Washington’s Farewell Address (1796)

Vol. 43, pp. 233-249 of The Harvard Classics

George Washington retired to private life in 1796, entrusting "the preservation of the Union" to the "love of liberty." His last appeal is a vital message to American citizens, as pertinent today as when he penned it.

(George Washington published "Farewell Address," Sept. 15, 1796.)

[Washington refused to be a candidate for a third term of the Presidency; and in May, 1796, he sent to Hamilton a rough draft of his farewell address, asking for his criticism. After much revision by both the document was published on Sept. 19, and was read to the House of Representatives. The advice contained in it has ever since exercised a profound influence on the policy of the nation.]

Friends and Fellow-Citizens:

THE PERIOD for a new election of a Citizen, to administer the Executive Government of the United States, being not far distant, and the time actually arrived, when your thoughts must be employed in designating the person, who is to be clothed with that important trust, it appears to me proper, especially as it may conduce to a more distinct expression of the public voice, that I should now apprize you of the resolution I have formed, to decline being considered among the number of those, out of whom a choice is to be made.

Dante Alighieri (1265–1321). The Divine Comedy.

Vol. 20, pp. 387-395 of The Harvard Classics

Dante, having journeyed through Hell and Purgatory, comes at last to St. Peter on his throne. St. Peter calls for the aid of St. James and St. John before passing final judgment on Dante's righteousness.

(Dante died Sept. 14, 1321.)

Inferno [Hell]

Canto XXIV

ARGUMENT.—Under the escort of his faithful master, Dante not without difficulty makes his way out of the sixth gulf; and in the seventh, sees the robbers tormented by venomous and pestilent serpents. The soul of Vanni Fucci, who had pillaged the sacristy of St. James in Pistoia, predicts some calamities that impended over that city, and over the Florentines.

IN the year’s early nonage, ¹ when the sun

Tempers his tresses in Aquarius’ urn,

And now toward equal day the nights recede;

Whenas the rime upon the earth puts on

Her dazzling sister’s image, but not long

Her milder sway endures; then riseth up

The village hind, whom fails his wintry store,

And looking out beholds the plain around

All whiten’d; whence impatiently he smites

His thighs, and to his hut returning in,

There paces to and fro, wailing his lot,

As a discomfited and helpless man;

Then comes he forth again, and feels new hope

Spring in his bosom, finding e’en thus soon

The world hath changed its countenance, grasps his crook,

And forth to pasture drives his little flock:

So me my guide dishearten’d, when I saw

His troubled forehead; and so speedily

That ill was cured; for at the fallen bridge

Arriving, toward me with a look as sweet,

He turn’d him back, as that I first beheld

At the steep mountain’s foot. Regarding well

The ruin, and some counsel first maintain’d

With his own thought, he opened wide his arm

And took me up. As one, who, while he works,

Computes his labor’s issue, that he seems

Still to foresee the effect; so lifting me

Up to the summit of one peak, he fix’d

His eye upon another. “Grapple that,”

Said he, “but first make proof, if it be such

As will sustain thee.” For one capt with lead

This were no journey. Scarcely he, though light,

And I, though onward push’d from crag to crag,

Could mount. And if the precinct of this coast

Were not less ample than the last, for him

I know not, but my strength had surely fail’d.

But Malebolge all toward the mouth

Inclining of the nethermost abyss,

The site of every valley hence requires,

That one side upward slope, the other fall.

  At length the point from whence the utmost stone

Juts down, we reach’d; soon as to that arrived,

So was the breath exhausted from my lungs

I could no further, but did seat me there.

John Bunyan

John Bunyan (1628–1688). The Pilgrim’s Progress.

Vol. 15, pp. 13-23 of The Harvard Classics

From cockfighting, bear baiting, and like sports, the wife of John Bunyan converted him to a life of humility and reverence. While imprisoned for preaching, he used his idle time in writing a fantastic story of a soul's salvation - probably the most famous allegory ever written.

(John Bunyan liberated and pardoned, Sept. 13, 1672.)

The Pilgrim’s Progress, in the Similitude of a Dream; The First Part

AS I walk’d through the wilderness of this world, I lighted on a certain place where was a Den, and I laid me down in that place to sleep; and as I slept, I dreamed a Dream. I dreamed, and behold I saw a Man cloathed with Rags, standing in a certain place, with his face from his own house, a Book in his hand, and a great Burden upon his back. I looked, and saw him open the Book, and read therein; and as he read, he wept and trembled; and not being able longer to contain, he brake out with a lamentable cry, saying What shall I do?

Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806–1861), Sonnets from the Portuguese.

Vol. 41, pp. 923-932 of The Harvard Classics

In all literary history there is no happier love story than that of Elizabeth Barrett and Robert Browning. During their secret courtship Miss Barrett sent Browning many beautiful love letters written in verse.

(Browning married Elizabeth Barrett, Sept. 12, 1846.)

I

I THOUGHT once how Theocritus had sung

Of the sweet years, the dear and wished-for years,

Who each one in a gracious hand appears

To bear a gift for mortals, old or young:

And, as I mused it in its antique tongue,

I saw, in gradual vision through my tears,

The sweet, sad years, the melancholy years,

Those of my own life, who by turns had flung

A shadow across me. Straightway I was ’ware,

So weeping, how a mystic Shape did move

Behind me, and drew me backward by the hair;

And a voice said in mastery, while I strove,—

“Guess now who holds thee?”—“Death,” I said. But, there,

The silver answer rang,—“Not Death, but Love.”

Adam Smith. (1723–1790). Wealth of Nations.

Vol. 10, pp. 66-74 of The Harvard Classics

What regulates wages, on what do they depend? Adam Smith, world's authority on economic problems, advances his theories on these matters.

Book I

VIII. Of the Wages of Labour

THE PRODUCE of labour constitutes the natural recompence or wages of labour.

  In that original state of things, which precedes both the appropriation of land and the accumulation of stock, the whole produce of labour belongs to the labourer. He has neither landlord nor master to share with him.

Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809–1894), Selected Poems.

Vol. 42, pp. 1365-1370 of The Harvard Classics

One of America's famous New Englanders, Oliver Wendell Holmes, devoted his life principally to medicine. His name, however, was made famous through his poem, "Old Ironsides," by which he saved America's most famous battleship from de­struction when her fighting days were ended.

The Chambered Nautilus

THIS is the ship of pearl, which, poets feign,

        Sails the unshadowed main,—

        The venturous bark that flings

    On the sweet summer wind its purpled wings

    In gulfs enchanted, where the siren sings,

        And coral reefs lie bare,

Where the cold sea-maids rise to sun their streaming hair.

Ralph Waldo Emerson. (1803–1882), Nature.

Vol. 5, pp. 223-230 of The Harvard Classics

"There are days during the year," says Emerson, "when the world of nature reaches perfection." Can anyone escape this call, especially in the glorious Indian Summer?

(Emerson retires from the ministry, Sept. 9, 1832.)

The rounded world is fair to see,

Nine time folded in mystery:

Though baffled seers cannot impart

The secret of its laboring heart,

Throb thine with Nature’s throbbing breast,

And all is clear from east to west,

Spirit that lurks each form within

Beckons to spirit of its kin;

Self-kindled every atom glows,

And hints the future which it owes.

THERE are days which occur in this climate, at almost any season of the year, wherein the world reaches its perfection, when the air, the heavenly bodies, and the earth, make a harmony, as if nature would indulge her offspring; when, in these bleak upper sides of the planet, nothing is to desire that we have heard of the happiest latitudes, and we bask in the shining hours of Florida and Cuba; when everything that has life gives sign of satisfaction, and the cattle that lie on the ground seem to have great and tranquil thoughts. These halcyons may be looked for with a little more assurance in that pure October weather, which we distinguish by the name of the Indian Summer. The day, immeasurably long, sleeps over the broad hills and warm wide fields. To have lived through all its sunny hours, seems longevity enough. The solitary places do not seem quite lonely. At the gates of the forest, the surprised man of the world is forced to leave his city estimates of great and small, wise and foolish. The knapsack of custom falls off his back with the first step he makes into these precincts. Here is sanctity which shames our religions, and reality which discredits our heroes. Here we find nature to be the circumstance which dwarfs every other circumstance, and judges like a god all men that come to her. We have crept out of our close and crowded houses into the night and morning, and we see what majestic beauties daily wrap us in their bosom. How willingly we would escape the barriers which render them comparatively impotent, escape the sophistication and second thought, and suffer nature to entrance us. The tempered light of the woods is like a perpetual morning, and is stimulating and heroic. The anciently reported spells of these places creep on us. The stems of pines, hemlocks, and oaks, almost gleam like iron on the excited eye. The incommunicable trees begin to persuade us to live with them, and quit our life of solemn trifles. Here no history, or church, or state, is interpolated on the divine sky and the immortal year. How easily we might walk onward into the opening landscape, absorbed by new pictures, and by thoughts fast succeeding each other, until by degrees the recollection of home was crowded out of the mind, all memory obliterated by the tyranny of the present, and we were led in triumph by nature.