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can it be so or does my sight deceive me in the uncertain light
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it is count hugo of the rhine the deadliest foe of all our race and hateful unto me and mine
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i know you and i see the scar the brand upon your forehead shine and redden like a baleful star
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count hugo once but now the wreck of what i was o hoheneck
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then suddenly from the dark there came a voice that called me by my name and said to me kneel down and pray
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have known me in that earlier time a man of violence and crime whose passions brooked no curb nor check
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yes lift your princely hand and take revenge if 't is revenge you seek then pardon me for jesus' sake
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but now our souls are more subdued the hand of god and not in vain has touched us with the fire of pain
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let us kneel down and side by side pray till our souls are purified and pardon will not be denied
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no danger to-night he will let us alone as i happen to know he has guests of his own
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well then since you are in the mood to give your noisy humors vent sing and howl to your heart's content
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tanquam sint fluminis undae nec quaeras unde sed fundas semper abunde
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what is the name of yonder friar with an eye that glows like a coal of fire and such a black mass of tangled hair
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he's a stranger you had better ask his name and where he is going and whence he came
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you must know then it is in the diocese called the diocese of vannes in the province of brittany
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ha that is a convent that is an abbey
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and then all day up and away through the forest hunting the deer
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ah my friends i'm afraid that here you are a little too pious a little too tame and the more is the shame
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't is the greatest folly not to be jolly that's what i think
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for some of us knew a thing or two in the abbey of st gildas de rhuys
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for instance the great ado with old fulbert's niece the young and lovely heloise
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what is that bell for are you such asses as to keep up the fashion of midnight masses
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a spy in the convent one of the brothers telling scandalous tales of the others
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do you brother paul creep under the window close to the wall and open it suddenly when i call
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then seize the villain by the hair and hold him there and punish him soundly once for all
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as saint dunstan of old we are told once caught the devil by the nose
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help help are you going to slay me
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and such am i my soul within was dark with passion and soiled with sin
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many a wandering suabian bard whose life was dreary and bleak and hard has found through me the way to fame
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it was a dream and would not stay a dream that in a single night faded and vanished out of sight
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no other words than these he said but they were like a funeral wail my life was ended my heart was dead
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and i thanked god in my fever and pain that those shadows on the midnight plain were gone and could not come again
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i left my father's home to come like catherine to her martyrdom for blindly i esteemed it so
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and when i heard the convent door behind me close to ope no more i felt it smite me like a blow
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i felt the agony decrease by slow degrees then wholly cease ending in perfect rest and peace
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the path that runs through the fairest meads on the sunniest side of the valley leads into a region bleak and sterile
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ah what a pity 't is that she should listen unto such songs when in her orisons she might have heard in heaven the angels singing
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and here the heart of the new-wedded wife coming from church with her beloved lord he startles with the rattle of his drum
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for the reason that life and all that speaks of life is lovely and death and all that speaks of death is hateful
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ha ha perdition
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ha ha defeated
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how bleak and bare it is nothing but mosses grow on these rocks
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how beautiful it is it seems a garden of paradise
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the days are short the way before us long we must not linger if we think to reach the inn at belinzona before vespers
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ho barbarossa how thy mottled haunches sweat with this canter over hill and glade
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hark what sweet sounds are those whose accents holy fill the warm noon with music sad and sweet
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but by what instinct or what secret sign meeting me here do you straightway divine that northward of the alps my country lies
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your accent like st peter's would betray you did not your yellow beard and your blue eyes
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moreover we have seen your face before and heard you preach at the cathedral door on easter sunday in the strasburg square
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it is the sea it is the sea in all its vague immensity fading and darkening in the distance
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upon a sea more vast and dark the spirits of the dead embark all voyaging to unknown coasts
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we wave our farewells from the shore and they depart and come no more or come as phantoms and as ghosts
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the sea is silent the sea is discreet deep it lies at thy very feet there is no confessor like unto death
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the fisherman who lies afloat with shadowy sail in yonder boat is singing softly to the night
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but do i comprehend aright the meaning of the words he sung so sweetly in his native tongue
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angel of god thy finer sense perceives celestial and perpetual harmonies
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all this morning until noon we had baffling winds and sudden flaws struck the sea with their cat's-paws
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do you see that livornese felucca that vessel to the windward yonder running with her gunwale under
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one hundred and twenty-five propositions which i will maintain with the sword of the tongue against all disputants old and young
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let us see if doctors or dialecticians will dare to dispute my definitions or attack any one of my learned theses
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and therein he contradicteth himself for he opens the whole discussion by stating that god can only exist in creating
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so much at least i am bound to acknowledge the air seems healthy the buildings stately and on the whole i like it greatly
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the first three years of the college course are given to logic alone as the source of all that is noble and wise and true
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that seems rather strange i must confess in a medical school yet nevertheless you doubtless have reasons for that
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the challenge of some scholastic wight who wishes to hold a public debate on sundry questions wrong or right
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so long as the boastful human mind consents in such mills as this to grind i sit very firmly upon my throne
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against all opposition against all prayers entreaties protestations she will not be persuaded
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not one step further for i only meant to put thus far thy courage to the proof
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it is enough i too have strength to die for thou hast taught me
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the rest is yours why wait you i am ready
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then start not at the creaking of the door through which i pass i see what lies beyond it
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and you o prince bear back my benison unto my father's house and all within it
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this morning in the church i prayed for them after confession after absolution when my whole soul was white i prayed for them
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and in your life let my remembrance linger as something not to trouble and disturb it but to complete it adding life to life
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perhaps it is a mercy of god lest the dead there under the sod in the land of strangers should be lonely
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god help us i hope we have done right we thought we were acting for the best
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alas i am simple and lowly bred i am poor distracted and forlorn
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they call her the lady alicia now for the prince in salerno made a vow that elsie only would he wed
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as fair and lovely did she seem as in a story or a dream some beautiful and foreign lady
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we shall behold our child once more she is not dead she is not dead
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god listening must have overheard the prayers that without sound or word our hearts in secrecy have said
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the forest behind and the garden before and midway an old man of threescore with a wife and children that caress him
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they are the bells of geisenheim that with their melancholy chime ring out the curfew of the sun
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their voices only speak to me of peace and deep tranquillity and endless confidence in thee
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o power of meekness whose very gentleness and weakness are like the yielding but irresistible air
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oh yes a tower of strength indeed a present help in all our need a sword and buckler is our god
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yea music is the prophet's art among the gifts that god hath sent one of the most magnificent
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enough i have had of hunting hares enough of these hours of idle mirth enough of nets and traps and gins
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behold a hand unbars the door ye shall be captives held no more
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res et verba philippus res sine verbis lutherus erasmus verba sine re
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why touch upon such themes perhaps some friend may ask incredulous and to what good end
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st paul commands all women to keep silence within the churches
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thou canst not answer it is for the priest and against this i bear my testimony
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the hand that cut the red cross from the colors of the king can cut the red heart from this heresy
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to-night they sleep in prison if they die they cannot say that we have caused their death
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we do but guard the passage with the sword pointed towards them if they dash upon it their blood will be on their own heads not ours
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o day of rest how beautiful how fair how welcome to the weary and the old
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ah why will man by his austerities shut out the blessed sunshine and the light and make of thee a dungeon of despair
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all silent as a graveyard no one stirring no footfall in the street no sound of voices
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the women screamed and fainted and the boys made such an uproar in the gallery i could not keep them quiet
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