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I asked the ancient, venerable dead,
Sages who wrote, and warriors who bled:
From the cold grave a hollow murmur flowed,
"Time sowed the seed we reap in this abode !"

I asked a dying sinner, ere the tide

Of life had left his veins: "Time!" he replied;

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DUKE S. What fool is this?

JAQUES. O worthy fool! - One that hath been a courtier ;

"I've lost it! ah, the treasure!”—and he died. | And says, if ladies be but young and fair,

I asked the golden sun and silver spheres,
Those bright chronometers of days and years:
They answered, "Time is but a meteor glare,"
And bade me for eternity prepare.

I asked the Seasons, in their annual round,
Which beautify or desolate the ground;
And they replied (no oracle more wise),

"Tis Folly's blank, and Wisdom's highest prize!"

I asked a spirit lost, but O the shriek

They have the gift to know it: and in his brain—
Which is as dry as the remainder biscuit

! After a voyage- he hath strange places crammed
With observation, the which he vents
In mangled forms.

SHAKESPEARE

THE JESTER'S SERMON.

That pierced my soul! I shudder while I speak. THE Jester shook his hood and bells, and leaped

It cried, "A particle! a speck! a mite
Of endless years, duration infinite!"
Of things inanimate my dial I
Consulted, and it made me this reply,
"Time is the season fair of living well,
The path of glory or the path of hell."
I asked my Bible, and methinks it said,
"Time is the present hour, the past has fled;
Live live to-day! to-morrow never yet
On any human being rose or set."

I asked old Father Time himself at last;
But in a moment he flew swiftly past,
His chariot was a cloud, the viewless wind
His noiseless steeds, which left no trace behind.
I asked the mighty angel who shall stand
One foot on sea and one on solid land:

upon a chair,

The pages laughed, the women screamed, and tossed their scented hair;

The falcon whistled, staghounds bayed, the lapdog barked without,

The scullion dropped the pitcher brown, the cook railed at the lout!

The steward, counting out his gold, let pouch and money fall,

And why? because the Jester rose to say grace in

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with might and main ;

"Mortal!" he cried, "the mystery now is o'er; The grooms beat on their metal cans, and roared

Time was, Time is, but Time shall be no more!"

66

MARSDEN.

FOOL MORALIZING ON TIME.

JAQUES.

FROM AS YOU LIKE IT."

"Good morrow, fool," quoth I.

"No, sir," quoth he,

till they were red,

But still the Jester shut his eyes and rolled his

witty head;

And when they grew a little still, read half a yard of text,

And, waving hand, struck on the desk, then frowned like one perplexed.

"Dear sinners all," the fool began, "man's life is but a jest,

Call me not fool, till heaven hath sent me for- A dream, a shadow, bubble, air, a vapor at the best,

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Thus may we see," quoth he, "how the world wags: The fool that eats till he is sick must fast till he

'T is but an hour ago since it was nine;
And after one hour more 't will be eleven ;
And so, from hour to hour, we ripe and ripe,
And then, from hour to hour, we rot and rot;
And thereby hangs a tale." When I did hear
The motley fool thus moral on the time,
My lungs began to crow like chanticleer,

That fools should be so deep contemplative;

is well;

The wooer who can flatter most will bear away the belle.

"Let no man halloo he is safe till he is through the wood;

He who will not when he may, must tarry when he should.

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