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University of Virginia Library

My Sonnets

[by W. C. Bennett]

Bennett, W. C. (1820-1895)

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TO THE SONNET.

THE ANCIENT MYTHOLOGY.

APHRODITE AND ZEUS.

SPERTHIES AND BULIS.

THE TEN THOUSAND IN SIGHT OF THE EUXINE.

ALEXANDER THE GREAT.

ALEXANDER THE GREAT.

LUTHER'S DISCOVERY OF A BIBLE AT ERFURTH.

['Twas worthy Laud, for 'twas a bigot's thought]

THE EMIGRATION OF THREE THOUSAND PURITANS FROM NORWICH TO ESCAPE THE PERSECUTION OF LAUD.

THE VESSEL, BOUND FOR AMERICA, DETAINED BY CHARLES I, HAVING ON BOARD PYM, HAMPDEN, AND CROMWELL.

THE PARTING OF PYM AND STRAFFORD.

CHARLES THE FIRST.

MARVELL'S REJECTION OF THE BRIBE.

WASHINGTON'S SALE OF HIS NURSE.

NAPOLEON AT THE TOMB OF FREDERICK THE GREAT.

HAYDON'S NAPOLEON AT ST HELENA.

WRITTEN ON READING SILVIO PELLICO'S IMPRISONMENTS.

WRITTEN ON READING THE FOREGOING SONNET.

[My books! my books! your very names my tongue]

BUCKHARDT READING ROBINSON CRUSOE TO HIS ARABS IN THE DESERT.

[Above dominions, high o'er sceptred kings]

WRITTEN ON SHOOTER'S HILL.

WRITTEN IN GREENWICH PARK.

[Mourn for the leaves, the infants of the spring]

[Mourn for the leaves, that the white clouds of June]

WRITTEN IN KNOWLE PARK.

[Answer, ye glorious worlds that tread in light]

WRITTEN AT HASTINGS.

WRITTEN IN GREENWICH PARK.

[Hate none, though the wild cry of blood should ring]

[Hate none, but do thou rather pity those]

[Scorn none, but look upon the poor, the low]

[Judge none, for know your vision is all blind]

[By our own standard do we measure men]

[Vain of thy titled name, laugh not the low]

[Holier is love than wisdom, if the wise]

[Do good and cease not, though the pleasant praise]

[Envy their eyes to sightless blindness sears]

[Strength-eating toil lays its cold grasp on life]

[Is man made but for toil? “Yes,” do they say]

['Tis false, God made not man for toil alone]

[By the sweet beauty of yon bending sky,—]

[Content!—O hate it, for it is a thing]

[To tread the earth not far above the brutes]

[For what do we, to trade, our best days sell?]

[O, many an hour, my restless thoughts would dwell]

[Say, what is it to live, thou child of clay?]

[Who truly lives?—Man, fleeting shadow, tell.]

[When cherished hope becomes reality]

[The riddle of existence, ponder. What]

[Dust unto dust!—The breathing form, that trod]

[Of this be sure, the false shall surely die]

[What is the leash you strain on? Why not slip]

[Fame for the prize, what holds you from the race?]

WITH A FAREWELL PRESENT.

[Still dwell with me sweet Hope and Memory.]

[Sweet Poesy, oh, do thou not disdain]

[I love a laugh,—of all things, I love best]

CHRISTMAS SONGS.

[Can he, the frail, weak, child of clay,—]

[Where is the majesty by earth]

THERE IS BEAUTY IN ALL.

THE FACTORY-CHILD'S MAY-DAY SONG.

THE STARVING MAN'S PRAYER.

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5

TO THE SONNET.

Thou chronicler of fleeting thoughts, in thee
Find shelter from oblivion and a home
My, else swift-dying, fancies, as they come
Up from the mind's abysses. Thou to me
A visible enduring memory
Shalt be; for thou, I know, art never dumb
When I demand of thee my thoughts. In some,
Perchance in all, the stranger's eye shall see
No thing that worth the treasuring may seem,
Yet in the lucid amber of thy line
Still will I shrine them,—still devoutly deem
That they are lovely, since they all are mine.
Sweet Sonnet! my winged thoughts O treasure still;
I love them, let the world think what they will.

November 15, 1842.