Letitia Elizabeth Landon quotes - page 29
It was a face, with nothing but the blush
To mark it from the sculptured features round :
As perfect in its beauty ; but the flush
Of earthly warmth and earthly feeling crowned
The master-piece of nature ;- that rich gush
Was from the heart, which thus a language found,
The eloquence of truth and silence ever : -
Words, sighs, and smiles deceive, but blushes never.
Letitia Elizabeth Landon
There's feasting spread in gorgeous halls,
The lamps flash round the city walls,
And many a flood of lustre falls
O'er many an honoured name.
Turn thou from this, and enter where
Some mother weeps o'er her despair,
Some desolate bride rends her rich hair,
Some orphan joins the cry !
Then back again to the death plain,
Where lie those whom they weep in vain,
And ask, in gazing on the slain,
What art thou, Victory ?
Letitia Elizabeth Landon
Death came like a friend to restore thee
To those who had died before thee:
Father, mother,
Sister, brother-
There were none of these to mourn o'er thee.
But now that Death has found thee,
Thy kindred and friends are round thee ;
In their rest they are laid
In the dark yew shade,
And cold sleep like their own has bound thee.
Letitia Elizabeth Landon
The shade fell darker from the clustering vine,
Whose green boughs twined the lattice like a wreath ;
The lark had ceased the musical glad laugh
With which he hails the morning; note by note
The matin song had died upon the wind;
The dew which hung upon the cypresses
Had turned to sunshine on the waving leaves;-.
Letitia Elizabeth Landon
The clouds, and not the stars, to them
The omen and the sign be given-
The clouds, the vapours of our soil,
Not stars, whose element is heaven.
The deepening shade, the flitting light,
Mark what each coming month will know-
The passing joy, the constant care,
Of life's sad pilgrimage below.
Letitia Elizabeth Landon
Other sorrows soften the heart, - poverty hardens it. Nothing like poverty for chilling the affections and repressing the spirits. Its annoyances are all of the small and mean order ; its regrets all of a selfish kind ; its presence is perpetual ; and the scant meal, and the grudged fire, are repeated day by day, yet who can become accustomed to them ?
Letitia Elizabeth Landon