Power by a thousand tough and stringy roots
Fixed to the people's pious nursery-faith.

This, this will be no strife of strength with strength.
That feared I not. I brave each combatant,
Whom I can look un, fixing eye to eye,

Who, full himself of courage, kindles courage
In me, too. 'Tis a foe invisible
The which I fear,- a fearful enemy,

Which in the human heart opposes me,

By its coward fear alone made fearful to me.
Not that, which full of life, instinct with power,
Makes known its present being; that is not
The true, the perilously formidable.

O no! it is the common, the quite common,
The thing of an eternal yesterday.
What ever was, and evermore returns,
Sterling to-morrow, for to-day it was sterling!
For of the wholly common is man made,
And custom is his nurse! Woe, then, to them
Who lay irreverent hands upon his old
House furniture, the dear inheritance
From his forefathers! For time consecrates;
And what is gray with age becomes religion.
Be in possession, and thou hast the right,
And sacred will the many guard it for thee!

6. HE BELIEF IN ASTROLOGY.-Schiller. Coleridge's Translation.

O NEVER rudely will I blame his faith

In the might of stars and angels. 'Tis not merely
The human being's Pride that peoples space
With life and mystical predominance;

Since likewise for the stricken heart of Love
This visible nature, and this common world,
Is all too narrow; yea, a deeper import
Lurks in the legend told my infant years
Than lies upon that truth, we live to learn.
For fable is Love's world, his home, his birth-place;
Delightedly dwells he 'mong fays and talismans,
And spirits; and delightedly believes

Divinities, being himself divine.

The intelligible forms of ancient poets,

The fair humanities of old religion,

The Power, the Beauty, and the Majesty,

That had her haunts in dale, or piny mountain,
Or forest by slow stream, or pebbly spring,

Or chasms, and watery depths, - all these have vanished
They live no longer in the faith of reason!

still

But still the heart doth need a language,
Doth the old instinct bring back the old names,
And to yon starry world they now are gone,
Spirits or gods, that used to share this earth
With man as with their friend; and to the lover
Yonder they move, from yonder visible sky
Shoot influence down: and even at this day
'Tis Jupiter who brings whate'er is great,
And Venus who brings everything that 's fair!

2. THE GRIEF OF BEREAVEMENT.- Wallenstein's Reflections on hearing of the death of young Piccolomini. Translated from Schiller by Coleridge.

He is gone, is dust!

He, the more fortunate! yea, he hath finished!
For him there is no longer any future.

His life is bright, bright without spot it was,
And cannot cease to be. No ominous hour
Knocks at his door with tidings of mishap.

Far off is he, above desire and fear;

No more submitted to the change and chance

Of the unsteady planets. O! 't is well

With him! but who knows what the coming hour,

Veiled in thick darkness, brings for us?

This anguish will be wearied down, I know;
What is permanent with man?
From the highest,

pang

As from the vilest thing of every day,

He learns to wean himself; for the strong hours
Conquer him. Yet I feel what I have lost

In him. The bloom is vanished from my life.
For O he stood beside me, like my youth,
Transformed for me the real to a dream,
Clothing the palpable and the familiar
With golden exhalations of the dawn!
Whatever fortunes wait my future toils,
The beautiful is vanished, and returns not

58. PRIULI AND JAFFIER. Thomas Otway.

Thomas Otway, from whose tragedy of "Venice Preserved" the following extract is taker, was born in Sussex, England, in 1651, and died, in a state of almost incredible destitution and wretchedness, in 1685. He was the author of several plays, of which his "Venice Preserved" is the most deservedly celebrated.

Priuli. No more! I'll hear no more! Begone, and leave me'
Jaffier. Not hear me! By my sufferings, but you shall!

My Lord, my Lord' I'm not that abject wretch

You think me. Patience! where's the distance throws
Me back so far, but I may boldly speak

In right, though proud oppression will not hear me?

Pri. Have you not wronged me?
Jaf. Could my nature e'er

Have brooked injustice, or the doing wrongs,
I need not now thus low have bent myself
To gain a hearing from a cruel father.
Wronged you?

Pri. Yes, wronged me! In the nicest point
The honor of my house, you've done me wrong.
You may remember (for I now will speak,
And urge its baseness), when you first came home
From travel, with such hopes as made you looked on,
By all men's eyes, a youth of expectation,
Pleased with your growing virtue, I received you,
Courted, and sought to raise you to your
merits:
My house, my table, nay, my fortune, too,

My very self, was yours; you might have used me
To your best service. Like an open friend,
I treated, trusted you, and thought you mine,
When, in requital of my best endeavors,
You treacherously practised to undo me:
Seduced the weakness of my age's darling,
My only child, and stole her from my bosom.
O, Belvidera!

Jaf. 'Tis to me you owe her:
Childless you

had been else, and in the grave
Your name extinct, no more Priuli heard of.
You may remember, scarce five years are past,
Since, in your brigantine, you sailed to see
The Adriatic wedded by our Duke;

And I was with you. Your unskilful pilot
Dashed us upon a rock, when to your boat
You made for safety: entered first yourself:
The affrighted Belvidera following next,
As she stood trembling on the vessel's side,
Was, by a wave, washed off into the deep;
When instantly I plunged into the sea,
And, buffeting the billows to her rescue,
Redeemed her life with half the loss of mine.
Like a rich conquest, in one hand I bore her,
And with the other dashed the saucy waves,
That thronged and pressed to rob me of my prize.
I brought her,
gave her to your despairing arms :
Indeed you thanked me; but a nobler gratitude

Rose in her soul; for from that hour she loved me.

Till for her life she paid me with herself.

Pr. You stole her from me!. like a thief you stole her, At dead of night! that curséd hour you chose

To rifle me of all my heart held dear

May all your joys in her prove false, like mine!
A sterile fortune, and a barren bed,

Attend you both! continual discord make
Your days and nights bitter and grievous! still
May the hard hand of a vexatious need
Oppress and grind you; till, at last, you find
The curse of disobedience all your portion!

Jaf. Half of your curse you have bestowed in vain;
Heaven has already crowned our outcast lot
With a young boy, sweet as his mother's beauty.
May he live to prove more gentle than his grandsire,
And happier than his father!

Pri. Rather live

To bait thee for his bread, and din your ears

With hungry cries; whilst his unhappy mother
Sits down and weeps in bitterness of want!
Jaf. You talk as if 't would please you.
Pri. Twould, by Heaven!

Jaf. Would I were in my grave!

Pri. And she, too, with thee!

For, living here, you 're but my cursed remembrancers

I was once happy!

Jaf. You use me thus, because

you know my soul Is fond of Belvidera. You perceive

My life feeds on her, therefore thus you treat me.
Were I that thief, the doer of such wrongs

As you upbraid me with, what hinders me

But I might send her back to you with contumely,

And court my fortune where she would be kinder?
Pri. You dare not do 't!

Jaf. Indeed, my Lord, I dare not.

My heart, that awes me, is too much my master.

Three years are past, since first our vows were plighted, During which time, the world must bear me witness, I've treated Belvidera as your daughter,

The daughter of a Senator of Venice;
Distinction, place, attendance, and observance,
Due to her birth, she always has commanded.

Out of my little fortune I've done this;

Because (though hopeless e'er to win your nature)

The world might see I loved her for herself,

Not as the heiress of the great Priuli.

Pri. No more!

Jaf. Yes, all, and then adieu forever.

There's not a wretch that lives on common charity

But's happier than I; for I have known

The luscious sweets of plenty;

every night

Have slept with soft content about my head,

And never waked but to a joyful morning;

Yet now must fall, like a full ear of corn,

Whose blossom 'scaped, yet 's withered in the ripening!
Pri. Home, and be humble! Study to retrench;
Discharge the lazy vermin in thy hall,

Those pageants of thy folly;

Reduce the glittering trappings of thy wife

To humble weeds, fit for thy little state;

Then to some suburb cottage both retire,

Drudge to feed loathsome life! Hence, hence, and starve!
Home, home, I say!

39. NOTHING IN IT.-Charles Mathews.

Leech. But you don't laugh, Coldstream! Come, man, be amused, for once in your life! -you don't laugh.

Sir Charles. O, yes, I do. You mistake; I laughed twice, distinctly, only, the fact is, I am bored to death!

Leech. Bored? What! after such a feast as that you have given us? I'm inspired! I'm a King at this moment, and all the world is at my feet!

Look at me,

--

Sir C. My dear Leech, you began life late. You are a young fellow, forty-five, and have the world yet before you. I started at thirteen, lived quick, and exhausted the whole round of pleasure before I was thirty. I've tried everything, heard everything, done everything, know everything; and here I am, a man of thirty-three, literally used up-completely blasé !

Leech. Nonsense, man!-used up, indeed! — with your wealth, with your twenty estates in the sunniest spots in England, — not to mention that Utopia, within four walls, in the Rue de Provence, in Paris.

Sir C. I'm dead with ennui !

Leech. Ennui poor Croesus!

a little mat

Sir C. Croesus! no, I'm no Croesus! My father, you 've seen his portrait, good old fellow!- he certainly did leave me ter of twelve thousand pounds a year; but, after all— Leech. O, come !—

Sir C. O, I don't complain of it.

Leech. I should think not.

Sir C. O, no; there are some people who can manage to do on on credit.

less,

Leech. I know several. My dear Coldstream, you should try change of scene.

Sir C. I have tried it; what's the use?

Leech. But I'd gallop all over Europe.
Sir C. I have; there's nothing in it.

Leech. Nothing in all Europe?

Sir C. Nothing! - O, dear, yes! I remember, at one time, I did, somehow,

go about a good deal.