I think as Lazarus passes,
          That perhaps he has had his chances,
     And knew not how to use them,
          To make himself rich and great,
     And lift himself up to the summit,
          Too dizzy, perchance, to be envied,
     But proud enough to scorn
          All men of meaner estate.

     I think that Dives flaunting
          His riches in the sunshine,
     May owe his gold to his fathers,
          Not a penny to himself.
     And that all things taken together,
          Men are but busy spiders;
     That Fate the busier housewife
          Leaves on, or sweeps off the shelf.

     But I neither laugh nor sigh
          At the rights or wrongs I witness;
     I take the world as it passes
          And would mend it if I might.
     But as I cannot, I may not,
          And so go home to my pillow,
     And wrap myself in the blankets,
          And wish it a calm good night.

               II. THE DEMI-SEMI LUNATIC.

     Says Fate to the Fated,
          "Unravel my skein."
     Says the Fated to Fate
          " 'Twere eternally vain."
     Says Body to Soul,
          " We are mysteries twain."
     " Wherein do we differ?"
          Says Pleasure to Pain;
     "Are not living and dying
          Mere links in a chain?
     And is not the antidote
          Part of the bane?"
     Unriddle my riddle
          Oh sphinx of the plain!
     It weighs on my spirit
          It addles my brain.

               III. THE ANGRY PESSIMIST.

You prefer a buffoon to a scholar,
A harlequin to a teacher,
A jester to a statesman,
An Anonyma flaring on horseback
To a modest and spotless woman—
                                        Brute of a public!

You think that to sneer shows wisdom,
That a gibe outvalues a reason.
That slang, such as thieves delight in,
Is fit for the lips of the gentle,
And rather a grace than a blemish,
                                        Thick headed public!

You think that if merit's exalted
'Tis excellent sport to decry it,
And trail its good name in the gutter;
And that cynics, white-gloved and cravated,
Are the cream and quintessence of all things,
                                        Ass of a public!

You think that success is a merit,
That honour and virtue and courage
Are all very well in their places,
But that money's a thousand times better;
Detestable, stupid, degraded,
                                        Pig of a public!

               IV. THE EPICUREAN.

     What is the use of plodding,
          Plodding for ever and ever,
     To gain the bright half million,
          That shall lift us above the crowd?
     And dying, a full nine-tenths of us
          Without a sole enjoyment,
     Worthy a true man's taking,
          By kindly Heaven allowed?

     I'm not afraid to be humble,
          For though my fortune's little
     I make that little suffice
          For the pleasures it can buy:
     A pint of Claret or Rhenish,
          Or a well-cooked dish in season,
     A book, a gem, or a picture,
          To please the mind and eye.

     I've something to spare for the needy
          Who make no trade of their sorrow,
     And as much as half my income
          For the wants of the friends I love;
     And I pity and laugh at the selfish
          And self-degrading zanies,
     Who look so much beneath them,
          That they cannot see above.

     It signifies little—thinking—
          So I shall go home to dinner,
     And drinking a flask of Burgundy
          The King and the Pope of wine;
     I'll pledge my love (my wife),
          Like "rare old Ben" in the ditty,
     Who left a kiss in the goblet,
          As I can do in mine.

     I'll laugh: we'll laugh and be happy,
          And free of hatred and envy,
     We'll think in our single mindedness
          That we are truly wise;
     And if we are not—what matters?
          For if love and satisfaction
     Be not the best of wisdom,
          I care not where wisdom lies.

PLAIN ENGLISH.

IF every other part of life in this island of
ours be (as we are by some expected to
believe) perfect, our method of teaching is
defective, and sadly defective; painfully out of
the straight line, and immeasurably below the
ideal point. Our school-books seem written for
children not to understand, rather than to make
difficult things easy to them, and obscure things
plain. Dry details from which every pictorial
fact has been cut out; dull catalogues of mere
words to which no living interest is attached;
dates without a single dramatic incident to help
towards the remembering of them; lists of
battles and of kings, for history; lists of chief
towns, of departments, of rivers, and of vague
and awful "boundaries," for geography; these
are the cheerful means by which we endeavour
to make children love their books, and think
learning better than houses or lands. It is
one of the strange contradictions of human,
nature, that we go on seeing evils, and lamenting
them, but never attempt to remedy them.
We know that our method of teaching the
young, our school-books, and our range of