MAXIMS AND PROVERBS "Enough is better than too much." "Actions speak louder than words." 66 "A cat in gloves catches no mice." "Be not swift to take offense; Anger is a foe to sense." "Our to-days and yesterdays Are the blocks with which we build." "Cheerful looks make every dish a feast." "A fool and his money are soon parted." "And many strokes, though with a little ax, Hew down and fell the hardest timbered oak." "He that lives upon hope will die fasting." "A learned man is a tank, a wise man is a spring." "A good cause makes a stout heart and a strong "A man cannot whistle and drink at the same time." "He that does good to another does good to himself." “A handful of good life is worth a bushel of learning." 66 'People who live in glass houses should never throw stones." "Since thou art not sure of a minute, throw not away an hour." "If you would be wealthy, think of saving as well as of getting." THE ARROW AND THE SONG I shot an arrow into the air, It fell to earth, I know not where; For so swiftly it flew, the sight Could not follow it in its flight. I breathed a song into the air, It fell to earth, I know not where; For who has sight so keen and strong That it can follow the flight of a song? Long, long afterward, in an oak, Scorn not the lightest word or deed, There's fruit in each wind-wafted seed No act falls fruitless; none can tell Nor what results enfolded dwell Within it silently. -SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE. THE DAY IS DONE The day is done, and the darkness I see the lights in the village Gleam through the rain and the mist, And a feeling of sadness comes o'er me That my soul cannot resist! A feeling of sadness and longing As the mist resembles the rain. Come, read to me some poem, Not from the grand old masters, For, like strains of martial music, And to-night I long for rest. Read from some humbler poet, Whose songs gushed from his heart, As showers from the clouds of summer, Or tears from the eyelids start; Who, through long days of labor, Such songs have power to quiet Then read from the treasured volume And lend to the rhyme of the poet And the night shall be filled with music, -HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. "Manhood is the one immortal thing Beneath Time's changeful sky." -JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 66 THE AMERICANISM OF LINCOLN Among us perhaps half our people are not descendants of the men . . . of the Revolution: they, or their ancestors, came from Europe since 1776, to find themselves our equals. . . . They cannot trace their connection by blood with those glorious men. But when they look through that old Declaration of Independence, they find those old men saying, 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,' and they feel that the moral sentiment then taught is the source of all moral principle in them, and that they have a right to claim it as though they were blood of the blood and flesh of the flesh of the men who wrote that Declaration. That is the electric cord in the Declaration that links the hearts of patriotic and liberty-loving men together; that will link those patriotic hearts as long as the love of freedom exists in the minds of men throughout the world. . . . It gave liberty to this country, and hope to all mankind for all future time. promised that in due time the weight should be lifted from the shoulders of all men, and that all men should have an equal chance. . . ." - From the speeches of ABRAHAM LINCOLN. But words are things, and a small drop of ink, Falling like dew, upon a thought, produces It That which makes thousands, perhaps millions, think. -G. G. BYRON. |