Lives of Great Men
Remind Us
That We Can Make
Our Lives Sublime
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Time is fleeting, according to Longfellow
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Editorial Note:
Henry Longfellow
was born on
February 27, 1807,
and lived up to 1882.
While many of his
poems have a theosophical
content, the reader
must take into consideration
the fact that in
theosophy and philosophy the concept
of a monotheistic
god does not make sense. The term
is a “misnomer”,
according to the Masters of the
Wisdom. The word can
be accepted in part if one establishes
that “God” is the totality of Nature, as Baruch Spinoza
wrote.
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What the heart of the young man said to the psalmist
Tell me not, in
mournful numbers,
Life is but
an empty dream! -
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things
are not what they seem.
Life is real!
Life is earnest!
And the
grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not
spoken of the soul.
Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
Is our
destined end or way;
But to act, that each to-morrow
Find us
farther than to-day.
Art is long, and Time is fleeting,
And our
hearts, though stout and brave,
Still, like muffled drums, are beating
Funeral
marches to the grave.
In the world’s broad field of battle,
In the
bivouac of Life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle!
Be a hero in
the strife!
Trust no Future, howe’er pleasant!
Let the dead
Past bury its dead!
Act, - act in the living Present!
Heart
within, and God o’erhead!
Lives of great men all remind us
We can make
our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints
on the sands of time;
Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o’er
life’s solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing,
shall take heart again.
Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart
for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to
labor and to wait.
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The above poem is
reproduced from the book “Favorite Poems”, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow,
Dover-Thrift Editions, Dover Publications, Inc., New York, copyright 1992, 82 pages,
p. 02.
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On the role of the esoteric movement in the
ethical awakening of mankind during the 21st century, see the book “The Fire and Light of Theosophical Literature”, by
Carlos Cardoso Aveline.
Published in
2013 by The Aquarian Theosophist,
the volume has 255 pages and can be obtained through Amazon Books.
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