C.N. Douglas, comp. Forty Thousand Quotations: Prose and Poetical. 1917.

J. G. Saxe

At Learning’s fountain it is sweet to drink,

But ’tis a nobler privilege to think.

Give me kisses! Nay, ’tis true

I am just as rich as you;

And for every kiss I owe,

I can pay you back, you know.

Kiss me, then,

Every moment—and again.

“God bless the man who first invented sleep!”

So Sancho Panza said and so say I;

And bless him, also, that he didn’t keep

His great discovery to himself, nor try

To make it,—as the lucky fellow might—

A close monopoly by patent right.

Golden hair, like sunlight streaming

On the marble of her shoulder.

He says a thousand pleasant things—

But never says “Adieu.”

I love vast libraries; yet there is a doubt,

If one be better with them or without—

Unless he use them wisely, and, indeed,

Knows the high art of what and how to read.

I will touch

My mouth unto the leaves, caressingly;

And so wilt thou. Thus, from these lips of mine

My message will go kissingly to thine,

With more than Fancy’s load of luxury,

And prove a true love-letter.

Say, what is life? ’Tis to be born

A helpless babe, to greet the light

With a sharp wail, as if the morn

Foretold a cloudy noon and night;

To weep, to sleep, and weep again,

With sunny smiles between; and then?

Alas! poor human nature, pity, if hard pressed, degenerates into contempt.

Beauty intoxicates the eye, as wine does the body; both are morally fatal if indulged.

Order is the primary regulation of the celestial regions.