone;
Short as the watch that ends the night
Before the rising sun.
Time like an ever-rolling stream
Bears all its sons away;
They fly, forgotten, as a dream
Dies at the opening day.
Our God, our help in ages past,
Our hope for years to come,
Be thou our guard while troubles last,
And our eternal home.
.
JESUS SHALL REIGN WHERE'ER THE SUN
ESUS shall reign where'er the sun
Does his successive journeys run;
His kingdom stretch from shore to shore,
Till moons shall wax and wane no more.
J
For him shall endless prayer be made,
And princes throng to crown his head;
His name like sweet perfume shall rise
With every morning sacrifice.
People and realms of every tongue
Dwell on his love with sweetest song;
And infant voices shall proclaim
Their early blessings on his name.
Blessings abound where'er he reigns;
The prisoner leaps to lose his chains;
The weary find eternal rest,
And all the sons of want are blest.
Let every creature rise and bring
Peculiar honors to our king;
Angels descend with songs again,
And earth repeat the loud Amen.


## p. 15720 (#42) ###########################################

15720
ISAAC WATTS
JOY TO THE WORLD, THE LORD IS COME
Jor
Oy to the world, the Lord is come!
Let earth receive her king;
Let every heart prepare him room,
And heaven and nature sing.
Joy to the earth, the Savior reigns!
Let men their songs employ;
While fields and flowers, rocks, hills, and plains
Repeat the sounding joy.
No more let sins and sorrows grow,
Nor thorns infest the ground:
He comes to make his blessings flow
Far as the curse is found.
He rules the world with truth and grace,
And makes the nations prove
The glories of his righteousness,
And wonders of his love.
THOU WHOM MY SOUL ADMIRES ABOVE
.
.
HOU whom my soul admires above
All earthly joy and earthly love,-
Tell me, dear Shepherd, let me know
Where do thy sweetest pastures grow?
The
Where is the shadow of that rock
That from the sun defends thy flock ?
Fain would I feed among thy sheep,
Among them rest, among them sleep.
Why should thy bride appear like one
Who turns aside to paths unknown?
My constant feet would never rove,
Would never seek another love.
1


## p. 15721 (#43) ###########################################

ISAAC WATTS
15721
WELCOME, SWEET DAY OF REST
WE
TELCOME, sweet day of rest
That saw the Lord arise;
Welcome to this reviving breast,
And these rejoicing eyes!
The King himself comes near,
And feasts his saints to-day;
Here may we sit and see him here,
And love and praise and pray.
One day amidst this place
Where my dear God hath been,
Is sweeter than ten thousand days
Of pleasurable sin.
My willing soul would stay
In such a frame as this,
And sit and sing herself away
To everlasting bliss.
COME, HOLY SPIRIT, HEAVENLY DOVE
COM
WOME, Holy Spirit, heavenly Dove,
With all thy quickening powers:
Kindle a flame of sacred love
In these cold hearts of ours.
Look how we grovel here below,
Fond of these trilling toys;
Our souls can neither fly nor go
To reach eternal joys.
In vain we tune our formal songs,
In vain we strive to rise:
Hosannas languish on our tongues,
And our devotion dies.
Come, Holy Spirit, heavenly Dove,
With all thy quickening powers:
Come shed abroad a Savior's love,
And that shall kindle ours.


## p. 15722 (#44) ###########################################

1572 2
ISAAC WATTS
THERE IS A LAND OF PURE DELIGHT
THERE
HERE is a land of pure delight
Where saints immortal reign;
Infinite day excludes the night,
And pleasures banish pain.
There everlasting spring abides,
And never-withering flowers;
Death like a narrow sea divides
This heavenly land from ours.
Sweet fields beyond the swelling flood
Stand dressed in living green;
So to the Jews old Canaan stood,
While Jordan rolled between.
But tim'rous mortals start and shrink
To cross the narrow sea,
And linger shivering on the brink,
And fear to launch away.
Oh!
could we make our doubts remove,-
These gloomy doubts that rise,-
And see the Canaan that we love
With unbeclouded eyes;
Could we but climb where Moses stood,
And view the landscape o'er,
Not Jordan's stream nor death's cold flood
Could fright us from the shore.
WHEN I SURVEY THE WONDROUS CROSS
W*
THEN I survey the wondrous Cross
On which the Prince of Glory died,
My richest gain I count but loss,
And pour contempt on all my pride.
Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast,
Save in the death of Christ my God:
All the vain things that charm me most,
I sacrifice them to his blood.


## p. 15723 (#45) ###########################################

ISAAC WATTS
15723
See from his head, his hands, his feet,
Sorrow and love flow mingled down:
Did e'er such love and sorrow meet,
Or thorns compose so rich a crown?
Were the whole realm of nature mine,
That were a present far too small:
Love so amazing, so divine,
Demands my soul, my life, my all.
LET DOGS DELIGHT TO BARK AND BITE
From Divine and Moral Songs for Children)
L
ET dogs delight to bark and bite,
For God hath made them so;
Let bears and lions growl and fight,
For 'tis their nature to;
But, children, you should never let
Your angry passions rise:
Your little hands were never made
To tear each other's eyes.
Let love through all your actions run,
And all your words be mild;
Live like the blessed Virgin's Son,-
That sweet and lovely child.
His soul was gentle as a lamb;
And as his stature grew,
He grew in favor both with man
And God his father, too.
Now, Lord of all, he reigns above;
And from his heavenly throne,
He sees what children dwell in love,
And marks them for his own.


## p. 15724 (#46) ###########################################

15724
ISAAC WATTS
HOW DOTH THE LITTLE BUSY BEE
From Divine and Moral Songs for Children)
Hº *
ow doth the little busy bee
Improve each shining hour.
And gather honey all the day
From every opening flower.
How skillfully she builds her cell;
How neat she spreads her wax,
And labors hard to store it well
With the sweet food she makes.
In works of labor or of skill,
I would be busy too;
For Satan finds some mischief still
For idle hands to do.
In books, or work, or healthful play,
Let my first years be passed;
That I may give for every day
Some good account at last.


## p. 15724 (#47) ###########################################



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## p. 15725 (#51) ###########################################

15725
DANIEL WEBSTER
(1782-1852)
BY CARL SCHURZ
F THE generation of American statesmen that followed those
of the Revolutionary period, few will live as long in the
memory of the people, and none as long in the literature of
the country, as Daniel Webster. His figure rises above the level of
his time like a monument of colossal proportions. He was a child
of the War of Independence, born in 1782. His father, a Puritan of
stern and sterling character, had, as a backwoods farmer in New
Hampshire, been an Indian fighter while New England had an Indian
frontier, a soldier in the French war, and a captain in the Revolution-
ary army. His high standing among his neighbors made him a judge
of the local court. Ambitious for his children, he strained his scanty
means to the utmost to give his son the best education within reach,
first at Exeter Academy, then at Dartmouth College. From his
earliest days Daniel was petted by good fortune. His seemingly
delicate health, his genial nature, and his promising looks, put, in the
family circle, everybody at his service, even at personal sacrifice;
and such sacrifice by others he became gradually accustomed to ex-
pect, as a prince expects homage.
At the academy and the college he shone not by phenomenal
precocity, but by rapid progress in the studies he liked, - Latin, liter-
ature, and history. He did not excel in the qualities of the genuine
scholar,— patient and thorough research, and the eager pursuit of
knowledge for its own sake; but he was a voracious reader, assimi-
lating easily what he read by dint of a strong memory and of seri-
ous reflection, and soon developed the faculty of making the most of
what he knew by clear, vigorous, affluent, and impressive utterance.
At an early age, too, he commanded attention by a singular charm
of presence, to which his great dark eyes contributed not a little;
and notwithstanding his high animal spirits, by a striking dignity of
carriage and demeanor,— traits which gradually matured into that
singularly imposing personality, the effect of which is described by
his contemporaries in language almost extravagant, borrowing its
similes from kings, cathedrals, and inountain peaks.
His conspicuous power of speech caused him, even during his
college days, to be drawn upon for orations on the Fourth of July


## p. 15726 (#52) ###########################################

15726
DANIEL WEBSTER
and other festive days. The same faculty, reinforced by his virtue
of knowing what he knew, gave him, after he had gone through
the usual course of law study, early successes at the bar, which soon
carried him from the field of legal practice into political life.
He
inherited Federalism from his father, and naturally accepted it, be-
cause he was a conservative by instinct and temperament. Existing
things had a prima facie claim upon his respect and support, because
they existed. He followed his party with fidelity, sometimes at the
expense of his reason and logic, but without the narrow-mindedness
of a proscriptive partisan spirit. In the excited discussions which pre-
ceded and accompanied the War of 1812, he took an active part as
a public speaker and a pamphleteer. Something happened then, at
the very beginning of his public career, that revealed in strong light
the elements of strength as well as those of weakness in his nature.
In a speech on the Fourth of July, 1812, at Portsmouth, New Hamp-
shire, he set forth in vigorous language his opposition to the war policy
of the Administration; but with equal emphasis he also declared that
the remedy lay, not in lawless resistance, but only in “the exercise
of the constitutional right of suffrage,” a proposition then by no
means popular with the extreme Federalists of New England. A few
weeks later he was appointed by a local mass convention of Federal-
ists to write an address on the same subject, which became widely
known as the “Rockingham Memorial. ? In it he set forth with signal
force the complaints of his party; but as to the remedy, he consented
to give voice to the sense of the meeting by a thinly veiled threat
of secession, and a hint at the possibility of a dissolution of the Union.
In the first case he expressed his own opinions as a statesman and a
patriot; in the second he accepted the opinions of those around him
as his own, and spoke with equal ability and vigor as the mouthpiece
or attorney of others: a double character, destined to reappear from
time to time in his public life with puzzling effect.
New Hampshire sent him to Congress, where he took his seat in
the House of Representatives in May 1813. He soon won a place in
the front rank of debaters, especially on questions of finance. But
the two terms during which he represented a New Hampshire con-
stituency were a mere prelude to his great political career. In 1817 he
left Congress to give himself to his legal practice, which gained much
in distinction and lucrativeness by his removal to Boston.
He rose
rapidly to national eminence as a practitioner in the Federal as well
the State tribunals. It was there that he won peculiar lustre
through his memorable argument in the famous Dartmouth College
case before the Federal Supreme Court, which fascinated John Marshall
on the bench, and moved to tears the thronged audience in the court-
room. It left Webster with no superior and with few rivals at the
as


## p. 15727 (#53) ###########################################

DANIEL WEBSTER
15727
American bar. It may be questioned whether he was a great lawyer
in the highest sense. There were others whose knowledge was larger
and more thorough, and whose legal opinion carried greater authority.
But hardly any of these surpassed him in the faculty of seizing, with
instinctive sureness of grasp, the vital point of a cause, of endowing
mere statement with the power of demonstration, of marshaling facts
and arguments in massive array for concentric attack on the decisive
point, of moving the feelings together with the understanding by
appeals of singular magic, and also of so assimilating and using the
work of others as if it had been his own. Adding to all this the
charm of that imposing personality, which made every word falling
from his lips sound as if it were entitled to far more than ordinary
respect, he could not fail to win brilliant successes. He was engaged
in many of the most important and celebrated cases of his time -
some then celebrated and still remembered because of the part he
played in them.
In Boston, Webster found a thoroughly congenial home. Its his-
tory and traditions, its wealth and commercial activity, the high
character of its citizenship, the academic atmosphere created by its
institutions of learning, the refined tone of its social circles, the fame
of its public men, made the Boston of that period, in the main
attributes of civilized life, the foremost city in the United States.
Boston society received Webster with open arms, and presently he
became in an almost unexampled measure its idol. Together with
the most distinguished personages of the State, among them the ven-
erable John Adams, he was elected a member of the convention
called to revise the State Constitution, where as the champion of
conservative principles he advocated and carried the proposition that
the State Senate should remain the representative of property. When
in 1820, the day arrived for the celebration of the two-hundredth
anniversary of the landing of the Pilgrims on Plymouth Rock, it was
he whom the public voice designated as the orator of the day. The
oration, with its historical picturesqueness, its richness of thought and
reasoning, its broad sweep of contemplation, and the noble and mag-
nificent simplicity of its eloquence, was in itself an event. No lit-
erary production of the period in America achieved greater renown.
From that time on, Massachusetts loved to exhibit herself in his per-
son on occasions of state; and in preference to all others, Webster
was her spokesman when she commemorated the great events of her
history. As such he produced a series of addresses - at the laying of
the corner-stone, and later at the completion, of the Bunker Hill mon-
ument, on the death of John Adams and of Thomas Jefferson, and on
other occasions — which his contemporaries acclaimed as ranking with
the great oratorical achievements of antiquity.


## p. 15728 (#54) ###########################################

15728
DANIEL WEBSTER
>>
(
Webster soon appeared in Congress again: first in 1823, in the
House of Representatives, as the member from the Boston district;
and a few years later in the Senate. Then began the most brilliant
part of his political career. It was the period when the component
elements of the old political parties — the Federalists and the Repub-
licans – became intermingled; when old party issues vanished; and
when new questions, or rather old questions in new shapes and rela-
tions, caused new groupings of men to be formed. In the confus-
ion of the political and personal conflicts which characterized the
so-called "era of good feeling, and which immediately followed it,
Webster became a supporter of the administration of John Quincy
Adams; and, as an old Federalist and conservative, was naturally
attracted by that combination of political forces which subsequently
organized itself as the Whig party.
In the House of Representatives, he attracted the attention of the
world abroad by a stinging philippic against the Holy Alliance” in
a eulogy on the Greek revolution, and by a sober exposition of the
Monroe Doctrine in a speech on the famous Panama mission. But
his most remarkable achievement was an argument against Henry
Clay's "American System” — tariff Protection as a policy, the very
policy which was destined to become the corner-stone of the Whig
platform. Webster's Free Trade speech — for so it may be called -
summed up and amplified the views he had already expressed on
previous occasions, in a presentation of fundamental principles so
broad and clear, with a display of knowledge so rich and accurate,
and an analysis of facts and theories so keen and thorough, that it
stands unsurpassed in our political literature, and may still serve as
a text-book to students of economic science. But Clay's tariff was
adopted nevertheless; and four years later Webster abandoned many
of his own conclusions, on the ground that in the mean time New
England, accepting Protection as the established policy of the country,
had invested much capital in manufacturing enterprises, the success
of which depended upon the maintenance of the protective policy,
and should therefore not be left in the lurch. For this reason he
became a protectionist. This plea appeared again and again in his
high-tariff speeches which followed; but he never attempted to deny
or shake the broad principles so strongly set forth in his great argu-
ment of 1824.
Webster reached the highest point of his power and fame when,
in 1830, he gave voice as no one else could to the national con-
sciousness of the American people. Before the War of 1812, the
Union had been looked upon by many thoughtful and patriotic
Americans as an experiment, - a promising one indeed, but of un-
certain issue. Whether it would be able to endure the strain of


## p. 15729 (#55) ###########################################

DANIEL WEBSTER
15729
(
)
(C
))
divergent local interests, feelings, and aspirations, and whether its
component parts would continue in the desire permanently to remain
together in one political structure, were still matters of doubt and
speculation. The results of the War of 1812 did much to inspire the
American heart with a glow of pride in the great common country,
with confident anticipations of its high destinies, and with an instinct-
ive feeling that the greatness of the country and the splendors of its
destinies depended altogether upon the permanency of the Union.
The original theory that the Constitution of the United States was
a mere compact of partnership between independent and sovereign
commonwealths, to be dissolved at will, whatever historical founda-
tion it may have had, yielded to an overruling sentiment of a com-
mon nationality.
This sentiment was affronted by the Nullification movement in
South Carolina, which, under the guise of resistance to the high tariff
of 1828, sought to erect a bulwark for slavery through the enforce-
ment of the doctrine that a State by its sovereign action could over-
rule a Federal law, and might, as a last resort, legally withdraw from
the «federal compact. ” Against this assumption Webster rose up in
his might, like Samson going forth against the Philistines. In his
famous “Reply to Hayne,” he struck down the doctrine of the legal-
ity of State resistance and of secession with blows so crushing, and
maintained the supremacy of the Federal authority in its sphere,
and the indissolubility of the Union, with an eloquence so grand
and triumphant, that as his words went over the land the national
heart bounded with joy and broke out in enthusiastic acclamations.
At that moment Webster stood before the world as the first of living
Americans. Nor was this the mere sensation of a day. His “Lib-
erty and Union, now and forever, one and inseparable! ” remained
the watchword of American patriotism, and still reverberated thirty
years later in the thunders of the Civil War. That glorious speech
continues to hold the first place among the monuments of American
oratory.
In the contest against the Nullification movement in South Caro-
lina, Webster firmly maintained, against Henry Clay's compromise
policy, that wherever the national authority was lawlessly set at defi-
ance, peace should never be purchased by concession to the challen-
gers; and that it was time to “test the strength of the government. ”
He therefore sturdily supported President Jackson's “force bill. ”
although the administration of that doughty warrior was otherwise
most uncongenial to him. But when the compromise had actually
been adopted, he dropped back into the party line behind Clay's
leadership, which he thenceforth never again forsook. There was an
element of indolence in his nature which it needed strong impulses
XXVII-984
>


## p. 15730 (#56) ###########################################

15730
DANIEL WEBSTER
to overcome, so as to set the vast machinery of his mind in full mo-
tion. Such an impulse was furnished again by Jackson's attack on
the United States Bank, and by other somewhat autocratic financial
measures. Webster opposed this policy in a series of speeches on
currency and banking, which deserve very high rank in the literature
of that branch of economics. They were not free from partisan bias
in the specific application of those fundamental principles of which
Webster had such a masterly grasp; but notwithstanding this, his
deep insight into the nature and conditions of credit, and his thorough
study and profound judgment of the functions of banking, made him
an invaluable teacher of the science of public finance. Nobody has
ever depicted the vices and dangers inherent in an unsound currency,
and the necessity of grounding the monetary system upon a firm
basis of value, with greater force and more convincing lucidity.
But in spite of the brilliancy and strength of his efforts in oppos-
ing Jackson's willful and erratic policies, Webster never became the
real leader of the Whig party. Although he was greatly the superior
of Clay in wealth of knowledge, in depth of thought, in statesmanlike
breadth of view, in solidity of reasoning power, and in argumentative
eloquence, he fell far behind him in those attributes which in con-
tests for general leadership are apt to turn the scale: the spirit of
initiative, force of will, that sincere self-confidence which extorts con-
fidence from others, bold self-assertion in doubtful situations, and
constant alertness in watching and directing the details of political
movements. Clay therefore remained the general leader of the Whig
party; while Webster, with New England at his back, stood now by
his side, now behind him, as in feudal times a great duke, rich in
treasure and lands and retainers, himself of royal blood, may have
stood now behind, now by the side of his king.
Unhappily for himself, Webster was not satisfied with the theatre
of action on which his abilities fitted him for the greatest service,
and on which he achieved his highest renown. At a comparatively
early period of his career he ardently wished to be sent as minister
to England; and he bore a grudge to John Quincy Adams for his
failure to gratify that desire. Ever since his Reply to Hayne” had
“
made his name a household word in the country, an ungovernable
longing possessed him to be President of the United States. The
morbid craving commonly called “the Presidential fever” developed
in him, as it became chronic, its most distressing form; disordering
his ambition, unsettling his judgment, and warping his statesmanship.
His imagination always saw the coveted prize within his grasp, which
in reality it never was. He lacked the sort of popularity which since
the administration of John Quincy Adams seemed to be required for
a Presidential candidacy. He traveled over the land south and north,


## p. 15731 (#57) ###########################################

DANIEL WEBSTER
15731
and east and west, to manufacture it for himself; but in vain. The
people looked at him with awe, and listened to him with rapture and
wonder; but as to the Presidency, the fancy and favor of the poli-
ticians, as well as of the masses, obstinately ran to other men. So
it was again and again. Clay, too, was unfortunate as a Presidential
candidate; but he could have at least the nomination of his party
so long as there appeared to be any hope for his election. Webster
was denied even that. The vote for him in the party conventions
was always distressingly small; usually confined to New England, or
only a part of it. Yet he never ceased to hope against hope, and
thus to invite more and more galling disappointments. To Henry
Clay he could yield without humiliation; but when he saw his party
prefer to himself not once, but twice and three times, men of only
military fame, without any political significance whatever, his morti-
fication was so keen that in the bitterness of his soul he twice openly
protested against the result. Worse than all this, he had to meet the
fate a fate not uncommon with chronic Presidential candidates - to
see the most important and most questionable act of his last years
attributed to his inordinate craving for the elusive prize.
The cause of this steady succession of failures may have been,
partly, that the people found him too unlike themselves, too un-
familiar to the popular heart; and partly that the party managers
shrunk from nominating him because they saw in him not only a
giant, but a very vulnerable giant, who would not wear well »
a candidate. They had indeed reason to fear the discussions to
which in an excited canvass his private character would be sub-
jected. Of his moral failings, those relating to money were the most
notorious and the most offensive to the moral sense of the plain peo-
ple. In the course of his public life he became accustomed not only
to the adulation but also to the material generosity of his followers.
Great as his professional income was, his prodigality went far beyond
his means; and the recklessness with which he borrowed and forgot
to return, betrayed an utter insensibility to pecuniary obligation.
With the coolest nonchalance he spent the money of his friends, and
left to them his debts for payment. This habit increased as he grew
older, and severely tested the endurance of his admirers. So grave a
departure from the principles of common honesty could not fail to
cast a dark shadow upon his character, and it is not strange that the
cloud of distrust should have spread from his private to his public
morals. The charge was made that he stood in the Senate advocat-
ing high tariffs as the paid attorney of the manufacturers of New
England. It was met by the answer that so great a man would
not sell himself. This should have been enough. Nevertheless, his
defenders were grievously embarrassed when the fact was pointed
(
as


## p. 15732 (#58) ###########################################

15732
DANIEL WEBSTER
out that it was after all in great part the money of the rich manu-
facturers and bankers that stocked his farm, furnished his house,
supplied his table, and paid his bills. A man less great could
hardly have long sustained himself in public life under such a bur-
den of suspicion. That Daniel Webster did sustain himself, strik-
ingly proved the strength of his prestige. But his moral failings
cost him the noblest fruit of great service,- an unbounded public
confidence.
Although disappointed in his own expectations, he vigorously
supported General Harrison for the Presidency in the campaign of
1840, and in 1841 was made Secretary of State. He remained in that
office until he had concluded the famous Ashburton treaty, under
the administration of President Tyler, who turned against the Whig
policies. After his resignation he was again elected to the Senate.
Then a fateful crisis in his career approached.
The annexation of Texas, the Mexican War, and the acquisition of
territory on our southern and western border, brought the slavery
question sharply into the foreground. Webster had always, when
occasion called for a demonstration of sentiment, denounced slavery
as a great moral and political evil; and although affirming that under
the Constitution it could not be touched by the action of the general
government in the States in which it existed, declared himself against
its extension. He had opposed the annexation of Texas, the war
against Mexico, and the enlargement of the republic by conquest.
But while he did not abandon his position concerning slavery, his
tone in maintaining it grew gradually milder. The impression gained
ground that as a standing candidate for the Presidency, he became
more and more anxious to conciliate Southern opinion.
Then the day came that tried men's souls. The slave power had
favored war and conquest, hoping that the newly acquired territory
would furnish more slave States and more Senators in its interest.
That hope was cruelly dashed when California presented herself for
admission into the Union, with a State constitution excluding slavery
from her soil. To the slave power this was a stunning blow. It had
fought for more slave States and conquered for more free States.
The admission of California would hopelessly destroy the balance of
power between freedom and slavery in the Senate. The country soon
was ablaze with excitement. In the North the antislavery feeling
ran high. The fire-eaters” of the South, exasperated beyond meas-
ure by their disappointment, vociferously threatened to disrupt the
Union. Henry Clay, true to his record, hoped to avert the danger by
a compromise. He sought to reconcile the South to the inevitable
admission of California by certain concessions to slavery, among them
the ill-famed and ill-fated Fugitive Slave Law; a law offensive not


## p. 15733 (#59) ###########################################

DANIEL WEBSTER
15733
-
only to antislavery sentiment, but also to the common impulses of
humanity and to the pride of manhood.
Webster had to choose. The antislavery men of New England,
and even many of his conservative friends, hoped and expected that
he would again, as he had done in Nullification times, proudly plant
the Union flag in the face of a disunion threat, with a defiant refusal
of concession to a rebellious spirit, and give voice to the moral
sense of the North. But Webster chose otherwise. On the 7th of
March, 1850, he spoke in the Senate. The whole country listened
with bated breath. While denouncing secession and pleading for
the Union in glowing periods, he spoke of slavery in regretful but
almost apologetic accents, upbraided the abolitionists as mischievous
marplots, earnestly advocated the compromise, and commended that
feature of it which was most odious to Northern sentiment, — the
Fugitive Slave Law.
From this “Seventh of March Speech » — by that name it has
passed into history – Webster never recovered. It stood in too strik-
ing a contrast to the “Reply to Hayne. ” There was indeed still the
same lucid comprehensiveness of statement. The heavy battalions
of argument marched with the same massive tread. But there was
lacking that which had been the great inspiration of the “Reply to
Hayne,” - the triumphant consciousness of being right. The effect
of the speech corresponded to its character. Southern men wel-
comed it as a sign of Northern submissiveness, but it did not go
far enough to satisfy them. The impression it made upon the anti-
slavery people of the North was painful in the extreme. They saw
in it “the fall of an archangel. ” Many of them denounced it as the
treacherous bid of a Presidential candidate for Southern favor. Their
reproaches varied from the indignant murmur to the shrillest note of
execration. Persons less interested or excited looked up at the colos-
sal figure of the old hero of “Liberty and Union with a sort of
bewildered dismay, as if something unnatural and portentous had
happened to him. Even many of his stanchest adherents among
the conservative Whigs stood at first stunned and perplexed, needing
some time to gather themselves up for his defense.
This was not surprising. Henry Clay could plan and advocate the
compromise of 1850 without loss of character. Although a man of
antislavery instincts, he was himself a slaveholder representing a
slaveholding community, a compromiser in his very being; and com-
promise had always been the vital feature of his statesmanship. But
Webster could not apologize for slavery, and in its behalf approve
compromise and concession in the face of disunion threats, without
turning his back upon the most illustrious feat of his public life.
Injustice may have been done to him by the assailants of his mo-
tives, but it can hardly be denied that the evidence of circumstances


## p. 15734 (#60) ###########################################

15734
DANIEL WEBSTER
stood glaringly against him. He himself was ill at ease. The viru-
lent epithets and sneers with which he thenceforth aspersed anti-
slavery principles and antislavery men - contrasting strangely with
the stately decorum he had always cultivated in his public utter-
ances — betrayed the bitterness of a troubled soul.
The 7th of March speech, and the series of addresses with which
he sought to set right and fortify the position he had taken, helped
greatly in inducing both political parties to accept the compromise of
1850; and also in checking, at least for the time being, the anti-
slavery movement in the Northern States. But they could not kill
that movement, nor could they prevent the coming of the final crisis.
They did, however, render him acceptable to the slave power, when,
after the death of General Taylor, President Fillmore made him
Secretary of State. Once more he stirred the people's heart by a
note addressed to the Chevalier Hülsemann, the Austrian chargé
d'affaires, in which, defending the mission of a special agent to
inquire into the state of the Hungarian insurrection, he proudly just-
ified the conduct of the government, pointed exultingly to the great-
ness of the republic, and vigorously vindicated the sympathies of the
American people with every advance of free institutions the world
over. The whole people applauded, and this was to him the last
flash of popularity.
In 1852 his hope to attain the Whig nomination for the Presidency
rose to the highest pitch, although his prospects were darker than
But he had reached the age of seventy; this was his last
chance, and he clung to it with desperate eagerness. He firmly
counted upon receiving in the convention a large number of South-
ern votes; he received not one. His defeat could hardly have been
more overwhelming. The nomination fell to General Scott. In the
agony of his disappointment, Webster advised his friends to vote for
the Democratic candidate, Franklin Pierce. In 1848 he had declared
General Taylor's nomination to be one «not fit to be made ); but
after all he had supported it. Then he still saw a possibility for
himself ahead.