THE POETICAL WORKS OF MARK AKENSIDE.
IN TWO VOLUMES.
WITH THE LIFE OF THE AUTHOR.
Genius of ancient Greece! whose faithful steps
Have led us to these awful solitudes
Of Nature and of Science; Nurse rever'd
Of gen'rous counsels and heroick deeds!
O let some portion of thy matchless praise
Dwell in my breast, and teach me to adorn
This unattempted theme!—Let me
With blameless hand from thy unenvious fields
Transplant some living blossoms to adorn
My native clime—while to my compatriot youth
I point the great example of thy sons.
And tune to Attick themes the British lyre.
PLEAS. OF IMAG. ENLARCED
Come, AKENSIDE! come with thine Attick urn,
Fill'd from Ilissus by the Naiad's hand:
Thy harp was tun'd to Freedom—Strains like thine,
When Asia's lord bor'd the huge mountain's side
And bridg'd the sea, to battle rous'd the tribes
Of ancient Creece.—
ANONYM.
VOL. II.
EDINBURG: AT THE
Apollo Press,
BY THE MARTINS.
Anno
1781.
THE POETICAL WORKS OF MARK AKENSIDE.
VOL. II.
CONTAINING HIS ODES, MISCELLANIES, HYMNS, INSCRIPTIONS,
&c. &c. &c.
With what enchantment Nature's goodly scene
Attracts the sense of mortals; how the mind
For its own eye doth objects nobler still
Prepare; how men by various lessons learn
To judge of Beauty's praise; what raptures fill
The breast with Fancy's native arts endow'd,
And what true culture guides it to renown,
My Verse unfolds. Ye Gods or godlike Pow'rs!
Ye Guardians of the sacred task! attend
Propitious: hand in hand around your Bard
Move in majestick measures.—Be great in him,
And let your favour make him wise to speak
Of all your wondrous empire, with a voice
So temper'd to his theme that those who hear
May yield perpetual homage to yourselves.—
O! attend, whoe'er thou art whom th
se delights can touch,
Whom Nature's aspect, Nature's simple garb,
Can thus command: O! listen to my Song,
And I will guide thee to her blissful walks,
And teach thy solitude her voice to hea,
And point her gracious features to thy view.
PLEAS. OF IMAG. ENLARGED.
EDINBURG: AT THE
Apollo Press,
BY THE MARTINS.
Anno
1781.
ODES ON SEVERAL SUBJECTS. IN TWO BOOKS.
BOOK I. ODE I. PREFACE.
I.
ON yonder verdant hillock laid
Where oaks and elms, a friendly shade!
O'erlook the falling stream,
O master of the Latin lyre!
A while with thee will I retire
From summer's noontide beam.
II.
And lo! within my lonely bow'r
Th' industrious bee from many a flow'r
Collects her balmy dews;
"For me," she sings, "the gems are born,
"For me their silken robe adorn,
"Their fragrant breath diffuse."
III.
Sweet Murmurer! may no rude storm
This hospitable scene deform.
Nor check thy gladsome toils;
Still may the buds unsully'd spring,
Still show'rs and sunshine court thy wing
To these ambrosial spoils.
IV.
Nor shall my Muse hereafter fail
Her sellow-lab'rer thee to hail,
And lucky be the strains!
For long ago did Nature frame
Your seasons and your arts the same,
Your pleasures and your pains.
V.
Like thee in lowly sylvan scenes,
On river-banks and flow'ry greens,
My Muse delighted plays,
Nor thro' the desert of the air
Tho' swans or eagles triumph there
With fond ambition strays;
VI.
Nor where the boding raven chants,
Nor near the owl's unhallow'd haunts,
Will she her cares employ,
But flies from ruins and from tombs,
From Superstition's horrid glooms,
To daylight and to joy.
VII.
Nor will she tempt the barren waste,
Nor deigns the lurking strength to taste
Of any noxious thing,
But leaves with scorn to Envy's use
Th' insipid nightshade's baneful juice,
The nettle's sordid sting.
VIII.
From all which Nature fairest knows,
The vernal blooms the summer rose,
She draws her blameless wealth,
And when the gen'rous task is done
She consecrates a double boon
To pleasure and to health.
ODE II. ON THE WINTER SOLSTICE, MDCCXL.
I.
THE radiant ruler of the year
At length his wintry goal attains,
Soon to reverse the long career,
And northward bend his steady reins.
Now piercing half Potosi's height
Prone rush the siery floods of light,
Ripening the mountain's silver stores,
While in some cavern's horrid shade
The panting Indian hides his head,
And oft' th' approach of eve implores.
II.
But lo! on this deserted coast
How pale the sun, how thick the air!
Must'ring his storms, a sordid host!
Lo! Winter desolates the year.
The fields resign their latest bloom,
No more the breezes waft perfume,
No more the streams in musick roll,
But snows fall dark or rains resound,
And while great Nature mourns around
Her griefs infect the human soul.
III.
Hence the loud city's busy throngs
Urge the warm bowl and splendid sire;
Harmonious dances, festive songs,
Against the spiteful heav'n conspire.
Mean-time perhaps with tender fears
Some village-dame the curfew hears
While round the hearth her children play:
At morn their father went abroad,
The moon is sunk and deep the road;
She sighs, and wonders at his stay.
IV.
But thou my Lyre! awake, arise,
And hail the sun's returning force;
Ev'n now he climbs the northern skies,
And health and hope attend his course.
Then louder howl th' aerial waste,
Be earth with keener cold embrac'd,
Yet gentle hours advance their wing,
And Fancy, mocking Winter's might,
With flow'rs, and dews, and streaming light,
Already decks the newborn spring.
V.
O Fountain of the golden day!
Could mortal vows promote thy speed,
How soon before thy vernal ray
Should each unkindly damp recede!
How soon each hov'ring tempest fly
Whose stores for mischief arm the sky
Prompt on our heads to burst amain,
To rend the forest from the steep,
Or thund'ring o'er the Baltick deep
To whelm the merchant's hopes of gain!
VI.
But let not man's unequal views
Presume o'er Nature and her laws;
'Tis his with grateful joy to use
Th' indulgence of the Sovran Cause;
Secure that health and beauty springs
Thro' this majestick frame of things
Beyond what he can reach to know,
And that Heav'n's allsubduing will
With good the progeny of ill
Attemp'reth ev'ry state below.
VII.
How pleasing wears the wintry night
Spent with the old illustrious dead!
While by the taper's trembling light
I seem those awful scenes to tread
Where chiefs or legislators lie
Whose triumphs move before my eye
In arms and antick pomp array'd,
While now I taste th' Ionian song,
Now bend to Plato's godlike tongue
Resounding thro' the olive shade.
VIII.
But should some cheerful equal friend
Bid leave the studious page a while,
Let Mirth on Wisdom then attend,
And social Ease on learned Toil;
Then while at Love's uncareful shrine
Each dictates to the god of Wine
Her name whom all his hopes obey,
What flatt'ring dreams each bosom warm,
While absence height'ning ev'ry charm
Invokes the slow-returning May!
IX.
May, thou delight of heav'n and earth!
When will thy genial star arise?
Th' auspicious morn which gives thee birth
Shall bring Eudora to my eyes.
Within her sylvan haunt behold,
As in the happy garden old,
She moves like that primeval fair:
Thither ye silver-sounding Lyres!
Ye tender Smiles, ye chaste Desires!
Fond Hope and mutual Faith! repair.
X.
And if believing Love can read
His better omens in her eye,
Then shall my fears, O charming Maid!
And ev'ry pain of absence die;
Then shall my jocund harp, attun'd
To thy true ear, with sweeter sound
Pursue the free Horatian song;
Old Tyne shall listen to my tale,
And Echo down the bord'ring vale
The liquid melody prolong.
ODE II. FOR THE WINTER SOLSTICE, December 11, 1740
This Ode was afterwards entirely altered, as may be seen p. 7.—The reader will not be displeased to see it as it was originally written.
.
I.
Now to the utmost southern goal
The sun has trac'd his annual way,
And backward now prepares to roll,
And bless the North with earlier day.
Prone on Potosi's lofty brow
Floods of sublimer splendour flow,
Ripening the latent seeds of gold,
Whilst panting in the lonely shade
Th' afflicted Indian hides his head,
Nor dares the blaze of noon behold.
II.
But lo' on this deserted coast
How faint the light, how chill the air!
Lo! arm'd with whirlwind, hail, and frost,
Fierce Winter desolates the year.
The fields resign their cheerful bloom,
No more the breezes breathe perfume,
No more the warbling waters roll;
Deserts of snow fatigue the eye,
Successive tempests bloat the sky,
And gloomy damps oppress the soul.
III.
But let my drooping genius rise
And hail the sun's remotest ray,
Now now he climbs the northern skies,
To-morrow nearer than to-day.
Then louder howl the stormy waste
By sand and ocean worse defac'd,
Yet brighter hours are on the wing,
And Fancy thro' the wintry gloom,
Radiant with dews and flow'rs in bloom,
Already hails th' emerging spring.
IV.
O Fountain of the golden day!
Could mortal vows but urge thy speed,
How soon before the vernal ray
Should each unkindly damp recede!
How soon each tempest hov'ring fly
That now fermenting loads the sky,
Prompt on our heads to burst amain,
To rend the forest from the steep,
And thund'ring o'er the Baltick deep
To whelm the merchant's hopes of gain!
V.
But let not man's imperfect views
Presume to tax wise Nature's laws;
'Tis his with silent joy to use
Th' indulgence of the Sov'reign Cause;
Secure that from the whole of things
Beauty and good consummate springs
Beyond what he can reach to know,
And that the providence of Heav'n
Has some peculiar blessing giv'n
To each allotted state below.
VI.
Ev'n now how sweet the wintry night
Spent with the old illustrious dead!
While by the taper's trembling light
I seem the awful course to tread
Where chiefs and legislators lie
Whose triumphs move before my eye
With ev'ry laurel fresh display'd,
While charm'd I rove in classick song,
Or bend to Freedom's fearless tongue,
Or walk the academick shade.
ODE III. TO A FRIEND UNSUCCESSFUL IN LOVE.
I.
INDEED my Phaedria! if to find
That wealth can female wishes gain
Had e'er disturb'd your thoughtful mind
Or cost one serious moment's pain,
I should have said that all the rules
You learn'd of moralists and schools
Were very useless, very vain.
II.
Yet I perhaps mistake the case.—
Say, tho' with this heroick air,
Like one that holds a nobler chase,
Y
u try the tender loss to bear,
Does not your heart renounce your tongue?
Seems not my censure strangely wrong
To count it such a slight affair?
III.
When Hesper gilds the shaded sky
Oft' as you seek the wellknown grove,
Methinks I see you cast your eye
Back to the morning scenes of love:
Each pleasing word you heard her say,
Her gentle look her graceful way,
Again your struggling fan
y move.
IV.
Then tell me, is your soul entire?
Does Wisdom calmly hold her throne?
Then can you question each desire,
Bid this remain and that be gone?
No tear half starting from your eye?
No kindling blush you know not why?
No stealing sigh nor stifled groan?
V.
Away with this unmanly mood!
See where the hoary churl appears
Whose hand hath seiz'd the fav'rite good
Which you reserv'd for happier years,
While side by side the blushing maid
Shrinks from his visage half afraid
Spite of the sickly joy she wears.
VI.
Ye guardian Pow'rs of Love and Fame!
This chaste harmonious pair behold,
And thus reward the gen'rous flame
Of all who barter vows for gold.
O bloom of youth! O tender charms!
Well bury'd in a dotard's arms!
O equal price of beauty sold!
VII.
Cease then to gaze with looks of love;
Bid her adieu the venal fair;
Unworthy she your bless to prove,
Then wherefore should she prove your care?
No: lay your myrtle garland down,
And let a while the willow's crown
With luckier omens bind your hair.
VIII.
O just ecaped the faithless main,
Tho' driv'n unwilling on the land,
To guide your favour'd steps again
Behold your better genius stand!
Where Truth revolves her page divine,
Where Virtue leads to Honour's shrine,
Behold he lifts his awful hand!
IX.
Fix but on these your ruling aim
And Time, the sire of manly care,
Will Fancy's dazzling colours tame,
A sob'rer dress will Beauty wear;
Then shall Esteem by Knowledge led
Inthrone within your heart and head
Some happier love, some truer fair.
ODE IV. AFFECTED INDIFFERENCE. TO THE SAME.
I.
YES, you contemn the perjur'd maid
Who all your fav'rite hopes betray'd,
Nor tho' her heart should home return,
Her tuneful tongue its falsehood mourn,
Her winning eyes your faith implore,
Would you her hand receive again,
Or once dissemble your disdain,
Or listen to the Siren's theme,
Or stoop to love, since now esteem,
And confidence, and friendship, is no more.
II.
Yet tell me Phaedria! tell me why,
When summoning your pride, you try
To meet her looks with cool neglect,
Or cross her walk with slight respect,
(For so is falsehood best repaid)
Whence do your cheeks indignant glow?
Why is your struggling tongue so slow?
What means that darkness on your brow?
As if with all her broken vow
You meant the fair apostate to upbraid?
ODE V. AGAINST SUSPICION.
I.
On fly! it is dire Suspicion's mien,
And meditating plagues unseen
The sorc'ress hither bends;
Behold her torch in gall imbru'd,
Behold—her garment drops with blood
Of lovers and of friends.
II.
Fly far! already in your eyes
I see a pale suffusion rise;
And soon thro' ev'ry vein,
Soon will her secret venom spread,
And all your heart and all your head
Imbibe the potent stain.
III.
Then many a demon will she raise
To vex your sleep, to haunt your ways,
While gleams of lost delight
Raise the dark tempest of the brain,
As lightning shines across the main
Thro' whirlwinds and thro' night.
IV.
No more can Faith or Candour move,
But each ingenuous deed of love
Which Reason would applaud
Now smiling o'er her dark distress
Fancy malignant strives to dress
Like Injury and Fraud.
V.
Farewell to Virtue's peaceful times;
Soon will you stoop to act the crimes
Which thus you stoop to fear.
Guilt follows guilt; and where the train
Begins with wrongs of such a stain
What horrours form the rear!
VI.
'Tis thus to work her baleful pow'r
Suspicion waits the sullen hour
Of fretfulness and strife,
When care th' infirmer bosom wrings,
Or Eurus waves his murky wings
To damp the seats of life.
VII.
But come, forsake the scene unblest
Which first beheld your faithful breast
To groundless fears a prey;
Come where with my prevailing lyre
The skies, the streams, the groves, conspire
To charm your doubts away.
VIII.
Thron'd in the Sun's descending car
What pow'r unseen diffuseth far
This tenderness of mind?
What genius smiles on yonder flood?
What god in whispers from the wood
Bids ev'ry thought be kind?
IX.
O thou! whate'er thy awful name,
Whose wisdom our untoward frame
With social love restrains;
Thou! who by fair affection's ties
Giv'st us to double all our joys
And half disarm our pains;
X.
Let universal candour still,
Clear as yon' heav'n-reflecting rill,
Preserve my open mind,
Nor this nor that man's crooked ways
One sordid doubt within me raise
To injure humankind.
ODE VI. HYMN TO CHEERFULNESS.
How thick the shades of ev'ning close!
How pale the sky with weight of snows!
Haste, light the tapers, urge the fire,
And bid the joyless day retire.
—Alas! in vain I try within
To brighten the dejected scene;
While rous'd by grief these fiery pains
Tear the frail texture of my veins,
While Winter's voice that storms around,
And yon' deep death-bell's groaning sound,
Renew my mind's oppressive gloom
Till starting Horrour shakes the room.
Is there in Nature no kind pow'r
To sooth Affliction's lonely hour?
To blunt the edge of dire disease,
And teach these wintry shades to please?
Come, Cheerfulness! triumphant Fair!
Shine thro' the hov'ring cloud of care:
O sweet of language, mild of mien!
O Virtue's friend, and Pleasure's queen!
Assuage the flames that burn my breast,
Compose my jarring thoughts to rest,
And while thy gracious gifts I feel
My song shall all thy praise reveal.
As once (it was in Astrea's reign)
The vernal pow'rs renew'd their train,
It happen'd that immortal Love
Was ranging thro' the spheres above,
And downward hither cast his eye
The year's returning pomp to spy.
He saw the radiant god of Day
Waft in his car the rosy May;
The fragrant Airs and genial Hours
Were shedding round him dews and flow'rs;
Before his wheels Aurora past,
And Hesper's golden lamp was last:
But fairest of the blooming throng
When Health majestick mov'd along,
Delighted to survey below
The joys which from her presence flow,
While earth enliven'd hears her voice,
And swains, and flocks, and fields, rejoice,
Then mighty Love her charms confest,
And soon his vows inclin'd her breast,
And known from that auspicious morn
The pleasing Cheerfulness was born.
Thou, Cheerfulness! by Heav'n design'd
To sway the movements of the mind,
Whatever fretful passion springs,
Whatever wayward fortune brings
To disarrange the pow'r within
And strain the musical machine,
Thou, Coddess! thy attemp'ring hand
Doth each discordant string command,
Refines the soft and swells the strong,
And joining Nature's gen'ral song
Thro' many a varying tone unfolds
The harmony of human souls.
Fair Guardian of domestick life!
Kind Banisher of homebred strife!
Nor sullen lip nor taunting eye
Deforms the scene where thou art by;
No sick'ning husband damns the hour
Which bound his joys to female pow'r;
No pining mother weeps the cares
Which parents waste on thankless heirs;
Th' officious daughters pleas'd attend,
The brother adds the name of friend:
By thee with flow'rs their board is crown'd,
With songs from thee their walks resound,
And morn with welcome lustre shines,
And ev'ning unperceiv'd declines.
Is there a youth whose anxious heart
Labours with love's unpity'd smart?
Tho' now he stray by rills and bow'rs,
And weeping waste the lonely hours,
Or if the nymph her audience deign
Debase the story of his pain
With slavish looks, discolour'd eyes,
And accents falt'ring into sighs,
Yet thou, auspicious Pow'r! with ease
Canst yield him happier arts to please,
Inform his mien with manlier charms,
Instruct his tongue with nobler arms,
With more commanding passion move,
And teach the dignity of love.
Friend to the Muse and all her train!
For thee I court the Muse again;
The Muse for thee may well exert
Her pomp, her charms, her fondest art,
Who owes to thee that pleasing sway
Which earth and peopled heav'n obey.
Let Melancholy's plaintive tongue
Repeat what later bards have sung,
But thine was Homer's ancient might,
And thine victorious Pindar's flight;
Thy hand each Lesbian wreath attir'd,
Thy lips Sicilian reeds inspir'd;
Thy spirit lent the glad perfume
Whence yet the stow'rs of Teos bloom,
Whence yet from Tibur's Sabine vale
Delicious blows th' enliv'ning gale,
While Horace calls thy sportive choir,
Heroes and nymphs, around his lyre.
But see where yonder pensive sage
(A prey perhaps to Fortune's rage,
Perhaps by tender griefs opprest,
Or glooms congenial to his breast)
Retires in desert scenes to dwell,
And bids the joyless world farewell:
Alone he treads th' autumnal shade,
Alone beneath the mountain laid
He sees the nightly damps ascend
And gath'ring storms aloft impend,
He hears the neighb'ring surges roll,
And raging thunders shake the pole,
Then struck by ev'ry object round,
And stunn'd by ev'ry horrid sound,
He asks a clue for Nature's ways,
But evil haunts him thro' the maze;
He sees ten thousand demons rise
To wield the empire of the skies,
And Chance and Fate assume the rod,
And Malice blot the throne of God.
—O thou! whose pleasing pow'r I sing,
Thy lenient influence hither bring,
Compose the storm, dispel the gloom,
Till Nature wear her wonted bloom
Till fields and shades their sweets exhale,
And musick swell each op'ning gale;
Then o'er his breast thy sostness pour,
And let him learn the timely hour
To trace the world's benignant laws,
And judge of that Presiding Cause
Who founds on discord Beauty's reign,
Converts to pleasure ev'ry pain,
Subdues each hostile form to rest,
And bids the universe be blest.
O thou! whose pleasing pow'r I sing,
If right I touch the votive string,
If equal praise I yield thy name,
Still govern thou thy poet's flame,
Still with the Muse my bosom share,
And sooth to peace intruding care;
But most exert thy pleasing pow'r
On friendship's consecrated hour,
And while my Sophron points the road
To godlike Wisdom's calm abode,
Or warm in freedom's ancient cause
Traceth the source of Albion's laws,
Add thou o'er all the gen'rous toil
The light of thy unclouded smile.
But if by Fortune's stubborn sway
From him and friendship torn away,
I court the Muse's healing spell
For griefs that still with absence dwell,
Do thou conduct my fancy's dreams
To such indulgent placid themes
As just the struggling breast may cheer,
And just suspend the starting tear,
Yet leave that sacred sense of wo
Which none but friends and lovers know.
ODE VII. ON THE USE OF POETRY.
I.
NOT for themselves did humankind
Contrive the parts by Heav'n assign'd
On life's wide scene to play:
Not Scipio's force nor Caesar's skill
Can conquer glory's arduous hill
If Fortune close the way.
II.
Yet still the self-depending soul,
Tho' last and least in Fortune's roll,
His proper sphere commands,
And knows what Nature's seal bestow'd,
And sees before the throne of God
The rank in which he stands.
III.
Who train'd by laws the future age,
Who rescu'd nations from the rage
Of partial factious pow'r,
My heart with distant homage views,
Content if thou, celestial Muse!
Didst rule my natal hour.
IV.
Not far beneath the hero's feet
Nor from the legislator's seat
Stands far remote the bard:
Tho' not with publick terrours crown'd
Yet wider shall his rule be found,
More lasting his award.
V.
Lycurgus fashion'd Sparta's fame,
And Pompey to the Roman name
Gave universal sway.
Where are they?—Homer's rev'rend page
Holds empire to the thirtieth age,
And tongues and climes obey.
VI.
And thus when William's acts divine
No longer shall from Bourbon's line
Draw one vindictive vow,
When Sidney shall with Cato rest,
And Russel move the patriot's breast
No more than Brutus now;
VII.
Yet then shall Shakespeare's pow'rful art
O'er ev'ry passion ev'ry heart
Confirm his awful throne;
Tyrants shall bow before his laws,
And freedom's, glory's, virtue's, cause
Their dread assertor own.
ODE VIII. ON LEAVING HOLLAND.
I. 1.
FAREWELL to Leyden's lonely bound,
The Belgian Muse's sober seat,
Where dealing frugal gifts around
To all the fav'rites at her feet
She trains the body's bulky frame
For passive persevering toils;
And lest from any prouder aim
The daring mind should scorn her homely spoils,
She breathes maternal fogs to damp its restless flame.
I. 2.
Farewell the grave pacifick air
Where never mountain zephir blew,
The marshy levels lank and bare
Which Pan which Ceres never knew,
The Naiads with obscene attire
Urging in vain their urns to flow,
While round them chant the croking choir,
And haply sooth some lover's prudent wo,
Or prompt some restive bard and modulate his lyre,
I. 3.
Farewell ye Nymphs! whom sober care of gain
Snatch'd in your cradles from the god of Love;
She render'd all his boasted arrows vain,
And all his gifts did he in spite remove:
Ye too, the slow-ey'd Fathers of the land!
With whom dominion steals from hand to hand,
Unown'd, undignify'd by publick choice,
I go where Liberty to all is known,
And tells a monarch on his throne
He reigns not but by her preserving voice.
II. 1.
O my lov'd England! when with thee
Shall I sit down to part no more?
Far from this pale discolour'd sea
That sleeps upon the reedy shore,
When shall I plough thy azure tide?
When on thy hills the flocks admire,
Like mountain snows, till down their side
I trace the village and the sacred spire,
While bow'rs and copses green the golden slope divide?
II. 2.
Ye Nymphs who guard the pathless grove,
Ye Blueey'd Sisters of the streams!
With whom I wont at morn to rove,
With whom at noon I talk'd in dreams,
O take me to your haunts again,
The rocky spring the greenwood glade,
To guide my lonely footsteps deign,
To prompt my slumbers in the murm'ring shade,
And sooth my vacant ear with many an airy strain!
II. 3.
And thou, my faithful Harp! no longer mourn
Thy drooping master's inauspicious hand;
Now brighter skies and fresher gales return,
Now fairer maids thy melody demand.
Daughters of Albion! listen to my lyre:
O Phoebus! guardian of th'Aonian choir,
Why sounds not mine harmonious as thy own,
When all the virgin deities above
With Venus and with Juno move
In concert round th' Olympian Father's throne?
III. 1.
Thee too, Protectress of my lays,
Elate with whose majestick call
Above degen'rate Latium's praise,
Above the slavish boast of Gaul,
I dare from impious thrones reclaim
And wanton Sloth's ignoble charms
The honours of a poet's name,
To Somers' counsels or to Hamden's arms
Thee, Freedom! I rejoin, and bless thy genuine flame.
III. 2.
Great Citizen of Albion! thee
Heroick Valour still attends,
And useful Science, pleas'd to see
How Art her studious toil extends,
While Truth diffusing from on high
A lustre unconfin'd as day
Fills and commands the publick eye,
Till pierc'd and sinking by her pow'rful ray
Tame Faith and monkish Awe like nightly demons fly.
III. 3.
Hence the whole land the patriot's ardour shares,
Hence dread Religion dwells with social Joy,
And holy passions and unsully'd cares
In youth, in age, domestick life employ.
O fair Britannia! hail!—With partial love
The tribes of men their native seats approve,
Unjust and hostile to each foreign fame;
But when for gen'rous minds and manly laws
A nation holds her prime applause
There publick zeal shall all reproof disclaim.
ODE IX. TO CURIO
See The Epistle to Curio in this volume.
, MDCCXLIV.
I.
THRICE hath the spring beheld thy faded fame
Since I exulting grasp'd the tuneful shell,
Eager thro' endless years to sound thy name,
Proud that my memory with thine should dwell,
How hast thou stain'd the splendour of my choice!
Those godlike forms which hover'd round thy voice,
Laws, Freedom, Glory, whither are they flown?
What can I now of thee to time report
Save thy fond Country made thy impious sport,
Her fortune and her hope the victims of thy own?
II.
There are with eyes unmov'd and reckless heart
Who saw thee from thy summit fall thus low,
Who deem'd thy arm extended but to dart
The publick vengeance on thy private foe:
But spite of ev'ry gloss of envious minds,
The owl-ey'd race whom virtue's lustre blinds,
Who sagely prove that each man hath his price,
I still believ'd thy aim from blemish free,
I yet, ev'n yet, believe it spite of thee
And all thy painted pleas to greatness and to vice.
III.
"Thou didst not dream of Liberty decay'd,
"Nor wish to make her guardian laws more strong,
"But the rash many first by thee misled
"Bore thee at length unwillingly along."
Rise from your sad abodes ye curst of old
For faith deserted or for cities sold!
Own here one untry'd unexampled deed,
One mystery of shame from Curio learn,
To beg the infamy he did not earn,
And 'scape in Guilt's disguise from Virtue's offer'd meed.
IV.
For saw we not that dang'rous pow'r avow'd
Whom Freedom oft' hath found her mortal bane,
Whom Publick Wisdom ever strove t' exclude,
And but with blushes suff'reth in her train?
Corruption vaunted her bewitching spoils,
O'er court o'er senate spread in pomp her toils,
And call'd herself the states directing soul,
Till Curio like a good magician try'd,
With Eloquence and Reason at his side,
By strength of holier spells th' enchantress to control.
V.
Soon with thy country's hope thy fame extends;
The rescu'd merchant oft' thy words resounds:
Thee and thy cause the rural hearth defends;
His bowl to thee the grateful sailor crowns:
The learn'd recluse with awful zeal who read
Of Grecian heroes Roman patriots dead,
Now with like awe doth living merit scan,
While he whom virtue in his blest retreat
Bad social ease and publick passions meet
Ascends the civil scene, and knows to be a man.
VI.
At length in view the glorious end appear'd,
We saw thy spirit thro' the senate reign,
And Freedom's friends thy instant omen heard
Of laws for which their fathers bled in vain.
Wak'd in the strise the publick Genius rose
More keen, more ardent, from his long repose;
Deep thro' her bounds the City felt his call;
Each crowded haunt was stirr'd beneath his pow'r,
And murm'ring challeng'd the deciding hour
Of that too vast event the hope and dread of all.
VII.
O ye good Pow'rs who look on humankind!
Instruct the mighty moments as they rowl,
And watch the fleeting shapes in Curio's mind,
And steer his passions steady to the goal.
O Alfred! father of the English name,
O valiant Edward! first in civil fame,
O William! height of publick virtue pure,
Bend from your radiant seats a joyful eye,
Behold the sum of all your labours nigh,
Your plans of law complete, your ends of rule secure.
VIII.
'Twas then—O shame! O soul from faith estrang'd!
O Albion! oft' to flatt'ring vows a prey,
'Twas then—thy thought what sudden frenzy chang'd?
What rushing palsy took thy strength away?
Is this the man in freedom's cause approv'd,
The man so great, so honour'd, so belov'd,
Whom the dead envy'd and the living blest,
This patient slave by tinsel bonds allur'd,
This wretched suitor for a boon abjur'd,
Whom those that fear'd him scorn, that trusted him detest?
IX.
O lost alike to action and repose!
With all that habit of familiar fame
Sold to the mock'ry of relentless foes,
And doom'd t' exhaust the dregs of life in shame,
To act with burning brow and throbbing heart
A poor deserter's dull exploded part,
To slight the favour thou canst hope no more,
Renounce the giddy crowd, the vulgar wind,
Charge thy own lightness on thy Country's mind,
And from her voice appeal to each tame foreign shore.
X.
But England's sons to purchase thence applause
Shall ne'er the loyalty of slaves pretend,
By courtly passions try the publick cause,
Nor to the forms of rule betray the end.
O Race erect! by manliest passions mov'd,
The labours which to Virtue stand approv'd
Prompt with a lover's fondness to survey,
Yet where Injustice works her wilful claim
Fierce as the flight of Jove's destroying flame,
Impatient to confront and dreadful to repay.
XI.
These thy heart owns no longer. In their room
See the grave queen of pageants, Honour, dwell
Couch'd in thy bosom's deep tempestuous gloom
Like some grim idol in a sorc'rer's cell:
Before her rites thy sick'ning reason flew,
Divine Persuasion from thy tongue withdrew,
While Laughter mock'd or Pity stole a sigh.
Can Wit her tender movements rightly frame
Where the prime function of the foul is lame?
Can Fancy's feeble springs the force of truth supply?
XII.
But come; it is time; strong destiny impends
To shut thee from the joys thou hast betray'd:
With princes fill'd the solemn fane ascends
By Infamy the mindful demon sway'd;
There vengeful vows for guardian laws essac'd,
From nations fetter'd and from towns laid waste,
For ever thro' the spacious courts resound;
There long Posterity's united groan,
And the sad charge of horrours not their own,
Assail the giant chiefs and press them to the ground.
XIII.
In sight old Time, imperious judge! awaits:
Above revenge, or fear, or pity, just
He urgeth onward to those guilty gates
The Great, the Sage, the Happy, and August,
And still he asks them of the hidden plan
Whence ev'ry treaty ev'ry war began,
Evolves their secrets and their guilt proclaims,
And still his hands despoil them on the road
Of each vain wreath by lying bards bestow'd,
And crush their trophies huge and raze their sculptur'd names.
XIV.
Ye mighty Shades! arise, give place, attend;
Here his eternal mansion Curio seeks;
—Low doth proud Wentworth to the stranger bend,
And his dire welcome hardy Clifford speaks:
"He comes whom Fate with surer arts prepar'd
"T' accomplish all which we but vainly dar'd,
"Whom o'er the stubborn herd she taught to reign,
"Who sooth'd with gaudy dreams their raging pow'r
"Even to its last irrevocable hour,
"Then baffled their rude strength and broke them to the chain."
XV.
But ye whom yet wise Liberty inspires,
Whom for her champions o'er the world she claims,
(That household godhead whom of old your sires
Sought in the woods of Elbe and bore to Thames)
Drive ye this hostile omen far away;
Their own fell efforts on her foes repay;
Your wealth, your arts, your fame, be her's alone:
Still gird your swords to combat on her side,
Still frame your laws her gen'rous test t' abide,
And win to her defence the altar and the throne.
XVI.
Protect her from yourselves ere yet the flood
Of golden luxury which commerce pours
Hath spread that selfish fierceness thro' your blood
Which not her lightest discipline endures:
Snatch from fantastick demagogues her cause;
Dream not of Numa's manners Plato's laws:
A wiser founder and a nobler plan
O Sons of Alfred! were for you assign'd:
Bring to that birthright but an equal mind
And no sublimer lot will Fate reserve for man.
ODE X. TO THE MUSE.
I.
QUEEN of my songs, harmonious Maid!
Ah! why hast thou withdrawn thy aid?
Ah! why forsaken thus my breast,
With inauspicious damps opprest?
Where is the dread prophetick heat
With which my bosom wont to beat?
Where all the bright mysterious dreams
Of haunted groves and tuneful streams
That woo'd my genius to divinest themes?
II.
Say, Goddess! can the festal board,
Or young Olympia's form ador'd,
Say, can the pomp of promis'd fame
Relume thy faint thy dying flame?
Or have melodious airs the pow'r
To give one free poetick hour?
Or from amid th' Elysian train
The soul of Milton shall I gain
To win thee back with some celestial strain?
III.
O pow'rful strain! O sacred soul!
His numbers ev'ry sense control:
And now again my bosom burns;
The Muse, the Muse herself, returns!
Such on the banks of Tyne confest
I hail'd the fair immortal guest
When first she seal'd me for her own,
Made all her blissful treasures known,
And bad me swear to follow her alone.
ODE XI. ON LOVE. TO A FRIEND.
I.
NO, foolish Youth!—To virtuous fame
If now thy early hopes be vow'd,
If true ambition's nobler flame
Command thy footsteps from the crowd,
Lean not to Love's enchanting snare;
His songs, his words, his looks, beware,
Nor join his votaries the young and fair.
II.
By thought, by dangers, and by toils,
The wreath of just renown is worn;
Nor will Ambition's awful spoils
The flow'ry pomp of Ease adorn;
But love unbends the force of thought,
By love unmanly fears are taught,
And love's reward with gaudy sloth is bought.
III.
Yet thou hast read in tuneful lays,
And heard from many a zealous breast,
The pleasing tale of Beauty's praise
In Wisdom's lofty language drest;
Of Beauty pow'rful to impart
Each finer sense each comelier art,
And sooth and polish man's ungentle heart.
IV.
If then from Love's deceit secure
Thus far alone thy wishes tend,
Go see the white-wing'd ev'ning hour
On Delia's vernal walk descend;
Go while the golden light serene,
The grove, the lawn, the soften'd scene,
Becomes the presence of the rural queen.
V.
Attend while that harmonious tongue
Each bosom each desire commands:
Apollo's lute by Hermes strung,
And touch'd by chaste Minerva's hands,
Attend. I feel a force divine,
O Delia! win my thoughts to thine;
That half the colour of thy life is mine.
VI.
Yet conscious of the dang'rous charm
Soon would I turn my steps away,
Nor oft' provoke the lovely harm,
Nor lull my reason's watchful sway:
But thou, my Friend!—I hear thy sighs;
Alas! I read thy downcast eyes,
And thy tongue salters and thy colour flies.
VII.
So soon again to meet the fair?
So pensive all this absent hour?
—O yet, unlucky Youth! beware
While yet to think is in thy pow'r.
In vain with friendship's flatt'ring name
Thy passion veils its inward shame,
Friendship, the treach'rous fuel of thy flame!
VIII.
Once I remember, new to Love,
And dreading his tyrannick chain,
I sought a gentle maid, to prove
What peaceful joys in friendship reign,
Whence we forsooth might safely stand,
And pitying view the lovesick band,
And mock the winged boy's malicious hand.
IX.
Thus frequent past the cloudless day,
To smiles and sweet discourse resign'd,
While I exulted to survey
One gen'rous woman's real mind,
Till friendship soon my languid breast
Each night with unknown cares possest,
Dash'd my coy slumbers or my dreams distrest.
X.
Fool that I was!—And now, ev'n now,
While thus I preach the Stoick strain,
Unless I shun Olympia's view
An hour unsays it all again.
O Friend!—when Love directs her eyes
To pierce where ev'ry passion lies
Where is the firm, the cautious, or the wise?
ODE XII. TO SIR FRANCIS HENRY DRAKE, BARONET.
I.
BEHOLD! the Balance in the sky
Swift on the wintry scale inclines,
To earthy caves the Dryads fly,
And the bare pastures Pan resigns.
Late did the farmer's fork o'erspread
With recent soil the twice-mown mead,
Tainting the bloom which autumn knows;
He whets the rusty coulter now,
He binds his oxen to the plough,
And wide his future harvest throws.
II.
Now London's busy confines round,
By Kensington's imperial tow'rs,
From Highgate's rough descent profound,
Essexian heaths or Kentish bow'rs,
Where'er I pass I see approach
Some rural statesman's eager coach,
Hurry'd by senatorial cares,
While rural nymphs (alike within
Aspiring courtly praise to win)
Debate their dress, reform their airs.
III.
Say, what can now the country boast
O Drake! thy footsteps to detain,
When peevish winds and gloomy frost
The sunshine of the temper stain?
Say, are the priests of Devon grown
Friends to this tolerating throne,
Champions for George's legal right?
Have gen'ral freedom, equal law,
Won to the glory of Nassau
Each bold Wessexian squire and knight?
IV.
I doubt it much, and guess at least
That when the day which made us free
Shall next return, that sacred feast
Thou better may'st observe with me:
With me the sulph'rous treason old
A far inferiour part shall hold
In that glad day's triumphal strain,
And gen'rous William be rever'd,
Nor one untimely accent heard
Of James or his ignoble reign.
V.
Then while the Gascon's fragrant wine
With modest cups our joy supplies
We 'll truly thank the pow'r divine
Who bad the chief the patriot rise;
Rise from heroick case, (the spoil
Due for his youth's Herculean toil,
From Belgium to her saviour son)
Rise with the same unconquer'd zeal
For our Britannia's injur'd weal,
Her laws defac'd her shrines o'erthrown.
VI.
He came: the tyrant from our shore
Like a forbidden demon fled,
And to eternal exile bore
Pontifick rage and vassal dread:
There sunk the mould'ring Gothick reign;
New years came forth, a lib'ral train!
Call'd by the people's great decree.
That day, my Friend! let blessings crown:
—Fill to the demigod's renown
From whom thou hast that thou art free.
VII.
Then, Drake! (for wherefore should we part
The publick and the private weal?)
In vows to her who sways thy heart
Fair health, glad fortune, will we deal;
Whether Aglaia's blooming cheek,
Or the soft ornaments that speak
So eloquent in Daphne's smile,
Whether the piercing lights that fly
From the dark heav'n of Myrto's eye
Haply thy fancy then beguile.
VIII.
For so it is; thy stubborn breast,
Tho' touch'd by many a slighter wound,
Hath no full conquest yet confest,
Nor the one fatal charmer found;
While I, a true and loyal swain,
My fair Olympia's gentle reign
Thro' all the varying seasons own:
Her genius still my bosom warms,
No other maid for me hath charms,
Or I have eyes for her alone.
ODE XIII. ON LYRICK POETRY.
I. 1.
ONCE more I join the Thespian choir
And taste th' inspiring fount again;
O parent of the Grecian lyre
Admit me to thy pow'rful strain!—
And lo! with ease my step invades
The pathless vale and op'ning shades,
Till now I spy her verdant seat;
And now at large I drink the sound
While these her offspring list'ning round
By turns her melody repeat.
I. 2.
I see Anacreon smile and sing,
His silver tresses breathe perfume,
His cheek displays a second spring
Of roses taught by wine to bloom.
Away, deceitful Cares! away,
And let me listen to his lay;
Let me the wanton pomp enjoy
While in smooth dance the light-wing'd Hours
Lead round his lyre its patron pow'rs,
Kind Laughter and convivial Joy.
I. 3.
Broke from the fetters of his native land,
Devoting shame and vengeance to her lords,
With louder impulse and a threat'ning hand
The Lesbian patriot
Alcaeus.
smites the sounding chords.
Ye wretches! ye perfidious train!
Ye ours'd of gods and freeborn men!
Ye murderers of the laws!
Tho' now ye glory in your lust,
Tho' now ye tread the feeble neck in dust,
Yet Time and righteous Jove will judge your dreadful cause.
II. 1.
But lo! to Sappho's melting airs
Descends the radiant queen of Love:
She smiles, and asks what fonder cares
Her suppliant's plaintive measures move?
Why is my faithful maid distrest?
Who, Sappho, wounds thy tender breast?
Say, flies he?—Soon he shall pursue:
Shuns he thy gifts?—He soon shall give:
Slights he thy sorrows?—He shall grieve,
And soon to all thy wishes bow.
II. 2.
But, O Melpomene! for whom
Awakes thy golden shell again?
What mortal breath shall e'er presume
To echo that unbounded strain?
Majestick in the frown of years
Behold the man of Thebes
Pindar.
appears:
For some there are whose mighty frame
The hand of Jove at birth endow'd
With hopes that mock the gazing crowd,
As eagles drink the noontide flame,
II. 3.
While the dim raven beats her weary wings,
And clamours far below.—Propitious Muse!
While I so late unlock thy purer springs,
And breathe whate'er thy ancient airs infuse,
Wilt thou for Albion's sons around
(Ne'er hadst thou audience more renown'd)
Thy charming arts employ,
As when the winds from shore to shore
Thro' Greece thy lyre's persuasive language bore
Till towns, and isles, and seas, return'd the vocal joy?
III. 1.
Yet then did Pleasure's lawless throng,
Oft' rushing forth in loose attire,
Thy virgin dance thy graceful song
Pollute with impious revels dire.
O fair, O chaste! thy echoing shade
May no foul discord here invade;
Nor let thy strings one accent move
Except what earth's untroubled ear
'Mid all her social tribes may hear
And Heav'n's unerring throne approve.
III. 2.
Queen of the Lyre! in thy retreat
The fairest flow'rs of Pindus glow,
The vine aspires to crown thy seat,
And myrtles round thy laurel grow:
Thy strings adapt their vary'd strain
To ev'ry pleasure ev'ry pain
Which mortal tribes were born to prove,
And straight our passions rise or fall,
As at the wind's imperious call
The ocean swells the billows move.
III. 3.
When Midnight listens o'er the slumb'ring earth
Let me, O Muse! thy solemn whispers hear,
When Morning sends her fragrant breezes forth
With airy murmurs touch my op'ning ear;
And ever watchful at thy side
Let Wisdom's awful suff'rage guide
The tenour of thy lay:
To her of old by Jove was giv'n
To judge the various deeds of earth and heav'n:
'Twas thine by gentle arts to win us to her sway.
IV. 1.
Oft' as to wellearn'd ease resign'd
I quit the maze where Science toils,
Do thou retresh my yielding mind
With all thy gay delusive spoils;
But O! indulgent, come not nigh
The busy steps the jealous eye
Of wealthy Care or gainful Age,
Whose barren souls thy joys disdain,
And hold as foes to Reason's reign
Whome'er thy lovely works engage.
IV. 2.
When
iendship and when letter'd Mirth
Haply partake my simple board,
Then let thy blameless hand call forth
The musick of the Teian chord;
Or if invok'd at softer hours,
O
seek with me the happy bow'rs
That hear Olympia's gentle tongue:
To Beauty link'd with Virtue's train,
To Love devoid of jealous pain,
There let the Sapphick lute be strung.
IV. 3.
But when from envy and from death to claim
A hero bleeding for his native land,
When to throw incense on the Vestal flame
Of Liberty my genius gives command,
Nor Theban voice nor Lesbian lyre
From thee O Muse! do I require,
While my presaging mind,
Conscious of pow'rs she never knew,
Astonish'd grasps at things beyond her view,
Nor by another's fate submits to be confin'd.
ODE XIV. TO THE HON. CHARLES TOWNSHLND, FROM THE COUNTRY
I.
SAY, Townshend! what can London boast
pay thee for the pleasures lost,
The health to-day resign'd,
When Spring from this her fav'rite seat
Bad Winter hasten his retreat,
And met the western wind?
II.
Oh! knew'st thou how the balmy air,
The sun, the azure heav'ns, prepare
To heal thy languid frame,
No more would noisy courts engage,
In vain would lying Faction's rage
Thy sacred leisure claim.
III.
Oft' I look'd forth and oft' admir'd,
Till with the studious volume tir'd
I sought the open day;
"And sure," I cry'd, "the rural gods
"Expect me in their green abodes,
"And chide my tardy lay."
IV.
But ah! in vain my restless feet
Trac'd ev'ry silent shady seat
Which knew their forms of old;
Nor Naiad by her fountain laid
Nor Woodnymph tripping thro' her glade
Did now their rites unfold:
V.
Whether to nurse some infant oak
They turn the slowly-tinkling brook
And catch the pearly show'rs,
Or brush the mildew from the woods,
Or paint with noontide beams the buds,
Or breathe on op'ning flow'rs.
VI.
Such rites which they with spring renew
The eyes of Care can never view,
And care hath long been mine;
And hence offended with their guest
Since grief of love my soul opprest
They hide their toils divine.
VII.
But soon shall thy enliv'ning tongue
This heart by dear affliction wrung
With noble hope inspire;
Then will the sylvan pow'rs again
Receive me in their genial train
And listen to my lyre.
VIII.
Beneath yon' Dryad's lonely shade
A rustick altar shall be paid
Of turf with laurel fram'd.
And thou th' inscription wilt approve,
"This for the peace which lost by love
"By friendship was reclaim'd."
ODE XV. TO THE EVENING STAR.
I.
TO-NIGHT retir'd the queen of Heav'n
With young Endymion stays;
And now to Hesper is it giv'n
A while to rule the vacant sky,
Till she shall to her lamp supply
A stream of brighter rays.
II.
O Hesper! while the starry throng
With awe thy path surrounds,
Oh! listen to my suppliant song,
If haply now the vocal sphere
Can suffer thy delighted ear
To stoop to mortal sounds.
III.
So may the bridegroom's genial strain
Thee still invoke to shine,
So may the bride's unmarry'd train
To Hymen chant their flatt'ring vow,
Still that his lucky torch may glow
With lustre pure as thine.
IV.
Far other vows must I prefer
To thy indulgent pow'r:
Alas! but now I paid my tear
On fair Olympia's virgin tomb,
And lo! from thence in quest I roam
Of Philomela's bow'r.
V.
Propitious send thy golden ray
Thou purest light above;
Let no false flame seduce to stray
Where gulf or steep lie hid for harm.
But lead where musick's healing charm
May sooth afflicted love.
VI.
To them by many a grateful song
In happier season, vow'd
These lawns, Olympia's haunt, belong;
Oft' by yon' silver stream we walk'd,
Or fix'd while Philomela talk'd
Beneath yon' copses stood.
VII.
Nor seldom where the beechen boughs
That roofless tow'r invade
We came while her enchanting Muse
The radiant moon above us held,
Till by a clam'rous owl compell'd
She fled the solemn shade.
VIII.
But hark! I hear her liquid tone.
Now, Hesper! guide my feet
Down the red marl with moss o'ergrown
Thro' yon' wild thicket next the plain
Whose hawthorns choke the winding lane
Which leads to her retreat.
IX.
See the green space! on either hand
Enlarg'd it spreads around:
See! in the midst she takes her stand
Where one old oak his awful shade
Extends o'er half the level mead
Enclos'd in woods profound.
X.
Hark! how thro' many a melting note
She now prolongs her lays;
How sweetly down the void they float!
The breeze their magick path attends,
The stars shine out the forest bends,
The wakeful heifers gaze!
XI.
Whoe'er thou art whom Chance may bring
To this sequester'd spot,
If then the plaintive Siren sing,
Oh! softly tread beneath her bow'r,
And think of Heav'n's disposing pow'r,
Of man's uncertain lot.
XII.
Oh! think o'er all this mortal stage
What mournful scenes arise,
What ruin waits on kingly rage,
How often Virtue dwells with Wo,
How many griefs from knowledge flow,
How swiftly pleasure flies!
XIII.
O sacred Bird! let me at eve
Thus wand'ring all alone
Thy tender counsel oft' receive,
Bear witness to thy pensive airs,
And pity Nature's common cares
Till I forget my own.
ODE XVI. TO CALEB HARDINGE, M. D.
I.
WITH sordid floods the wintry urn
Aquarius.
Hath stain'd fair Richmond's level green,
Her naked hill the Dryads mourn,
No longer a poetick scene;
No longer there thy raptur'd eye
The beauteous forms of earth or sky
Surveys as in their Author's mind,
And London shelters from the year
Those whom thy social hours to share
The Attick Muse design'd.
II.
From Hampstead's airy summit me
Her guest the City shall behold
What day the people's stern decree
To unbelieving kings is told,
When common men (the dread of Fame)
Adjudg'd as one of evil name
Before the sun th' anointed head:
Then seek thou too the pious Town,
With no unworthy cares to crown
That ev'ning's awful shade.
III.
Deem not I call thee to deplore
The sacred martyr of the day,
By fast and penitential lore
To purge our ancient guilt away:
For this on humble faith I rest
That still our advocate the priest
From heav'nly wrath will save the land,
Nor ask what rites our pardon gain,
Nor how his potent sounds restrain
The Thund'rer's lifted hand.
IV.
No, Hardinge! peace to church and state!
That ev'ning let the Muse give law,
While I anew the theme relate
Which my first youth enamour'd saw.
Then will I oft' explore thy thought
What to reject which Locke hath taught,
What to pursue in Virgil's lay,
Till hope ascends to lostiest things,
Nor envies demagogues or kings
Their frail and vulgar sway.
V.
O vers'd in all the human frame!
Lead thou where'er my labour lies,
And English Fancy's eager flame
To Grecian purity chastize,
While hand in hand at Wisdom's shrine
Beauty with Truth I strive to join,
And grave Assent with glad Applause,
To paint the story of the soul
And Plato's visions to control
By Verulamian
Verulam gave one of his titles to Francis Bacon author of the Novum Organum.
laws.
ODE XVII. ON A SERMON AGAINST GLORY, MDCCXLVII.
I.
COME then, tell me, Sage Divine!
Is it an offence to own
That our bosoms e'er incline
Toward immortal glory's throne?
For with me nor Pomp nor Pleasure,
Bourbon's might, Braganza's treasure,
So can Fancy's dream rejoice,
So conciliate Reason's choice,
As one approving word of her impartial voice.
II.
If to spurn at noble praise
Be the passport to thy heav'n
Follow thou these gloomy ways;
No such law to me was giv'n,
Nor I trust shall I deplore me
Faring like my friends before me,
Nor an holier place desire
Than Timoleon's arms acquire
And Tully's curule chair and Milton's golden lyre.
ODE XVIII. TO THE RIGHT HON. FRANCIS EARL OF HUNTINGDON, MDCCXLVII.
I. 1.
THE wise and great of ev'ry clime
Thro' all the spacious walks of Time
Where'er the Muse her pow'r display'd
With joy have listen'd and obey'd;
For taught of Heav'n the sacred Nine
Persuasive numbers forms divine
To mortal sense impart:
They best the soul with glory fire,
They noblest counsels boldest deeds inspire,
And high o'er Fortune's rage inthrone the fixed heart.
I. 2.
Nor less prevailing is their charm
The vengeful bosom to disarm,
To melt the proud with human wo,
And prompt unwilling tears to flow.
Can wealth a pow'r like this afford?
Can Cromwell's arts or Marlb'rough's sword
An equal empire claim?
No, Hastings! thou my words wilt own;
Thy breast the gifts of ev'ry Muse hath known,
Nor shall the giver's love disgrace thy noble name.
I. 3.
The Muse's awful art,
And the blest function of the poet's tongue,
Ne'er shalt thou blush to honour, to assert
From all that scorned Vice or slavish Fear hath sung,
Nor shall the blandishment of Tuscan strings,
Warbling at will in Pleasure's myrtle bow'r,
Nor shall the servile notes to Celtick kings,
By flatt'ring minstrels paid in evil hour,
Move thee to spurn the heav'nly Muse's reign:
A diff'rent strain
And other themes
From her prophetick shades and hallow'd streams
(Thou well canst witness) meet the purg'd ear,
Such as when Greece to her immortal shell
Rejoicing listen'd godlike sounds to hear,
To hear the sweet instructress tell
(While men and heroes throug'd around)
How life its noblest use may find,
How well for freedom be resign'd,
And how by Glory Virtue shall be crown'd.
II. 1.
Such was the Chian father's strain
To many a kind domestick train,
Whose pious hearth and genial bowl
Had cheer'd the rev'rend pilgrim's soul,
When ev'ry hospitable rite
With equal bounty to requite
He struck his magick strings,
And pour'd spontaneous numbers forth,
And seiz'd their ears with tales of ancient worth,
And fill'd their musing hearts with vast heroick things.
II 2.
Stanza
II. 2.] Lycurgus, the Lacedaemonian lawgiver, brought into Greece from Asia Minor the first complete copy of Homer's Works.—At Plataea was fought the decifive battle between the Persian army and the united militia of Greece under Pausanias and Aristides.—Cimon the Athenian erected a trophy in Cyprus for two great victories gained on the same day over the Persians by sea and land. Diodorus Siculus has preserved the inscription which the Athenians affixed to the consecrated spoils after this great success, in which it is very remarkable that the greatness of the occasion has raised the manner of expression above the usual simplicity and modesty of all other ancient inscriptions. It is this;
The following translation is almost literal;
Since first the sea from Asia's hostile coast
Divided Europe, and the god of War
Assail'd imperious cities, never yet
At once among the waves and on the shore
Hath such a labour been achiev'd by men
Who earth inhabit. They whose arms the M
es
In Cyprus felt pernicious, they the same
Have won from skilful Tyre an hundred ships
Crowded with warriours. Asia groans, in both
Her hands
smitten by the might of war.
Now oft' where happy spirits dwell,
Where yet he tunes his charming shell,
Oft' near him with applauding hands
The Genius of his country stands;
To list'ning gods he makes him known,
That man divine by whom were sown
The seeds of Grecian fame,
Who first the race with freedom fir'd
From whom Lycurgus Sparta's sons inspir'd,
From whom Placaean palms and Cyprian trophies came.
II. 3.
Stanza
II. 3.] Pindar was contemporary with Aristides and Cimon, in whom the glory of ancient Greece was at its height. When Xerxes invaded Greece Pindar was true to the common interest of his country, though his fellow-citizens the Thebans had sold themselves to the Persian king. In one of his odes he expresses the great distress and anxiety of his mind occasioned by the vast preparations of Xerxes against Greece,
(
Isthm.
viii.)
in another he celebrates the victories of Salamis, Plataea, and Himera,
(
Pyth.
i.)
It will be necessary to add two or three other particulars of his life, real or fabulous, in order to explain what follows in the text concerning him. First, then, he was thought to be so great a favourite of Apollo that the priests of that deity allotted him a constant share of their offerings. It was said of him as of some other illustrious men, that at his birth a swarm of bees lighted on his lips and fed him with their honey: it was also a tradition concerning him that Pan was heard to recite his poetry, and seen dancing to one of his hymns on the mountains near Thebes. But a real historical fact in his life is, that the Thebans imposed a large fine upon him on account of the veneration which he expressed in his poems for that heroick spirit shewn by the people of Athens in defence of the common liberty which his own fellow-citizens had shamefully betrayed; and as the argument of this ode implies that great poetical talents and high sentiments of liberty do reciprocaily produce and assist each other, so Pindar is perhaps the most exemplary proof of this connexion which occurs in history. The Thebans were remarkable in general for a slavish disposition through all the fortunes of their commonwealth at the time of its ruin by Philip, and even in its best state under the administration of Pelopidas and Epaminondas; and every one knows they were no less remarkable for great dulness and want of all genius. That Pindar should have equally distinguished himself from the rest of his fellow-citizens in both these respects seems somewhat extraordinary, and is scarce to be accounted for but by the preceding observation.
O noblest happiest age
When Aristides rul'd and Cimon sought,
When all the gen'rous fruits of Homer's page
Exulting Pindar saw to full perfection brought!
O Pindar! ost' shalt thou be hail'd of me;
Not that Apollo fed thee from his shrine,
Not that thy lips drank sweetness from the bee,
Nor yet that studious of thy notes divine
Pan danc'd their measure with the sylvan throng,
But that thy song
Was proud t' unfold
What thy base rulers trembled to behold,
Amid corrupted Thebes was proud to tell
The deeds of Athens and the Persian shame,
Hence on thy head their impious vengeance fell.
But thou, O faithful to thy fame!
The Muse's law didst rightly know,
That who would animate his lays,
And other minds to virtue raise,
Must feel his own with all her spirit glow.
III. 1.
Are there approv'd of later times
Whose verse adorn'd a tyrant's
Octavianus Caesar.
crimes,
Who saw majestick Rome betray'd
And lent th' imperial ruffian aid?
Alas! not one polluted bard,
No, not the strains that Mincius heard
Or Tibur's hills reply'd,
Dare to the Muse's ear aspire,
Save that instructed by the Grecian lyre
With freedom's ancient notes their shameful task they hide.
III. 2.
Mark how the dread Pantheon stands
Amid the domes of modern hands,
Amid the toys of idle state,
How simply, how severely great!
Then turn, and while each western clime
Presents her tuneful sons to Time
So mark thou Milton's name,
And add, "Thus dissers from the throng
"The spirit which inform'd thy awsul song,
"Which bad thy potent voice protect thy country's same."
III. 3.
Stanza
III. 3.] Alluding to his Defence of the People of England against Salmasius. See particularly the manner in which he himself speaks of that undertaking in the Introduction to his Reply to
us.
Yet hence barbarick Zeal
His mem'ry with unholy rage pursues,
While from these arduous cares of publick weal
She bids each bard begone, and rest him with his Muse.
O Fool! to think the man whose ample mind
Must grasp at all that yonder stars survey,
Must join the noblest forms of ev'ry kind
The world's most perfect image to display,
Can
'er his country's majesty behold
Unmov'd or cold;
O fool! to deem
That he whose thought must visit ev'ry theme,
Whose heart must ev'ry strong emotion know,
Inspir'd by Nature or by Fortune taught,
That he, if haply some presumptuous foe
With false ignoble science fraught
Shall spurn at Freedom's faithful band,
That he their dear desence will shun,
Or hide their glories from the sun,
Or deal their vengeance with a woman's hand.
IV. 1.
I care not that in Arno's plain
Or on the sportive banks of Seine
From publick themes the Muses' quire
Content with polish'd Ease retire.
Where priests studious head command,
Where tyrants bow the warlike hand
To vile Ambition's aim,
Say, what can publick themes assord
Save venal honours to an hateful lord,
Reserv'd for angry Heav'n and scorn'd of honest Fame?
IV. 2.
But here, where Freedom's equal throne
To all her valiant sons is known,
Where all are conscious of her carcs,
And each the pow'r that rules him shares,
Here let the bard whose dastard tongue
Leaves publick arguments unsung
Bid publick praise farewell,
Let him to fitter climes remove,
Far from the hero's and the patriot's love,
And lull mysterious monks to slumber in their cell.
IV. 3.
Stanza.
IV. 3.] Edward III. from whom descended Henry Hastings, third Earl of Huntingdon, by the daughter of the Duke of Clarence, brother to Edward IV.
O Hastings! not to all
Can ruling Heav'n the same endowments lend;
Yet still doth Nature to her offspring call,
That to one gen'ral weal their diff'rent pow'rs they bend
Unenvious. Thus alone tho' strains divine
Inform the bosom of the Muse's son,
Tho' with new honours the Patrician's line
Advance from age to age, yet thus alone
They win the suffrage of impartial Fame.
The poet's name
He best shall prove
Whose lays the soul with noblest passions move:
But thee, O Progeny of heroes old!
Thee to severer toils thy fate requires;
The fate which form'd thee in a chosen mould,
The grateful country of thy sires,
Thee to sublimer paths demand,
Sublimer than thy sires could trace
Or thy own Edward teach his race
Tho' Gaul's proud Genius sank beneath his hand.
V. 1.
From rich domains and subject farms
They led the rustick youth to arms,
And kings their stern achievements fear'd
While private strife their banners rear'd:
But loftier scenes to thee are shown,
Where empire's wide establish'd throne
No private master fills,
Where long foretold the people reigns,
Where each a vassal's humble heart disdains,
And judgeth what he sees, and as he judgeth wills.
V. 2.
Here be it thine to calm and guide
The swelling Democratick tide,
To watch the state's uncertain frame,
And baffle Faction's partial aim,
But chiefly with determin'd zeal
To quell that servile band who kneel
To Freedom's banish'd soes,
That monster which is daily found
Expert and bold thy country's peace to wound,
Yet dreads to handle arms nor manly counsel knows.
V. 3.
Stanza
V. 3.] At Whittington, a village on the edge of Scarsdale in Derbyshire, the Earls of Devonshire and Danby, with the Lord Delamere, privately concerted the plan of the Revolution. The house in which they met is at present a farmhouse, and the country people distinguish the room where they sat by the name of The Plotting Parlour.
'Tis highest Heav'ns command
That guilty aims should sordid paths pursue,
That what ensnares the heart should maim the hand,
And Virtue's worthless foes be false to glory too.
But look on Freedom: see thro' ev'ry age
What labours, perils, griefs, hath she disdain'd!
What arms, what regal pride, what priestly rage,
Have her dread offspring conquer'd or sustain'd!
For Albion well have conquer'd. Let the strains
Of happy swains
Which now resound
Where Scarsdale's cliffs the swelling pastures bound
Bear witness: there oft' let the farmer hail
The sacred orchard which imbow'rs his gate,
And shew to strangers passing down the vale
Where Cav'ndish, Booth, and Osborne, sat
When bursting from their country's chain
Ev'n in the midst of deadly harms,
Of papal snares and lawless arms,
They plann'd for Freedom this her noblest reign.
VI. 1.
This reign, these laws, this publick care,
Which Nassau gave us all to share,
Had ne'er adorn'd the English name
Could Fear have silenc'd Freedom's claim:
But Fear in vain attempts to bind
Those lofty efforts of the mind
Which social good inspires;
Where men for this assault a throne
Each adds the common welfare to his own
And each unconquer'd heart the strength of all acquires.
VI. 2.
Say, was it thus when late we view'd
Our fields in civil blood imbru'd?
When Fortune crown'd the barb'rous host,
And half th' astonish'd isle was lost?
Did one of all that vaunting train
Who dare affront a peaceful reign,
Durst one in arms appear?
Durst one in counsels pledge his life,
Stake his luxurious fortunes in the strife,
Or lend his boasted name his vagrant friends to cheer?
VI. 3.
Yet, Hastings! these are they
Who challenge to themselves thy country's love;
The true, the constant, who alone can weigh
What glory should demand or liberty approve.
But let their works declare them. Thy free pow'rs,
The gen'rous pow'r of thy prevailing mind,
Not for the tasks of their confed'rate hours,
Lewd brawls and lurking slander, were design'd.
Be thou thy own approver. Honest praise
Oft' nobly sways
Ingenuous youth;
But sought from cowards and the lying mouth
Praise is reproach. Eternal God alone
For mortals fixeth that sublime award:
He from the faithful records of his throne
Bids the historian and the bard
Dispose of honour and of scorn,
Discern the patriot from the slave,
And write the good, the wise, the brave
For lessons to the multitude unborn.
END OF BOOK FIRST.
ODES ON SEVERAL SUBJECTS. IN TWO BOOKS.
BOOK II. ODE I. THE REMONSTRANCE OF SHAKESPEARE,
Supposed to have been spoken at the Theatre-Royal while the French Comedians were acting by Subscription, 1749.
IF yet regardful of your native land
Old Shakespeare's tongue you deign to understand,
Lo! from the blissful bow'rs where Heav'n rewards
Instructive sages and unblemish'd bards
I come, the ancient
ounder of the stage,
Intent to learn in this discerning age
What form of wit your fancies have embrac'd,
And whither tends your elegance of taste,
That thus at length our homely toils you spurn,
That thus to foreign scenes you proudly turn,
That from my brow the laurel wreath you claim
To crown the rivals of your country's fame.
What tho' the footsteps of my devious Muse
The measur'd walks of Grecian art refuse?
Or tho' the frankness of my hardy style
Mock the nice touches of the critick's file?
Yet what my age and climate held to view
Impartial I survey'd and fearless drew.
And say, ye skilful in the human heart!
Who know to prize a poet's noblest part,
What age, what clime, could e'er an ampler field
For lofty thought for daring fancy yield?
I saw this England break the shameful bands
Forg'd for the souls of men by sacred hands,
I saw each groaning realm her aid implore,
Her sons the heroes of each warlike shore,
Her naval standard (the dire Spaniard's bane)
Obey'd thro' all the circuit of the main;
Then too great Commerce for a late-found world
Around your coast her eager sails unfurl'd;
New hopes new passions thence the bosom
ir'd,
New plans new arts the genius thence inspir'd,
Thence ev'ry scence which private fortune knows
In stronger life with bolder spirit rose.
Disgrac'd I this full prospect which I drew,
My colours languid or my strokes untrue?
Have not your sages, warriours, swains, and kings,
Confess'd the living draught of men and things?
What other bard in any clime appears
Alike the master of your smiles and tears?
Yet have I deign'd your audience to entice
With wretched bribes to luxury and vice?
Or have my various scenes a purpose known
Which Freedom, Virtue, Glory, might not own?
Such from the first was my dramatick plan;
It should be yours to crown what I began:
And now that England spurns her Gothick chain,
And equal laws and social science reign,
I thought now surely shall my zealous eyes
View nobler bards and juster criticks rise,
Intent with learned labour to refine
The copious ore of Albion's native mine,
Our stately Muse more graceful airs to teach,
And form her tongue to more attractive speech,
Till rival nations listen at her feet,
And own her polish'd as they own'd her great.
But do you thus my fav'rite hopes fulfil?
Is France at last the standard of your skill?
Alas for you that so betray a mind
Of art unconscious and to beauty blind!
Say, does her language your ambition raise,
Her barren, trivial, unharmonious, phrase,
Which fetters eloquence to scantiest bounds,
And maims the cadence of poetick sounds?
Say, does your humble admiration chuse
The gentle prattle of her Comick Muse,
While wits, plaindealers, fops, and fools, appear,
Charg'd to say nought but what the king may hear?
Or rather melt your sympathizing hearts
Won by her Tragick scenes' romantick arts,
Where old and young declaim on soft desire,
And heroes never but for love expire?
No: tho' the charms of novelty a while
Perhaps too fondly win your thoughtless smile,
Yet not for you design'd indulgent Fate
The modes or manners of the Bourbon state;
And ill your minds my partial judgment reads,
And many an augury my hope misleads,
If the fair maids of yonder blooming train
To their light courtship would an audience deign,
Or those chaste matrons a Parisian wife
Chuse for the model of domestick life,
Or if one youth of all that gen'rous band,
The strength and splendour of their native land,
Would yield his portion of his country's same,
And quit old Freedom's patrimonial claim,
With lying smiles Oppression's pomp to see,
And judge of glory by a king's decree.
O blest at home with justly envy'd laws!
O long the chiefs of Europe's gen'ral cause!
Whom Heav'n hath chosen at each dang'rous hour
To check the inroads of barbarick Pow'r,
The rights of trampled nations to reclaim,
And guard the social world from bonds and shame,
Oh! let not Luxury's fantastick charms
Thus give the lie to your heroick arms,
Nor for the ornaments of life embrace
Dishonest lessons from that vaunting race
Whom Fate's dread laws, (for in eternal Fate
Despotick Rule was heir to Freedom's hate)
Whom in each warlike each commercial part,
In civil counsel and in pleasing art,
The Judge of earth predestin'd for your foes,
And made it same and virtue to oppose.
ODE II. TO SLEEP.
I.
THOU silent Pow'r! whose welcome sway
Charms ev'ry anxious thought away,
In whose divine oblivion drown'd
Sore pain and weary toil grow mild,
Love is with kinder looks beguil'd,
And Grief forgets her fondly-cherish'd wound,
Oh whither hast thou flown, indulgent God!
God of kind shadows and of healing dews,
Whom dost thou touch with thy Lethaean rod?
Around whose temples now thy opiate airs diffuse?
II.
Lo! Midnight from her starry reign
Looks awful down on earth and main,
The tuneful birds lie hush'd in sleep,
With all that crop the verdant food,
With all that skim the crystal flood
Or haunt the caverns of the rocky steep;
No rushing winds disturb the tufted bow'rs,
No wakeful sound the moonlight valley knows
Save where the brook its liquid murmur pours,
And lulls the waving scene to more profound repose.
III.
Oh let not me alone complain,
Alone invoke thy pow'r in vain!
Descend propitious on my eyes,
Not from the couch that bears a crown,
Not from the courtly statesman's down,
Nor where the miser and his treasure lies;
Bring not the shapes that break the murd'rer's rest,
Nor those the hireling soldier loves to see,
Nor those which haunt the bigot's gloomy breast;
Far be their guilty nights and far their dreams from me!
IV.
Nor yet those awful forms present
For chiefs and heroes only meant.
The figur'd brass, the choral song,
The rescu'd people's glad applause,
The list'ning senate, and the laws
Fix'd by the counsels of Timoleon's
After Timoleon had delivered Syracuse from the tyranny of Dionysius the people on every important deliberation sent for him into the publick assembly, asked his advice, and voted according to it.
P
.
tongue,
Are scenes too grand for Fortune's private ways,
And tho' they shine in youth's ingenuous view
The sober gainful arts of modern days
To such romantick thoughts have bid a long adieu.
V.
I ask not, god of Dreams! thy care
To banish Love's presentments fair:
Nor rosy cheek nor radiant eye
Can arm him with such strong command
That the young sorc'rer's fatal hand
Should round my soul his pleasing fetters tie:
Nor yet the courtier's hope, the giving smile,
(A lighter phantom and a baser chain)
Did e'er in slumber my proud lyre beguile
To lend the pomp of thrones her ill-according strain.
VI.
But, Morpheus! on thy balmy wing
Such honourable visions bring
As sooth'd great Milton's injur'd age
When in prophetick dreams he saw
The race unborn with pious awe
Imbibe each virtue from his heav'nly page;
Or such as Mead's benignant fancy knows
When health's deep treasures by his art explor'd
Have sav'd the infant from an orphan's woes
Or to the trembling sire his age's hope restor'd.
ODE III. TO THE CUCKOO.
I.
O Rustick herald of the spring!
At length in yonder woody vale
Fast by the brook I hear thee sing,
And studious of thy homely tale
Amid the vespers of the grove,
Amid the chanting choir of love,
Thy sage responses hail.
II.
The time has been when I have frown'd
To hear thy voice the woods invade,
And while thy solemn accent drown'd
Some sweeter poet of the shade
Thus thought I, thus the sons of Care
Some constant youth or gen'rous fair
With dull advice upbraid.
III.
I said "While Philomela's song
"Proclaims the passion of the grove
"It ill beseems a Cuckoo's tongue
"Her charming language to reprove."—
Alas! how much a lover's ear
Hates all the sober truth to hear,
The sober truth of love!
IV.
When hearts are in each other blest,
When nought but lofty faith can rule
The nymph's and swain's consenting breast,
How Cuckoolike in Cupid's school
With store of grave prudential saws
On Fortune's pow'r and Custom's laws
Appears each friendly fool!
V.
Yet think betimes, ye gentle Train!
Whom love, and hope, and fancy, sway,
Who ev'ry harsher care disdain,
Who by the morning judge the day,
Think that in April's fairest hours
To warbling shades and painted flow'rs
The Cuckoo joins his lay.
ODE IV. TO THE HON. CHARLES TOWNSHEND, In the Country, 1750.
I. 1.
How oft' shall I survey
This humble roof, the lawn, the greenwood shade,
The vale with sheaves o'erspread,
The glassy brook, the flocks which round thee stray?
When will thy cheerful mind
Of these have utter'd all her dear esteem?
Or tell me dost thou deem
No more to join in glory's toilsome race,
But here content embrace
That happy leisure which thou hadst resign'd?
I. 2.
Alas! ye happy hours
When books and youthful sport the soul could share
Ere one ambitious care
Of civil life had aw'd her simpler pow'rs,
Oft' as your winged train
Revisit here my friend in white array
Oh! fail not to display
Each fairer scene where I perchance had part
That so his gen'rous heart
Th' abode of even Friendship may remain.
I. 3.
For not imprudent of my loss to come
I saw from Contemplation's quiet cell
His feet ascending to another home
Where publick Praise and envy'd Greatness dwell.
But shall we therefore, O my Lyre!
Reprove Ambition's best desire,
Extinguish Glory's flame?
Far other was the task enjoin'd
When to my hand thy strings were first assign'd,
Far other faith belongs to Friendship's honour'd name.
II. 1.
Thee Townshend! not the arms
Of slumb'ring Ease nor Pleasure's rosy chain
Were destin'd to detain;
No, nor bright Science, nor the Muse's charms.
For them high Heav'n prepares
Their proper votaries, an humbler band:
And ne'er world Spenser's hand
Have deign'd to strike the warbling Tuscan shell,
Nor Harrington to tell
What habit an immortal city wears,
II. 2
Had this been born to shield
The cause which Cromwell's impious hand betray'd,
Or that like Vere diiplay'd
His Redcross banner o'er the Belgian field;
Yet where the will divine
Hsth shut those loftiest paths, it next remains
With reason clad in strains
Of harmony selected minds t' inspire,
And Virtue's living fire
To feed and eternize in hearts like thine.
II. 3.
For never shall the herd whom Envy sways
So quell my purpose or my tongue control
That I should fear illustrious worth to praise
Because its master's friendship mov'd my soul.
Yet if this undissembling strain
Should now perhaps thine ear detain
With any pleasing sound,
Remember thou that righteous Fame
From hoary Age a strict account will claim
Of each auspicious palm with which thy youth was crown'd.
III. 1.
Nor obvious is the way
Where Heav'n expects thee, nor the traveller leads
Thro' flow'rs or fragrant meads
Or groves that hark to Philomela's lay.
The impartial laws of Fate
To nobler virtues wed severer cares.
Is there a man who shares
The summit next where heav'nly natures dwell?
Ask him (for he can tell)
What storms beat round that rough laborious height.
III. 2.
Ye Heroes! who of old
Did gen'rous England Freedom's throne ordain
From Alfred's parent reign
To Nassau, great deliv'rer wise and bold!
I know your perils hard,
Your wounds, your painful marches, wintry seas,
The night estrang'd from ease,
The day by cowardice and falsehood vex'd,
The head with doubt perplex'd,
Th' indignant heart disdaining the reward
III. 3.
Which Envy hardly grants. But, O renown!
O praise from judging Heav'n and virtuous men
If thus they purchas'd thy divinest crown
Say, who shall hesitate or who complain?
And now they sit on thrones above,
And when among the gods they move
Before the Sovran Mind,
"Lo! these," he saith, "Lo! these are they
"Who to the laws of mine eternal sway
"From violence and fear asserted humankind."
IV. 1.
Thus honour'd while the train
Of legislators in his presence dwell,
If I may aught foretel
The statesman shall the second palm obtain.
For dreadful deeds of arms
Let vulgar bards with undiscerning praise
More glitt'ring trophies raise,
But wisest Heav'n what deeds may chiefly move
To favour and to love;
What save wide blessings or averted harms?
IV. 2.
Nor to th' embattled field
Shall these achievments of the peaceful gown
The green immortal crown
Of valour or the songs of conquest yield.
Not Fairfax wildly bold,
While bare of crest he hew'd his fatal way
Thro' Naseby's firm array
To heavier dangers did his breast oppose
Than Pym's free virtue chose
When the proud force of Strafford he controll'd.
IV. 3.
But what is man at enmity with truth?
What were the fruits of Wentworth's copious mind
When (blighted all the promise of his youth)
The patriot in a tyrant's league had join'd?
Let Ireland's loud lamenting plains,
Let Tyne's and Humber's trampled swains,
Let menac'd London, tell
How impious Guile made Wisdom base,
How gen'rous Zeal to cruel Rage gave place,
And how unbless'd he liv'd and how dishonour'd fell.
V. 1.
Thence never hath the Muse
Around his tomb Pierian roses flung,
Nor shall one poet's tongue
His name for musick's pleasing labour chuse.
And sure when Nature kind
Hath deck'd some favour'd breast above the throng,
That man with grievous wrong
Affronts and wounds his genius if he bends
To Guilt's ignoble ends
The functions of his ill-submitting mind.
V. 2.
For worthy of the wise
Nothing can seem but virtue, nor earth yield
Their fame an equal field
Save where impartial Freedom gives the prize:
There Somers fix'd his name,
Enroll'd the next to William; there shall Time
To ev'ry wond'ring clime
Point out that Somers who from Faction's crowd,
The sland'rous and the loud,
Could fair assent and modest rev'rence claim.
V. 3.
Nor aught did laws or social arts acquire,
Nor this majestick weal of Albion's land
Did aught accomplish or to aught aspire
Without his guidance, his superiour hand.
And rightly shall the Muse's care
Wreaths like her own for him prepare,
Whose mind's enamour'd aim
Could forms of civil beauty draw
Sublime as ever sage or poet saw,
Yet still to life's rude scene the proud ideas tame.
VI. 1.
Let none profane be near!
The Muse was never foreign to his breast;
On Pow'r's grave seat confest
Still to her voice he bent a lover's ear:
And if the blessed know
Their ancient cares, ev'n now th' unfading groves
Where haply Milton roves
With Spenser, hear th' enchanted echoes round
Thro' farthest heav'n resound
Wise Somers! guardian of their fame below.
VI. 2.
He knew, the patriot knew,
That letters and the Muses' pow'rful art
Exalt th' ingenuous heart
And brighten ev'ry form of just and true:
They lend a nobler sway
To civil Wisdom than Corruption's lure
Could ever yet procure;
They too from Envy's pale malignant light
Conduct her forth to sight
Cloth'd in the fairest colours of the day.
VI. 3.
O Townshend! thus may Time, the judge severe,
Instruct my happy tongue of thee to tell,
And when I speak of one to freedom dear
For planning wisely and for acting well,
Of one whom glory loves to own,
Who still by lib'ral means alone
Hath lib'ral ends pursu'd,
Then for the guerdon of my lay
"This man with faithful friendship," will I say,
"From youth to honour'd age my arts and me hath view'd."
ODE V. ON LOVE OF PRAISE.
I.
OF all the springs within the mind
Which prompt her steps in Fortune's maze
From none more pleasing aid we find
Than from the genuine love of praise.
II.
Nor any partial private end
Such rev'rence to the publick bears,
Nor any passion, Virtue's friend,
So like to Virtue's self appears.
III.
For who in glory can delight
Without delight in glorious deeds?
What man a charming voice can slight
Who courts the echo that succeeds?
IV.
But not the echo on the voice
More than on virtue praise depends,
To which of course its real price
The judgment of the praiser lends.
V.
If praise then with religious awe
From the sole perfect Judge be sought,
A nobler aim, a purer law,
Nor priest, nor bard, nor sage, hath taught;
VI.
With which in character the same,
Tho' in an humbler sphere it lies,
I count that soul of human fame
The suffrage of the good and wise.
ODE VI. TO W. HALL, ESQ. WITH THE WORKS OF CHAULIEU.
I.
ATTEND to Chaulieu's wanton lyre
While fluent as the skylark sings
When first the morn allures its wings
The epicure his theme pursues,
And tell me if among the choir
Whose musick charms the banks of Seine
So full, so free, so rich, a strain
E'er dictated the warbling Muse.
II.
Yet, Hall! while thy judicious ear
Admires the welldissembled art
That can such harmony impart
To the lame pace of Gallick rhymes,
While wit from affectation clear
Bright images and passions true
Recall to thy assenting view
The envy'd bards of nobler times;
III.
Say, is not oft' his doctrine wrong?
This priest of Pleasure, who aspires
To lead us to her sacred fires,
Knows he the ritual of her shrine?
Say, (her sweet influence to thy song
So may the goddess still afford)
Doth she consent to be ador'd
With shameless love and frantick wine?
IV.
Nor Cato nor Chrysippus here
Need we in high indignant phrase
From their Elysian quiet raise,
But Pleasure's oracle alone
Consult attentive, not severe.
O Pleasure! we blaspheme not thee,
Nor emulate the rigid knee
Which bends but at the Stoick throne.
V.
We own had Fate to man assign'd
Nor sense nor wish but what obey
Or Venus soft or Bacchus gay,
Then might our bard's voluptuous creed
Most aptly govern humankind,
Unless perchance what he hath sung
Of tortur'd joints and nerves unstrung
Some wrangling heretick should plead.
VI.
But now with all these proud desires
For dauntless truth and honest fame,
With that strong master of our frame
Th' inexorable judge within,
What can be done? Alas! ye fires
Of love! alas! ye rosy smiles!
Ye nectar'd cups from happier soils!
—Ye have no bribe his grace to win.
ODE VII. TO THOMAS EDWARDS, ESQ. On the late Edition of Mr. Pope's Works, 1751.
I.
BELIEVE me, Edwards! to restrain
The licence of a railer's tongue
Is what but seldom men obtain
By sense or wit, by prose or song;
A task for more Herculean pow'rs,
Nor suited to the sacred hours
Of leisure in the Muses' bow'rs.
II.
In bow'rs where laurel weds with palm
The Muse, the blameless queen, resides,
Fair Fame attends, and Wisdom calm
Her eloquence harmonious guides,
While shut for ever from her gate
Oft' trying still repining wait
Fierce Envy and calumnious Hate.
III.
Who then from her delightful bounds
Would step one moment forth to heed
What impotent and savage sounds
From their unhappy mouths proceed?
No; rather Spenser's lyre again
Prepare, and let thy pious strain
For Pope's dishonour'd shade complain.
IV.
Tell how displeas'd was ev'ry bard
When lately in th' Elysian grove
They of his Muse's guardian heard,
His delegate to fame above,
And what with one accord they said
Of Wit in drooping age misled,
And Warburton's officious aid:
V.
Stanza
V.] During Mr. Pope's war with Theobald, Concanen, and the rest of their tribe, Mr. Warburton, the present Lord Bishop of Gloucester, did with great zeal cultivate their friendship, having been introduced forsooth at the meetings of that respectable confederacy, a favour which he afterwards spoke of in very high terms of complacency and thankfulness: at the same time in his intercourse with them he treated Mr. Pope in a most contemptuous manner, and as a writer without genius. Of the truth of these assertions his Lordship can have no doubt if he recollects his own correspondence with Concanen, a part of which is still in being, and will probably be remembered as long as any of this prelate's writings.
How Virgil mourn'd the sordid fate
To that melodious lyre assign'd,
Beneath a tutor who so late
With Midas and his rout combin'd
By spiteful Clamour to confound
That very lyre's enchanting sound,
Tho' list'ning realms admir'd around:
VI.
How Horace own'd he thought the fire
Of his friend Pope's satirick line
Did farther fuel scarce require
From such a militant divine:
How Milton scorn'd the sophist vain
Who durst approach his hallow'd strain
With unwash'd hands and lips profane.
VII.
Then Shakespeare debonnair and mild
Brought that strange Comment forth to view;
"Conceits more deep," he said and smil'd,
"Than his own fools or madmen knew;"
But thank'd a gen'rous friend above
Who did with free advent'rous love
Such pageants from his tomb remove.
VIII.
And if to Pope in equal need
The same kind office thou wouldst pay,
Then, Edwards! all the band decreed
That future bards with frequent lay
Should call on thy auspicious name
From each absurd intruder's claim
To keep inviolate their fame.
ODE VIII. TO THE AUTHOR OF MEMOIRS OF THE HOUSE OF BRANDENBURGH, 1751
In the year 1751 appeared a very splendid edition in 4to of
Memoires pour servir a l'Histoire de la Maison de Brandebourg, a Berlin et la Haye,
with a privilege signed
Frederick,
the same being engraved in imitation of handwriting. In this edition among other extraordinary passages are the two following, to which the third stanza of this ode more particularly refers:
Page
163.]
"Il se fit une migration [the author is speaking of what happened of the revocation of the Edict of Nantz] dont on n'avoit guere vu d'exemples dans l'histoire: un peuple entier sortit du royaume par l'esprit de parti en haine du pape, et pour recevoir sous un autre ciel la communion sous les deux especes: quatre cens mille ames s'expatrierent ainsi et abandonnerent tous leur biens pour detonne
dans d'autres temples les vieuxpseaumesde Clement Marot."
Page
242.]
"La crainte donna le jour a la credulite, et l'amour propre interessa bientot le ciel au destin des hommes."
.
I.
THE men renow'd as chiefs of human race,
And born to lead in counsels or in arms,
Have seldom turn'd their feet from Glory's chase
To dwell with books or court the Muse's charms:
Yet to our eyes if haply time hath brought
Some genuine transcript of their calmer thought,
There still we own the wise, the great, or good,
And Caesar there and Xenophon are seen
As clear in spirit and sublime of mien
As on Pharsalian plains or by th'Assyrian slood.
II.
Say thou too, Fred'rick! was not this thy aim?
Thy vigils could the student's lamp engage
Except for this? except that future fame
Might read thy genius in the faithful page?
That if hereafter Envy shall presume
With words irrev'rent to inscribe thy tomb,
And baser weeds upon thy palms to fling,
That hence posterity may try thy reign,
Assert thy treaties, and thy wars explain,
And view in native lights the hero and the king.
III.
O evil foresight and pernicious care!
Wilt thou indeed abide by this appeal?
Shall we the lessons of thy pen compare
With private honour or with publick zeal?
Whence then at things divine those darts of scorn?
Why are the woes which virtuous men have borne
For sacred Truth a prey to Laughter giv'n
What fiend, what foe of Nature, urg'd thy arm
Th' Almighty of his sceptre to disarm,
To push this earth adrist and leave it loose from heav'n?
IV.
Ye godlike Shades of legislators old!
Ye who made Rome victorious Athens wise!
Ye first of mortals, with the blest enroll'd!
Say, did not horrour in your bosoms rise
When thus by impious Vanity impell'd
A magistrate, a monarch, ye beheld
Affronting civil Order's holiest bands,
Those bands which ye so labour'd to improve.
Those hopes and fears of justice from above
Which tam'd the savage world to your divine commands?
ODE IX. TO THE RIGHT REV. BENJAMIN LORD BISHOP OF WINCHESTER, 1754.
I. 1.
FOR toils which patriots have endur'd,
For treason quell'd and laws secur'd,
In ev'ry nation Time displays
The palm of honourable praise.
Envy may rail and Faction fierce
May strive; but what, alas! can those
(Tho' bold yet blind and sordid foes)
To gratitude and love oppose,
To faithful story and persuasive verse?
I. 2.
O Nurse of freedom, Albion! say,
Thou tamer of despotick sway,
What man among thy sons around
Thus heir to glory hast thou found?
What page in all thy annals bright
Hast thou with purer joy survey'd
Than that where truth by Hoadley's aid
Shines thro' imposture's solemn shade,
Thro' kingly and thro' sacerdotal night?
I. 3.
To him the Teacher blest
Who sent religion from the palmy field
By Jordan like the morn to cheer the west,
And lifted up the veil which Heav'n from earth conceal'd,
To Hoadley thus his mandate he addrest;
"Go thou and rescue my dishonour'd law
"From hands rapacious and from tongues impure;
"Let not my peaceful name be made a lure
"Fell Persecution's mortal snares to aid,
"Let not my words be impious chains to draw
"The freeborn soul in more than brutal awe,
"To faith without assent, allegiance unrepaid."
II. 1.
Stanza
II. 1.] Mr. Locke died in 1704, when Mr. Hoadley was beginning to distinguish himself in the cause of civil and religious liberty, Lord Godolphin in 1712, when the doctrines of the Jacobite faction were chiefly favoured by those in power, Lord Somers in 1716, amid the practices of the Nonjuring clergy against the Protestant establishment, and Lord Stanhope in 1721, during the controversy with the lower
ouse of Convocation.
No cold or unperforming hand
Was arm'd by Heav'n with this command:
The world soon felt it; and on high
To William's ear with welcome joy
Did Locke among the blest unfold
The rising hope of Hoadley's name,
Godolphin then confirm'd the fame,
And Somers when from earth he came,
And gen'rous Stanhope, the fair sequel told.
II. 2.
Then drew the lawgivers around,
(Sires of the Grecian name renown'd)
And list'ning ask'd and wond'ring knew
What private force could thus subdue
The vulgar and the great combin'd,
Could war with sacred folly wage,
Could a whole nation disengage
From the dread bonds of many an age
And to new habits mould the publick mind.
II. 3.
For not a conqueror's sword
Nor the strong pow'rs to civil founders known
Were his, but truth by faithful search explor'd
And social sense like seed in genial plenty sown.
Wherever it took root the soul (restor'd
To freedom) freedom too for others sought.
Not monkish craft, the tyrant's claim divine,
Not regal zeal, the bigot's cruel shrine,
Could longer guard from Reason's warfare sage;
Not the wild rabble to sedition wrought,
Nor synods by the papal Genius taught,
Nor St. John's spirit loose nor Atterbury's rage.
III. 1.
But where shall recompense be found,
Or how such arduous merit crown'd?
For look on life's laborious scene
What rugged spaces he between
Advent'rous Virtue's early toils
And her triumphal throne! the shade
Of death mean-time does oft' invade
Her progress, nor to us display'd
Wears the bright heroine her expected spoils.
III. 2.
Yet born to conquer is her pow'r:
—O Hoadley! if that fav'rite hour
On earth arrive, with thankful awe
We own just Heav'n's indulgent law,
And proudly thy success behold;
We attend thy rev'rend length of days
With benediction and with praise,
And hail thee in our publick ways
Like some great spirit fam'd in ages old.
III. 3.
While thus our vows prolong
Thy steps on earth, and when by us resign'd
Thou join'st thy seniors, that heroick throng
Who rescu'd or preserv'd the rights of humankind,
O! not unworthy may thy Albion's tongue
Thee still her friend and benefactor name;
O! never, Hoadley! in thy country's eyes
May impious gold or pleasure's gaudy prize
Make publick
tue, publick freedom vile,
Nor our own manners tempt us to disclaim
That heritage, our noblest wealth and same,
Which thou hast kept entire from force and factious guile.
ODE X.
I.
IF rightly tuneful bards decide,
If it be fix'd in Love's decrees
That beauty ought not to be try'd
But by its native pow'r to please,
Then tell me, Youths and Lovers! tell
What fair can Amoret excel?
II.
Behold that bright unfully'd smile,
And Wisdom speaking in her mien,
Yet (she so artless all the while,
So little studious to be seen)
We nought but instant gladness know,
Nor think to whom the gift we owe.
III.
But neither musick nor the pow'rs
Of youth, and mirth, and frolick cheer,
Add half that sunshine to the hours,
Or make life's prospect half so clear,
As mem'ry brings it to the eye
From scenes where Amoret was by.
IV.
Yet not a satirist could there
Or fault or indiscretion find,
Nor any prouder sage declare
One virtue pictur'd in his mind
Whose form with lovelier colours glows
Than Amoret's demeanour shows.
V.
This sure is beauty's happiest part,
This gives the most unbounded sway,
This shall enchant the subject heart
When rose and lily fade away,
And she be still in spite of time
Sweet Amoret in all her prime.
ODE XI. AT STUDY.
I.
WHITHER did my fancy stray?
By what magick drawn away
Have I left my studious theme,
From this philosophick page,
From the problems of the sage,
Wand'ring thro' a pleasing dream?
II.
'Tis in vain, alas! I find,
Much in vain, my zealous mind
Would to learned Wisdom's throne
Dedicate each thoughtful hour;
Nature bids a softer pow'r
Claim some minutes for his own.
III.
Let the busy or the wise
View him with contemptuous eyes,
Love is native to the heart:
Guide its wishes as you will,
Without love you 'll find it still
Void in one essential part.
IV.
Me tho' no peculiar fair
Touches with a lover's care,
Tho' the pride of my desire
Asks immortal Friendship's name,
Asks the palm of honest fame,
And the old heroick lyre;
V.
Tho' the day have smoothly gone,
Or to letter'd leisure known
Or in social duty spent,
Yet at eve my lonely breast
Seeks in vain for perfect rest,
Languishes for true content.
ODE XII. TO THE COUNTRY GENTLEMEN OF ENGLAND, 1758.
I.
WHITHER is Europe's ancient spirit fled?
Where are those valiant tenants of her shore
Who from the warriour-bow the strong dart sped,
Or with firm hand the rapid poleaxe bore?
Freeman and Soldier was their common name
Who late with reapers to the furrow came,
Now in the front of battle charg'd the foe,
Who taught the steer the wintry plough t' endure,
Now in full councils check'd encroaching pow'r,
And gave the guardian laws their majesty to know.
II.
But who are ye? from Ebro's loit'ring sons
To Tiber's pageants, to the sports of Seine,
From Rhine's frail palaces to Danube's thrones,
And cities looking on the Cimbrick main,
Ye lost, ye self-deserted! whose proud lords
Have baffled your tame hands, and giv'n you swords
To slavish ruffians hir'd for their command:
These at some greedy monk's or harlot's nod
See rifled nations crouch beneath their rod;
These are the publick will, the reason of the land.
III.
Thou, heedless Albion! what, alas! the while
Dost thou presume? O inexpert in arms,
Yet vain of freedom, how dost thou beguile
With dreams of hope these near and loud alarms?
Thy splendid home, thy plan of laws renown'd,
The praise and envy of the nations round,
What care hast thou to guard from Fortune's sway?
Amid the storms of war how soon may all
The lofty pile from its foundations fall,
Of ages the proud toil, the ruin of a day!
IV.
No; thou art rich, thy streams and fertile vales
Add industry's wise gifts to Nature's store,
And ev'ry port is crowded with thy fails,
And ev'ry wave throws treasure on thy shore.
What boots it? if luxurious plenty charm
Thy selfish heart from glory, if thy arm
Shrink at the frowns of danger and of pain,
Those gifts, that treasure, is no longer thine.
Oh! rather far be poor. Thy gold will shine
Tempting the eye of Force, and deck thee to thy bane.
V.
But what hath force or war to do with thee?
Girt by the azure tide, and thron'd sublime
Amid thy floating bulwarks, thou canst see
With scorn the fury of each hostile clime
Dash'd ere it reach thee. Sacred from the foe
Are thy fair fields. Athwart thy guardian prow
No bold invader's foot shall tempt the strand.—
Yet say, my Country! will the waves and wind
Obey thee? hast thou all thy hopes resign'd
To the sky's fickle faith the pilot's wav'ring hand?
VI.
For oh! may neither fear nor stronger love
(Love by thy virtuous princes nobly won)
Thee last of many wretched nations move
With mighty armies station'd round the throne
To trust thy safety. Then farewell the claims
Of Freedom! her proud records to the flames
Then bear, an off'ring at Ambition's shrine,
Whate'er thy ancient patriots dar'd demand
From furious John's or faithless Charles's hand,
Or what great William seal'd for his adopted line.
VII.
But if thy sons be worthy of their name,
If lib'ral laws with lib'ral hearts they prize,
Let them from conquest and from servile shame
In war's glad school their own protectors rise.
Ye chiefly, heirs of Albion's cultur'd plains!
Ye leaders of her bold and faithful swains!
Now not unequal to your birth be found;
The publick voice bids arm your rural state,
Paternal hamlets for your ensigns wait,
And grange and fold prepare to pour their youth around.
VIII.
Why are ye tardy? what inglorious care
Detains you from their head, your native post?
Who most their country's fame and fortune share
'Tis theirs to share her toils her perils most.
Each man his task in social life sustains:
With partial labours with domestick gains
Let others dwell: to you indulgent Heav'n
By counsel and by arms the publick cause
To serve for publick love and love's applause,
The first employment far, the noblest hire, hath giv'n.
IX.
Have ye not heard of Lacedaemon's fame?
Of Attick chiefs in Freedom's war divine?
Of Rome's dread gen'rals? the Valerian name?
The Fabian sons? the Scipios? matchless line!
Your lot was theirs. The farmer and the swain
Met his lov'd patron's summons from the plain;
The legions gather'd; the bright Eagles flew;
Barbarian monarchs in the triumph mourn'd,
The conq'rors to their household gods return'd,
And fed Calabrian flocks, and steer'd the Sabine plough.
X.
Shall then this glory of the antick age,
This pride of men, be lost among mankind?
Shall war's heroick arts no more engage
The unbought hand the unsubjected mind?
Doth valour to the race no more belong?
No more with scorn of violence and wrong
Doth forming Nature now her sons inspire,
That like some mystery to few reveal'd
The skill of arms abash'd and aw'd they yield,
And from their own defence with hopeless hearts retire?
XI.
O shame to human life to human laws!
The loose advent'rer, hireling of a day,
Who his fell sword without affection draws,
Whose god whose country is a tyrant's pay,
This man the lessons of the field can learn,
Can ev'ry palm which decks a warriour earn,
And ev'ry pledge of conquest, while in vain
To guard your altars, your paternal lands,
Are social arms held out to your free hands!
Too arduous is the lore, too irksome were the pain.
XII.
Mean-time by Pleasure's lying tales allur'd
From the bright sun and living breeze ye stray,
And deep in London's gloomy haunts immur'd
Brood o'er your fortune's, freedom's, health's decay.
O blind of choice, and to yourselves untrue!
The young grove shoots, their bloom the fields renew,
The mansion asks its lord, the swains their friend,
While he doth Riot's orgies haply share,
Or tempt the gamester's dark destroying snare,
Or at some courtly shrine with slavish incense bend.
XIII.
And yet full oft' your anxious tongues complain
That lawless tumult prompts the rustick throng,
That the rude village inmates now disdain
Those homely ties which rul'd their fathers long.
Alas! your fathers did by other arts
Draw those kind ties around their simple hearts,
And led in other parts their ductile will,
By succour, faithful counsel, courteous cheer,
Won them the ancient manners to revere,
To prize their country's peace, and Heav'n's duerites fulfil.
XIV.
But mark the judgment of experienc'd Time,
Tutor of nations. Doth light discord tear
A state, and impotent sedition's crime?
The pow'rs of warlike prudence dwell not there,
The pow'rs who to command and to obey
Instruct the valiant. There would civil sway
The rising race to manly concord tame,
Oft' let the marshall'd field their steps unite,
And in glad splendour bring before their sight
One common cause and one hereditary fame.
XV.
Nor yet be aw'd nor yet your task disown
Tho' war's proud votaries look on severe,
Tho' secrets taught erewhile to them alone
They deem profan'd by your intruding ear;
Let them in vain your martial hope to quell
Of new refinements fiercer weapons tell,
And mock the old simplicity in vain:
To the time's warfare simple or refin'd
The time itself adapts the warriour's mind,
And equal prowess still shall equal palms obtain.
XVI.
Say then, if England's youth in earlier days
On Glory's field with well train'd armies vy'd,
Why shall they now renounce that gen'rous praise?
Why dread the foreign mercenary's pride?
Tho' Valois brav'd young Edward's gentle hand,
And Albert rush'd on Henry's way-worn band,
With Europe's chosen sons in arms renown'd,
Yet not on Vere's bold archers long they look'd,
Nor Audley's squires nor Mowbray'sycomen brook'd;
They saw their standard fall, and left their monarch bound.
XVII.
Such were the laurels which your fathers won,
Such Glory's dictates in their dauntless breast.
—Is there no voice that speaks to ev'ry son,
No nobler holier call to you addrest?
O! by majestick Freedom, righteous Laws,
By heav'nly Truth's by manly Reason's cause,
Awake! attend! be indolent no more:
By Friendship, social Peace, domestick Love,
Rise! arm! your Country's living safety prove,
And train her valiant youth, and watch around her shore.
ODE XIII. ON RECOVERING FROM A FIT OF SICKNESS, In the Country, 1758.
I.
THY verdant scenes, O Goulder's Hill!
Once more I seek, a languid guest;
With throbbing temples and with burden'd breast
Once more I climb thy steep aerial way.
O faithful cure of oft'-returning ill!
Now call thy sprightly breezes round,
Dissolve this rigid cough profound,
And bid the springs of life with gentler movement play.
II.
How gladly 'mid the dews of dawn
My weary lungs thy healing gale,
The balmy west or the fresh north, inhale!
How gladly while my musing footsteps rove
Round the cool orchard or the sunny lawn
Awak'd I stop, and look to find
What shrub perfumes the pleasant wind,
Or what wild songster charms the Dryads of the grove!
III.
Now ere the morning walk is done
The distant voice of Health I hear
Welcome as Beauty's to the lover's ear:
"Droop not, nor doubt of my return," she cries;
"Here will I 'mid the radiant calm of noon
"Meet thee beneath yon' chestnut bow'r,
"And lenient on thy bosom pour
"That indolence divine which lulls the earth and skies."
IV.
The goddess promis'd not in vain;
I found her at my fav'rite time,
Nor wish'd to breathe in any softer clime,
While (half-reclin'd half-slumb'ring as I lay)
She hover'd o'er me: then among her train
Of Nymphs and Zephirs to my view
Thy gracious form appear'd anew,
Then first, O heav'nly Muse! unseen for many a day.
V.
In that soft pomp the tuneful maid
Shone like the golden star of Love:
I saw her hand in careless measures move,
I heard sweet preludes dancing on her lyre,
While my whole frame the sacred sound obey'd.
New sunshine o'er my fancy springs,
New colours clothe external things,
And the last glooms of pain and sickly plaint retire.
VI.
O Goulder's Hill! by thee restor'd
Once more to this enliven'd hand
My harp, which late resounded o'er the land
The voice of Glory solemn and severe,
My Dorian harp, shall now with mild accord
To thee her joyful tribute pay,
And send a less ambitious lay
Of friendship and of love to greet thy master's ear:
VII.
For when within thy shady seat
First from the sultry Town he chose,
And the tir'd senate's cares, his wish'd repose,
Then wast thou mine; to me a happier home
For social leisure, where my welcome feet,
Estrang'd from all th' intangling ways
In which the restless vulgar strays
Thro' Nature's simple paths with ancient Faith might roam.
VIII.
And while around his sylvan scene
My Dyson led the white wing'd Hours
Oft' from th' Athenian Academick bow'rs
Their sages came, oft' heard our ling'ring walk,
The Mantuan musick warbling o'er the green,
And oft' did Tully's rev'rend shade,
Tho' much for liberty afraid,
With us of letter'd ease or virtuous glory talk.
IX.
But other guests were on their way,
And reach'd ere long this favour'd grove,
Ev'n the celestial progeny of Jove,
Bright Venus! with her allsubduing son,
Whose golden shaft most willingly obey
The best and wisest. As they came
Glad Hymen wav'd his genial flame,
And sang their happy gifts and prais'd their spotless throne.
X.
I saw when thro' yon' festive gate
He led along his chosen maid,
And to my friend with smiles presenting said;
"Receive that fairest wealth which Heav'n assign'd
"To human fortune. Did thy lonely state
"One wish, one utmost hope, confess?
"Behold! she comes t' adorn and bless;
"Comes worthy of thy heart and equal to thy mind."
ODE XIV. THE COMPLAINT.
I.
AWAY! away!
Tempt me no more insidious Love!
Thy soothing sway
Long did my youthful bosom prove:
At length thy treason is discern'd,
At length some dearbought caution earn'd:
Away! nor hope my riper age to move.
II.
I know, I see
Her merit. Needs it now be shewn,
Alas! to me?
How often to myself unknown
The graceful, gentle, virtuous, maid
Have I admir'd! how often said
What joy to call a heart like her's one's own!
III.
But, flattering God!
O squand'rer of content and ease!
In thy abode
Will Care's rude lesson learn to please?
O say, Deceiver! hast thou won
Proud Fortune to attend thy throne,
Or plac'd thy friends above her stern decrees?
ODE XV. ON DOMESTICK MANNERS. [UNFINISHED.]
I.
MEEK Honour, female shame,
O! whither, sweetest offspring of the sky!
From Albion dost thou fly,
Of Albion's daughters once the fav'rite fame?
O Beauty's only friend!
Who giv'st her pleasing rev'rence to inspire,
Who selfish bold desire
Dost to esteem and dear affection turn,
Alas! of thee forlorn
What joy, what praise, what hope, can life pretend?
II.
Behold! our youths in vain
Concerning nuptial happiness inquire;
Our maids no more aspire
The arts of bashful Hymen to attain,
But with triumphant eyes
And cheeks impassive as they move along
Ask homage of the throng;
The lover swears that in a harlot's arms
Are found the selfsame charms,
And worthless and deserted lives and dies.
III.
Behold! unbless'd at home
The father of the cheerless household mourns;
The night in vain returns,
For Love and glad Content at distance roam,
While she in whom his mind
Seeks refuge from the day's dull task of cares,
To meet him she prepares
Thro' noise, and spleen, and all the gamester's art,
A listless harrass'd heart,
Where not one tender thought can welcome find.
IV.
'Twas thus along the shore
Of Thames Britannia's guardian Genius heard
From many a tongue preferr'd
Of strife and grief the fond invective lore,
At which the queen divine
Indignant, with her adamantine spear
Like thunder sounding near
Smote the Redcross upon her silver shield,
And thus her wrath reveal'd,
(I watch'd her awful words and made them mine.)
* * * * * * * * * *
END OF BOOK SECOND.
MISCELLANIES.
AN EPISTLE TO CURIO
Curio was a young Roman Senator of distinguished rank and parts. Being profusely extravagant he soon dissipated a splendid fortune, to supply the want of which he entered into the designs of Caesar against the liberties of his country, altho' he had formerly been a professed enemy to him. Cicero, to whose care he had been committed upon his first entrance into the Forum, exerted himself to prevent his ruin, but without effect, and he became one of the first victims in the Civil war. This Epistle was first published in the 1744, when a celebrated patriot was supposed to have deserted the cause of his country. The Author afterwards transformed it into the Ode to Curio,
"a performance disgraceful only to its Author,"
says a celebrated writer. The Epistle, which is too curious to be omitted, we here give in its original form. The Ode is printed p. 31. of this volume.
.
THRICE has the spring beheld thy faded fame
And the fourth winter rises on thy shame
Since I exulting grasp'd the votive shell
In sounds of triumph all thy praise to tell,
Blest could my skill thro' ages make thee shine,
And proud to mix my memory with thine.
But now the cause that wak'd my song before
With praise with triumph crowns the toil no more.
If to the glorious man whose faithful cares,
Nor quell'd by malice nor relax'd by years,
Had aw'd Ambition's wild audacious hate,
And dragg'd at length Corruption to her fate,
If ev'ry tongue its large applauses ow'd,
And wellearn'd laurels ev'ry Muse bestow'd,
If publick justice urg'd the high reward,
And Freedom smil'd on the devoted bard,
Say then, to him whose levity or lust
Laid all a people's gen'rous hopes in dust,
Who taught Ambition firmer heights of pow'r,
And sav'd Corruption at her hopeless hour,
Does not each tongue its execrations owe?
Shall not each Muse a wreath of shame bestow?
And publick justice fanctify th' award,
And Freedom's hand protect th' impartial bard?
Yet, long reluctant, I forbore thy name,
Long watch'd thy virtue like a dying flame,
Hung o'er each glimm'ring spark with anxious eyes,
And wish'd and hop'd the light again would rise;
Put since thy guilt still more entire appears,
Since no art hides, no supposition clears,
Since vengeful Slander now too sinks her blast,
And the first rage of party-hate is past,
Calm as the judge of Truth at length I come
To weigh thy merits and pronounce thy doom;
So may my trust from all reproach be free,
And Earth and Time confirm the fair decree!
There are who say they view'd without amaze
Thy sad reverse of all thy former praise,
That thro' the pageants of a patriot's name
They pierc'd the foulness of thy secret aim,
Or deem'd thy arm exalted but to throw
The publick thunder on a private foe;
But I, whose soul consented to thy cause,
Who felt thy genius stamp its own applause,
Who saw the spirits of each glorious age
Move in thy bosom and direct thy rage,
I scorn'd th' ungen'rous gloss of slavish minds,
The owley'd race whom Virtue's lustre blinds:
Spite of the learned in the ways of vice,
And all who prove that each man has his price,
I still believ'd thy end was just and free,
And yet, ev'n yet believe it—spite of thee;
Ev'n tho' thy mouth impure has dar'd disclaim,
Urg'd by the wretched impotence of shame,
Whatever filial cares thy zeal had paid
To laws infirm and liberty decay'd,
Has begg'd Ambition to forgive the show,
Has told Corruption thou wert ne'er her foe,
Has boasted in thy country's awful ear
Her gross delusion when she held thee dear,
How tame she follow'd thy tempestuous call,
And heard thy pompous tales, and trusted all.—
Rise from your sad abodes ye curst of old
For laws subverted and for cities sold!
Paint all the noblest trophies of your guilt,
The oaths you perjur'd and the blood you spilt;
Yet must you one untempted vileness own,
One dreadful palm reserv'd for him alone;
With study'd arts his country's praise to spurn,
To beg the infamy he did not earn,
To challenge hate when honour was his due,
And plead his crimes where all his virtue knew!
Do robes of state the guarded heart enclose
From each fair feeling human nature knows?
Can pompous titles stun th' enchanted ear
To all that reason all that sense would hear?
Else couldst thou e'er desert thy sacred post,
In such unthankful baseness to be lost?
Else couldst thou wed the emptiness of vice,
And yield thy glories at an idiot's price?
When they who loud for liberty and laws
In doubtful times had fought their country's cause,
When now of conquest and dominion sure
They
ought alone to hold their fruits secure,
When taught by these Oppression hid the face
To leave Corruption stronger in her place,
By silent spells to work the publick fate,
And taint the vitals of the passive state,
Till healing Wisdom should avail no more,
And Freedom loath to tread the poison'd shore,
Then like some guardian god that slies to save
The weary pilgrim from an instant grave,
Whom sleeping and secure the guileful snake
Steals near and nearer thro' the peaceful brake,
Then Curio rose, toward the publick wo
To wake the heedless and incite the slow,
Against Corruption Liberty to arm,
And quell th' enchantress by a mightier charm.
Swift o'er the land the fair contagion
lew,
And with thy country's hopes thy honours grew:
Thee patriot the Patrician roof confest;
Thy pow'rful voice the rescu'd merchant blest;
Of thee with awe the rural hearth resounds;
The bowl to thee the grateful sailor crowns:
Touch'd in the sighing shade with manlier sires
To trace thy steps the lovesick youth aspires;
The learn'd recluse who oft' amaz'd had read
Of Grecian heroes Roman patriots dead,
With new amazement hears a living name
Pretend to share in such forgotten fame;
And he who scorning courts and courtly ways
Left the tame track of these dejected days
The life of nobler ages to renew
In virtues sacred from a monarch's view,
Rous'd by thy labours from the bless'd retreat
Where social ease and publick passions meet,
Again ascending treads the civil scene,
To act and be a man as thou hadst been.
Thus by degrees thy cause superiour grew,
And the great end appear'd at last in view;
We heard the people in thy hopes rejoice,
We saw the senate bending to thy voice;
The friends of freedom hail'd th' approaching reign
Of laws for which our fathers bled in vain,
While venal Faction struck with new dismay
Shrunk at their frown, and self-abandon'd lay.
Wak'd in the shock the Publick Genius rose
Abash'd and keener from his long repose;
Sublime in ancient pride he rais'd the spear
Which slaves and tyrants long were wont to fear:
The City felt his call; from man to man,
From street to street, the glorious horrour ran;
Each crowded haunt was stirr'd beneath his pow'r,
And murm'ring challeng'd the deciding hour.
Lo! the deciding hour at last appears,
The hour of ev'ry freeman's hopes and fears!
Thou, Genius! guardian of the Roman name,
O ever prompt tyrannick rage to tame!
Instruct the mighty moments as they rowl,
And guide each movement steady to the goal.
Ye Spirits! by whose providential art
Succeeding motives turn the changeful heart,
Keep, keep the best in view to Curio's mind,
And watch his fancy and his passions bind!
Ye Shades immortal! who by Freedom led
Or in the field or on the scaffold bled,
Bend from your radiant seats a joyful eye,
And view the crown of all your labours nigh;
See Freedom mounting her eternal throne!
The sword submitted and the laws her own;
See publick Pow'r chastis'd beneath her stands,
With eyes intent and uncorrupted hands!
See private life by wisest arts reclaim'd!
See ardent youth to noblest manners fram'd!
See us acquire whate'er was sought by you
If Curio, only Curio, will be true.
'Twas then—O shame! O trust how ill repaid!
O Latium! oft' by faithless sons betray'd!—
'Twas then—What frenzy on thy reason stole?
What spells unsinew'd thy determin'd soul?
—Is this the man in Freedom's cause approv'd,
The man so great, so honour'd, so belov'd,
This patient slave by tinsel chains allur'd,
This wretched suitor for a boon abjur'd,
This Curio, hated and despis'd by all,
Who fell himself to work his country's fall?
O lost alike to action and repose!
Unknown, unpity'd, in the worst of woes!
With all that conscious undissembled pride
Sold to the insults of a foe defy'd!
With all that habit of familiar same
Doom'd to exhaust the dregs of life in shame!
The sole sad refuge of thy baffled art,
To act a statesman's dull exploded part,
Renounce the praise no longer in thy pow'r,
Display thy virtue tho' without a dow'r,
Contemn the giddy crowd, the vulgar wind,
And shut thy eyes that others may be blind.
—Forgive me, Romans! that I bear to smile
When shameless mouths your majesty defile,
Paint you a thoughless, frantick, headlong, crew,
And cast their own impieties on you:
For witness Freedom! to whose sacred pow'r
My soul was vow'd from reason's earliest hour,
How have I stood exulting to survey
My country's virtues op'ning in thy ray!
How with the sons of ev'ry foreign shore
The more I match'd them honour'd her's the more!
O Race erect! whose native strength of soul
Which kings, nor priests, nor sordid laws, control,
Bursts the tame round of animal affairs,
And seeks a nobler centre for its cares,
Intent the laws of life to comprehend,
And fix dominion's limits by its end,
Who bold and equal in their love or hate,
By conscious reason judging ev'ry state,
The man forget not tho' in rags he lies,
And know the mortal thro' a crown's disguise,
Thence prompt alike with witty scorn to view
Fastidious Grandeur lift his solemn brow,
Or all awake at Pity's soft command
Bend the mild ear and stretch the gracious hand,
Thence large of heart from envy far remov'd,
When publick toils to virtue stand approv'd,
Not the young lover fonder to admire,
Nor more indulgent the delighted sire,
Yet high and jealous of their freeborn name
Fierce as the flight of Jove's destroying flame,
Where'er Oppression works her wanton sway
Proud to confront and dreadful to repay;
But if to purchase Curio's sage applause
My country must with him renounce her cause,
Quit with a slave the path a patriot trod,
Bow the meek knee and kiss the regal rod,
Then still, ye Pow'rs! instruct his tongue to rail,
Nor let his zeal nor let his subject fail,
Else ere he change the style bear me away
To where the Gracchi where the Bruti
The two brothers, Tiberius and Caius Gracchus, lost their lives in attempting to introduce the only regulation that could give stability and good order to the Roman republick.
Junius Brutus founded the commonwealth, and died in its defence.
stay!
O long rever'd and late resign'd to shame!
If this uncourtly page thy notice claim,
When the loud cares of bus'ness are withdrawn,
Nor welldrest beggars round thy footsteps fawn,
In that still thoughtful solitary hour
When Truth exerts her unresisted pow'r,
Breaks the false opticks ting'd with Fortune's glare,
Unlocks the breast and lays the passions bare,
Then turn thy eyes on that important scene,
And ask thyself—if all be well within?
Where is the heartfelt worth and weight of soul
Which labour could not stop nor fear control?
Where the known dignity, the stamp of awe,
Which half-abash'd the proud and venal saw?
Where the calm triumphs of an honest cause?
Where the delightful taste of just applause?
Where the strong reason, the commanding tongue,
On which the Senate fir'd or trembling hung?
All vanish'd, all are sold!—and in their room,
Couch'd in thy bosom's deep distracted gloom,
See the pale form of barb'rous Grandeur dwell,
Like some grim idol in a sorc'rer's cell!
To her in chains thy dignity was led,
At her polluted shrine thy honour bled;
With blasted weeds thy awful brow she crown'd,
Thy pow'rful tongue with poison'd philters bound,
That baffled Reason straight indignant flew,
And fair Persuasion from her seat withdrew:
For now no longer Truth supports thy cause,
No longer Glory prompts thee to applause;
No longer Virtue breathing in thy breast,
With all her conscious majesty confest,
Still bright and brighter wakes th' almighty flame
To rouse the feeble and the wilful tame,
And where she sees the catching glimpses rowl
Spreads the strong blaze and all involves the soul;
But cold restraints thy conscious fancy chill,
And formal passions mock thy struggling will;
Or if thy Genius e'er forget his chain,
And reach impatient at a nobler strain,
Soon the sad bodings of contemptuous mirth
Shoot thro' thy breast and stab the gen'rous birth,
Till blind with smart from truth to frenzy tost,
And all the tenour of thy reason lost,
Perhaps thy anguish drains a real tear,
While some with pity some with laughter hear.
—Can art, alas! or genius, guide the head
Where truth and freedom from the heart are fled?
Can lesser wheels repeat their native stroke
When the prime function of the soul is broke?
But come, unhappy Man! thy sates impend;
Come, quit thy friends, if yet thou hast a friend;
Turn from the poor rewards of guilt like thine,
Renounce thy titles and thy robes resign;
For see the hand of Destiny display'd
To shut thee from the joys thou hast betray'd!
See the dire fane of Infamy arise
Dark as the grave and spacious as the skies,
Where from the first of time thy kindred train,
The chiefs and princes of th' unjust, remain!
Eternal barriers guard the pathless road
To warn the wand'rer of the curs'd abode,
But prone as whirlwinds scour the passive sky
The heights surmounted down the steep they fly.
There black with frowns relentless Time awaits,
And goads their footsteps to the guilty gates,
And still he asks them of their unknown aims,
Evolves their secrets and their guilt proclaims,
And still his hands despoil them on the road
Of each vain wreath by lying bards bestow'd,
Break their proud marbles, crush their festal cars,
And rend the lawless trophies of their wars.
At last the gates his potent voice obey,
Fierce to their dark abode he drives his prey,
Where ever arm'd with adamantine chains
The watchful demon o'er her vassals reigns,
O'er mighty names and giant pow'rs of lust,
The Great, the Sage, the Happy, and August
Titles which have been generally ascribed to the most pernicious of men.
;
No gleam of hope their baleful mansion cheers,
No sound of honour hails their unbless'd cars,
But dire reproaches from the friend betray'd,
The childless fire and violated maid,
But vengeful vows for guardian laws essac'd,
From towns enslav'd and continents laid waste,
But long Posterity's united groan,
And the sad charge of horrours not their own,
For ever thro' the trembling space resound,
And sink eaxh impious forehead to the ground.
Ye mighty foes of Liberty and Rest
Give way; do homage to a mightier guest!
Ye daring Spirits of the Roman race,
See Curio's toil your proudest claims efface!
—Aw'd at the name fierce Appius
Appius Claudius the Decemvir, and L. Cornelius Cinna, both attempted toestablish a tyrannical dominion in Rome, and both perished by the treason.
rising bends,
And hardy Cinna from his throne attends:
"He comes," they cry, "to whom the Fates assign'd
"With surer arts to work what we design'd,
"From year to year the stubborn herd to sway,
"Month all their wrongs and all their rage obey,
"Till own'd their guide and trusted with their pow'r
"He mock'd their hopes in one decisive hour,
"Then tir'd and yielding led them to the chain,
"And quench'd the spirit we provok'd in vain."
But thou, Supreme! by whose eternal hands
Fair Liberty's heroick empire stands,
Whose thunders the rebellious deep control,
And quell the triumphs of the traitor's soul,
O turn this dreadful omen far away!
On Freedom's foes their own attempts repay,
Relume her sacred fire so near supprest,
And six her shrine in ev'ry Roman breast.
Tho' bold Corruption boast around the land
"Let Virtue if she can my baits withstand!"
Tho' bolder now she urge th' accursed claim,
Gay with her trophies rais'd on Curio's shame,
Yet some there are who scorn her impious mirth,
Who know what conscience and a heart are worth.
—O Friend and Father of the human mind,
Whose art for noblest ends our frame design'd!
If I, tho' fated to the studious shade,
Which party-strife nor anxious pow'r invade,
If I aspire in publick virtue's cause
To guide the Muses by sublimer laws,
Do thou her own authority impart,
And give my numbers entrance to the heart:
Perhaps the verse might rouse her smother'd flame,
And snatch the fainting patriot back to fame;
Perhaps by worthy thoughts of humankind
To worthy deeds exalt the conscious mind,
Or dash Corruption in her proud career,
And teach her slaves that Vice was born to fear.
LOVE. AN ELEGY.
Too much my heart of Beauty's pow'r hath known,
Too long to Love hath Reason left her throne,
Too long my Genius mourn'd his myrtle chain,
And three rich years of youth consum'd in vain.
My wishes lull'd with soft inglorious dreams
Forgot the patriot's and the sage's themes;
Thro' each Elysian vale and Fairy grove,
Thro' all th' enchanted paradise of Love,
Misled by sickly Hope's deceitful flame,
Averse to action, and renouncing fame.
At last the visionary scenes decay,
My eyes exulting bless the newborn day
Whose faithful beams detect the dang'rous road
In which my heedless feet securely trod,
And strip the phantoms of their lying charms
That lur'd my soul from Wisdom's peaceful arms.
For silver streams and banks bespread with flow'rs,
For mossy couches and harmonious bow'rs,
Lo! barren heaths appear and pathless woods,
And rocks hung dreadful o'er unfathom'd floods:
For openness of heart, for tender smiles,
Looks fraught with love, and wrath-disarming wiles,
Lo! sullen Spite and perjur'd Lust of Gain,
And cruel Pride and crueller Disdain;
Lo! cordial Faith to idiot airs re
in'd,
Now coolly civil now transporting kind;
For graceful Ease, lo! Affectation walks,
And dull Half-sense for Wit and Wisdom talks:
New to each hour what low delight succeeds,
What precious furniture of hearts and heads!
By nought their prudence but by getting known,
And all their courage in deceiving shown.
See next what plagues attend the lover's state,
What frightful forms of Terrour, Scorn, and Hate!
See burning Fury heav'n and earth defy!
See dumb Despair in icy fetters lie!
See black Suspicion bend his gloomy brow,
The hideous image of himself to view!
And fond Belief with all a lover's flame
Sinks in those arms that points his head with shame!
There wan Dejection falt'ring as he goes,
In shades and silence vainly seeks repose,
Musing thro' pathless wilds consumes the day,
Then lost in darkness weeps the hours away.
Here the gay crowd of Luxury advance,
Some touch the lyre and others urge the dance;
On ev'ry head the rosy garland glows,
In ev'ry hand the golden goblet flows,
The Siren views them with exulting eyes,
And laughs at bashful Virtue as she flies.
But see behind where Scorn and Want appear,
The grave remonstrance and the witty sneer;
See fell Remorse in action prompt to dart
Her shaky poison thro' the conscious heart!
And Sloth to cancel with oblivious shame
The fair memorial of recording Fame!
Are these delights that one would wish to gain?
Is this th' Elysium of a sober brain?
To wait for happiness in female smiles,
Bear all her scorn, be caught with all her wiles,
With pray'rs, with bribes, with lies, her pity crave,
Bless her hard bonds, and boast to be her slave,
To feel for trifles a distracting train
Of hopes and terrours equally in vain,
This hour to tremble and the next to glow?
Can Pride, can Sense, can Reason, stoop so low,
When Virtue at an easier price displays
The sacred wreaths of honourable praise,
When Wisdom utters her divine decree
To laugh at pompous Folly and be free?
I bid adieu then to these woful scenes,
I bid adieu to all the sex of queens;
Adieu to ev'ry suff'ring simple soul
That lets a woman's will his ease control.
There laugh ye Witty! and rebuke ye Grave!
For me I scorn to boast that I'm a slave;
I bid the whining brotherhood be gone:
Joy to my heart! my wishes are my own.
Farewell the female heav'n the female hell,
To the great god of Love a glad farewell.
Is this the triumph of thy awful name?
Are these the splendid hopes that urg'd thy aim
When first my bosom own'd thy haughty sway,
When thus Minerva heard thee boasting say,
"Go, martial Maid! elsewhere thy arts employ,
"Nor hope to shelter that devoted boy;
"Go teach the solemn sons of Care and Age,
"The pensive statesmen and the midnight sage;
"The young with me must other lessons prove,
"Youth calls for Pleasure, Pleasure calls for Love;
"Behold his heart thy grave advice disdains,
"Behold I bind him in eternal chains?"
Alas! great Love, how idle was the boast!
Thy chains are broken and thy lessons lost;
Thy wilful rage has tir'd my suff'ring heart,
And passion, reason, forc'd thee to depart.
But wherefore dost thou linger on thy way,
Why vainly search for some pretence to stay
When crowds of vassals court thy pleasing yoke
And countless victims bow them to the stroke?
Lo! round thy shrine a thousand youths advance,
Warm with the gentle ardours of romance
Each longs t' assert th cause with feats of arms,
And make the world consess Dulcinea's charms.
Ten thousand girls with flow'ry chaplets crown'd
To groves and streams thy tender triumph
ound,
Each bids the stream in murmurs speak her flame,
Each calls the grove to sigh her shepherd's name:
But if thy pride such easy honours scorn,
If nobler trophies must thy toil adorn,
Behold yon' flow'ry antiquated maid
Bright in the bloom of threescore years display'd,
Her shalt thou bind in thy delightful chains,
And thrill with gentle pangs her wither'd veins,
Her frosty cheek with crimson blushes dye,
With dreams of rapture melt her maudlin eye.
Turn then thy labours to the servile crowd,
Entice the wary and control the proud,
Make the sad miser his best gains forego,
The solemn statesman sigh to be a beau,
The bold coquette with fondest passion burn,
The Bacchanalian o'er his bottle mourn,
And that chief glory of thy pow'r maintain
"To poise ambition in a female brain."
Be these thy triumphs, but no more presume
That my rebellious heart will yield thee room:
I know thy puny force thy simple wiles,
I break triumphant thro' thy slimsy toils:
I see thy dying lamp's last languid glow,
Thy arrows blunted and unbrac'd thy bow;
I feel diviner fires my breast inflame
To active science and ingenuous fame,
Resume the paths my earliest choice began,
And lose with pride the lover in the man.
A BRITISH PHILIPPICK, OCCASIONED BY THE INSULTS OF THE SPANIARDS, AND THE PRESENT PREPARATIONS FOR WAR, 1738.
WHENCE this unwonted transport in my breast?
Why glow my thoughts? and whither would the Muse
Aspire with rapid wing? Her country's cause
Demands her efforts: at that sacred call
She summons all her ardour, throws aside
The trembling lyre, and with the warriour's trump
She means to thunder in each British ear;
And if one spark of honour or of fame,
Disdain of insult, dread of infamy,
One thought of publick virtue, yet survive,
She means to wake it, rouse the gen'rous flame,
With patriot zeal inspirit ev'ry breast,
And
ire each British heart with British wrongs.
Alas, the vain attempt! What influence now
Can the Muse boast? or what attention now
Is paid to fame or virtue? Where is now
The British spirit, gen'rous, warm, and brave,
So frequent wont from tyranny and wo
To free the suppliant nations? Where indeed
If that protection once to strangers giv'n
Be now withheld from sons! each nobler thought
That wa
'd our
ires is lost and bury'd now
In luxury and avarice. Baneful vice!
H
w it unmans a nation! Yet I'll try;
aim to shake this vile degen'rate sloth,
I'll dare to rouse Britannia's dreaming sons
To fame, to virtue, and impart around
A gen'rous feeling of compatriot woes.
Come then the various pow'rs of forceful Speech,
All that can move, awaken, fire, transport!
Come the bold ardour of the Theban bard,
Th' arousing thunder of the patriot Greek,
The soft persuasion of the Roman sage!
Come all! and raise me to an equal height,
A r
pture worthy of my glorious cause,
Lest my best efforts failing should debase
The sacred them
, for with no common wing
The Muse attempts to soar. Yet what need these?
My country's fame, my freeborn British heart,
Shall be my best inspirers, raise my flight
High as the Theban's pinion, and with more
Than Greek or Roman flame exalt my soul.
Oh! could I give the vast ideas birth
Expressive of the thoughts that flame within,
No more should lazy Luxury detain
Our ardent youth, no more should Britain's sons
Sit tamely passive by, and careless hear
The pray'rs, sighs, groans, (immortal insamy!)
Of fellow Britons with oppression sunk
In bitterness of soul demanding aid,
Calling on Britain their dear native land,
The land of Liberty, so greatly sam'd
For just redress, the land so often dy'd
With her best blood, for that arousing cause
The freedom of her sons; those sons that now
Far from the manly blessings of her sway
Drag the vile fetters of a Spanish lord.
And dare they, dare the vanquish'd sons of Spain,
Enslave a Briton? Have they then forgot,
So soon forgot, the great th' immortal day
When rescu'd Sicily with joy beheld
The swift-wing'd thunder of the British arm
Disperse their navies, when their coward bands
Fled like the raven from the bird of Jove,
From swift impending vengeance fled in vain?
Are these our lords? and can Britannia see
Her soes oft' vanquish'd thus defy her pow'r,
Insult her standard and enslave her sons,
And not arise to justice? Did our sires,
Unaw'd by chains, by exile, or by death,
Preserve inviolate her guardian rights,
To Britons ever sacred, that their sons
Might give them up to Spaniards?—Turn your eyes,
Turn ye degen'rate! who with haughty boast
Call yourselves Britons, to that dismal gloom,
That dungeon dark and deep, where never thought
Of joy or peace can enter; see the gates
Harsh-creaking open; what an hideous void,
Dark as the yawning grave! while still as death
A frightful silence reigns: there on the ground
Behold your brethren chain'd like beasts of prey,
There mark your num'rous glories, there behold
The look that speaks unutterable wo,
The mangled limb, the faint the deathful eye,
With famine sunk, the deep-heart bursting groan
Suppress'd in silence; view the loathsome food
Refus'd by dogs; and oh the stinging thought!
View the dark Spaniard glorying in their wrongs,
The deadly priest triumphant in their woes,
And thund'ring worse damnation on their souls,
While that pale form in all the pangs of death
Too faint to speak, yet eloquent of all
His native British spirit yet untam'd,
Raises his head, and with indignant srowns
Of great defiance and superiour scorn
Looks up and dies.—Oh! I'm all on fire!
But let me spare the theme, lest future times
Should blush to hear that either conquer'd Spain
Durst offer Britain such outrageous wrong
Or Britain tamely bore it.—
Descend ye guardian Heroes of the land!
Scourges of Spain descend! behold your sons,
See how they run the same heroick race,
How prompt how ardent in their country's cause,
How greatly proud t'assert their British blood,
And in their deeds reflect their fathers' fame!
Ah! would to Heav'n ye did not rather see
How dead to virtue in the publick cause,
How cold, how careless, how to glory deaf,
They shame your laurels and belie their birth!
Come ye great Spirits, Cav'ndish, Rawleigh, Blake!
And ye of later name, your country's pride,
Oh come! disperse these lazy fumes of sloth,
Teach British hearts with British fires to glow;
In wak'ning whispers rouse our ardent youth,
Blazon the triumphs of your better days,
Paint all the glorious scenes of rightful war
In all its splendours; to their swelling souls
Say how ye bow'd th' insulting Spaniards' pride,
Say how ye thunder'd o'er their prostrate heads,
Say how ye broke their lines and fir'd their ports,
Say how not death in all its srightful shapes
Could damp your souls or shake the great resolve
For right and Britain; then display the joys
The patriot's soul exalting while he views
Transported millions hail with loud acclaim
The guardian of their civil sacred rights;
(How greatly welcome to the virtuous man
Is death for others' good!) the radiant thoughts
That beam celestial on his passing soul,
Th' unfading crowns awaiting him above,
The exalting plaudit of the Great Supreme,
Who in his actions with complacence views
His own reflected splendour; then descend
Tho' to a lower yet a nobler scene;
Paint the just honours to his relicks paid,
Shew grateful millions weeping o'er his grave,
While his fair fame in each progressive age
For ever brightens, and the wise and good
Of ev'ry land in universal choir
With richest incense of undying praise
His urn encircle, to the wond ring world
His num'rous triumphs blazon, while with awe,
With filial rev'rence, in his steps they tread,
And copying ev'ry virtue ev'ry fame
Transplant his glories into second life,
And with unsparing hand make nations blest
By his example. Vast immense rewards
For all the turmoils which the virtuous mind
Encounters here! Yet, Britons! are ye cold?
Yet deaf to glory, virtue, and the call
Of your poor injur'd countrymen? Ah! no:
I see ye are not; ev'ry bosom glows
With native greatness, and in all its state
The British spirit rises. Glorious change!
Fame, Virtue, Freedom, welcome! Oh! forgive
The Muse, that ardent in her sacred cause
Your glory question'd; she beholds with joy,
She owns, she triumphs, in her wish'd mistake.
See from her seabeat throne in awful march
Britannia tow'rs! upon her laurel crest
The plumes majestick nod; behold she heaves
Her guardian shields, and terrible in arms
For battle shakes her adamantine spear;
Loud at her foot the British Lion roars,
Frighting the nations: haughty Spain full soon
Shall hear and tremble. Go then, Britons! forth
Your country's daring champions; tell your foes,
Tell them in thunders o'er their prostrate land,
You were not born for slaves: let all your deeds
Shew that the sons of those immortal men,
The stars of shining story, are not slow
In virtue's path to emulate their sires,
T' assert their country's rights, avenge her sons,
And hurl the bolts of Justice on her soes.
HYMNS.
HYMN TO THE NAIADS. MDCCXLVI.
The Argument.
The Nymphs who preside over springs and rivulets are addressed at daybreak in honour of their several fun
ons, and of the relations which they bear to the natural and to the moral world. Their origin is deduced from the first allegorical deities or powers of Nature, according to the doctrine of the old mythological poets concerning the generation of the gods and the rise of things. They are then successively considered as giving motion to the air and exciting summer breezes; as nourishing and beautifying the vegetable creation; as contributing to the fulness of navigable rivers, and consequently to the maintenance of commerce, and by that means to the maritime part of military p
er. Next is represented their favourable influence upon health when assisted by rural exercise, which introduces their connexion with the art of physick, and the happy effects of mineral medicinal springs. Lastly, they are celebrated for the friendship which the Muses
them and for the true inspiration which temperance only can receive, in opposition to the enthusiasm of the more licentious poets.
O'ER yonder eastern hill the Twilight pale
Walks forth from darkness, and the god of Day
With bright Astraea seated by his side
Waits yet to leave the ocean. Tarry, Nymphs!
Ye Nymphs! ye blueey'd progeny of Thames!
Who now the mazes of this rugged heath
Trace with your fleeting steps, who all night long
Repeat amid the cool and tranquil air
Your lonely murmurs, tarry, and receive
My offer'd lay. To pay you homage due
I leave the gates of Sleep; nor shall my lyre
Too far into the splendid hours of Morn
Engage your audience; my observant hand
Shall close the strain ere any sultry beam
Approach you: to your subterranean haunts
Ye then may timely steal, to pace with care
The humid sands, to loosen from the soil
The bubbling sources, to direct the rills
To meet in wider channels, or beneath
Some grotto's dripping arch at height of noon
To slumber, shelter'd from the burning heav'n.
Where shall my song begin ye Nymphs! or end?
Wide is your praise and copious.—First of things,
First of the lonely pow'rs, ere Time arose,
Were Love and Chaos; Love the fire of Fate,
℣. 25.
—Love—Elder than Chaos.
] Hesiod in his Theogony gives a different account, and makes Chaos the eldest of beings, though he assigns to Love neither father nor superiour, which circumstance is particularly mentioned by Phaedrus in Plato's Banquet as being observable not only in Hesiod but in all other writers both of verse and prose, and on the same occasion he cites a line from Parmenides, in which Love is expressly styled the eldest of all the gods. Yet Aristophanes, in The Birds, affirms that
"Chaos and Night, and Erebus and Tartarus, were first, and that Love was produced from an egg which the sable-winged Night deposited in the immense bosom of Erebus."
But it must be observed that the Love designed by this comick poet was always distinguished from the other, from that original and selfexistent being the ΤΟ ΟΝ or ΑΓΑΘΟΝ of Plato, and meant only the ΔΗΜΙΟΥΡΓΟΣ or second person of the old Grecian trinity, to whom is inscribed an hymn among those which pass under the name of Orpheus, where he is called Protogonos, or the First-begotten, is said to have been born of an egg, and is represented as the principal or origin of all these external appearances of Nature. In the Fragments of Orpheus collected by Henry Stephens he is named Phanes, the Discoverer or Discloser, who unfolded the ideas of the Supreme Intelligence, and exposed them to the perception of inferiour beings in this visible frame of the world, as Mocrobius, and Proclus, and Athenagoras, all agree to interpret the several passages of Orpheus which they have preserved.
But the Love designed in our text is the one selfexistent and Infinite Mind, whom if the generality of ancient mythologists have not introduced or truly described in accounting for the production of the world and its appearances, yet to a modern poet it can be no objection that he hath ventured to differ from them in this particular, though in other respects he professeth to imitate their manner and conform to their opinions; for in these great points of natural theology they differ no less remarkably among themselves, and are perpetually confounding the philosophical relations of things with the traditionary circumstances of mythick history; upon which very account Callimachus in his Hymn to Jupiter declareth his dissent from them concerning even an article of the national creed, adding that the ancient bards were by no means to be depended on. And yet in the exordium of the old Argonautick poem ascribed to Orpheus it is said that
"Love, whom mortals in later times call Phanes, was the father of the eternally begotten Night,"
who is generally represented by these mytholOgical poets as being herself the parent of all things and who in The Indigitamenta, or Orphick Hymns, is said to be the same with Cypris, or Love itself. Moreover, in the body of this Argonautick poem, where the personated Orpheus introduceth himself singing to his lyre in reply to Chiron, he celebrateth
"the obscure memory of Chaos, and the natures which it contained within itself in a state of perpetual vicissitude; how the heaven had its boundary determined, the generation of the earth, the depth of the ocean, and also the sapient Love, the most ancient, the self-sufficient, with all the beings which he produced when he separated one thing from another:"
which noble passage is more directly to Aristotle's purpose in the first book of his Metaphysicks than any of those which he has there quoted to shew that the ancient poets and mythologists agreed with Empedocles, Anaxagoras, and the other more sober philosophers, in that natural anticipation and common notion of mankind concerning the necessity of mind and reason to account for the connexion, motion, and good order of the world. For though neither this poem nor the hymns which pass under the same name are, it should seem, the work of the real Orpheus, yet beyond all question they are very ancient. The hymns more particularly are allowed to be older than the invasion of Greece by Xerxes, and were probably a set of publick and solemn forms of devotion, as appears by a passage in one of them, which Demosthenes hath almost literally cited in his first oration against Aristogiton, as the saying of Orpheus, the founder of their most holy mysteries. On this account they are of higher authority than any other mythological work now extant, the Theogony of Hesiod himself not excepted. The poetry of them is often extremely noble, and the mysterious air which prevails in them, together with its delightful impression upon the mind, cannot be better expressed than in that remarkable description with which they inspired the German editor Eschenbach when he accidentally met with them at Leipsick:
"Thesaurum me reperisse credidi,"
says he,
"et prosecto thesaurum reperi. Incredibile dictu quo me sacro horrore afflaverint indigitamenta ista deorum: nam et tempus ad illorum lectionem eligere cogebar, quod vel solum horrorem incutere animo potest, nocturnum; cum enim totam diem consumserim in contemplando urbis splendore, et in adeundis, quibus scatet urbs illa, viris doctis; sola nox restabat, quam Orpheo consecrare potui. In abyssum quendam mysteriorum venerandae antiquitatis descendere videbar, quotiescunque silente mundo, solis vigilantibus astris et luna,
istos hymnos ad manus sumsi."
℣. 25.
Chaos.
] The unformed undigested mass of Moses and Plato, which Milton calls
"The womb of Nature."
Ibid. Love the sire of Fate.
] Fate is the universal system of natural causes, the work of the Omnipotent Mind or of Love; so Minucius Felix:
"Quid enim aliud eft fatum, quam quod de unoquoque nostrum deus fatus est."
So also Cicero, in the first Book on Divination;
"Fatum autem id appello, quod Graeci ΕΙΡΜΑΡΜΕΝΗΝ; id est, ordinem seriemque causarum, cum causa causae nexa rem ex se gignat—ex quo intelligitur, ut fatum sit non id quod superstitiose, sed id quod physice dicitur causa aeterna rerum."
To the same purpose is the doctrine of Hierocles in that excellent fragment concerning Providence and Destiny. As to the three Fates or Destinies of the poets, they represented that part of the general system of natural causes which relate to man and to other mortal beings, for so we are told in the hymn addressed to them among the Orphick Indigitamenta, where they are called the daughters of Night (or Love) and contrary to the vulgar notion are distinguished by the epithets of Gentle and Tenderhearted. According to
Hesiod,
Theog.
ver. 904,
they were the daughters of Jupiter and Themis, but in the Orphick Hymn to Venus or Love that goddess is directly styled the mother of Necessity, and is represented immediately after as governing the three Destinies, and conducting the whole system of Natural causes.
Elder than Chaos. Born of Fate was Time,
℣. 26.
Born of Fate was Time.
] Cronos, Saturn, or Time, was, according to Apollodorus, the son of Coelum and Tellus; but the author of the Hymns gives it quite undisguised by mythological language, and calls him plainly the offspring of the Earth and the starry Heaven, that is of Fate, as explained in the preceding note.
Who many sons and many comely births
Devour'd, relentless Father! till the child
℣. 28.
Who many sons devour'd.
] The known fable of Saturn devouring his children was certainly meant to imply the dissolution of natural bodies, which are produced and destroyed by Time.
℣. 28.
The child—Of Rhea.
] Jupiter so called by Pindar.
Of Rhea drove him from the upper sky,
℣. 29.
Drove him from the upper sky.
] That Jupiter dethroned his father Saturn is recorded by all the mythologists. Phurnutus or Cornutus, the author of a little Greek treatise on the nature of the gods, informs us that by Jupiter was meant the vegetable soul of the world, which restrained and prevented those uncertain alterations which Saturn or Time used formerly to cause in the mundane system.
And quell'd his deadly might. Then social reign'd
℣. 30.
Then social reign'd,
&c.] Our mythology here supposeth that before the establishment of the vital, vegetative, plastick nature, (represented by Jupiter) the four elements were in a variable and unsettled condition, but afterwards welldisposed, and at peace among themselves. Tethys was the wife of the Ocean, Ops or Rhea the earth, Vesta the eldest daughter of Saturn fire, and the Cloudcompeller, or
, the air, though he also represented the plastick principle of nature, as may be seen in the Orphick hymn inscribed to him.
The kindred pow'rs Tethys and rev'rend Ops,
And spotless Vesta, while supreme of sway
Remain'd the Cloudcompeller. From the couch
Of Tethys sprang the sedgy-crowned race
℣. 34.
The sedgy-crowned race.
] The river-gods, who according to Hesiod's Theogony were the sons of Oceanus and Tethys.
Who from a thousand urns o'er ev'ry clime
Send tribute to their parent; and from them
℣. 36.
From them—Are ye O Naiads!
] The descent of the Naiads is less certain than most points of the Greek mythology,
Homer,
Odyss.
xiii.
. Virgil in the eighth book of the Aeneid speaks as if the Nymphs or Naiads were the parents of the rivers, but in this he contradicts the testimony of Hesiod, and evidently departs from the orthodox system which representeth several nymphs as retaining to every single river. On the other hand Callimachus, who was very learned in all the school-divinity of those times, in his Hymn to Delos maketh Peneus the great Thessalian river-godthe father of his nymphs; and Ovid, in the fourteenth book of his Metamorphoses, mentions the Naiads of Latium as the immediate daughters of the neighbouring river-gods. Accordingly the Naiads of particular rivers are occasionally both by Ovid and Statius called by a patronymick, from the name of the river to which they belong.
Are ye O Naiads! Arethusa fair,
And tuneful Aganippe, that sweet name
Bandusia, that soft family which dwelt
With Syrian Daphne, and the honour'd tribes
℣. 40.
Syrian Daphne.
] The grove of Daphne in Syria, near Antioch, was famous for its delightful fountains.
Ibid. The tribes—Belov'd of Paeon.
] Mineral and medicinal springs. Paeon was the physician of the gods.
Belov'd of Paeon. Listen to my strain
Daughters of Tethys! listen to your praise.
You Nymphs! the winged offspring which of old
℣. 43.
The winged offspring.
] The Winds, who according to Hesiod and Apollodorus were the sons of Astraeus and Aurora.
Aurora to divine Astraeus bore
Owns, and your aid beseecheth. When the might
Of Hyperion from his noontide throne
℣. 46.
Hyperion.
] A son of Coelum and Tellus, and father of the Sun, who is thence called by Pindar Hyperionides. But Hyperion is put by Homer in the same manner as here, for the Sun himself.
Unbends their languid pinions aid from you
They ask; Favonius and the mild Southwest
From you relief implore: your sallying streams
℣. 49.
Your sallying streams.
] The state of the atmosphere with respect to rest and motion is in several ways affected by rivers and running streams, and that more especially in hot seasons; first, they destroy its equilibrium, by cooling those parts of it with which they are in contact; and, secondly, they communicate their own motion; and the air which is thus moved by them being left heated is of consequence more elastick than other parts of the atmosphere, and therefore fitter to preserve and to propagate that motion.
Fresh vigour to their weary wings impart;
Again they fly disporting from the mead
Half ripen'd and the tender blades of corn
To sweep the noxious mildew, or dispel
Contagious steams, which oft' the parched earth
Breathes on her fainting sons. From noon to eve
Along the river and the paved brook
Ascend the cheerful breezes, hail'd of bards
Who fast by learned Cam th' Aeolian lyre
Solicit, nor unwelcome to the youth
Who on the heights of Tibur all inclin'd
Or rushing Anio, with a pious hand
The rev'rend scene delineates, broken fanes
Or tombs, or pillar'd aqueducts, the pomp
Of ancient Time, and haply while he scans
The ruins with a silent tear revolves
The fame and fortune of imperious Rome.
You too O Nymphs! and your unenvious aid,
The rural pow'rs confess, and still prepare
For you their choicest treasures. Pan commands
Oft' as the Delian king with Sirius holds
℣. 70.
Delian king.
] One of the epithets of Apollo or the Sun, in the Orphick hymn inscribed to him.
The central heav'ns, the Father of the Grove
Commands, his Dryads over your abodes
To spread their deepest umbrage. Well the god
Rememb'reth how indulgent ye supply'd
Your genial dews to nurse them in their prime.
Pales, the Pasture's queen, where'er ye stray
Pursues your steps delighted, and the path
With living verdure clothes. Around your haunts
The laughing Chloris with profusest hand
℣. 79.
Chloris.
] The ancient Greek name for Flora.
Throws wide her blooms, her odours. Still with you
Pomona seeks to dwell; and o'er the lawns
And o'er the vale of Richmond, where with Thames
Ye love to wander, Amalthea pours
℣. 83.
Amalthea.
] The mother of the first Bacchus, whose birth and education was written, as Diodorus Siculus informs us, in the old Pelasgick character by Thymoetes, grandson to Laomedon and contemporary with Orpheus. Thymoetes had travelled over Libya to the country which borders on the western ocean, there he saw the island of Nysa, and learned from the inhabitants that
"Ammon king of Libya was married in former ages to Rhea sister of Saturn and the Titans; that he afterwards fell in love with a beautiful virgin whose name was Amalthea, had by her a son, and gave her possession of a neighbouring track of land wonderfully fertile, which in shape nearly resembling the horn of an ox was thence called the Hesperian horn, and afterwards the horn of Amalthea; that fearing the jealousy of Rhea he concealed the young Bacchus with his mother in the island of Nysa;"
the beauty of which Diodorus describes with great dignity and pomp of style. This fable is one of the noblest in all the ancient mythology, and seems to have made a particular impression on the imagination of Milton, the only modern poet (unless perhaps it be necessary to except Spenser) who in these mysterious traditions of the poetick story had a heart to feel and words to express the simple and solitary genius of Antiquity. To raise the idea of his Paradise he prefers it even to
—"that Nysean isle
"Girt by the river Triton, where old Cham
"(Whom Gentiles Ammon call and Libyan Jove)
"Hid Amalthea and her florid son
"Young Bacchus from his stepdame Rhea's eye."
Wellpleas'd the wealth of that Ammonian horn,
Her dow'r, unmindful of the fragrant isles
Nysaean or Atlantick. Nor canst thou,
(Albeit oft' ungrateful thou dost mock
The bev'rage of the sober Naiad's urn,
O Bromius! O Lenaean!) nor canst thou
Disown the pow'rs whose bounty ill repaid
With nectar feeds thy tendrils. Yet from me,
Yet, blameless Nymphs! from my delighted lyre,
Accept the rites your bounty well may claim,
Nor heed the scoffings of th' Edonian band.
℣. 94.
Edonian band.
] The priestesses and other ministers of Bacchus, so called from Edonus a mountain of Thrace, where his rites were celebrated.
For better praise awaits you. Thames your sire,
As down the verdant slope your duteous rills
Descend, the tribute stately Thames receives
Delighted, and your piety applauds,
And bids his copious tide roll on secure,
For faithful are his daughters, and with words
Auspicious gratulates the bark which now
His banks forsaking her advent'rous wings
Yields to the breeze, with Albion's happy gifts
Extremest isles to bless. And oft' at morn,
When Hermes from Olympus bent o'er earth
℣. 105.
When Hermes.
] Hermes or Mercury was the patrron of commerce, in which benevolent character he is addressed by the author of The Indigitamenta in these beautiful lines;
To bear the words of Jove on yonder hill
Stoops lightly sailing, oft' intent your springs
He views, and waving o'er some newborn stream
His blest pacifick wand, "And yet," he cries,
"Yet," cries the son of Maia, "tho' recluse
"And silent be your stores from you, fair Nymphs!
"Flows wealth and kind society to men;
"By you my function and my honour'd name
"Do I possess while o'er the Boetick vale,
"Or thro' the tow'rs of Memphis or the palms
"By sacred Ganges water'd, I conduct
"The English merchant, with the buxom fleece
"Of fertile Ariconium while I clothe
"Sarmatian kings, or to the household gods
"Of Syria from the bleak Cornubian shore
"Dispense the min'ral treasure which of old
℣. 121.
Dispense the min'ral treasure.
] The merchants of Sidon and Tyre made frequent voyages to the coast of Cornwall, from whence they carried home great quantities of tin.
"Sidonian pilots sought, when this fair land
"Was yet unconscious of those gen'rous arts
"Which wise Phoenicia from their native clime
"Transplanted to a more indulgent heav'n."
Such are the words of Hermes, such the praise
O Naiads! which from tongues celestial waits
Your bounteous deeds. From bounty iffueth pow'r,
And those who sedulous in prudent works
Relieve the wants of Nature Jove repays
With noble wealth; and his own seat on earth,
Fit judgments to pronounce and curb the might
Of wicked men. Your kind unfailing urns
Not vainly to the hospitable arts
Of Hermes yield their store; for O ye Nymphs!
Hath he not won th' unconquerable queen
℣. 136.
Hath he not won.
] Mercury, the patron of commerce, being so greatly dependent on the good offices of the Naiads, in return obtains for them the friendship of Minerva, the goddess of War; for military power, at least the naval part of it, hath constantly followed the establishment of trade; which exemplifies the preceding observation, that
"from bounty issueth power."
Of Arms to court your friendship? You she owns
The fair associates who extend her sway
Wide o'er the mighty deep, and grateful things
Of you she uttereth oft' as from the shore
Of Thames, or Medway's vale, or the green banks
Of Vecta, she her thund'ring navy leads
To Calpe's foaming channel or the rough
℣. 143.
Calpe—Cantabrian surge.
] Gibraltar and the bay of Biscay.
Cantabrian surge, her auspices divine
Imparting to the senate and the prince
Of Albion to dismay barbarick kings,
Th' Iberian or the Celt. The pride of kings
Was ever scorn'd by Pallas, and of old
Rejoic'd the virgin from the brazen prow
Of Athens o'er Aegina's gloomy surge
℣. 150.
Aegina's gloomy surge
Near this island the Athenia
obtained the victory of Salamis ever the Persian navy.
To drive her clouds and storms, o'erwhelming all
The Persian's promis'd glory, when the realms
Of Indus and the soft Ionian clime,
When Libya's torrid champain, and the rocks
Of cold Imaus, join'd their servile bands
To sweep the sons of Liberty from earth.
In vain! Minerva on the bounding prow
Of Athens stood, and with the thunder's voice
Denounc'd her terrours on their impious heads,
And shook her burning egis. Xerxes saw;
℣. 160.
Xerxes saw.
] This circumstance is recorded in that passage perhaps the most splendid among all the remains
ancient history, where Plutarch in his Life of Themistocles describe
the seafights of Artemisium and Salamis.
From Heracleum on the mountain's height
Thron'd in his golden car he knew the sign
Celestial, felt unrighteous hope forsake
His falt'ring heart, and turn'd his face with shame.
Hail! ye who share the stern Minerva's pow'r,
Who arm the hand of Liberty for war,
And give to the renown'd Britannick name
To awe contending monarchs, yet benign,
Yet mild of nature, to the works of peace
More prone, and lenient of the many ills
Which wait on human life. Your gentle aid
Hygeia well can witness, she who saves
From pois'nous cates and cups of pleasing bane
The wretch devoted to th' entangling snares
Of Bacchus and of Comus. Him she leads
To Cynthia's lonely haunts. To spread the toils,
To beat the coverts, with the jovial horn
At dawn of day to summon the loud hounds,
She calls the ling'ring sluggard from his dreams,
And where his breast may drink the mountain breeze,
And where the fervour of the sunny vale
May beat upon his brow, thro' devious paths
Beckons his rapid courser. Nor when ease,
Cool ease and welcome slumbers, have becalm'd
His eager bosom, does the queen of Health
Her pleasing care withhold. His decent board
She guards presiding, and the frugal pow'rs
With joy sedate leads in, and while the brown
Ennaean dame with Pan presents her stores,
While changing still and comely in the change
Vertumnus and the Hours before him spread
The garden's banquet, you to crown his feast,
To crown his feast O Naiads! you the fair
Hygeia calls; and from your shelving seats
And groves of poplar plenteous cups ye bring
To slake his veins, till soon a purer tide
Flows down those loaded channels, washeth off
The dregs of luxury, the lurking seeds
Of crude disease, and thro' th' abodes of life
Sends vigour, sends repose. Hail, Naiads! hail,
Who give to Labour health, to stooping Age
The joys which Youth had squander'd: oft' your urns
Will I invoke, and frequent in your praise
Abash the frantick thyrsus with my song.
℣. 204.
Thyrsus.
] A staff or spear wreathed round with ivy, of constant use in the Bacchanalian mysteries.
For not estrang'd from your benignant arts
Is he the god to whose mysterious shrine
My youth was sacred and my votive cares
Belong, the learned Paeon. Oft' when all
His cordial treasures he hath search'd in vain,
When herbs and potent trees, and drops of balm
Rich with the genial influence of the sun
(To rouse dark Fancy from her plaintive dreams,
To brace the nerveless arm, with food to win
Sick appetite, or hush the unquiet breast
Which pines with silent passion) he in vain
Hath prov'd, to your deep mansions he descends;
Your gares of humid rock, your dim arcades,
He ent'reth, where impurpled veins of ore
Gleam on the roof, where thro' the rigid mine
Your trickling rills insinuate: there the god
From your indulgent hands the streaming bowl
Wafts to his paleey'd suppliants, wafts the seeds
Metallick, and the elemental salts
Wash'd from the pregnant glebe. Theydrink, and soon
Flies pain, flies inauspicious care, and soon
The social haunt or unfrequented shade
Hears Io, Io Paean! as of old
℣. 227.
Io Paean.
] An exclamation of victory and triumph derived from Apollo's encounter with Python.
When Python fell. And O propitious Nymphs!
Oft' as for hapless mortals I implore
Your salutary springs, thro' ev'ry urn
Oh shed your healing treasures! with the first
And finest breath which from the genial strife
Of min'ral fermentation springs, like light
O'er the fresh morning's vapours, lustrate then
The fountain, and inform the rising wave!
My lyre shall pay your bounty: scorn not ye
That humble tribute. Tho' a mortal hand
Excite the strings to utt'rance, yet for themes
Not unregarded of celestial pow'rs
I frame their language, and the Muses deign
To guide the pious tenour of my lay.
The Muses (sacred by their gifts divine)
In early days did to my wond'ring sense
Their secrets oft' reveal; oft' my rais'd ear
In slumber selt their musick; oft' at noon
Or hour of sunset by some lonely stream,
In field or shady grove, they taught me words
Of pow'r from death and envy to preserve
The good man's name; whence yet with gratefulmind
And off'rings unprofan'd by ruder eye
My vows I send, my homage, to the seats
Of rocky Cirrha where with you they dwell,
℣. 252.
Cirrha.
] One of the summits of Parnassus, and sacred to Apollo. Near it were several fountains said to be frequented by the Muses. Nysa, the other eminence of the same mountain, was dedicated to Bacchus.
Where you their chaste campanious they admit
Thro' all the hallow'd scene, where oft' intent
And leaning o'er Castalia's mossy verge
They mark the cadence of your confluent urns
How tuneful, yielding gratefullest repose
To their consorted measure, till again
With emulation all the sounding choir,
And bright Apollo leader of the song,
Their voices thro' the liquid air exalt,
And sweep their lofty strings; those pow'rful strings
That charm the mind of gods, that fill the courts
℣. 263.
—charm the mind of gods.
] This whole passage concerning the effects of sacred musick among the gods is taken from Pindar's first Pythian ode.
Of wide Olympus with oblivion sweet
Of evils, with immortal rest from cares,
Assuage the terrours of the throne of Jove,
And quench the formidable thunderbolt
Of unrelenting fire. With slacken'd wings
While now the solemn concert breathes around
Incumbent o'er the sceptre of his lord
Sleeps the stern eagle, by the number'd notes
Possess'd, and satiate with the melting tone,
Sov'reign of birds! The furious god of War
His darts forgetting and the winged wheels
That bear him vengeful o'er th' embattled plain,
Relents and sooths his own fierce heart to ease,
Most welcome ease. The fire of gods and men
In that great moment of divine delight
Looks down on all that live, and whatsoe'er
He loves not o'er the peopled earth and o'er
Th' interminated ocean he beholds
Curs'd with abhorrence by his doom severe,
And troubled at the sound. Ye Naiads! ye
With ravish'd ears the melody attend
Worthy of sacred silence, but the slaves
Of Bacchus with tempest'ous clamours strive
To drown the heav'nly strains, of highest Jove
Irrev'rent, and by mad presumption fir'd
Their own discordant raptures to advance
With hostile emulation. Down they rush
From Nysa's vine-impurpled cliff the dames
Of Thrace, the Satyrs, and th' unruly Fauns,
With old Silenus reeling thro' the crowd
Which gambols round him, in convulsions wild
Tossing their limbs, and brandishing in air
The ivy-mantled thyrsus, or the torch
Thro' black smoke flaming, to the Phrygian pipe's
℣. 297.
Phrygian pipe's.
] The Phrygian musick was fantastick and turbulent, and fit to excite disorderly passions.
Shrill voice, and to the clashing cymbals, mix'd
With shrieks and frantick uproar. May the gods
From ev'ry unpolluted ear avert
Their orgies! If within the seats of men,
Within the walls, the gates, where Pallas holds
℣. 302.
The gates, where Pallas holds—The guardian key.
] It was the office of Minerva to be the guardian of walled cities, whence she was named ΠΟΑΙΑΣ and ΠΟΔΙΟΥΧΟΣ, and had her statues placed in their gates, being supposed to keep the keys, and on that account styled ΚΑΗΔΟΥΧΟΣ.
The guardian key, if haply there be found
Who loves to mingle with the revel band
And hearken to their accents, who aspires
From such instructers to inform his breast
With verse, let him, fit votarist! implore
Their inspiration. He perchance the gifts
Of young Lyaeus and the dread exploits
May sing in aptest numbers; he the fate
℣. 310.
Fate—Of sober Pentheus.
] Pentheus was torn in pieces by the Bacchanalian priests and women for despising their mysteries.
Of sober Pentheus, he the Paphian rites,
And naked Mars with Cytherea chain'd,
And strong Alcides in the spinster's robes,
May celebrate applauded; but with you
O Naiads! far from that unhallow'd rout
Must dwell the man whoe'er to praised themes
Invokes th' immortal Muse. Th' immortal Muse
To your calm habitations, to the cave
℣. 318.
The cave—Corycian.
] Of this cave Pausanias in his tenth book gives the following description:
"Between Delphi and the eminences of Parnassus is a road to the grotto of Corycium, which has its name from the nymph Corycia, and is by far the most remarkable which I have seen. One may walk a great way into it without a torch. It is of a considerable height, and hath several springs within it; and yet a much greater quantity of water distils from the shell and roof so as to be continually dropping on the ground. The people round Parnassus hold it sacred to the Corycian nymphs and to Pan."
Corycian or the Delphick mount, will guide
℣. 319.
Delphick mount.
] Delphi, the seat and oracle of Apollo, had a mountainous and rocky situation on the skirts of Parnassus.
His footsteps, and with your unsully'd streams
His lips will bathe, whether th' eternal lore
Of Themis or the majesty of Jove
To mortals he reveal, or teach his lyre
Th' unenvy'd guerdon of the patriot's toils,
In those unfading islands of the blest
Where sacred bards abide. Hail! honour'd Nymphs!
Thrice hail! for you the Cyrenaick shell
℣. 327.
Cyrenaick.
] Cyrene was the native country of Callimachus, whose Hymns are the most remarkable example of that mythological passion which is assumed in the preceding poem, and have always afforded particular pleasure to the author of it by reason of the mysterious solemnity with which they affect the mind. On this account he was induced to attempt somewhat in the same manner, solely by way of exercise, the manner itself being now almost entirely abandoned in poetry: and as the mere genealogy or the personal adventures of Heathen gods could have been but little interesting to a modern reader, it was therefore thought proper to select some convenient part of the history of Nature, and to employ these ancient divinities as it is probable they were first employed, to wit, in personifying natural causes, and in representing the mutual agreement or opposition of the corporeal and moral powers of the world, which hath been accounted the very highest office of poetry.
Behold I touch revering: to my songs
Be present ye with favourable feet,
And all profaner audience far remove.
HYMN TO SCIENCE.
"O vitae philosophia dux! O virtutis indagatrix, expultrixque vitiorum.—Tu urbes peperisti: tu inventrix legum, tu magistra morum et disciplinae fuisti: ad te confugimus, a te opem petimus."
CIC.
Tusc. Quaest.
I.
SCIENCE! thou fair effusive ray,
From the great source of mental day
Free, gen'rous, and refin'd,
Descend with all thy treasures fraught,
Illumine each bewilder'd thought,
And bless my lab'ring mind!
II.
But first with thy resistless light
Disperse those phantoms from my sight,
Those mimick shades of thee,
The scholiast's learning, sophist's cant,
The visionary bigot's rant,
The monk's philosophy.
III.
O let thy pow'rful charms impart
The patient head the candid heart
Devoted to thy sway,
Which no weak passions e'er mislead,
Which still with dauntless steps proceed
Where Reason points the way!
IV.
Give me to learn each secret cause;
Let Number's, Figure's, Motion's, laws
Reveal'd before me stand;
These to great Nature's scenes apply,
And round the globe and thro' the sky
Disclose her working hand.
V.
Next to thy nobler search resign'd
The busy, restless, human mind
Thro' ev'ry maze pursue;
Detect perception where it lies,
Catch the ideas as they rise,
And all their changes view.
VI.
Say from what simple springs began
The vast ambitious thoughts of man
Which range beyond control,
Which seek eternity to trace,
Dive thro' th' infinity of space,
And strain to grasp the whole?
VII.
Her secret stores let Mem'ry tell,
Bid Fancy quit her Fairy cell
In all her colours drest,
While prompt her sallies to control
Reason the judge recalls the soul
To truth's severest test.
VIII.
Then lanch thro' Being's wide extent;
Let the fair scale with just ascent
And cautious steps be trod,
And from the dead corporeal mass
Thro' each progressive order pass
To Instinct, Reason, God.
IX.
There, Science! veil thy daring eye,
Nor dive too deep nor soar too high
In that divine abyss,
To Faith content thy beams to lend,
Her hopes t' assure her steps befriend,
And light her way to bless.
X.
Then downwards take thy flight again,
Mix with the policies of men
And social Nature's ties;
The plan the genius of each state,
Its int'rest and its pow'rs, relate,
Its fortunes and its rise.
XI.
Thro' private life pursue thy course,
Trace ev'ry action to its source,
And means and motives weigh;
Put tempters, passions, in the scale,
Mark what degrees in each prevail,
And fix the doubtful sway.
XII.
That last best effort of thy skill,
To form the life and rule the will,
Propitious Pow'r! impart;
Teach me to cool my passions' fires,
Make me the judge of my desires,
The master of my heart.
XIII.
Raise me above the vulgar's breath,
Pursuit of fortune, fear of death,
And all in life that is mean:
Still true to reason be my plan,
Still let my actions speak the man
Thro' ev'ry various scene.
XIV.
Hail! queen of Manners, light of truth;
Hail! charm of age and guide of youth,
Sweet refuge of distress;
In bus'ness thou exact, polite;
Thou giv'st retirement its delight,
Prosperity its grace.
XV.
Of wealth, pow'r, freedom, thou the cause;
Foundress of order, cities, laws,
Of arts inventress, thou!
Without thee what were humankind?
How vast their wants, their thoughts how blind,
Their joys how mean, how few!
XVI.
Sun of the soul! thy beams unveil;
Let others spread the daring sail
On Fortune's faithless sea,
While undeluded happier I
From the vain tumult timely fly
And sit in peace with thee.
INSCRIPTIONS.
I. FOR A GROTTO.
To me, whom in their lays the shepherds call
Actaea, daughter of the neighb'ring stream,
This cave belongs. The figtree and the vine
Which o'er the rocky entrance downward shoot
Were plac'd by Glycon: he with cowslips pale,
Primrose and purple lychnis, deck'd the green
Before my threshold, and my shelving walls
With honeysuckle cover'd. Here at noon
Lall'd by the murmur of my rising fount
I slumber: here my clust'ring fruits I tend,
Or from the humid flow'rs at break of day
Fresh garlands weave, and chase from all my bounds
Each thing impure or noxious. Enter in
O Stranger! undismay'd; nor bat nor toad
Here lurks; and if thy breast of blameless thoughts
Approve thee, not unwelcome shalt thou tread
My quiet mansion, chiefly if thy name
Wise Pallas and th' immortal Muses own.
II. FOR A STATUE OF CHAUCER AT WOODSTOCK.
SUCH was old Chaucer, such the placid mien
Of him who first with harmony inform'd
The language of our fathers. Here he dwelt
For many a cheerful day. These ancient walls
Have often heard him while his legends blithe
He sang of love or knighthood, or the wiles
Of homely life, thro' each estate and age
The fashions and the follies of the world
With cunning hand portraying. Tho' perchance
From Blenheim's tow'rs O Stranger! thou art come
Glowing with Churchill's trophies, yet in vain
Dost thou applaud them if thy breast be cold
To him this other hero, who in times
Dark and untaught began with charming verse
To tame the rudeness of his native land.
III.
WHOE'ER thou art whose path in summer lies
Thro' yonder village, turn thee where the grove
Of branching oaks a rural palace old
Imbosoms; there dwells Albert, gen'rous lord
Of all the harvest round! and onward thence
A low plain chapel fronts the morning light
Fast by a silent rivulet. Humbly walk
O Stranger! o'er the consecrated ground,
And on that verdant hillock which thou seest
Beset with osiers let thy pious hand
Sprinkle fresh water from the brook, and strew
Sweet-smelling flow'rs, for there doth Edmund rest,
The learned shepherd, for each rural art
Fam'd, and for sons harmonious, and the woes
Of ill-requited love. The faithless pride
Of fair Matilda sank him to the grave
In manhood's prime; but soon did righteous Heav'n
With tears, with sharp remorse and pining care,
Avenge her falsehood; nor could all the gold
And nuptial pomp which lur'd her plighted faith
From Edmund to a lostier husband's home
Relieve her breaking heart, or turn aside
The strokes of Death. Go, Traveller! relate
The mournful story; haply some fair maid
May hold it in remembrance, and be taught
That riches cannot pay for truth or love.
IV.
O Youths and Virgins! O declining Eld!
O pale Misfortune's slaves! O ye who dwell
Unknown with humble Quiet! ye who wait
In courts, or fill the golden seat of kings,
O sons of Sport and Pleasure! O thou Wretch
That weepst for jealous love, or the sore wounds
Of conscious guilt or Death's rapacious hand,
Which left thee void of hope! O ye who roam
In exile! ye who thro' th' embattled field
Seek bright renown, or who for nobler palms
Contend, the leaders of a publick cause!
Approach; behold this Marble! know ye not
The features? hath not oft' his faithful tongue
Told you the fashion of your own estate,
The secrets of your bosom? Here then round
His monument with rev'rence while ye stand
Say to each other "This was Shakespeare's form,
"Who walk'd in ev'ry path of human life,
"Felt ev'ry passion, and to all mankind
"Doth now, will ever, that experience yield
"Which his own genius only could acquire."
V.
GVLIELMVS III. FORTIS, PIVS, LIBERATOR, CVM INEVNTE AETATE PATRIAE LABENTI ADFVISSET SALVS IPSE VNICA; CVM MOX ITIDEM REIPVBLICAE BRITANNICAE VINDEX RENVNCIATVS ESSET ATQVE STATOR; TVM DENIQVE AD ID SE NATVM RECOGNOVIT ET REGEM FACTVM, VT CVRARET NE DOMINO IMPOTENTI CEDERENT PAX, FIDES, FORTVNA, GENERIS HVMANI. AVCTORI PVBLICAE FELICITATIS P G. A. M. A.
VI. FOR A COLUMN AT RUNNYMEDE.
THOU who the verdant plain dost traverse here
While Thames among his willows from thy view
Retires, O Stranger! stay thee, and the scene
Around contemplate well. This is the place
Where England's ancient Barons, clad in arms,
And stern with conquest, from their tyrant king
(Then render'd tame) did challenge and secure
The Charter of thy freedom. Pass not on
Till thou hast bless'd their memory, and paid
Those thanks which God appointed the reward
Of publick virtue. And if chance thy home
Salute thee with a father's honour'd name
Go call thy sons, instruct them what a debt
They owe their ancestors, and make them swear
To pay it, by transmitting down entire
Those sacred rights to which themselves were born.
VII. THE WOODNYMPH.
APPROACH in silence; it is no vulgar tale
Which I the Dryad of this hoary oak
Pronounce to mortal ears. The second age
Now hasteneth to its period since I rose
On this fair lawn. The groves of yonder vale
Are all my offspring; and each Nymph who guards
The copses and the surrow'd fields beyond
Obeys me. Many changes have I seen
In human things, and many awful deeds
Of justice, when the ruling hand of Jove
Against the tyrants of the land, against
The unhallow'd sons of Luxury and Guile,
Was arm'd for retribution. Thus at length
Expert in laws divine I know the paths
Of Wisdom, and erroneous Tolly's end
Have oft' presag'd; and now wellpleas'd I wait
Each ev'ning till a noble youth who loves
My shade a while releas'd from publick cares
Yon' peaceful gate shall enter, and sit down
Beneath my branches: then his musing mind
I p
ompt unseen, and place before his view
Sincerest forms of good, and move his heart
With the dread bounties of the Sire Supreme
Of gods and men, with Freedom's gen'rous deeds,
The losty voice of Glory, and the faith
Of sacred Friendship. Stranger! I have told
My function: if within thy bosom dwell
Aught which may challenge praise, thou wilt not leave
Unhonour'd my abode, nor shall I hear
A sparing benediction from thy tongue.
VIII.
YE Pow'rs unseen! to whom the bards of Greece
Erected altars, ye who to the mind
More lofty views unfold, and prompt the heart
With more divine emotions, if erewhile
Not quite unpleasing have my votive rites
Of you been deem'd when oft' this lonely seat
To you I consecrated, then vonchsafe
Here with your instant energy to crown
My happy solitude. It is the hour
When most I love t' invoke you, and have felt
Most frequent your glad ministry divine.
The air is calm, the sun's unveiled orb
Shines in the middle heav'n; the harvest round
Stands quiet, and among the golden sheaves
The reapers lie reclin'd; the neighb'ring groves
Are mute, nor ev'n a linnet's random strain
Echoeth amid the silence. Let me feel
Your influence ye kind Pow'rs! Aloft in heav'n
Abide ye? or on those transparent clouds
Pass ye from hill to hill? or on the shades
Which yonder elms cast o'er the lake below
Do you converse retir'd? From what lov'd haunt
Shall I expect you? Let me once more feel
Your influence O ye kind inspiring Pow'rs!
And I will guard it well; nor shall a thought
Rise in my mind, nor shall a passion move
Across my bosom, unobserv'd, unstor'd,
By faithful Memory: and then at some
More active moment will I call them forth
Anew, and join them in majestick forms,
And give them utt'rance in harmonious strains,
That all mankind shall wonder at your sway.
IX.
ME tho' in life's sequester'd vale
Th' Almighty Sire ordain'd to dwell,
Remote from Glory's toilsome ways
And the great scenes of publick praise,
Yet let me still with grateful pride
Remember how my infant frame
He temper'd with prophetick flame,
And early musick to my tongue supply'd.
'Twas then my future fate he weigh'd,
And this be thy concern he said,
At once with Passion's keen alarms,
And Beauty's pleasurable charms,
And sacred Truth's eternal light,
To move the various mind of man,
Till under one unblemish'd plan
His reason, fancy, and his heart, unite.
CONTENTS.
ODES.
Book I. Ode I. Page 5
Book I. Ode II. On the Winter Solstice, 1740, 7
Book I. Ditto, as it was originally written, 11
Book I. Ode III. To a Friend unsuccessful in Love, 14
Book I. Ode IV. Affected indifference. To the same, 16
Book I. Ode V. Against Suspicion, 17
Book I. Ode VI. Hymn to Cheerfulness, 20
Book I. Ode VII. On the Use of Poetry, 26
Book I. Ode VIII. On leaving Holland, 28
Book I. Ode IX. To Curio, 1744, 31
Book I. Ode X. To the Muse, 38
Book I. Ode XI. On Love. To a Friend, 39
Book I. Ode XII. To Sir Francis Henry Drake, Bt. 42
Book I. Ode XIII. On Lyrick Poetry, 45
Book I. Ode XIV. To the Hon. Cha. Townshend, from the Country, 50
Book I. Ode XV. To the Evening Star, 53
Book I. Ode XVI. To Caleb Hardinge, M. D. 56
Book I. Ode XVII. On a Serm. against Glory, 1748, 58
Book I. Ode XVIII. To the Rt. Hon. Francis Earl of Huntingdon, 1747, 59
Book II. Ode I. The Remonstrance of Shakespeare, 72
Book II. Ode II. To Sleep, 76
Book II. Ode III. To the Cuckoo, 78
Book II. Ode IV. To the Hon. Charles Townshend, in the Country, 1750, 80
Book II. Ode V. On Love of Praise, 87
Book II. Ode VI. To W. Hall, Esq. with the Works of Chaulieu, 89
Book II. Ode VII. To Tho. Edwards, Esq. 1751, 91
Book II. Ode VIII. To the Author of Mem. of the House of Brandenburg, 1751, 94
Book II. Ode IX. To the Rt. Rev. Benj. Ld. Bishop of Winchester, 1754, Page 96
Book II. Ode X. 100
Book II. Ode XI. At Study, 101
Book II. Ode XII. To the Country Gentlemen of England, 1758, 103
Book II. Ode XIII. On recovering from a fit of Sickness, 1758, 110
Book II. Ode XIV. The Complaint, 113
Book II. Ode XV. On Domestick Manners (unfinished) 114
MISCELLANIES.
An Epistle to Curio, 117
Love. An Elegy, 130
A British Philippick, 135
HYMNS.
Hymn to the Naiads, 1746, 142
Hymn to Science, 162
INSCRIPTIONS.
I. For A Grotto, 167
II. For a Statue of Chaucer at Woodstock, 168
III. "Whoe'er thou art,"
&c. ib.
IV. "O Youths and Virgins!"
&c.
169
V. "Gulielmus III."
&c.
170
VI. For a Column at Runnymede, 171
VII. The Woodnymph,
ib.
VIII. "Ye Pow'rs unseen!"
&c.
172
IX. "Me tho' in life's sequester'd vale,"
&c.
174
From the APOLLO PRESS, by the MARTINS, Nov. 10. 1721.
THE END.