Truth seek we both--Thou, in the life without thee and around; I in the Heart within--by both can Truth alike be found; The healthy eye can through the world the great Creator track-- The healthy heart is but the glass which gives creation back. * * * * * THE SCIENCE OF POLITICS All that thou dost be right--to that alone confine thy view, And halt within the certain rule--the All that's right to do! True zeal _the what already is_ would sound and perfect see; False zeal would sound and perfect make the something that's to be! * * * * * TO ASTRONOMERS Of the Nebulæ and planets do not babble so to me; What! is Nature only mighty inasmuch as you can see? Inasmuch as you can measure her immeasurable ways, As she renders world on world, sun and system to your gaze? Though through space your object be the Sublimest to embrace, Never the Sublime abideth--where you vainly search--in space! * * * * * THE BEST GOVERNED STATE How the best state to know?--It is found out, Like the best women--that least talked about. * * * * * MY BELIEF What thy religion? Those thou namest--none! None! Why?--Because I have religion! * * * * * FRIEND AND FOE Dear is my friend--yet from my foe, as from my friend, comes good; My friend shows what I _can_ do, and my foe shows what I _should_. * * * * * LIGHT AND COLOR Dwell, Light, beside the changeless God--God spoke and Light began; Come, thou, the ever-changing one--come, Color, down to Man! * * * * * FORUM OF WOMEN Woman--to judge man rightly--do not scan Each separate act;--pass judgment on the Man! * * * * * GENIUS Intellect can repeat what's been fulfill'd, And, aping Nature, as she buildeth--build; O'er Nature's base can haughty Reason dare To pile its lofty castle--in the air. But only thine, O Genius, is the charge, In Nature's kingdom Nature to enlarge! * * * * * THE IMITATOR Good out of good--that art is known to all-- But Genius from the bad the good can call; Then, Mimic, not from leading-strings escaped, Work'st but the matter that's already shaped The already-shaped a nobler hand awaits-- All matter asks a Spirit that _creates!_ * * * * * CORRECTNESS (FREE TRANSLATION) The calm correctness, where no fault we see, Attests Art's loftiest or its least degree; Alike the smoothness of the surface shows The Pool's dull stagner--the great Sea's repose. * * * * * THE MASTER The herd of scribes, by what they tell us, Show all in which their wits excel us; But the True Master we behold, In what his art leaves--just untold.