10. Life's a short summer, man a flower; He dies, alas! how soon he dies. Catch then, O catch the transient hour; 11. In our levity we dwell upon what is gone forever, while we suffer the actual reality to slip unperceived from us. 12. Be wise to-day; it is madness to defer; Next day the fatal precedent will plead. 13. Each following day Is the creator of our human mould Not less than was the first. TO EACH DAY ITS TASK 14. Knowing ourselves, our world, our task so great, Our time so brief, 'tis clear if we refuse The means so limited, the tools so rude, To execute our purpose, life will fleet, And we shall fade, and leave our task undone. 15. Our interest lies with so much of the past as may serve to guide our actions in the present, and our interest lies with so much of the future as we may hope will be appreciably affected by our good actions now. 16. Beyond that we do not know, and we ought not to care. Do I seem to say: "Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die?" Far from it; on the contrary, I say: "Let us take hands and help, for this day we are alive together." 17. Say to thyself: If there is any good thing that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to human being, let me do it now, for I may not pass this any way again. CHAPTER LXVII THERE WILL COME HOURS OF SPIRITUAL DEPRESSION 1. Make not too great a matter of thine own thoughts, and take not too much notice of them. A MORBID INTROSPEC TION 2. These troublesome thoughts are like troublesome scolds, that, if thou regardest them and answer them, will never have done with thee. 3. But if thou lettest them talk and takest no notice of them nor makest any answer to them, they will be weary and give over. 4. Meditation is no duty at all for a melancholy person. A set and serious meditation will but confound thee, and disturb thee, and disable thee to other duties. 5. Charge not thy soul any deeper than there is cause with the effects of thy disease. 6. It is as natural for a melancholy person to be harried and molested with doubts and fears, and despairing thoughts and temptations, as it is for a man to talk idly in a fever when his understanding faileth. 7 Trust not to thine own judgment in thy melancholy state, either as to the condition of thy soul, or the choice and conduct of thy thoughts or ways, but commit thyself to the direction of some experienced, faithful guide. There Will Come Hours of Spiritual Depression 211 8. It is one of the worst things in melancholy persons, that commonly they are most wise in their own eyes, and stiff in their own conceits, when their brains are sickest and their understandings weakest. 9. Therefore as a wise man, when he is sick, will trust himself to the direction of his physician, and the help of his friends about him, and not wilfully refuse it because they advise him contrary to his feeling; 10. So wilt thou do, if thou art wise, trust thyself with some fit director; and despise not his judgment, either about thy state or about thy duty. 11. It is as dangerous to exaggerate our vices as to exaggerate our virtues. To believe ourselves monsters has results not less unfortunate than to believe ourselves perfect. 12. Let not the mind brood on self: save it from speculation, from those stagnant moments in which the awful teachings of the spirit grope into the unfathomable unknown, IN DARK HOURS WALK BY MEMORY OF THE WAY For 13. And the heart torments itself with questions which are insoluble except to an active life. the awful Future becomes intelligible only in the light of a felt and active Present. 14. I know by experience what it is to feel one's heart withered, and disgusted with all that might bring comfort; and I am quite sure that if this were continual, I should not long be able to fight against it. 15. The capriciousness of our temper is even still more strange than that of fortune. 16. Hours there will come of soulless night, When all that's holy, all that's bright, 17. When truth and love, and hope and peace, All vanish into nothingness, And fade away. 18. We cannot kindle when we will The fire that in the heart resides, The spirit bloweth and is still, 19. But tasks in hours of insight willed Can be through hours of gloom fulfilled. HOPE AND HAPPINESS ARE DUTIES 1. If thy morals make thee dreary, depend upon it they are wrong. MIRTH AND MORALS 2. I do not say, give them up, for they may be all thou hast; but conceal them like a vice, lest they should spoil the lives of better and simpler people. 3. Give not over thy mind to heaviness, and afflict not thyself in thine own counsel. 4. The gladness of the heart is the life of man, and the joyfulness of a man prolongeth his days. 5. Love thine own soul, and comfort thy heart; remove sorrow far from thee, for sorrow hath killed many, and there is no profit therein. 6. No mortal nature can endure, either in the actions of religion or study of wisdom, without sometime slackening the cords of intense thought and labour. 7. We cannot always be contemplative or pragmatical abroad, but have need of some delightful intermissions, wherein the enlarged soul may leave off awhile her severe schooling, 8. And, like a glad youth in wandering vacancy, may keep her holidays to joy and harmless pastime. 9. It is not only our right, it is our duty to enjoy and to be happy. Pleasure does us good if gratefully and |