Daily Thoughts by Charles Kingsley

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DAILY THOUGHTS

Selected from the Writings OF CHARLES KINGSLEY

BY HIS WIFE

SECOND EDITION

London MACMILLAN AND CO. 1885

_Printed by_ R. & R. CLARK, _Edinburgh_.

_This little Volume_, _selected from the MS. Note-books_, _Sermons and Private Letters_, _as well as from the published Works of my Husband_, _is dedicated to our children_, _and to all who feel the blessing of his influence on their daily life and thought_.

_F. E. K._

_July_ 10, 1884.

January.

Welcome, wild North-easter! Shame it is to see Odes to every zephyr: Ne'er a verse to thee. . . . . . Tired we are of summer, Tired of gaudy glare, Showers soft and steaming, Hot and breathless air. Tired of listless dreaming Through the lazy day: Jovial wind of winter Turn us out to play! Sweep the golden reed-beds; Crisp the lazy dyke; Hunger into madness Every plunging pike. Fill the lake with wild-fowl; Fill the marsh with snipe; While on dreary moorlands Lonely curlew pipe. Through the black fir forest Thunder harsh and dry, Shattering down the snow-flakes Off the curdled sky. . . . . . Come; and strong within us Stir the Viking's blood; Bracing brain and sinew: Blow, thou wind of God!

_Ode to North-east Wind_.

New Year's Day. January 1. {3}

Gather you, gather you, angels of God-- Freedom and Mercy and Truth; Come! for the earth is grown coward and old; Come down and renew us her youth. Wisdom, Self-sacrifice, Daring, and Love, Haste to the battlefield, stoop from above, To the day of the Lord at hand!

_The Day of the Lord_. 1847.

The Nineteenth Century. January 2.

Now, and at no other time: in this same nineteenth century lies our work. Let us thank God that we are here now, and joyfully try to understand _where_ we are, and what our work is _here_. As for all superstitions about "the good old times," and fancies that _they_ belonged to God, while this age belongs only to man, blind chance, and the evil one, let us cast them from us as the suggestions of an evil lying spirit, as the natural parents of laziness, pedantry, fanaticism, and unbelief. And therefore let us not fear to ask the meaning of this present day, and of all its different voices--the pressing, noisy, complex present, where our workfield lies, the most intricate of all states of society, and of all schools of literature yet known.

_Introductory Lecture_, _Queen's College_. 1848.

Forward. January 3.

Let us forward. God leads us. Though blind, shall we be afraid to follow? I do not see my way: I do not care to: but I know that He sees His way, and that I see Him.

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