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Thou wilt not hold in scorn the child who dares Look up to Thee, the Father,—dares to ask More than Thy wisdom answers. From Thy hand The worlds were cast; yet every leaflet claims From that same hand its little shining sphere Of star-lit dew; thine image, the great sun, Girt with his mantle of tempestuous flame, Glares in mid-heaven; but to his noontide blaze The slender violet lifts its lidless eye, And from his splendor steals its fairest hue, Its sweetest perfume from the scorching fire.

Thou wilt not hold in scorn the child who dares Look up to Thee, the Father,—dares to ask More than Thy wisdom answers. From Thy hand The worlds were cast; yet every leaflet claims From that same hand its little shining sphere Of star-lit dew; thine image, the great sun, Girt with his mantle of tempestuous flame, Glares in mid-heaven; but to his noontide blaze The slender violet lifts its lidless eye, And from his splendor steals its fairest hue, Its sweetest perfume from the scorching fire.

Approximate author period: c. 1809 AD · industrial

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Attribution & collection notes
Author or tradition
Oliver Wendell Holmes
Attribution: attributed
Country attributed
Not established
A country attribution does not establish the earliest origin.
Historical period
Approximate author period: c. 1809 AD · industrial
documented author birth year (1809)
An author lifetime, approximate period or collection date is not necessarily the date when these words were first written or spoken.
Recorded source
The Optimist’s Good Morning (1911) (1911 AD)

Complete signed selection 328; printed byline: Oliver Wendell Holmes; Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, 1911; printed copyright 1907

A collection's publication date can be later than the words it records.