Says Hope to Grief one low’ring day, “Cast off those looks of sorrow; Come, dry your tears, and let us play: All may be well to-morrow.” “Alas!” cries Grief, “no leisure hour The Gods assign my fate; On love or friendship, fame or power, I’m ever doom’d to wait.” “Never,” cries Hope, with winning smile, “Nourish my foe Despair; Yon hamlet see, let’s join awhile The boys at see-saw there.” Now purple lights and balmy gales Play round the radiant maid; Her angel look at once prevails, Grief sigh’d--but still obey’d. Hope featly pois’d the trembling beam, Grief made no further pother; The spectre sat at one extreme, The fairy at the other. Then came Despair with low’ring frown, With scowling eye he gazed; For lo! the heavier _Grief_ weigh’d down, The higher _Hope_ was rais’d. But Mercy, e’en by angels blest, Smil’d from her starry scope, To see that Grief, the more deprest, Looks up the more to Hope! ❦ [Sidenote: Unjust suspicion.] It is painful to describe the combat of innocence and unjust suspicion; it is dreadful to represent the possibility of appearances bearing testimony against truth, and melancholy to reflect that innocence may be oppressed by the blind judgment of men, without deriving aid from the enlightened and all-seeing Judge of the universe. ❦ It is the heartless alone who believe that love can grow old. It is, and remains spring forever! As long as the human faculties retain their vigour--as long as the mind is undegraded by selfish interests, and remains faithful to truth, love, once born, lives in an honest heart, diffusing freshness and vigour, even in old age, over the intellect, the feelings, and the whole existence. ❦ [Sidenote: Capucine Friars.] The Capucines touch no money but with a pair of pincers, which conveys it into their cowl or sack to carry it to market. ❦ _Arms of the House of Medici._ “The house of Medici,” says the author of the Discours merveilleux sur la Vie de Catherine de Medici, “was for a long period hidden amongst the lowest refuse of the people at Florence. It began to rise by means of a collier, who had a son an apothecary, _who took the name of his profession_; and as we in the present day see people taking for devices the emblems of their trade, as tailors their scissors, masons their hammer or trowel, so this doctor adopted _five pills_, as it is their habit to order an odd number to their patients.” This is a singular derivation of the armorial bearings of this celebrated house. ❦ [Sidenote: Scenes from the Life of Michael Angelo.]