GLAVE
This day I read in the sad scholar's page
That the old earth is withered and undone;
That faith and great emprize beneath the sun
Are vain and empty in our doting age;
'T were best to calm the spirit's noble rage,
To live in dreams, and all high passion shun,
While round and round the aimless seasons run—
Pleasured alone with dead art's heritage.
Then, as I read, outshone thy face of youth,
Hero and martyr of humanity,
Dead yesterday on Afric's shore of doom!
Ah, no; Faith, Courage fail not, while lives Truth,
While Pity lives, while man for man can die,
And deeds of glory light the dark world's gloom.
OF HENRY GEORGE
WHO DIED FIGHTING AGAINST POLITICAL TYRANNY AND CORRUPTION
Now is the city great! That deep-voiced bell
Tolls for a martyred hero. Such is he
Who loved her, strove for her, and nobly fell.
His fire be ours—the passion to be free.
New York, 1897.
SCORN
Who are the men that good men most despise?
Not they who, ill begot and spawned in shame,
Riot and rob, or rot before men's eyes,—
Who basely live, and dying leave no name.
These are the piteous refuse of mankind,
Fatal the ascendant star when they were born,
