Erle

“ It is purely from ignorance that you fail to appreciate the valuable social organon I want to teach you. Of course you have heard your guardian quote Emerson? He is a favourite author with some who frequent the classic halls of the 'Century;' but perhaps you do not know that he has investigated 'Courage,' and thrown new light upon that ancient and rare attribute of noble souls? Now, my dear, in dealing with Erle Palma, if you desire to trim the lion's claws, and crimp his mane, adopt the courage of silence. ”

“ Ay, clean as Marian Erle: As Marian Leigh, I know, I were not clean: I have not so much life that I should love, ... Except the child. Ah God! I could not bear To see my darling on a good man’s knees, And know by such a look, or such a sigh, Or such a silence, that he thought sometimes, ‘This child was fathered by some cursed wretch’ ... For, Romney,—angels are less tender-wise Than God and mothers: even you would think What we think never. He is ours, the child ”

“ Scarce lacked that thunderbolt of the falling beam,
Which nicked me on the forehead as I passed
The gallery door with a burden. Say heaven’s bolt,
Not William Erle’s; not Marian’s father’s; tramp
And poacher, whom I found for what he was,
And, eager for her sake to rescue him,
Forth swept from the open highway of the world,
Road-dust and all,—till, like a woodland boar
Most naturally unwilling to be tamed,
He notched me with his tooth. But not a word
To Marian! ”

“ I durst encounter man for man,
With him to break a spere.
Erle Douglas on his milke-white steede,
Most like a baron bolde,
Rode foremost of his company,
Whose armour shone like gold.
Show me, sayd hee, whose men you bee,
That hunt soe boldly heere,
That, without my consent, doe chase
And kill my fallow-deere.
The first man that did answer make
Was noble Percy hee;
Who sayd, Wee list not to declare,
Nor shew whose men wee bee:
Yet wee will spend our deerest blood,
Thy cheefest harts to slay. ”

“ But the fact is, that there always have been, in all countries, men who were what is popularly termed “born before their time”—men who were in advance, intellectually, of their age—men who, overleaping the barriers of prejudice, managed to see deeper into things in general than their fellows, and to become more or less famous.
Now our hero, Erling the Bold, was one of those who could see beyond his time, and who became almost prophetically wise ”

“ This illustration of the stern chieftain's daughter among the mountains with her companions, bewailing the desolate fate to which she was devoted, is an adaptation from one of Merle's beautiful pictures. ”

“ With stout Erle Percy there was slaine
Sir John of Egerton,
Sir Robert Ratcliff, and Sir John,
Sir James that bold barròn:
And with Sir George and stout Sir James,
Both knights of good account,
Good Sir Ralph Raby there was slaine,
Whose prowesse did surmount.
For Witherington needs must I wayle,
As one in doleful dumpes;
For when his leggs were smitten off,
He fought upon his stumpes.
And with Erle Douglas, there was slaine
Sir Hugh Montgomerye,
Sir Charles Murray, that from the feeld
One foote wold never flee.
Sir Charles Murray, of Ratcliff, too,
His sisters sonne was hee ”

“ At last these two stout erles did meet,
Like captaines of great might:
Like lyons wood, they layd on lode,
And made a cruell fight:
They fought untill they both did sweat,
With swords of tempered steele;
Untill the blood, like drops of rain,
They tricklin downe did feele.
Yeeld thee, Lord Percy, Douglas sayd
In faith I will thee bringe,
Where thou shalt high advanced bee
By James our Scottish king:
Thy ransome I will freely give,
And this report of thee,
Thou art the most couragious knight,
That ever I did see.
Noe, Douglas, quoth Erle Percy then,
Thy proffer I doe scorne ”

“ But all wold not prevayle.
Theyr bodyes, bathed in purple gore,
They bare with them away:
They kist them dead a thousand times,
Ere they were cladd in clay.
The news was brought to Eddenborrow,
Where Scottlands king did raigne,
That brave Erle Douglas suddenlye
Was with an arrow slaine:
O heavy newes, King James did say,
Scotland may witnesse bee,
I have not any captaine more
Of such account as hee.
Like tydings to King Henry came,
Within as short a space,
That Percy of Northumberland
Was slaine in Chevy-Chace:
Now God be with him, said our king,
Sith it will noe better bee ”

“ One afternoon, which is ever present in my recollection, I was enjoying a walk with my friend in the City Park and reciting poetry. At that age I knew entire books by heart, word for word. One of these was Goethe's "Faust." The sun was just setting and reminded me of the glorious passage:
"Sie ruckt und weicht, der Tag ist uberlebt,
Dort eilt sie hin und fordert neues Leben. ”

“ The Duttons and theyr fellow-players forsakying the Erle of Warwycke theyr mayster, became followers of the Erle of Oxford, and wrot themselves his COMOEDIANS, which certayne Gentlemen altered and made CAMOELIONS. The Duttons, angry with that, compared themselves to any gentlemen ”

“ This yere the erle of Arundell admirall of Engelond faught on the see with the Flemynges, upon oure lady day in lenten, and scomfyted them, and tok manye schippes lade with Rochell wyn; among whiche schippes was oo schipp called Mewes Colman, [69] and that schipp was the admyrall of Flaundres, the whiche was taken and manye othere prisoners. ”

“ The bataill on the see betuen the erl of Hunt’ and the kynges adversaries.and the same yere, upon seynt Petyr day and Poule, the erle of Huntyngdon, with othere certeyn lordes and there106 retenue, foughten with ix carykes of Jene, the grettest that evere were seyn in this coostes, and scomfited them; of whiche, thanked be God, he toke iiij grete with there patrons, and the admirall of them alle was called the bastard of Burbon, with alle the tresoure that they alle schulde aben waged with for a quarter of a yere; and the othere carykes fledden awey. ”

“ “I don’t pretend to know what people are meant for,” said Madame Merle. “I only know what I can do with them.” ”

“ ERROLL it's a bonny place,
It stands upon a plain;
A bad report this ladie's raisd,
That Erroll is nae a man.
But it fell ance upon a day
Lord Erroll went frae hame,
And he is on to the hunting gane,
Single man alane. ”

“ The beautiful boy Erling, fair-haired, fair-browed, and blue-eyed, came up beside his father. Earl Haakon gazed down at the boy. “Thou art too young for the fight—but not too young— Come, Erling! Come with me! The gods are angry! They have turned their faces from us and are calling for a sacrifice. They are asking for a rich sacrifice, before they will give us victory. Come, Erling! ”

“ If Great Britain, toward whom the animosity of the recent war was still strong, had not been a monarchy, or if the revolution which changed our Revolutionary benefactress, France, into a republic, had happened in England, or if the French Revolution had not so closely followed in form the change in the United States from monarchy to republicanism, party animosity in America would have been checked instead of advanced by the Old World contest. ”

“ She told me every word of praise her masters gave her religiously; she knew that that was what my soul lived on. Erla had all the little ways of love that feed the heart.
It distressed her that I had still to be the wage-earner; I had to keep her purpose inflexibly before her or she would have given up the future many times for the present need. For the rest, we pinched and saved in every way we could. ”

“ Clay was given a vote of thanks by the Mexican Congress for his sentiments expressed for their welfare. Ministers had been sent to them as rapidly as they showed ability to govern themselves and to maintain a stable government. Should all this good work be undone and the hands turned backward on the dial of liberty by conspiring European monarchs? Should legitimacy cast its blight again on the New World as it had already done on the Old? Should the Holy Alliance be allowed to extend its monarchical compulsion to the Spanish-American republics under the sacred garb of religion? ”

“ Criticism of the Confederation which our fathers framed to take the place of British rule must be tempered by the reflection that the action was taken while the land was in the chaos of war. Praise is due their genius for organisation, inherited from the mother country they were warring against, which enabled them to contemplate a new form of government while engaged in dissolving the old. The Government is dead; long live the Government. According to the intention, there was to be no interregnum in which Anarchy might rear his ugly head, and destroy existing forms and instincts of government. ”

“ The Dutch in New York and the Germans of Pennsylvania took almost no part in the Philadelphia Convention. It is as useless to deny an English parentage for the American Constitution as to deny that there were English colonies in America. So did the heirs of the ages avoid the mistakes of the past by seeking the results of the law of the survival of the fittest. They form a strong contrast with another people, less fitted by inheritance for self-government, who were at about the same time entering upon the task of constitution-making. ”

“ When an English statesman suggested that his Government would do well to cultivate the new Republic for the sake of trade if for no higher motive, Lord Brougham ridiculed the proposition of paying heed to "a people whose armies are as yet at the plough, or making awkward attempts at the loom, whose assembled navies could not lay siege to an English sloop of war." These sneers, although containing a large proportion of truth, exasperated the young nation beyond control. ”

“ In his veto message, he spoke the almost forgotten language of the old days when he said that the power to regulate commerce did not extend to enterprises conducted within the several States; that the efforts of the Union should be confined to foreign commerce; that any expenditure of the bonus proceeds under the plea of the common defence would be to give Congress a general power of legislation. ”

“ The Congress faced an absolutely new task. There were many precedents in history for colonial holding, varying from the policy of Greece, which allowed complete severance of home ties, to that of Spain, which regarded colonies as existing solely for the benefit of the mother country. By adopting the one, the United States must have left the western emigrants to perish. The other was repugnant to a people who had just rebelled against even the moderate colonial system of Great Britain. Equality is the only standard for a republic. ”

“ Whatever destiny may have made of the later Union, whatever theories may now be indulged in concerning the abstract Union the fathers made in 1789, the concrete Union which was put into effect was the offspring of the States not only in the thoughts of the people, but it was even dependent upon them for aid in several particulars necessary for putting it into operation. ”

“ A foreign war would have been fatal to the adopted policy of a disinterested neutrality, not dependent upon force, and to an uninterrupted home development which was to continue for over a century. Neither the clamour nor defamation of the Democratic clubs, nor the insinuations of the opposition press that the President was biassed toward a monarchy because he wished eventually to transform his office into a kingship, could drive the cool Washington from his stand of neutrality. ”

“ For—in shame and sadness do I speak it, Ernest—I am not worthy to be typified by yonder benign and majestic image.”
“And why?” asked Ernest. He pointed to the volume. “Are not those thoughts divine?”
“They have a strain of the Divinity,” replied the poet. “You can hear in them the far-off echo of a heavenly song. But my life, dear Ernest, has not corresponded with my thought. I have had grand dreams, but they have been only dreams, because I have lived—and that, too, by my own choice—among poor and mean realities. ”

“ The opposition to a change in the national form of government, as shown in the debates in the various State conventions, was based upon expediency among the masses and constitutionality among the few. In the light of the dangers which have confronted the people during a century of experience, some of the objections to the Constitution seem ridiculous. ”

“ Since that time, a third phase of party government has been developed, purely on grounds of expediency in domestic and foreign control.
Political parties, therefore, are peculiarly dependent upon public opinion. They are creatures of sentiment. They possess no power save that of persuasion as to the proper lines of conducting the administration. Choosing positions on great questions largely from previous policy, they must appeal to the people for justification and support. They live by opposition. No party can exist alone. ”

“ His freedom from personal ambition and selfish motive having been tested in the tempting days of the war, he could be relied upon by the people not to betray them in their extremity by any assumption of powers. Reputed to be a man of great self-control, almost cold-blooded in his self-guardedness, having dwelt far removed from the partisan strife pertaining naturally to populous centres, he would be careful in forming opinions, conservative in actions, and unlikely to yield to the influence of faction or partisanship. ”

“ In cases of deliberate, dangerous, and palpable infractions of the Constitution, affecting the sovereignty of a state and the liberties of the people, it is not only the right, but the duty of such a state to interpose its authority for their protection. ”

“ In the series of papers now known as the Federalist, Madison, when attempting to quiet the fears of the people upon the possibility of the Central Government securing too much power under the Constitution, said of this provision: "The power of establishing post-roads must, in every view, be a harmless power." Little could he foresee that within ten years he would be called upon by his great chief, Jefferson, to decide whether "to establish" meant to lay out a road, to construct it, or simply to adopt an existing one. ”