[ { "title": "Loss And Gain", "author": "Ralph Waldo Emerson", "lines": [ "Virtue runs before the muse", "And defies her skill,", "She is rapt, and doth refuse", "To wait a painter's will.", "", "Star-adoring, occupied,", "Virtue cannot bend her,", "Just to please a poet's pride,", "To parade her splendor.", "", "The bard must be with good intent", "No more his, but hers,", "Throw away his pen and paint,", "Kneel with worshippers.", "", "Then, perchance, a sunny ray", "From the heaven of fire,", "His lost tools may over-pay,", "And better his desire." ], "linecount": "16" }, { "title": "Celestial Love", "author": "Ralph Waldo Emerson", "lines": [ "Higher far,", "Upward, into the pure realm,", "Over sun or star,", "Over the flickering Dæmon film,", "Thou must mount for love,—", "Into vision which all form", "In one only form dissolves;", "In a region where the wheel,", "On which all beings ride,", "Visibly revolves;", "Where the starred eternal worm", "Girds the world with bound and term;", "Where unlike things are like,", "When good and ill,", "And joy and moan,", "Melt into one.", "There Past, Present, Future, shoot", "Triple blossoms from one root", "Substances at base divided", "In their summits are united,", "There the holy Essence rolls,", "One through separated souls,", "And the sunny &Aelig;on sleeps", "Folding nature in its deeps,", "And every fair and every good", "Known in part or known impure", "To men below,", "In their archetypes endure.", "", "The race of gods,", "Or those we erring own,", "Are shadows flitting up and down", "In the still abodes.", "The circles of that sea are laws,", "Which publish and which hide the Cause.", "Pray for a beam", "Out of that sphere", "Thee to guide and to redeem.", "O what a load", "Of care and toil", "By lying Use bestowed,", "From his shoulders falls, who sees", "The true astronomy,", "The period of peace!", "Counsel which the ages kept,", "Shall the well-born soul accept.", "As the overhanging trees", "Fill the lake with images,", "As garment draws the garment's hem", "Men their fortunes bring with them;", "By right or wrong,", "Lands and goods go to the strong;", "Property will brutely draw", "Still to the proprietor,", "Silver to silver creep and wind,", "And kind to kind,", "Nor less the eternal poles", "Of tendency distribute souls.", "There need no vows to bind", "Whom not each other seek but find.", "They give and take no pledge or oath,", "Nature is the bond of both.", "No prayer persuades, no flattery fawns,", "Their noble meanings are their pawns.", "Plain and cold is their address,", "Power have they for tenderness,", "And so thoroughly is known", "Each others' purpose by his own,", "They can parley without meeting,", "Need is none of forms of greeting,", "They can well communicate", "In their innermost estate;", "When each the other shall avoid,", "Shall each by each be most enjoyed.", "Not with scarfs or perfumed gloves", "Do these celebrate their loves,", "Not by jewels, feasts, and savors,", "Not by ribbons or by favors,", "But by the sun-spark on the sea,", "And the cloud-shadow on the lea,", "The soothing lapse of morn to mirk,", "And the cheerful round of work.", "Their cords of love so public are,", "They intertwine the farthest star.", "The throbbing sea, the quaking earth,", "Yield sympathy and signs of mirth;", "Is none so high, so mean is none,", "But feels and seals this union.", "Even the tell Furies are appeased,", "The good applaud, the lost are eased.", "", "Love's hearts are faithful, but not fond,", "Bound for the just, but not beyond;", "Not glad, as the low-loving herd,", "Of self in others still preferred,", "But they have heartily designed", "The benefit of broad mankind.", "And they serve men austerely,", "After their own genius, clearly,", "Without a false humility;", "For this is love's nobility,", "Not to scatter bread and gold,", "Goods and raiment bought and sold,", "But to hold fast his simple sense,", "And speak the speech of innocence,", "And with hand, and body, and blood,", "To make his bosom-counsel good:", "For he that feeds men, serveth few,", "He serves all, who dares be true." ], "linecount": "107" }, { "title": "Mithridates", "author": "Ralph Waldo Emerson", "lines": [ "I cannot spare water or wine,", "Tobacco-leaf, or poppy, or rose;", "From the earth-poles to the Line,", "All between that works or grows,", "Every thing is kin of mine.", "", "Give me agates for my meat,", "Give me cantharids to eat,", "From air and ocean bring me foods,", "From all zones and altitudes.", "", "From all natures, sharp and slimy,", "Salt and basalt, wild and tame,", "Tree, and lichen, ape, sea-lion,", "Bird and reptile be my game.", "", "Ivy for my fillet band,", "Blinding dogwood in my hand,", "Hemlock for my sherbet cull me,", "And the prussic juice to lull me,", "Swing me in the upas boughs,", "Vampire-fanned, when I carouse.", "", "Too long shut in strait and few,", "Thinly dieted on dew,", "I will use the world, and sift it,", "To a thousand humors shift it,", "As you spin a cherry.", "O doleful ghosts, and goblins merry,", "O all you virtues, methods, mights;", "Means, appliances, delights;", "Reputed wrongs, and braggart rights;", "Smug routine, and things allowed;", "Minorities, things under cloud!", "Hither! take me, use me, fill me,", "Vein and artery, though ye kill me;", "God! I will not be an owl,", "But sun me in the Capitol." ], "linecount": "34" }, { "title": "Ode To Beauty", "author": "Ralph Waldo Emerson", "lines": [ "Who gave thee, O Beauty!", "The keys of this breast,", "Too credulous lover", "Of blest and unblest?", "Say when in lapsed ages", "Thee knew I of old;", "Or what was the service", "For which I was sold?", "When first my eyes saw thee,", "I found me thy thrall,", "By magical drawings,", "Sweet tyrant of all!", "I drank at thy fountain", "False waters of thirst;", "Thou intimate stranger,", "Thou latest and first!", "Thy dangerous glances", "Make women of men;", "New-born we are melting", "Into nature again.", "Lavish, lavish promiser,", "Nigh persuading gods to err,", "Guest of million painted forms", "Which in turn thy glory warms,", "The frailest leaf, the mossy bark,", "The acorn's cup, the raindrop's arc,", "The swinging spider's silver line,", "The ruby of the drop of wine,", "The shining pebble of the pond,", "Thou inscribest with a bond", "In thy momentary play", "Would bankrupt Nature to repay.", "", "Ah! what avails it", "To hide or to shun", "Whom the Infinite One", "Hath granted his throne?", "The heaven high over", "Is the deep's lover,", "The sun and sea", "Informed by thee,", "Before me run,", "And draw me on,", "Yet fly me still,", "As Fate refuses", "To me the heart Fate for me chooses,", "Is it that my opulent soul", "Was mingled from the generous whole,", "Sea valleys and the deep of skies", "Furnished several supplies,", "And the sands whereof I'm made", "Draw me to them self-betrayed?", "I turn the proud portfolios", "Which hold the grand designs", "Of Salvator, of Guercino,", "And Piranesi's lines.", "I hear the lofty Pæans", "Of the masters of the shell,", "Who heard the starry music,", "And recount the numbers well:", "Olympian bards who sung", "Divine Ideas below,", "Which always find us young,", "And always keep us so.", "Oft in streets or humblest places", "I detect far wandered graces,", "Which from Eden wide astray", "In lowly homes have lost their way.", "", "Thee gliding through the sea of form,", "Like the lightning through the storm,", "Somewhat not to be possessed,", "Somewhat not to be caressed,", "No feet so fleet could ever find,", "No perfect form could ever bind.", "Thou eternal fugitive", "Hovering over all that live,", "Quick and skilful to inspire", "Sweet extravagant desire,", "Starry space and lily bell", "Filling with thy roseate smell,", "Wilt not give the lips to taste", "Of the nectar which thou hast.", "", "All that's good and great with thee", "Stands in deep conspiracy.", "Thou hast bribed the dark and lonely", "To report thy features only,", "And the cold and purple morning", "Itself with thoughts of thee adorning,", "The leafy dell, the city mart,", "Equal trophies of thine art,", "E'en the flowing azure air", "Thou hast touched for my despair,", "And if I languish into dreams,", "Again I meet the ardent beams.", "Queen of things! I dare not die", "In Being's deeps past ear and eye,", "Lest there I find the same deceiver,", "And be the sport of Fate forever.", "Dread power, but dear! if God thou be,", "Unmake me quite, or give thyself to me." ], "linecount": "99" }, { "title": "To Eva", "author": "Ralph Waldo Emerson", "lines": [ "O Fair and stately maid, whose eye", "Was kindled in the upper sky", "At the same torch that lighted mine;", "For so I must interpret still", "Thy sweet dominion o'er my will,", "A sympathy divine.", "", "Ah! let me blameless gaze upon", "Features that seem in heart my own,", "Nor fear those watchful sentinels", "Which charm the more their glance forbids,", "Chaste glowing underneath their lids", "With fire that draws while it repels.", "", "Thine eyes still shined for me, though far", "I lonely roved the land or sea,", "As I behold yon evening star,", "Which yet beholds not me.", "", "This morn I climbed the misty hill,", "And roamed the pastures through;", "How danced thy form before my path,", "Amidst the deep-eyed dew!", "", "When the red bird spread his sable wing,", "And showed his side of flame,", "When the rose-bud ripened to the rose,", "In both I read thy name." ], "linecount": "24" } ]