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504

PREACHING. PRECIOUS.

PREACHING.

JUDGE not the preacher, for he is thy judge,
If thou mistake him thou conceiv'st him not:
God calleth preaching folly. Do not grudge
To pick out treasures from an earthen pot;
The worst speak something good. If all want sense
God takes a text and preacheth patience.

He that gets patience and the blessing which
Preachers conclude with, hath not lost his pains.

Herbert.

The proud he tam'd, the penitent he cheer'd,
Nor to rebuke the rich offender fear'd;

His preaching much, but more his practice wrought
A living sermon of the truths he taught.

Dryden.

At church with meek and unaffected grace,
His looks adorn'd the venerable place;
Truth from his lips prevail'd with double sway,
And fools, who came to scoff, remain'd to pray.
Goldsmith.

PRECIOUS.

YE tradeful merchants, that with weary toil,
Do seek most precious things to make your gain,
And both the Indies of their treasures spoil,
What needeth you to seek so far in vain?

For lo! my love doth in herself contain

All this world's riches, that may far be found.

If sapphires, lo! her eyes be sapphires plain;
If rubies, lo! her lips be rubies round;

If pearls, her teeth be pearls both pure and sound;
If ivory, her forehead ivory ween;

If gold, her locks are finest gold on ground;
If silver, her fair hands are silver sheen;
But that which fairest is but few behold,
Her mind adorn'd with virtues manifold.

I never saw

Spenser.

Such precious deeds in one that promised nought But beggary and poor luck.

Shakspere.

PREFERMENT. PRELUDE. PREROGATIVE. 505

PREFERMENT.

'Tis the curse of service,

Preferment goes by letter and affection,

Not by the old gradations, when each second
Stood heir to the first.

All preferment

Shakspere.

That springs from sin and lust, shoots quickly up, As gardeners' crops do in the rottenest ground.

Middleton.

When knaves come to preferment, they rise as
Gallows are raised in the low countries, one
Upon another's shoulders.

Ford.

PRELUDE.

EITHER Songster, holding out their throats,
And folding up their wings, renewed their notes,
As if all day, preluding to the fight,

They only had rehearsed, to sing by night.

A lively prelude fashioning the way
In which the voice shall wander.

Dryden.

Keats.

PREROGATIVE.

How could communities,

The primogeniture and due of birth,
Prerogative of age, sceptres, and crowns,
But by degree stand in authentic place.-Shakspere.

For freedom still maintained alone,
Freedom, an English subject's sole prerogative,
Accept our pious praise.

Dryden.

Let him maintain his power, but not increase it;
The strong prerogative when strained too high,
Cracks like the tortured chord of harmony,
And spoils the concert between king and subject.

Havard.

506

PRESCIENCE.

PRESENCE.

PRESCIENCE.

FREEDOM was first bestowed on human race,
And prescience only held the second place.-Dryden.

Before Thy prescience, Power Divine!
What is this idle sense of mine?

What all the learning of the schools?
What sages, priests, and pedants? fools!
The world is Thine, from Thee it rose,
By Thee it ebbs, by Thee it flows.

Hence, worldly lore! By whom is wisdom shown?
The Eternal knows, knows all, and he alone.

From the Persian of Omar Khiam.

PRESENCE.

THE presence of a King engenders love
Amongst his subjects and his loyal friends,
As it disanimates his enemies.

Shakspere.

Thou with eternal wisdom didst converse,
Wisdom, thy sister, and with her didst play
In presence of the Almighty Father, pleased
With thy celestial song.

Milton.

I do not doubt his love, but I could wish
His presence might confirm it: when I see
A fire well fed, shoot up its wanton flame,
And dart itself into the face of heaven,
I grant that fire, without a fresh supply,
May for a while be still a fire; but yet
How doth its lustre languish, and itself
Grow dark, if it too long want the embrace
Of its loved pyle! how straight it buried lies
In its own ruins!
Robert Mead.

Yes, Thou art ever present, Power Divine!
Not circumscrib'd by time, nor fix'd to space,
Confin'd to altars, nor to temples bound.
In wealth, in want, in freedom, or in chains,
In dungeons, or on thrones, the faithful find Thee.
Hannah More.

PRESENT. PRESERVATION.

507

PRESENT.

THOU future things canst represent
As present.

Seek not to know to-morrow's doom;
That is not ours, which is to come.
The present moment's all our store:
The next, should heav'n allow,
Then this will be no more:

Milton.

So all our life is but one instant now. Congreve.

The moments past, if thou art wise, retrieve,
With pleasant memory of the bliss they gave;
The present hours in present mirth employ,
And bribe the future with the hopes of joy.-Prior.

Time that is past thou never canst recall;
Of time to come thou art not sure at all;
The present, only, is within thy power,

And therefore now improve the present hour.-Byron.

PRESERVATION.

THE miser's gold, the painted cloud
Of titles, that make vain men proud;
The courtier's pomp, or glorious scar
Got by a soldier in the war,

Can hold no weight with his brave mind,

That studies to preserve mankind.-Sir W. Davenant.

Nature does require

Her times of preservation, which, perforce,

I give my tendence to.

Every senseless thing, by nature's light,
Does preservation seek, destruction shun.

Shakspere.

Jove tempers all, steadies all things that reel;
When wildly swerveth

Davies.

From the safe line life's burning chariot wheel,
His hand preserveth.

Blackie, from Eschylus.

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WITH easy freedom and a gay address,
A pressing lover seldom wants success.

Press on! for it is Godlike to unloose
The spirit, and forget yourself in thought;
Bending a pinion for the deeper sky,
And in the very fetters of your flesh,
Mating with the pure essences of heaven.

Rowe.

N. P. Willis.

The press from her fecundous womb
Brought forth the arts of Greece and Rome:
Her offspring, skill'd in logic war,
Truth's banner wav'd in open air:
Then monster superstition fled,
And hid in shades its Gorgon head;
And lawless power the long-kept field,
By reason quell'd, was forc'd to yield.
This nurse of arts, and freedom's fence
To chain, is treason against sense;
And liberty, thy thousand tongues
None silence, who design no wrongs,
For those, who use the gag's restraint,
First rob before they stop complaint.

But mightiest of the mighty means,
On which the arm of progress leans,
Man's noblest mission to advance,
His woes assuage, his weal enhance,
His rights enforce, his wrongs redress,—
Mightiest of Mighty is the press.

The second Ark we bring:
"The Press!" all nations sing;
What can they less?

Oh! pallid Want; Oh! Labour stark;
Behold, we bring the second Ark-

Greene.

Dr. Bowring.

The Press! the Press! the Press!

Ebenezer Elliott.

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