No project wide attention ever drew
But it disparted all the learned crew. 
As through their group the cleaving line’s prolonged
With fiery combatants each field is thronged. 
In battle-royal they engage at once
For guidance of the hesitating dunce. 
The Titans on the heights contend full soon—­
On this side Webster and on that Calhoun,
The monstrous conflagration of their fight
Startling the day and splendoring the night! 
Both are unconquerable—­one is right. 
Will’t keep the pigmy, if we make him strong,
From siding with a giant in the wrong? 
When Genius strikes for error, who’s afraid
To arm poor Folly with a wooden blade? 
O Rabelais, you knew it all!—­your good
And honest judge (by men misunderstood)
Knew to be right there was but one device
Less fallible than ignorance—­the dice. 
The time must come—­Heaven expedite the day!—­
When all mankind shall their decrees obey,
And nations prosper in their peaceful sway.

TINKER DICK

Good Parson Dickson preached, I’m told,
A sermon—­ah, ’twas very old
  And very, very, bald! 
’Twas all about—­I know not what
It was about, nor what ’twas not. 
  “A Screw Loose” it was called.

Whatever, Parson Dick, you say,
The world will get each blessed day
  Still more and more askew,
And fall apart at last.  Great snakes! 
What skillful tinker ever takes
  His tongue to turn a screw?

BATS IN SUNSHINE

Well, Mr. Kemble, you are called, I think,
  A great divine, and I’m a great profane. 
You as a Congregationalist blink
  Some certain truths that I esteem a gain,
  And drop them in the coffers of my brain,
Pleased with the pretty music of their chink. 
Perhaps your spiritual wealth is such
A golden truth or two don’t count for much.

You say that you’ve no patience with such stuff
  As by Renan is writ, and when you read
(Why do you read?) have hardly strength enough
  To hold your hand from flinging the vile screed
  Into the fire.  That were a wasteful deed
Which you’d repent in sackcloth extra rough;
For books cost money, and I’m told you care
To lay up treasures Here as well as There.

I fear, good, pious soul, that you mistake
  Your thrift for toleration.  Never mind: 
Renan in any case would hardly break
  His great, strong, charitable heart to find
  The bats and owls of your myopic kind
Pained by the light that his ideas make. 
’Tis Truth’s best purpose to shine in at holes
Where cower the Kembles, to confound their souls!

A WORD TO THE UNWISE

    [Charles Main, of the firm of Main & Winchester, has ordered a
    grand mausoleum for his plot in Mountain View Cemetery.—­City
    Newspaper.]