A thousand nameless acts, That lurk in lovely secrecy, and die The golden opportunity Is never offered twice; seize then the hour When fortune smiles and duty points the way; Nor shrink aside to 'scape the specter fear; Nor pause, though pleasure beckon from her bower; But bravely bear thee onward to the goal. ANONYMOUS. O Opportunity! thy guilt is great : 'Tis thou that execut'st the traitor's treason! Thou setts't the wolf where he the lamb may get; Whoever plots the sin, thou 'point'st the season; 'Tis thou that spurn'st at right, at law, at reason; And in thy shady cell, where none may spy him, Unnoticed, like the trodden flowers which Sits Sin, to seize the souls that wander by him. SHAKSPEARE. A little fire is quickly trodden out; We must take the current when it serves Or lose our ventures. SHAKSPEARE. Occasion, set on wing, flies fast away, Whose back once turned, no holdfast can we find. ANONYMOUS. Miss not the occasion; by the forelock take That subtle power, the never-halting Time, Lest a mere moment's putting off should make Mischance almost as heavy as a crime. WORDSWORTH. O seize the instant time; you never will With waters once passed by impel the mill. From the Persian, translated by TRENCH. The means that Heaven yields must be embraced And not neglected; else, if Heaven would, And we will not, Heaven's offer we refuse, The proffered means of succor and redress. SHAKSPEARE. Opportunity makes the thief. From the LATIN. OPPORTUNITY-OPPRESSION. Moments seize; He finds his fellow guilty of a skin 229 Heaven's on their wing: a moment we may Not colored like his own; and having power To enforce the wrong, for such a worthy wish Tyranny Remember, Heaven has an avenging rod; To smite the poor is treason against God. COWPER. Ill-fated race! the softening arts of peace, Kind, equal rule, the government of laws, And all-protecting freedom, which alone Sustain the name and dignity of man, These are not theirs. THOMSON. Was man ordained the slave of man to toil, Yoked with the brutes, and fettered to the soil; Weighed in a tyrant's balance with his gold? No! Nature stamped us in a heavenly mould! She bade no wretch his thankless labor urge, Nor, trembling, take the pittance and the CAMPBELL. scourge. The widowed Indian, when her lord expires, Absolves all faith; and who invades our Mounts the dread pile, and braves the funeral fires! 230 OPPRESSION-PARDON. The free-born man thus shrunk into a slave, That ruled his sinews, and repressed his soul. O, from the fields of cane, From the low rice-swamp, from the trader's cell; From the black slave ship's foul and loathsome hell, And coffle's weary chain; Hoarse, horrible, and strong, Rises to Heaven that agonizing cry, His rest, his labor, pastime, strength, and Filling the arches of the hollow sky, "How long, O God, how long?" WHITTIER. health, Were only portions of a master's wealth; His love-O name not love, where Christians doom The fruits of love to slavery from the womb. MONTGOMERY. Slave is no word of deathless lineage sprung: rung Too long to have God's holy cause denied. LOWELL. He who permits oppression shares the crime. DARWIN. [See also FREEDOM.] PARDON-FORGIVENESS. Survey the wondrous cure, And at each step let higher wonder rise! Pardon for infinite offense! and pardon Paul and Silas, in their prison, sang of Christ Through means that speak its value infinite! the Lord arisen, And an earthquake's arm of might broke their dungeon gates at night. But, alas! what holy angel brings the slave this glad evangel? A pardon bought with blood! with blood divine! With blood divine of Him I made my foe! YOUNG. And what earthquake's arm of might breaks Come, listen to His voice who died to save Even for the least of all the tears that shine From human lips that blessed word, forgive! Thou didst kneel down to Him who came The sound which openeth heaven, renews But "Thus far, and no farther," when addressed To the wild wave, or wilder human breast, When headstrong passion gets the reins of That never ought to be the lot of man. Takes each impression, and is worked at Evil and strong, seducing passions prey pleasure. YOUNG. The ruling passion, be it what it will, Like mighty rivers, with resistless force, POPE. The worst of slaves is he whom passion rules. BROOKE. The heart, surrendered to the ruling power And all their deep impressions wear away. COWPER. When passion rules, how rare The hours that fall to virtue's share! SCOTT. way; Who then to vice the subject spirits give, Thou that didst bow the billow's pride Thy mandates to fulfill, Speak, speak to passion's raging tide, Speak, and say, "Peace, be still!" MRS. HEMANS. Earthly desires and sensual lust But in the life beyond the tomb From the Spanish of MANRIQUE. O how the passions, insolent and strong, Make us the madness of their will obey. CRABBE. |
