Great Throughts Treasury

"This, though there may be many an exception, is in general true of the visible signs of our passions; and it is no less true of the audible. A man habitually peevish, or passionate, or querulous, or imperious, may be known by the sound of his voice, as well as by his physiognomy."

"Though richest hues the peacock's plumes adorn, yet horror screams from his discordant throat. Rise, sons of harmony, and hail the morn, while warbling larks on russet pinions float; or seek at noon the woodland scene remote, where the gray linnets carol from the hill: O let them ne'er, with artificial note, to please a tyrant, strain the little bill, but sing what heaven inspires, and wander where they will."

"Thy shades, thy silence, now be mine, thy charms my only theme; my haunt the hollow cliff, whose pine waves o'er the gloomy stream. Where the sacred owl, on pinions gray, breaks from the rustling boughs, and down the lone vale sails away, to more profound repose."

"'Tis night, and the landscape is lovely no more; I mourn, but you woodlands I mourn not for you! For spring is returning your charms to restore, perfumed with fresh fragrance and glittering with dew. Nor yet for the ravage of winter I mourn, kind nature the embryo blossom shall save; but when shall spring visit the mouldering urn?"

"To the pure soul by Fancy's fire refined, ah, what is mirth but turbulence unholy, when with the charm compared of heavenly melancholy."

"True dignity is his whose tranquil mind virtue has raised above the things below; who, every hope and fear to heaven resign'd shrinks not, though fortune aims her deadliest blow."

"'Twas thus by the glare of false science betray'd, that leads to bewilder, and dazzles to blind."

"What cannot art and industry perform, when science plans the progress of their toil!"

"When squint-eyed Slander plies the unhallow'd tongue, from poison'd maw when Treason weaves his line, and Muse apostate (infamy to song!) Grovels, low muttering, at Sedition's shrine."

"While the bloom of youth lasts, and the smoothness of feature peculiar to that period, the human face is less marked with any strong character than in old age. A peevish or surly stripling may elude the eye of the physiognomist; but a wicked old man whose visage does not betray the evil temperature of his heart must have more cunning than it would be prudent for him to acknowledge. Even by the trade or profession the human countenance may be characterized. They who employ themselves in the nicer mechanic arts, that require the earnest attention of the artist, do generally contract a fixedness of feature suited to that one uniform sentiment which engrosses them while at work. Whereas other artists, whose work requires less attention, and who ply their trade and amuse themselves with conversation at the same time, have, for the most part, smoother and more unmeaning faces: their thoughts are more miscellaneous, and therefore their features are less fixed in one uniform configuration. A keen penetrating look indicates thoughtfulness and spirit: a dull torpid countenance is not often accompanied with great sagacity."

"Wilt thou debase the heart which God refined? No; let thy heaven-taught soul to heaven aspire, to fancy, freedom, harmony, resigned; ambition's groveling crew forever left behind."

"Zealous, yet modest; innocent, though free; patient of toil, serene amidst alarms; inflexible in faith, invincible in arms."