Henry Wilmarth Hazzen

“ Master is he, thus conscious of life's stress,
⁠Who, year by year thro' toil, a path has found
⁠To best from better, as its vantage ground;
And he whose mission, too, has been far less,
⁠To strive in sunshine, than in shadows grope,
⁠Still finds his heart replete with youth and hope. ”

“ THE sun looked old, the earth seem'd in its wane;
The race itself showed symptoms of decay;
A moral staleness fill'd each coming day
With aspirations largely counted vain.
The fields of thought, tho' rich with golden grain,
Ungathered stood, for lack of worthy hand
To harvest well, and feed a hungry land,
And build the world anew and fresh again.
Men's hearts were harden'd in their greed for pelf ”

“ For needless fear, lest Death his dart should throw
'Gainst score of youth, consort with wasting age,
The same blot out as if it had not been;
Save from myself there be to try again.
I nothing am, a vanished, fruitless page,
Yet this I know, beyond the power of speech,
That human life to be partakes of God ”

“ Glorious it was — the thought of what is mine —
⁠The counterpart of Nature's boundless whole;
Glorious to feel, though late in life's decline,
⁠'Twas early in the journey of the soul.
Thus did these scenes confirm the Sage's truth,
That nature thus perceived is endless youth. ”

“ It is not possible for one to speak nobly who does not feel profoundly, and nature has so blended suffering with power, that it sometimes has the relation of cause to effect. While Mr. Hazzen thrilled to the joyousness of nature, with a soul attuned to its subtlest harmonies, he was often smitten with sore pain as he looked out on the conflict of life, its incompleteness and unrest. ”

“ The harebell blossomed fair to see,
Wild grew the eglantine.
My soul was fresh as morning dew,
My heart was clear of worldly taint;
And earth and sky a heaven-like hue,
Did on my vision paint. ”

“ Rather to each there comes in deeper sense,
⁠The conscious presence of a king sublime,
Whose rule the years touch not, nor seasons sway,
⁠But leaps the bounds of time;
Always with vigor, hope, and aspiration rife,
This king of kings forevermore is Life! ”

“ It was a nature in which self-interest was so small an element, that notwithstanding its full measure of rich gifts, failed to crystallize in what the world recognizes as success. He was more wonderful than anything he ever spoke, embodying in his own person such a gracious loveliness that people in crowded thoroughfares were constrained to look after him, reminded of high things, himself implying what all true poems imply,—himself the best poem. ”

“ The first that's in my memory green,
⁠The last that Time can harm.
No lovelier spot could wish demand,
⁠No fairer sight could be;
Here Nature's wealth, with bounteous hand,
⁠Was lavished full and free. ”

“ Man is his own star; and the soul that can
Render an honest and a perfect man,
Commands all light, all influence, all fate,
Nothing to him falls early or too late.
Beaumont and Fletcher.
Individuality
SINCE "all our knowledge is ourselves to know,"
My highest use to others and to me
Are my own thoughts that come of what I see,
Reflecting back and causing there to grow
Kindred in soil, in germ exotic though
Distinct ideas, of self-determined force
Gaging the weight and worth of my discourse,
And all of good that's in me to bestow. ”

“ Christianity is greater and more universal than any of us have as yet been able to see or realize. God builds his temple in the human heart on the ruin, if need be, of the churches and every other institution of man. ”

“ The only right use of this world is to use it as a means, never as an end. This world is simply the soul's rescue from nonentity.
"Moved by our higher impulses, we are always in a state of elevation. ”

“ As the American republic was to exemplify in itself the last analysis of politics as a science of government, so it was also to make known and emphasize the last analysis of religion. Transcendentalism is that analysis. It is the world merged in spirit; matter subordinated to mind. ”

“ Did not deep winter snow,
⁠So white and clear,
Make haste in muddy
⁠Thaws to disappear,—
⁠Snow somewhat were like her.
Better than all that nature
⁠Yet hath shown,
Or art, she stands secure,
⁠Supreme alone,—
⁠Of whom to you I write. ”

“ If I were necessitated to improvise my own deity, it would be woman. She alone is worthy of intimation as substitute, if we had to have one, for God. The man who has no friend among women, he of all others is most alone. ”

“ He adds a new beatitude in recognition of the unsung service of teaching when he writes to a friend who had given her gifts and art to the teaching of the young—
"Blessed is that teacher who in the midst of incessant rudimental humdrum and petty repetition is still able to suggest and embody in himself the sublime summit of a perfected science."
Regarding friendship between men and women, he writes:
"The man who loves his wife deeply and truly must necessarily be something of a lover of all women, and vice versa. As a man looks upon his wife, so he looks in a measure upon women in general. ”

“ He impressed himself upon his students in his class work and by his lectures, so that they came to love literature, and studied the great authors as enthusiastically as did their teacher. They were familiarized with the histories of the nations whose graves lie along the highway of the past, and with the literatures they created. With the history and literature of modern Europe they were equally well acquainted, for it was not possible to be a pupil of Mr. Hazzen and not have a delightful acquaintance with the German and English classics. ”

“ He was the most popular of teachers, and his pupils, scattered through the West, realize that life has been made richer and fuller to them through his instructions. "Capacity for pain" is not unfrequently "a mark of rank in nature." ”

“ It seems strange that one who was so vigorous physically, and who was endowed with such spiritual strength, should have fallen on the march so early. But he put so much of himself into his work, and spent his vital force so prodigally in the attainment or his purposes, that he bankrupted himself of nervous force when he should have been at his best. ”

“ The nineteenth century is woman's.
⁠Victor Hugo.
To M. A. L.
O NOBLE woman, first among the blest,
⁠To fill the measure of a high ideal,
⁠With far more traits substantial, rich and real,
Than seldom yet were by one soul possessed,
Obeying ever duty's stern behest ”

“ Honest in every fiber of his being, scorning to lend his influence in behalf of any measure that was even equivocal, he could never be induced, as a lawyer, to plead for a cause whose rightfulness was not clearly apparent. ”

“ For such a man the law has few rewards, and it was not strange that he came to feel the need of more congenial employment.
In November, 1877, Mr. Hazzen married Isabel F. Dearborn, teacher of music in the Mt. Carroll Seminary, Illinois. He took the position of teacher of history and literature in the same institution, and held it till 1896, when the school was transferred to Chicago University. With his marriage a new life dawned upon him. The wedded couple were friends from early childhood, and affianced lovers while he was in the strenuous struggle for education and position. ”