American Books

ABRAHAM LINCOLN: Born, Feb. 12th, 1809. Assassinated, Good-Friday, April 14th, 1865. "Confusion now hath made his masterpiece!Most sacrilegious murder hath broke opeThe Lord's anointed temple, and stole thenceThe life o' the building. * * * * * * * * * * "Approach the chamber, and destroy your sightWith a new Gorgon:—Do not bid me speak;See, and then speak yourselves.—Awake!... more...

MAZELLI Canto I. I. "Stay, traveller, stay thy weary steed,The sultry hour of noon is near,Of rest thy way-worn limbs have need,Stay, then, and, taste its sweetness here.The mountain path which thou hast spedIs steep, and difficult to tread,And many a farther step 'twill cost,Ere thou wilt find another host;But if thou scorn'st not humble fare,Such as the pilgrim loves to share,—Not... more...

AN OLD HEART How young I am!  Ah! heaven, this curse of youth   Doth mock me from my mirror with great eyes,And pulsing veins repeat the unwelcome truth,   That I must live, though hope within me dies. So young, and yet I have had all of life.   Why, men have lived to see a hundred years,Who have not known the rapture, joy, and strife   Of my brief youth, its passion and its tears. Oh! what... more...

To M AE C E N A S.   MAECENAS, you, beneath the myrtle shade,  Read o'er what poets sung, and shepherds play'd.  What felt those poets but you feel the same?  Does not your soul possess the sacred flame?  Their noble strains your equal genius shares  In softer language, and diviner airs.    While Homer paints, lo! circumfus'd in air,  Celestial Gods in mortal forms... more...

FOREWORD In presenting a loyal and venerable ex-slave as an artless exponent of freedom, freedom of conduct as well as of speech, the author of this trivial volume is perhaps not composing an individual so truly as individualizing a composite, if the expression will pass. The grizzled brown dispenser of homely admonitions is a figure not unfamiliar to those who have "moved in plantation... more...

One hesitates to lift the veil and throw the light upon a life so hidden and a personality so withdrawn as that of Emma Lazarus; but while her memory is fresh, and the echo of her songs still lingers in these pages, we feel it a duty to call up her presence once more, and to note the traits that made it remarkable and worthy to shine out clearly before the world. Of dramatic episode or climax in her... more...

“As the Spirits of Darkness be stronger in the dark, so Good Spirits which be Angels of Light are augmented not only by the Divine light of the Sun, but also by our common VVood Fire: and as the Celestial Fire drives away dark spirits, so also this our Fire of VVood doth the same.” Cor. Agrippa, Occult Philosophy, Book I. chap. v. “Announced by all the trumpets of the sky, Arrives the snow; and,... more...

MEMOIR. Frederick William Thomas was the oldest child of E. S. Thomas and Anna his wife. He was born at Providence Rhode Island, but spent his earlier years at Charleston South Carolina, where Mr. E. S. Thomas resided and edited and published the Charleston City Gazette. While Frederick William was still young, Mr. Thomas removed to Baltimore Maryland, and there his son was educated and brought up to... more...

AN OLD SWEETHEART OF MINE As one who cons at evening o'er an album all alone,And muses on the faces of the friends that he has known,So I turn the leaves of fancy till, in shadowy design,I find the smiling features of an old sweetheart of mine.   The lamplight seems to glimmer with a flicker of surprise,As I turn it low to rest me of the dazzle in my eyes,And light my pipe in silence, save a sigh... more...

Poems. "The Salt of the Earth."The salt of the earth—what a meaningful phraseFrom the lips of the Saviour, and one that conveysA sense of the need of a substance salineThis pestilent sphere to refresh and refine,And a healthful and happy condition secureBy making it pure as the ocean is pure.In all the nomenclature known to the race,In all appellations of people or place,Was ever a name so... more...