A weed is no more than a flower in disguise, Which is seen through at once, if love give a man eyes.
James Russell LowellNot a change for the better in our human housekeeping has ever taken place that wise and good men have not opposed it-have not prophesied that the world would wake up to find its throat cut in consequence.
James Russell LowellHere was a type of the true elder race, And one of Plutarch's men talked with us face to face.
James Russell Lowell'Tis sorrow builds the shining ladder up, Whose golden rounds are our calamities, Whereon our firm feet planting, nearer God The spirit climbs, and hath its eyes unsealed. True it is that Death's face seems stern and cold When he is sent to summon those we love; But all God's angels come to us disguised; Sorrow and sickness, poverty and death, One after another, lift their frowning masks, And we behold the Seraph's face beneath, All radiant with the Glory and the calm Of having looked upon the front of God.
James Russell Lowell