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diff --git a/3698.txt b/3698.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d21fe8a --- /dev/null +++ b/3698.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6360 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Task and Other Poems, by William Cowper + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Task and Other Poems + +Author: William Cowper + +Posting Date: April 30, 2009 [EBook #3698] +Release Date: January, 2003 +First Posted: July 24, 2001 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE TASK AND OTHER POEMS *** + + + + +Produced by Les Bowler. + + + + + + + + + +THE TASK AND OTHER POEMS + + +BY + +WILLIAM COWPER. + + + + +CONTENTS. + + INTRODUCTION + THE TASK + BOOK I. THE SOFA + BOOK II. THE TIMEPIECE + BOOK III. THE GARDEN. + BOOK IV. THE WINTER EVENING. + BOOK V. THE WINTER MORNING WALK. + BOOK VI. THE WINTER WALK AT NOON. + THE DIVERTING HISTORY OF JOHN GILPIN. + AN EPISTLE TO JOSEPH HILL, ESQ. + TO MARY. + + + + +INTRODUCTION. + +After the publication of his "Table Talk" and other poems in March, +1782, William Cowper, in his quiet retirement at Olney, under Mrs. +Unwin's care, found a new friend in Lady Austen. She was a baronet's +widow who had a sister married to a clergyman near Olney, with whom +Cowper was slightly acquainted. In the summer of 1781, when his first +volume was being printed, Cowper met Lady Austen and her sister in the +street at Olney, and persuaded Mrs. Unwin to invite them to tea. Their +coming was the beginning of a cordial friendship. Lady Austen, without +being less earnest, had a liveliness that satisfied Cowper's sense of +fun to an extent that stirred at last some jealousy in Mrs. Unwin. +"She had lived much in France," Cowper said, "was very sensible, and +had infinite vivacity." + +The Vicar of Olney was in difficulties, with his affairs in the hands +of trustees. The duties of his office were entirely discharged by a +curate, and the vicarage was to let. Lady Austen, in 1782, rented it, +to be near her new friends. There was only a wall between the garden +of the house occupied by Cowper and Mrs. Unwin and the vicarage garden. +A door was made in the wall, and there was a close companionship of +three. When Lady Austen did not spend her evenings with Mrs. Unwin and +Cowper, Mrs. Unwin and Cowper spent their evenings with Lady Austen. +They read, talked, Lady Austen played and sang, and they all called one +another by their Christian names, William, Mary (Mrs. Unwin), and Anna +(Lady Austen). In a poetical epistle to Lady Austen, written in +December, 1781, Cowper closes a reference to the strength of their +friendship with the evidence it gave,-- + + "That Solomon has wisely spoken,-- + 'A threefold cord is not soon broken.'" + +One evening in the summer of 1782, when Cowper was low-spirited, Lady +Austen told him in lively fashion the story upon which he founded the +ballad of "John Gilpin." Its original hero is said to have been a Mr. +Bayer, who had a draper's shop in London, at the corner of Cheapside. +Cowper was so much tickled by it, that he lay awake part of the night +rhyming and laughing, and by the next evening the ballad was complete. +It was sent to Mrs. Unwin's son, who sent it to the Public Advertiser, +where for the next two or three years it lay buried in the "Poets' +Corner," and attracted no particular attention. + +In the summer of 1783, when one of the three friends had been reading +blank verse aloud to the other two, Lady Austen, from her seat upon the +sofa, urged upon Cowper, as she had urged before, that blank verse was +to be preferred to the rhymed couplets in which his first book had been +written, and that he should write a poem in blank verse. "I will," he +said, "if you will give me a subject." "Oh," she answered, "you can +write upon anything. Write on this sofa." He playfully accepted that +as "the task" set him, and began his poem called "The Task," which was +finished in the summer of the next year, 1784. But before "The Task" +was finished, Mrs. Unwin's jealousy obliged Cowper to give up his new +friend--whom he had made a point of calling upon every morning at +eleven--and prevent her return to summer quarters in the vicarage. + +Two miles from Olney was Weston Underwood with a park, to which its +owner gave Cowper the use of a key. In 1782 a younger brother, John +Throckmorton, came with his wife to live at Weston, and continued +Cowper's privilege. The Throckmortons were Roman Catholics, but in +May, 1784, Mr. Unwin was tempted by an invitation to see a balloon +ascent from their park. Their kindness as hosts won upon Cowper; they +sought and had his more intimate friendship, till in his correspondence +he playfully abused the first syllable of their name and called them +Mr. and Mrs. Frog. + +Cowper's "Task" went to its publisher and printing was begun, when +suddenly "John Gilpin," after a long sleep in the Public Advertiser, +rode triumphant through the town. A favourite actor of the day was +giving recitations at Freemason's Hall. A man of letters, Richard +Sharp, who had read and liked "John Gilpin," pointed out to the actor +how well it would suit his purpose. The actor was John Henderson, +whose Hamlet, Shylock, Richard III., and Falstaff were the most popular +of his day. He died suddenly in 1785, at the age of thirty-eight, and +it was thus in the last year of his life that his power of recitation +drew "John Gilpin" from obscurity and made it the nine days' wonder of +the town. Pictures of John Gilpin abounded in all forms. He figured +on pocket-handkerchiefs. When the publisher asked for a few more pages +to his volume of "The Task," Cowper gave him as makeweights an "Epistle +to Joseph Hill," his "Tirocinium," and, a little doubtfully, "John +Gilpin." So the book was published in June, 1785; was sought by many +because it was by the author of "John Gilpin," and at once won +recognition. The preceding volume had not made Cowper famous. "The +Task" at once gave him his place among the poets. + +Cowper's "Task" is to this day, except Wordsworth's "Excursion," the +best purely didactic poem in the English language. The "Sofa" stands +only as a point of departure:--it suits a gouty limb; but as the poet +is not gouty, he is up and off. He is off for a walk with Mrs. Unwin +in the country about Olney. He dwells on the rural sights and rural +sounds, taking first the inanimate sounds, then the animate. In muddy +winter weather he walks alone, finds a solitary cottage, and draws from +it comment upon the false sentiment of solitude. He describes the walk +to the park at Weston Underwood, the prospect from the hilltop, touches +upon his privilege in having a key of the gate, describes the avenues +of trees, the wilderness, the grove, and the sound of the thresher's +flail then suggests to him that all live by energy, best ease is after +toil. He compares the luxury of art with wholesomeness of Nature free +to all, that brings health to the sick, joy to the returned seafarer. +Spleen vexes votaries of artificial life. True gaiety is for the +innocent. So thought flows on, and touches in its course the vital +questions of a troubled time. "The Task" appeared four years before +the outbreak of the French Revolution, and is in many passages not less +significant of rising storms than the "Excursion" is significant of +what came with the breaking of the clouds. + +H. M. + + + +THE TASK. + + + +BOOK I. + +THE SOFA. + +["The history of the following production is briefly this:--A lady, +fond of blank verse, demanded a poem of that kind from the author, and +gave him the SOFA for a subject. He obeyed, and having much leisure, +connected another subject with it; and, pursuing the train of thought +to which his situation and turn of mind led him, brought forth, at +length, instead of the trifle which he at first intended, a serious +affair--a volume.] + + + I sing the Sofa. I, who lately sang + Truth, Hope, and Charity, and touched with awe + The solemn chords, and with a trembling hand, + Escaped with pain from that advent'rous flight, + Now seek repose upon a humbler theme: + The theme though humble, yet august and proud + The occasion--for the Fair commands the song. + + Time was, when clothing sumptuous or for use, + Save their own painted skins, our sires had none. + As yet black breeches were not; satin smooth, + Or velvet soft, or plush with shaggy pile: + The hardy chief upon the rugged rock + Washed by the sea, or on the gravelly bank + Thrown up by wintry torrents roaring loud, + Fearless of wrong, reposed his weary strength. + Those barbarous ages past, succeeded next + The birthday of invention; weak at first, + Dull in design, and clumsy to perform. + Joint-stools were then created; on three legs + Upborne they stood. Three legs upholding firm + A massy slab, in fashion square or round. + On such a stool immortal Alfred sat, + And swayed the sceptre of his infant realms; + And such in ancient halls and mansions drear + May still be seen, but perforated sore + And drilled in holes the solid oak is found, + By worms voracious eating through and through. + + At length a generation more refined + Improved the simple plan, made three legs four, + Gave them a twisted form vermicular, + And o'er the seat, with plenteous wadding stuffed, + Induced a splendid cover green and blue, + Yellow and red, of tapestry richly wrought + And woven close, or needlework sublime. + There might ye see the peony spread wide, + The full-blown rose, the shepherd and his lass, + Lapdog and lambkin with black staring eyes, + And parrots with twin cherries in their beak. + + Now came the cane from India, smooth and bright + With Nature's varnish; severed into stripes + That interlaced each other, these supplied, + Of texture firm, a lattice-work that braced + The new machine, and it became a chair. + But restless was the chair; the back erect + Distressed the weary loins that felt no ease; + The slippery seat betrayed the sliding part + That pressed it, and the feet hung dangling down, + Anxious in vain to find the distant floor. + These for the rich: the rest, whom fate had placed + In modest mediocrity, content + With base materials, sat on well-tanned hides + Obdurate and unyielding, glassy smooth, + With here and there a tuft of crimson yarn, + Or scarlet crewel in the cushion fixed: + If cushion might be called, what harder seemed + Than the firm oak of which the frame was formed. + No want of timber then was felt or feared + In Albion's happy isle. The lumber stood + Ponderous, and fixed by its own massy weight. + But elbows still were wanting; these, some say, + An alderman of Cripplegate contrived, + And some ascribe the invention to a priest + Burly and big, and studious of his ease. + But rude at first, and not with easy slope + Receding wide, they pressed against the ribs, + And bruised the side, and elevated high + Taught the raised shoulders to invade the ears. + Long time elapsed or e'er our rugged sires + Complained, though incommodiously pent in, + And ill at ease behind. The ladies first + Gan murmur, as became the softer sex. + Ingenious fancy, never better pleased + Than when employed to accommodate the fair, + Heard the sweet moan with pity, and devised + The soft settee; one elbow at each end, + And in the midst an elbow, it received, + United yet divided, twain at once. + So sit two kings of Brentford on one throne; + And so two citizens who take the air, + Close packed and smiling in a chaise and one. + But relaxation of the languid frame + By soft recumbency of outstretched limbs, + Was bliss reserved for happier days; so slow + The growth of what is excellent, so hard + To attain perfection in this nether world. + Thus first necessity invented stools, + Convenience next suggested elbow-chairs, + And luxury the accomplished Sofa last. + + The nurse sleeps sweetly, hired to watch the sick, + Whom snoring she disturbs. As sweetly he + Who quits the coach-box at the midnight hour + To sleep within the carriage more secure, + His legs depending at the open door. + Sweet sleep enjoys the curate in his desk, + The tedious rector drawling o'er his head, + And sweet the clerk below; but neither sleep + Of lazy nurse, who snores the sick man dead, + Nor his who quits the box at midnight hour + To slumber in the carriage more secure, + Nor sleep enjoyed by curate in his desk, + Nor yet the dozings of the clerk are sweet, + Compared with the repose the Sofa yields. + + Oh, may I live exempted (while I live + Guiltless of pampered appetite obscene) + From pangs arthritic that infest the toe + Of libertine excess. The Sofa suits + The gouty limb, 'tis true; but gouty limb, + Though on a Sofa, may I never feel: + For I have loved the rural walk through lanes + Of grassy swarth, close cropped by nibbling sheep, + And skirted thick with intertexture firm + Of thorny boughs: have loved the rural walk + O'er hills, through valleys, and by river's brink, + E'er since a truant boy I passed my bounds + To enjoy a ramble on the banks of Thames. + And still remember, nor without regret + Of hours that sorrow since has much endeared, + How oft, my slice of pocket store consumed, + Still hungering penniless and far from home, + I fed on scarlet hips and stony haws, + Or blushing crabs, or berries that emboss + The bramble, black as jet, or sloes austere. + Hard fare! but such as boyish appetite + Disdains not, nor the palate undepraved + By culinary arts unsavoury deems. + No Sofa then awaited my return, + No Sofa then I needed. Youth repairs + His wasted spirits quickly, by long toil + Incurring short fatigue; and though our years, + As life declines, speed rapidly away, + And not a year but pilfers as he goes + Some youthful grace that age would gladly keep, + A tooth or auburn lock, and by degrees + Their length and colour from the locks they spare; + The elastic spring of an unwearied foot + That mounts the stile with ease, or leaps the fence, + That play of lungs inhaling and again + Respiring freely the fresh air, that makes + Swift pace or steep ascent no toil to me, + Mine have not pilfered yet; nor yet impaired + My relish of fair prospect; scenes that soothed + Or charmed me young, no longer young, I find + Still soothing and of power to charm me still. + And witness, dear companion of my walks, + Whose arm this twentieth winter I perceive + Fast locked in mine, with pleasure such as love, + Confirmed by long experience of thy worth + And well-tried virtues, could alone inspire-- + Witness a joy that thou hast doubled long. + Thou know'st my praise of Nature most sincere, + And that my raptures are not conjured up + To serve occasions of poetic pomp, + But genuine, and art partner of them all. + How oft upon yon eminence, our pace + Has slackened to a pause, and we have borne + The ruffling wind scarce conscious that it blew, + While admiration feeding at the eye, + And still unsated, dwelt upon the scene! + Thence with what pleasure have we just discerned + The distant plough slow-moving, and beside + His labouring team, that swerved not from the track, + The sturdy swain diminished to a boy! + Here Ouse, slow winding through a level plain + Of spacious meads with cattle sprinkled o'er, + Conducts the eye along his sinuous course + Delighted. There, fast rooted in his bank + Stand, never overlooked, our favourite elms + That screen the herdsman's solitary hut; + While far beyond and overthwart the stream + That, as with molten glass, inlays the vale, + The sloping land recedes into the clouds; + Displaying on its varied side the grace + Of hedgerow beauties numberless, square tower, + Tall spire, from which the sound of cheerful bells + Just undulates upon the listening ear; + Groves, heaths, and smoking villages remote. + Scenes must be beautiful which daily viewed + Please daily, and whose novelty survives + Long knowledge and the scrutiny of years: + Praise justly due to those that I describe. + + Nor rural sights alone, but rural sounds + Exhilarate the spirit, and restore + The tone of languid Nature. Mighty winds, + That sweep the skirt of some far-spreading wood + Of ancient growth, make music not unlike + The dash of ocean on his winding shore, + And lull the spirit while they fill the mind, + Unnumbered branches waving in the blast, + And all their leaves fast fluttering, all at once. + Nor less composure waits upon the roar + Of distant floods, or on the softer voice + Of neighbouring fountain, or of rills that slip + Through the cleft rock, and, chiming as they fall + Upon loose pebbles, lose themselves at length + In matted grass, that with a livelier green + Betrays the secret of their silent course. + Nature inanimate employs sweet sounds, + But animated Nature sweeter still + To soothe and satisfy the human ear. + Ten thousand warblers cheer the day, and one + The livelong night: nor these alone whose notes + Nice-fingered art must emulate in vain, + But cawing rooks, and kites that swim sublime + In still repeated circles, screaming loud, + The jay, the pie, and even the boding owl + That hails the rising moon, have charms for me. + Sounds inharmonious in themselves and harsh, + Yet heard in scenes where peace for ever reigns, + And only there, please highly for their sake. + + Peace to the artist, whose ingenious thought + Devised the weather-house, that useful toy! + Fearless of humid air and gathering rains + Forth steps the man--an emblem of myself! + More delicate his timorous mate retires. + When Winter soaks the fields, and female feet, + Too weak to struggle with tenacious clay, + Or ford the rivulets, are best at home, + The task of new discoveries falls on me. + At such a season and with such a charge + Once went I forth, and found, till then unknown, + A cottage, whither oft we since repair: + 'Tis perched upon the green hill-top, but close + Environed with a ring of branching elms + That overhang the thatch, itself unseen + Peeps at the vale below; so thick beset + With foliage of such dark redundant growth, + I called the low-roofed lodge the PEASANT'S NEST. + And hidden as it is, and far remote + From such unpleasing sounds as haunt the ear + In village or in town, the bay of curs + Incessant, clinking hammers, grinding wheels, + And infants clamorous whether pleased or pained, + Oft have I wished the peaceful covert mine. + Here, I have said, at least I should possess + The poet's treasure, silence, and indulge + The dreams of fancy, tranquil and secure. + Vain thought! the dweller in that still retreat + Dearly obtains the refuge it affords. + Its elevated site forbids the wretch + To drink sweet waters of the crystal well; + He dips his bowl into the weedy ditch, + And heavy-laden brings his beverage home, + Far-fetched and little worth: nor seldom waits + Dependent on the baker's punctual call, + To hear his creaking panniers at the door, + Angry and sad and his last crust consumed. + So farewell envy of the PEASANT'S NEST. + If solitude make scant the means of life, + Society for me! Thou seeming sweet, + Be still a pleasing object in my view, + My visit still, but never mine abode. + + Not distant far, a length of colonnade + Invites us; monument of ancient taste, + Now scorned, but worthy of a better fate. + Our fathers knew the value of a screen + From sultry suns, and, in their shaded walks + And long-protracted bowers, enjoyed at noon + The gloom and coolness of declining day. + We bear our shades about us; self-deprived + Of other screen, the thin umbrella spread, + And range an Indian waste without a tree. + Thanks to Benevolus--he spares me yet + These chestnuts ranged in corresponding lines, + And, though himself so polished, still reprieves + The obsolete prolixity of shade. + + Descending now (but cautious, lest too fast) + A sudden steep, upon a rustic bridge + We pass a gulf, in which the willows dip + Their pendent boughs, stooping as if to drink. + Hence ankle-deep in moss and flowery thyme + We mount again, and feel at every step + Our foot half sunk in hillocks green and soft, + Raised by the mole, the miner of the soil. + He, not unlike the great ones of mankind, + Disfigures earth, and plotting in the dark + Toils much to earn a monumental pile, + That may record the mischiefs he has done. + + The summit gained, behold the proud alcove + That crowns it! yet not all its pride secures + The grand retreat from injuries impressed + By rural carvers, who with knives deface + The panels, leaving an obscure rude name + In characters uncouth, and spelt amiss. + So strong the zeal to immortalise himself + Beats in the breast of man, that even a few + Few transient years, won from the abyss abhorred + Of blank oblivion, seem a glorious prize, + And even to a clown. Now roves the eye, + And posted on this speculative height + Exults in its command. The sheepfold here + Pours out its fleecy tenants o'er the glebe. + At first, progressive as a stream, they seek + The middle field; but scattered by degrees, + Each to his choice, soon whiten all the land. + There, from the sunburnt hay-field homeward creeps + The loaded wain; while, lightened of its charge, + The wain that meets it passes swiftly by, + The boorish driver leaning o'er his team, + Vociferous, and impatient of delay. + Nor less attractive is the woodland scene + Diversified with trees of every growth, + Alike yet various. Here the gray smooth trunks + Of ash, or lime, or beech, distinctly shine, + Within the twilight of their distant shades; + There, lost behind a rising ground, the wood + Seems sunk, and shortened to its topmost boughs. + No tree in all the grove but has its charms, + Though each its hue peculiar; paler some, + And of a wannish gray; the willow such, + And poplar that with silver lines his leaf, + And ash far-stretching his umbrageous arm; + Of deeper green the elm; and deeper still, + Lord of the woods, the long-surviving oak. + Some glossy-leaved and shining in the sun, + The maple, and the beech of oily nuts + Prolific, and the lime at dewy eve + Diffusing odours; nor unnoted pass + The sycamore, capricious in attire, + Now green, now tawny, and ere autumn yet + Have changed the woods, in scarlet honours bright. + O'er these, but far beyond (a spacious map + Of hill and valley interposed between), + The Ouse, dividing the well-watered land, + Now glitters in the sun, and now retires, + As bashful, yet impatient to be seen. + + Hence the declivity is sharp and short, + And such the re-ascent; between them weeps + A little Naiad her impoverished urn, + All summer long, which winter fills again. + The folded gates would bar my progress now, + But that the lord of this enclosed demesne, + Communicative of the good he owns, + Admits me to a share: the guiltless eye + Commits no wrong, nor wastes what it enjoys. + Refreshing change! where now the blazing sun? + By short transition we have lost his glare, + And stepped at once into a cooler clime. + Ye fallen avenues! once more I mourn + Your fate unmerited, once more rejoice + That yet a remnant of your race survives. + How airy and how light the graceful arch, + Yet awful as the consecrated roof + Re-echoing pious anthems! while beneath, + The chequered earth seems restless as a flood + Brushed by the wind. So sportive is the light + Shot through the boughs, it dances as they dance, + Shadow and sunshine intermingling quick, + And darkening and enlightening, as the leaves + Play wanton, every moment, every spot. + + And now, with nerves new-braced and spirits cheered, + We tread the wilderness, whose well-rolled walks, + With curvature of slow and easy sweep-- + Deception innocent--give ample space + To narrow bounds. The grove receives us next; + Between the upright shafts of whose tall elms + We may discern the thresher at his task. + Thump after thump resounds the constant flail, + That seems to swing uncertain and yet falls + Full on the destined ear. Wide flies the chaff, + The rustling straw sends up a frequent mist + Of atoms, sparkling in the noonday beam. + Come hither, ye that press your beds of down + And sleep not: see him sweating o'er his bread + Before he eats it.--'Tis the primal curse, + But softened into mercy; made the pledge + Of cheerful days, and nights without a groan. + + By ceaseless action, all that is subsists. + Constant rotation of the unwearied wheel + That Nature rides upon, maintains her health, + Her beauty, her fertility. She dreads + An instant's pause, and lives but while she moves. + Its own revolvency upholds the world. + Winds from all quarters agitate the air, + And fit the limpid element for use, + Else noxious: oceans, rivers, lakes, and streams + All feel the freshening impulse, and are cleansed + By restless undulation: even the oak + Thrives by the rude concussion of the storm: + He seems indeed indignant, and to feel + The impression of the blast with proud disdain, + Frowning as if in his unconscious arm + He held the thunder. But the monarch owes + His firm stability to what he scorns, + More fixed below, the more disturbed above. + The law, by which all creatures else are bound, + Binds man the lord of all. Himself derives + No mean advantage from a kindred cause, + From strenuous toil his hours of sweetest ease. + The sedentary stretch their lazy length + When custom bids, but no refreshment find, + For none they need: the languid eye, the cheek + Deserted of its bloom, the flaccid, shrunk, + And withered muscle, and the vapid soul, + Reproach their owner with that love of rest + To which he forfeits even the rest he loves. + Not such the alert and active. Measure life + By its true worth, the comforts it affords, + And theirs alone seems worthy of the name + Good health, and, its associate in the most, + Good temper; spirits prompt to undertake, + And not soon spent, though in an arduous task; + The powers of fancy and strong thought are theirs; + Even age itself seems privileged in them + With clear exemption from its own defects. + A sparkling eye beneath a wrinkled front + The veteran shows, and gracing a gray beard + With youthful smiles, descends towards the grave + Sprightly, and old almost without decay. + + Like a coy maiden, Ease, when courted most, + Farthest retires--an idol, at whose shrine + Who oftenest sacrifice are favoured least. + The love of Nature and the scene she draws + Is Nature's dictate. Strange, there should be found + Who, self-imprisoned in their proud saloons, + Renounce the odours of the open field + For the unscented fictions of the loom; + Who, satisfied with only pencilled scenes, + Prefer to the performance of a God + The inferior wonders of an artist's hand. + Lovely indeed the mimic works of Art, + But Nature's works far lovelier. I admire, + None more admires, the painter's magic skill, + Who shows me that which I shall never see, + Conveys a distant country into mine, + And throws Italian light on English walls. + But imitative strokes can do no more + Than please the eye, sweet Nature every sense. + The air salubrious of her lofty hills, + The cheering fragrance of her dewy vales, + And music of her woods--no works of man + May rival these; these all bespeak a power + Peculiar, and exclusively her own. + Beneath the open sky she spreads the feast; + 'Tis free to all--'tis ev'ry day renewed, + Who scorns it, starves deservedly at home. + He does not scorn it, who, imprisoned long + In some unwholesome dungeon, and a prey + To sallow sickness, which the vapours dank + And clammy of his dark abode have bred + Escapes at last to liberty and light; + His cheek recovers soon its healthful hue, + His eye relumines its extinguished fires, + He walks, he leaps, he runs--is winged with joy, + And riots in the sweets of every breeze. + He does not scorn it, who has long endured + A fever's agonies, and fed on drugs. + Nor yet the mariner, his blood inflamed + With acrid salts; his very heart athirst + To gaze at Nature in her green array. + Upon the ship's tall side he stands, possessed + With visions prompted by intense desire; + Fair fields appear below, such as he left + Far distant, such as he would die to find-- + He seeks them headlong, and is seen no more. + + The spleen is seldom felt where Flora reigns; + The lowering eye, the petulance, the frown, + And sullen sadness that o'ershade, distort, + And mar the face of beauty, when no cause + For such immeasurable woe appears, + These Flora banishes, and gives the fair + Sweet smiles, and bloom less transient than her own. + It is the constant revolution, stale + And tasteless, of the same repeated joys + That palls and satiates, and makes languid life + A pedlar's pack that bows the bearer down. + Health suffers, and the spirits ebb; the heart + Recoils from its own choice--at the full feast + Is famished--finds no music in the song, + No smartness in the jest, and wonders why. + Yet thousands still desire to journey on, + Though halt and weary of the path they tread. + The paralytic, who can hold her cards + But cannot play them, borrows a friend's hand + To deal and shuffle, to divide and sort + Her mingled suits and sequences, and sits + Spectatress both and spectacle, a sad + And silent cipher, while her proxy plays. + Others are dragged into the crowded room + Between supporters; and once seated, sit + Through downright inability to rise, + Till the stout bearers lift the corpse again. + These speak a loud memento. Yet even these + Themselves love life, and cling to it as he, + That overhangs a torrent, to a twig. + They love it, and yet loathe it; fear to die, + Yet scorn the purposes for which they live. + Then wherefore not renounce them? No--the dread, + The slavish dread of solitude, that breeds + Reflection and remorse, the fear of shame, + And their inveterate habits, all forbid. + + Whom call we gay? That honour has been long + The boast of mere pretenders to the name. + The innocent are gay--the lark is gay, + That dries his feathers saturate with dew + Beneath the rosy cloud, while yet the beams + Of day-spring overshoot his humble nest. + The peasant too, a witness of his song, + Himself a songster, is as gay as he. + But save me from the gaiety of those + Whose headaches nail them to a noonday bed; + And save me, too, from theirs whose haggard eyes + Flash desperation, and betray their pangs + For property stripped off by cruel chance; + From gaiety that fills the bones with pain, + The mouth with blasphemy, the heart with woe. + + The earth was made so various, that the mind + Of desultory man, studious of change, + And pleased with novelty, might be indulged. + Prospects however lovely may be seen + Till half their beauties fade; the weary sight, + Too well acquainted with their smiles, slides off + Fastidious, seeking less familiar scenes. + Then snug enclosures in the sheltered vale, + Where frequent hedges intercept the eye, + Delight us, happy to renounce a while, + Not senseless of its charms, what still we love, + That such short absence may endear it more. + Then forests, or the savage rock may please, + That hides the sea-mew in his hollow clefts + Above the reach of man: his hoary head + Conspicuous many a league, the mariner, + Bound homeward, and in hope already there, + Greets with three cheers exulting. At his waist + A girdle of half-withered shrubs he shows, + And at his feet the baffled billows die. + The common overgrown with fern, and rough + With prickly gorse, that, shapeless and deformed + And dangerous to the touch, has yet its bloom, + And decks itself with ornaments of gold, + Yields no unpleasing ramble; there the turf + Smells fresh, and, rich in odoriferous herbs + And fungous fruits of earth, regales the sense + With luxury of unexpected sweets. + + There often wanders one, whom better days + Saw better clad, in cloak of satin trimmed + With lace, and hat with splendid ribbon bound. + A serving-maid was she, and fell in love + With one who left her, went to sea and died. + Her fancy followed him through foaming waves + To distant shores, and she would sit and weep + At what a sailor suffers; fancy too, + Delusive most where warmest wishes are, + Would oft anticipate his glad return, + And dream of transports she was not to know. + She heard the doleful tidings of his death, + And never smiled again. And now she roams + The dreary waste; there spends the livelong day, + And there, unless when charity forbids, + The livelong night. A tattered apron hides, + Worn as a cloak, and hardly hides, a gown + More tattered still; and both but ill conceal + A bosom heaved with never-ceasing sighs. + She begs an idle pin of all she meets, + And hoards them in her sleeve; but needful food, + Though pressed with hunger oft, or comelier clothes, + Though pinched with cold, asks never.--Kate is crazed! + + I see a column of slow-rising smoke + O'ertop the lofty wood that skirts the wild. + A vagabond and useless tribe there eat + Their miserable meal. A kettle slung + Between two poles upon a stick transverse, + Receives the morsel; flesh obscene of dog, + Or vermin, or, at best, of cock purloined + From his accustomed perch. Hard-faring race! + They pick their fuel out of every hedge, + Which, kindled with dry leaves, just saves unquenched + The spark of life. The sportive wind blows wide + Their fluttering rags, and shows a tawny skin, + The vellum of the pedigree they claim. + Great skill have they in palmistry, and more + To conjure clean away the gold they touch, + Conveying worthless dross into its place; + Loud when they beg, dumb only when they steal. + Strange! that a creature rational, and cast + In human mould, should brutalise by choice + His nature, and, though capable of arts + By which the world might profit and himself, + Self-banished from society, prefer + Such squalid sloth to honourable toil. + Yet even these, though feigning sickness oft + They swathe the forehead, drag the limping limb, + And vex their flesh with artificial sores, + Can change their whine into a mirthful note + When safe occasion offers, and with dance, + And music of the bladder and the bag, + Beguile their woes, and make the woods resound. + Such health and gaiety of heart enjoy + The houseless rovers of the sylvan world; + And breathing wholesome air, and wandering much, + Need other physic none to heal the effects + Of loathsome diet, penury, and cold. + + Blest he, though undistinguished from the crowd + By wealth or dignity, who dwells secure + Where man, by nature fierce, has laid aside + His fierceness, having learnt, though slow to learn + The manners and the arts of civil life. + His wants, indeed, are many; but supply + Is obvious; placed within the easy reach + Of temperate wishes and industrious hands. + Here virtue thrives as in her proper soil; + Not rude and surly, and beset with thorns, + And terrible to sight, as when she springs + (If e'er she spring spontaneous) in remote + And barbarous climes, where violence prevails, + And strength is lord of all; but gentle, kind, + By culture tamed, by liberty refreshed, + And all her fruits by radiant truth matured. + War and the chase engross the savage whole; + War followed for revenge, or to supplant + The envied tenants of some happier spot; + The chase for sustenance, precarious trust! + His hard condition with severe constraint + Binds all his faculties, forbids all growth + Of wisdom, proves a school in which he learns + Sly circumvention, unrelenting hate, + Mean self-attachment, and scarce aught beside. + Thus fare the shivering natives of the north, + And thus the rangers of the western world, + Where it advances far into the deep, + Towards the Antarctic. Even the favoured isles + So lately found, although the constant sun + Cheer all their seasons with a grateful smile, + Can boast but little virtue; and inert + Through plenty, lose in morals what they gain + In manners, victims of luxurious ease. + These therefore I can pity, placed remote + From all that science traces, art invents, + Or inspiration teaches; and enclosed + In boundless oceans, never to be passed + By navigators uninformed as they, + Or ploughed perhaps by British bark again. + But far beyond the rest, and with most cause, + Thee, gentle savage! whom no love of thee + Or thine, but curiosity perhaps, + Or else vain-glory, prompted us to draw + Forth from thy native bowers, to show thee here + With what superior skill we can abuse + The gifts of Providence, and squander life. + The dream is past. And thou hast found again + Thy cocoas and bananas, palms, and yams, + And homestall thatched with leaves. But hast thou found + Their former charms? And, having seen our state, + Our palaces, our ladies, and our pomp + Of equipage, our gardens, and our sports, + And heard our music; are thy simple friends, + Thy simple fare, and all thy plain delights + As dear to thee as once? And have thy joys + Lost nothing by comparison with ours? + Rude as thou art (for we returned thee rude + And ignorant, except of outward show), + I cannot think thee yet so dull of heart + And spiritless, as never to regret + Sweets tasted here, and left as soon as known. + Methinks I see thee straying on the beach, + And asking of the surge that bathes the foot + If ever it has washed our distant shore. + I see thee weep, and thine are honest tears, + A patriot's for his country. Thou art sad + At thought of her forlorn and abject state, + From which no power of thine can raise her up. + Thus fancy paints thee, and, though apt to err, + Perhaps errs little when she paints thee thus. + She tells me too that duly every morn + Thou climb'st the mountain-top, with eager eye + Exploring far and wide the watery waste, + For sight of ship from England. Every speck + Seen in the dim horizon turns thee pale + With conflict of contending hopes and fears. + But comes at last the dull and dusky eve, + And sends thee to thy cabin, well prepared + To dream all night of what the day denied. + Alas, expect it not. We found no bait + To tempt us in thy country. Doing good, + Disinterested good, is not our trade. + We travel far, 'tis true, but not for naught; + And must be bribed to compass earth again + By other hopes, and richer fruits than yours. + + But though true worth and virtue, in the mild + And genial soil of cultivated life + Thrive most, and may perhaps thrive only there, + Yet not in cities oft. In proud and gay + And gain-devoted cities, thither flow, + As to a common and most noisome sewer, + The dregs and feculence of every land. + In cities, foul example on most minds + Begets its likeness. Rank abundance breeds + In gross and pampered cities sloth and lust, + And wantonness and gluttonous excess. + In cities, vice is hidden with most ease, + Or seen with least reproach; and virtue, taught + By frequent lapse, can hope no triumph there, + Beyond the achievement of successful flight. + I do confess them nurseries of the arts, + In which they flourish most; where, in the beams + Of warm encouragement, and in the eye + Of public note, they reach their perfect size. + Such London is, by taste and wealth proclaimed + The fairest capital in all the world, + By riot and incontinence the worst. + There, touched by Reynolds, a dull blank becomes + A lucid mirror, in which nature sees + All her reflected features. Bacon there + Gives more than female beauty to a stone, + And Chatham's eloquence to marble lips. + Nor does the chisel occupy alone + The powers of sculpture, but the style as much; + Each province of her art her equal care. + With nice incision of her guided steel + She ploughs a brazen field, and clothes a soil + So sterile with what charms soe'er she will, + The richest scenery and the loveliest forms. + Where finds philosophy her eagle eye, + With which she gazes at yon burning disk + Undazzled, and detects and counts his spots? + In London. Where her implements exact, + With which she calculates, computes, and scans + All distance, motion, magnitude, and now + Measures an atom, and now girds a world? + In London. Where has commerce such a mart, + So rich, so thronged, so drained, and so supplied, + As London, opulent, enlarged, and still + Increasing London? Babylon of old + Not more the glory of the earth, than she + A more accomplished world's chief glory now. + + She has her praise. Now mark a spot or two + That so much beauty would do well to purge; + And show this queen of cities, that so fair + May yet be foul; so witty, yet not wise. + It is not seemly, nor of good report, + That she is slack in discipline; more prompt + To avenge than to prevent the breach of law: + That she is rigid in denouncing death + On petty robbers, and indulges life + And liberty, and ofttimes honour too, + To peculators of the public gold: + That thieves at home must hang; but he, that puts + Into his overgorged and bloated purse + The wealth of Indian provinces, escapes. + Nor is it well, nor can it come to good, + That through profane and infidel contempt + Of holy writ, she has presumed to annul + And abrogate, as roundly as she may, + The total ordinance and will of God; + Advancing fashion to the post of truth, + And centring all authority in modes + And customs of her own, till Sabbath rites + Have dwindled into unrespected forms, + And knees and hassocks are wellnigh divorced. + + God made the country, and man made the town. + What wonder, then, that health and virtue, gifts + That can alone make sweet the bitter draught + That life holds out to all, should most abound + And least be threatened in the fields and groves? + Possess ye therefore, ye who, borne about + In chariots and sedans, know no fatigue + But that of idleness, and taste no scenes + But such as art contrives, possess ye still + Your element; there only ye can shine, + There only minds like yours can do no harm. + Our groves were planted to console at noon + The pensive wanderer in their shades. At eve + The moonbeam, sliding softly in between + The sleeping leaves, is all the light they wish, + Birds warbling all the music. We can spare + The splendour of your lamps, they but eclipse + Our softer satellite. Your songs confound + Our more harmonious notes. The thrush departs + Scared, and the offended nightingale is mute. + There is a public mischief in your mirth; + It plagues your country. Folly such as yours, + Graced with a sword, and worthier of a fan, + Has made, which enemies could ne'er have done, + Our arch of empire, steadfast but for you, + A mutilated structure, soon to fall. + + + +BOOK II. + +THE TIMEPIECE. + + Oh for a lodge in some vast wilderness, + Some boundless contiguity of shade, + Where rumour of oppression and deceit, + Of unsuccessful or successful war, + Might never reach me more! My ear is pained, + My soul is sick with every day's report + Of wrong and outrage with which earth is filled. + There is no flesh in man's obdurate heart, + It does not feel for man. The natural bond + Of brotherhood is severed as the flax + That falls asunder at the touch of fire. + He finds his fellow guilty of a skin + Not coloured like his own, and having power + To enforce the wrong, for such a worthy cause + Dooms and devotes him as his lawful prey. + Lands intersected by a narrow frith + Abhor each other. Mountains interposed + Make enemies of nations, who had else + Like kindred drops been mingled into one. + Thus man devotes his brother, and destroys; + And worse than all, and most to be deplored, + As human nature's broadest, foulest blot, + Chains him, and tasks him, and exacts his sweat + With stripes, that mercy, with a bleeding heart, + Weeps when she sees inflicted on a beast. + Then what is man? And what man, seeing this, + And having human feelings, does not blush + And hang his head, to think himself a man? + I would not have a slave to till my ground, + To carry me, to fan me while I sleep, + And tremble when I wake, for all the wealth + That sinews bought and sold have ever earned. + No: dear as freedom is, and in my heart's + Just estimation prized above all price, + I had much rather be myself the slave + And wear the bonds, than fasten them on him. + We have no slaves at home--then why abroad? + And they themselves, once ferried o'er the wave + That parts us, are emancipate and loosed. + Slaves cannot breathe in England; if their lungs + Receive our air, that moment they are free, + They touch our country and their shackles fall. + That's noble, and bespeaks a nation proud + And jealous of the blessing. Spread it then, + And let it circulate through every vein + Of all your empire; that where Britain's power + Is felt, mankind may feel her mercy too. + + Sure there is need of social intercourse, + Benevolence and peace and mutual aid, + Between the nations, in a world that seems + To toll the death-bell to its own decease; + And by the voice of all its elements + To preach the general doom. When were the winds + Let slip with such a warrant to destroy? + When did the waves so haughtily o'erleap + Their ancient barriers, deluging the dry? + Fires from beneath and meteors from above, + Portentous, unexampled, unexplained, + Have kindled beacons in the skies, and the old + And crazy earth has had her shaking fits + More frequent, and foregone her usual rest. + Is it a time to wrangle, when the props + And pillars of our planet seem to fail, + And nature with a dim and sickly eye + To wait the close of all? But grant her end + More distant, and that prophecy demands + A longer respite, unaccomplished yet; + Still they are frowning signals, and bespeak + Displeasure in His breast who smites the earth + Or heals it, makes it languish or rejoice. + And 'tis but seemly, that, where all deserve + And stand exposed by common peccancy + To what no few have felt, there should be peace, + And brethren in calamity should love. + + Alas for Sicily, rude fragments now + Lie scattered where the shapely column stood. + Her palaces are dust. In all her streets + The voice of singing and the sprightly chord + Are silent. Revelry and dance and show + Suffer a syncope and solemn pause, + While God performs, upon the trembling stage + Of His own works, His dreadful part alone. + How does the earth receive Him?--With what signs + Of gratulation and delight, her King? + Pours she not all her choicest fruits abroad, + Her sweetest flowers, her aromatic gums, + Disclosing paradise where'er He treads? + She quakes at His approach. Her hollow womb, + Conceiving thunders, through a thousand deeps + And fiery caverns roars beneath His foot. + The hills move lightly and the mountains smoke, + For He has touched them. From the extremest point + Of elevation down into the abyss, + His wrath is busy and His frown is felt. + The rocks fall headlong and the valleys rise, + The rivers die into offensive pools, + And, charged with putrid verdure, breathe a gross + And mortal nuisance into all the air. + What solid was, by transformation strange + Grows fluid, and the fixed and rooted earth + Tormented into billows, heaves and swells, + Or with vortiginous and hideous whirl + Sucks down its prey insatiable. Immense + The tumult and the overthrow, the pangs + And agonies of human and of brute + Multitudes, fugitive on every side, + And fugitive in vain. The sylvan scene + Migrates uplifted, and, with all its soil + Alighting in far-distant fields, finds out + A new possessor, and survives the change. + Ocean has caught the frenzy, and upwrought + To an enormous and o'erbearing height, + Not by a mighty wind, but by that voice + Which winds and waves obey, invades the shore + Resistless. Never such a sudden flood, + Upridged so high, and sent on such a charge, + Possessed an inland scene. Where now the throng + That pressed the beach and hasty to depart + Looked to the sea for safety? They are gone, + Gone with the refluent wave into the deep, + A prince with half his people. Ancient towers, + And roofs embattled high, the gloomy scenes + Where beauty oft and lettered worth consume + Life in the unproductive shades of death, + Fall prone: the pale inhabitants come forth, + And, happy in their unforeseen release + From all the rigours of restraint, enjoy + The terrors of the day that sets them free. + Who then, that has thee, would not hold thee fast, + Freedom! whom they that lose thee so regret, + That even a judgment, making way for thee, + Seems in their eyes a mercy, for thy sake. + + Such evil sin hath wrought; and such a flame + Kindled in heaven, that it burns down to earth, + And, in the furious inquest that it makes + On God's behalf, lays waste His fairest works. + The very elements, though each be meant + The minister of man to serve his wants, + Conspire against him. With his breath he draws + A plague into his blood; and cannot use + Life's necessary means, but he must die. + Storms rise to o'erwhelm him: or, if stormy winds + Rise not, the waters of the deep shall rise, + And, needing none assistance of the storm, + Shall roll themselves ashore, and reach him there. + The earth shall shake him out of all his holds, + Or make his house his grave; nor so content, + Shall counterfeit the motions of the flood, + And drown him in her dry and dusty gulfs. + What then--were they the wicked above all, + And we the righteous, whose fast-anchored isle + Moved not, while theirs was rocked like a light skiff, + The sport of every wave? No: none are clear, + And none than we more guilty. But where all + Stand chargeable with guilt, and to the shafts + Of wrath obnoxious, God may choose His mark, + May punish, if He please, the less, to warn + The more malignant. If He spared not them, + Tremble and be amazed at thine escape, + Far guiltier England, lest He spare not thee! + + Happy the man who sees a God employed + In all the good and ill that chequer life! + Resolving all events, with their effects + And manifold results, into the will + And arbitration wise of the Supreme. + Did not His eye rule all things, and intend + The least of our concerns (since from the least + The greatest oft originate), could chance + Find place in His dominion, or dispose + One lawless particle to thwart His plan, + Then God might be surprised, and unforeseen + Contingence might alarm Him, and disturb + The smooth and equal course of His affairs. + This truth, philosophy, though eagle-eyed + In nature's tendencies, oft overlooks; + And, having found His instrument, forgets + Or disregards, or, more presumptuous still, + Denies the power that wields it. God proclaims + His hot displeasure against foolish men + That live an Atheist life: involves the heaven + In tempests, quits His grasp upon the winds + And gives them all their fury; bids a plague + Kindle a fiery boil upon the skin, + And putrefy the breath of blooming health. + He calls for Famine, and the meagre fiend + Blows mildew from between his shrivelled lips, + And taints the golden ear. He springs His mines, + And desolates a nation at a blast. + Forth steps the spruce philosopher, and tells + Of homogeneal and discordant springs + And principles; of causes how they work + By necessary laws their sure effects; + Of action and reaction. He has found + The source of the disease that nature feels, + And bids the world take heart and banish fear. + Thou fool! will thy discovery of the cause + Suspend the effect, or heal it? Has not God + Still wrought by means since first He made the world, + And did He not of old employ His means + To drown it? What is His creation less + Than a capacious reservoir of means + Formed for His use, and ready at His will? + Go, dress thine eyes with eye-salve, ask of Him, + Or ask of whomsoever He has taught, + And learn, though late, the genuine cause of all. + + England, with all thy faults, I love thee still-- + My country! and while yet a nook is left, + Where English minds and manners may be found, + Shall be constrained to love thee. Though thy clime + Be fickle, and thy year most part deformed + With dripping rains, or withered by a frost, + I would not yet exchange thy sullen skies + And fields without a flower, for warmer France + With all her vines; nor for Ausonia's groves + Of golden fruitage, and her myrtle bowers. + To shake thy senate, and from heights sublime + Of patriot eloquence to flash down fire + Upon thy foes, was never meant my task; + But I can feel thy fortune, and partake + Thy joys and sorrows with as true a heart + As any thunderer there. And I can feel + Thy follies too, and with a just disdain + Frown at effeminates, whose very looks + Reflect dishonour on the land I love. + How, in the name of soldiership and sense, + Should England prosper, when such things, as smooth + And tender as a girl, all essenced o'er + With odours, and as profligate as sweet, + Who sell their laurel for a myrtle wreath, + And love when they should fight; when such as these + Presume to lay their hand upon the ark + Of her magnificent and awful cause? + Time was when it was praise and boast enough + In every clime, and travel where we might, + That we were born her children. Praise enough + To fill the ambition of a private man, + That Chatham's language was his mother tongue, + And Wolfe's great name compatriot with his own. + Farewell those honours, and farewell with them + The hope of such hereafter. They have fallen + Each in his field of glory; one in arms, + And one in council;--Wolfe upon the lap + Of smiling victory that moment won, + And Chatham, heart-sick of his country's shame. + They made us many soldiers. Chatham, still + Consulting England's happiness at home, + Secured it by an unforgiving frown + If any wronged her. Wolfe, where'er he fought, + Put so much of his heart into his act, + That his example had a magnet's force, + And all were swift to follow whom all loved. + Those suns are set. Oh, rise some other such! + Or all that we have left is empty talk + Of old achievements, and despair of new. + + Now hoist the sail, and let the streamers float + Upon the wanton breezes. Strew the deck + With lavender, and sprinkle liquid sweets, + That no rude savour maritime invade + The nose of nice nobility. Breathe soft, + Ye clarionets, and softer still, ye flutes, + That winds and waters lulled by magic sounds + May bear us smoothly to the Gallic shore. + True, we have lost an empire--let it pass. + True, we may thank the perfidy of France + That picked the jewel out of England's crown, + With all the cunning of an envious shrew. + And let that pass--'twas but a trick of state. + A brave man knows no malice, but at once + Forgets in peace the injuries of war, + And gives his direst foe a friend's embrace. + And shamed as we have been, to the very beard + Braved and defied, and in our own sea proved + Too weak for those decisive blows that once + Insured us mastery there, we yet retain + Some small pre-eminence, we justly boast + At least superior jockeyship, and claim + The honours of the turf as all our own. + Go then, well worthy of the praise ye seek, + And show the shame ye might conceal at home, + In foreign eyes!--be grooms, and win the plate, + Where once your nobler fathers won a crown!-- + 'Tis generous to communicate your skill + To those that need it. Folly is soon learned, + And, under such preceptors, who can fail? + + There is a pleasure in poetic pains + Which only poets know. The shifts and turns, + The expedients and inventions multiform + To which the mind resorts, in chase of terms + Though apt, yet coy, and difficult to win-- + To arrest the fleeting images that fill + The mirror of the mind, and hold them fast, + And force them sit, till he has pencilled off + A faithful likeness of the forms he views; + Then to dispose his copies with such art + That each may find its most propitious light, + And shine by situation, hardly less + Than by the labour and the skill it cost, + Are occupations of the poet's mind + So pleasing, and that steal away the thought + With such address from themes of sad import, + That, lost in his own musings, happy man! + He feels the anxieties of life, denied + Their wonted entertainment, all retire. + Such joys has he that sings. But ah! not such, + Or seldom such, the hearers of his song. + Fastidious, or else listless, or perhaps + Aware of nothing arduous in a task + They never undertook, they little note + His dangers or escapes, and haply find + There least amusement where he found the most. + But is amusement all? studious of song + And yet ambitious not to sing in vain, + I would not trifle merely, though the world + Be loudest in their praise who do no more. + Yet what can satire, whether grave or gay? + It may correct a foible, may chastise + The freaks of fashion, regulate the dress, + Retrench a sword-blade, or displace a patch; + But where are its sublimer trophies found? + What vice has it subdued? whose heart reclaimed + By rigour, or whom laughed into reform? + Alas, Leviathan is not so tamed. + Laughed at, he laughs again; and, stricken hard, + Turns to the stroke his adamantine scales, + That fear no discipline of human hands. + + The pulpit therefore--and I name it, filled + With solemn awe, that bids me well beware + With what intent I touch that holy thing-- + The pulpit, when the satirist has at last, + Strutting and vapouring in an empty school, + Spent all his force, and made no proselyte-- + I say the pulpit, in the sober use + Of its legitimate peculiar powers, + Must stand acknowledged, while the world shall stand, + The most important and effectual guard, + Support, and ornament of virtue's cause. + There stands the messenger of truth; there stands + The legate of the skies; his theme divine, + His office sacred, his credentials clear. + By him, the violated Law speaks out + Its thunders, and by him, in strains as sweet + As angels use, the Gospel whispers peace. + He stablishes the strong, restores the weak, + Reclaims the wanderer, binds the broken heart, + And, armed himself in panoply complete + Of heavenly temper, furnishes with arms + Bright as his own, and trains, by every rule + Of holy discipline, to glorious war, + The sacramental host of God's elect. + Are all such teachers? would to heaven all were! + But hark--the Doctor's voice--fast wedged between + Two empirics he stands, and with swollen cheeks + Inspires the news, his trumpet. Keener far + Than all invective is his bold harangue, + While through that public organ of report + He hails the clergy, and, defying shame, + Announces to the world his own and theirs, + He teaches those to read whom schools dismissed, + And colleges, untaught; sells accents, tone, + And emphasis in score, and gives to prayer + The adagio and andante it demands. + He grinds divinity of other days + Down into modern use; transforms old print + To zigzag manuscript, and cheats the eyes + Of gallery critics by a thousand arts.-- + Are there who purchase of the Doctor's ware? + Oh name it not in Gath!--it cannot be, + That grave and learned Clerks should need such aid. + He doubtless is in sport, and does but droll, + Assuming thus a rank unknown before, + Grand caterer and dry-nurse of the Church. + + I venerate the man whose heart is warm, + Whose hands are pure, whose doctrine and whose life, + Coincident, exhibit lucid proof + That he is honest in the sacred cause. + To such I render more than mere respect, + Whose actions say that they respect themselves. + But, loose in morals, and in manners vain, + In conversation frivolous, in dress + Extreme, at once rapacious and profuse, + Frequent in park with lady at his side, + Ambling and prattling scandal as he goes, + But rare at home, and never at his books + Or with his pen, save when he scrawls a card; + Constant at routs, familiar with a round + Of ladyships, a stranger to the poor; + Ambitions of preferment for its gold, + And well prepared by ignorance and sloth, + By infidelity and love o' the world, + To make God's work a sinecure; a slave + To his own pleasures and his patron's pride.-- + From such apostles, O ye mitred heads, + Preserve the Church! and lay not careless hands + On skulls that cannot teach, and will not learn. + + Would I describe a preacher, such as Paul, + Were he on earth, would hear, approve, and own, + Paul should himself direct me. I would trace + His master-strokes, and draw from his design. + I would express him simple, grave, sincere; + In doctrine uncorrupt; in language plain, + And plain in manner; decent, solemn, chaste, + And natural in gesture; much impressed + Himself, as conscious of his awful charge, + And anxious mainly that the flock he feeds + May feel it too; affectionate in look + And tender in address, as well becomes + A messenger of grace to guilty men. + Behold the picture!--Is it like?--Like whom? + The things that mount the rostrum with a skip, + And then skip down again; pronounce a text, + Cry--Hem; and reading what they never wrote, + Just fifteen minutes, huddle up their work, + And with a well-bred whisper close the scene. + + In man or woman, but far most in man, + And most of all in man that ministers + And serves the altar, in my soul I loathe + All affectation. 'Tis my perfect scorn; + Object of my implacable disgust. + What!--will a man play tricks, will he indulge + A silly fond conceit of his fair form + And just proportion, fashionable mien, + And pretty face, in presence of his God? + Or will he seek to dazzle me with tropes, + As with the diamond on his lily hand, + And play his brilliant parts before my eyes, + When I am hungry for the Bread of Life? + He mocks his Maker, prostitutes and shames + His noble office, and, instead of truth, + Displaying his own beauty, starves his flock! + Therefore, avaunt, all attitude and stare + And start theatric, practised at the glass. + I seek divine simplicity in him + Who handles things divine; and all beside, + Though learned with labour, and though much admired + By curious eyes and judgments ill-informed, + To me is odious as the nasal twang + Heard at conventicle, where worthy men, + Misled by custom, strain celestial themes + Through the prest nostril, spectacle-bestrid. + Some, decent in demeanour while they preach, + That task performed, relapse into themselves, + And having spoken wisely, at the close + Grow wanton, and give proof to every eye-- + Whoe'er was edified themselves were not. + Forth comes the pocket mirror. First we stroke + An eyebrow; next compose a straggling lock; + Then with an air, most gracefully performed, + Fall back into our seat; extend an arm, + And lay it at its ease with gentle care, + With handkerchief in hand, depending low: + The better hand, more busy, gives the nose + Its bergamot, or aids the indebted eye + With opera glass to watch the moving scene, + And recognise the slow-retiring fair. + Now this is fulsome, and offends me more + Than in a Churchman slovenly neglect + And rustic coarseness would. A heavenly mind + May be indifferent to her house of clay, + And slight the hovel as beneath her care. + But how a body so fantastic, trim, + And quaint in its deportment and attire, + Can lodge a heavenly mind--demands a doubt. + + He that negotiates between God and man, + As God's ambassador, the grand concerns + Of judgment and of mercy, should beware + Of lightness in his speech. 'Tis pitiful + To court a grin, when you should woo a soul; + To break a jest, when pity would inspire + Pathetic exhortation; and to address + The skittish fancy with facetious tales, + When sent with God's commission to the heart. + So did not Paul. Direct me to a quip + Or merry turn in all he ever wrote, + And I consent you take it for your text, + Your only one, till sides and benches fail. + No: he was serious in a serious cause, + And understood too well the weighty terms + That he had ta'en in charge. He would not stoop + To conquer those by jocular exploits, + Whom truth and soberness assailed in vain. + + Oh, popular applause! what heart of man + Is proof against thy sweet seducing charms? + The wisest and the best feel urgent need + Of all their caution in thy gentlest gales; + But swelled into a gust--who then, alas! + With all his canvas set, and inexpert, + And therefore heedless, can withstand thy power? + Praise from the riveled lips of toothless, bald + Decrepitude, and in the looks of lean + And craving poverty, and in the bow + Respectful of the smutched artificer, + Is oft too welcome, and may much disturb + The bias of the purpose. How much more, + Poured forth by beauty splendid and polite, + In language soft as adoration breathes? + Ah, spare your idol! think him human still; + Charms he may have, but he has frailties too; + Dote not too much, nor spoil what ye admire. + + All truth is from the sempiternal source + Of light divine. But Egypt, Greece, and Rome + Drew from the stream below. More favoured, we + Drink, when we choose it, at the fountain head. + To them it flowed much mingled and defiled + With hurtful error, prejudice, and dreams + Illusive of philosophy, so called, + But falsely. Sages after sages strove, + In vain, to filter off a crystal draught + Pure from the lees, which often more enhanced + The thirst than slaked it, and not seldom bred + Intoxication and delirium wild. + In vain they pushed inquiry to the birth + And spring-time of the world; asked, Whence is man? + Why formed at all? and wherefore as he is? + Where must he find his Maker? With what rites + Adore Him? Will He hear, accept, and bless? + Or does He sit regardless of His works? + Has man within him an immortal seed? + Or does the tomb take all? If he survive + His ashes, where? and in what weal or woe? + Knots worthy of solution, which alone + A Deity could solve. Their answers vague, + And all at random, fabulous and dark, + Left them as dark themselves. Their rules of life, + Defective and unsanctioned, proved too weak + To bind the roving appetite, and lead + Blind nature to a God not yet revealed. + 'Tis Revelation satisfies all doubts, + Explains all mysteries, except her own, + And so illuminates the path of life, + That fools discover it, and stray no more. + Now tell me, dignified and sapient sir, + My man of morals, nurtured in the shades + Of Academus, is this false or true? + Is Christ the abler teacher, or the schools? + If Christ, then why resort at every turn + To Athens or to Rome for wisdom short + Of man's occasions, when in Him reside + Grace, knowledge, comfort, an unfathomed store? + How oft when Paul has served us with a text, + Has Epictetus, Plato, Tully, preached! + Men that, if now alive, would sit content + And humble learners of a Saviour's worth, + Preach it who might. Such was their love of truth, + Their thirst of knowledge, and their candour too. + + And thus it is. The pastor, either vain + By nature, or by flattery made so, taught + To gaze at his own splendour, and to exalt + Absurdly, not his office, but himself; + Or unenlightened, and too proud to learn, + Or vicious, and not therefore apt to teach, + Perverting often, by the stress of lewd + And loose example, whom he should instruct, + Exposes and holds up to broad disgrace + The noblest function, and discredits much + The brightest truths that man has ever seen. + For ghostly counsel, if it either fall + Below the exigence, or be not backed + With show of love, at least with hopeful proof + Of some sincerity on the giver's part; + Or be dishonoured in the exterior form + And mode of its conveyance, by such tricks + As move derision, or by foppish airs + And histrionic mummery, that let down + The pulpit to the level of the stage; + Drops from the lips a disregarded thing. + The weak perhaps are moved, but are not taught, + While prejudice in men of stronger minds + Takes deeper root, confirmed by what they see. + A relaxation of religion's hold + Upon the roving and untutored heart + Soon follows, and the curb of conscience snapt, + The laity run wild.--But do they now? + Note their extravagance, and be convinced. + + As nations, ignorant of God, contrive + A wooden one, so we, no longer taught + By monitors that Mother Church supplies, + Now make our own. Posterity will ask + (If e'er posterity sees verse of mine), + Some fifty or a hundred lustrums hence, + What was a monitor in George's days? + My very gentle reader, yet unborn, + Of whom I needs must augur better things, + Since Heaven would sure grow weary of a world + Productive only of a race like us, + A monitor is wood--plank shaven thin. + We wear it at our backs. There, closely braced + And neatly fitted, it compresses hard + The prominent and most unsightly bones, + And binds the shoulders flat. We prove its use + Sovereign and most effectual to secure + A form, not now gymnastic as of yore, + From rickets and distortion, else, our lot. + But thus admonished we can walk erect, + One proof at least of manhood; while the friend + Sticks close, a Mentor worthy of his charge. + Our habits costlier than Lucullus wore, + And, by caprice as multiplied as his, + Just please us while the fashion is at full, + But change with every moon. The sycophant, + That waits to dress us, arbitrates their date, + Surveys his fair reversion with keen eye; + Finds one ill made, another obsolete, + This fits not nicely, that is ill conceived; + And, making prize of all that he condemns, + With our expenditure defrays his own. + Variety's the very spice of life, + That gives it all its flavour. We have run + Through every change that fancy, at the loom + Exhausted, has had genius to supply, + And, studious of mutation still, discard + A real elegance, a little used, + For monstrous novelty and strange disguise. + We sacrifice to dress, till household joys + And comforts cease. Dress drains our cellar dry, + And keeps our larder lean; puts out our fires, + And introduces hunger, frost, and woe, + Where peace and hospitality might reign. + What man that lives, and that knows how to live, + Would fail to exhibit at the public shows + A form as splendid as the proudest there, + Though appetite raise outcries at the cost? + A man o' the town dines late, but soon enough, + With reasonable forecast and despatch, + To ensure a side-box station at half-price. + You think, perhaps, so delicate his dress, + His daily fare as delicate. Alas! + He picks clean teeth, and, busy as he seems + With an old tavern quill, is hungry yet. + The rout is folly's circle which she draws + With magic wand. So potent is the spell, + That none decoyed into that fatal ring, + Unless by Heaven's peculiar grace, escape. + There we grow early gray, but never wise; + There form connections, and acquire no friend; + Solicit pleasure hopeless of success; + Waste youth in occupations only fit + For second childhood, and devote old age + To sports which only childhood could excuse. + There they are happiest who dissemble best + Their weariness; and they the most polite, + Who squander time and treasure with a smile, + Though at their own destruction. She that asks + Her dear five hundred friends, contemns them all, + And hates their coming. They (what can they less?) + Make just reprisals, and, with cringe and shrug + And bow obsequious, hide their hate of her. + All catch the frenzy, downward from her Grace, + Whose flambeaux flash against the morning skies, + And gild our chamber ceilings as they pass, + To her who, frugal only that her thrift + May feed excesses she can ill afford, + Is hackneyed home unlackeyed; who, in haste + Alighting, turns the key in her own door, + And, at the watchman's lantern borrowing light, + Finds a cold bed her only comfort left. + Wives beggar husbands, husbands starve their wives, + On Fortune's velvet altar offering up + Their last poor pittance--Fortune, most severe + Of goddesses yet known, and costlier far + Than all that held their routs in Juno's heaven.-- + So fare we in this prison-house the world. + And 'tis a fearful spectacle to see + So many maniacs dancing in their chains. + They gaze upon the links that hold them fast + With eyes of anguish, execrate their lot, + Then shake them in despair, and dance again. + + Now basket up the family of plagues + That waste our vitals. Peculation, sale + Of honour, perjury, corruption, frauds + By forgery, by subterfuge of law, + By tricks and lies, as numerous and as keen + As the necessities their authors feel; + Then cast them, closely bundled, every brat + At the right door. Profusion is its sire. + Profusion unrestrained, with all that's base + In character, has littered all the land, + And bred within the memory of no few + A priesthood such as Baal's was of old, + A people such as never was till now. + It is a hungry vice:--it eats up all + That gives society its beauty, strength, + Convenience, and security, and use; + Makes men mere vermin, worthy to be trapped + And gibbeted, as fast as catchpole claws + Can seize the slippery prey; unties the knot + Of union, and converts the sacred band + That holds mankind together to a scourge. + Profusion, deluging a state with lusts + Of grossest nature and of worst effects, + Prepares it for its ruin; hardens, blinds, + And warps the consciences of public men + Till they can laugh at virtue; mock the fools + That trust them; and, in the end, disclose a face + That would have shocked credulity herself, + Unmasked, vouchsafing this their sole excuse;-- + Since all alike are selfish, why not they? + This does Profusion, and the accursed cause + Of such deep mischief has itself a cause. + + In colleges and halls, in ancient days, + When learning, virtue, piety, and truth + Were precious, and inculcated with care, + There dwelt a sage called Discipline. His head, + Not yet by time completely silvered o'er, + Bespoke him past the bounds of freakish youth, + But strong for service still, and unimpaired. + His eye was meek and gentle, and a smile + Played on his lips, and in his speech was heard + Paternal sweetness, dignity, and love. + The occupation dearest to his heart + Was to encourage goodness. He would stroke + The head of modest and ingenuous worth, + That blushed at its own praise, and press the youth + Close to his side that pleased him. Learning grew + Beneath his care, a thriving, vigorous plant; + The mind was well informed, the passions held + Subordinate, and diligence was choice. + If e'er it chanced, as sometimes chance it must, + That one among so many overleaped + The limits of control, his gentle eye + Grew stern, and darted a severe rebuke; + His frown was full of terror, and his voice + Shook the delinquent with such fits of awe + As left him not, till penitence had won + Lost favour back again, and closed the breach. + But Discipline, a faithful servant long, + Declined at length into the vale of years; + A palsy struck his arm, his sparkling eye + Was quenched in rheums of age, his voice unstrung + Grew tremulous, and moved derision more + Than reverence in perverse, rebellious youth. + So colleges and halls neglected much + Their good old friend, and Discipline at length, + O'erlooked and unemployed, fell sick and died. + Then study languished, emulation slept, + And virtue fled. The schools became a scene + Of solemn farce, where ignorance in stilts, + His cap well lined with logic not his own, + With parrot tongue performed the scholar's part, + Proceeding soon a graduated dunce. + Then compromise had place, and scrutiny + Became stone-blind, precedence went in truck, + And he was competent whose purse was so. + A dissolution of all bonds ensued, + The curbs invented for the mulish mouth + Of headstrong youth were broken; bars and bolts + Grew rusty by disuse, and massy gates + Forgot their office, opening with a touch; + Till gowns at length are found mere masquerade; + The tasselled cap and the spruce band a jest, + A mockery of the world. What need of these + For gamesters, jockeys, brothellers impure, + Spendthrifts and booted sportsmen, oftener seen + With belted waist, and pointers at their heels, + Than in the bounds of duty? What was learned, + If aught was learned in childhood, is forgot, + And such expense as pinches parents blue + And mortifies the liberal hand of love, + Is squandered in pursuit of idle sports + And vicious pleasures; buys the boy a name, + That sits a stigma on his father's house, + And cleaves through life inseparably close + To him that wears it. What can after-games + Of riper joys, and commerce with the world, + The lewd vain world that must receive him soon, + Add to such erudition thus acquired, + Where science and where virtue are professed? + They may confirm his habits, rivet fast + His folly, but to spoil him is a task + That bids defiance to the united powers + Of fashion, dissipation, taverns, stews. + Now, blame we most the nurselings, or the nurse? + The children crooked and twisted and deformed + Through want of care, or her whose winking eye + And slumbering oscitancy mars the brood? + The nurse no doubt. Regardless of her charge, + She needs herself correction; needs to learn + That it is dangerous sporting with the world, + With things so sacred as a nation's trust; + The nurture of her youth, her dearest pledge. + + All are not such. I had a brother once-- + Peace to the memory of a man of worth, + A man of letters and of manners too-- + Of manners sweet as virtue always wears, + When gay good-nature dresses her in smiles. + He graced a college in which order yet + Was sacred, and was honoured, loved, and wept, + By more than one, themselves conspicuous there. + Some minds are tempered happily, and mixt + With such ingredients of good sense and taste + Of what is excellent in man, they thirst + With such a zeal to be what they approve, + That no restraints can circumscribe them more + Than they themselves by choice, for wisdom's sake. + Nor can example hurt them. What they see + Of vice in others but enhancing more + The charms of virtue in their just esteem. + If such escape contagion, and emerge + Pure, from so foul a pool, to shine abroad, + And give the world their talents and themselves, + Small thanks to those whose negligence or sloth + Exposed their inexperience to the snare, + And left them to an undirected choice. + + See, then, the quiver broken and decayed, + In which are kept our arrows. Rusting there + In wild disorder and unfit for use, + What wonder if discharged into the world + They shame their shooters with a random flight, + Their points obtuse and feathers drunk with wine. + Well may the Church wage unsuccessful war + With such artillery armed. Vice parries wide + The undreaded volley with a sword of straw, + And stands an impudent and fearless mark. + + Have we not tracked the felon home, and found + His birthplace and his dam? The country mourns-- + Mourns, because every plague that can infest + Society, that saps and worms the base + Of the edifice that Policy has raised, + Swarms in all quarters; meets the eye, the ear, + And suffocates the breath at every turn. + Profusion breeds them. And the cause itself + Of that calamitous mischief has been found, + Found, too, where most offensive, in the skirts + Of the robed pedagogue. Else, let the arraigned + Stand up unconscious and refute the charge. + So, when the Jewish leader stretched his arm + And waved his rod divine, a race obscene, + Spawned in the muddy beds of Nile, came forth + Polluting Egypt. Gardens, fields, and plains + Were covered with the pest. The streets were filled; + The croaking nuisance lurked in every nook, + Nor palaces nor even chambers 'scaped, + And the land stank, so numerous was the fry. + + + +BOOK III. + +THE GARDEN. + + As one who, long in thickets and in brakes + Entangled, winds now this way and now that + His devious course uncertain, seeking home; + Or, having long in miry ways been foiled + And sore discomfited, from slough to slough + Plunging, and half despairing of escape, + If chance at length he find a greensward smooth + And faithful to the foot, his spirits rise, + He chirrups brisk his ear-erecting steed, + And winds his way with pleasure and with ease; + So I, designing other themes, and called + To adorn the Sofa with eulogium due, + To tell its slumbers and to paint its dreams, + Have rambled wide. In country, city, seat + Of academic fame, howe'er deserved, + Long held, and scarcely disengaged at last. + But now with pleasant pace, a cleanlier road + I mean to tread. I feel myself at large, + Courageous, and refreshed for future toil, + If toil await me, or if dangers new. + + Since pulpits fail, and sounding-boards reflect + Most part an empty ineffectual sound, + What chance that I, to fame so little known, + Nor conversant with men or manners much, + Should speak to purpose, or with better hope + Crack the satiric thong? 'Twere wiser far + For me, enamoured of sequestered scenes, + And charmed with rural beauty, to repose, + Where chance may throw me, beneath elm or vine + My languid limbs, when summer sears the plains; + Or when rough winter rages, on the soft + And sheltered Sofa, while the nitrous air + Feeds a blue flame and makes a cheerful hearth; + There, undisturbed by folly, and apprised + How great the danger of disturbing her, + To muse in silence, or at least confine + Remarks that gall so many to the few, + My partners in retreat. Disgust concealed + Is ofttimes proof of wisdom, when the fault + Is obstinate, and cure beyond our reach. + + Domestic happiness, thou only bliss + Of Paradise that has survived the fall! + Though few now taste thee unimpaired and pure, + Or, tasting, long enjoy thee, too infirm + Or too incautious to preserve thy sweets + Unmixed with drops of bitter, which neglect + Or temper sheds into thy crystal cup. + Thou art the nurse of virtue. In thine arms + She smiles, appearing, as in truth she is, + Heaven-born, and destined to the skies again. + Thou art not known where Pleasure is adored, + That reeling goddess with the zoneless waist + And wandering eyes, still leaning on the arm + Of Novelty, her fickle frail support; + For thou art meek and constant, hating change, + And finding in the calm of truth-tried love + Joys that her stormy raptures never yield. + Forsaking thee, what shipwreck have we made + Of honour, dignity, and fair renown, + Till prostitution elbows us aside + In all our crowded streets, and senates seem + Convened for purposes of empire less, + Than to release the adult'ress from her bond. + The adult'ress! what a theme for angry verse, + What provocation to the indignant heart + That feels for injured love! but I disdain + The nauseous task to paint her as she is, + Cruel, abandoned, glorying in her shame. + No; let her pass, and charioted along + In guilty splendour shake the public ways; + The frequency of crimes has washed them white, + And verse of mine shall never brand the wretch + Whom matrons now of character unsmirched + And chaste themselves, are not ashamed to own. + Virtue and vice had boundaries in old time + Not to be passed; and she that had renounced + Her sex's honour, was renounced herself + By all that prized it; not for prudery's sake, + But dignity's, resentful of the wrong. + 'Twas hard, perhaps, on here and there a waif + Desirous to return, and not received; + But was a wholesome rigour in the main, + And taught the unblemished to preserve with care + That purity, whose loss was loss of all. + Men, too, were nice in honour in those days, + And judged offenders well. Then he that sharped, + And pocketed a prize by fraud obtained, + Was marked and shunned as odious. He that sold + His country, or was slack when she required + His every nerve in action and at stretch, + Paid with the blood that he had basely spared + The price of his default. But now,--yes, now, + We are become so candid and so fair, + So liberal in construction, and so rich + In Christian charity (good-natured age!) + That they are safe, sinners of either sex, + Transgress what laws they may. Well dressed, well bred, + Well equipaged, is ticket good enough + To pass us readily through every door. + Hypocrisy, detest her as we may + (And no man's hatred ever wronged her yet), + May claim this merit still--that she admits + The worth of what she mimics with such care, + And thus gives virtue indirect applause; + But she has burnt her mask, not needed here, + Where vice has such allowance, that her shifts + And specious semblances have lost their use. + + I was a stricken deer that left the herd + Long since; with many an arrow deep infixt + My panting side was charged, when I withdrew + To seek a tranquil death in distant shades. + There was I found by one who had himself + Been hurt by the archers. In his side he bore, + And in his hands and feet, the cruel scars. + With gentle force soliciting the darts + He drew them forth, and healed and bade me live. + Since then, with few associates, in remote + And silent woods I wander, far from those + My former partners of the peopled scene, + With few associates, and not wishing more. + Here much I ruminate, as much I may, + With other views of men and manners now + Than once, and others of a life to come. + I see that all are wanderers, gone astray + Each in his own delusions; they are lost + In chase of fancied happiness, still woo'd + And never won. Dream after dream ensues, + And still they dream that they shall still succeed, + And still are disappointed: rings the world + With the vain stir. I sum up half mankind, + And add two-thirds of the remaining half, + And find the total of their hopes and fears + Dreams, empty dreams. The million flit as gay + As if created only, like the fly + That spreads his motley wings in the eye of noon, + To sport their season and be seen no more. + The rest are sober dreamers, grave and wise, + And pregnant with discoveries new and rare. + Some write a narrative of wars, and feats + Of heroes little known, and call the rant + A history; describe the man, of whom + His own coevals took but little note, + And paint his person, character, and views, + As they had known him from his mother's womb; + They disentangle from the puzzled skein, + In which obscurity has wrapped them up, + The threads of politic and shrewd design + That ran through all his purposes, and charge + His mind with meanings that he never had, + Or, having, kept concealed. Some drill and bore + The solid earth, and from the strata there + Extract a register, by which we learn + That He who made it and revealed its date + To Moses, was mistaken in its age. + Some, more acute and more industrious still, + Contrive creation; travel nature up + To the sharp peak of her sublimest height, + And tell us whence the stars; why some are fixt, + And planetary some; what gave them first + Rotation, from what fountain flowed their light. + Great contest follows, and much learned dust + Involves the combatants, each claiming truth, + And truth disclaiming both. And thus they spend + The little wick of life's poor shallow lamp + In playing tricks with nature, giving laws + To distant worlds, and trifling in their own. + Is't not a pity now, that tickling rheums + Should ever tease the lungs and blear the sight + Of oracles like these? Great pity, too, + That having wielded the elements, and built + A thousand systems, each in his own way, + They should go out in fume and be forgot? + Ah, what is life thus spent? and what are they + But frantic who thus spend it? all for smoke-- + Eternity for bubbles proves at last + A senseless bargain. When I see such games + Played by the creatures of a Power who swears + That He will judge the earth, and call the fool + To a sharp reckoning that has lived in vain, + And when I weigh this seeming wisdom well, + And prove it in the infallible result + So hollow and so false--I feel my heart + Dissolve in pity, and account the learned, + If this be learning, most of all deceived. + Great crimes alarm the conscience, but it sleeps + While thoughtful man is plausibly amused. + Defend me, therefore, common sense, say I, + From reveries so airy, from the toil + Of dropping buckets into empty wells, + And growing old in drawing nothing up! + + 'Twere well, says one sage erudite, profound, + Terribly arched and aquiline his nose, + And overbuilt with most impending brows, + 'Twere well could you permit the world to live + As the world pleases. What's the world to you?-- + Much. I was born of woman, and drew milk + As sweet as charity from human breasts. + I think, articulate, I laugh and weep, + And exercise all functions of a man. + How then should I and any man that lives + Be strangers to each other? Pierce my vein, + Take of the crimson stream meandering there, + And catechise it well. Apply your glass, + Search it, and prove now if it be not blood + Congenial with thine own; and if it be, + What edge of subtlety canst thou suppose + Keen enough, wise and skilful as thou art, + To cut the link of brotherhood, by which + One common Maker bound me to the kind? + True; I am no proficient, I confess, + In arts like yours. I cannot call the swift + And perilous lightnings from the angry clouds, + And bid them hide themselves in the earth beneath; + I cannot analyse the air, nor catch + The parallax of yonder luminous point + That seems half quenched in the immense abyss: + Such powers I boast not--neither can I rest + A silent witness of the headlong rage, + Or heedless folly, by which thousands die, + Bone of my bone, and kindred souls to mine. + + God never meant that man should scale the heavens + By strides of human wisdom. In His works, + Though wondrous, He commands us in His Word + To seek Him rather where His mercy shines. + The mind indeed, enlightened from above, + Views Him in all; ascribes to the grand cause + The grand effect; acknowledges with joy + His manner, and with rapture tastes His style. + But never yet did philosophic tube, + That brings the planets home into the eye + Of observation, and discovers, else + Not visible, His family of worlds, + Discover Him that rules them; such a veil + Hangs over mortal eyes, blind from the birth, + And dark in things divine. Full often too + Our wayward intellect, the more we learn + Of nature, overlooks her Author more; + From instrumental causes proud to draw + Conclusions retrograde, and mad mistake: + But if His Word once teach us, shoot a ray + Through all the heart's dark chambers, and reveal + Truths undiscerned but by that holy light, + Then all is plain. Philosophy, baptised + In the pure fountain of eternal love, + Has eyes indeed; and, viewing all she sees + As meant to indicate a God to man, + Gives HIM His praise, and forfeits not her own. + Learning has borne such fruit in other days + On all her branches. Piety has found + Friends in the friends of science, and true prayer + Has flowed from lips wet with Castalian dews. + Such was thy wisdom, Newton, childlike sage! + Sagacious reader of the works of God, + And in His Word sagacious. Such too thine, + Milton, whose genius had angelic wings, + And fed on manna. And such thine, in whom + Our British Themis gloried with just cause, + Immortal Hale! for deep discernment praised, + And sound integrity not more, than famed + For sanctity of manners undefiled. + + All flesh is grass, and all its glory fades + Like the fair flower dishevelled in the wind; + Riches have wings, and grandeur is a dream; + The man we celebrate must find a tomb, + And we that worship him, ignoble graves. + Nothing is proof against the general curse + Of vanity, that seizes all below. + The only amaranthine flower on earth + Is virtue; the only lasting treasure, truth. + But what is truth? 'twas Pilate's question put + To truth itself, that deigned him no reply. + And wherefore? will not God impart His light + To them that ask it?--Freely--'tis His joy, + His glory, and His nature to impart. + But to the proud, uncandid, insincere, + Or negligent inquirer, not a spark. + What's that which brings contempt upon a book + And him that writes it, though the style be neat, + The method clear, and argument exact? + That makes a minister in holy things + The joy of many, and the dread of more, + His name a theme for praise and for reproach?-- + That, while it gives us worth in God's account, + Depreciates and undoes us in our own? + What pearl is it that rich men cannot buy, + That learning is too proud to gather up, + But which the poor and the despised of all + Seek and obtain, and often find unsought? + Tell me, and I will tell thee what is truth. + + Oh, friendly to the best pursuits of man, + Friendly to thought, to virtue, and to peace, + Domestic life in rural leisure passed! + Few know thy value, and few taste thy sweets, + Though many boast thy favours, and affect + To understand and choose thee for their own. + But foolish man foregoes his proper bliss, + Even as his first progenitor, and quits, + Though placed in paradise, for earth has still + Some traces of her youthful beauty left, + Substantial happiness for transient joy. + Scenes formed for contemplation, and to nurse + The growing seeds of wisdom; that suggest, + By every pleasing image they present, + Reflections such as meliorate the heart, + Compose the passions, and exalt the mind; + Scenes such as these, 'tis his supreme delight + To fill with riot and defile with blood. + Should some contagion, kind to the poor brutes + We persecute, annihilate the tribes + That draw the sportsman over hill and dale + Fearless, and rapt away from all his cares; + Should never game-fowl hatch her eggs again, + Nor baited hook deceive the fish's eye; + Could pageantry, and dance, and feast, and song + Be quelled in all our summer months' retreats; + How many self-deluded nymphs and swains, + Who dream they have a taste for fields and groves, + Would find them hideous nurseries of the spleen, + And crowd the roads, impatient for the town! + They love the country, and none else, who seek + For their own sake its silence and its shade; + Delights which who would leave, that has a heart + Susceptible of pity, or a mind + Cultured and capable of sober thought, + For all the savage din of the swift pack, + And clamours of the field? Detested sport, + That owes its pleasures to another's pain, + That feeds upon the sobs and dying shrieks + Of harmless nature, dumb, but yet endued + With eloquence, that agonies inspire, + Of silent tears and heart-distending sighs! + Vain tears, alas! and sighs that never find + A corresponding tone in jovial souls. + Well--one at least is safe. One sheltered hare + Has never heard the sanguinary yell + Of cruel man, exulting in her woes. + Innocent partner of my peaceful home, + Whom ten long years' experience of my care + Has made at last familiar, she has lost + Much of her vigilant instinctive dread, + Not needful here, beneath a roof like mine. + Yes--thou mayst eat thy bread, and lick the hand + That feeds thee; thou mayst frolic on the floor + At evening, and at night retire secure + To thy straw-couch, and slumber unalarmed; + For I have gained thy confidence, have pledged + All that is human in me to protect + Thine unsuspecting gratitude and love. + If I survive thee I will dig thy grave, + And when I place thee in it, sighing say, + I knew at least one hare that had a friend. + + How various his employments, whom the world + Calls idle, and who justly in return + Esteems that busy world an idler, too! + Friends, books, a garden, and perhaps his pen, + Delightful industry enjoyed at home, + And nature in her cultivated trim + Dressed to his taste, inviting him abroad-- + Can he want occupation who has these? + Will he be idle who has much to enjoy? + Me, therefore, studious of laborious ease, + Not slothful; happy to deceive the time, + Not waste it; and aware that human life + Is but a loan to be repaid with use, + When He shall call His debtors to account, + From whom are all our blessings; business finds + Even here: while sedulous I seek to improve, + At least neglect not, or leave unemployed, + The mind He gave me; driving it, though slack + Too oft, and much impeded in its work + By causes not to be divulged in vain, + To its just point--the service of mankind. + He that attends to his interior self, + That has a heart and keeps it; has a mind + That hungers and supplies it; and who seeks + A social, not a dissipated life, + Has business; feels himself engaged to achieve + No unimportant, though a silent task. + A life all turbulence and noise may seem, + To him that leads it, wise and to be praised; + But wisdom is a pearl with most success + Sought in still water, and beneath clear skies. + He that is ever occupied in storms, + Or dives not for it or brings up instead, + Vainly industrious, a disgraceful prize. + + The morning finds the self-sequestered man + Fresh for his task, intend what task he may. + Whether inclement seasons recommend + His warm but simple home, where he enjoys, + With her who shares his pleasures and his heart, + Sweet converse, sipping calm the fragrant lymph + Which neatly she prepares; then to his book + Well chosen, and not sullenly perused + In selfish silence, but imparted oft + As aught occurs that she may smile to hear, + Or turn to nourishment digested well. + Or if the garden with its many cares, + All well repaid, demand him, he attends + The welcome call, conscious how much the hand + Of lubbard labour needs his watchful eye, + Oft loitering lazily if not o'erseen, + Or misapplying his unskilful strength. + Nor does he govern only or direct, + But much performs himself; no works indeed + That ask robust tough sinews, bred to toil, + Servile employ--but such as may amuse, + Not tire, demanding rather skill than force. + Proud of his well-spread walls, he views his trees + That meet, no barren interval between, + With pleasure more than even their fruits afford, + Which, save himself who trains them, none can feel. + These, therefore, are his own peculiar charge, + No meaner hand may discipline the shoots, + None but his steel approach them. What is weak, + Distempered, or has lost prolific powers, + Impaired by age, his unrelenting hand + Dooms to the knife. Nor does he spare the soft + And succulent that feeds its giant growth, + But barren, at the expense of neighbouring twigs + Less ostentatious, and yet studded thick + With hopeful gems. The rest, no portion left + That may disgrace his art, or disappoint + Large expectation, he disposes neat + At measured distances, that air and sun + Admitted freely may afford their aid, + And ventilate and warm the swelling buds. + Hence Summer has her riches, Autumn hence, + And hence even Winter fills his withered hand + With blushing fruits, and plenty not his own, + Fair recompense of labour well bestowed + And wise precaution, which a clime so rude + Makes needful still, whose Spring is but the child + Of churlish Winter, in her froward moods + Discovering much the temper of her sire. + For oft, as if in her the stream of mild + Maternal nature had reversed its course, + She brings her infants forth with many smiles, + But, once delivered, kills them with a frown. + He therefore, timely warned, himself supplies + Her want of care, screening and keeping warm + The plenteous bloom, that no rough blast may sweep + His garlands from the boughs. Again, as oft + As the sun peeps and vernal airs breathe mild, + The fence withdrawn, he gives them ev'ry beam, + And spreads his hopes before the blaze of day. + + To raise the prickly and green-coated gourd, + So grateful to the palate, and when rare + So coveted, else base and disesteemed-- + Food for the vulgar merely--is an art + That toiling ages have but just matured, + And at this moment unessayed in song. + Yet gnats have had, and frogs and mice long since, + Their eulogy; those sang the Mantuan bard, + And these the Grecian in ennobling strains; + And in thy numbers, Philips, shines for aye + The solitary Shilling. Pardon then, + Ye sage dispensers of poetic fame! + The ambition of one meaner far, whose powers + Presuming an attempt not less sublime, + Pant for the praise of dressing to the taste + Of critic appetite, no sordid fare, + A cucumber, while costly yet and scarce. + + The stable yields a stercoraceous heap + Impregnated with quick fermenting salts, + And potent to resist the freezing blast. + For ere the beech and elm have cast their leaf + Deciduous, and when now November dark + Checks vegetation in the torpid plant + Exposed to his cold breath, the task begins. + Warily therefore, and with prudent heed + He seeks a favoured spot, that where he builds + The agglomerated pile, his frame may front + The sun's meridian disk, and at the back + Enjoy close shelter, wall, or reeds, or hedge + Impervious to the wind. First he bids spread + Dry fern or littered hay, that may imbibe + The ascending damps; then leisurely impose, + And lightly, shaking it with agile hand + From the full fork, the saturated straw. + What longest binds the closest, forms secure + The shapely side, that as it rises takes + By just degrees an overhanging breadth, + Sheltering the base with its projected eaves. + The uplifted frame compact at every joint, + And overlaid with clear translucent glass, + He settles next upon the sloping mount, + Whose sharp declivity shoots off secure + From the dashed pane the deluge as it falls. + He shuts it close, and the first labour ends. + Thrice must the voluble and restless earth + Spin round upon her axle, ere the warmth + Slow gathering in the midst, through the square mass + Diffused, attain the surface. When, behold! + A pestilent and most corrosive steam, + Like a gross fog Boeotian, rising fast, + And fast condensed upon the dewy sash, + Asks egress; which obtained, the overcharged + And drenched conservatory breathes abroad, + In volumes wheeling slow, the vapour dank, + And purified, rejoices to have lost + Its foul inhabitant. But to assuage + The impatient fervour which it first conceives + Within its reeking bosom, threatening death + To his young hopes, requires discreet delay. + Experience, slow preceptress, teaching oft + The way to glory by miscarriage foul, + Must prompt him, and admonish how to catch + The auspicious moment, when the tempered heat, + Friendly to vital motion, may afford + Soft fermentation, and invite the seed. + The seed selected wisely, plump and smooth + And glossy, he commits to pots of size + Diminutive, well filled with well-prepared + And fruitful soil, that has been treasured long, + And drunk no moisture from the dripping clouds: + These on the warm and genial earth that hides + The smoking manure, and o'erspreads it all, + He places lightly, and, as time subdues + The rage of fermentation, plunges deep + In the soft medium, till they stand immersed. + Then rise the tender germs upstarting quick + And spreading wide their spongy lobes; at first + Pale, wan, and livid; but assuming soon, + If fanned by balmy and nutritious air + Strained through the friendly mats, a vivid green. + Two leaves produced, two rough indented leaves, + Cautious he pinches from the second stalk + A pimple, that portends a future sprout, + And interdicts its growth. Thence straight succeed + The branches, sturdy to his utmost wish, + Prolific all, and harbingers of more. + The crowded roots demand enlargement now + And transplantation in an ampler space. + Indulged in what they wish, they soon supply + Large foliage, overshadowing golden flowers, + Blown on the summit of the apparent fruit. + These have their sexes, and when summer shines + The bee transports the fertilising meal + From flower to flower, and even the breathing air + Wafts the rich prize to its appointed use. + Not so when winter scowls. Assistant art + Then acts in nature's office, brings to pass + The glad espousals and insures the crop. + + Grudge not, ye rich (since luxury must have + His dainties, and the world's more numerous half + Lives by contriving delicates for you), + Grudge not the cost. Ye little know the cares, + The vigilance, the labour, and the skill + That day and night are exercised, and hang + Upon the ticklish balance of suspense, + That ye may garnish your profuse regales + With summer fruits, brought forth by wintry suns. + Ten thousand dangers lie in wait to thwart + The process. Heat and cold, and wind and steam, + Moisture and drought, mice, worms, and swarming flies + Minute as dust and numberless, oft work + Dire disappointment that admits no cure, + And which no care can obviate. It were long, + Too long to tell the expedients and the shifts + Which he, that fights a season so severe, + Devises, while he guards his tender trust, + And oft, at last, in vain. The learned and wise + Sarcastic would exclaim, and judge the song + Cold as its theme, and, like its theme, the fruit + Of too much labour, worthless when produced. + + Who loves a garden, loves a greenhouse too. + Unconscious of a less propitious clime + There blooms exotic beauty, warm and snug, + While the winds whistle and the snows descend. + The spiry myrtle with unwithering leaf + Shines there and flourishes. The golden boast + Of Portugal and Western India there, + The ruddier orange and the paler lime, + Peep through their polished foliage at the storm, + And seem to smile at what they need not fear. + The amomum there with intermingling flowers + And cherries hangs her twigs. Geranium boasts + Her crimson honours, and the spangled beau, + Ficoides, glitters bright the winter long, + All plants, of every leaf, that can endure + The winter's frown if screened from his shrewd bite, + Live there and prosper. Those Ausonia claims, + Levantine regions these; the Azores send + Their jessamine; her jessamine remote + Caffraria: foreigners from many lands, + They form one social shade, as if convened + By magic summons of the Orphean lyre. + Yet such arrangement, rarely brought to pass + But by a master's hand, disposing well + The gay diversities of leaf and flower, + Must lend its aid to illustrate all their charms, + And dress the regular yet various scene. + Plant behind plant aspiring, in the van + The dwarfish, in the rear retired, but still + Sublime above the rest, the statelier stand. + So once were ranged the sons of ancient Rome, + A noble show, while Roscius trod the stage; + And so, while Garrick, as renowned as he, + The sons of Albion, fearing each to lose + Some note of Nature's music from his lips, + And covetous of Shakespeare's beauty, seen + In every flash of his far-beaming eye. + Nor taste alone and well-contrived display + Suffice to give the marshalled ranks the grace + Of their complete effect. Much yet remains + Unsung, and many cares are yet behind + And more laborious; cares on which depends + Their vigour, injured soon, not soon restored. + The soil must be renewed, which often washed + Loses its treasure of salubrious salts, + And disappoints the roots; the slender roots, + Close interwoven where they meet the vase, + Must smooth be shorn away; the sapless branch + Must fly before the knife; the withered leaf + Must be detached, and where it strews the floor + Swept with a woman's neatness, breeding else + Contagion, and disseminating death. + Discharge but these kind offices (and who + Would spare, that loves them, offices like these?) + Well they reward the toil. The sight is pleased, + The scent regaled, each odoriferous leaf, + Each opening blossom, freely breathes abroad + Its gratitude, and thanks him with its sweets. + + So manifold, all pleasing in their kind, + All healthful, are the employs of rural life, + Reiterated as the wheel of time + Runs round, still ending, and beginning still. + Nor are these all. To deck the shapely knoll + That, softly swelled and gaily dressed, appears + A flowery island from the dark green lawn + Emerging, must be deemed a labour due + To no mean hand, and asks the touch of taste. + Here also grateful mixture of well-matched + And sorted hues (each giving each relief, + And by contrasted beauty shining more) + Is needful. Strength may wield the ponderous spade, + May turn the clod, and wheel the compost home, + But elegance, chief grace the garden shows + And most attractive, is the fair result + Of thought, the creature of a polished mind. + Without it, all is Gothic as the scene + To which the insipid citizen resorts, + Near yonder heath; where industry misspent, + But proud of his uncouth, ill-chosen task, + Has made a heaven on earth; with suns and moons + Of close-rammed stones has charged the encumbered soil, + And fairly laid the zodiac in the dust. + He, therefore, who would see his flowers disposed + Sightly and in just order, ere he gives + The beds the trusted treasure of their seeds, + Forecasts the future whole; that when the scene + Shall break into its preconceived display, + Each for itself, and all as with one voice + Conspiring, may attest his bright design. + Nor even then, dismissing as performed + His pleasant work, may he suppose it done. + Few self-supported flowers endure the wind + Uninjured, but expect the upholding aid + Of the smooth-shaven prop, and neatly tied + Are wedded thus, like beauty to old age, + For interest sake, the living to the dead. + Some clothe the soil that feeds them, far diffused + And lowly creeping, modest and yet fair; + Like virtue, thriving most where little seen. + Some, more aspiring, catch the neighbour shrub + With clasping tendrils, and invest his branch, + Else unadorned, with many a gay festoon + And fragrant chaplet, recompensing well + The strength they borrow with the grace they lend. + All hate the rank society of weeds, + Noisome, and very greedy to exhaust + The impoverished earth; an overbearing race, + That, like the multitude made faction-mad, + Disturb good order, and degrade true worth. + + Oh blest seclusion from a jarring world, + Which he, thus occupied, enjoys! Retreat + Cannot, indeed, to guilty man restore + Lost innocence, or cancel follies past; + But it has peace, and much secures the mind + From all assaults of evil; proving still + A faithful barrier, not o'erleaped with ease + By vicious custom raging uncontrolled + Abroad and desolating public life. + When fierce temptation, seconded within + By traitor appetite, and armed with darts + Tempered in hell, invades the throbbing breast, + To combat may be glorious, and success + Perhaps may crown us, but to fly is safe. + Had I the choice of sublunary good, + What could I wish that I possess not here? + Health, leisure; means to improve it, friendship, peace, + No loose or wanton though a wandering muse, + And constant occupation without care. + Thus blest, I draw a picture of that bliss; + Hopeless, indeed, that dissipated minds + And profligate abusers of a world + Created fair so much in vain for them, + Should seek the guiltless joys that I describe, + Allured by my report; but sure no less + That self-condemned they must neglect the prize, + And what they will not taste, must yet approve. + What we admire we praise; and when we praise + Advance it into notice, that, its worth + Acknowledged, others may admire it too. + I therefore recommend, though at the risk + Of popular disgust, yet boldly still, + The cause of piety and sacred truth + And virtue, and those scenes which God ordained + Should best secure them and promote them most; + Scenes that I love, and with regret perceive + Forsaken, or through folly not enjoyed. + Pure is the nymph, though liberal of her smiles, + And chaste, though unconfined, whom I extol. + Not as the prince in Shushan, when he called, + Vain-glorious of her charms, his Vashti forth, + To grace the full pavilion. His design + Was but to boast his own peculiar good, + Which all might view with envy, none partake. + My charmer is not mine alone; my sweets, + And she that sweetens all my bitters, too, + Nature, enchanting Nature, in whose form + And lineaments divine I trace a hand + That errs not, and find raptures still renewed, + Is free to all men--universal prize. + Strange that so fair a creature should yet want + Admirers, and be destined to divide + With meaner objects even the few she finds. + Stript of her ornaments, her leaves and flowers, + She loses all her influence. Cities then + Attract us, and neglected Nature pines, + Abandoned, as unworthy of our love. + But are not wholesome airs, though unperfumed + By roses, and clear suns, though scarcely felt, + And groves, if unharmonious yet secure + From clamour and whose very silence charms, + To be preferred to smoke--to the eclipse + That Metropolitan volcanoes make, + Whose Stygian throats breathe darkness all day long, + And to the stir of commerce, driving slow, + And thundering loud with his ten thousand wheels? + They would be, were not madness in the head + And folly in the heart; were England now + What England was, plain, hospitable, kind, + And undebauched. But we have bid farewell + To all the virtues of those better days, + And all their honest pleasures. Mansions once + Knew their own masters, and laborious hands + That had survived the father, served the son. + Now the legitimate and rightful lord + Is but a transient guest, newly arrived + And soon to be supplanted. He that saw + His patrimonial timber cast its leaf, + Sells the last scantling, and transfers the price + To some shrewd sharper, ere it buds again. + Estates are landscapes, gazed upon awhile, + Then advertised, and auctioneered away. + The country starves, and they that feed the o'er-charged + And surfeited lewd town with her fair dues, + By a just judgment strip and starve themselves. + The wings that waft our riches out of sight + Grow on the gamester's elbows, and the alert + And nimble motion of those restless joints, + That never tire, soon fans them all away. + Improvement too, the idol of the age, + Is fed with many a victim. Lo! he comes-- + The omnipotent magician, Brown, appears. + Down falls the venerable pile, the abode + Of our forefathers, a grave whiskered race, + But tasteless. Springs a palace in its stead, + But in a distant spot; where more exposed + It may enjoy the advantage of the North + And aguish East, till time shall have transformed + Those naked acres to a sheltering grove. + He speaks. The lake in front becomes a lawn, + Woods vanish, hills subside, and valleys rise, + And streams, as if created for his use, + Pursue the track of his directed wand + Sinuous or straight, now rapid and now slow, + Now murmuring soft, now roaring in cascades, + Even as he bids. The enraptured owner smiles. + 'Tis finished. And yet, finished as it seems, + Still wants a grace, the loveliest it could show, + A mine to satisfy the enormous cost. + Drained to the last poor item of his wealth, + He sighs, departs, and leaves the accomplished plan + That he has touched and retouched, many a day + Laboured, and many a night pursued in dreams, + Just when it meets his hopes, and proves the heaven + He wanted, for a wealthier to enjoy. + And now perhaps the glorious hour is come, + When having no stake left, no pledge to endear + Her interests, or that gives her sacred cause + A moment's operation on his love, + He burns with most intense and flagrant zeal + To serve his country. Ministerial grace + Deals him out money from the public chest, + Or, if that mine be shut, some private purse + Supplies his need with an usurious loan, + To be refunded duly, when his vote, + Well-managed, shall have earned its worthy price. + Oh, innocent compared with arts like these, + Crape and cocked pistol and the whistling ball + Sent through the traveller's temples! He that finds + One drop of heaven's sweet mercy in his cup, + Can dig, beg, rot, and perish well-content, + So he may wrap himself in honest rags + At his last gasp; but could not for a world + Fish up his dirty and dependent bread + From pools and ditches of the commonwealth, + Sordid and sickening at his own success. + + Ambition, avarice, penury incurred + By endless riot, vanity, the lust + Of pleasure and variety, despatch, + As duly as the swallows disappear, + The world of wandering knights and squires to town; + London engulfs them all. The shark is there, + And the shark's prey; the spendthrift, and the leech + That sucks him. There the sycophant, and he + That with bare-headed and obsequious bows + Begs a warm office, doomed to a cold jail + And groat per diem if his patron frown. + The levee swarms, as if in golden pomp + Were charactered on every statesman's door, + 'BATTERED AND BANKRUPT FORTUNES MENDED HERE.' + These are the charms that sully and eclipse + The charms of nature. 'Tis the cruel gripe + That lean hard-handed poverty inflicts, + The hope of better things, the chance to win, + The wish to shine, the thirst to be amused, + That, at the sound of Winter's hoary wing, + Unpeople all our counties of such herds + Of fluttering, loitering, cringing, begging, loose + And wanton vagrants, as make London, vast + And boundless as it is, a crowded coop. + + Oh thou resort and mart of all the earth, + Chequered with all complexions of mankind, + And spotted with all crimes; in whom I see + Much that I love, and more that I admire, + And all that I abhor; thou freckled fair + That pleases and yet shocks me, I can laugh + And I can weep, can hope, and can despond, + Feel wrath and pity when I think on thee! + Ten righteous would have saved a city once, + And thou hast many righteous.--Well for thee-- + That salt preserves thee; more corrupted else, + And therefore more obnoxious at this hour + Than Sodom in her day had power to be, + For whom God heard his Abram plead in vain. + + + +BOOK IV. + +THE WINTER EVENING. + + Hark! 'tis the twanging horn o'er yonder bridge, + That with its wearisome but needful length + Bestrides the wintry flood, in which the moon + Sees her unwrinkled face reflected bright;-- + He comes, the herald of a noisy world, + With spattered boots, strapped waist, and frozen locks, + News from all nations lumbering at his back. + True to his charge the close-packed load behind, + Yet careless what he brings, his one concern + Is to conduct it to the destined inn, + And, having dropped the expected bag--pass on. + He whistles as he goes, light-hearted wretch, + Cold and yet cheerful: messenger of grief + Perhaps to thousands, and of joy to some; + To him indifferent whether grief or joy. + Houses in ashes, and the fall of stocks, + Births, deaths, and marriages, epistles wet + With tears that trickled down the writer's cheeks, + Fast as the periods from his fluent quill, + Or charged with amorous sighs of absent swains, + Or nymphs responsive, equally affect + His horse and him, unconscious of them all. + But oh, the important budget! ushered in + With such heart-shaking music, who can say + What are its tidings? have our troops awaked? + Or do they still, as if with opium drugged, + Snore to the murmurs of the Atlantic wave? + Is India free? and does she wear her plumed + And jewelled turban with a smile of peace, + Or do we grind her still? The grand debate, + The popular harangue, the tart reply, + The logic and the wisdom and the wit + And the loud laugh--I long to know them all; + I burn to set the imprisoned wranglers free, + And give them voice and utterance once again. + + Now stir the fire, and close the shutters fast, + Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa round, + And while the bubbling and loud-hissing urn + Throws up a steamy column, and the cups, + That cheer but not inebriate, wait on each, + So let us welcome peaceful evening in. + Not such his evening, who with shining face + Sweats in the crowded theatre, and squeezed + And bored with elbow-points through both his sides, + Outscolds the ranting actor on the stage; + Nor his, who patient stands till his feet throb + And his head thumps, to feed upon the breath + Of patriots bursting with heroic rage, + Or placemen all tranquillity and smiles. + This folio of four pages, happy work! + Which not even critics criticise, that holds + Inquisitive attention while I read + Fast bound in chains of silence, which the fair, + Though eloquent themselves, yet fear to break, + What is it but a map of busy life, + Its fluctuations and its vast concerns? + Here runs the mountainous and craggy ridge + That tempts ambition. On the summit, see, + The seals of office glitter in his eyes; + He climbs, he pants, he grasps them. At his heels, + Close at his heels, a demagogue ascends, + And with a dextrous jerk soon twists him down + And wins them, but to lose them in his turn. + Here rills of oily eloquence, in soft + Meanders, lubricate the course they take; + The modest speaker is ashamed and grieved + To engross a moment's notice, and yet begs, + Begs a propitious ear for his poor thoughts, + However trivial all that he conceives. + Sweet bashfulness! it claims, at least, this praise, + The dearth of information and good sense + That it foretells us, always comes to pass. + Cataracts of declamation thunder here, + There forests of no meaning spread the page + In which all comprehension wanders lost; + While fields of pleasantry amuse us there, + With merry descants on a nation's woes. + The rest appears a wilderness of strange + But gay confusion; roses for the cheeks + And lilies for the brows of faded age, + Teeth for the toothless, ringlets for the bald, + Heaven, earth, and ocean plundered of their sweets. + Nectareous essences, Olympian dews, + Sermons and city feasts and favourite airs, + Ethereal journeys, submarine exploits, + And Katterfelto with his hair on end + At his own wonders, wondering for his bread. + + 'Tis pleasant through the loopholes of retreat + To peep at such a world; to see the stir + Of the great Babel and not feel the crowd; + To hear the roar she sends through all her gates + At a safe distance, where the dying sound + Falls a soft murmur on the uninjured ear. + Thus sitting and surveying thus at ease + The globe and its concerns, I seem advanced + To some secure and more than mortal height, + That liberates and exempts me from them all. + It turns submitted to my view, turns round + With all its generations; I behold + The tumult and am still. The sound of war + Has lost its terrors ere it reaches me; + Grieves, but alarms me not. I mourn the pride + And avarice that makes man a wolf to man; + Hear the faint echo of those brazen throats + By which he speaks the language of his heart, + And sigh, but never tremble at the sound. + He travels and expatiates, as the bee + From flower to flower so he from land to land; + The manners, customs, policy of all + Pay contribution to the store he gleans, + He sucks intelligence in every clime, + And spreads the honey of his deep research + At his return--a rich repast for me. + He travels and I too. I tread his deck, + Ascend his topmast, through his peering eyes + Discover countries, with a kindred heart + Suffer his woes and share in his escapes; + While fancy, like the finger of a clock, + Runs the great circuit, and is still at home. + + Oh Winter, ruler of the inverted year, + Thy scattered hair with sleet-like ashes filled, + Thy breath congealed upon thy lips, thy cheeks + Fringed with a beard made white with other snows + Than those of age, thy forehead wrapped in clouds, + A leafless branch thy sceptre, and thy throne + A sliding car indebted to no wheels, + But urged by storms along its slippery way, + I love thee, all unlovely as thou seem'st, + And dreaded as thou art. Thou hold'st the sun + A prisoner in the yet undawning East, + Shortening his journey between morn and noon, + And hurrying him, impatient of his stay, + Down to the rosy west; but kindly still + Compensating his loss with added hours + Of social converse and instructive ease, + And gathering at short notice in one group + The family dispersed, and fixing thought + Not less dispersed by daylight and its cares. + I crown thee king of intimate delights, + Fire-side enjoyments, home-born happiness, + And all the comforts that the lowly roof + Of undisturbed retirement, and the hours + Of long uninterrupted evening know. + No rattling wheels stop short before these gates; + No powdered pert proficients in the art + Of sounding an alarm, assault these doors + Till the street rings; no stationary steeds + Cough their own knell, while heedless of the sound + The silent circle fan themselves, and quake: + But here the needle plies its busy task, + The pattern grows, the well-depicted flower, + Wrought patiently into the snowy lawn, + Unfolds its bosom; buds and leaves and sprigs + And curly tendrils, gracefully disposed, + Follow the nimble finger of the fair; + A wreath that cannot fade, of flowers that blow + With most success when all besides decay. + The poet's or historian's page, by one + Made vocal for the amusement of the rest; + The sprightly lyre, whose treasure of sweet sounds + The touch from many a trembling chord shakes out; + And the clear voice symphonious, yet distinct, + And in the charming strife triumphant still, + Beguile the night, and set a keener edge + On female industry; the threaded steel + Flies swiftly, and unfelt the task proceeds. + The volume closed, the customary rites + Of the last meal commence: a Roman meal, + Such as the mistress of the world once found + Delicious, when her patriots of high note, + Perhaps by moonlight, at their humble doors, + And under an old oak's domestic shade, + Enjoyed--spare feast!--a radish and an egg. + Discourse ensues, not trivial, yet not dull, + Nor such as with a frown forbids the play + Of fancy, or proscribes the sound of mirth; + Nor do we madly, like an impious world, + Who deem religion frenzy, and the God + That made them an intruder on their joys, + Start at His awful name, or deem His praise + A jarring note; themes of a graver tone + Exciting oft our gratitude and love, + While we retrace with memory's pointing wand + That calls the past to our exact review, + The dangers we have scaped, the broken snare, + The disappointed foe, deliverance found + Unlooked for, life preserved and peace restored, + Fruits of omnipotent eternal love:-- + Oh evenings worthy of the gods! exclaimed + The Sabine bard. Oh evenings, I reply, + More to be prized and coveted than yours, + As more illumined and with nobler truths, + That I, and mine, and those we love, enjoy. + + Is Winter hideous in a garb like this? + Needs he the tragic fur, the smoke of lamps, + The pent-up breath of an unsavoury throng + To thaw him into feeling, or the smart + And snappish dialogue that flippant wits + Call comedy, to prompt him with a smile? + The self-complacent actor, when he views + (Stealing a sidelong glance at a full house) + The slope of faces from the floor to the roof, + As if one master-spring controlled them all, + Relaxed into an universal grin, + Sees not a countenance there that speaks a joy + Half so refined or so sincere as ours. + Cards were superfluous here, with all the tricks + That idleness has ever yet contrived + To fill the void of an unfurnished brain, + To palliate dulness and give time a shove. + Time, as he passes us, has a dove's wing, + Unsoiled and swift and of a silken sound. + But the world's time is time in masquerade. + Theirs, should I paint him, has his pinions fledged + With motley plumes, and, where the peacock shows + His azure eyes, is tinctured black and red + With spots quadrangular of diamond form, + Ensanguined hearts, clubs typical of strife, + And spades, the emblem of untimely graves. + What should be, and what was an hour-glass once, + Becomes a dice-box, and a billiard mast + Well does the work of his destructive scythe. + Thus decked he charms a world whom fashion blinds + To his true worth, most pleased when idle most, + Whose only happy are their wasted hours. + Even misses, at whose age their mothers wore + The back-string and the bib, assume the dress + Of womanhood, sit pupils in the school + Of card-devoted time, and night by night, + Placed at some vacant corner of the board, + Learn every trick, and soon play all the game. + But truce with censure. Roving as I rove, + Where shall I find an end, or how proceed? + As he that travels far, oft turns aside + To view some rugged rock, or mouldering tower, + Which seen delights him not; then coming home, + Describes and prints it, that the world may know + How far he went for what was nothing worth; + So I, with brush in hand and pallet spread + With colours mixed for a far different use, + Paint cards and dolls, and every idle thing + That fancy finds in her excursive flights. + + Come, Evening, once again, season of peace, + Return, sweet Evening, and continue long! + Methinks I see thee in the streaky west, + With matron-step slow moving, while the night + Treads on thy sweeping train; one hand employed + In letting fall the curtain of repose + On bird and beast, the other charged for man + With sweet oblivion of the cares of day; + Not sumptuously adorned, nor needing aid, + Like homely-featured night, of clustering gems, + A star or two just twinkling on thy brow + Suffices thee; save that the moon is thine + No less than hers, not worn indeed on high + With ostentatious pageantry, but set + With modest grandeur in thy purple zone, + Resplendent less, but of an ampler round. + Come, then, and thou shalt find thy votary calm, + Or make me so. Composure is thy gift; + And whether I devote thy gentle hours + To books, to music, or to poet's toil, + To weaving nets for bird-alluring fruit, + Or twining silken threads round ivory reels + When they command whom man was born to please, + I slight thee not, but make thee welcome still. + + Just when our drawing-rooms begin to blaze + With lights, by clear reflection multiplied + From many a mirror, in which he of Gath, + Goliath, might have seen his giant bulk + Whole without stooping, towering crest and all, + My pleasures too begin. But me perhaps + The glowing hearth may satisfy a while + With faint illumination, that uplifts + The shadow to the ceiling, there by fits + Dancing uncouthly to the quivering flame. + Not undelightful is an hour to me + So spent in parlour twilight; such a gloom + Suits well the thoughtful or unthinking mind, + The mind contemplative, with some new theme + Pregnant, or indisposed alike to all. + Laugh ye, who boast your more mercurial powers + That never feel a stupor, know no pause, + Nor need one; I am conscious, and confess. + Fearless, a soul that does not always think. + Me oft has fancy ludicrous and wild + Soothed with a waking dream of houses, towers, + Trees, churches, and strange visages expressed + In the red cinders, while with poring eye + I gazed, myself creating what I saw. + Nor less amused have I quiescent watched + The sooty films that play upon the bars + Pendulous, and foreboding in the view + Of superstition, prophesying still, + Though still deceived, some stranger's near approach. + 'Tis thus the understanding takes repose + In indolent vacuity of thought, + And sleeps and is refreshed. Meanwhile the face + Conceals the mood lethargic with a mask + Of deep deliberation, as the man + Were tasked to his full strength, absorbed and lost. + Thus oft reclined at ease, I lose an hour + At evening, till at length the freezing blast + That sweeps the bolted shutter, summons home + The recollected powers, and, snapping short + The glassy threads with which the fancy weaves + Her brittle toys, restores me to myself. + How calm is my recess! and how the frost + Raging abroad, and the rough wind, endear + The silence and the warmth enjoyed within! + I saw the woods and fields at close of day + A variegated show; the meadows green + Though faded, and the lands, where lately waved + The golden harvest, of a mellow brown, + Upturned so lately by the forceful share; + I saw far off the weedy fallows smile + With verdure not unprofitable, grazed + By flocks fast feeding, and selecting each + His favourite herb; while all the leafless groves + That skirt the horizon wore a sable hue, + Scarce noticed in the kindred dusk of eve. + To-morrow brings a change, a total change, + Which even now, though silently performed + And slowly, and by most unfelt, the face + Of universal nature undergoes. + Fast falls a fleecy shower; the downy flakes, + Descending and with never-ceasing lapse + Softly alighting upon all below, + Assimilate all objects. Earth receives + Gladly the thickening mantle, and the green + And tender blade, that feared the chilling blast, + Escapes unhurt beneath so warm a veil. + + In such a world, so thorny, and where none + Finds happiness unblighted, or if found, + Without some thistly sorrow at its side, + It seems the part of wisdom, and no sin + Against the law of love, to measure lots + With less distinguished than ourselves, that thus + We may with patience bear our moderate ills, + And sympathise with others, suffering more. + Ill fares the traveller now, and he that stalks + In ponderous boots beside his reeking team; + The wain goes heavily, impeded sore + By congregating loads adhering close + To the clogged wheels, and, in its sluggish pace, + Noiseless appears a moving hill of snow. + The toiling steeds expand the nostril wide, + While every breath, by respiration strong + Forced downward, is consolidated soon + Upon their jutting chests. He, formed to bear + The pelting brunt of the tempestuous night, + With half-shut eyes, and puckered cheeks, and teeth + Presented bare against the storm, plods on; + One hand secures his hat, save when with both + He brandishes his pliant length of whip, + Resounding oft, and never heard in vain. + Oh happy, and, in my account, denied + That sensibility of pain with which + Refinement is endued, thrice happy thou! + Thy frame, robust and hardy, feels indeed + The piercing cold, but feels it unimpaired; + The learned finger never need explore + Thy vigorous pulse, and the unhealthful East, + That breathes the spleen, and searches every bone + Of the infirm, is wholesome air to thee. + Thy days roll on exempt from household care, + Thy waggon is thy wife; and the poor beasts, + That drag the dull companion to and fro, + Thine helpless charge, dependent on thy care. + Ah, treat them kindly! rude as thou appearest, + Yet show that thou hast mercy, which the great, + With needless hurry whirled from place to place, + Humane as they would seem, not always show. + + Poor, yet industrious, modest, quiet, neat, + Such claim compassion in a night like this, + And have a friend in every feeling heart. + Warmed while it lasts, by labour, all day long + They brave the season, and yet find at eve, + Ill clad and fed but sparely, time to cool. + The frugal housewife trembles when she lights + Her scanty stock of brushwood, blazing clear, + But dying soon, like all terrestrial joys; + The few small embers left she nurses well. + And while her infant race with outspread hands + And crowded knees sit cowering o'er the sparks, + Retires, content to quake, so they be warmed. + The man feels least, as more inured than she + To winter, and the current in his veins + More briskly moved by his severer toil; + Yet he, too, finds his own distress in theirs. + The taper soon extinguished, which I saw + Dangled along at the cold finger's end + Just when the day declined, and the brown loaf + Lodged on the shelf, half-eaten, without sauce + Of sav'ry cheese, or butter costlier still, + Sleep seems their only refuge. For alas, + Where penury is felt the thought is chained, + And sweet colloquial pleasures are but few. + With all this thrift they thrive not. All the care + Ingenious parsimony takes, but just + Saves the small inventory, bed and stool, + Skillet and old carved chest, from public sale. + They live, and live without extorted alms + From grudging hands, but other boast have none + To soothe their honest pride that scorns to beg, + Nor comfort else, but in their mutual love. + I praise you much, ye meek and patient pair, + For ye are worthy; choosing rather far + A dry but independent crust, hard-earned + And eaten with a sigh, than to endure + The rugged frowns and insolent rebuffs + Of knaves in office, partial in their work + Of distribution; liberal of their aid + To clamorous importunity in rags, + But ofttimes deaf to suppliants who would blush + To wear a tattered garb however coarse, + Whom famine cannot reconcile to filth; + These ask with painful shyness, and, refused + Because deserving, silently retire. + But be ye of good courage! Time itself + Shall much befriend you. Time shall give increase, + And all your numerous progeny, well trained, + But helpless, in few years shall find their hands, + And labour too. Meanwhile ye shall not want + What, conscious of your virtues, we can spare, + Nor what a wealthier than ourselves may send. + I mean the man, who when the distant poor + Need help, denies them nothing but his name. + + But poverty with most, who whimper forth + Their long complaints, is self-inflicted woe, + The effect of laziness or sottish waste. + Now goes the nightly thief prowling abroad + For plunder; much solicitous how best + He may compensate for a day of sloth, + By works of darkness and nocturnal wrong, + Woe to the gardener's pale, the farmer's hedge + Plashed neatly and secured with driven stakes + Deep in the loamy bank. Uptorn by strength + Resistless in so bad a cause, but lame + To better deeds, he bundles up the spoil-- + An ass's burden,--and when laden most + And heaviest, light of foot steals fast away. + Nor does the boarded hovel better guard + The well-stacked pile of riven logs and roots + From his pernicious force. Nor will he leave + Unwrenched the door, however well secured, + Where chanticleer amidst his harem sleeps + In unsuspecting pomp; twitched from the perch + He gives the princely bird with all his wives + To his voracious bag, struggling in vain, + And loudly wondering at the sudden change. + Nor this to feed his own. 'Twere some excuse + Did pity of their sufferings warp aside + His principle, and tempt him into sin + For their support, so destitute; but they + Neglected pine at home, themselves, as more + Exposed than others, with less scruple made + His victims, robbed of their defenceless all. + Cruel is all he does. 'Tis quenchless thirst + Of ruinous ebriety that prompts + His every action, and imbrutes the man. + Oh for a law to noose the villain's neck + Who starves his own; who persecutes the blood + He gave them in his children's veins, and hates + And wrongs the woman he has sworn to love. + + Pass where we may, through city, or through town, + Village or hamlet of this merry land, + Though lean and beggared, every twentieth pace + Conducts the unguarded nose to such a whiff + Of stale debauch, forth-issuing from the styes + That law has licensed, as makes temperance reel. + There sit involved and lost in curling clouds + Of Indian fume, and guzzling deep, the boor, + The lackey, and the groom. The craftsman there + Takes a Lethean leave of all his toil; + Smith, cobbler, joiner, he that plies the shears, + And he that kneads the dough: all loud alike, + All learned, and all drunk. The fiddle screams + Plaintive and piteous, as it wept and wailed + Its wasted tones and harmony unheard; + Fierce the dispute, whate'er the theme; while she, + Fell Discord, arbitress of such debate, + Perched on the sign-post, holds with even hand + Her undecisive scales. In this she lays + A weight of ignorance, in that, of pride, + And smiles delighted with the eternal poise. + Dire is the frequent curse and its twin sound + The cheek-distending oath, not to be praised + As ornamental, musical, polite, + Like those which modern senators employ, + Whose oath is rhetoric, and who swear for fame. + Behold the schools in which plebeian minds, + Once simple, are initiated in arts + Which some may practise with politer grace, + But none with readier skill! 'Tis here they learn + The road that leads from competence and peace + To indigence and rapine; till at last + Society, grown weary of the load, + Shakes her encumbered lap, and casts them out. + But censure profits little. Vain the attempt + To advertise in verse a public pest, + That, like the filth with which the peasant feeds + His hungry acres, stinks and is of use. + The excise is fattened with the rich result + Of all this riot; and ten thousand casks, + For ever dribbling out their base contents, + Touched by the Midas finger of the state, + Bleed gold for Ministers to sport away. + Drink and be mad then; 'tis your country bids! + Gloriously drunk, obey the important call, + Her cause demands the assistance of your throats;-- + Ye all can swallow, and she asks no more. + + Would I had fallen upon those happier days + That poets celebrate; those golden times + And those Arcadian scenes that Maro sings, + And Sidney, warbler of poetic prose. + Nymphs were Dianas then, and swains had hearts + That felt their virtues. Innocence, it seems, + From courts dismissed, found shelter in the groves; + The footsteps of simplicity, impressed + Upon the yielding herbage (so they sing), + Then were not all effaced. Then speech profane + And manners profligate were rarely found, + Observed as prodigies, and soon reclaimed. + Vain wish! those days were never: airy dreams + Sat for the picture; and the poet's hand, + Imparting substance to an empty shade, + Imposed a gay delirium for a truth. + Grant it: I still must envy them an age + That favoured such a dream, in days like these + Impossible, when virtue is so scarce + That to suppose a scene where she presides + Is tramontane, and stumbles all belief. + No. We are polished now. The rural lass, + Whom once her virgin modesty and grace, + Her artless manners and her neat attire, + So dignified, that she was hardly less + Than the fair shepherdess of old romance, + Is seen no more. The character is lost. + Her head adorned with lappets pinned aloft + And ribbons streaming gay, superbly raised + And magnified beyond all human size, + Indebted to some smart wig-weaver's hand + For more than half the tresses it sustains; + Her elbows ruffled, and her tottering form + Ill propped upon French heels; she might be deemed + (But that the basket dangling on her arm + Interprets her more truly) of a rank + Too proud for dairy-work, or sale of eggs; + Expect her soon with foot-boy at her heels, + No longer blushing for her awkward load, + Her train and her umbrella all her care. + + The town has tinged the country; and the stain + Appears a spot upon a vestal's robe, + The worse for what it soils. The fashion runs + Down into scenes still rural, but alas, + Scenes rarely graced with rural manners now. + Time was when in the pastoral retreat + The unguarded door was safe; men did not watch + To invade another's right, or guard their own. + Then sleep was undisturbed by fear, unscared + By drunken howlings; and the chilling tale + Of midnight murder was a wonder heard + With doubtful credit, told to frighten babes + But farewell now to unsuspicious nights, + And slumbers unalarmed. Now, ere you sleep, + See that your polished arms be primed with care, + And drop the night-bolt. Ruffians are abroad, + And the first larum of the cock's shrill throat + May prove a trumpet, summoning your ear + To horrid sounds of hostile feet within. + Even daylight has its dangers; and the walk + Through pathless wastes and woods, unconscious once + Of other tenants than melodious birds, + Or harmless flocks, is hazardous and bold. + Lamented change! to which full many a cause + Inveterate, hopeless of a cure, conspires. + The course of human things from good to ill, + From ill to worse, is fatal, never fails. + Increase of power begets increase of wealth; + Wealth luxury, and luxury excess; + Excess, the scrofulous and itchy plague + That seizes first the opulent, descends + To the next rank contagious, and in time + Taints downward all the graduated scale + Of order, from the chariot to the plough. + The rich, and they that have an arm to check + The licence of the lowest in degree, + Desert their office; and themselves, intent + On pleasure, haunt the capital, and thus + To all the violence of lawless hands + Resign the scenes their presence might protect. + Authority itself not seldom sleeps, + Though resident, and witness of the wrong. + The plump convivial parson often bears + The magisterial sword in vain, and lays + His reverence and his worship both to rest + On the same cushion of habitual sloth. + Perhaps timidity restrains his arm, + When he should strike he trembles, and sets free, + Himself enslaved by terror of the band, + The audacious convict whom he dares not bind. + Perhaps, though by profession ghostly pure, + He, too, may have his vice, and sometimes prove + Less dainty than becomes his grave outside + In lucrative concerns. Examine well + His milk-white hand. The palm is hardly clean-- + But here and there an ugly smutch appears. + Foh! 'twas a bribe that left it. He has touched + Corruption. Whoso seeks an audit here + Propitious, pays his tribute, game or fish, + Wildfowl or venison, and his errand speeds. + + But faster far and more than all the rest + A noble cause, which none who bears a spark + Of public virtue ever wished removed, + Works the deplored and mischievous effect. + 'Tis universal soldiership has stabbed + The heart of merit in the meaner class. + Arms, through the vanity and brainless rage + Of those that bear them, in whatever cause, + Seem most at variance with all moral good, + And incompatible with serious thought. + The clown, the child of nature, without guile, + Blest with an infant's ignorance of all + But his own simple pleasures, now and then + A wrestling match, a foot-race, or a fair, + Is balloted, and trembles at the news. + Sheepish he doffs his hat, and mumbling swears + A Bible-oath to be whate'er they please, + To do he knows not what. The task performed, + That instant he becomes the serjeant's care, + His pupil, and his torment, and his jest; + His awkward gait, his introverted toes, + Bent knees, round shoulders, and dejected looks, + Procure him many a curse. By slow degrees, + Unapt to learn and formed of stubborn stuff, + He yet by slow degrees puts off himself, + Grows conscious of a change, and likes it well. + He stands erect, his slouch becomes a walk, + He steps right onward, martial in his air, + His form and movement; is as smart above + As meal and larded locks can make him: wears + His hat or his plumed helmet with a grace, + And, his three years of heroship expired, + Returns indignant to the slighted plough. + He hates the field in which no fife or drum + Attends him, drives his cattle to a march, + And sighs for the smart comrades he has left. + 'Twere well if his exterior change were all-- + But with his clumsy port the wretch has lost + His ignorance and harmless manners too. + To swear, to game, to drink, to show at home + By lewdness, idleness, and Sabbath-breach, + The great proficiency he made abroad, + To astonish and to grieve his gazing friends, + To break some maiden's and his mother's heart, + To be a pest where he was useful once, + Are his sole aim, and all his glory now! + Man in society is like a flower + Blown in its native bed. 'Tis there alone + His faculties expanded in full bloom + Shine out, there only reach their proper use. + But man associated and leagued with man + By regal warrant, or self-joined by bond + For interest sake, or swarming into clans + Beneath one head for purposes of war, + Like flowers selected from the rest, and bound + And bundled close to fill some crowded vase, + Fades rapidly, and by compression marred + Contracts defilement not to be endured. + Hence chartered boroughs are such public plagues, + And burghers, men immaculate perhaps + In all their private functions, once combined, + Become a loathsome body, only fit + For dissolution, hurtful to the main. + Hence merchants, unimpeachable of sin + Against the charities of domestic life, + Incorporated, seem at once to lose + Their nature, and, disclaiming all regard + For mercy and the common rights of man, + Build factories with blood, conducting trade + At the sword's point, and dyeing the white robe + Of innocent commercial justice red. + Hence too the field of glory, as the world + Misdeems it, dazzled by its bright array, + With all the majesty of thundering pomp, + Enchanting music and immortal wreaths, + Is but a school where thoughtlessness is taught + On principle, where foppery atones + For folly, gallantry for every vice. + + But slighted as it is, and by the great + Abandoned, and, which still I more regret, + Infected with the manners and the modes + It knew not once, the country wins me still. + I never framed a wish or formed a plan + That flattered me with hopes of earthly bliss, + But there I laid the scene. There early strayed + My fancy, ere yet liberty of choice + Had found me, or the hope of being free. + My very dreams were rural, rural too + The first-born efforts of my youthful muse, + Sportive, and jingling her poetic bells + Ere yet her ear was mistress of their powers. + No bard could please me but whose lyre was tuned + To Nature's praises. Heroes and their feats + Fatigued me, never weary of the pipe + Of Tityrus, assembling as he sang + The rustic throng beneath his favourite beech. + Then Milton had indeed a poet's charms: + New to my taste, his Paradise surpassed + The struggling efforts of my boyish tongue + To speak its excellence; I danced for joy. + I marvelled much that, at so ripe an age + As twice seven years, his beauties had then first + Engaged my wonder, and admiring still, + And still admiring, with regret supposed + The joy half lost because not sooner found. + Thee, too, enamoured of the life I loved, + Pathetic in its praise, in its pursuit + Determined, and possessing it at last + With transports such as favoured lovers feel, + I studied, prized, and wished that I had known, + Ingenious Cowley: and though now, reclaimed + By modern lights from an erroneous taste, + I cannot but lament thy splendid wit + Entangled in the cobwebs of the schools. + I still revere thee, courtly though retired, + Though stretched at ease in Chertsey's silent bowers, + Not unemployed, and finding rich amends + For a lost world in solitude and verse. + 'Tis born with all. The love of Nature's works + Is an ingredient in the compound, man, + Infused at the creation of the kind. + And though the Almighty Maker has throughout + Discriminated each from each, by strokes + And touches of His hand, with so much art + Diversified, that two were never found + Twins at all points--yet this obtains in all, + That all discern a beauty in His works, + And all can taste them: minds that have been formed + And tutored, with a relish more exact, + But none without some relish, none unmoved. + It is a flame that dies not even there, + Where nothing feeds it. Neither business, crowds, + Nor habits of luxurious city life, + Whatever else they smother of true worth + In human bosoms, quench it or abate. + The villas, with which London stands begirt + Like a swarth Indian with his belt of beads, + Prove it. A breath of unadulterate air, + The glimpse of a green pasture, how they cheer + The citizen, and brace his languid frame! + Even in the stifling bosom of the town, + A garden in which nothing thrives, has charms + That soothe the rich possessor; much consoled + That here and there some sprigs of mournful mint, + Of nightshade, or valerian, grace the well + He cultivates. These serve him with a hint + That Nature lives; that sight-refreshing green + Is still the livery she delights to wear, + Though sickly samples of the exuberant whole. + What are the casements lined with creeping herbs, + The prouder sashes fronted with a range + Of orange, myrtle, or the fragrant weed, + The Frenchman's darling? are they not all proofs + That man, immured in cities, still retains + His inborn inextinguishable thirst + Of rural scenes, compensating his loss + By supplemental shifts, the best he may? + The most unfurnished with the means of life, + And they that never pass their brick-wall bounds + To range the fields, and treat their lungs with air, + Yet feel the burning instinct: over-head + Suspend their crazy boxes planted thick + And watered duly. There the pitcher stands + A fragment, and the spoutless tea-pot there; + Sad witnesses how close-pent man regrets + The country, with what ardour he contrives + A peep at nature, when he can no more. + + Hail, therefore, patroness of health and ease + And contemplation, heart-consoling joys + And harmless pleasures, in the thronged abode + Of multitudes unknown, hail rural life! + Address himself who will to the pursuit + Of honours, or emolument, or fame, + I shall not add myself to such a chase, + Thwart his attempts, or envy his success. + Some must be great. Great offices will have + Great talents. And God gives to every man + The virtue, temper, understanding, taste, + That lifts him into life, and lets him fall + Just in the niche he was ordained to fill. + To the deliverer of an injured land + He gives a tongue to enlarge upon, a heart + To feel, and courage to redress her wrongs; + To monarchs dignity, to judges sense; + To artists ingenuity and skill; + To me an unambitious mind, content + In the low vale of life, that early felt + A wish for ease and leisure, and ere long + Found here that leisure and that ease I wished. + + + +BOOK V. + +THE WINTER MORNING WALK. + + 'Tis morning; and the sun, with ruddy orb + Ascending, fires the horizon; while the clouds, + That crowd away before the driving wind, + More ardent as the disk emerges more, + Resemble most some city in a blaze, + Seen through the leafless wood. His slanting ray + Slides ineffectual down the snowy vale, + And, tingeing all with his own rosy hue, + From every herb and every spiry blade + Stretches a length of shadow o'er the field, + Mine, spindling into longitude immense, + In spite of gravity, and sage remark + That I myself am but a fleeting shade, + Provokes me to a smile. With eye askance + I view the muscular proportioned limb + Transformed to a lean shank; the shapeless pair, + As they designed to mock me, at my side + Take step for step, and, as I near approach + The cottage, walk along the plastered wall, + Preposterous sight, the legs without the man. + The verdure of the plain lies buried deep + Beneath the dazzling deluge, and the bents + And coarser grass upspearing o'er the rest, + Of late unsightly and unseen, now shine + Conspicuous, and, in bright apparel clad, + And fledged with icy feathers, nod superb. + The cattle mourn in corners, where the fence + Screens them, and seem, half petrified, to sleep + In unrecumbent sadness. There they wait + Their wonted fodder, not, like hungering man, + Fretful if unsupplied, but silent, meek, + And patient of the slow-paced swain's delay. + He from the stack carves out the accustomed load, + Deep-plunging, and again deep-plunging oft + His broad keen knife into the solid mass: + Smooth as a wall the upright remnant stands, + With such undeviating and even force + He severs it away: no needless care, + Lest storms should overset the leaning pile + Deciduous, or its own unbalanced weight. + Forth goes the woodman, leaving unconcerned + The cheerful haunts of man, to wield the axe + And drive the wedge in yonder forest drear, + From morn to eve his solitary task. + Shaggy and lean and shrewd, with pointed ears + And tail cropped short, half lurcher and half cur, + His dog attends him. Close behind his heel + Now creeps he slow, and now with many a frisk, + Wide-scampering, snatches up the drifted snow + With ivory teeth, or ploughs it with his snout; + Then shakes his powdered coat and barks for joy. + Heedless of all his pranks the sturdy churl + Moves right toward the mark; nor stops for aught, + But now and then, with pressure of his thumb, + To adjust the fragrant charge of a short tube, + That fumes beneath his nose; the trailing cloud + Streams far behind him, scenting all the air. + Now from the roost, or from the neighbouring pale, + Where, diligent to catch the first faint gleam + Of smiling day, they gossiped side by side, + Come trooping at the housewife's well-known call + The feathered tribes domestic; half on wing, + And half on foot, they brush the fleecy flood, + Conscious, and fearful of too deep a plunge. + The sparrows peep, and quit the sheltering eaves + To seize the fair occasion; well they eye + The scattered grain, and, thievishly resolved + To escape the impending famine, often scared + As oft return, a pert, voracious kind. + Clean riddance quickly made, one only care + Remains to each, the search of sunny nook, + Or shed impervious to the blast. Resigned + To sad necessity the cock foregoes + His wonted strut, and, wading at their head + With well-considered steps, seems to resent + His altered gait, and stateliness retrenched. + How find the myriads, that in summer cheer + The hills and valleys with their ceaseless songs, + Due sustenance, or where subsist they now? + Earth yields them naught: the imprisoned worm is safe + Beneath the frozen clod; all seeds of herbs + Lie covered close, and berry-bearing thorns + That feed the thrush (whatever some suppose), + Afford the smaller minstrel no supply. + The long-protracted rigour of the year + Thins all their numerous flocks. In chinks and holes + Ten thousand seek an unmolested end, + As instinct prompts, self-buried ere they die. + The very rooks and daws forsake the fields, + Where neither grub nor root nor earth-nut now + Repays their labour more; and perched aloft + By the way-side, or stalking in the path, + Lean pensioners upon the traveller's track, + Pick up their nauseous dole, though sweet to them, + Of voided pulse, or half-digested grain. + The streams are lost amid the splendid blank, + O'erwhelming all distinction. On the flood + Indurated and fixed the snowy weight + Lies undissolved, while silently beneath + And unperceived the current steals away; + Not so where, scornful of a check, it leaps + The mill-dam, dashes on the restless wheel, + And wantons in the pebbly gulf below. + No frost can bind it there. Its utmost force + Can but arrest the light and smoky mist + That in its fall the liquid sheet throws wide. + And see where it has hung the embroidered banks + With forms so various, that no powers of art, + The pencil, or the pen, may trace the scene! + Here glittering turrets rise, upbearing high + (Fantastic misarrangement) on the roof + Large growth of what may seem the sparkling trees + And shrubs of fairy land. The crystal drops + That trickle down the branches, fast congealed, + Shoot into pillars of pellucid length + And prop the pile they but adorned before. + Here grotto within grotto safe defies + The sunbeam. There imbossed and fretted wild, + The growing wonder takes a thousand shapes + Capricious, in which fancy seeks in vain + The likeness of some object seen before. + Thus nature works as if to mock at art, + And in defiance of her rival powers; + By these fortuitous and random strokes + Performing such inimitable feats, + As she with all her rules can never reach. + Less worthy of applause though more admired, + Because a novelty, the work of man, + Imperial mistress of the fur-clad Russ, + Thy most magnificent and mighty freak, + The wonder of the North. No forest fell + When thou wouldst build; no quarry sent its stores + To enrich thy walls; but thou didst hew the floods, + And make thy marble of the glassy wave. + In such a palace Aristaeus found + Cyrene, when he bore the plaintive tale + Of his lost bees to her maternal ear. + In such a palace poetry might place + The armoury of winter, where his troops, + The gloomy clouds, find weapons, arrowy sleet, + Skin-piercing volley, blossom-bruising hail, + And snow that often blinds the traveller's course, + And wraps him in an unexpected tomb. + Silently as a dream the fabric rose. + No sound of hammer or of saw was there. + Ice upon ice, the well-adjusted parts + Were soon conjoined, nor other cement asked + Than water interfused to make them one. + Lamps gracefully disposed, and of all hues, + Illumined every side. A watery light + Gleamed through the clear transparency, that seemed + Another moon new-risen, or meteor fallen + From heaven to earth, of lambent flame serene. + So stood the brittle prodigy, though smooth + And slippery the materials, yet frost-bound + Firm as a rock. Nor wanted aught within + That royal residence might well befit, + For grandeur or for use. Long wavy wreaths + Of flowers, that feared no enemy but warmth, + Blushed on the panels. Mirror needed none + Where all was vitreous, but in order due + Convivial table and commodious seat + (What seemed at least commodious seat) were there, + Sofa and couch and high-built throne august. + The same lubricity was found in all, + And all was moist to the warm touch; a scene + Of evanescent glory, once a stream, + And soon to slide into a stream again. + Alas, 'twas but a mortifying stroke + Of undesigned severity, that glanced + (Made by a monarch) on her own estate, + On human grandeur and the courts of kings + 'Twas transient in its nature, as in show + 'Twas durable; as worthless, as it seemed + Intrinsically precious; to the foot + Treacherous and false; it smiled, and it was cold. + + Great princes have great playthings. Some have played + At hewing mountains into men, and some + At building human wonders mountain high. + Some have amused the dull sad years of life + (Life spent in indolence, and therefore sad) + With schemes of monumental fame, and sought + By pyramids and mausoleum pomp, + Short-lived themselves, to immortalise their bones. + Some seek diversion in the tented field, + And make the sorrows of mankind their sport. + But war's a game which, were their subjects wise, + Kings should not play at. Nations would do well + To extort their truncheons from the puny hands + Of heroes whose infirm and baby minds + Are gratified with mischief, and who spoil, + Because men suffer it, their toy the world. + + When Babel was confounded, and the great + Confederacy of projectors wild and vain + Was split into diversity of tongues, + Then, as a shepherd separates his flock, + These to the upland, to the valley those, + God drave asunder and assigned their lot + To all the nations. Ample was the boon + He gave them, in its distribution fair + And equal, and he bade them dwell in peace. + Peace was a while their care. They ploughed and sowed, + And reaped their plenty without grudge or strife, + But violence can never longer sleep + Than human passions please. In every heart + Are sown the sparks that kindle fiery war, + Occasion needs but fan them, and they blaze. + Cain had already shed a brother's blood: + The Deluge washed it out; but left unquenched + The seeds of murder in the breast of man. + Soon, by a righteous judgment, in the line + Of his descending progeny was found + The first artificer of death; the shrewd + Contriver who first sweated at the forge, + And forced the blunt and yet unblooded steel + To a keen edge, and made it bright for war. + Him Tubal named, the Vulcan of old times, + The sword and falchion their inventor claim, + And the first smith was the first murderer's son. + His art survived the waters; and ere long, + When man was multiplied and spread abroad + In tribes and clans, and had begun to call + These meadows and that range of hills his own, + The tasted sweets of property begat + Desire of more; and industry in some + To improve and cultivate their just demesne, + Made others covet what they saw so fair. + Thus wars began on earth. These fought for spoil, + And those in self-defence. Savage at first + The onset, and irregular. At length + One eminent above the rest, for strength, + For stratagem, or courage, or for all, + Was chosen leader. Him they served in war, + And him in peace for sake of warlike deeds + Reverenced no less. Who could with him compare? + Or who so worthy to control themselves + As he, whose prowess had subdued their foes? + Thus war, affording field for the display + Of virtue, made one chief, whom times of peace, + Which have their exigencies too, and call + For skill in government, at length made king. + King was a name too proud for man to wear + With modesty and meekness, and the crown, + So dazzling in their eyes who set it on, + Was sure to intoxicate the brows it bound. + It is the abject property of most, + That being parcel of the common mass, + And destitute of means to raise themselves, + They sink and settle lower than they need. + They know not what it is to feel within + A comprehensive faculty, that grasps + Great purposes with ease, that turns and wields, + Almost without an effort, plans too vast + For their conception, which they cannot move. + Conscious of impotence they soon grow drunk + With gazing, when they see an able man + Step forth to notice; and besotted thus + Build him a pedestal and say--Stand there, + And be our admiration and our praise. + They roll themselves before him in the dust, + Then most deserving in their own account + When most extravagant in his applause, + As if exalting him they raised themselves. + Thus by degrees, self-cheated of their sound + And sober judgment that he is but man, + They demi-deify and fume him so + That in due season he forgets it too. + Inflated and astrut with self-conceit + He gulps the windy diet, and ere long, + Adopting their mistake, profoundly thinks + The world was made in vain if not for him. + Thenceforth they are his cattle: drudges, born + To bear his burdens, drawing in his gears, + And sweating in his service. His caprice + Becomes the soul that animates them all. + He deems a thousand, or ten thousand lives, + Spent in the purchase of renown for him + An easy reckoning, and they think the same. + Thus kings were first invented, and thus kings + Were burnished into heroes, and became + The arbiters of this terraqueous swamp; + Storks among frogs, that have but croaked and died. + Strange that such folly, as lifts bloated man + To eminence fit only for a god, + Should ever drivel out of human lips, + Even in the cradled weakness of the world! + Still stranger much, that when at length mankind + Had reached the sinewy firmness of their youth, + And could discriminate and argue well + On subjects more mysterious, they were yet + Babes in the cause of freedom, and should fear + And quake before the gods themselves had made. + But above measure strange, that neither proof + Of sad experience, nor examples set + By some whose patriot virtue has prevailed, + Can even now, when they are grown mature + In wisdom, and with philosophic deeps + Familiar, serve to emancipate the rest! + Such dupes are men to custom, and so prone + To reverence what is ancient, and can plead + A course of long observance for its use, + That even servitude, the worst of ills, + Because delivered down from sire to son, + Is kept and guarded as a sacred thing. + But is it fit, or can it bear the shock + Of rational discussion, that a man, + Compounded and made up like other men + Of elements tumultuous, in whom lust + And folly in as ample measure meet, + As in the bosoms of the slaves he rules, + Should be a despot absolute, and boast + Himself the only freeman of his land? + Should when he pleases, and on whom he will, + Wage war, with any or with no pretence + Of provocation given, or wrong sustained, + And force the beggarly last doit, by means + That his own humour dictates, from the clutch + Of poverty, that thus he may procure + His thousands, weary of penurious life, + A splendid opportunity to die? + Say ye, who (with less prudence than of old + Jotham ascribed to his assembled trees + In politic convention) put your trust + I' th' shadow of a bramble, and recline + In fancied peace beneath his dangerous branch, + Rejoice in him and celebrate his sway, + Where find ye passive fortitude? Whence springs + Your self-denying zeal that holds it good + To stroke the prickly grievance, and to hang + His thorns with streamers of continual praise? + We too are friends to loyalty; we love + The king who loves the law, respects his bounds. + And reigns content within them; him we serve + Freely and with delight, who leaves us free; + But recollecting still that he is man, + We trust him not too far. King though he be, + And king in England, too, he may be weak + And vain enough to be ambitious still, + May exercise amiss his proper powers, + Or covet more than freemen choose to grant: + Beyond that mark is treason. He is ours, + To administer, to guard, to adorn the state, + But not to warp or change it. We are his, + To serve him nobly in the common cause + True to the death, but not to be his slaves. + Mark now the difference, ye that boast your love + Of kings, between your loyalty and ours. + We love the man; the paltry pageant you: + We the chief patron of the commonwealth; + You the regardless author of its woes: + We, for the sake of liberty, a king; + You chains and bondage for a tyrant's sake. + + Our love is principle, and has its root + In reason, is judicious, manly, free; + Yours, a blind instinct, crouches to the rod, + And licks the foot that treads it in the dust. + Were kingship as true treasure as it seems, + Sterling, and worthy of a wise man's wish, + I would not be a king to be beloved + Causeless, and daubed with undiscerning praise, + Where love is more attachment to the throne, + Not to the man who fills it as he ought. + + Whose freedom is by sufferance, and at will + Of a superior, he is never free. + Who lives, and is not weary of a life + Exposed to manacles, deserves them well. + The state that strives for liberty, though foiled + And forced to abandon what she bravely sought, + Deserves at least applause for her attempt, + And pity for her loss. But that's a cause + Not often unsuccessful; power usurped + Is weakness when opposed; conscious of wrong, + 'Tis pusillanimous and prone to flight. + But slaves that once conceive the glowing thought + Of freedom, in that hope itself possess + All that the contest calls for; spirit, strength, + The scorn of danger, and united hearts, + The surest presage of the good they seek. * + +* The author hopes that he shall not be censured for unnecessary warmth +upon so interesting a subject. He is aware that it is become almost +fashionable to stigmatise such sentiments as no better than empty +declamation. But it is an ill symptom, and peculiar to modern times.--C. + + Then shame to manhood, and opprobrious more + To France than all her losses and defeats, + Old or of later date, by sea or land, + Her house of bondage worse than that of old + Which God avenged on Pharaoh--the Bastille! + Ye horrid towers, the abode of broken hearts, + Ye dungeons and ye cages of despair, + That monarchs have supplied from age to age + With music such as suits their sovereign ears, + The sighs and groans of miserable men! + There's not an English heart that would not leap + To hear that ye were fallen at last, to know + That even our enemies, so oft employed + In forging chains for us, themselves were free. + For he that values liberty, confines + His zeal for her predominance within + No narrow bounds; her cause engages him + Wherever pleaded. 'Tis the cause of man. + There dwell the most forlorn of humankind, + Immured though unaccused, condemned untried, + Cruelly spared, and hopeless of escape. + There, like the visionary emblem seen + By him of Babylon, life stands a stump, + And filleted about with hoops of brass, + Still lives, though all its pleasant boughs are gone. + To count the hour bell and expect no change; + And ever as the sullen sound is heard, + Still to reflect that though a joyless note + To him whose moments all have one dull pace, + Ten thousand rovers in the world at large + Account it music; that it summons some + To theatre, or jocund feast, or ball; + The wearied hireling finds it a release + From labour, and the lover, that has chid + Its long delay, feels every welcome stroke + Upon his heart-strings trembling with delight;-- + To fly for refuge from distracting thought + To such amusements as ingenious woe + Contrives, hard-shifting and without her tools;-- + To read engraven on the mouldy walls, + In staggering types, his predecessor's tale, + A sad memorial, and subjoin his own;-- + To turn purveyor to an overgorged + And bloated spider, till the pampered pest + Is made familiar, watches his approach, + Comes at his call, and serves him for a friend;-- + To wear out time in numbering to and fro + The studs that thick emboss his iron door, + Then downward and then upward, then aslant + And then alternate, with a sickly hope + By dint of change to give his tasteless task + Some relish, till the sum, exactly found + In all directions, he begins again:-- + Oh comfortless existence! hemmed around + With woes, which who that suffers would not kneel + And beg for exile, or the pangs of death? + That man should thus encroach on fellow-man, + Abridge him of his just and native rights, + Eradicate him, tear him from his hold + Upon the endearments of domestic life + And social, nip his fruitfulness and use, + And doom him for perhaps a heedless word + To barrenness and solitude and tears, + Moves indignation; makes the name of king + (Of king whom such prerogative can please) + As dreadful as the Manichean god, + Adored through fear, strong only to destroy. + + 'Tis liberty alone that gives the flower + Of fleeting life its lustre and perfume, + And we are weeds without it. All constraint, + Except what wisdom lays on evil men, + Is evil; hurts the faculties, impedes + Their progress in the road of science; blinds + The eyesight of discovery, and begets, + In those that suffer it, a sordid mind + Bestial, a meagre intellect, unfit + To be the tenant of man's noble form. + Thee therefore still, blameworthy as thou art, + With all thy loss of empire, and though squeezed + By public exigence, till annual food + Fails for the craving hunger of the state, + Thee I account still happy, and the chief + Among the nations, seeing thou art free, + My native nook of earth! Thy clime is rude, + Replete with vapours, and disposes much + All hearts to sadness, and none more than mine; + Thine unadulterate manners are less soft + And plausible than social life requires. + And thou hast need of discipline and art + To give thee what politer France receives + From Nature's bounty--that humane address + And sweetness, without which no pleasure is + In converse, either starved by cold reserve, + Or flushed with fierce dispute, a senseless brawl; + Yet, being free, I love thee; for the sake + Of that one feature, can be well content, + Disgraced as thou hast been, poor as thou art, + To seek no sublunary rest beside. + But once enslaved, farewell! I could endure + Chains nowhere patiently; and chains at home, + Where I am free by birthright, not at all. + Then what were left of roughness in the grain + Of British natures, wanting its excuse + That it belongs to freemen, would disgust + And shock me. I should then with double pain + Feel all the rigour of thy fickle clime; + And, if I must bewail the blessing lost + For which our Hampdens and our Sidneys bled, + I would at least bewail it under skies + Milder, among a people less austere, + In scenes which, having never known me free, + Would not reproach me with the loss I felt. + Do I forebode impossible events, + And tremble at vain dreams? Heaven grant I may, + But the age of virtuous politics is past, + And we are deep in that of cold pretence. + Patriots are grown too shrewd to be sincere, + And we too wise to trust them. He that takes + Deep in his soft credulity the stamp + Designed by loud declaimers on the part + Of liberty, themselves the slaves of lust, + Incurs derision for his easy faith + And lack of knowledge, and with cause enough. + For when was public virtue to be found, + Where private was not? Can he love the whole + Who loves no part? he be a nation's friend + Who is, in truth, the friend of no man there? + Can he be strenuous in his country's cause, + Who slights the charities for whose dear sake + That country, if at all, must be beloved? + --'Tis therefore sober and good men are sad + For England's glory, seeing it wax pale + And sickly, while her champions wear their hearts + So loose to private duty, that no brain, + Healthful and undisturbed by factious fumes, + Can dream them trusty to the general weal. + Such were not they of old whose tempered blades + Dispersed the shackles of usurped control, + And hewed them link from link. Then Albion's sons + Were sons indeed. They felt a filial heart + Beat high within them at a mother's wrongs, + And shining each in his domestic sphere, + Shone brighter still once called to public view. + 'Tis therefore many, whose sequestered lot + Forbids their interference, looking on, + Anticipate perforce some dire event; + And seeing the old castle of the state, + That promised once more firmness, so assailed + That all its tempest-beaten turrets shake, + Stand motionless expectants of its fall. + All has its date below. The fatal hour + Was registered in heaven ere time began. + We turn to dust, and all our mightiest works + Die too. The deep foundations that we lay, + Time ploughs them up, and not a trace remains. + We build with what we deem eternal rock; + A distant age asks where the fabric stood; + And in the dust, sifted and searched in vain, + The undiscoverable secret sleeps. + + But there is yet a liberty unsung + By poets, and by senators unpraised, + Which monarchs cannot grant, nor all the power + Of earth and hell confederate take away; + A liberty, which persecution, fraud, + Oppression, prisons, have no power to bind, + Which whoso tastes can be enslaved no more: + 'Tis liberty of heart, derived from heaven, + Bought with His blood who gave it to mankind, + And sealed with the same token. It is held + By charter, and that charter sanctioned sure + By the unimpeachable and awful oath + And promise of a God. His other gifts + All bear the royal stamp that speaks them His, + And are august, but this transcends them all. + His other works, this visible display + Of all-creating energy and might, + Are grand, no doubt, and worthy of the Word + That, finding an interminable space + Unoccupied, has filled the void so well, + And made so sparkling what was dark before. + But these are not His glory. Man, 'tis true, + Smit with the beauty of so fair a scene, + Might well suppose the Artificer Divine + Meant it eternal, had He not Himself + Pronounced it transient, glorious as it is, + And still designing a more glorious far, + Doomed it, as insufficient for His praise. + These, therefore, are occasional, and pass; + Formed for the confutation of the fool + Whose lying heart disputes against a God; + That office served, they must be swept away. + Not so the labours of His love; they shine + In other heavens than these that we behold, + And fade not. There is Paradise that fears + No forfeiture, and of its fruits He sends + Large prelibation oft to saints below. + Of these the first in order, and the pledge + And confident assurance of the rest, + Is liberty; a flight into His arms + Ere yet mortality's fine threads give way, + A clear escape from tyrannising lust, + And fill immunity from penal woe. + + Chains are the portion of revolted man, + Stripes and a dungeon; and his body serves + The triple purpose. In that sickly, foul, + Opprobrious residence, he finds them all. + Propense his heart to idols, he is held + In silly dotage on created things + Careless of their Creator. And that low + And sordid gravitation of his powers + To a vile clod, so draws him with such force + Resistless from the centre he should seek, + That he at last forgets it. All his hopes + Tend downward, his ambition is to sink, + To reach a depth profounder still, and still + Profounder, in the fathomless abyss + Of folly, plunging in pursuit of death. + But ere he gain the comfortless repose + He seeks, and acquiescence of his soul, + In heaven renouncing exile, he endures + What does he not? from lusts opposed in vain, + And self-reproaching conscience. He foresees + The fatal issue to his health, fame, peace, + Fortune, and dignity; the loss of all + That can ennoble man, and make frail life, + Short as it is, supportable. Still worse, + Far worse than all the plagues with which his sins + Infect his happiest moments, he forebodes + Ages of hopeless misery; future death, + And death still future; not a hasty stroke, + Like that which sends him to the dusty grave, + But unrepealable enduring death. + Scripture is still a trumpet to his fears: + What none can prove a forgery, may be true; + What none but bad men wish exploded, must. + That scruple checks him. Riot is not loud + Nor drunk enough to drown it. In the midst + Of laughter his compunctions are sincere, + And he abhors the jest by which he shines. + Remorse begets reform. His master-lust + Falls first before his resolute rebuke, + And seems dethroned and vanquished. Peace ensues, + But spurious and short-lived, the puny child + Of self-congratulating Pride, begot + On fancied Innocence. Again he falls, + And fights again; but finds his best essay, + A presage ominous, portending still + Its own dishonour by a worse relapse, + Till Nature, unavailing Nature, foiled + So oft, and wearied in the vain attempt, + Scoffs at her own performance. Reason now + Takes part with appetite, and pleads the cause, + Perversely, which of late she so condemned; + With shallow shifts and old devices, worn + And tattered in the service of debauch, + Covering his shame from his offended sight. + + "Hath God indeed given appetites to man, + And stored the earth so plenteously with means + To gratify the hunger of His wish, + And doth He reprobate and will He damn + The use of His own bounty? making first + So frail a kind, and then enacting laws + So strict, that less than perfect must despair? + Falsehood! which whoso but suspects of truth, + Dishonours God, and makes a slave of man. + Do they themselves, who undertake for hire + The teacher's office, and dispense at large + Their weekly dole of edifying strains, + Attend to their own music? have they faith + In what, with such solemnity of tone + And gesture, they propound to our belief? + Nay--conduct hath the loudest tongue. The voice + Is but an instrument on which the priest + May play what tune he pleases. In the deed, + The unequivocal authentic deed, + We find sound argument, we read the heart." + + Such reasonings (if that name must needs belong + To excuses in which reason has no part) + Serve to compose a spirit well inclined + To live on terms of amity with vice, + And sin without disturbance. Often urged + (As often as, libidinous discourse + Exhausted, he resorts to solemn themes + Of theological and grave import), + They gain at last his unreserved assent, + Till, hardened his heart's temper in the forge + Of lust and on the anvil of despair, + He slights the strokes of conscience. Nothing moves, + Or nothing much, his constancy in ill; + Vain tampering has but fostered his disease, + 'Tis desperate, and he sleeps the sleep of death. + Haste now, philosopher, and set him free. + Charm the deaf serpent wisely. Make him hear + Of rectitude and fitness: moral truth + How lovely, and the moral sense how sure, + Consulted and obeyed, to guide his steps + Directly to the FIRST AND ONLY FAIR. + Spare not in such a cause. Spend all the powers + Of rant and rhapsody in virtue's praise, + Be most sublimely good, verbosely grand, + And with poetic trappings grace thy prose + Till it outmantle all the pride of verse.-- + Ah, tinkling cymbal and high-sounding brass + Smitten in vain! such music cannot charm + The eclipse that intercepts truth's heavenly beam, + And chills and darkens a wide-wandering soul. + The still small voice is wanted. He must speak, + Whose word leaps forth at once to its effect, + Who calls for things that are not, and they come. + + Grace makes the slave a freeman. 'Tis a change + That turns to ridicule the turgid speech + And stately tone of moralists, who boast, + As if, like him of fabulous renown, + They had indeed ability to smooth + The shag of savage nature, and were each + An Orpheus and omnipotent in song. + But transformation of apostate man + From fool to wise, from earthly to divine, + Is work for Him that made him. He alone, + And He, by means in philosophic eyes + Trivial and worthy of disdain, achieves + The wonder; humanising what is brute + In the lost kind, extracting from the lips + Of asps their venom, overpowering strength + By weakness, and hostility by love. + + Patriots have toiled, and in their country's cause + Bled nobly, and their deeds, as they deserve, + Receive proud recompense. We give in charge + Their names to the sweet lyre. The historic muse, + Proud of the treasure, marches with it down + To latest times; and sculpture, in her turn, + Gives bond in stone and ever-during brass, + To guard them, and to immortalise her trust. + But fairer wreaths are due, though never paid, + To those who, posted at the shrine of truth, + Have fallen in her defence. A patriot's blood + Well spent in such a strife may earn indeed, + And for a time ensure to his loved land, + The sweets of liberty and equal laws; + But martyrs struggle for a brighter prize, + And win it with more pain. Their blood is shed + In confirmation of the noblest claim, + Our claim to feed upon immortal truth, + To walk with God, to be divinely free, + To soar, and to anticipate the skies! + Yet few remember them. They lived unknown, + Till persecution dragged them into fame + And chased them up to heaven. Their ashes flew + --No marble tells us whither. With their names + No bard embalms and sanctifies his song, + And history, so warm on meaner themes, + Is cold on this. She execrates indeed + The tyranny that doomed them to the fire, + But gives the glorious sufferers little praise. + + He is the freeman whom the truth makes free, + And all are slaves beside. There's not a chain + That hellish foes confederate for his harm + Can wind around him, but he casts it off + With as much ease as Samson his green withes. + He looks abroad into the varied field + Of Nature, and, though poor perhaps compared + With those whose mansions glitter in his sight, + Calls the delightful scenery all his own. + His are the mountains, and the valleys his, + And the resplendent river's. His to enjoy + With a propriety that none can feel, + But who, with filial confidence inspired, + Can lift to heaven an unpresumptuous eye, + And smiling say--My Father made them all! + Are they not his by a peculiar right, + And by an emphasis of interest his, + Whose eye they fill with tears of holy joy, + Whose heart with praise, and whose exalted mind + With worthy thoughts of that unwearied love + That planned, and built, and still upholds a world + So clothed with beauty, for rebellious man? + Yes--ye may fill your garners, ye that reap + The loaded soil, and ye may waste much good + In senseless riot; but ye will not find + In feast or in the chase, in song or dance, + A liberty like his, who, unimpeached + Of usurpation, and to no man's wrong, + Appropriates nature as his Father's work, + And has a richer use of yours, than you. + He is indeed a freeman. Free by birth + Of no mean city, planned or e'er the hills + Were built, the fountains opened, or the sea + With all his roaring multitude of waves. + His freedom is the same in every state; + And no condition of this changeful life + So manifold in cares, whose every day + Brings its own evil with it, makes it less. + For he has wings that neither sickness, pain, + Nor penury, can cripple or confine. + No nook so narrow but he spreads them there + With ease, and is at large. The oppressor holds + His body bound, but knows not what a range + His spirit takes, unconscious of a chain; + And that to bind him is a vain attempt, + Whom God delights in, and in whom He dwells. + + Acquaint thyself with God if thou wouldst taste + His works. Admitted once to His embrace, + Thou shalt perceive that thou wast blind before; + Thine eye shall be instructed, and thine heart, + Made pure, shall relish, with divine delight + Till then unfelt, what hands divine have wrought. + Brutes graze the mountain-top with faces prone, + And eyes intent upon the scanty herb + It yields them; or, recumbent on its brow, + Ruminate, heedless of the scene outspread + Beneath, beyond, and stretching far away + From inland regions to the distant main. + Man views it and admires, but rests content + With what he views. The landscape has his praise, + But not its Author. Unconcerned who formed + The paradise he sees, he finds it such, + And such well pleased to find it, asks no more. + Not so the mind that has been touched from heaven, + And in the school of sacred wisdom taught + To read His wonders, in whose thought the world, + Fair as it is, existed ere it was. + Nor for its own sake merely, but for His + Much more who fashioned it, he gives it praise; + Praise that from earth resulting as it ought + To earth's acknowledged Sovereign, finds at once + Its only just proprietor in Him. + The soul that sees Him, or receives sublimed + New faculties or learns at least to employ + More worthily the powers she owned before; + Discerns in all things what, with stupid gaze + Of ignorance, till then she overlooked, + A ray of heavenly light gilding all forms + Terrestrial, in the vast and the minute + The unambiguous footsteps of the God + Who gives its lustre to an insect's wing + And wheels His throne upon the rolling worlds. + Much conversant with heaven, she often holds + With those fair ministers of light to man + That fill the skies nightly with silent pomp + Sweet conference; inquires what strains were they + With which heaven rang, when every star, in haste + To gratulate the new-created earth, + Sent forth a voice, and all the sons of God + Shouted for joy.--"Tell me, ye shining hosts + That navigate a sea that knows no storms, + Beneath a vault unsullied with a cloud, + If from your elevation, whence ye view + Distinctly scenes invisible to man + And systems of whose birth no tidings yet + Have reached this nether world, ye spy a race + Favoured as ours, transgressors from the womb + And hasting to a grave, yet doomed to rise + And to possess a brighter heaven than yours? + As one who, long detained on foreign shores, + Pants to return, and when he sees afar + His country's weather-bleached and battered rocks, + From the green wave emerging, darts an eye + Radiant with joy towards the happy land; + So I with animated hopes behold, + And many an aching wish, your beamy fires, + That show like beacons in the blue abyss, + Ordained to guide the embodied spirit home + From toilsome life to never-ending rest. + Love kindles as I gaze. I feel desires + That give assurance of their own success, + And that, infused from heaven, must thither tend." + + So reads he Nature whom the lamp of truth + Illuminates. Thy lamp, mysterious Word! + Which whoso sees, no longer wanders lost + With intellect bemazed in endless doubt, + But runs the road of wisdom. Thou hast built, + With means that were not till by Thee employed, + Worlds that had never been, hadst Thou in strength + Been less, or less benevolent than strong. + They are Thy witnesses, who speak Thy power + And goodness infinite, but speak in ears + That hear not, or receive not their report. + In vain Thy creatures testify of Thee + Till Thou proclaim Thyself. Theirs is indeed + A teaching voice; but 'tis the praise of Thine + That whom it teaches it makes prompt to learn, + And with the boon gives talents for its use. + Till Thou art heard, imaginations vain + Possess the heart, and fables, false as hell, + Yet deemed oracular, lure down to death + The uninformed and heedless souls of men. + We give to chance, blind chance, ourselves as blind, + The glory of Thy work, which yet appears + Perfect and unimpeachable of blame, + Challenging human scrutiny, and proved + Then skilful most when most severely judged. + But chance is not; or is not where Thou reign'st: + Thy providence forbids that fickle power + (If power she be that works but to confound) + To mix her wild vagaries with Thy laws. + Yet thus we dote, refusing, while we can, + Instruction, and inventing to ourselves + Gods such as guilt makes welcome--gods that sleep, + Or disregard our follies, or that sit + Amused spectators of this bustling stage. + Thee we reject, unable to abide + Thy purity, till pure as Thou art pure, + Made such by Thee, we love Thee for that cause + For which we shunned and hated Thee before. + Then we are free: then liberty, like day, + Breaks on the soul, and by a flash from heaven + Fires all the faculties with glorious joy. + A voice is heard that mortal ears hear not + Till Thou hast touched them; 'tis the voice of song, + A loud Hosanna sent from all Thy works, + Which he that hears it with a shout repeats, + And adds his rapture to the general praise. + In that blest moment, Nature, throwing wide + Her veil opaque, discloses with a smile + The Author of her beauties, who, retired + Behind His own creation, works unseen + By the impure, and hears His power denied. + Thou art the source and centre of all minds, + Their only point of rest, eternal Word! + From Thee departing, they are lost and rove + At random, without honour, hope, or peace. + From Thee is all that soothes the life of man, + His high endeavour, and his glad success, + His strength to suffer, and his will to serve. + But, oh, Thou Bounteous Giver of all good, + Thou art of all Thy gifts Thyself the crown! + Give what Thou canst, without Thee we are poor, + And with Thee rich, take what Thou wilt away. + + + +BOOK VI. + +THE WINTER WALK AT NOON. + + There is in souls a sympathy with sounds, + And as the mind is pitched the ear is pleased + With melting airs or martial, brisk or grave; + Some chord in unison with what we hear + Is touched within us, and the heart replies. + How soft the music of those village bells + Falling at intervals upon the ear + In cadence sweet, now dying all away, + Now pealing loud again, and louder still, + Clear and sonorous as the gale comes on. + With easy force it opens all the cells + Where memory slept. Wherever I have heard + A kindred melody, the scene recurs, + And with it all its pleasures and its pains. + Such comprehensive views the spirit takes, + That in a few short moments I retrace + (As in a map the voyager his course) + The windings of my way through many years. + Short as in retrospect the journey seems, + It seemed not always short; the rugged path, + And prospect oft so dreary and forlorn, + Moved many a sigh at its disheartening length. + Yet feeling present evils, while the past + Faintly impress the mind, or not at all, + How readily we wish time spent revoked, + That we might try the ground again, where once + (Through inexperience as we now perceive) + We missed that happiness we might have found. + Some friend is gone, perhaps his son's best friend + A father, whose authority, in show + When most severe, and mustering all its force, + Was but the graver countenance of love; + Whose favour, like the clouds of spring, might lower, + And utter now and then an awful voice, + But had a blessing in its darkest frown, + Threatening at once and nourishing the plant. + We loved, but not enough, the gentle hand + That reared us. At a thoughtless age allured + By every gilded folly, we renounced + His sheltering side, and wilfully forewent + That converse which we now in vain regret. + How gladly would the man recall to life + The boy's neglected sire! a mother too, + That softer friend, perhaps more gladly still, + Might he demand them at the gates of death. + Sorrow has since they went subdued and tamed + The playful humour; he could now endure + (Himself grown sober in the vale of tears) + And feel a parent's presence no restraint. + But not to understand a treasure's worth + Till time has stolen away the slighted good, + Is cause of half the poverty we feel, + And makes the world the wilderness it is. + The few that pray at all, pray oft amiss, + And, seeking grace to improve the prize they hold, + Would urge a wiser suit than asking more. + + The night was winter in his roughest mood, + The morning sharp and clear; but now at noon + Upon the southern side of the slant hills, + And where the woods fence off the northern blast, + The season smiles, resigning all its rage, + And has the warmth of May. The vault is blue + Without a cloud, and white without a speck + The dazzling splendour of the scene below. + Again the harmony comes o'er the vale, + And through the trees I view the embattled tower + Whence all the music. I again perceive + The soothing influence of the wafted strains, + And settle in soft musings, as I tread + The walk still verdant under oaks and elms, + Whose outspread branches overarch the glade. + The roof, though movable through all its length, + As the wind sways it, has yet well sufficed, + And, intercepting in their silent fall + The frequent flakes, has kept a path for me. + No noise is here, or none that hinders thought: + The redbreast warbles still, but is content + With slender notes and more than half suppressed. + Pleased with his solitude, and flitting light + From spray to spray, where'er he rests he shakes + From many a twig the pendant drops of ice, + That tinkle in the withered leaves below. + Stillness, accompanied with sounds so soft, + Charms more than silence. Meditation here + May think down hours to moments. Here the heart + May give an useful lesson to the head, + And learning wiser grow without his books. + Knowledge and wisdom, far from being one, + Have ofttimes no connection. Knowledge dwells + In heads replete with thoughts of other men; + Wisdom in minds attentive to their own. + Knowledge, a rude unprofitable mass, + The mere materials with which wisdom builds, + Till smoothed and squared and fitted to its place, + Does but encumber whom it seems to enrich. + Knowledge is proud that he has learned so much, + Wisdom is humble that he knows no more. + Books are not seldom talismans and spells + By which the magic art of shrewder wits + Holds an unthinking multitude enthralled. + Some to the fascination of a name + Surrender judgment hoodwinked. Some the style + Infatuates, and, through labyrinths and wilds + Of error, leads them by a tune entranced. + While sloth seduces more, too weak to bear + The insupportable fatigue of thought, + And swallowing therefore without pause or choice + The total grist unsifted, husks and all. + But trees, and rivulets whose rapid course + Defies the check of winter, haunts of deer, + And sheep-walks populous with bleating lambs, + And lanes, in which the primrose ere her time + Peeps through the moss that clothes the hawthorn root, + Deceive no student. Wisdom there, and truth, + Not shy as in the world, and to be won + By slow solicitation, seize at once + The roving thought, and fix it on themselves. + + What prodigies can power divine perform + More grand than it produces year by year, + And all in sight of inattentive man? + Familiar with the effect we slight the cause, + And in the constancy of Nature's course, + The regular return of genial months, + And renovation of a faded world, + See nought to wonder at. Should God again, + As once in Gibeon, interrupt the race + Of the undeviating and punctual sun, + How would the world admire! but speaks it less + An agency divine, to make him know + His moment when to sink and when to rise + Age after age, than to arrest his course? + All we behold is miracle: but, seen + So duly, all is miracle in vain. + Where now the vital energy that moved, + While summer was, the pure and subtle lymph + Through the imperceptible meandering veins + Of leaf and flower? It sleeps: and the icy touch + Of unprolific winter has impressed + A cold stagnation on the intestine tide. + But let the months go round, a few short months, + And all shall be restored. These naked shoots, + Barren as lances, among which the wind + Makes wintry music, sighing as it goes, + Shall put their graceful foliage on again, + And more aspiring and with ampler spread + Shall boast new charms, and more than they have lost. + Then, each in its peculiar honours clad, + Shall publish even to the distant eye + Its family and tribe. Laburnum rich + In streaming gold; syringa ivory pure; + The scented and the scentless rose; this red + And of a humbler growth, the other tall, + And throwing up into the darkest gloom + Of neighbouring cypress, or more sable yew, + Her silver globes, light as the foamy surf + That the wind severs from the broken wave; + The lilac various in array, now white, + Now sanguine, and her beauteous head now set + With purple spikes pyramidal, as if + Studious of ornament, yet unresolved + Which hue she most approved, she chose them all; + Copious of flowers the woodbine, pale and wan, + But well compensating their sickly looks + With never-cloying odours, early and late; + Hypericum all bloom, so thick a swarm + Of flowers like flies, clothing her slender rods, + That scarce a leaf appears; mezereon too, + Though leafless, well attired, and thick beset + With blushing wreaths investing every spray; + Althaea with the purple eye; the broom, + Yellow and bright as bullion unalloyed + Her blossoms; and luxuriant above all + The jasmine, throwing wide her elegant sweets, + The deep dark green of whose unvarnished leaf + Makes more conspicuous, and illumines more + The bright profusion of her scattered stars.-- + These have been, and these shall be in their day, + And all this uniform uncoloured scene + Shall be dismantled of its fleecy load, + And flush into variety again. + From dearth to plenty, and from death to life, + Is Nature's progress when she lectures man + In heavenly truth; evincing, as she makes + The grand transition, that there lives and works + A soul in all things, and that soul is God. + The beauties of the wilderness are His, + That make so gay the solitary place + Where no eye sees them. And the fairer forms + That cultivation glories in, are His. + He sets the bright procession on its way, + And marshals all the order of the year. + He marks the bounds which Winter may not pass, + And blunts his pointed fury. In its case, + Russet and rude, folds up the tender germ + Uninjured, with inimitable art, + And, ere one flowery season fades and dies, + Designs the blooming wonders of the next. + + Some say that in the origin of things, + When all creation started into birth, + The infant elements received a law + From which they swerve not since; that under force + Of that controlling ordinance they move, + And need not His immediate hand, who first + Prescribed their course, to regulate it now. + Thus dream they, and contrive to save a God + The encumbrance of His own concerns, and spare + The great Artificer of all that moves + The stress of a continual act, the pain + Of unremitted vigilance and care, + As too laborious and severe a task. + So man the moth is not afraid, it seems, + To span Omnipotence, and measure might + That knows no measure, by the scanty rule + And standard of his own, that is to-day, + And is not ere to-morrow's sun go down. + But how should matter occupy a charge + Dull as it is, and satisfy a law + So vast in its demands, unless impelled + To ceaseless service by a ceaseless force, + And under pressure of some conscious cause? + The Lord of all, Himself through all diffused + Sustains and is the life of all that lives. + Nature is but a name for an effect + Whose cause is God. He feeds the secret fire + By which the mighty process is maintained, + Who sleeps not, is not weary; in whose sight + Slow-circling ages are as transient days; + Whose work is without labour, whose designs + No flaw deforms, no difficulty thwarts, + And whose beneficence no charge exhausts. + Him blind antiquity profaned, not served, + With self-taught rites and under various names + Female and male, Pomona, Pales, Pan, + And Flora and Vertumnus; peopling earth + With tutelary goddesses and gods + That were not, and commending as they would + To each some province, garden, field, or grove. + But all are under One. One spirit--His + Who bore the platted thorns with bleeding brows-- + Rules universal nature. Not a flower + But shows some touch in freckle, streak, or stain, + Of His unrivalled pencil. He inspires + Their balmy odours and imparts their hues, + And bathes their eyes with nectar, and includes, + In grains as countless as the sea-side sands, + The forms with which He sprinkles all the earth. + Happy who walks with Him! whom, what he finds + Of flavour or of scent in fruit or flower, + Or what he views of beautiful or grand + In nature, from the broad majestic oak + To the green blade that twinkles in the sun, + Prompts with remembrance of a present God. + His presence, who made all so fair, perceived, + Makes all still fairer. As with Him no scene + Is dreary, so with Him all seasons please. + Though winter had been none had man been true, + And earth be punished for its tenant's sake, + Yet not in vengeance; as this smiling sky, + So soon succeeding such an angry night, + And these dissolving snows, and this clear stream, + Recovering fast its liquid music, prove. + + Who then, that has a mind well strung and tuned + To contemplation, and within his reach + A scene so friendly to his favourite task, + Would waste attention at the chequered board, + His host of wooden warriors to and fro + Marching and counter-marching, with an eye + As fixt as marble, with a forehead ridged + And furrowed into storms, and with a hand + Trembling, as if eternity were hung + In balance on his conduct of a pin? + Nor envies he aught more their idle sport, + Who pant with application misapplied + To trivial toys, and, pushing ivory balls + Across the velvet level, feel a joy + Akin to rapture, when the bauble finds + Its destined goal of difficult access. + Nor deems he wiser him, who gives his noon + To Miss, the Mercer's plague, from shop to shop + Wandering, and littering with unfolded silks + The polished counter, and approving none, + Or promising with smiles to call again. + Nor him, who, by his vanity seduced, + And soothed into a dream that he discerns + The difference of a Guido from a daub, + Frequents the crowded auction. Stationed there + As duly as the Langford of the show, + With glass at eye, and catalogue in hand, + And tongue accomplished in the fulsome cant + And pedantry that coxcombs learn with ease, + Oft as the price-deciding hammer falls + He notes it in his book, then raps his box, + Swears 'tis a bargain, rails at his hard fate + That he has let it pass--but never bids. + + Here unmolested, through whatever sign + The sun proceeds, I wander; neither mist, + Nor freezing sky, nor sultry, checking me, + Nor stranger intermeddling with my joy. + Even in the spring and play-time of the year + That calls the unwonted villager abroad + With all her little ones, a sportive train, + To gather king-cups in the yellow mead, + And prank their hair with daisies, or to pick + A cheap but wholesome salad from the brook, + These shades are all my own. The timorous hare, + Grown so familiar with her frequent guest, + Scarce shuns me; and the stock-dove unalarmed + Sits cooing in the pine-tree, nor suspends + His long love-ditty for my near approach. + Drawn from his refuge in some lonely elm + That age or injury has hollowed deep, + Where on his bed of wool and matted leaves + He has outslept the winter, ventures forth + To frisk awhile, and bask in the warm sun, + The squirrel, flippant, pert, and full of play. + He sees me, and at once, swift as a bird, + Ascends the neighbouring beech; there whisks his brush, + And perks his ears, and stamps and scolds aloud, + With all the prettiness of feigned alarm, + And anger insignificantly fierce. + + The heart is hard in nature, and unfit + For human fellowship, as being void + Of sympathy, and therefore dead alike + To love and friendship both, that is not pleased + With sight of animals enjoying life, + Nor feels their happiness augment his own. + The bounding fawn that darts across the glade + When none pursues, through mere delight of heart, + And spirits buoyant with excess of glee; + The horse, as wanton and almost as fleet, + That skims the spacious meadow at full speed, + Then stops and snorts, and throwing high his heels + Starts to the voluntary race again; + The very kine that gambol at high noon, + The total herd receiving first from one, + That leads the dance, a summons to be gay, + Though wild their strange vagaries, and uncouth + Their efforts, yet resolved with one consent + To give such act and utterance as they may + To ecstasy too big to be suppressed-- + These, and a thousand images of bliss, + With which kind nature graces every scene + Where cruel man defeats not her design, + Impart to the benevolent, who wish + All that are capable of pleasure pleased, + A far superior happiness to theirs, + The comfort of a reasonable joy. + + Man scarce had risen, obedient to His call + Who formed him from the dust, his future grave, + When he was crowned as never king was since. + God set His diadem upon his head, + And angel choirs attended. Wondering stood + The new-made monarch, while before him passed, + All happy and all perfect in their kind, + The creatures, summoned from their various haunts + To see their sovereign, and confess his sway. + Vast was his empire, absolute his power, + Or bounded only by a law whose force + 'Twas his sublimest privilege to feel + And own, the law of universal love. + He ruled with meekness, they obeyed with joy. + No cruel purpose lurked within his heart, + And no distrust of his intent in theirs. + So Eden was a scene of harmless sport, + Where kindness on his part who ruled the whole + Begat a tranquil confidence in all, + And fear as yet was not, nor cause for fear. + But sin marred all; and the revolt of man, + That source of evils not exhausted yet, + Was punished with revolt of his from him. + Garden of God, how terrible the change + Thy groves and lawns then witnessed! every heart, + Each animal of every name, conceived + A jealousy and an instinctive fear, + And, conscious of some danger, either fled + Precipitate the loathed abode of man, + Or growled defiance in such angry sort, + As taught him too to tremble in his turn. + Thus harmony and family accord + Were driven from Paradise; and in that hour + The seeds of cruelty, that since have swelled + To such gigantic and enormous growth, + Were sown in human nature's fruitful soil. + Hence date the persecution and the pain + That man inflicts on all inferior kinds, + Regardless of their plaints. To make him sport, + To gratify the frenzy of his wrath, + Or his base gluttony, are causes good + And just in his account, why bird and beast + Should suffer torture, and the streams be dyed + With blood of their inhabitants impaled. + Earth groans beneath the burden of a war + Waged with defenceless innocence, while he, + Not satisfied to prey on all around, + Adds tenfold bitterness to death by pangs + Needless, and first torments ere he devours. + Now happiest they that occupy the scenes + The most remote from his abhorred resort, + Whom once as delegate of God on earth + They feared, and as His perfect image loved. + The wilderness is theirs with all its caves, + Its hollow glens, its thickets, and its plains + Unvisited by man. There they are free, + And howl and roar as likes them, uncontrolled, + Nor ask his leave to slumber or to play. + Woe to the tyrant, if he dare intrude + Within the confines of their wild domain; + The lion tells him, "I am monarch here;" + And if he spares him, spares him on the terms + Of royal mercy, and through generous scorn + To rend a victim trembling at his foot. + In measure, as by force of instinct drawn, + Or by necessity constrained, they live + Dependent upon man, those in his fields, + These at his crib, and some beneath his roof; + They prove too often at how dear a rate + He sells protection. Witness, at his foot + The spaniel dying for some venial fault, + Under dissection of the knotted scourge; + Witness the patient ox, with stripes and yells + Driven to the slaughter, goaded as he runs + To madness, while the savage at his heels + Laughs at the frantic sufferer's fury spent + Upon the guiltless passenger o'erthrown. + He too is witness, noblest of the train + That wait on man, the flight-performing horse: + With unsuspecting readiness he takes + His murderer on his back, and, pushed all day, + With bleeding sides, and flanks that heave for life, + To the far-distant goal, arrives and dies. + So little mercy shows who needs so much! + Does law, so jealous in the cause of man, + Denounce no doom on the delinquent? None. + He lives, and o'er his brimming beaker boasts + (As if barbarity were high desert) + The inglorious feat, and, clamorous in praise + Of the poor brute, seems wisely to suppose + The honours of his matchless horse his own. + But many a crime, deemed innocent on earth, + Is registered in heaven, and these, no doubt, + Have each their record, with a curse annexed. + Man may dismiss compassion from his heart, + But God will never. When He charged the Jew + To assist his foe's down-fallen beast to rise, + And when the bush-exploring boy that seized + The young, to let the parent bird go free, + Proved He not plainly that His meaner works + Are yet His care, and have an interest all, + All, in the universal Father's love? + On Noah, and in him on all mankind, + The charter was conferred by which we hold + The flesh of animals in fee, and claim, + O'er all we feed on, power of life and death. + But read the instrument, and mark it well; + The oppression of a tyrannous control + Can find no warrant there. Feed then, and yield + Thanks for thy food. Carnivorous, through sin, + Feed on the slain, but spare the living brute. + + The Governor of all, Himself to all + So bountiful, in whose attentive ear + The unfledged raven and the lion's whelp + Plead not in vain for pity on the pangs + Of hunger unassuaged, has interposed, + Not seldom, His avenging arm, to smite + The injurious trampler upon nature's law, + That claims forbearance even for a brute. + He hates the hardness of a Balaam's heart, + And, prophet as he was, he might not strike + The blameless animal, without rebuke, + On which he rode. Her opportune offence + Saved him, or the unrelenting seer had died. + He sees that human equity is slack + To interfere, though in so just a cause, + And makes the task His own; inspiring dumb + And helpless victims with a sense so keen + Of injury, with such knowledge of their strength, + And such sagacity to take revenge, + That oft the beast has seemed to judge the man. + An ancient, not a legendary tale, + By one of sound intelligence rehearsed, + (If such, who plead for Providence may seem + In modern eyes) shall make the doctrine clear. + + Where England, stretched towards the setting sun, + Narrow and long, o'erlooks the western wave, + Dwelt young Misagathus; a scorner he + Of God and goodness, atheist in ostent, + Vicious in act, in temper savage-fierce. + He journeyed, and his chance was, as he went, + To join a traveller of far different note-- + Evander, famed for piety, for years + Deserving honour, but for wisdom more. + Fame had not left the venerable man + A stranger to the manners of the youth, + Whose face, too, was familiar to his view. + Their way was on the margin of the land, + O'er the green summit of the rocks whose base + Beats back the roaring surge, scarce heard so high. + The charity that warmed his heart was moved + At sight of the man-monster. With a smile + Gentle and affable, and full of grace, + As fearful of offending whom he wished + Much to persuade, he plied his ear with truths + Not harshly thundered forth or rudely pressed, + But, like his purpose, gracious, kind, and sweet. + "And dost thou dream," the impenetrable man + Exclaimed, "that me the lullabies of age, + And fantasies of dotards such as thou, + Can cheat, or move a moment's fear in me? + Mark now the proof I give thee, that the brave + Need no such aids as superstition lends + To steel their hearts against the dread of death." + He spoke, and to the precipice at hand + Pushed with a madman's fury. Fancy shrinks, + And the blood thrills and curdles at the thought + Of such a gulf as he designed his grave. + But though the felon on his back could dare + The dreadful leap, more rational, his steed + Declined the death, and wheeling swiftly round, + Or ere his hoof had pressed the crumbling verge, + Baffled his rider, saved against his will. + The frenzy of the brain may be redressed + By medicine well applied, but without grace + The heart's insanity admits no cure. + Enraged the more by what might have reformed + His horrible intent, again he sought + Destruction, with a zeal to be destroyed, + With sounding whip and rowels dyed in blood. + But still in vain. The Providence that meant + A longer date to the far nobler beast, + Spared yet again the ignobler for his sake. + And now, his prowess proved, and his sincere, + Incurable obduracy evinced, + His rage grew cool; and, pleased perhaps to have earned + So cheaply the renown of that attempt, + With looks of some complacence he resumed + His road, deriding much the blank amaze + Of good Evander, still where he was left + Fixed motionless, and petrified with dread. + So on they fared; discourse on other themes + Ensuing, seemed to obliterate the past, + And tamer far for so much fury shown + (As is the course of rash and fiery men) + The rude companion smiled as if transformed. + But 'twas a transient calm. A storm was near, + An unsuspected storm. His hour was come. + The impious challenger of power divine + Was now to learn that Heaven, though slow to wrath, + Is never with impunity defied. + His horse, as he had caught his master's mood, + Snorting, and starting into sudden rage, + Unbidden, and not now to be controlled, + Rushed to the cliff, and having reached it, stood. + At once the shock unseated him; he flew + Sheer o'er the craggy barrier, and, immersed + Deep in the flood, found, when he sought it not, + The death he had deserved, and died alone. + So God wrought double justice; made the fool + The victim of his own tremendous choice, + And taught a brute the way to safe revenge. + + I would not enter on my list of friends + (Though graced with polished manners and fine sense, + Yet wanting sensibility) the man + Who needlessly sets foot upon a worm. + An inadvertent step may crush the snail + That crawls at evening in the public path; + But he that has humanity, forewarned, + Will tread aside, and let the reptile live. + The creeping vermin, loathsome to the sight, + And charged perhaps with venom, that intrudes + A visitor unwelcome into scenes + Sacred to neatness and repose, the alcove, + The chamber, or refectory, may die. + A necessary act incurs no blame. + Not so when, held within their proper bounds + And guiltless of offence, they range the air, + Or take their pastime in the spacious field. + There they are privileged; and he that hunts + Or harms them there is guilty of a wrong, + Disturbs the economy of Nature's realm, + Who, when she formed, designed them an abode. + The sum is this: if man's convenience, health, + Or safety interfere, his rights and claims + Are paramount, and must extinguish theirs. + Else they are all--the meanest things that are-- + As free to live and to enjoy that life, + As God was free to form them at the first, + Who in His sovereign wisdom made them all. + Ye, therefore, who love mercy, teach your sons + To love it too. The spring-time of our years + Is soon dishonoured and defiled in most + By budding ills, that ask a prudent hand + To check them. But, alas! none sooner shoots, + If unrestrained, into luxuriant growth, + Than cruelty, most devilish of them all. + Mercy to him that shows it, is the rule + And righteous limitation of its act, + By which Heaven moves in pardoning guilty man; + And he that shows none, being ripe in years, + And conscious of the outrage he commits, + Shall seek it and not find it in his turn. + + Distinguished much by reason, and still more + By our capacity of grace divine, + From creatures that exist but for our sake, + Which having served us, perish, we are held + Accountable, and God, some future day, + Will reckon with us roundly for the abuse + Of what He deems no mean or trivial trust. + Superior as we are, they yet depend + Not more on human help, than we on theirs. + Their strength, or speed, or vigilance, were given + In aid of our defects. In some are found + Such teachable and apprehensive parts, + That man's attainments in his own concerns, + Matched with the expertness of the brutes in theirs, + Are ofttimes vanquished and thrown far behind. + Some show that nice sagacity of smell, + And read with such discernment, in the port + And figure of the man, his secret aim, + That oft we owe our safety to a skill + We could not teach, and must despair to learn. + But learn we might, if not too proud to stoop + To quadruped instructors, many a good + And useful quality, and virtue too, + Rarely exemplified among ourselves; + Attachment never to be weaned, or changed + By any change of fortune, proof alike + Against unkindness, absence, and neglect; + Fidelity, that neither bribe nor threat + Can move or warp; and gratitude for small + And trivial favours, lasting as the life, + And glistening even in the dying eye. + + Man praises man. Desert in arts or arms + Wins public honour; and ten thousand sit + Patiently present at a sacred song, + Commemoration-mad; content to hear + (Oh wonderful effect of music's power!) + Messiah's eulogy, for Handel's sake. + But less, methinks, than sacrilege might serve-- + (For was it less? What heathen would have dared + To strip Jove's statue of his oaken wreath + And hang it up in honour of a man?) + Much less might serve, when all that we design + Is but to gratify an itching ear, + And give the day to a musician's praise. + Remember Handel! who, that was not born + Deaf as the dead to harmony, forgets, + Or can, the more than Homer of his age? + Yes--we remember him; and, while we praise + A talent so divine, remember too + That His most holy Book from whom it came + Was never meant, was never used before + To buckram out the memory of a man. + But hush!--the muse perhaps is too severe, + And with a gravity beyond the size + And measure of the offence, rebukes a deed + Less impious than absurd, and owing more + To want of judgment than to wrong design. + So in the chapel of old Ely House, + When wandering Charles, who meant to be the third, + Had fled from William, and the news was fresh, + The simple clerk, but loyal, did announce, + And eke did rear right merrily, two staves, + Sung to the praise and glory of King George. + --Man praises man; and Garrick's memory next, + When time has somewhat mellowed it, and made + The idol of our worship while he lived + The god of our idolatry once more, + Shall have its altar; and the world shall go + In pilgrimage to bow before his shrine. + The theatre, too small, shall suffocate + Its squeezed contents, and more than it admits + Shall sigh at their exclusion, and return + Ungratified. For there some noble lord + Shall stuff his shoulders with King Richard's bunch, + Or wrap himself in Hamlet's inky cloak, + And strut, and storm, and straddle, stamp, and stare, + To show the world how Garrick did not act, + For Garrick was a worshipper himself; + He drew the liturgy, and framed the rites + And solemn ceremonial of the day, + And called the world to worship on the banks + Of Avon famed in song. Ah! pleasant proof + That piety has still in human hearts + Some place, a spark or two not yet extinct. + The mulberry-tree was hung with blooming wreaths, + The mulberry-tree stood centre of the dance, + The mulberry-tree was hymned with dulcet airs, + And from his touchwood trunk the mulberry-tree + Supplied such relics as devotion holds + Still sacred, and preserves with pious care. + So 'twas a hallowed time: decorum reigned, + And mirth without offence. No few returned + Doubtless much edified, and all refreshed. + --Man praises man. The rabble all alive, + From tippling benches, cellars, stalls, and styes, + Swarm in the streets. The statesman of the day, + A pompous and slow-moving pageant, comes; + Some shout him, and some hang upon his car + To gaze in his eyes and bless him. Maidens wave + Their kerchiefs, and old women weep for joy + While others not so satisfied unhorse + The gilded equipage, and, turning loose + His steeds, usurp a place they well deserve. + Why? what has charmed them? Hath he saved the state? + No. Doth he purpose its salvation? No. + Enchanting novelty, that moon at full + That finds out every crevice of the head + That is not sound and perfect, hath in theirs + Wrought this disturbance. But the wane is near, + And his own cattle must suffice him soon. + Thus idly do we waste the breath of praise, + And dedicate a tribute, in its use + And just direction sacred, to a thing + Doomed to the dust, or lodged already there. + Encomium in old time was poet's work; + But, poets having lavishly long since + Exhausted all materials of the art, + The task now falls into the public hand; + And I, contented with a humble theme, + Have poured my stream of panegyric down + The vale of Nature, where it creeps and winds + Among her lovely works, with a secure + And unambitious course, reflecting clear + If not the virtues yet the worth of brutes. + And I am recompensed, and deem the toil + Of poetry not lost, if verse of mine + May stand between an animal and woe, + And teach one tyrant pity for his drudge. + + The groans of Nature in this nether world, + Which Heaven has heard for ages, have an end. + Foretold by prophets, and by poets sung, + Whose fire was kindled at the prophets' lamp, + The time of rest, the promised Sabbath, comes. + Six thousand years of sorrow have well-nigh + Fulfilled their tardy and disastrous course + Over a sinful world; and what remains + Of this tempestuous state of human things, + Is merely as the working of a sea + Before a calm, that rocks itself to rest. + For He, whose car the winds are, and the clouds + The dust that waits upon His sultry march, + When sin hath moved Him, and His wrath is hot, + Shall visit earth in mercy; shall descend + Propitious, in His chariot paved with love, + And what His storms have blasted and defaced + For man's revolt, shall with a smile repair. + + Sweet is the harp of prophecy; too sweet + Not to be wronged by a mere mortal touch; + Nor can the wonders it records be sung + To meaner music, and not suffer loss. + But when a poet, or when one like me, + Happy to rove among poetic flowers, + Though poor in skill to rear them, lights at last + On some fair theme, some theme divinely fair, + Such is the impulse and the spur he feels + To give it praise proportioned to its worth, + That not to attempt it, arduous as he deems + The labour, were a task more arduous still. + + Oh scenes surpassing fable, and yet true, + Scenes of accomplished bliss! which who can see, + Though but in distant prospect, and not feel + His soul refreshed with foretaste of the joy? + Rivers of gladness water all the earth, + And clothe all climes with beauty; the reproach + Of barrenness is past. The fruitful field + Laughs with abundance, and the land once lean, + Or fertile only in its own disgrace, + Exults to see its thistly curse repealed. + The various seasons woven into one, + And that one season an eternal spring, + The garden fears no blight, and needs no fence, + For there is none to covet, all are full. + The lion and the libbard and the bear + Graze with the fearless flocks. All bask at noon + Together, or all gambol in the shade + Of the same grove, and drink one common stream. + Antipathies are none. No foe to man + Lurks in the serpent now. The mother sees, + And smiles to see, her infant's playful hand + Stretched forth to dally with the crested worm, + To stroke his azure neck, or to receive + The lambent homage of his arrowy tongue. + All creatures worship man, and all mankind + One Lord, one Father. Error has no place; + That creeping pestilence is driven away, + The breath of heaven has chased it. In the heart + No passion touches a discordant string, + But all is harmony and love. Disease + Is not. The pure and uncontaminated blood + Holds its due course, nor fears the frost of age. + One song employs all nations; and all cry, + "Worthy the Lamb, for He was slain for us!" + The dwellers in the vales and on the rocks + Shout to each other, and the mountain-tops + From distant mountains catch the flying joy, + Till nation after nation taught the strain, + Each rolls the rapturous Hosanna round. + Behold the measure of the promise filled, + See Salem built, the labour of a God! + Bright as a sun the sacred city shines; + All kingdoms and all princes of the earth + Flock to that light; the glory of all lands + Flows into her, unbounded is her joy + And endless her increase. Thy rams are there, + Nebaioth,* and the flocks of Kedar there; + The looms of Ormus, and the mines of Ind, + And Saba's spicy groves pay tribute there. + Praise is in all her gates. Upon her walls, + And in her streets, and in her spacious courts + Is heard salvation. Eastern Java there + Kneels with the native of the farthest West, + And AEthiopia spreads abroad the hand, + And worships. Her report has travelled forth + Into all lands. From every clime they come + To see thy beauty and to share thy joy, + O Sion! an assembly such as earth + Saw never; such as heaven stoops down to see. + +* Nebaioth and Kedar, the sons of Ishmael, and progenitors of the +Arabs, in the prophetic scripture here alluded to may be reasonably +considered as representatives of the Gentiles at large.--C. + + Thus heavenward all things tend. For all were once + Perfect, and all must be at length restored. + So God has greatly purposed; who would else + In His dishonoured works Himself endure + Dishonour, and be wronged without redress. + Haste then, and wheel away a shattered world, + Ye slow-revolving seasons! We would see + (A sight to which our eyes are strangers yet) + A world that does not dread and hate His laws, + And suffer for its crime: would learn how fair + The creature is that God pronounces good, + How pleasant in itself what pleases Him. + Here every drop of honey hides a sting; + Worms wind themselves into our sweetest flowers, + And even the joy, that haply some poor heart + Derives from heaven, pure as the fountain is, + Is sullied in the stream; taking a taint + From touch of human lips, at best impure. + Oh for a world in principle as chaste + As this is gross and selfish! over which + Custom and prejudice shall bear no sway, + That govern all things here, shouldering aside + The meek and modest Truth, and forcing her + To seek a refuge from the tongue of strife + In nooks obscure, far from the ways of men, + Where violence shall never lift the sword, + Nor cunning justify the proud man's wrong, + Leaving the poor no remedy but tears; + Where he that fills an office, shall esteem + The occasion it presents of doing good + More than the perquisite; where laws shall speak + Seldom, and never but as wisdom prompts, + And equity, not jealous more to guard + A worthless form, than to decide aright; + Where fashion shall not sanctify abuse, + Nor smooth good-breeding (supplemental grace) + With lean performance ape the work of love. + + Come then, and added to Thy many crowns + Receive yet one, the crown of all the earth, + Thou who alone art worthy! it was Thine + By ancient covenant, ere nature's birth, + And Thou hast made it Thine by purchase since, + And overpaid its value with Thy blood. + Thy saints proclaim Thee King; and in their hearts + Thy title is engraven with a pen + Dipt in the fountain of eternal love. + Thy saints proclaim Thee King; and Thy delay + Gives courage to their foes, who, could they see + The dawn of Thy last advent, long-desired, + Would creep into the bowels of the hills, + And flee for safety to the falling rocks. + The very spirit of the world is tired + Of its own taunting question, asked so long, + "Where is the promise of your Lord's approach?" + The infidel has shot his bolts away, + Till, his exhausted quiver yielding none, + He gleans the blunted shafts that have recoiled, + And aims them at the shield of truth again. + The veil is rent, rent too by priestly hands, + That hides divinity from mortal eyes; + And all the mysteries to faith proposed, + Insulted and traduced, are cast aside, + As useless, to the moles and to the bats. + They now are deemed the faithful and are praised, + Who, constant only in rejecting Thee, + Deny Thy Godhead with a martyr's zeal, + And quit their office for their error's sake. + Blind and in love with darkness! yet even these + Worthy, compared with sycophants, who kneel, + Thy Name adoring, and then preach Thee man! + So fares Thy Church. But how Thy Church may fare, + The world takes little thought; who will may preach, + And what they will. All pastors are alike + To wandering sheep resolved to follow none. + Two gods divide them all, Pleasure and Gain; + For these they live, they sacrifice to these, + And in their service wage perpetual war + With conscience and with Thee. Lust in their hearts, + And mischief in their hands, they roam the earth + To prey upon each other; stubborn, fierce, + High-minded, foaming out their own disgrace. + Thy prophets speak of such; and noting down + The features of the last degenerate times, + Exhibit every lineament of these. + Come then, and added to Thy many crowns + Receive yet one as radiant as the rest, + Due to Thy last and most effectual work, + Thy Word fulfilled, the conquest of a world. + + He is the happy man, whose life even now + Shows somewhat of that happier life to come; + Who, doomed to an obscure but tranquil state, + Is pleased with it, and, were he free to choose, + Would make his fate his choice; whom peace, the fruit + Of virtue, and whom virtue, fruit of faith, + Prepare for happiness; bespeak him one + Content indeed to sojourn while he must + Below the skies, but having there his home. + The world o'erlooks him in her busy search + Of objects more illustrious in her view; + And occupied as earnestly as she, + Though more sublimely, he o'erlooks the world. + She scorns his pleasures, for she knows them not; + He seeks not hers, for he has proved them vain. + He cannot skim the ground like summer birds + Pursuing gilded flies, and such he deems + Her honours, her emoluments, her joys; + Therefore in contemplation is his bliss, + Whose power is such, that whom she lifts from earth + She makes familiar with a heaven unseen, + And shows him glories yet to be revealed. + Not slothful he, though seeming unemployed, + And censured oft as useless. Stillest streams + Oft water fairest meadows; and the bird + That flutters least is longest on the wing. + Ask him, indeed, what trophies he has raised, + Or what achievements of immortal fame + He purposes, and he shall answer--None. + His warfare is within. There unfatigued + His fervent spirit labours. There he fights, + And there obtains fresh triumphs o'er himself, + And never-withering wreaths, compared with which + The laurels that a Caesar reaps are weeds. + Perhaps the self-approving haughty world, + That, as she sweeps him with her whistling silks, + Scarce deigns to notice him, or if she see, + Deems him a cipher in the works of God, + Receives advantage from his noiseless hours + Of which she little dreams. Perhaps she owes + Her sunshine and her rain, her blooming spring + And plenteous harvest, to the prayer he makes + When, Isaac-like, the solitary saint + Walks forth to meditate at eventide, + And think on her who thinks not for herself. + Forgive him then, thou bustler in concerns + Of little worth, and idler in the best, + If, author of no mischief and some good, + He seeks his proper happiness by means + That may advance, but cannot hinder thine. + Nor, though he tread the secret path of life, + Engage no notice, and enjoy much ease, + Account him an encumbrance on the state, + Receiving benefits, and rendering none. + His sphere though humble, if that humble sphere + Shine with his fair example, and though small + His influence, if that influence all be spent + In soothing sorrow and in quenching strife, + In aiding helpless indigence, in works + From which at least a grateful few derive + Some taste of comfort in a world of woe, + Then let the supercilious great confess + He serves his country; recompenses well + The state beneath the shadow of whose vine + He sits secure, and in the scale of life + Holds no ignoble, though a slighted place. + The man whose virtues are more felt than seen, + Must drop, indeed, the hope of public praise; + But he may boast, what few that win it can, + That if his country stand not by his skill, + At least his follies have not wrought her fall. + Polite refinement offers him in vain + Her golden tube, through which a sensual world + Draws gross impurity, and likes it well, + The neat conveyance hiding all the offence. + Not that he peevishly rejects a mode + Because that world adopts it. If it bear + The stamp and clear impression of good sense, + And be not costly more than of true worth, + He puts it on, and for decorum sake + Can wear it e'en as gracefully as she. + She judges of refinement by the eye, + He by the test of conscience, and a heart + Not soon deceived; aware that what is base + No polish can make sterling, and that vice, + Though well-perfumed and elegantly dressed, + Like an unburied carcass tricked with flowers, + Is but a garnished nuisance, fitter far + For cleanly riddance than for fair attire. + So life glides smoothly and by stealth away, + More golden than that age of fabled gold + Renowned in ancient song; not vexed with care, + Or stained with guilt, beneficent, approved + Of God and man, and peaceful in its end. + + So glide my life away! and so at last, + My share of duties decently fulfilled, + May some disease, not tardy to perform + Its destined office, yet with gentle stroke, + Dismiss me weary to a safe retreat + Beneath the turf that I have often trod. + It shall not grieve me, then, that once, when called + To dress a Sofa with the flowers of verse, + I played awhile, obedient to the fair, + With that light task, but soon to please her more, + Whom flowers alone I knew would little please, + Let fall the unfinished wreath, and roved for fruit; + Roved far and gathered much; some harsh, 'tis true, + Picked from the thorns and briars of reproof, + But wholesome, well-digested; grateful some + To palates that can taste immortal truth; + Insipid else, and sure to be despised. + But all is in His hand whose praise I seek, + In vain the poet sings, and the world hears, + If He regard not, though divine the theme. + 'Tis not in artful measures, in the chime + And idle tinkling of a minstrel's lyre, + To charm His ear, whose eye is on the heart; + Whose frown can disappoint the proudest strain, + Whose approbation--prosper even mine. + + + +THE DIVERTING HISTORY OF JOHN GILPIN; + +SHOWING HOW HE WENT FARTHER THAN HE INTENDED, AND CAME SAFE HOME AGAIN. + + John Gilpin was a citizen + Of credit and renown, + A train-band captain eke was he + Of famous London town. + + John Gilpin's spouse said to her dear, + "Though wedded we have been + These twice ten tedious years, yet we + No holiday have seen. + + "To-morrow is our wedding-day, + And we will then repair + Unto 'The Bell' at Edmonton, + All in a chaise and pair. + + "My sister and my sister's child, + Myself and children three, + Will fill the chaise; so you must ride + On horseback after we." + + He soon replied, "I do admire + Of womankind but one, + And you are she, my dearest dear, + Therefore it shall be done. + + "I am a linen-draper bold, + As all the world doth know, + And my good friend the Calender + Will lend his horse to go." + + Quoth Mistress Gilpin, "That's well said; + And, for that wine is dear, + We will be furnished with our own, + Which is both bright and clear." + + John Gilpin kissed his loving wife; + O'erjoyed was he to find + That though on pleasure she was bent, + She had a frugal mind. + + The morning came, the chaise was brought, + But yet was not allowed + To drive up to the door, lest all + Should say that she was proud. + + So three doors off the chaise was stayed, + Where they did all get in; + Six precious souls, and all agog + To dash through thick and thin. + + Smack went the whip, round went the wheels, + Were never folk so glad; + The stones did rattle underneath + As if Cheapside were mad. + + John Gilpin at his horse's side + Seized fast the flowing mane, + And up he got, in haste to ride, + But soon came down again; + + For saddle-tree scarce reached had he, + His journey to begin, + When, turning round his head, he saw + Three customers come in. + + So down he came; for loss of time, + Although it grieved him sore, + Yet loss of pence, full well he knew, + Would trouble him much more. + + 'Twas long before the customers + Were suited to their mind. + When Betty, screaming, came down stairs, + "The wine is left behind!" + + "Good lack!" quoth he; "yet bring it me, + My leathern belt likewise, + In which I bear my trusty sword, + When I do exercise." + + Now Mistress Gilpin (careful soul!) + Had two stone bottles found, + To hold the liquor that she loved, + And keep it safe and sound. + + Each bottle had a curling ear, + Through which the belt he drew, + And hung a bottle on each side, + To make his balance true. + + Then over all, that he might be + Equipped from top to toe, + His long red cloak, well brushed and neat, + He manfully did throw. + + Now see him mounted once again + Upon his nimble steed, + Full slowly pacing o'er the stones + With caution and good heed! + + But, finding soon a smoother road + Beneath his well-shod feet, + The snorting beast began to trot, + Which galled him in his seat. + + So, "Fair and softly," John he cried, + But John he cried in vain; + That trot became a gallop soon, + In spite of curb and rein. + + So stooping down, as needs he must + Who cannot sit upright, + He grasped the mane with both his hands, + And eke with all his might. + + His horse, who never in that sort + Had handled been before, + What thing upon his back had got + Did wonder more and more. + + Away went Gilpin, neck or naught; + Away went hat and wig; + He little dreamt, when he set out, + Of running such a rig. + + The wind did blow, the cloak did fly, + Like streamer long and gay, + Till, loop and button failing both, + At last it flew away. + + Then might all people well discern + The bottles he had slung; + A bottle swinging at each side, + As hath been said or sung. + + The dogs did bark, the children screamed, + Up flew the windows all; + And every soul cried out, "Well done!" + As loud as he could bawl. + + Away went Gilpin--who but he? + His fame soon spread around-- + He carries weight! he rides a race! + 'Tis for a thousand pound! + + And still, as fast as he drew near, + 'Twas wonderful to view + How in a trice the turnpike men + Their gates wide open threw. + + And now, as he went bowing down + His reeking head full low, + The bottles twain behind his back + Were shattered at a blow. + + Down ran the wine into the road, + Most piteous to be seen, + Which made his horse's flanks to smoke + As they had basted been. + + But still he seemed to carry weight, + With leathern girdle braced; + For all might see the bottle-necks + Still dangling at his waist. + + Thus all through merry Islington + These gambols he did play, + And till he came unto the Wash + Of Edmonton so gay. + + And there he threw the wash about + On both sides of the way, + Just like unto a trundling mop, + Or a wild goose at play. + + At Edmonton, his loving wife + From the bal-cony spied + Her tender husband, wondering much + To see how he did ride. + + "Stop, stop, John Gilpin!--here's the house!" + They all at once did cry; + "The dinner waits, and we are tired." + Said Gilpin, "So am I!" + + But yet his horse was not a whit + Inclined to tarry there; + For why?--his owner had a house + Full ten miles off, at Ware. + + So like an arrow swift he flew, + Shot by an archer strong; + So did he fly--which brings me to + The middle of my song. + + Away went Gilpin, out of breath, + And sore against his will, + Till at his friend the Calender's + His horse at last stood still. + + The Calender, amazed to see + His neighbour in such trim, + Laid down his pipe, flew to the gate, + And thus accosted him:-- + + "What news? what news? your tidings tell: + Tell me you must and shall-- + Say why bareheaded you are come, + Or why you come at all." + + Now Gilpin had a pleasant wit, + And loved a timely joke; + And thus unto the Calender + In merry guise he spoke: + + "I came because your horse would come; + And if I well forebode, + My hat and wig will soon be here; + They are upon the road." + + The Calender, right glad to find + His friend in merry pin, + Returned him not a single word, + But to the house went in; + + Whence straight he came with hat and wig, + A wig that flowed behind, + A hat not much the worse for wear, + Each comely in its kind. + + He held them up, and, in his turn, + Thus showed his ready wit,-- + "My head is twice as big as yours; + They therefore needs must fit. + + "But let me scrape the dirt away + That hangs upon your face; + And stop and eat, for well you may + Be in a hungry case." + + Says John, "It is my wedding-day, + And all the world would stare, + If wife should dine at Edmonton, + And I should dine at Ware." + + So turning to his horse, he said, + "I am in haste to dine; + 'Twas for your pleasure you came here, + You shall go back for mine." + + Ah, luckless speech, and bootless boast! + For which he paid full dear; + For while he spake, a braying ass + Did sing most loud and clear; + + Whereat his horse did snort as he + Had heard a lion roar, + And galloped off with all his might, + As he had done before. + + Away went Gilpin, and away + Went Gilpin's hat and wig; + He lost them sooner than at first, + For why?--they were too big. + + Now Mistress Gilpin, when she saw + Her husband posting down + Into the country far away, + She pulled out half-a-crown. + + And thus unto the youth she said, + That drove them to "The Bell," + "This shall be yours when you bring back + My husband safe and well." + + The youth did ride, and soon did meet + John coming back amain, + Whom in a trice he tried to stop + By catching at his rein; + + But not performing what he meant, + And gladly would have done, + The frighted steed he frighted more, + And made him faster run. + + Away went Gilpin, and away + Went postboy at his heels, + The postboy's horse right glad to miss + The lumbering of the wheels. + + Six gentlemen upon the road + Thus seeing Gilpin fly, + With postboy scampering in the rear, + They raised the hue and cry: + + "Stop thief! stop thief!--a highwayman!" + Not one of them was mute; + And all and each that passed that way + Did join in the pursuit. + + And now the turnpike gates again + Flew open in short space, + The tollmen thinking, as before, + That Gilpin rode a race. + + And so he did, and won it too, + For he got first to town; + Nor stopped till where he had got up + He did again get down. + + Now let us sing, "Long live the king, + And Gilpin, long live he; + And when he next doth ride abroad, + May I be there to see!" + + + +AN EPISTLE TO JOSEPH HILL, ESQ. + + DEAR JOSEPH,--five and twenty years ago-- + Alas, how time escapes!--'tis even so-- + With frequent intercourse, and always sweet + And always friendly, we were wont to cheat + A tedious hour--and now we never meet. + As some grave gentleman in Terence says + ('Twas therefore much the same in ancient days), + "Good lack, we know not what to-morrow brings-- + Strange fluctuation of all human things!" + True. Changes will befall, and friends may part, + But distance only cannot change the heart: + And were I called to prove the assertion true, + One proof should serve--a reference to you. + + Whence comes it, then, that in the wane of life, + Though nothing have occurred to kindle strife, + We find the friends we fancied we had won, + Though numerous once, reduced to few or none? + Can gold grow worthless that has stood the touch? + No. Gold they seemed, but they were never such. + Horatio's servant once, with bow and cringe, + Swinging the parlour-door upon its hinge, + Dreading a negative, and overawed + Lest he should trespass, begged to go abroad. + "Go, fellow!--whither?"--turning short about-- + "Nay. Stay at home; you're always going out."-- + "'Tis but a step, sir; just at the street's end." + "For what?"--"An please you, sir, to see a friend." + "A friend!" Horatio cried, and seemed to start; + "Yea, marry shalt thou, and with all my heart-- + And fetch my cloak, for though the night be raw + I'll see him too--the first I ever saw." + + I knew the man, and knew his nature mild, + And was his plaything often when a child; + But somewhat at that moment pinched him close, + Else he was seldom bitter or morose. + Perhaps, his confidence just then betrayed, + His grief might prompt him with the speech he made; + Perhaps 'twas mere good-humour gave it birth, + The harmless play of pleasantry and mirth. + Howe'er it was, his language in my mind + Bespoke at least a man that knew mankind. + + But not to moralise too much, and strain + To prove an evil of which all complain + (I hate long arguments, verbosely spun), + One story more, dear Hill, and I have done. + Once on a time, an emperor, a wise man. + No matter where, in China or Japan, + Decreed that whosoever should offend + Against the well-known duties of a friend, + Convicted once, should ever after wear + But half a coat, and show his bosom bare; + The punishment importing this, no doubt, + That all was naught within and all found out. + + Oh happy Britain! we have not to fear + Such hard and arbitrary measure here; + Else could a law, like that which I relate, + Once have the sanction of our triple state, + Some few that I have known in days of old + Would run most dreadful risk of catching cold. + While you, my friend, whatever wind should blow, + Might traverse England safely to and fro, + An honest man, close buttoned to the chin, + Broad-cloth without, and a warm heart within. + + + +TO MARY. + + The twentieth year is well-nigh past + Since first our sky was overcast, + Ah, would that this might be the last! + My Mary! + + Thy spirits have a fainter flow, + I see thee daily weaker grow-- + 'Twas my distress that brought thee low, + My Mary! + + Thy needles, once a shining store, + For my sake restless heretofore, + Now rust disused, and shine no more, + My Mary! + + For though thou gladly wouldst fulfil + The same kind office for me still, + Thy sight now seconds not thy will, + My Mary! + + But well thou playedst the housewife's part, + And all thy threads with magic art + Have wound themselves about this heart, + My Mary! + + Thy indistinct expressions seem + Like language uttered in a dream; + Yet me they charm, whate'er the theme, + My Mary! + + Thy silver locks, once auburn bright, + Are still more lovely in my sight + Than golden beams of orient light, + My Mary! + + For could I view nor them nor thee, + What sight worth seeing could I see? + The sun would rise in vain for me, + My Mary! + + Partakers of thy sad decline, + Thy hands their little force resign; + Yet gently prest, press gently mine, + My Mary! + + Such feebleness of limbs thou prov'st, + That now at every step thou mov'st + Upheld by two, yet still thou lov'st, + My Mary! + + And still to love, though prest with ill, + In wintry age to feel no chill, + With me, is to be lovely still, + My Mary! + + But ah! by constant heed I know, + How oft the sadness that I show, + Transforms thy smiles to looks of woe, + My Mary! + + And should my future lot be cast + With much resemblance of the past, + Thy worn-out heart will break at last, + My Mary! + + + + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Task and Other Poems, by William Cowper + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE TASK AND OTHER POEMS *** + +***** This file should be named 3698.txt or 3698.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/6/9/3698/ + +Produced by Les Bowler. + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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