A HAPPY LIFE.

BY SIR HENRY WOTTON, BORN 1568, DIED 1640.

How happy is he born and taught,

That serveth not another's will, Whose armor is his honest thought,

And simple truth his utmost skill!

Whose passions not his masters are,
Whose soul is still prepared for death,-

Untied unto the worldly care

Of public fame, or private breath;

Who envies none whom chance doth raise, Or vice; who never understood

How deepest wounds are given by praise:

Nor rules of state, but rules of good:

Who hath his life from rumors freed,

Whose conscience is his strong retreat; Whose state can neither flatterers feed, Nor ruin make oppressors great ;

Who God doth late and early pray, More of his grace than gifts to lend;. And entertains the harmless day

With some religious book or friend!.

This man is freed from servile bands
Of hope to rise, or fear to fall;

Lord of himself, though not of lands;:

And having nothing, yet hath all!

10

THE OTHER DAY.

Ir seems, love, but the other day,
That thou and I were young together;
And yet we've trod a toilsome way,

And wrestled oft with stormy weather.

I see thee in thy spring of years,

Ere cheek or curl had known decay;

And there's a music in mine ears,

As sweet as heard the other day.

Affection, like a rainbow, bends

Above the past, to glad my gaze; And something still of beauty lends To memory's dream of other days. Within my heart there seems to beat

That lighter, happier heart of youth, When looks and words were kind and sweet,

And love's world seemed a world of truth.

Within this inner heart of mine

A thousand golden fancies throng, And whispers of a time divine

Appeal with half-forgotten tongue.

I know, I feel, 'tis but a dream,

That thou art old and I am grey; And that, however brief it seem,

We are not as the other day:

Not as the other day, when flowers

Shook fragrance on our joyous track;

When Love could never count the hours,

And Hope ne'er dreamed of looking back; When, if the world had been our own,

We thought how changed should be its state:

Then, every cot should be a throne,

The poor as happy as the great!

When we'd that scheme which love imparts,

That chain all interest to bind,

The fellowship of human hearts,

The federation of mankind!

And though with us time travels on,

Still relics of our youth remain,

As certain flowers, when spring is gone, Will in the autumn bloom again.

Alas! 'mid worldly things and men,
Love's hard to caution or convince;

And hopes, which were but fables then,

Have left us, with their moral, since.

The twilight of the memory cheers

The soul with many a star sublime;

And still the mists of other years

Hang dew-drops on the leaves of Time.

For what was then obscure and far,

Hath grown more radiant to our eyes;

Although the promised hoped-for star

Of social love hath yet to rise.

Still foot by foot the world is crossed,

Still onward, though it slow appear:

Who knows how small a balance lost

Might cast the sun from out its sphere?