Like a blind spinner in the sun, I tread my days; I know that all the threads will run Appointed ways; I know each day will bring its task, And, bein… - Helen Hunt Jackson

On the king’s gate the moss grew gray;
The king came not. They called him dead;
And made his eldest son one day
Slave in his father’s stead.

When on the ground red apples lie
In piles like jewels shining,
And redder still on old stone walls
Are leaves of woodbines twining.

There is nothing so skilful in its own defence as imperious pride. […] Wounded vanity knows when it is mortally hurt; and limps off the field, piteous, all disguises thrown away. But pride carries its banner to the last; and fast as it is driven from one field unfurls it in another, never admitting that there is a shade less honor in the second field than in the first, or in the third than in the second; and so on till death.