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 WORDSWORTH COLLECTION 
 
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THE POETICAL 
 
 AND DRAMATIC WORKS OF 
 
 S. T. COLERIDGE 
 
 VOL I 
 
 LONDON 
 
 WILLIAM PICKERING 
 1844 
 
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 PRINTED BY C. W HITTINGHAM. 
 
 
 
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PREFACE. 1 
 
 Compositions resembling- those of the present 
 volume are not unfrequently condemned for their 
 querulous egotism. But egotism is to be con- 
 demned then only when it offends against time 
 and place, as in a history or an epic poem. To 
 censure it in a monody or sonnet is almost as ab- 
 surd as to dislike a circle for being round. Why 
 then write Sonnets or Monodies ? Because they 
 give me pleasure when perhaps nothing else 
 could. After the more violent emotions of sor- 
 row, the mind demands amusement, and can find 
 it in employment alone : but full of its late suffer- 
 ings, it can endure no employment not in some 
 measure connected with them. Forcibly to turn 
 away our attention to general subjects is a painful 
 and most often an unavailing effort. 
 
 " But O ! how grateful to a wounded heart 
 The tale of misery to impart — 
 From others' eyes bid artless sorrows flow, 
 And raise esteem upon the base of woe !" 
 
 SHAW. 
 
 1 To the first and second editions. 
 
VI PREFACE. 
 
 The communicativeness of our nature leads us to 
 describe our own sorrows ; in the endeavour to 
 describe them, intellectual activity is exerted ; 
 and from intellectual activity there results a plea- 
 sure, which is gradually associated, and mingles 
 as a c6rrective, with the painful subject of the 
 description. " True !" (it may be answered) " but 
 how is the Public interested in your sorrows or 
 your description?" We are for ever attributing 
 personal unities to imaginary aggregates. What 
 is the Public, but a term for a number of scattered 
 individuals ? Of whom as many will be interested 
 in these sorrows, as have experienced the same or 
 similar. 
 
 " Holy be the lay 
 Which mourning soothes the mourner on his way." 
 
 If I could judge of others by myself, I should not 
 hesitate to affirm, that the most interesting pas- 
 sages in all writings are those in which the author 
 developes his own feelings ? The sweet voice of 
 Cona 1 never sounds so sweetly, as when it speaks 
 of itself; and I should almost suspect that man of 
 an unkindly heart, who could read the opening 
 of the third book of the Paradise Lost without pe- 
 culiar emotion. By a law of our nature, he, who 
 
 1 Ossian. 
 
PREFACE. Vll 
 
 labours under a strong feeling, is impelled to seek 
 for sympathy ; but a poet's feelings are all strong. 
 Quicquid amet valde amat. Akenside therefore 
 speaks with philosophical accuracy when he 
 classes Love and Poetry, as producing the same 
 effects : 
 
 " Love and the wish of Poets when their tongue 
 Would teach to others' bosoms, what so charms 
 Their own." pleasures of imagination. 
 
 There is one species of egotism which is truly 
 disgusting ; not that which leads us to communi- 
 cate our feelings to others, but that which would 
 reduce the feelings of others to an identity with 
 our own. The atheist, who exclaims, " pshaw !" 
 when he glances his eye on the praises of Deity, 
 is an egotist : an old man, when he speaks con- 
 temptuously of Love-verses, is an egotist : and 
 the sleek favorites of fortune are egotists, when 
 they condemn all " melancholy, discontented" 
 verses. Surely, it would be candid not merely to 
 ask whether the poem pleases ourselves, but to 
 consider whether or no there may not be others, 
 to whom it is well calculated to give an innocent 
 pleasure. 
 
 I shall only add, that each of my readers will, 
 I hope, remember, that these poems on various 
 subjects, which he reads at one time and under 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 the influence of one set of feelings, were written 
 at different times and prompted by very different 
 feelings ; and therefore that the supposed in- 
 feriority of one poem to another may sometimes 
 be owing to the temper of mind, in which he 
 happens to peruse it. 
 
 My poems have been rightly charged with a 
 profusion of double-epithets, and a general turgid- 
 ness. I have pruned the double-epithets with no 
 sparing hand ; and used my best efforts to tame 
 the swell and glitter both of thought and diction. 1 
 This latter fault however bad insinuated itself into 
 my Religious Musings with such intricacy of 
 union, that sometimes I have omitted to disen- 
 
 1 Without any feeling of anger, I may yet be allowed to 
 express some degree of surprise, that after having run the 
 critical gauntlet for a certain class of faults, which I had, 
 viz. a too ornate, and elaborately poetic diction, and nothino- 
 having come before the judgment-seat of the Reviewers 
 during the long interval, I should for at least seventeen 
 years, quarter after quarter, have been placed by them in 
 the foremost rank of the proscribed, and made to abide the 
 brunt of abuse and ridicule for faults directly opposite, viz. 
 bald and prosaic language, and an affected simplicity both 
 of matter and manner — faults which assuredly did not enter 
 into the character of my compositions. 
 
 Literary Life, i. 51. Published 1817. 
 
PREFACE. iX 
 
 tangle the weed from the fear of snapping the 
 flower. A third and heavier accusation has been 
 brought against me, that of obscurity ; but not, I 
 think, with equal justice. An author is obscure, 
 when his conceptions are dim and imperfect, and 
 his language incorrect, or inappropriate, or in- 
 volved. A poem that abounds in allusions, like 
 the Bard of Gray, or one that impersonates high 
 and abstract truths, like Collins's Ode on the po- 
 etical character, claims not to be popular — but 
 should be acquitted of obscurity. The deficiency 
 is in the reader. But this is a charge which 
 every poet, whose imagination is warm and rapid, 
 must expect from his contemporaries. Milton did 
 not escape it ; and it was adduced with virulence 
 against Gray and Collins. We now hear no more 
 of it: not that their poems are better understood 
 at present, than they were at their first publica- 
 tion ; but their fame is established ; and a critic 
 would accuse himself of frigidity or inattention, 
 who should profess not to understand them. But 
 a living writer is yet sub judice ; and if we can- 
 not follow his conceptions or enter into his feel- 
 ings, it is more consoling to our pride to consider 
 him as lost beneath, than as soaring above us. If 
 any man expect from my poems the same easiness 
 of style which he admires in a drinking-song, for 
 
X PREFACE. 
 
 him I have not written. Intelligibilia, non in- 
 tellectum adfero. 
 
 I expect neither profit nor general fame by my 
 writings ; and I consider myself as having been 
 amply repaid without either. Poetry has been to 
 me its own " exceeding great reward :" it has 
 soothed my afflictions ; it has multiplied and re- 
 fined my enjoyments ; it has endeared solitude ; 
 and it has given me the habit of wishing to dis- 
 cover the Good and the Beautiful in all that meets 
 and surrounds me. 
 
 S. T. C. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 VOLUME I. 
 
 Juvenile Poems. Page 
 
 Genevieve 3 
 
 Sonnet. To the Autumnal Moon 3 
 
 Anthem for the Children of Christ's Hospital 4 
 
 Time, real and imaginary 5 
 
 Monody on the Death of Chatterton 6 
 
 Songs of the Pixies 13 
 
 The Raven 18 
 
 Music 20 
 
 Devonshire Roads 21 
 
 Inside the Coach 22 
 
 Mathematical Prohlem .. 23 
 
 The Nose 27 
 
 Monody on a Tea-kettle S9 
 
 Absence, a Farewell Ode 30 
 
 .Sonnet. On Leaving School 31 
 
 To the Muse 32 
 
 With Fielding's Amelia 33 
 
 Sonnet. On hearing that his Sister's Death was 
 
 inevitable S3 
 
 On Seeing a Youth affectionately welcomed by a 
 
 Sister 34 
 
 The same 35 
 
 Pain 35 
 
 Life 36 
 
 Lines on an Autumnal Evening 36 
 
 The Rose 40 
 
 The Kiss 41 
 
 To a Young Ass 43 
 
 Happiness » > 44 
 
 Domestic Peace 48 
 
 TheSig-h 48 
 
Xll CONTENTS. 
 
 Juvenile Poems. age 
 
 Epitaph on an Infant 4 ^ 
 
 On Imitation *0 
 
 Honor *>0 
 
 Progress of Vice 53 
 
 Lines written at the King's Arms, Ross 54 
 
 Destruction of the Bastile 55 
 
 Lines to a beautiful Spring in a Village 57 
 
 On a Friend who died of a Frenzy Fever induced 
 
 by calumnious reports 58 
 
 To a Young Lady, with a Poem on the French 
 
 Revolution 60 
 
 Sonnet I. " My Heart has thanked thee, Bowles" 62 
 II. " As late I lay in Slumber's Shadowy 
 
 Vale" 63 
 
 III. " Though roused by that dark vizir 
 
 Riot rude 64 
 
 IV. " When British Freedom from a 
 
 happier land" 64 
 
 V. " It was some Spirit, Sheridan !" 65 
 
 VI. " what a loud and fearful shriek'' 66 
 
 VII. " As when far off" 66 
 
 — VIII. "Thou gentle look" 67 
 
 IX. " Pale Roamer through the Night !" 68 
 
 X. " Sweet Mercy I" 68 
 
 XI. " Thou Bleedest, my Poor Heart" ... 69 
 
 . XII. To the Author of the Robbers 70 
 
 Lines, composed while climbing Brockley Coomb 70 
 
 Lines in the Manner of Spenser 71 
 
 Imitated from Ossian 73 
 
 The Complaint of Ninathoma 74 
 
 Imitated from the Welsh 75 
 
 To an Infant 75 
 
 Lines in Answer to a Letter from Bristol 76 
 
 To a Friend in Answer to a melancholy Letter... 80 
 
 Religious Musings 82 
 
 The Destiny of Nations, a Vision 98 
 
CONTENTS. Xlll 
 
 Siuylline Leaves. Page 
 
 Ode to the Departing Year 121 
 
 France, an Ode 128 
 
 Fears in Solitude 132 
 
 Fire, Famine, and Slaughter 141 
 
 Love 145 
 
 The Ballad of the Dark Ladie. A Fragment.... 150 
 
 Lewti, or the Circassian Love Chaunt 152 
 
 The Picture, or the Lover's Resolution 155 
 
 The Night Scene, a Dramatic Fragment 162 
 
 To an Unfortunate Woman 166 
 
 To an Unfortunate Woman at the Theatre 167 
 
 Lines composed in a Concert Room 168 
 
 The Keepsake 170 
 
 To a Lady, with Falconer's Shipwreck 172 
 
 To a Young Lady on her recovery from a Fever 173 
 
 Something Childish, but very Natural 174 
 
 Home-sick: written in Germany 175 
 
 Answer to a Child's Question 176 
 
 A Child's Evening Prayer 176 
 
 The Visionary Hope 177 
 
 The Happy Husband 178 
 
 Recollections of Love 179 
 
 On revisiting the Sea-shore 181 
 
 Hymn before Sunrise, in the Vale of Chamouni 183 
 Lines written in the Album at Elbingerode in the 
 
 Hartz Forest 187 
 
 On observing a Blossom on the First of Feb- 
 ruary 189 
 
 The ^Eolian Harp 190 
 
 Reflections on having left a place of Retirement 193 
 
 To the Rev. George Coleridge 196 
 
 Inscription for a Fountain on a Heath 199 
 
 A Tombless Epitaph 200 
 
 This Lime-Tree Bower my Prison 201 
 
 To a Friend, who had declared his intention of 
 
 writing no more Poetry 20o 
 
XIV CONTENTS. 
 
 Sibylline Leaves. Page 
 To William Wordsworth, composed on the night 
 after his recitation of a Poem on the growth 
 
 of an individual mind 206 
 
 The Nightingale 211 
 
 Frost at Midnight 216 
 
 The Three Graves 219 
 
 — Dejection, an Ode 235 
 
 Ode to Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire 241 
 
 Ode to Tranquillity 244 
 
 To a Young Friend, on his proposing to domes- 
 ticate with the Author 246 
 
 Lines to W. L. while he sang a song to Purcell's 
 
 Music 249 
 
 Addressed to a Young Man of Fortune 249 
 
 Sonnet. To the River Otter 250 
 
 Composed on a journey homeward after 
 
 hearing of the birth of a Son 251 
 
 To a Friend 252 
 
 The Virgin's Cradle Hymn 252 
 
 Epitaph on an Infant 253 
 
 Melancholy, a Fragment 253 
 
 Tell's Birth Place 254 
 
 A Christmas Carol 256 
 
 Human Life 258 
 
 Moles 259 
 
 The Visit of the Gods 259 
 
 Elegy, imitated from Akenside 261 
 
 Separation 262 
 
 On taking leave of 263 
 
 The Pang more sharp than all 263 
 
 Kubla Khan 266 
 
 The Pains of Sleep 270 
 
 Limbo 272 
 
 Ne plus ultra 273 
 
 Apologetic Preface to Fire, Famine, and Slaughter 274 
 
JUVENILE POEMS 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
GENEVIEVE. 
 
 Maid of my Love, sweet Genevieve ! 
 
 In Beauty's light you glide along : 
 
 Your eye is like the star of eve, 
 
 And sweet your Voice, as Seraph's song. 
 
 Yet not your heavenly Beauty gives 
 
 This heart with passion soft to glow : 
 
 Within your soul a Voice there lives I 
 
 It bids you hear the tale of Woe. 
 
 When sinking low the Sufferer wan 
 
 Beholds no hand outstretcht to save, 
 
 Fair, as the bosom of the Swan 
 
 That rises graceful o'er the wave, 
 
 I've seen your breast with pity heave,. 
 
 And therefore love I you, sweet Genevieve ! 
 
 SONNET. 
 
 TO THE AUTUMNAL MOON. 
 
 Mild Splendour of the various-vested Night ! 
 Mother of wildly- working visions ! hail ! 
 I watch thy gliding, while with watery light 
 Thy weak eye glimmers through a fleecy veil ; 
 
4 JUVENILE POEMS 
 
 And when thou lovest thy pale orb to shroud 
 Behind the gathered blackness lost on high ; 
 And when thou dartest from the wind-rent cloud 
 Thy placid lightning o'er the awakened sky. 
 Ah such is Hope ! as changeful and as fair ! 
 Now dimly peering on the wistful sight ; 
 Now hid behind the dragon-winged Despair : 
 But soon emerging in her radiant might 
 She o'er the sorrow-clouded breast of Care 
 Sails, like a meteor kindling in its flight. 
 
 ANTHEM 
 FOR THE CHILDREN OF CHRIST'S HOSPITAL. 
 
 Seraphs ! around th' Eternal's seat who throng 
 
 With tuneful extacies of praise : 
 O ! teach our feeble tongues like yours the song 
 
 Of fervent gratitude to raise — 
 Like you, inspir'd with holy flame 
 To dwell on that Almighty name 
 Who bade the child of woe no longer sisrh. 
 And Joy in tears o'erspread the Widow's eye. 
 
 Th' all-gracious Parent hears the wretch's 
 prayer ; 
 
 The meek tear strongly pleads on high ; 
 Wan Resignation struggling with despair 
 
 The Lord beholds with pitying eye ; 
 Sees cheerless want unpitied pine, 
 Disease an earth its head recline, 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. O 
 
 And bids compassion seek the realms of woe 
 To heal the wounded, and to raise the low. 
 
 She comes ! she comes ! the meek ey'd power 
 I see 
 With liberal hand that loves to bless ; 
 The clouds of sorrow at her presence flee ; 
 
 Rejoice ! rejoice '. ye children of distress ! 
 The beams that play around her head 
 Thro' want's dark vale their radiance spread : 
 The young uncultur'd mind imbibes the ray, 
 And vice reluctant quits th' expected prey. 
 
 Cease, thou lorn mother ! cease thy wailings 
 drear ; 
 Ye babes ! the unconscious sob forego ; 
 Or let full gratitude now prompt the tear 
 
 Which erst did sorrow force to flow. 
 Unkindly cold and tempest shrill 
 In life's morn oft the traveller chill, 
 But soon his path the sun of Love shall warm ; 
 And each glad scene look brighter for the storm ! 
 
 1789. 
 
 TIME, REAL AND IMAGINARY. 
 
 AN ALLEGORY. 
 
 On the wide level of a mountain's head, 
 (I knew not where, but 'twas some faery place) 
 Their pinions, ostrich-like, for sails outspread, 
 Two lovely children run an endless race, 
 
6 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 A sister and a brother ! 
 That far outstripp'd the other ; 
 Yet ever runs she with reverted face, 
 And looks and listens for the boy behind : 
 For he, alas ! is blind ! 
 O'er rough and smooth with even step he passed, 
 And knows not whether he be first or last. 
 
 MONODY ON THE DEATH OF CHATTERTOT*. 
 
 O what a wonder seems the fear of death, 
 Seeing how gladly we all sink to sleep, 
 Babes, Children, Youths, and Men, 
 Night following night for threescore years and ten ! 
 But doubly strange, where life is but a breath 
 To sigh and pant with, up Want's rugged steep. 
 
 Away, Grim Phantom ! Scorpion King, away ! 
 Reserve thy terrors and thy stings display 
 For coward Wealth and Guilt in robes of State ! 
 Lo ! by the grave I stand of one, for whom 
 A prodigal Nature and a niggard Doom 
 (That all bestowing, this withholding all,) 
 Made each chance knell from distant spire or dome 
 Sound like a seeking Mother's anxious call, 
 Return, poor Child ! Home, weary Truant, home ! 
 
 Thee, Chatterton ! these unblest stones protect 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 7 
 
 From want, and the bleak freezings of neglect. 
 Too long before the vexing Storm-blast driven 
 Here hast thou found repose ! beneath this sod ! 
 Thou ! O vain word ! thou dwell'st not with the clod ! 
 Amid the shining Host of the Forgiven 
 Thou at the throne of Mercy and thy God 
 The triumph of redeeming Love dost hymn 
 (Believe it, O my Soul !) to harps of Seraphim. 
 
 Yet oft, perforce, ('tis suffering Nature's call) 
 I weep, that heaven-born Genius so should fall ; 
 And oft, in Fancy's saddest hour, my soul 
 Averted shudders at the poisoned bowl. 
 Now groans my sickening heart, as still I view 
 
 Thy corse of livid hue ; 
 Now indignation checks the feeble sigh, [eye ! 
 Or flashes through the tear that glistens in mine 
 
 Is this the land of song-ennobled line ? 
 
 Is this the land, where Genius ne'er in vain 
 
 Poured forth his lofty strain ? 
 Ah me ! yet Spenser, gentlest bard divine, 
 Beneath chill Disappointment's shade, 
 His weary limbs in lonely anguish laid ; 
 
 And o'er her darling dead 
 
 Pity hopeless hung her head, 
 While " mid the pelting of that merciless storm," 
 Sunk to the cold earth Otway's famished form ! 
 
 Sublime of thought, and confident of fame, 
 
8 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 From vales where Avon winds the Minstrel 1 came. 
 Light-hearted youth ! aye, as he hastes along, 
 He meditates the future song, 
 
 How dauntless jElla fray'd the Dacyan foe ; 
 And while the numbers flowing strong 
 In eddies whirl, in surges throng, 
 
 Exulting in the spirits' genial throe 
 
 In tides of power his life-blood seems to flow. 
 
 And now his cheeks with deeper ardors flame, 
 His eyes have glorious meanings, that declare 
 More than the light of outward day shines there, 
 A holier triumph and a sterner aim ! 
 Wings grow within him ; and he soars above 
 Or Bard's or Minstrel's lay of war or love. 
 Friend to the friendless, to the Sufferer health, 
 He hears the widow's prayer, the good man's 
 
 praise ; 
 To scenes of bliss transmutes his fancied wealth, 
 And young - and old shall now see happy days. 
 On many a waste he bids trim Gardens rise, 
 Gives the blue sky to many a prisoner's eyes ; 
 And now in wrath he grasps the patriot steel, 
 And her own iron rod he makes Oppression feel. 
 
 Sweet Flower of Hope ! free Nature's genial child ! 
 That didst so fair disclose thy early bloom, 
 Filling the wide air with a rich perfume ! 
 For thee in vain all heavenly aspects smil'd ; • 
 
 1 Avon, a river near Bristol ; the birth-place of Chatterton. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 9 
 
 From the hard world brief respite could they win — 
 The frost nipp'd sharp without, the canker prey'd 
 
 within ! 
 Ah ! where are fled the charms of vernal Grace, 
 And Joy's wild gleams that lighten'd o'er thy face I 
 Youth of tumultuous soul, and haggard eye ! 
 Thy wasted form, thy hurried steps I view, 
 On thy wan forehead starts the lethal dew, 
 And oh ! the anguish of that shuddering sigh ! 
 
 Such were the struggles of the gloomy hour, 
 
 When Care, of withered brow, 
 Prepared the poison's death-cold power : 
 Already to thy lips was raised the bowl, 
 When near thee stood Affection meek 
 (Her bosom bare, and wildly pale her cheek) 
 Thy sullen gaze she bade thee roll 
 On scenes that well might melt thy soul ; 
 Thy native cot she flashed upon thy view, 
 Thy native cot, where still, at close of day, 
 Peace smiling sate, and listened to thy lay ; 
 Thy Sister's shrieks she bade thee hear, 
 And mark thy mother's thrilling tear ; 
 
 See, see her breast's convulsive throe, 
 Her silent agony of woe ! 
 Ah ! dash the poisoned chalice from thy hand ! 
 
 And thou had'st dashed it, at her soft command, 
 But that Despair and Indignation rose, 
 And told again the story of thy woes ; 
 
10 
 
 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Told the keen insult of the unfeeling 1 heart ; 
 The dread dependence on the low-born mind ; 
 Told every pang, with which thy soul must smart, 
 Neglect, and grinning Scorn, and Want combined ! 
 Recoiling quick, thou bad'st the friend of pain 
 Roll the black tide of Death through every freez-*- 
 ing vein ! 
 
 O Spirit blest ! 
 Whether the Eternal's throne around, 
 Amidst the blaze of Seraphim, 
 Thou pourest forth the grateful hymn ; 
 Or soaring thro' the blest domain 
 Enrapturest Angels with thy strain, — 
 Grant me, like thee, the lyre to sound, 
 Like thee with fire divine to glow ; — 
 But ah ! when rage the waves of woe, 
 Grant me with firmer breast to meet their hate, 
 And soar beyond the storm with upright eye elate ! 
 
 Ye woods ! that wave o'er Avon's rocky steep, 
 To Fancy's ear sweet is your murmuring deep ! 
 For here she loves the cypress wreath to weave 
 Watching, with wistful eye, the saddening tints of 
 
 eve. 
 Here, far from men, amid this pathless grove, 
 In solemn thought the Minstrel wont to rove 
 Like star-beam on the slow sequestered tide 
 Lone-glittering, through the high tree branching 
 
 wide. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 1 1 
 
 And here, in Inspiration's eager hour, 
 When most the big soul feels the mastering power, 
 These wilds, these caverns roaming o'er, 
 Round which the screaming sea-gulls soar, 
 With wild unequal steps he passed along, 
 Oft pouring on the winds a broken song : 
 Anon, upon some rough rock's fearful brow 
 Would pause abrupt — and gaze upon the waves 
 below. 
 
 Poor Chatterton ! he sorrows for thy fate 
 Who would have praised and loved thee, ere too late. 
 Poor Chatterton ! farewell ! of darkest hues 
 This chaplet cast I on thy unshaped tomb ; 
 But dare no longer on the sad theme muse, 
 Lest kindred woes persuade a kindred doom : 
 For oh ! big gall-drops, shook from Folly's wing, 
 Have blackened the fair promise of my spring ; 
 And the stern Fate transpierced with viewless dart 
 The last pale Hope that shivered at my heart ! 
 
 Hence, gloomy thoughts ! no more my soul shall 
 
 dwell 
 On joys that were ! No more endure to weigh 
 The shame and anguish of the evil day, 
 Wisely forgetful ! O'er the ocean swell 
 Sublime of Hope I seek the cottaged dell 
 Where Virtue calm with careless step may stray; 
 And, dancing to the moon-light roundelay, 
 The wizard passions weave a holy spell ! 
 
12 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 O Chatterton ! that thou wert yet alive ! 
 Sure thou would'st spread the canvass to the gale, 
 And love with us the tinkling team to drive 
 O'er peaceful Freedom's undivided dale ; 
 And we, at sober eve, would round thee throng, 
 Would hang, enraptured, on thy stately song, 
 And greet with smiles the young-eyed Poesy 
 All deftly masked, as hoar Antiquity. 
 Alas, vain Phantasies ! the fleeting brood 
 Of Woe self-solaced in her dreamy mood ! 
 Yet will I love to follow the sweet dream, 
 Where Susquehana pours his untamed stream ; 
 And on some hill, whose forest- frowning side 
 Waves o'er the murmurs of his calmer tide, 
 Will raise a solemn Cenotaph to thee, 
 Sweet Harper of time-shrouded Minstrelsy ! 
 And there, soothed sadly by the dirgeful wind, 
 Muse on the sore ills I had left behind. 
 
r 
 
 JUVENILE POEMS. 13 
 
 SONGS OF THE PIXIES. 
 
 The Pixies, in the superstition of Devonshire, are a race 
 of being's invisibly small, and harmless or friendly to man. 
 At a small distance from a village in that county, half way 
 up a wood-covered hill, is an excavation called the Pixies' 
 Parlour. The roots of old trees form its ceiling ; and on 
 its sides are innumerable cyphers, among which the author 
 discovered his own and those of his brothers, cut by the 
 hand of their childhood. At the foot of the hill flows the 
 river Otter. 
 
 To this place the Author, during the Summer months of 
 the year 1 793, conducted a party of young ladies ; one of 
 whom, of stature elegantly small, and of complexion 
 colourless yet clear, was proclaimed the Faery Queen. On 
 which occasion the following Irregular Ode was written. 
 
 I. 
 
 Whom the untaught Shepherds call 
 
 Pixies in their madrigal, 
 Fancy's children, here we dwell : 
 
 Welcome, Ladies ! to our cell. 
 Here the wren of softest note 
 
 Builds its nest and warbles well; 
 Here the blackbird strains his throat ; 
 
 Welcome, Ladies ! to our cell. 
 
 When fades the moon to shadowy-pale, 
 And scuds the cloud before the gale, 
 Ere the Morn, all gem-bedight, 
 
I 
 
 1 4 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Hath streak'd the East with rosy light, 
 We sip the furze-flower's fragrant dews 
 Clad in robes of rainbow hues : 
 Or sport amid the shooting gleams 
 To the tune of distant-tinkling teams, 
 While lusty Labour scouting sorrow 
 Bids the Dame a glad good-morrow, 
 Who jogs the accustomed road along, 
 And paces cheery to her cheering song. 
 
 But not our filmy pinion 
 We scorch amid the blaze of day, 
 When Noontide's fiery-tressed minion 
 Flashes the fervid ray. 
 Aye from the sultry heat 
 We to the cave retreat 
 O'ercanopied by huge roots intertwined 
 With wildest texture, blackened o'er with age : 
 Round them their mantle green the ivies bind, 
 Beneath whose foliage pale 
 Fanned by the unfrequent gale 
 We shield us from the Tyrant's mid-day rage. 
 
 Thither, while the murmuring throng 
 Of wild-bees hum their drowsy song, 
 By Indolence and Fancy brought, 
 A youthful Bard, " unknown to Fame," 
 Wooes the Queen of Solemn Thought, 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 15 
 
 And heaves the gentle misery of a sigh 
 Gazing with tearful eye, 
 As round our sandy grot appear 
 Many a rudely sculptured name 
 To pensive Memory dear ! 
 Weaving gay dreams of sunny-tinctured hue 
 
 We glance before his view : 
 O'er his hush'd soul our soothing witcheries shed 
 And twine the future garland round his head. 
 
 v. 
 
 When Evening's dusky car 
 
 Crowned with her dewy star 
 Steals o'er the fading sky in shadowy flight ; 
 
 On leaves of aspen trees 
 
 We tremble to the breeze 
 Veiled from the grosser ken of mortal sight. 
 
 Or, haply, at the visionary hour, 
 Along our wildly-bowered sequestered walk, 
 We listen to the enamoured rustic's talk ; 
 Heave with the heavings of the maiden's breast, 
 Where young-eyed Loves have hid their turtle nest ; 
 
 Or guide of soul-subduing power 
 The glance, that from the half-confessing eye 
 Darts the fond question or the soft reply. 
 
 Or through the mystic ringlets of the vale 
 We flash our faery feet in gamesome prank ; 
 Or, silent-sandal'd, pay our defter court, 
 
16 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Circling the Spirit of the Western Gale, 
 Where wearied with his flower-caressing sport, 
 Supine he slumbers on a violet bank ; 
 Then with quaint music hymn the parting- gleam 
 By lonely Otter's sleep-persuading stream ; 
 Or where his wave with loud unquiet song 
 Dashed o'er the rocky channel froths along ; 
 Or where, his silver waters smoothed to rest, 
 The tall tree's shadow sleeps upon his breast. 
 
 Hence thou lingerer, Light ! 
 Eve saddens into Night. 
 Mother of wildly- working dreams ! we view 
 The sombre hours, that round thee stand 
 With down-cast eyes (a duteous band) ! 
 Their dark robes dripping with the heavy dew. 
 Sorceress of the ebon throne ! 
 Thy power the Pixies own, 
 When round thy raven brow 
 Heaven's lucent roses glow, 
 And clouds in watery colours drest 
 Float in light drapeiy o'er thy sable vest : 
 What time the pale moon sheds a softer day 
 Mellowing the woods beneath its pensive beam : 
 For mid the quivering light 'tis ours to play, 
 Aye dancing to the cadence of the stream. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Welcome, Ladies ! to the cell 
 Where the blameless Pixies dwell : 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 17 
 
 But thou, sweet Nymph ! proclaimed our Faeiy 
 Queen, 
 With what obeisance meet 
 Thy presence shall we greet ? 
 For lo ! attendant on thy steps are seen 
 Graceful Ease in artless stole, 
 And white-robed Purity of soul, 
 With Honour's softer mien ; 
 Mirth of the loosely-flowing hair, 
 And meek-eyed Pity eloquently fair, 
 
 Whose tearful cheeks are lovely to the view. 
 As snow-drop wet with dew. 
 
 IX. 
 
 Unboastful Maid ! though now the Lily pale 
 
 Transparent grace thy beauties meek ; 
 Yet ere again along the impurpling vale, 
 The purpling vale and elfin-haunted grove, 
 Young Zephyr his fresh flowers profusely throws, 
 
 We'll tinge with livelier hues thy cheek ; 
 And, haply, from the nectar-breathing Rose 
 Extract a Blush for Love ! 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
18 JUVENILE VOEMS. 
 
 THE RAVEN. 
 
 A CHRISTMAS TALE, TOLD BY A SCHOOL-BO Y TO HIS 
 LITTLE BROTHERS AND SISTERS. 
 
 Underneath an old oak tree 
 
 There was of swine a huge company 
 
 That grunted as they crunched the mast : 
 
 For that was ripe, and fell full fast. 
 
 Then they trotted away, for the wind grew high : 
 
 One acorn they left, and no more might you spy. 
 
 Next came a Raven, that liked not such folly : 
 
 He belonged, they did say, to the witch Melancholy ! 
 
 Blacker was he than blackest jet, 
 
 Flew low in the rain, and his feathers not wet. 
 
 He picked up the acorn and buried it straight 
 
 By the side of a river both deep and great. 
 Where then did the Raven go ? 
 He went high and low, 
 
 Over hill, over dale, did the black Raven go. 
 Many Autumns, many Springs 
 Travelled he with wandering wings : 
 Many Summers, many Winters — 
 1 can't tell half his adventures. 
 
 At length he came back, and with him a She, 
 And the acorn was grown to a tall oak tree. 
 They built them a nest in the topmost bough, 
 And young ones they had. and were happy enow 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 19 
 
 But soon came a woodman in leathern guise, 
 His brow, like a pent-house, hung 1 over his eyes. 
 He'd an axe in his hand, not a word he spoke, 
 But with many a hem ! and a sturdy stroke, 
 At length he brought down the poor Raven's own oak . 
 His young ones were killed ; for they could not 
 
 depart, 
 And their mother did die of a broken heart. 
 The boughs from the trunk the woodman did sever ; 
 And they floated it down on the course of the river. 
 They sawed it in planks, and its bark they did strip, 
 And with this tree and others they made a good ship. 
 The ship, it was launched ; but in sight of the land 
 Such a storm there did rise as no ship could withstand . 
 It bulged on a rock^ and the waves rushed in fast : 
 Round and round flew the Raven, and cawed to 
 
 the blast. 
 He heard the last shriek of the perishing souls — 
 See ! See ! o'er the topmast the mad water rolls ! 
 
 Right glad was the Raven, and off he went fleet, 
 And Death riding home on a cloud he did meet, 
 And he thank'd him again and again for this treat: 
 
 They had taken his all, and Revenge it was sweet ! 
 
20 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 MUSIC. 
 
 Hence, soul-dissolving Harmony 
 
 That lead'st th' oblivious soul astray— 
 Though thou sphere descended be — 
 Hence away ! — 
 Thou mightier Goddess, thou demand'st my lay, 
 
 Born when earth was seiz'd with cholic ; 
 Or as more sapient sages say, 
 What time the Legion diabolic 
 
 Compelled their beings to enshrine 
 In bodies vile of herded swine, 
 Precipitate adown the steep 
 With hideous rout were plunging in the deep, 
 And hog and devil mingling grunt and yell 
 
 Seiz'd on the ear with horrible obtrusion ; — 
 Then if aright old legendaries tell, 
 
 Wert tbou begot by Discord on Confusion ! 
 
 What tho' no name's sonorous power 
 Was given thee at thy natal hour ! — 
 Yet oft I feel thy sacred might, 
 While concords wing their distant fligbt. 
 Such power inspires thy holy son 
 Sable clerk of Tiverton. 
 And oft where Otter sports his stream, 
 I hear thy banded offspring scream. 
 Thou Goddess ! thou inspir'st each throat ; 
 'Tis thou who pour'st the scritch owl note ! 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 21 
 
 Transported hear'st thy children all 
 Scrape and blow and squeak and squall, 
 And while old Otter's steeple rings, 
 Clappest hoarse thy raven wings ! 
 
 1790. 
 
 DEVONSHIRE ROADS. 
 
 The indignant Bard compos'd this furious ode, 
 As tir'd he dragg'd his way thro' Plimtree road ! 
 Crusted with filth and stuck in mire 
 Dull sounds the Bard's bemudded lyre ; 
 Nathless Revenge and Ire the Poet goad 
 To pour his imprecations on the road. 
 Curst road ! whose execrable way 
 Was darkly shadow'd out in Milton's lay, 
 When the sad fiends thro' Hell's sulphureous roads 
 Took the first survey of their new abodes ; 
 Or when the fall'n Archangel fierce 
 Dar'd through the realms of Night to pierce, 
 What time the Blood Hound lur'd by Human scent 
 Thro' all Confusion's quagmires floundering went. 
 
 •Nor cheering pipe, nor Bird's shrill note 
 Around thy dreary paths shall float ; 
 Their boding songs shall scritch owls pour 
 To fright the guilty shepherds sore, 
 Led by the wandering fires astray 
 Thro' the dank horrors of thy way ! 
 
22 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 While they their mud-lost sandals hunt 
 May all the curses, which they grunt 
 In raging moan like goaded hog, 
 Alight upon thee, damned Bog ! 
 
 1790. 
 
 INSIDE THE COACH. 
 
 Tis hard on Bagshot Heath to try 
 
 Unclos'd to keep the weary eye ; 
 
 But ah ! Oblivion's nod to get 
 
 In rattling coach is harder yet. 
 Slumbrous God of half shut eye ! 
 
 Who lov'st with Limbs supine to lie ; 
 Soother sweet of toil and care 
 
 Listen, listen to my prayer ; 
 And to thy votary dispense 
 
 Thy soporific influence ! 
 What tho' around thy drowsy head 
 
 The seven-fold cap of night be spread, 
 Yet lift that drowsy head awhile 
 
 And yawn propitiously a smile ; 
 In drizzly rains poppean dews 
 
 O'er the tir'd inmates of the Coach diffuse 
 And when thou'st charm 'd our eyes to rest 
 
 Pillowing the chin upon the breast, 
 Bid many a dream from thy dominions 
 
 Wave its various-painted pinions, 
 Till ere the splendid visions close 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 23 
 
 We snore quartettes in extacy of nose. 
 
 While thus we urge our airy course, 
 
 Oh may no jolt's electric force 
 
 Our fancies from their steeds unhorse, 
 And call us from thy fairy reign 
 To dreary Bagshot Heath again ! 
 
 1790. 
 
 If Pegasus will let thee only ride him, 
 Spurning my clumsy efforts to o'erstride him, 
 Some fresh expedient the Muse will try, 
 And walk on stilts, although she cannot fly. 
 
 DEAR BROTHER, 
 
 I have often been surprised that Mathematics, 
 the quintessence of Truth, should have found 
 admirers so few and so languid. Frequent con- 
 sideration and minute scrutiny have at length un- 
 ravelled the case ; viz. that though Reason is 
 feasted, Imagination is starved ; whilst Reason is 
 luxuriating in its proper Paradise, Imagination is 
 wearily travelling on a dreary desart. To assist 
 Reason by the stimulus of Imagination is the de- 
 sign of the following production. In the execu- 
 tion of it much may be objectionable. The verse 
 (particularly in the introduction of the ode) may 
 be accused of unwarran table liberties, but they 
 are liberties equally homogeneal with the exact- 
 ness of Mathematical disquisition, and the bold- 
 ness of Pindaric daring. I have three strong 
 
24 
 
 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 champions to defend me against the attacks of 
 Criticism ; the Novelty, the Difficulty, and the 
 Utility of the work. I may justly plume myself, 
 that I first have drawn the nymph Mathesis from 
 the visionary caves of abstracted Idea, and caused 
 her to unite with Harmony. The first-born of 
 this Union I now present to you ; with interested 
 motives indeed — as I expect to receive in return 
 the more valuable offspring 1 of your Muse. 
 
 March 31, 1791. Thine ever, 
 
 To the Rev. G. C. Q T P 
 
 This is now — this was erst, 
 Proposition the first — and Problem the first. 
 
 On a given finite line 
 Which must no way incline ; 
 To describe an equi — 
 — lateral Tri — 
 — A, N, G, E, L, E. 
 
 Now let A. B. 
 Be the given line 
 Which must no way incline ; 
 The great Mathematician 
 Makes this Requisition, 
 
 That we describe an Equi — 
 — lateral Tri — 
 — angle on it : 
 Aid us Reason — aid us Wit ! 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 2.5 
 
 From the centre A. at the distance A. B. 
 
 Describe the circle B. C. D. 
 At the distance B. A. from B. the centre 
 The round A. C. E. to describe boldly venture. 
 (Third postulate see.) 
 And from the point C. 
 In which the circles make a potber 
 Cutting and slashing one another, 
 Bid the straight lines a journeying go. 
 C. A. C. B. those lines will show 
 
 To the points, which by A. B . are reckon'd, 
 And postulate the second 
 For Authority ye know. 
 
 A. B. C. 
 Triumphant shall be 
 An Equilateral Triangle, 
 Not Peter Pindar carp, nor Zoilus can wrangle. 
 
 in. 
 
 Because the point A. is the centre 
 
 Of the circular B. CD. 
 And because the point B. is the centre 
 
 Of the circular A. C. E. 
 A. C. to A. B. and B. C. to B. A. 
 Harmoniously equal for ever must stay ; 
 
 Then C. A. and B. C. 
 Both extend the kind hand 
 
 To the basis A. B, 
 
26 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Unambitiously join'd in Equality's Band. 
 But to the same powers, when two powers are equal, 
 My mind forebodes the sequel ; 
 My mind does some celestial impulse teach, 
 
 And equalizes each to each. 
 Thus C. A. with B. C. strikes the same sure al- 
 liance, 
 That C. A. and B. C. had with A. B. before ; 
 And in mutual affiance 
 None attempting to soar 
 
 Above another, 
 The unanimous three 
 C. A. and B. C. and A. B. 
 All are equal, each to his brother, 
 
 Preserving the balance of power so true : 
 Ah ! the like would the proud Autocratix 1 do ! 
 At taxes impending not Britain would tremble, 
 Nor Prussia struggle her fear to dissemble ; 
 Nor the Mah'met-sprung wight 
 The great Mussulman 
 Would stain his Divan 
 With Urine the soft-flowing daughter of Fright. 
 
 But rein your stallion in, too daring Nine ! 
 
 Should Empires bloat the scientific line ? 
 Or with dishevell'd hair all madly do ye run 
 
 For transport that your task is done 1 
 
 1 Empress of Russia. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 27 
 
 For done it is — the cause is tried ! 
 And Proposition, gentle maid, 
 Who soothly ask'd stern Demonstration's aid, 
 Has prov'd her right, and A. B. C. 
 Of Angles three 
 Is shown to be of equal side ; 
 And now our weary steed to rest in fine, 
 Tis raised upon A. B. the straight, the given line. 
 
 THE NOSE 
 
 Ye souls unus'd to lofty verse, 
 
 Who sweep the earth with lowly wing, 
 
 Like sand before the blast disperse — 
 A Nose ! a mighty Nose I sing ! 
 As erst Prometheus stole from heaven the fire 
 
 To animate the wonder of his hand ; 
 Thus with unhallow'd hands, O muse, aspire, 
 
 And from my subject snatch a burning brand ! 
 So like the Nose I sing — my verse shall glow — 
 Like Phlegethon my verse in waves of fire shall flow! 
 
 Light of this once all darksome spot 
 
 Where now their glad course mortals run, 
 First-born of Sirius begot 
 Upon the focus of the sun — 
 
 I'll call thee ! for such thy earthly name — 
 
 What name so high, but what too low must be? 
 
28 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Comets, when most they drink the solar flame 
 
 Are but faint types and images of thee ! 
 Burn madly Fire ! o'er earth in ravage run, 
 
 Then blush for shame more red by fiercer 
 
 outdone ! 
 
 I saw when from the turtle feast 
 
 The thick dark smoke in volumes rose ! 
 
 I saw the darkness of the mist 
 Encircle thee, O Nose! 
 Shorn of thy rays thou shott'st a fearful gleam 
 
 (The turtle quiver'd with prophetic fright) 
 Gloomy and sullen thro' the night of steam : — 
 
 So Satan's Nose when Dunstan urg'd to flight, 
 Glowing from gripe of red hot pincers dread 
 Athwart the smokes of H ell disastrous twilight shed ! 
 
 The furies to madness my brain devote — 
 
 In robes of ice my body wrap ! 
 On billowy flames of fire I float, 
 
 Hear ye, my entrails how they snap ? 
 Some power unseen forbids my lungs to breathe ! 
 What fire-clad meteors round me whizzing fly! 
 I vitrify thy torrid zone beneath 
 
 Proboscis fierce ! I am calcin'd ! I die ! 
 Thus, like great Pliny, in Vesuvius' fire, 
 
 I perish in the blaze while I the blaze admire. 
 
 1789. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 29 
 
 MONODY ON A TEA-KETTLE. 
 
 O muse who sangest late another's pain, 
 To griefs domestic turn thy coal-black steed ! 
 With slowest steps thy funeral steed must go, 
 Nodding his head in all the pomp of woe : 
 Wide scatter round each dark and deadly weed, 
 And let the melancholy dirge complain, [run) 
 (While Bats shall shriek and Dogs shall howling 
 The tea-kettle is spoilt and Coleridge is undone ! 
 Your cheerful songs, ye unseen crickets cease ! 
 Let songs of grief your alter'd minds engage ! 
 For he who sang responsive to your lay, 
 What time the joyous bubbles 'gan to play, 
 The sooty swain has felt the fire's fierce rage ; — 
 Yes he is gone, and all my woes increase ; 
 I heard the Water issuing from the Wound — 
 No more the Tea shall pour its flagrant steams 
 around ! 
 
 O Goddess best beloved, delightful Tea ! [vine ? 
 
 With thee compar'd what yields the madd'ning 
 
 Sweet power ! who know'st to spread the calm 
 delight, 
 
 And the pure joy prolong to midmost night ! 
 
 Ah ! must I all thy varied sweets resign ? 
 
 Enfolded close in grief thy form I see 
 No more wilt thou extend thy willing arms, 
 Receive the fervent Jove and yield him all thy 
 charm? i 
 
30 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 How sink the mighty low by Fate opprest ! — 
 Perhaps O Kettle ! thou by scornful toe 
 Rude urg'd t' ignoble place with plaintive din, 
 May'st rust obscure midst heaps of vulgar tin ; — 
 As if no joy had ever seiz'd my breast [fly, — 
 When from thy spout the streams did arching 
 As if infus'd thou ne'er hadst known t' inspire 
 All the warm raptures of poetic fire ! 
 But hark ! or do I fancy the glad voice — 
 " What tho' the swain did wondrous charms dis- 
 close — 
 (Not such did Memnon's sister sable drest) 
 Take these bright arms with royal face imprest, 
 A better Kettle shall thy soul rejoice, 
 And with Oblivion's wings o'erspread thy woes !" 
 Thus Fairy Hope can soothe distress and toil ; 
 On empty Trivets she bids fancied Kettles boil ! 
 
 1790. 
 
 ABSENCE. 
 
 A FAREWELL ODE ON QUITTING SCHOOL FOR JESUS 
 COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. 
 
 Where graced with many a classic spoil 
 Cam rolls his reverend stream alono - , 
 I haste to urge the learned toil 
 That sternly chides my love-lorn sono- : 
 Ah me ! too mindful of the days 
 Illumed by Passion's orient rays, 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 31 
 
 When peace, and Cheerfulness, and Health 
 Enriched me with the best of wealth. 
 
 Ah fair Delights ! that o'er my soul 
 On Memory's wing, like shadows fly ! 
 Ah Flowers ! which Joy from Eden stole 
 While Innocence stood smiling by ! — 
 But cease, fond Heart ! this bootless moan : 
 Those Hours on rapid Pinions flown 
 Shall yet return, by Absence crowned, 
 And scatter livelier roses round. 
 The Sun who ne'er remits his fires 
 On heedless eyes may pour the day : 
 The Moon, that oft from Heaven retires, 
 Endears her renovated ray. 
 What though she leave the sky unblest 
 To mourn awhile in murky vest ? 
 When she relumes her lovely Light, 
 We bless the Wanderer of the Night/ 
 
 SONNET. 
 
 ON THE SAME. 
 
 Farewell parental scenes ! a sad farewell ! 
 To you my grateful heart still fondly clings, 
 Tho' fluttering round on Fancy's burnish'd wings 
 Her tales of future Joy Hope loves to tell. 
 Adieu, adieu ! ye much lov'd cloisters pale ! 
 
32 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Ah ! would those happy days return again, 
 When 'neath your arches, free from every stain, 
 I heard of guilt and wonder'd at the tale ! 
 Dear haunts ! where oft my simple lays I sang, ^ 
 Listening meanwhile the echoings of my feet, 
 Lingering I quit you, with as great a pang, 
 As when ere while, my weeping childhood, torn 
 By early sorrow from my native seat, 
 Mingled its tears with hers — my widow'd Parent 
 lorn. 
 
 TO THE MUSE. 
 
 Tho' no hold flights to thee belong; 
 
 And tho' thy lays with conscious fear, 
 
 Shrink from Judgment's eye severe, 
 
 Yet much I thank thee, Spirit of my song ! 
 
 For, lovely Muse ! thy sweet employ 
 
 Exalts my soul, refines my breast, 
 
 Gives each pure pleasure keener zest, 
 
 And softens sorrow into pensive Joy. 
 
 From thee I learn'd the wish to bless, 
 
 From thee to commune with my heart ; 
 
 From thee, dear Muse ! the gayer part, 
 
 To laugh with Pity at the crowds, that press 
 
 Where Fashion flaunts her robes by Folly spun, 
 
 Whose hues gay varying wanton in the sun. 
 
 1789. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 33 
 
 WITH FIELDING'S AMELIA. 
 
 Virtues and Woes alike too great for man 
 
 In the soft tale oft claim the useless sigh ; 
 For vain the attempt to realize the plan, 
 
 On folly's wings must imitation fly. 
 With other aim has Fielding here display'd 
 
 Each social duty and each social care ; 
 With just yet vivid coloring portray' d 
 
 What every wife should he, what many are 
 And sure the Parent of a race so sweet 
 With douhle pleasure on the page shall dwell, 
 Each scene with sympathizing breast shall meet> 
 While Reason still with smiles delights to tell 
 Maternal hope, that her lov'd Progeny 
 In all but Sorrows shall Amelias be ! 
 
 ON RECEIVING AN ACCOUNT 
 THAT HIS ONLY SISTER'S DEATH WAS INEVITABLE. 
 
 THEtearwhichmourn'd a brother's fate scarce dry— 
 Pain after pain, and woe succeeding woe- 
 Is my heart destin'd for another blow ? 
 my sweet sister ! and must thou too die ? 
 Ah ! how has Disappointment pour'd the tear 
 O'er infant Hope destroy 'd by early frost ! 
 
 VOL. I. D 
 
34 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 How are ye gone, whom most my soul held dear ! 
 Scarce had I lov'd you, ere I mourn'd you lost ; 
 Say, is this hollow eye — this heartless pain 
 Fated to rove thro' Life's wide cheerless plain — 
 Nor father, brother, sister meets its ken — 
 My woes, my joys unshar'd ! Ah ! long ere then 
 On me thy icy dart, stern Death, be prov'd ; — 
 Better to die, than live and not be lov'd ! 
 
 ON SEEING A YOUTH 
 
 AFFECTIONATELY WELCOMED BY A SISTER. 
 
 I too a sister had ! too cruel Death ! 
 How sad remembrance bids my bosom heave ! 
 Tranquil her soul, as sleeping- Infant's breath ; 
 Meek were her manners as a vernal Eve. 
 Knowledge, that frequent lifts the bloated mind, 
 Gave her the treasure of a lowly breast, 
 And Wit to venom'd Malice oft assign'd, 
 Dwelt in her bosom in a Turtle's nest. 
 Cease, busy Memoiy ! cease to urge the dart ; 
 Nor on my soul her love to me impress ! 
 For oh I mourn in anguish — and my heart 
 Feels the keen pang, th' unutterable distress. 
 Yet wherefore grieve I that her sorrows cease, 
 For Life was misery, and the Grave is Peace ! 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 35 
 
 THE SAME. 
 
 I too a sister had, an only sister; — 
 
 She lov'd me dearly and I doted on her ; 
 
 To her I pour'd forth all my puny sorrows, 
 
 (As a sick patient in a nurse's arms) 
 
 And of the heart those hidden maladies 
 
 That e'en from Friendship's eye will shrink asham'd. 
 
 O '. I have wak'd at midnight and have wept 
 
 Because she was not. 
 
 PAIN. 
 
 Once could the Morn's first beams, the healthful 
 
 breeze, 
 All nature charm, and gay was eveiy hour : — 
 But ah ! not Music's self, nor fragrant bower 
 Can glad the trembling sense of wan disease. 
 Now that the frequent pangs my frame assail, 
 Now that my sleepless eyes are sunk and dim, 
 And seas of pain seem waving through each limb — 
 Ah what can all Life's gilded scenes avail? 
 I view the crowd, whom youth and health inspire, 
 Hear the loud laugh, and catch the sportive lay, 
 Then sigh and think — I too could laugh and play 
 And gaily sport it on the Muse's lyre, 
 Ere Tyrant Pain had chas'd away delight, 
 Ere the wild pulse throbb'd anguish thro' the night ' 
 
36 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 LIFE. 
 
 As late I journied o'er the extensive plain 
 Where native Otter sports his scanty stream, 
 
 Musing in torpid woe a sister's pain, 
 
 The glorious prospect woke me from the dream. 
 
 At every step it widen'd to my sight, 
 
 Wood, Meadow, verdant Hill, and dreary Steep. 
 Following in quick succession of delight, 
 
 Till all — at once — did my eye ravish'd sweep ! 
 
 May this (I cried) my course through Life portray ! 
 New scenes of wisdom may each step display, 
 
 And knowledge open as my days advance ! 
 Till what time Death shall pour the undarken'd ray, 
 
 My eye shall dart thro' infinite expanse, 
 And thought suspended lie in rapture's blissful 
 Trance. 
 
 LINES ON AN AUTUMNAL EVENING. 
 
 O thou wild Fancy, check thy wing 1 No more 
 Those thin white flakes, those purple clouds explore ! 
 Nor there with happy spirits speed thy flight 
 Bathed in rich amber-glowing floods of light ; 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 37 
 
 Nor in yon gleam, where slow descends the day, 
 With western peasants hail the morning' ray ! 
 Ah ! rather bid the perished pleasures move, 
 A shadowy train, across the soul of Love ! 
 O'er Disappointment's wintry desert fling 
 Each flower that wreathed the dewy locks of Spring, 
 When blushing, like a bride, from Hope's trim bower 
 She leapt, awakened by the pattering shower. 
 Now sheds the sinking Sun a deeper gleam, 
 Aid, lovely Sorceress ! aid thy Poet's dream ! 
 With faery wand O bid the Maid arise, 
 Chaste Joyance dancing in her bright-blue eyes ; 
 As erst when from the Muses' calm abode 
 I came, with Learning's meed not unbestowed ; 
 When as she twined a laurel round my brow, 
 And met my kiss, and half returned my vow, 
 O'er all my frame shot rapid my thrilled heart, 
 And every nerve confessed the electric dart. 
 
 dear Deceit ! I see the Maiden rise, 
 
 Chaste Joyance dancing in her bright-blue eyes ! 
 When first the lark high soaring swells his throat, 
 ' Mocks the tired eye, and scatters the loud note, 
 
 1 trace her footsteps on the accustomed lawn, 
 I mark her glancing mid the gleam of dawn. 
 When the bent flower beneath the night dew weeps 
 And on the lake the silver lustre sleeps, 
 
 Amid the paly radiance soft and sad, 
 
 She meets my lonely path in moon-beams clad. 
 
 With her along the streamlet's brink I rove ; 
 
38 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 With her I list the warblirigs of the grove ; 
 And seems in each low wind her voice to float, 
 Lone whispering Pity in each soothing note ! 
 
 Spirits of Love ! ye heard her name ! Obey 
 The powerful spell, and to my haunt repair. 
 Whether on clustering pinions ye are there, 
 Where rich snows blossom on the Myrtle trees, 
 Or with fond languishment around my fair 
 Sigh in the loose luxuriance of her hair ; 
 O heed the spell, and hither wing your way, 
 Like far-off music, voyaging the breeze! 
 
 Spirits ! to you the infant Maid was given 
 Formed by the wonderous Alchemy of Heaven ! 
 No fairer Maid does Love's wide empire know, 
 No fairer Maid e'er heaved the bosom's snow. 
 A thousand Loves around her forehead fly ; 
 A thousand Loves sit melting in her eye ; 
 Love lights her smile— in Joy's red nectar dips 
 His myrtle flower, and plants it on her lips. 
 She speaks ! and hark that passion- warbled song — 
 Still, Fancy! still that voice, those notes prolong. 
 As sweet as when that voice with rapturous falls 
 Shall wake the softened echoes of Heaven's Halls! 
 
 O (have I sighed) were mine the wizard's rod, 
 Or mine the power of Proteus, changeful God ! 
 A flower-entangled Arbour I would seem 
 To shield my Love from Noontide's sultry beam : 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 39 
 
 Or bloom a Myrtle, from whose odorous boughs 
 My Love might weave gay garlands for her brows. 
 When Twilight stole across the fading vale, 
 To fan my Love I'd be the Evening Gale ; 
 Mourn in the soft folds of her swelling vest, 
 And flutter my faint pinions on her breast ! 
 On Seraph wing I'd float a Dream by night, 
 To soothe my Love with shadows of delight : — 
 Or soar aloft to be the Spangled Skies, 
 And gaze upon her with a thousand eyes ! 
 
 As when the savage, who his drowsy frame 
 Had basked beneath the Sun's unclouded flame, 
 Awakes amid the troubles of the air, 
 The skiey deluge, and white lightning's glare — 
 Aghast he scours before the tempest's sweep, 
 And sad recalls the sunny hour of sleep : — 
 So tossed by storms along Life's wildering way, 
 Mine eye reverted views that cloudless day, 
 When by my native brook I wont to rove, 
 While Hope with kisses nursed the Infant Love. 
 
 Dear native brook ! like Peace, so placidly 
 Smoothing through fertile fields thy current meek ! 
 Dear native brook ! where first young Poesy 
 Stared wildly-eager in her noontide dream ! 
 Where blameless pleasures dimple Quiet's cheek, 
 As water-lilies ripple thy slow stream ! 
 Dear native haunts ! where Virtue still is gay, 
 Where Friendship's fix'd star sheds a mellowed ray, 
 
40 
 
 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Where Love a crown of thornless Roses wears, 
 Where softened Sorrow smiles within her tears ; 
 And Memory, with a Vestal's chaste employ, 
 Unceasing feeds the lambent flame of joy ! 
 No more your sky-larks melting from the sight 
 Shall thrill the attuned heart-string with delight- 
 No more shall deck your pensive Pleasures sweet 
 With wreaths of sober hue my evening seat. 
 Yet dear to Fancy's eye your varied scene 
 Of wood, hill, dale, and sparkling brook between ! 
 Yet sweet to Fancy's ear the warbled song, 
 That soars on Morning's wing your vales among. 
 
 Scenes of my Hope ! the aching eye ye leave 
 Like yon bright hues that paint the clouds of eve ! 
 Tearful and saddening with the saddened blaze 
 Mine eye the gleam pursues with wistful gaze : 
 Sees shades on shades with deeper tint impend, 
 Till chill and damp the moonless night descend. 
 
 THE ROSE. 
 
 As late each flower that sweetest blows 
 I plucked, the Garden's pride ! 
 Within the petals of a Rose 
 A sleeping Love I spied. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 41 
 
 Around his brows a beamy wreath 
 Of many a lucent hue ; 
 All purple glowed his cheek, beneath, 
 Inebriate with dew. 
 
 I softly seized the unguarded Power, 
 Nor scared his balmy rest : 
 And placed him, caged within the flower, 
 On spotless Sara's breast. 
 
 But when unweeting of the guile 
 Awoke the prisoner sweet, 
 He struggled to escape awhile 
 And stamped his faery feet. 
 
 Ah ! soon the soul-entrancing sight 
 
 Subdued the impatient boy ! 
 
 He gazed ! he thrilled with deep delight '. 
 
 Then clapped his wings for joy. 
 
 " And O !" he cried — " of magic kind 
 
 What charms this Throne endear ! 
 
 Some other Love let Venus find — 
 
 I'll fix my empire here." 
 
 THE KISS. 
 
 One kiss, dear maid ! I said and sighed — 
 Your scorn the little boon denied. 
 Ah why refuse the blameless bliss ? 
 Can danger lurk within a kiss ? 
 
42 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Yon viewless Wanderer of the vale, 
 The Spirit of the Western Gale, 
 At Morning's break, at Evening's close 
 Inhales the sweetness of the R,ose, 
 And hovers o'er the uninjured Bloom 
 Sighing back the soft perfume. 
 Vigour to the Zephyr's wing 
 Her nectar-breathing- Kisses fling ; 
 And He the glitter of the Dew 
 . Scatters on the Rose's hue. 
 Bashful lo ! she bends her head, 
 And darts a blush of deeper Red ! 
 
 Too well those lovely lips disclose 
 The triumphs of the opening Rose ; 
 O fair ! O graceful ! bid them prove 
 As passive to the breath of Love. 
 In tender accents, faint and low, 
 Well-pleased I hear the whispered "No!" 
 The whispered " No" — how little meant ! 
 Sweet Falsehood that endears Consent ! 
 For on those lovely lips the while 
 Dawns the soft relenting smile, 
 And tempts with feigned dissuasion coy 
 The gentle violence of Jov. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 43 
 
 TO A YOUNG ASS. 
 
 ITS MOTHER BEING TETHERED NEAR IT. 
 
 Poor little Foal of an oppressed Race ! 
 I love the languid Patience of thy face : 
 And oft with gentle hand I give thee bread, 
 And clap thy ragged Coat, and pat thy head. 
 But what thy dulled Spirits hath dismayed, 
 That never thou dost sport along the glade ? 
 And (most unlike the nature of things young) 
 That earthward still thy moveless head is hung ? 
 Do thy prophetic Fears anticipate, 
 Meek Child of Misery ! thy future fate ? 
 The starving meal, and all the thousand aches 
 " Which patient Merit of the Unworthy takes ?" 
 Or is thy sad heart thrilled with filial pain 
 To see thy wretched Mother's shortened Chain ? 
 And, truly very piteous is her Lot — 
 Chained to a Log within a narrow spot, 
 Where the close-eaten Grass is scarcely seen, 
 While sweet around her waves the tempting Green .' 
 Poor Ass ! thy master should have learnt to show 
 Pity — best taught by fellowship of Woe ! 
 For much I fear me that He lives like thee, 
 Half famished in a land of Luxury ! 
 How askingly its footsteps hither bend, 
 it seems to say, "And have I then one Friend?" 
 Innocent Foal ! thou poor despised Forlorn ! 
 
44 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 I hail thee Brother — spite of the fool's scorn ! 
 And fain would take thee with me, in the Dell 
 Of Peace and mild Equality to dwell, 
 Where Toil shall call the charmer Health his 
 
 bride, 
 And Laughter tickle Plenty's ribless side ! 
 How thou wouldst toss thy heels in gamesome play, 
 And frisk about, as lamb or kitten gay ! 
 Yea ! and more musically sweet to me 
 Thy dissonant harsh bray of joy would be, 
 Than warbled melodies that soothe to rest 
 The aching of pale Fashion's vacant breast ! 
 
 HAPPINESS. 
 
 On wide, or narrow scale shall Man 
 Most happily describe life's plan ? 
 Say, shall he bloom and wither there, 
 Where first his infant buds appear ; 
 Or upwards dart with soaring force, 
 And tempt some more ambitious course ? 
 
 Obedient now to Hope's command, 
 I bid each humble wish expand, 
 And fair and bright Life's prospects seem, 
 While Hope displays her cheering beam, 
 And Fancy's vivid colorings stream, 
 While Emulation stands me nigh 
 The Goddess of the eager eye. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 45 
 
 With foot advanc'd and anxious heart 
 Now for the fancied goal I start : — 
 Ah ! why will Reason intervene 
 Me and my promised joys between ! 
 She stops my course, she chains my speed, 
 While thus her forceful words proceed. 
 " Ah ! listen, youth, ere yet too late, 
 What evils on thy course may wait ! 
 To bow the head, to bend the knee 
 A minion of Servility, 
 At low Pride's frequent frowns to sigh, 
 And watch the glance in Folly's eye ; 
 To toil intense, yet toil in vain, 
 And feel with what a hollow pain 
 Pale Disappointment hangs her head 
 O'er darling Expectation dead ! 
 
 " The scene is changed and Fortune's gale 
 Shall belly out each prosperous sail. 
 Yet sudden wealth full well I know 
 Did never Happiness bestow. 
 That wealth, to which we were not born 
 Dooms us to sorrow or to scorn. 
 Behold yon flock which long had trod 
 O'er the short grass of Devon's sod, 
 To Lincoln's rank rich meads transferr'd, 
 And in their fate thy own be fear'd ; 
 Through every limb contagions fly, 
 Deform 'd and chok'd they burst and die. 
 
 " When Luxury opens wide her arms, 
 And smiling wooes thee to those charms, 
 
40 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Whose fascination thousands own, 
 Shall thy brows wear the stoic frown ? 
 And when her goblet she extends 
 Which madd'ning myriads press around, 
 What power divine thy soul befriends 
 That thou shouldst dash it to the ground ? — 
 No, thou shalt drink, and thou shalt know 
 Her transient bliss, her lasting woe, 
 Her maniac joys, that know no measure, 
 And riot rude and painted pleasure ; — 
 Till (sad reverse !) the Enchantress vile 
 To frowns converts her magic smile ; 
 Her train impatient to destroy, 
 Observe her frown with gloomy joy ; 
 On thee with harpy fangs they seize 
 The hideous offspring of Disease, 
 Swoll'n Dropsy ignorant of Rest, 
 And Fever garb'd in scarlet vest, 
 Consumption driving the quick hearse, 
 And Gout that howls the frequent curse, 
 With Apoplex of heavy head 
 That surely aims his dart of lead. 
 
 " But say, Life's joys unmix'd were given 
 To thee some favorite of Heaven : 
 Within, without, tho' all were health — 
 Yet what e'en thus are Fame, Power, Wealth, 
 But sounds that variously express, 
 What's thine already— Happiness ! 
 'Tis thine the converse deep to hold 
 With all the famous sons of old ; 
 And thine the happy waking dream 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 47 
 
 While Hope pursues some favorite theme, 
 As oft when Night o'er Heaven is spread, 
 Round this maternal seat you tread, 
 Where far from splendour, far from riot, 
 In silence wrapt sleeps careless quiet. 
 Tis thine with fancy oft to talk, 
 And thine the peaceful evening walk ; 
 And what to thee the sweetest are — 
 The setting sun, the evening star — 
 The tints, which live along the sky, 
 And Moon that meets thy raptur'd eye, 
 Where oft the tear shall grateful start, 
 Dear silent pleasures of the Heart ! 
 Ah ! Being blest, for Heaven shall lend 
 To share thy simple joys a friend ! 
 Ah ! doubly blest, if Love supply 
 His influence to complete thy joy, 
 If chance some lovely maid thou find 
 To read thy visage in thy mind. 
 
 " One blessing more demands thy care : — 
 Once more to Heaven address the prayer : 
 For humble independence pray 
 The guardian genius of thy way ; 
 Whom (sages say) in days of yore 
 Meek competence to wisdom bore, 
 So shall thy little vessel glide 
 With a fair breeze adown the tide, 
 And Hope, if e'er thou 'ginst to sorrow 
 Remind thee of some fair to-morrow, 
 Till death shall close thy tranquil eye 
 While Faith proclaims " thou shalt not die !" 
 
48 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 DOMESTIC PEACE. 
 
 Tell me, on what holy ground 
 May Domestic Peace be found — 
 Halcyon Daughter of the skies ! 
 Far on fearful wings she flies, 
 From the pomp of sceptered State, 
 From the Rebel's noisy hate, 
 In a cottaged vale She dwells 
 Listening to the Sabbath bells ! 
 Still around her steps are seen 
 Spotless Honour's meeker mien, 
 Love, the sire of pleasing fears, 
 Sorrow smiling through her tears, 
 And conscious of the past employ 
 Memory, bosom-spring of joy. 
 
 THE SIGH. 
 
 When Youth his faery reign began 
 Ere sorrow had proclaimed me man ; 
 While Peace the present hour beguiled, 
 And all the lovely Prospect smiled ; 
 Then Mary ! 'mid my lightsome glee 
 I heav'd the painless Sigh for thee. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 49 
 
 And when, along the waves of woe, 
 My harassed Heart was doomed to know 
 The frantic burst of Outrage keen, 
 And the slow Pang that gnaws unseen ; 
 Then shipwrecked on Life's stormy sea 
 I heaved an anguished Sigh for thee ! 
 
 But soon Reflection's power imprest 
 A stiller sadness on my breast ; 
 And sickly hope with waning eye 
 Was well content to droop and die : 
 I yielded to the stern decree, 
 Yet heaved a languid Sigh for thee ! 
 
 And though in distant climes to roam, 
 A wanderer from my native home, 
 I fain would soothe the sense of Care, 
 And lull to sleep the Joys that were, 
 Thy Image may not banished be — 
 Still, Maiy ! still I sigh for thee. 
 
 June, 1794. 
 
 EPITAPH ON AN INFANT. 
 
 Ere Sin could blight or Sorrow fade, 
 
 Death came with friendly care ; 
 The opening bud to Heaven conveyed, 
 
 And bade it blossom there. 
 u,. r. E 
 
50 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 ON IMITATION. 
 
 All are not born to soar — and ah ! how few 
 
 In tracks, where Wisdom leads, their paths pursue ! 
 
 Contagious when to wit or wealth allied, 
 
 Folly and Vice diffuse their venom wide. 
 
 On Folly every fool his talent tries ; 
 
 It asks some toil to imitate the wise ; 
 
 Tho' few like Fox can speak — like Pitt can think — 
 
 Yet all like Fox can game— like Pitt can drink. 
 
 O, Curas hominum ! O, quantum est in rebus inane ! 
 
 The fervid Sun had more than halv'd the day, 
 When gloomy on his couch Philedon lay ; 
 His feeble frame consumptive as his purse, 
 His aching head did wine and women curse ; 
 His fortune ruin'd and his wealth decay'd, 
 Clamorous his Duns, his gaming debts unpaid, 
 The youth indignant seiz'd his tailor's bill, 
 And on its back thus wrote with moral quill: 
 " Various as colors in the rainbow shown, 
 Or similar in emptiness alone, 
 How false, how vain are Man's pursuits below ! 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 51 
 
 Wealth, Honor, Pleasure— what can ye bestow ? 
 Yet see, how high and low, and young and old 
 Pursue the all delusive power of Gold. 
 Fond man ! should all Peru thy empire own, 
 For thee tho' all Golconda's jewels shone, 
 What greater bliss could all this wealth supply ? 
 What, but to eat and drink and sleep and die ? 
 Go, tempt the stormy sea, the burning soil — 
 Go, waste the night in thought, the day in toil, 
 Dark frowns the rock, and fierce the tempests rave- 
 Thy ingots go the unconscious deep to pave ! 
 Or thunder at thy door the midnight train, 
 Or death shall knock that never knocks in vain. 
 Next Honor's sons come bustling on amain ; 
 I laugh with pity at the idle train. 
 Infirm of soul ! who think'st to lift thy name 
 Upon the waxen wings of human fame, — 
 Who for a sound, articulated breath — 
 Gazest undaunted in the face of death ! 
 What art thou but a Meteor's glaring light^ — 
 Blazing a moment and then sunk in night ? 
 Caprice which rais'd tbee high shall hurl tbee low 
 Or envy blast the laurels on thy brow. 
 To such poor joys could ancient Honor lead 
 When empty fame was toiling Merit's mead ; 
 To Modern Honor other lays belong ; 
 Profuse of joy and Lord of right and wrong, 
 Honor can game, drink, riot in the stew, 
 Cut a friend's throat ; — what cannot Honor do ? 
 Ah me — the storm within can Honor still 
 
52 JUVENILE K>EMS. 
 
 For Julio's death, whom Honor made me kill ? 
 Or will this lordly Honor tell the way 
 To pay those debts, which Honor makes me pay? 
 Or if with pistol and terrific threats 
 I make some traveller pay my Honor's debts, 
 A med'cine for this wound can Honor give ? 
 Ah, no ! my Honor dies to make my Honor live^ 
 But see ! young Pleasure, and her train advance, 
 And joy and laughter wake the inebriate dance '; 
 Around my neck she throws her fair white arms, 
 I meet her loves, and madden at her charms. 
 For the gay grape can joys celestial move, 
 And what so sweet below as Woman's love ? 
 With such high transport every moment flies, 
 I curse experience, that he makes me wise; 
 For at his frown the dear deliriums flew, 
 And the chang'd scene now wears a gloomy hue. 
 A hideous hag th' Enchantress Pleasure seems, 
 And all her joys appear but feverous dreams. 
 The vain Resolve still broken and still made, 
 Disease and loathing- and remorse invade ; 
 The charm is vanish'd and the bubble's broke,— 
 A slave to pleasure is a slave to smoke !" 
 Such lays repentant did the Muse supply; 
 When as the Sun was hastening down the sky, 
 In glittering state twice fifty guineas come, — 
 His Mother's plate antique had rais'd the sum. 
 Forth leap'd Philedon of new life possest : — 
 'Twas Brookes's all tiH two, — 'twas Hackett's ali 
 the rest ! 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 53 
 
 PROGRESS OF VICE. 
 
 Deep in the gulph of Vice and Woe 
 Leaps man at once with headlong 1 throw ? 
 Him inborn Truth and Virtue guide, 
 Whose guards are shame and conscious pride ; 
 
 In some gay hour Vice steals into the breast ; 
 
 Perchance she wears some softer Virtue's vest. 
 
 By unperceiv'd degrees she tempts to stray, 
 Till far from Virtue's path she leads the feet away. 
 
 Then swift the soul to disenthrall 
 Will Memory the past recall, 
 And fear before the Victim's eyes 
 Bid future ills and dangers rise. [bine — 
 
 But hark ! the voice, the lyre, their charms corn- 
 Gay sparkles in the cup the generous wine ; 
 Th' inebriate dance — -the fair frail nymph inspires, 
 And Virtue vanquish'd — scorn'd — with hasty flight 
 retires. 
 
 But soon to tempt the pleasures cease ; 
 Yet shame forbids return to peace, 
 And stern necessity will force 
 Still to urge on the desperate course. 
 The drear black paths of Vice the wretch must try, 
 Where Conscience flashes horror on each eye, 
 Where Hate — where Murder scowl — where starts 
 Affright ! 
 Ah ! close the scene, — ah ! close — for dreadful is 
 the sig-ht. 
 
54 JUVEJN1LE POEMS. 
 
 LINES 
 
 AVRITTEN AT THE KING'S ARMS, ROSS, FORMERLY 
 THE HOUSE OF THE " MAN OF ROSS." 
 
 Richer than Miser o'er his countless hoards, 
 Nobler than Kings, or king-polluted Lords, 
 Here dwelt the Man of Ross ! O Traveller, hear! 
 Departed Merit claims a reverent tear. 
 Friend to the friendless, to the sick man health, 
 With generous joy he viewed his modest wealth ; 
 He heard the widow's heaven-breathed prayer of 
 
 praise, 
 He marked the sheltered orphan's tearful gaze, 
 Or where the sorrow shrivelled captive lay, 
 Pour'd the bright blaze of Freedom's noon-tide ray. 
 Beneath this roof if thy cheered moments pass, 
 Fill to the good man's name one grateful glass ; 
 To higher zest shall Memory wake thy soul, 
 And Virtue mingle in the ennobled bowl. 
 But if, like me, through life's distressful scene 
 Lonely and sad thy pilgrimage hath been ; 
 And if thy breast with heart-sick anguish fraught, 
 Thou journeyest onward tempest- tossed in thought; 
 Here cheat thy cares ! in generous visions melt, 
 And dream of Goodness, thou hast never felt ! 
 
JUVENILE POEMS, 55 
 
 DESTRUCTION OF THE BASTILE. 
 
 I. 
 
 Heard'st thou yon universal cry, 
 
 And dost thou linger still on Gallia's shore ? 
 Go, Tyranny! beneath some barbarous sky 
 Thy terrors lost, and ruin'd power deplore ! 
 What tho' through many a groaning age 
 Was felt thy keen suspicious rage, 
 Yet Freedom rous'd by fierce Disdain 
 Has wildly broke thy triple chain, 
 And like the storm which earth's deep entrails hide, 
 At length has burst its way and spread the ruins 
 wide. 
 
 In sighs their sickly breath was spent ; each gleam 
 Of Hope had ceas'd the long long day to cheer ; 
 
 Or if delusive, in some flitting dream, 
 
 It gave them to their friends and children dear — 
 Awak'd by lordly Insult's sound 
 To all the doubled horrors round, 
 Oft shrunk they from Oppression's band 
 While anguish rais'd the desperate hand 
 
 For silent death ; or lost the mind's control, 
 
 Thro' every burning vein would tides of Frenzy roll. 
 
56 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 But cease, ye pitying bosoms, cease to bleed ! 
 
 Such scenes no more demand the tear humane 
 I see, I see ! glad Liberty succeed 
 
 With every patriot virtue in her train ! 
 And mark yon peasant's raptured eyes ; 
 Secure he views his harvests rise ; 
 No fetter vile the mind shall know, 
 And Eloquence shall fearless glow. 
 Yes ! Liberty the soul of Life shall reign, 
 Shall throb in eveiy pulse, shall flow thro' every 
 vein ! 
 
 Shall France alone a Despot spurn ? 
 
 Shall she alone, O Freedom, boast thy care ? 
 
 Lo, round thy standard Belgia's heroes burn, 
 Tho' Power's blood-stain'd streamers fire the air, 
 And wider yet thy influence spread, 
 Nor e'er recline thy weary head, 
 Till every land from pole to pole 
 Shall boast one independent soul ! 
 
 And still, as erst, let favor'd Britain be 
 
 First ever of the first and freest of the free ! 
 
JUVENILE POEMS, 57 
 
 LINES 
 
 TO A BEAUTIFUL SPRING IN A VILLAGE. 
 
 Once more, sweet Stream! with slow foot wandering 
 I bless thy milky waters cold and clear. [near, 
 Escaped the flashing of the noontide hours, 
 With one fresh garland of Pierian flowers 
 (Ere from thy zephyr-haunted brink I turn) 
 My languid hand shall wreath thy mossy urn. 
 For not through pathless grove with murmur rude 
 Thou soothest the sad wood-nymph, Solitude j 
 Nor thine unseen in cavern depths to well, 
 The hermit-fountain of some dripping cell ! 
 Pride of the Vale ! thy useful streams supply 
 The scattered cots and peaceful hamlet nigh. 
 The elfin tribe around thy friendly banks 
 With infant uproar and soul-soothing pranks, 
 Released from school, their little hearts at rest, 
 Launch paper navies on thy waveless breast. 
 The rustic here at eve with pensive look 
 Whistling lorn ditties leans upon his crook, 
 Or starting pauses with hope-mingled dread 
 To* list the much-loved maid's accustomed tread : 
 She, vainly mindful of her dame's command, 
 Loiters, the long-filled pitcher in her hand. 
 
 Unboastful Stream ! thy fount with pebbled falls 
 The faded form of past delight recalls, 
 
bii JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 What time the morning' sun of Hope arose, 
 And all was joy ; save when another's woes 
 A transient gloom upon my soul imprest, 
 Like passing clouds impictured on thy breast. 
 Life's current then ran sparkling to the noon, 
 Or silvery stole beneath the pensive Moon : 
 Ah ! now it works rude brakes and thorns among 5 
 Or o'er the rough rock bursts and foams along ! 
 
 LINES ON A FRIEND 
 
 WHO DIED OF A FRENZY FEVER INDUCED BY 
 CALUMNIOUS REPORTS. 
 
 Edmund ! thy grave with aching eye I scan, 
 
 And inly groan for Heaven's poor outcast — Man ! 
 
 'Tis tempest all or gloom : in early youth 
 
 If gifted with the Ithuriel lance of Truth 
 
 We force to start amid her feigned caress 
 
 Vice, siren-hag ! in native ugliness ; 
 
 A Brother's fate will haply rouse the tear, 
 
 And on we go in heaviness and fear ! 
 
 But if our fond hearts call to Pleasure's bower 
 
 Some pigmy Folly in a careless hour, [ground, 
 
 The faithless guest shall stamp the enchanted 
 
 And mingled forms of Misery rise around : 
 
 Heart-fretting Fear, with pallid look aghast, 
 
 That courts the future woe to hide the past ; 
 
 Remorse, the poisoned arrow in his side, 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 59 
 
 And loud lewd Mirth, to Anguish close allied : 
 Till Frenzy, fierce-eyed child of moping* pain, 
 Darts her hot lightning-flash athwart the brain. 
 Rest, injur'd shade ! Shall Slander squatting near 
 Spit her cold venom in a dead Man's ear ? 
 'Twas" thine to feel the sympathetic glow 
 In Merit's joy, and Poverty's meek woe ; 
 Thine all, that cheer the moment as it flies, 
 The zoneless Cares, and smiling Courtesies. 
 Nursed in thy heart the firmer Virtues grew, 
 And in thy heart they withered ! Such chill dew 
 Wan Indolence on each young blossom shed ; 
 And Vanity her filmy net-work spread, 
 With eye that rolled around in asking gaze, 
 And tongue that trafficked in the trade of praise. 
 Thy follies such ! the hard world marked them well ! 
 Were they more wise, the proud who never fell ? 
 Rest, injured shade ! the poor man's. grateful prayer 
 On heaven-ward wing thy wounded soul shall bear. 
 As oft at twilight gloom thy grave I pass, 
 And sit me down upon its recent grass, 
 With introverted eye I contemplate 
 Similitude of soul, perhaps of — fate ; 
 To me hath Heaven with bounteous hand assigned 
 Energic Reason and a shaping mind, 
 The daring ken of Truth, the Patriot's part, 
 And Pity's sigh, that breathes the gentle heart. 
 Sloth-jaundiced all ! and from my graspless hand 
 Drop Friendship's precious pearls, like hour-glass 
 sand. 
 
60 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 I weep, yet stoop not! the faint anguish flows, 
 A dreamy pang in Morning's feverous doze. 
 
 Is this piled earth our Being's passless mound ? 
 Tell me, cold grave ! is death with poppies crowned ? 
 Tired Sentinel ! mid fitful starts I nod, 
 And fain would sleep, though pillowed on a clod ! 
 
 TO A YOUNG LADY, 
 
 WITH A POEM ON THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. 
 
 Much on my early youth I love to dwell, 
 Ere yet I bade that friendly dome farewell, 
 Where first, beneath the echoing cloisters pale, 
 I heard of guilt and wondered at the tale ! 
 Yet though the hours flew by on careless wing, 
 Full heavily of Sorrow would I sing. 
 Aye as the star of evening flung its beam 
 In broken radiance on the wavy stream, 
 My soul amid the pensive twilight gloom 
 Mourned with the breeze, O Lee Boo ! 1 o'er thy 
 
 tomb. 
 Where'er I wandered, Pity still was near, 
 Breathed from the heart and glistened in the tear : 
 
 1 Lee Boo, the son of Abba Thule, Prince of the Pelew 
 Islands, came over to England with Captain Wilson, died 
 of the small-pox, and is buried in Greenwich church-yard. 
 See Keate's Account. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS, 61 
 
 No knell that tolled, but filled my anxious eye, 
 And suffering Nature wept that one should die ! * 
 
 Thus to sad sympathies I soothed my breast, 
 
 Calm, as the rainbow in the weeping West : 
 
 When slumbering Freedom roused by high Disdain 
 
 With giant fury burst her triple chain ! 
 
 Fierce on her front the blasting Dog-star glowed ; 
 
 Her banners, like a midnight meteor, flowed; 
 
 Amid the yelling of the storm-rent skies 
 
 She came, and scattered battles from her eyes ! 
 
 Then Exultation waked the patriot fire 
 
 And swept with wild hand the Tyrtaean lyre : 
 
 Red from the Tyrant's wound I shook the lance, 
 
 And strode in joy the reeking plains of France ! 
 
 Fallen is the oppressor, friendless, ghastly, low, 
 And my heart aches, though Mercy struck the blow. 
 With wearied thought once more I seek the Shade, 
 Where peaceful Virtue weaves the myrtle braid. 
 And O ! if Eyes whose holy glances roll, 
 Swift messengers, and eloquent of soul ; 
 If Smiles more winning, and a gentler Mien 
 Than the love-wildered Maniac's brain hath seen 
 Shaping celestial forms in vacant air, 
 If these demand the impassioned Poet's care — 
 If Mirth and softened Sense and Wit refined, 
 The blameless features of a lovely mind ; 
 
 1 Southey's Retrospects 
 
62 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Then haply shall my trembling hand assign 
 No fading wreath to Beauty's saintly shrine. 
 Nor, Sara! thou these early flowers refuse — 
 Ne'er lurked the snake beneath their simple hues ; 
 No purple bloom the Child of Nature brings 
 From Flattery's night-shade : as he feels he sings. 
 
 September, 1792. 
 
 SONNET I. 
 
 " Content, as random Fancies might inspire, 
 If his weak harp at times or lonely lvre 
 He struck with desultory hand, and drew 
 Some softened tones to Nature not untrue." 
 
 My heart has thanked thee, Bowles ! for those soft 
 
 strains 
 Whose sadness soothes me, like the murmurino- 
 Of wild-bees in the sunny showers of spring ! 
 For hence not callous to the mourner's pains 
 Through Youth's gay prime and thornless paths I 
 
 went : 
 And when the mightier throes of mind began, 
 And drove me forth, a thought-bewildered man, 
 Their mild and manliest melancholy lent 
 A mingled charm, such as the pang consigned 
 To slumber, though the big tear it renewed ; 
 
JtTVENILE POEMS. 63 
 
 Bidding a strange mysterious Pleasure brood 
 Over the wavy and tumultuous mind, 
 As the great Spirit erst with plastic sweep 
 Moved on the darkness of the unformed deep. 
 
 SONNET II. 
 
 As late I lay in slumber's shadowy vale, 
 
 With wetted cheek and in a mourner's guise, 
 
 I saw the sainted form of Freedom rise : 
 
 She spake ! not sadder moans the autumnal g-ale- 
 
 " Great Son of Genius ! sweet to me thy name, 
 
 Ere in an evil hour with altered voice 
 
 Thou bad'st Oppression's hireling crew rejoice 
 
 Blasting with wizard spell my laurelled fame. 
 
 Yet never, Burke ! thou drank'st Corruption's 
 
 bowl ! 
 Thee stormy Pity and the cherished lure 
 Of Pomp, and proud Precipitance of soul 
 Wildered with meteor fires. Ah Spirit pure ! 
 That error's mist had left thy purged eye : 
 So might I clasp thee with a Mother's joy !" 
 
64 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 SONNET III. 
 
 Though roused by that dark Vizir Riot rude 
 Have driven our Priestly o'er the ocean swell; 
 Though Superstition and her wolfish brood 
 Bay his mild radiance, impotent and fell ; 
 Calm in his halls of brightness he shall dwell ! 
 For lo ! Religion at his strong behest 
 Starts with mild anger from the Papal spell, 
 And flings to earth her tinsel-glittering vest, 
 Her mitred state and cumbrous pomp unholy ; 
 And Justice wakes to bid the Oppressor wail 
 Insulting aye the wrongs of patient Folly : 
 And from her dark retreat by Wisdom won 
 Meek Nature slowly lifts her matron veil 
 To smile with fondness on her grazing 1 son ! 
 
 SONNET IV. 
 
 When British Freedom for a happier land 
 Spread her broad wings, that fluttered with affright, 
 Erskine ! thy voice she heard, and paused her 
 
 flight 
 Sublime of hope ! For dreadless thou didst stand 
 (Thy censer glowing with the hallowed flame) 
 A hireless Priest before the insulted shrine, 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 65 
 
 And at her altar pour the stream divine 
 Of unmatched eloquence. Therefore thy name 
 Her sons shall venerate, and cheer thy breast 
 With blessings heaven-ward breathed. And when 
 
 the doom 
 Of Nature bids thee die, beyond the tomb 
 Thy light shall shine : as sunk beneath the West 
 Though the great Summer Sun eludes our gaze, 
 Still burns wide Heaven with his distended blaze. 
 
 SONNET V. 
 
 It was some Spirit, Sheridan ! that breathed 
 O'er thy young mind such wildly various power ! 
 My soul hath marked thee in her shaping hour, 
 Thy temples with Hymmettian flow 'rets wreathed : 
 And sweet thy voice, as when o'er Laura's bier 
 Sad music trembled through Vauclusa's glade ; 
 Sweet, as at dawn the love-lorn Serenade 
 That wafts soft dreams to Slumber's listening ear. 
 Now patriot rage and indignation high 
 Swell the full tones ! And now thine eye-beams 
 
 dance 
 Meanings of Scorn and Wit's quaint revelry ! 
 Writhes inly from the bosom-probing glance 
 The Apostate by the brainless rout adored, 
 As erst that elder Fiend beneath great Michael's 
 
 sword. 
 
 VOL. I. F 
 
66 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 SONNET VI. 
 
 O what a loud and fearful shriek was there, 
 
 A s though a thousand souls one death-groan poured ! 
 
 Ah me ! they saw beneath a hireling's sword 
 
 Their Kosciusko fall ! Through the swart air 
 
 (As pauses the tired Cossac's barbarous yell 
 
 Of triumph) on the chill and midnight gale 
 
 Rises with frantic burst or sadder swell 
 
 The dirge of murdered Hope ! while Freedom pale 
 
 Bends in such anguish o'er her destined bier, 
 
 As if from eldest time some Spirit meek 
 
 Had gathered in a mystic urn each tear 
 
 That ever on a Patriot's furrowed cheek 
 
 Fit channel found, and she had drained the bowl 
 
 In the mere wilfulness, and sick despair of soul ! 
 
 SONNET VII. 
 
 As when far off the warbled strains are heard 
 That soar on Morning's wing the vales among, 
 Within his cage the imprisoned matin bird 
 Swells the full chorus with a g-enerous song : 
 He bathes no pinion in the dewy light, 
 No Father's joy, no Lover's bliss he shares, 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 67 
 
 Yet still the rising radiance cheers his sight ; 
 His fellows' freedom soothes the captive's cares ! 
 Thou, Fayette ! who didst wake with startling voice 
 Life's better sun from that long wintry night, 
 Thus in thy Country's triumphs shalt rejoice, 
 And mock with raptures high the dungeon's might: 
 For lo ! the morning struggles into day, 
 And Slavery's spectres shriek and vanish from the 
 ray! 
 
 SONNET VIII. 
 
 Thou gentle Look, that didst my soul beguile, 
 
 Why hast thou left me ? Still in some fond dream 
 
 Revisit my sad heart, auspicious Smile ! 
 
 As falls on closing flowers the lunar beam : 
 
 What time, in sickly mood, at parting day 
 
 I lay me down and think of happier years ; 
 
 Of Joys, that glimmered in Hope's twilight ray, 
 
 Then left me darkling in a vale of tears. 
 
 pleasant days of hope — for ever gone ! — 
 
 Could I recall you ! — But that thought is vain. 
 
 Availeth not Persuasion's sweetest tone 
 
 To lure the fleet-winged Travellers back again : 
 
 Yet fair, though faint, their images shall gleam 
 
 Like the bright Rainbow on a willowy stream. 
 
(38 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 SONNET IX. 
 
 Pale Roamer through the night ! thou poor For- 
 lorn ! 
 Remorse that man on his death-hed possess, 
 Who in the credulous hour of tenderness 
 Betrayed, then cast thee forth to want and scorn 
 The world is pitiless : the chaste one's pride 
 Mimic of Virtue scowls on thy distress : 
 Thy Loves and they, that envied thee, deride : 
 And Vice alone will shelter wretchedness ! 
 O ! I could weep to think, that there should be 
 Cold-bosomed lewd ones, who endure to place 
 Foul offerings on the shrine of misery, 
 And force from famine the caress of Love ; 
 May He shed healing on the sore disgrace, 
 He, the great Comforter that rules above ! 
 
 SONNET X. 
 
 Sweet Mercy ! how my very heart has bled 
 To see thee, poor Old Man ! and thy gray hairs 
 Hoar with the snowy blast : while no one cares 
 To clothe thy shrivelled limbs and palsied head. 
 My Father ! throw away this tattered vest 
 That mocks thy shivering ! take my garment — use 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 69 
 
 A young man's arm ! I'll melt these frozen dews 
 That hang from thy white beard and numb thy 
 
 breast. 
 My Sara too shall tend thee, like a Child : 
 And thou shalt talk, in our fire-side's recess, 
 Of purple pride, that scowls on wretchedness. 
 He did not so, the Galilean mild. 
 Who met the Lazars turned from rich men's doors, 
 And called them Friends, and healed their noisome 
 
 SONNET XI. 
 
 Thou bleedest, my poor Heart ! and thy distress 
 Reasoning I ponder with a scornful smile, 
 And probe thy sore wound sternly, though the while 
 Swoln be mine eye and dim with heaviness. 
 Why didst thou listen to Hope's whisper bland ? 
 Or, listening, why forget the healing tale, 
 When Jealousy with feverous fancies pale 
 Jarred thy fine fibres with a maniac's hand ? 
 Faint was that Hope, and rayless ! — Yet 'twas fair, 
 And soothed with many a dream the hour of rest : 
 Thou shouldst have loved it most, when most op- 
 
 prest, 
 And nursed it with an agony of care, 
 Even as a Mother her sweet infant heir 
 That wan and sickly droops upon her breast \ 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 SONNET XII. 
 
 TO THE AUTHOR OF THE " ROBBERS." 
 
 Schiller ! that hour I would have wished to die, 
 If through the shuddering midnight I had sent 
 From the dark dungeon of the tower time-rent 
 That fearful voice, a famished Father's cry — 
 Lest in some after moment aught more mean 
 Might stamp me mortal ! A triumphant shout 
 Black Horror screamed, and all her goblin rout 
 Diminished shrunk from the more withering scene ! 
 Ah ! Bard tremendous in sublimity ! 
 Could I behold thee in thy loftier mood 
 Wandering at eve with finely frenzied eye 
 Beneath some vast old tempest-swinging wood ! 
 Awhile with mute awe gazing I would brood : 
 Then weep aloud in a wild ecstasy ! 
 
 LINES 
 
 COMPOSED WHILE CLIMBING THE LEFT ASCENT OF 
 
 BROCKLEY COOMB, SOMERSETSHIRE, 
 
 MAY, 1795, 
 
 With many a pause and oft reverted eye 
 
 1 climb the Coomb's ascent : sweet songsters near 
 
 Warble in shade their wild-wood melody : 
 
 Far off the unvarying Cuckoo soothes my ear. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 7 1 
 
 Up scour the startling 1 stragglers of the Flock 
 That on green plots o'er precipices browse : 
 From the deep fissures of the naked rock 
 The Yew tree bursts ! Beneath its dark green boughs 
 (Mid which the May-thorn blends its blossoms 
 
 white) 
 Where broad smooth stones jut out in mossy seats, 
 I rest: — and now have gained the topmost site. 
 Ah ! what a luxury of landscape meets 
 My gaze ! Proud towers, and cots more dear to me, 
 Elm-shadow'd fields, and prospect-bounding sea ! 
 Deep sighs my lonely heart : I drop the tear : 
 Enchanting spot ! O were my Sara here ! 
 
 LINES 
 
 IN THE MANNER, OF SPENSER. 
 
 Peace, that on a lilied bank dost love 
 To rest thine head beneath an olive tree, 
 
 1 would, that from the pinions of thy dove 
 One quill withouten pain yplucked might be ! 
 For O ! I wish my Sara's frowns to flee, 
 
 And fain to her some soothing song would write, 
 Lest she resent my rude discourtesy, 
 Who vowed to meet her ere the morning light, 
 But broke my plighted word — ah ! false and re- 
 creant wi°:ht ! 
 
72 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Last night as I my weary head did pillow 
 With thoughts of my dissevered Fair engrost, 
 Chill Fancy drooped wreathing herself with willow, 
 As though my breast entombed a pining ghost. 
 " From some blest couch, young Rapture's bridal 
 
 boast, 
 Rejected Slumber ! hither wing thy way ; 
 But leave me with the matin hour, at most ! 
 As night-closed floweret to the orient ray, 
 My sad heart will expand, when I the Maid survey . " 
 
 But Love, who heard the silence of my thought, 
 Contrived a too successful wile, I ween : 
 And whispered to himself, with malice fraught — 
 " Too long our Slave the Damsel's smiles hath seen : 
 To-morrow shall he ken her altered mien !" 
 He spake, and ambushed lay, till on my bed 
 The morning shot her dewy glances keen, 
 When as I 'gan to lift my drowsy head — 
 " Now, Bard ! I'll work thee woe !" the laughing 
 Elfin said. 
 
 Sleep, softly-breathing God ! his downy wing 
 Was fluttering now, as quickly to depart ; 
 When twanged an arrow from Love's mystic string, 
 With pathless wound it pierced him to the heart. 
 Was there some magic in the Elfin's dart ? 
 Or did he strike my couch with wizard lance ? 
 For straight so fair a Form did upwards start 
 (No fairer decked the bowers of old Romance) 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 73 
 
 That Sleep enamoured grew, nor moved from his 
 
 sweet trance ! 
 My Sara came, with gentlest look divine ; 
 Bright shone her eye, yet tender was its beam : 
 I felt the pressure of her lip to mine ! 
 Whispering we went, and Love was all our theme — 
 Love pure and spotless, as at first, I deem, 
 He sprang from Heaven ! Such joys with Sleep did 
 That I the living image of my dream ['bide 
 
 Fondly forgot. Too late I woke, and sigh'd — 
 " O ! how shall I behold my Love at even-tide !" 
 
 IMITATED FROM OSSIAN 
 
 The stream with languid murmur creeps, 
 
 In Lumin's flowery vale : 
 Beneath the dew the Lily weeps 
 
 Slow- waving to the gale. 
 
 " Cease, restless gale ! it seems to say, 
 Nor wake me with thy sighing ! 
 
 The honours of my vernal day 
 On rapid wing are flying. 
 
 " To-morrow shall the Traveller come 
 Who late beheld me blooming : 
 
 His searching eye shall vainly roam 
 The dreary vale of Lumin." 
 
74 JUVENILE POEMS 
 
 With eager gaze and wetted cheek 
 
 My wonted haunts along, 
 Thus, faithful Maiden ! thou shalt seek 
 
 The Youth of simplest song. 
 
 But I along the breeze shall roll 
 The voice of feeble power ; 
 
 And dwell, the Moon-beam of thy soul, 
 In Slumber's nightly hour. 
 
 THE COMPLAINT OF NINATHOMA. 
 
 How long will ye round me be swelling, 
 
 O ye blue-tumbling waves of the sea ? 
 Not always in caves was my dwelling, 
 
 Nor beneath the cold blast of the tree. 
 Through the high-sounding halls of Cathloma 
 
 In the steps of my beauty I strayed ; 
 The warriors beheld Ninathoma, 
 
 And they blessed the white-bosomed Maid ! 
 
 A Ghost ! by my cavern it darted ! 
 
 In moon-beams the Spirit was drest — 
 For lovely appear the departed 
 
 When they visit the dreams of my rest ! 
 But disturbed by the tempest's commotion 
 
 Fleet the shadowy forms of delight — 
 Ah cease, thou shrill blast of the Ocean ! 
 
 To howl through my cavern by night. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 IMITATED FROM THE WELSH. 
 
 If, while my passion I impart, 
 You deem my words untrue, 
 
 O place your hand upon my heart — 
 Feel how it throbs for you ! 
 
 Ah no ! reject the thoughtless claim 
 
 In pity to your Lover ! 
 That thrilling touch would aid the flame, 
 
 It wishes to discover. 
 
 TO AN INFANT. 
 
 Ah ! cease thy tears and sobs, my little Life ! 
 I did but snatch away the unclasped knife : 
 Some safer toy will soon arrest thine eye, 
 And to quick laughter change this peevish cry ! 
 Poor stumbler on the rocky coast of woe, 
 Tutored by pain each source of pain to know ! 
 Alike the foodful fruit and scorching fire 
 Awake thy eager grasp and young desire ; 
 Alike the Good, the 111 offend thy sight, 
 And rouse the stormy sense of shrill affright '. 
 Untaught, yet wise ! mid all thy brief alarms 
 Thou closely clingest to thy Mother's arms, 
 Nestling thy little face in that fond breast 
 Whose anxious heavings lull thee to thy rest ! 
 
76 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Man's breathing Miniature ! thou mak'st me sigh— 
 A Babe art thou — and such a Thing- am I ! 
 To anger rapid and as soon appeased, 
 For trifles mourning- and by trifles pleased, 
 Break Friendship's mirror with a tetchy blow, 
 Yet snatch what coals of fire on Pleasure's altar glow ! 
 
 O thou that rearest with celestial aim 
 
 The future Seraph in my mortal frame, 
 
 Thrice holy Faith ! whatever thorns I meet 
 
 As on I totter with unpractised feet, 
 
 Still let me stretch my arms and cling to thee, 
 
 Meek nurse of souls through their long infancy ! 
 
 LINES 
 
 WRITTEN AT SHURTON BARS, NEAR BRIDGEWATER, 
 
 SEPTEMBER, 1795, IN ANSWER TO A LETTER 
 
 FROM BRISTOL. 
 
 Good verse most good, and bad verse then seems better 
 
 Received from absent friend by way of Letter. 
 
 For what so sweet can laboured lays impart 
 
 As one rude rhyme warm from a friendly heart 1 — anon. 
 
 Nor travels my meandering eye 
 The starry wilderness on high ; 
 
 Nor now with curious sight 
 I mark the glow-worm, as I pass, 
 Move with " green radiance" through the grass, 
 
 An emerald of lis'ht. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 77 
 
 ever present to my view ! 
 My wafted spirit is with you, 
 
 And soothes your boding fears : 
 
 1 see you all oppressed with gloom 
 Sit lonely in that cheerless room — 
 
 Ah me ! You are in tears ! 
 
 Beloved Woman ! did you fly 
 
 Chilled Friendship's dark disliking eye, 
 
 Or Mirth's untimely din ? 
 With cruel weight these trifles press 
 A temper sore with tenderness, 
 
 When aches the Void withm 
 
 But why with sable wand unblest 
 Should Fancy rouse within my breast 
 
 Dim-visaged shapes of Dread ? 
 Untenanting its beauteous clay 
 My Sara's soul has winged its way, 
 
 And hovers round my head ! 
 
 I felt it prompt the tender dream, 
 When slowly sank the day's last gleam ; 
 
 You roused each gentler sense, 
 As sighing o'er the blossom's bloom 
 Meek Evening wakes its soft perfume 
 
 With viewless influence. 
 
 And hark, my Love ! The sea-breeze moans 
 Through yon reft house ! O'er rolling stones 
 
78 JUVENJXE POEMS. 
 
 In bold ambitious sweep, 
 The onward-surging tides supply 
 The silence of the cloudless sky 
 
 With mimic thunders deep. 
 
 Dark reddening from the channelled Isle 1 
 (Where stands one solitary pile 
 
 Unslated by the blast) 
 The watchfire, like a sullen star 
 Twinkles to many a dozing tar 
 
 Rude cradled on the mast. 
 
 Even there — beneath that light-house tower- 
 In the tumultuous evil hour 
 
 Ere Peace with Sara came, 
 Time was, I should have thought it sweet 
 To count the echoings of my feet, 
 
 And watch the storm-vexed flame. 
 
 And there in black soul -jaundiced fit 
 A sad gloom-pampered Man to sit, 
 
 And listen to the roar : 
 When mountain surges bellowing deep 
 With an uncouth monster leap 
 
 Plunged foaming on the shore. 
 
 Then by the lightning's blaze to mark 
 Some toiling tempest-shattered bark ; 
 
 1 The Plolmes, in the Bristol Channel. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 79 
 
 Her vain distress-guns hear ; 
 And when a second sheet of light 
 Flashed o'er the blackness of the night — 
 
 To see no vessel there ! 
 
 But Fancy now more gaily sings ; 
 Or if awhile she droop her wings, 
 
 As sky-larks 'mid the corn, 
 On summer fields she grounds her breast : 
 The oblivious poppy o'er her nest 
 
 Nods, till returning morn. 
 
 mark those smiling tears, that swell 
 The opened rose ! From heaven they fell, 
 
 And with the sun-beam blend. 
 Blest visitations from above, 
 Such are the tender woes of Love 
 
 Fostering the heart they bend ! 
 
 When stormy Midnight howling round 
 Beats on our roof with clattering sound, 
 
 To me your arms you'll stretch : 
 Great God ! you'll say — To us so kind, 
 O shelter from this loud bleak wind 
 
 The houseless, friendless wretch ! 
 
 The tears that tremble down your cheek, 
 Shall bathe my kisses chaste and meek 
 
 In Pity's dew divine ; 
 And from your heart the sighs that steal 
 
80 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Shall make your rising bosom feel 
 The answering swell of mine ! 
 
 How oft, my Love ! with shapings sweet 
 I paint the moment, we shall meet ! 
 
 With eager speed I dart — 
 I seize you in the vacant air, 
 And fancy, with a husband's care 
 
 I press you to my heart ! 
 
 Tis said, in Summer's evening hour 
 Flashes the golden-coloured flower 
 
 A fair electric flame : 
 And so shall flash my love-charged eye 
 When all the heart's big ecstasy 
 
 Shoots rapid through the frame ! 
 
 LINES 
 
 TO A FRIEND IN ANSWER TO A MELANCHOLY 
 LETTER. 
 
 Away, those cloudy looks, that labouring sigh, 
 The peevish offspring of a sickly hour ! 
 Nor meanly thus complain of Fortune's power, 
 When the blind gamester throws a luckless die. 
 
 Yon setting sun flashes a mournful gleam 
 Behind those broken clouds, his stormy train : 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 81 
 
 To-morrow shall the many-coloured main 
 In brightness roll beneath his orient beam ! 
 
 Wild, as the autumnal gust, the hand of Time 
 Flies o'er his mystic lyre : in shadowy dance 
 The alternate groups of Joy and Grief advance 
 Responsive to his varying strains sublime ! 
 
 Bears on its wing each hour a load of Fate ; 
 The swain, who, lulled by Seine's mild murmurs, led 
 His weary oxen to their nightly shed, 
 To-day may rule a tempest-troubled State. 
 
 Nor shall not Fortune with a vengeful smile 
 Survey the sanguinary despot's might, 
 And haply hurl the pageant from his height 
 Unwept to wander in some savage isle. 
 
 There shiv'ring sad beneath the tempest's frown 
 Round his tired limbs to wrap the purple vest ; 
 And mixed with nails and beads, an equal jest ! 
 Barter for food the jewels of his crown. 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
82 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 RELIGIOUS MUSINGS; 
 
 A DESULTORY POEM, WRITTEN ON THE CHRISTMAS 
 EVE OF 1794. 
 
 This is the time, when most divine to hear, 
 
 The voice of adoration rouses me, 
 
 As with a Cherub's trump : and high upborne, 
 
 Yea, mingling with the choir, I seem to view 
 
 The vision of the heavenly multitude, 
 
 Who hymned the song of peace o'er Bethlehem's 
 
 fields ! 
 Yet thou more bright than all the angel blaze, 
 That harbingered thy birth. Thou, Man of Woes ! 
 Despised Galilean ! For the great 
 Invisible (by symbols only seen) 
 With a peculiar and surpassing light 
 Shines from the visage of the oppressed good man, 
 When heedless of himself the scourged Saint 
 Mourns for the oppressor. Fair the vernal mead, 
 Fair the high grove, the sea, the sun, the stars; 
 True impress each of their creating Sire ! 
 Yet nor high grove, nor many-coloured mead, 
 Nor the green Ocean with his thousand isles, 
 Nor the starred azure, nor the sovran sun, 
 E'er with such majesty of portraiture 
 Imaged the supreme beauty uncreate, 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 83 
 
 As thou, meek Saviour ! at the fearful hour 
 When thy insulted anguish winged the prayer 
 Harped by Archangels, when they sing of mercy! 
 Which when the Almighty heard from forth his 
 
 throne 
 Diviner light filled Heaven with ecstasy ! 
 Heaven's hymnings paused : and Hell her yawnr 
 
 ing mouth 
 Closed a brief moment. 
 
 Lovely was the death 
 Of Him whose life was Love ! Holy with power 
 He on the thought-benighted Sceptic beamed 
 Manifest Godhead, melting into day 
 What floating mists of dark idolatry 
 Broke and misshaped the omnipresent Sire : 
 And first by Fear uncharmed the drowsed Soul. 
 Till of its nobler nature it 'gan feel 
 Dim recollections ; and thence soared to Hope, 
 Strong to believe whate'er of mystic good 
 The Eternal dooms for his immortal sons. 
 From Hope and firmer Faith to perfect Love 
 Attracted and absorbed : and centred there 
 God only to behold, and know, and feel, 
 Till by exclusive consciousness of God 
 All self-annihilated it shall make 
 God its identity : God all in all ! 
 We and our Father one ! 
 
 And blest are they, 
 
84 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Who in this fleshly World, the elect of Heaven, 
 Their strong eye darting through the deeds of men, 
 Adore with steadfast unpresuming gaze 
 Him Nature's essence, mind, and energy ! 
 And gazing, trembling, patiently ascend 
 Treading beneath their feet all visible things 
 As steps, that upward to their Father's throne 
 Lead gradual — else nor glorified nor loved. 
 They nor contempt embosom nor revenge : 
 For they dare know of what may seem deform, 
 The Supreme Fair sole operant : in whose sight 
 All things are pure, his strong controlling Love 
 Alike from all educing perfect good. 
 Their's too celestial courage, inly armed- 
 Dwarfing Earth's giant brood, what time they muse 
 On their great Father, great beyond compare ! 
 And marching onwards view high o'er their heads 
 His waving banners of Omnipotence. 
 
 Who the Creator love, created might 
 
 Dread not : within their tents no terrors walk. 
 
 For they are holy things before the Lord 
 
 Aye unprofaned, though Earth should league with 
 
 Hell ; 
 God's altar grasping with an eager hand 
 Fear, the wild-visaged, pale, eye-starting wretch, 
 Sure-refuged hears his hot pursuing fiends 
 Yell at vain distance. Soon refreshed from Heaven 
 He calms the throb and tempest of his heart. 
 His countenance settles ; a soft solemn bliss 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 85 
 
 Swims in his eye — his swimming eye upraised : 
 
 And Faith's whole armour glitters on his limbs ! 
 
 And thus transfigured with a dreadless awe, 
 
 A solemn hush of soul, meek he beholds 
 
 All things of terrible seeming : yea, unmoved 
 
 Views e'en the immitigable ministers 
 
 That shower down vengeance on these latter days. 
 
 For kindling with intenser Deity 
 
 From the celestial Mercy-seat they come, 
 
 And at the renovating wells of Love 
 
 Have filled their vials with salutary wrath, 
 
 To sickly Nature more medicinal 
 
 Than what soft balm the weeping good man pours 
 
 Into the lone despoiled traveller's wounds ! 
 
 Thus from the Elect, regenerate through faith, 
 Pass the dark Passions and what thirsty Cares 
 Drink up the Spirit, and the dim regards 
 Self-centre. Lo they vanish ! or acquire 
 New names, new features— -by supernal grace 
 Enrobed with Light, and naturalized in Heaven. 
 As when a shepherd on a vernal morn 
 Through some thick fog creeps timorous with slow 
 
 foot, 
 Darkling he fixes on the immediate road 
 His downward eye : all else of fairest kind 
 Hid or deformed. But lo ! the bursting Sun ! 
 Touched by the enchantment of that sudden beam 
 Straight the black vapour melteth, and in globes 
 Of dewy glitter gems each plant and tree ; 
 
00 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 On every leaf, on every blade it hangs ! 
 Dance glad the new-born intermingling rays, 
 And wide around the landscape streams with glory! 
 
 There is one Mind, one omnipresent Mind, 
 Omnific. His most holy name is Love. 
 Truth of subliming import ! with the which 
 Who feeds and saturates his constant soul, 
 He from his small particular orbit flies 
 With blest outstarting ! From Himself he flies, 
 Stands in the sun, and with no partial gaze 
 Views all creation ; and he loves it all, 
 And blesses it, and calls it very good ! 
 This is indeed to dwell with the most High ! 
 Cherubs and rapture-trembling Seraphim 
 Can press no nearer to the Almighty's Throne. 
 But that we roam unconscious, or with hearts 
 Unfeeling of our universal Sire, 
 And that in his vast family no Cain 
 Injures uninjured (in her best-aimed blow 
 Victorious murder a blind suicide) 
 Haply for this some younger Angel now 
 Looks down on human nature : and, behold ! 
 A sea of blood bestrewed with wrecks, where mad 
 Embattling interests on each other rush 
 With unhelmed rage ! 
 
 Tis the sublime of man, 
 Our noontide majesty, to know ourselves 
 Parts and proportions of one wondrous whole ! 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 87 
 
 This fraternizes man, this constitutes 
 Our charities and bearings. But 'tis God 
 Diffused through all, that doth make all one whole ; 
 This the worst superstition, him except 
 Aught to desire, Supreme Reality ! 
 The plenitude and permanence of bliss ! 
 
 Fiends of Superstition ! not that oft 
 
 The erring priest hath stained with brother's blood 
 Your grisly idols, not for this may wrath 
 Thunder against you from the Holy One ! 
 But o'er some plain that steameth to the sun, 
 Peopled with death ; or where more hideous Trade 
 Loud-laughing packs his bales of human anguish ; 
 
 1 v/ill raise up a mourning, O ye Fiends ! 
 
 And curse your spells, that film the eye of Faith, 
 Hiding the present God ; whose presence lost, 
 The moral world's cohesion, we become 
 An anarchy of Spirits ! Toy-bewitched, 
 Made blind by lusts, disherited of soul, 
 No common centre Man, no common sire 
 Knoweth ! A sordid solitary thing, 
 Mid countless brethren with a lonely heart 
 Through courts and cities the smooth savage roams 
 Feeling himself, his own low self the whole ; 
 When he by sacred sympathy might make 
 The whole one self ! self, that no alien knows ! 
 Self, far diffused as Fancy's wing can travel ! 
 Self, spreading still ! Oblivious of its own, 
 Yet all of all possessing ! This is Faith ! 
 This the Messiah's destined victory ! 
 
«8 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 But first offences needs must come ! Even now 1 
 (Black Hell laughs horrible — to hear the scoff!) 
 Thee to defend, meek Galilean ! Thee 
 And thy mild laws of Love unutterable, 
 Mistrust and enmity have burst the bands 
 Of social peace ; and listening treachery lurks 
 With pious fraud to snare a brother's life ; 
 And childless widows o'er the groaning- land 
 Wail numberless ; and orphans weep for bread 
 Thee to defend, dear Saviour of mankind ! 
 Thee, Lamb of God ! Thee, blameless Prince of 
 
 peace ! 
 From all sides rush the thirsty brood of War,— 
 Austria, and that foul Woman of the North, 
 The lustful murderess of her wedded lord ! 
 And he, connatural mind ! whom (in their songs 
 
 1 January 21st, 1794, in the debate on the address to 
 his Majesty, on the speech from the Throne, the Earl of 
 Guildford moved an amendment to the following effect : — 
 " That the House hoped his Majesty would seize the earliest 
 opportunity to conclude a peace with France," &c. This 
 motion was opposed by the Duke of Portland, who " con- 
 sidered the war to be merely grounded on one principle— 
 the preservation of the Christian Religion." May 30th, 
 1794, the Duke of Bedford moved a number of resolutions, 
 with a view to the establishment of a peace with France. 
 He was opposed (among others) by Lord Abingdon in these 
 remarkable words : " The best road to Peace, my Lords, is 
 War ! and War carried on in the same manner in which we 
 are taught to worship our Creator, namely, with all our 
 souls, and with all our minds, and with all our hearts, and 
 with all our strength." 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 89 
 
 So bards of elder time had haply feigned) 
 Some Fury fondled in her hate to man, 
 Bidding her serpent hair in mazy surge 
 Lick his young face, and at his mouth imbreathe 
 Horrible sympathy ! And leagued with these 
 Each petty German princeling, nursed in gore ! 
 Soul-hardened barterers of human blood ! 
 Death's prime slave-merchants ! Scorpion-whips 
 
 of Fate ! 
 Nor least in savagery of holy zeal, 
 Apt for the yoke, the race degenerate, 
 Whom Britain erst had blushed to call her sons ! 
 Thee to defend the Moloch priest prefers 
 The prayer of hate, and bellows to the herd 
 That Deity, accomplice Deity 
 In the fierce jealousy of wakened wrath 
 Will go forth with our armies and our fleets 
 To scatter the red ruin on their foes ! 
 blasphemy ! to mingle fiendish deeds 
 With blessedness ! 
 
 Lord of unsleeping Love, 1 
 From everlasting Thou ! We shall not die. 
 These, even these, in mercy didst thou form, 
 Teachers of Good through Evil, by brief wrong 
 Making Truth lovely, and her future might 
 Magnetic o'er the fixed untrembling heart. 
 
 1 Art thou not from everlasting-, O Lord, my God, 
 mine Holy One ? Wg shall not die. O Lord, thou hast 
 ordained them for judgment, &c. Habakkuk. 
 
90 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 In the primeval age a dateless while 
 
 The vacant Shepherd wandered with his flock, 
 
 Pitching his tent where'er the green grass waved. 
 
 But soon Imagination conjured up 
 
 A host of new desires : with busy aim, 
 
 Each for himself, Earth's eager children toiled. 
 
 So Property began, twy-streaming fount, 
 
 Whence Vice and Virtue flow, honey and gall. 
 
 Hence the soft couch, and many-coloured robe, 
 
 The timbrel, and arch'd dome and costly feast, 
 
 With all the inventive arts, that nursed the soul 
 
 To forms of beauty, and by sensual wants 
 
 Unsensualized the mind, which in the means 
 
 Learnt to forget the grossness of the end, 
 
 Best pleasured with its own activity. 
 
 And hence Disease that withers manhood's arm, 
 
 The daggered Envy, spirit-quenching Want, 
 
 Warriors, and Lords, and Priests — all the sore ills 
 
 That vex and desolate our mortal life. 
 
 Wide-wasting ills ! yet each the immediate source 
 
 Of mightier good. Their keen necessities 
 
 To ceaseless action goading human thought 
 
 Have made Earth's reasoning animal her Lord ; 
 
 And the pale-featured Sage's trembling hand 
 
 Strong as a host of armed Deities, 
 
 Such as the blind Ionian fabled erst. 
 
 From avarice thus, from luxury and war 
 Sprang heavenly science; and from science freedom. 
 O'er wakened realms Philosophers and Bards 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 91 
 
 Spread in concentric circles : they whose souls, 
 Conscious of their high dignities from God, 
 Brook not wealth's rivalry ! and they who long 
 Enamoured with the charms of order hate 
 The unseemly disproportion : and whoe'er 
 Turn with mild sorrow from the victor's car 
 And the low puppetry of thrones, to muse 
 On that hlest triumph, when the patriot Sage 
 Called the red lightnings from the o'er-rushing cloud 
 And dashed the beauteous terrors on the earth 
 Smiling majestic. Such a phalanx ne'er 
 Measured firm paces to the calming sound 
 Of Spartan flute ! These on the fated day, 
 When, stung to rage by pity, eloquent men 
 Have roused with pealing voice the unnumbered 
 
 tribes 
 That toil and groan and bleed, hungiy and blind, — 
 These hushed awhile with patient eye serene 
 Shall watch the mad careering of the storm ; 
 Then o'er the wild and wavy chaos rush 
 And tame the outrageous mass, with plastic might 
 Moulding confusion to such perfect forms, 
 As erst were wont, — bright visions of the day ! — 
 To float before them, when, the summer noon, 
 Beneath some arch'd romantic rock reclined 
 They felt the sea breeze lift their youthful locks ; 
 Or in the month of blossoms, at mild eve, 
 Wandering with desultory feet inhaled 
 The wafted perfumes, and the flocks and woods 
 And many-tinted streams and setting sun 
 
ya JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 With all his gorgeous company of clouds 
 
 Ecstatic gazed ! then homeward as they strayed" 
 
 Cast the sad eye to earth, and inly mused 
 
 Why there was misery in a world so fair. 
 
 Ah ! far removed from all that glads the sense, 
 
 From all that softens or ennohles Man, 
 
 The wretched Many ! Bent beneath their loads 
 
 They gape at pageant Power, nor recognise 
 
 Their cots' transmuted plunder ! From the tree 
 
 Of Knowledge, ere the vernal sap had risen 
 
 Rudely disbranched ! Blest Society ! 
 
 Fitliest depictured by some sun-scorched waste, 
 
 Where oft majestic through the tainted noon 
 
 The Simoom sails, before whose purple pomp 
 
 Who falls not prostrate dies ! And where by nigbt, 
 
 Fast by each precious fountain on green herbs 
 
 The lion couches ; or hy?ena dips 
 
 Deep in the lucid stream his bloody jaws ; 
 
 Or serpent plants his vast moon-glittering bulk, 
 
 Caught in whose monstrous twine Behemoth 1 yells, 
 
 His bones loud-crashing ! 
 
 O ye numberless, 
 Whom foul oppression's ruffian g-luttony 
 Drives from life's plenteous feast ! O thou poor 
 
 wretch 
 Who nursed in darkness and made wild by want, 
 
 1 Behemoth, in Hebrew, signifies wild beasts in general. 
 Some believe it is the elephant, some the hippopotamus ; 
 some affirm it is the wild bull. Poetically, it designates 
 any large quadruped. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 93 
 
 Roamest for prey, yea thy unnatural hand 
 Dost lift to deeds of blood ! O pale-eyed form, 
 The victim of seduction, doomed to know 
 Polluted nights and days of blasphemy ; 
 Who in loathed orgies with lewd wassailers 
 Must gaily laugh, while thy remembered home 
 Gnaws like a viper at thy secret heart ! 
 aged women ! ye who weekly catch 
 The morsel tossed by law-forced charity, 
 And die so slowly, that none call it murder! 
 O loathly suppliants ! ye, that unreceived 
 Totter heart-broken from the closing gates 
 Of the full Lazar-house : or, gazing, stand 
 Sick with despair ! O ye to glory's field 
 Forced or ensnared, who, as ye gasp in death, 
 Bleed with new wounds beneath the vulture's beak ! 
 O thou poor widow, who in dreams dost view 
 Thy husband's mangled corse, and from short doze 
 Start'st with a shriek ; or in thy half-thatched cot 
 Waked by the wintry night-storm, wet and cold 
 Cow'rst o'er thy screaming baby ! Rest awhile 
 Children of wretchedness! More groans must rise, 
 More blood must stream, or ere your wrongs be full. 
 Yet is the day of retribution nigh : 
 The Lamb of God hath opened the fifth seal : 
 And upward rush on swiftest wing of fire 
 The innumerable multitude of Wrongs 
 By man on man inflicted ! Rest awhile, 
 Children of wretchedness ! The hour is nigh ; 
 And lo ! the great, the rich, the mighty Men, 
 
94 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 The Kings and the chief Captains of the World 1 , 
 With all that fixed on high like stars of Heaven 
 Shot baleful influence, shall be cast to earth, 
 Vile and down- trodden, as the untimely fruit 
 Shook from the fig-tree by a sudden storm. 
 Even now the storm begins : ' each gentle name, 
 Faith and meek Piety, with fearful joy 
 Tremble far-off — for lo ! the giant Frenzy 
 Uprooting empires with his whirlwind arm 
 Mocketh high Heaven; burst hideous from the cell 
 Where the old Hag, unconquerable, huge, 
 Creation's eyeless drudge, black ruin, sits 
 Nursing the impatient earthquake. 
 
 O return ! 
 Pure Faith ! meek Piety ! The abhorred Form 
 Whose scarlet robe was stiff with earthly pomp, 
 Who drank iniquity in cups of gold, 
 Whose names were many and all blasphemous, 
 Hath met the horrible judgment ! Whence that cry ? 
 The mighty army of foul Spirits shrieked 
 Disherited of earth ! For she hath fallen 
 On whose black front was written Mystery ; 
 She that reeled heavily, whose wine was blood ; 
 She that worked whoredom with the Demon Power, 
 And from the dark embrace all evil things 
 Brought forth and nurtured : mitred atheism ! 
 And patient Folly who on bended knee 
 Gives back the steel that stabbed him; and pale Fear 
 
 1 Alluding to the French Revolution. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 95 
 
 Haunted by ghastlier shapings than surround 
 
 Moon-blasted Madness when he yells at midnight ! 
 
 Return pure Faith ! return meek Piety ! 
 
 The kingdoms of the world are yours : each heart 
 
 Self-governed, the vast family of Love 
 
 Raised from the common earth by common toil 
 
 Enjoy the equal produce. Such delights 
 
 As float to earth, permitted visitants ! 
 
 When in some hour of solemn jubilee 
 
 The massy gates of Paradise are thrown 
 
 Wide open, and forth come in fragments wild 
 
 Sweet echoes of unearthly melodies, 
 
 And odours snatched from beds of amaranth, 
 
 And they, that from the crystal river of life 
 
 Spring up on freshened wing, ambrosial gales ! 
 
 The favoured good man in his lonely walk 
 
 Perceives them, and his silent spirit drinks 
 
 Strange bliss which he shall recognise in heaven. 
 
 And such delights, such strange beatitudes 
 
 Seize on my young anticipating heart 
 
 When that blest future rushes on my view ! 
 
 For in his own and in his Father's might 
 
 The Saviour comes ! While as the Thousand Years 
 
 Lead up their mystic dance, the Desert shouts ! 
 
 Old Ocean claps his hands ! The mighty Dead 
 
 Rise to new life, whoe'er from earliest time 
 
 With conscious zeal had urged Love's wondrous plan, 
 
 Coadjutors of God. To Milton's trump 
 
 The high groves of the renovated Earth 
 
 Unbosom their glad echoes: inly hushed, 
 
96 JUVETSTILE POEMS. 
 
 Adoring- Newton his serener eye 
 Raises to heaven : and he of mortal kind 
 Wisest, he 1 first who marked the ideal tribes 
 Up the fine fibres through the sentient brain. 
 Lo ! Priestley there, patriot, and saint, and sage, 
 Him, full of years, from his loved native land 
 Statesmen blood stained and priests idolatrous 
 By dark lies maddening the blind multitude 
 Drove with vain bate. Calm, pitying he retired, 
 And mused expectant on these promised years. 
 
 O Years ! the blest pre-eminence of Saints ! 
 Ye sweep athwart my gaze, so heavenly bright, 
 The wings that veil the adoring Seraphs' eyes, 
 What time they bend before the Jasper Throne 2 
 Reflect no lovelier hues ! Yet ye depart, 
 And all beyond is darkness ! Heights most strange, 
 Whence Fancy falls, fluttering her idle wing. 
 For who of woman born may paint the hour, 
 When seized in his mid course, the Sun shall wane 
 Making noon ghastly ! Who of woman born 
 May image in the workings of his thought, 
 How the black-visaged, red-eyed Fiend out- 
 stretched 3 
 
 1 David Hartley. 
 
 s Rev. chap. iv. v. 52 and 3. — And immediately I was 
 in the Spirit : and behold, a Throne was set in Heaven 
 and one sat on the Throne. And he that sat was to look 
 upon like a jasper and a sardine stone, &c. 
 
 3 The final destruction impersonated. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 97 
 
 Beneath the unsteady feet of Nature groans, 
 In feverous slumbers — destined then to wake, 
 When fiery whirlwinds thunder his dread name 
 And Angels shout, Destruction ! How his arm 
 The last great Spirit lifting high in air 
 Shall swear by Him, the ever-living One, 
 Time is no more ! 
 
 Believe thou, O my soul, 
 Life is a vision shadowy of Truth ; 
 And vice, and anguish, and the wormy grave, 
 Shapes of a dream ! The veiling clouds retire, 
 And lo ! the Throne of the redeeming God 
 Forth flashing unimaginable day 
 Wraps in one blaze earth, heaven, and deepest hell. 
 
 Contemplant Spirits ! ye that hover o'er 
 
 With untired gaze the immeasurable fount 
 
 Ebullient with creative Deity ! 
 
 And ye of plastic power, that interfused 
 
 Roll through the grosser and material mass 
 
 In organizing surge ! Holies of God ! 
 
 (And what if Monads of the infinite mind) 
 
 I haply journeying my immortal course 
 
 Shall sometime join your mystic choir. Till then 
 
 I discipline my young and novice thought 
 
 In ministeries of heart-stirring song, 
 
 And aye on Meditation's heaven-ward wing 
 
 Soaring aloft I breathe the empyreal air 
 
 Of Love, omnific, omnipresent Love, 
 
 VOL. I. II 
 
98 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Whose day-spring rises glorious in my soul 
 As the great Sun, when he his influence 
 Sheds on the frost-bound waters — The glad stream 
 Flows to the ray and warbles as it flows. 
 
 THE DESTINY OF NATIONS. 
 A VISION. 
 
 Auspicious Reverence ! Hush all meaner song, 
 
 Ere we the deep preluding strain have poured 
 
 To the Great Father, only Rightful King, 
 
 Eternal Father ! King Omnipotent ! 
 
 To the Will Absolute, the One, the Good ! 
 
 The I AM, the Word, the Life, the Living God ! 
 
 Such symphony requires best instrument. 
 Seize, then, my soul ! from Freedom's trophied dome 
 The harp which hangeth high between the shields 
 Of Brutus and Leonidas ! With that 
 Strong music, that soliciting spell, force back 
 Man's free and stirring spirit that lies entranced. 
 
 For what is freedom, but the unfettered use 
 Of all the powers which God for use had given ? 
 But chiefly this, him first, him last to view 
 Through meaner powers and secondary things 
 Effulgent, as through clouds that veil his blaze. 
 For all that meets the bodily sense I deem 
 Symbolical, one mighty alphabet 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 99 
 
 For infant minds ; and we in this low world 
 Placed with our backs to bright reality, 
 That we may learn with young unwounded ken 
 The substance from its shadow. Infinite Love, 
 Whose latence is the plenitude of all, 
 Thou with retracted beams, and self-eclipse 
 Veiling, revealest thine eternal Sun. 
 
 But some there are who deem themselves most free 
 When they within this gross and visible sphere 
 Chain down the winged thought, scoffing ascent, 
 Proud in their meanness : and themselves they cheat 
 With noisy emptiness of learned phrase, 
 Their subtle fluids, impacts, essences, 
 Self-working tools, uncaused effects, and all 
 Those blind omniscients, those almighty slaves, 
 Untenanting creation of its God. 
 
 But properties are God : the naked mass 
 (If mass there be, fantastic guess or ghost) 
 Acts only by its inactivity. 
 Here we pause humbly. Others boldlier think 
 That as one body seems the aggregate 
 Of atoms numberless, each organized ; 
 So by a strange and dim similitude 
 Infinite myriads of self-conscious minds 
 Are one all-conscious Spirit, which informs 
 With absolute ubiquity of thought 
 (His one eternal self-affirming act !) 
 All his involved Monads, that yet seem 
 
100 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 With various province and apt agency 
 Each to pursue its own self-centring- end. 
 Some nurse the infant diamond in the mine ; 
 Some roll the genial juices through the oak ; 
 Some drive the mutinous clouds to clash in air, 
 And rushing on the storm with whirlwind speed, 
 Yoke the red lightnings to their volleying car. 
 Thus these pursue their never- varying course, 
 No eddy in their stream. Others, more wild, 
 With complex interests weaving human fates, 
 Duteous or proud, alike obedient all, 
 Evolve the process of eternal good. 
 
 And what if some rebellious o'er dark realms 
 Arrogate power ? yet these train up to God, 
 And on the rude eye, unconfirmed for day, 
 Flash meteor-lights better than total gloom. 
 As ere from Lieule-Oaive's vapoury head 
 The Laplander beholds the far-off sun 
 Dart his slant beam on unobeying snows, 
 While yet the stern and solitary night 
 Brooks no alternate sway, the Boreal Mom 
 With mimic lustre substitutes its gleam, 
 Guiding his course or by Niemi lake 
 Or Balda Zhiok, 1 or the mossy stone 
 Of Solfar-kapper, 2 while the snowy blast 
 
 1 Balda Zhiok ; i. e. mons altitudinis, the highest moun 
 tain in Lapland. 
 
 2 Solfar Kapper ; capitium Solfar, hie locus omnium 
 quotquot veterum Lapponum superstitio sacrifices religi- 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 101 
 
 Drifts arrowy hj y or eddies round his sledge, 
 Making the poor babe at its mother's back ' 
 Scream in its scanty cradle : he the while 
 Wins gentle solace as with upward eye 
 He marks the streamy banners of the North, 
 Thinking himself those happy spirits shall join 
 Who there in floating robes of rosy light 
 Dance sportively. For Fancy is the power 
 That first unsensualizes the dark mind, 
 Giving it new delights ; and bids it swell 
 With wild activity ; and peopling air, 
 By obscure fears of beings invisible, 
 Emancipates it from the grosser thrall 
 Of the present impulse, teaching self-control, 
 
 osoque cultui dedicavit, celebratissimus erat, in parte sinus 
 australis situs semimilliaris spatio a mari distans. Ipse 
 locus, quern curiositatis gratia aliquando me invisisse me- 
 mini, duabus prealtis lapidibus, sibi invicem oppositis, 
 quorum alter musco circumdatus erat, constabat. — Leemius 
 de Lapponibus. 
 
 1 The Lapland women carry their infants at their back 
 in a piece of excavated wood, which serves them for a 
 cradle. Opposite to the infant's mouth there is a hole 
 for it to breathe through. — Mirandum prorsus est et vix 
 credibile nisi cui vidisse contigit. Lappones hyeme iter 
 facientes pervastos montes.perque horridaet inviatesqua, 
 eo presertim tempore quo omnia perpetuis nivibus obtecta 
 sunt et nives ventis agitantur et in gyros aguntur, viam ad 
 destinata loca absque errore invenire posse, lactantem 
 autem infantem si quern habeat, ipsa mater in dorso bajulat, 
 in excavato ligno (Gieed'k ipsi vocant) quod pro cunis 
 utuntur : in hoc infans pannis et pellibus convolutus colli- 
 gatus jacet. — Leemius de Lapponibus. 
 
102 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Till Superstition with unconscious hand 
 
 Seat Reason on her throne. Wherefore not vain, 
 
 Nor yet without permitted power impressed, 
 
 I deem those legends terrible, with which 
 
 The polar ancient thrills his uncouth throng 1 : 
 
 Whether of pitying Spirits that make their moan 
 
 O'er slaughtered infants, or that giant bird 
 
 Vuokho, of whose rushing wings the noise 
 
 Is tempest, when the unutterable 1 shape 
 
 Speeds from the mother of Death, and utters once 
 
 That shriek, which never murderer heard, and lived. 
 
 Or if the Greenland Wizard in strange trance 
 Pierces the untravelled realms of Ocean's bed 
 Over the abysm, even to that uttermost cave 
 By mis-shaped prodigies beleaguered, such 
 As earth ne'er bred, nor air, nor the upper sea : 
 Where dwells the Fury Form, whose unheard name 
 With eager eye, pale cheek, suspended breath, 
 And lips half-opening with the dread of sound, 
 Unsleeping Silence guards, worn out with fear 
 Lest haply 'scaping on some treacherous blast 
 The fateful word let slip the elements 
 And frenzy Nature. Yet the wizard her, 
 Armed with Torng-arsuck's 2 power, the Spirit of 
 Good, 
 
 1 Jaibme Aibmo. 
 
 2 They call the Good Spirit Torngarsuck. The other 
 great but malignant spirit is a nameless Female ; she 
 dwells under the sea in a great house, where she can detain 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 103 
 
 Forces to unchain the foodful progeny 
 
 Of the Ocean stream; thence thro' the realm 
 
 of Souls, 
 Where live the Innocent, as far from cares 
 As from the storms and overwhelming 1 waves 
 That tumble on the surface of the Deep, 
 Returns with far-heard pant, hotly pursued 
 By the fierce Warders of the Sea, once more, 
 Ere by the frost foreclosed, to repossess 
 His fleshly mansion, that had staid the while 
 In the dark tent within a cow'ring group 
 Untenanted.— Wild phantasies ! yet wise, 
 On the victorious goodness of high God 
 Teaching reliance, and medicinal hope, 
 Till from Bethabra northward, heavenly Truth 
 With gradual steps, winning her difficult way, 
 Transfer their rude Faith perfected and pure. 
 
 If there be beings of higher class than Man, 
 I deem no nobler province they possess, 
 Than by disposal of apt circumstance 
 To rear up kingdoms : and the deeds they prompt, 
 
 in captivity all the animals of the ocean by her magic 
 power. When a dearth befalls the Greenlanders, an An- 
 gekok or magician must undertake a journey thither. He 
 passes through the kingdom of souls, over a horrible 
 abyss into the Palace of this phantom, and by his enchant- 
 ments causes the captive creatures to ascend directly to 
 the surface of the ocean. — See Crantz's History of Greenland, 
 vol. i. 206. 
 
104 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Distinguishing from mortal agency, 
 They choose their human ministers from such states 
 As still the Epic song half fears to name, 
 Repelled from all the minstrelsies that strike 
 The palace-roof and soothe the monarch's pride. 
 
 And such, perhaps, the Spirit, who (if words 
 Witnessed by answering deeds may claim our faith) 
 Held commune with that warrior-maid of France 
 Who scourged the Invader. From her infant days, 
 With Wisdom, mother of retired thoughts, 
 Her soul had dwelt ; and she was quick to mark 
 The good and evil thing, in human lore 
 Undisciplined. For lowly was her birth, 
 And Heaven had doomed her early years to toil 
 That pure from tyranny's least deed, herself 
 Unfeared by fellow-natures, she might wait 
 On the poor labouring man with kindly looks, 
 And minister refreshment to the tired 
 Way-wanderer, when along the rough hewn bench 
 The sweltry man had stretched him, and aloft 
 Vacantly watched the rudely pictured board 
 Which on the mulberry-bough with welcome creak 
 Swung to the pleasant breeze. Here, too, the Maid 
 Learnt more than schools could teach : Man's 
 
 shifting mind, 
 His vices and his sorrows ! And full oft 
 At tales of cruel wrong and strange distress 
 Had wept and shivered. To the tottering eld 
 Still as a daughter would she run : she placed 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 105 
 
 His cold limbs at the sunny door, and loved 
 To hear him story, in his garrulous sort, 
 Of his eventful years, all come and gone. 
 
 So twenty seasons past. The Virgin's form, 
 Active and tall, nor sloth nor luxury 
 Had shrunk or paled. Her front sublime and broad, 
 Her flexile eye-brows wildly haired and low, 
 And her full eye, now bright, now unillumed, 
 Spake more than Woman's thought ; and all her 
 
 face 
 Was moulded to such features as declared 
 That pity there had oft and strongly worked, 
 And sometimes indignation. Bold her mien, 
 And like a haughty huntress of the woods 
 She moved : yet sure she was a gentle maid ! 
 And in each motion her most innocent soul 
 Beamed forth so brightly, that who saw would say 
 Guilt was a thing impossible in her ! 
 Nor idly would have said— for she had lived 
 In this bad World, as in a place of tombs, 
 And touched not the pollutions of the dead. 
 
 'Twas the cold season when the rustic's eye 
 From the drear desolate whiteness of his fields 
 Rolls for relief to watch the skiey tints 
 And clouds slow varying their huge imagery ; 
 When now, as she was wont, the healthful Maid 
 Had left her pallet ere one beam of day 
 Slanted the fos:-smoke. She went forth alone 
 
1 06 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Urged by the indwelling angel-guide, that oft, 
 With dim inexplicable sympathies 
 Disquieting the heart, shapes out Man's course 
 To the predoomed adventure. Now the ascent 
 She climbs of that steep upland, on whose top 
 The Pilgrim-man, who long since eve had watched 
 The alien shine of unconcerning stars, 
 Shouts to himself, there first the Abbey-lights 
 Seen in Neufchatel's vale ; now slopes adown 
 The winding sheep-track vale-ward : when, behold 
 In the first entrance of the level road 
 An unattended team ! The foremost horse 
 Lay with stretched limbs ; the others, yet alive 
 But stiff and cold, stood motionless, their manes 
 Hoar with the frozen night dews. Dismally 
 The dark-red dawn now glimmered ; but its gleams 
 Disclosed no face of man. The maiden paused, 
 Then hailed who might be near. No voice replied. 
 From the thwart wain at length there reached her 
 
 ear 
 A sound so feeble that it almost seemed 
 Distant : and feebly, with slow effort pushed, 
 A miserable man crept forth : his limbs 
 The silent frost had eat, scathing like fire. 
 Faint on the shafts he rested. She, mean time, 
 Saw crowded close beneath the coverture 
 A mother and her children — lifeless all, 
 Yet lovely ! not a lineament was marred — 
 Death had put on so slumber-like a form ! 
 It was a piteous sight ; and one, a babe, 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 107 
 
 The crisp milk frozen on its innocent lips, 
 Lay on the woman's arm, its little hand 
 Stretched on her bosom. 
 
 Mutely questioning, 
 The Maid gazed wildly at the living wretch. 
 He, his head feebly turning, on the group 
 Looked with a vacant stare, and his eye spoke 
 The drowsy calm that steals on worn-out anguish. 
 She shuddered; but, each vainer pang subdued, 
 Quick disentangling from the foremost horse 
 The rustic bands, with difficulty and toil [rived, 
 The stiff cramped team forced homeward. There ar- 
 Anxiously tends him she with healing herbs, 
 And weeps and prays — but the numb power of Death 
 Spreads o'er his limbs ; and ere the noontide hour, 
 The hovering spirits of his wife and babes 
 Hail him immortal ! Yet amid his pangs, 
 With interruptions long from ghastly throes, 
 His voice had faltered out this simple tale. 
 
 The village, where he dwelt a husbandman, 
 By sudden inroad had been seized and fired 
 Late on the yester-evening. With his wife 
 And little ones he hurried his escape. [heard 
 
 They saw the neighbouring hamlets flame, they 
 Uproar and shrieks ! and terror-struck drove on 
 Through unfrequented roads, a weary way ! 
 But saw nor house nor cottage. All had quenched 
 Their evening hearth-fire : for the alarm had spread. 
 
108 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 The air clippedkeen, the night was fanged with frost, 
 And they provisionless ! The weeping wife 
 111 hushed her children's moans ; and still they 
 
 moaned, 
 Till fright and cold and hunger drank their life. 
 They closed their eyes in sleep, nor knew 'twas 
 
 death. 
 He only, lashing his o'er-wearied team, 
 Gained a sad respite, till beside the base 
 Of the high hill his foremost horse dropped dead. 
 Then hopeless, strengthless, sick for lack of food, 
 He crept beneath the coverture, entranced, 
 Till wakened by the maiden. — Such his tale. 
 
 Ah ! suffering to the height of what was suffered; 
 Stung with too keen a sympathy, the Maid 
 Brooded with moving lips, mute, startful, dark ! 
 And now her flushed tumultuous features shot 
 Such strange vivacity, as fires the eye 
 Of misery fancy-crazed ! and now once more 
 Naked, and void, and fixed, and all within 
 The unquiet silence of confused thought 
 And shapeless feelings. For a mighty hand 
 Was strong upon her, till in the heat of soul 
 To the high hill-top tracing back her steps, 
 Aside the beacon, up whose smouldered stones 
 The tender ivy-trails crept thinly, there, 
 Unconscious of the driving element, 
 Yea, swallowed up in the ominous dream, she sate 
 Ghastly as broad-eyed Slumber ! a dim anguish 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. ] 09 
 
 Breathed from her look ! and still with pant and sob, 
 Inly she toil'd to flee, and still subdued, 
 Felt an inevitable Presence near. 
 
 Thus as she toiled in troublous ecstasy, 
 A horror of great darkness wrapt her round, 
 And a voice uttered forth unearthly tones, 
 Calming; her soul,—" O Thou of the Most High 
 Chosen, whom all the perfected in Heaven 
 Behold expectant ■ < - 
 
 [The following fragments were intended to form part of 
 the poem when finished.] 
 
 " Maid beloved of Heaven ! 
 (To her the tutelary Power exclaimed) 
 Of Chaos the adventurous progeny 
 Thou seest ; foul missionaries of foul sire, 
 Fierce to regain the losses of that hour 
 When Love rose glittering, and his gorgeous wings 
 Over the abyss fluttered with such glad noise, 
 As what time after long and pestful calms, 
 With slimy shapes and miscreated life 
 Poisoning the vast Pacific, the fresh breeze 
 Wakens the merchant-sail uprising. Night 
 A heavy unimaginable moan 
 Sent forth, when she the Protoplast beheld 
 Stand beauteous on confusion's charmed wave. 
 Moaning she fled, and entered the Profound 
 That leads with downward windings to the cave 
 
1 ] JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Of darkness palpable, desert of Death 
 Sunk deep beneath Gehenna's massy roots. 
 There many a dateless age the beldam lurked 
 And trembled ; till engendered by fierce Hate, 
 Fierce Hate and gloomy Hope, a Dream arose, 
 Shaped like a black cloud marked with streaks of 
 
 fire. 
 It roused the Hell-Hag: she the dew damp wiped 
 From off her brow, and through the uncouth maze 
 Retraced her steps ; but ere she reached the mouth 
 Of that drear labyrinth, shuddering she paused, 
 Nor dared re-enter the diminished Gulf. 
 As through the dark vaults of some mouldered tower 
 (Which, fearful to approach, the evening hind 
 Circles at distance in his homeward way) 
 The winds breathe hollow, deemed the plaining groan 
 Of prisoned spirits ; with such fearful voice 
 Night murmured, and the sound thro' Chaos went. 
 Leaped at her call her hideous-fronted brood ! 
 A dark behest they heard, and rushed on earth ; 
 Since that sad hour, in camps and courts adored, 
 Rebels from God, and tyrants o'er Mankind !" 
 
 From his obscure haunt 
 Shrieked Fear, of Cruelty the ghastly dam, 
 Feverous yet freezing, eager-paced yet slow, 
 As she that creeps from forth her swampy reeds, 
 Ague, the biform hag ! when early Spring 
 Beams on the marsh-bred vapours. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 1 1 1 
 
 " Even so (the exulting Maiden said) 
 The sainted heralds of good tidings fell, 
 And thus they witnessed God ! But now the clouds 
 Treading, and storms beneath their feet, they soar 
 Higher, and higher soar, and soaring sing 
 Loud songs of triumph! O ye spirits of God, 
 Hover around my mortal agonies !" 
 She spake, and instantly faint melody 
 Melts on her ear, soothing and sad, and slow, 
 Such measures, as at calmest midnight heard 
 By aged hermit in his holy dream, 
 Foretell and solace death ; and now they rise 
 Louder, as when with harp and mingled voice 
 The white-robed 1 multitude of slaughtered saints 
 At Heaven's wide-opened portals gratulant 
 Receive some martyr'd patriot. The harmony 
 Entranced the Maid, till each suspended sense 
 Brief slumber seized, and confused ecstasy. 
 
 At length awakening slow, she gazed around : 
 And through a mist, the relique of that trance 
 Still thinning as she gazed, an Isle appeared, 
 Its high, o'er-hanging, white, broad-breasted cliffs, 
 
 1 Revelations, vi. 9, 11. And when he had opened the 
 fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of them that were 
 slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they 
 held. And white robes were given unto every one of them, 
 and it was said unto them, that they should rest yet for a little 
 season, until their fellow servants also and their brethren, 
 that should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled. 
 
112 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Glassed on the subject ocean. A vast plain 
 Stretched opposite, where ever and anon 
 The plough-man following sad his meagre team 
 Turned up fresh sculls unstartled, and the bones 
 Of fierce hate-breathing combatants, who there 
 All mingled lay beneath the common earth, 
 Death's gloomy reconcilement ! O'er the fields 
 Stept a fair Form, repairing all she might, 
 Her temples olive-wreatbed ; and where she trod, 
 Fresh flowerets rose, and many a foodful herb. 
 But wan her cheek, her footsteps insecure, 
 And anxious pleasure beamed in her faint eye, 
 As she had newly left a couch of pain, 
 Pale convalescent ! (yet some time to rule 
 With power exclusive o'er the willing world, 
 That blest prophetic mandate then fulfilled — 
 Peace be on Earth !) A happy while, but brief, 
 She seemed to wander with assiduous feet, 
 And healed the recent harm of chill and blight, 
 And nursed each plant that fair and virtuous grew. 
 
 But soon a deepprecursive sound moaned hollow : 
 Black rose the clouds, and now, (as in a dream) 
 Their reddening shapes, transformed to warrior- 
 hosts, 
 Coursed o'er the sky, and battled in mid-air. 
 Nor did not the large blood-drops fall from heaven 
 Portentous ! while aloft were seen to float, 
 Like hideous features booming on the mist, 
 Wan stains of ominous light ! Resigned, yet sad, 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 113 
 
 The fair Form bowed her olive-crowned brow, 
 Then o'er the plain with oft reverted eye 
 Fled till a place of tombs she reached, and there 
 Within a ruined sepulchre obscure 
 Found hiding-place. 
 
 The delegated Maid 
 Gazed through her tears, then in sad tones ex- 
 claimed ;— *■ 
 " Thou mild-eyed Form ! wherefore, ah ! where- 
 fore fled ? 
 The power of Justice like a name all light, 
 Shone from thy brow ; but all they, who unblamed 
 Dwelt in thy dwellings, call thee Happiness. 
 Ah ! why, uninjured and unprofited, 
 Should multitudes against their brethren rush ? 
 Why sow they guilt, still reaping misery ? 
 Lenient of care, thy songs, O Peace ! are sweet, 
 As after showers the perfumed gale of eve, 
 That flings the cool drops on a feverous cheek ; 
 And gay thy grassy altar piled with fruits. 
 But boasts the shrine of demon War one charm, 
 Save that with many an orgie strange and foul, 
 Dancing around with interwoven arms, 
 The maniac Suicide and giant Murder 
 Exult in their fierce union ! I am sad, 
 And know not why the simple peasants crowd 
 Beneath the Chieftains' standard !" Thus the Maid. 
 
 To her the tutelary Spirit said : 
 
 VOL. I. I 
 
114 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 "When luxury and lust's exhausted stores 
 No more can rouse the appetites of kings ; 
 When the low flattery of their reptile lords 
 Falls flat and heavy on the accustomed ear ; 
 When eunuchs sing, and fools buffoonery make, 
 And dancers writhe their harlot-limbs in vain ; 
 Then War and all its dread vicissitudes 
 Pleasingly agitate their stagnant hearts ; 
 Its hopes, its fears, its victories, its defeats, 
 Insipid royalty's keen condiment ! 
 Therefore uninjured and unprofited, 
 (Victims at once and executioners) 
 The congregated husbandmen lay waste 
 The vineyard and the harvest. As along 
 The Bothnic coast, or southward of the Line, 
 Though hushed the winds and cloudless the high 
 
 noon, 
 Yet if Leviathan, weary of ease, 
 In sports unwieldy toss his island-bulk, 
 Ocean behind him billows, and before 
 A storm of waves breaks foamy on the strand. 
 And hence, for times and seasons bloody and dark, 
 Short Peace shall skin the wounds of causeless War, 
 And War, his strained sinews knit anew, 
 Still violate the unfinished works of Peace. 
 But yonder look ! for more demands thy view '." 
 He said : and straightway from the opposite Isle 
 A vapour sailed, as when a cloud, exhaled 
 From Egypt's fields that steam hot pestilence, 
 Travels the sky for many a trackless league, 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 115 
 
 Till o'er some death-doomed land, distant in vain, 
 It broods incumbent. Forthwith from the plain, 
 Facing the Isle, a brighter cloud arose, 
 And steered its course which way the vapour went. 
 
 The Maiden paused, musing what this might 
 
 mean. 
 But long time passed not, ere that brighter cloud 
 Returned more bright ; along the plain it swept ; 
 And soon from forth its bursting sides emerged 
 A dazzling form, broad-bosomed, bold of eye, 
 And wild her hair, save where with laurels bound. 
 Not more majestic stood the healing God, 
 When from his bow the arrow sped that slew 
 Huge Python. Shriek'd Ambition's giant throng, 
 And with them hissed the locust-fiends that crawled 
 And glittered in Corruption's slimy track. 
 Great was their wrath, for short they knew their 
 
 reign ; 
 And such commotion made they, and uproar, 
 As when the mad tornado bellows through 
 The guilty islands of the western main, 
 What time departing from their native shores, 
 Eboe, or 1 Koromantyn's plain of palms, 
 The infuriate spirits of the murdered make 
 Fierce merriment, and vengeance ask of Heaven. 
 
 1 The Slaves in the West-Indies consider death as a 
 passport to their native country This sentiment is thus 
 expressed in the introduction to a Greek Prize-Ode on the 
 
116 JUVENILE POEMS. 
 
 Warmed with new influence, the unwholesome plain 
 Sent up its foulest fogs to meet the morn : 
 The Sun that rose on Freedom, rose in blood ! 
 
 " Maiden beloved, and Delegate of Heaven ! 
 (To her the tutelary Spirit said) 
 
 Slave-Trade, of which the thoughts are better than the lan- 
 o-uao-e in which they are conveyed. 
 
 ''il ctkotou TrvXag Qdvars, Trpdkt'nrwv 
 'Eg ysVof (nrtvSoig v-ko£,ev)(%ev 'Arte 
 Oil Z,tvicr6r)Gy yevvuv (nrapayfiois, 
 
 OiiS' oXoXvyfitp, 
 'AXXd /ecu kiikXokti x poiTvrroicn, 
 K.'dcfia.TOJV X a P$' tyo&ipoQ \"- tv iaiJl 
 'AXX' 6[iH)Q 'EXevQtply avvouceTg, 
 
 'SiTvyvi Tvpavvs ! 
 AaOKioig sttI TTTSpvysaffi cryai 
 T A ! SraXacnnov tcaQopwvTEQ oTS/ia 
 AiOepoTrXdyicTOiQ vtto ttoco avtioi 
 
 HarpiB' ett' alav. 
 "EvOa p.dv "Epatrai 'Epwfievyaiv 
 'Afupl TVf]yij(Jiv KirpivoJv vtt' aXowv, 
 "Ocrcr' vtvo fipoTolg tiraQov /3poroi, rd 
 
 Aeivd Xeyovri. 
 
 LITERAL TRANSLATION. 
 
 Leaving- the gates of darkness, O Death ! hasten thou 
 to a race yoked with misery ! Thou wilt not he received 
 with lacerations of cheeks, nor with funeral ululation — but 
 with circling dances and the joy of songs. Thou art terri- 
 ble indeed, yet thou dwellest with Liberty, stern Genius ! 
 Borne on thy dark pinions over the swelling of Ocean, they 
 return to their native country. There, by the side of foun- 
 tains beneath citron-groves, the lovers tell to their beloved 
 what horrors, being men, they had endured from men. 
 
JUVENILE POEMS. 117 
 
 Soon shall the morning struggle into day, 
 The stormy morning into cloudless noon. 
 Much hast thou seen, nor all canst understand — 
 But this be thy best omen — Save thy Country !" 
 Thus saying, from the answering Maid he passed, 
 And with him disappeared the heavenly Vision. 
 
 " Glory to Thee, Father of Earth and Heaven! 
 All conscious presence of the Universe ! 
 Nature's vast ever-acting energy ! 
 In will, in deed, impulse of All to All ! 
 Whether thy Love with unrefracted ray 
 Beam on the Prophet's purged eye, or if 
 Diseasing realms the enthusiast, wild of thought, 
 Scatter new frenzies on the infected throng, 
 Thou both inspiring and predooming both, 
 Fit instruments and best, of perfect end : 
 Glory to Thee, Father of Earth and Heaven ! " 
 
 And first a landscape rose 
 More wild and waste and desolate than where 
 The white bear, drifting on a field of ice, 
 Howls to her sundered cubs with piteous rage 
 And savage agony. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 I. POEMS OCCASIONED BY POLITICAL EVENTS 
 
 OR FEELINGS CONNECTED 
 
 WITH THEM. 
 
When I have borne in memory what has tamed 
 
 Great nations, how ennobling thoughts depart 
 
 When men change swords for ledgers, and desert 
 
 The student's bower for gold, some fears unnamed 
 
 I had, my country ! Am I to be blamed ! 
 
 But, when I think of Thee, and what thou art, 
 
 Verily, in the bottom of my heart, 
 
 Of those unfilial fears I am ashamed. 
 
 But dearly must we prize thee ; we who find 
 
 In thee a bulwark of the cause of men ; 
 
 And I by my affection was beguiled. 
 
 What wonder if a poet, now and then, 
 
 Among the many movements of his mind, 
 
 Felt for thee as a Lover or a Child. 
 
 ■WORDSWORTH. 
 
ODE TO THE DEPARTING YEAR.* 
 
 'Iov, lOtl, S) (I» KCLKa. 
 
 Yx' av fie Seivbg dp&ofiavrelag tcovoq 
 
 2rpo£sZ, rapaoffiov <ppoi{iioig t<pr]fiioig. 
 
 ***** 
 
 To fieWov tfZa. Kai <sv fi' iv ra-fcti Ttupuv 
 "Ayav y' a\r]66fiavTiv oiKTiipag kpeic;. 
 
 &schyl. Agam. 1225. 
 
 ARGUMENT. 
 
 The Ode commences with an address to the Divine Pro- 
 vidence, that regulates into one vast harmony all the events 
 of time, however calamitous some of them may appear to 
 mortals. The second Strophe calls on men to suspend their 
 private joys and sorrows, and devote them for a while to the 
 cause of human nature in general. The first Epode speaks 
 of the Empress of Russia, who died of an apoplexy on the 
 17th of November, 1796 ; having just concluded a sub- 
 sidiary treaty with the Kings combined against France- 
 The first and second Antistrophe describe the Image of the 
 Departing Year, &c. as in a vision. The second Epode 
 prophecies, in anguish of spirit, the downfall of this 
 country. 
 
 Spirit who sweepest the wild harp of Time ! 
 It is most hard, with an untroubled ear 
 Thy dark inwoven harmonies to hear! 
 
 1 This Ode was composed on the 24th, 25th, and 26th 
 days of December, 1796: and was first published on the 
 last day of that year. 
 
122 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Yet, mine eye fixed on Heaven's unchanging clime, 
 Long had I listened, free from mortal fear, 
 
 With inward stillness, and a bowed mind ; 
 
 When lo ! its folds far waving on the wind, 
 I saw the train of the departing Year ! 
 
 Starting from my silent sadness 
 
 Then with no unholy madness 
 Ere yet the entered cloud foreclosed my sight, 
 I raised the impetuous song, and solemnized his 
 flight. 
 
 Hither, from the recent tomb, 
 
 From the prison's direr gloom, 
 From distemper's midnight anguish ; 
 And thence, where poverty doth waste and languish ! 
 Or where, his two bright torches blending, 
 
 Love illumines manhood's maze ; 
 Or where o'er cradled infants bending 
 Hope has fixed her wishful gaze ; 
 
 Hither, in perplexed dance, 
 Ye Woes ! ye young-eyed Joys ! advance ! 
 
 By Time's wild harp, and by the hand 
 
 Whose indefatigable sweep 
 
 Raises its fateful strings from sleep, 
 T bid you haste, a mixed tumultuous band ! 
 
 From every private bower, 
 And each domestic hearth, 
 
 Haste for one solemn hour ; 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 123 
 
 And with a loud and yet a louder voice, 
 O'er Nature struggling in portentous birth, 
 
 Weep and rejoice ! 
 Still echoes the dread name that o'er the earth 
 Let slip the storm, and woke the brood of Hell : 
 
 And now advance in saintly jubilee 
 Justice and Truth ! They too have heard thy spell, 
 They too obey thy name, divinest Liberty! 
 
 I marked Ambition in his war-array ! 
 
 I heard the mailed Monarch's troublous cry — 
 " Ah ! wherefore does the Northern Conqueress 
 
 stay ! 
 Groans not her chariot on its onward way ?" 
 Fly, mailed Monarch, fly ! 
 Stunned by Death's twice mortal mace, 
 No more on murder's lurid face 
 The insatiate hag shall gloat with drunken eye ! 
 Manes of the unnumbered slain ! 
 Ye that gasped on Warsaw's plain ! 
 Ye that erst at Ismail's tower, 
 When human ruin choked the streams, 
 
 Fell in conquest's glutted hour, 
 Mid women's shrieks and infants' screams ! 
 Spirits of the uncomned slain, 
 
 Sudden blasts of triumph swelling, 
 Oft, at night, in misty train, 
 
 Rush around her narrow dwelling ! 
 The exterminating- fiend is fled — 
 
124 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 (Foul her life, and dark her doom) 
 Mighty armies of the dead 
 
 Dance, like death-fires, round her tomb ! 
 Then with prophetic song relate, 
 Each some tyrant-murderer's fate ! 
 
 Departing Year ! 'twas on no earthly shore 
 My soul beheld thy vision ! Where alone, 
 Voiceless and stern, before the cloudy throne, 
 Aye Memory sits : thy robe inscribed with gore, 
 With many an unimaginable g-roan 
 
 Thou storied'st thy sad hours ! Silence ensued, 
 Deep silence o'er the ethereal multitude, 
 Whose locks with wreaths, whose wreaths with 
 glories shone. 
 Then, his eye wild ardours glancing, 
 From the choired gods advancing, 
 The Spirit of the Earth made reverence meet, 
 And stood up, beautiful, before the cloudy seat. 
 
 v. 
 
 Throughout the blissful throng, 
 
 Hushed were harp and song : 
 Till wheeling round the throne the Lampads seven, 
 
 (The mystic Words of Heaven) 
 
 Permissive signal make : [spake ! 
 
 The fervent Spirit bowed, then spread his wings and 
 " Thou in stormy blackness throning 
 
 Love and uncreated Light, 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 125 
 
 By the Earth's unsolaced groaning, 
 Seize thy terrors, Arm of might ! 
 By peace with proffered insult scared, 
 Masked hate and envying scorn ! 
 By years of havoc yet unborn ! 
 And hunger's bosom to the frost-winds bared '. 
 But chief by Afric's wrongs, 
 
 Strange, horrible, and foul ! 
 By what deep guilt belongs 
 To the deaf Synod, ' full of gifts and lies !' 
 By wealth's insensate laugh ! by torture's howl ! 
 Avenger, rise ! 
 For ever shall the thankless Island scowl, 
 Her quiver full, and with unbroken bow ? 
 Speak ! from thy storm-black Heaven O speak aloud ! 
 
 And on the darkling foe 
 Open thine eye of fire from some uncertain cloud ! 
 
 dart the flash ! O rise and deal the blow ! 
 The Past to thee, to thee the Future cries ! 
 Hark ! how wide Nature joins her groans below ! 
 Rise, God of Nature ! rise." 
 
 The voice had ceased, the vision fled ; 
 Yet still I gasped and reeled with dread. 
 And ever, when the dream of night 
 Renews the phantom to my sight, 
 Cold sweat-drops gather on my limbs ; 
 
 My ears throb hot ; my eye-balls start ; 
 My brain with horrid tumult swims ; 
 
126 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Wild is the tempest of my heart ; 
 And my thick and struggling 1 breath 
 Imitates the toil of death ! 
 No stranger agony confounds 
 
 The soldier on the war-field spread, 
 When all foredone with toil and wounds, 
 
 Death-like he dozes among heaps of dead ! 
 (The strife is o'er, the day-light fled, 
 
 And the night-wind clamours hoarse ! 
 See ! the starting wretch's head 
 
 Lies pillowed on a brother's corse !) 
 
 Not yet enslaved, not wholly vile, 
 O Albion ! O my mother Isle ! 
 Thy valleys, fair as Eden's bowers, 
 Glitter green with sunny showers ; 
 Thy grassy uplands gentle swells 
 
 Echo to the bleat of flocks ; 
 (Those grassy hills, those glittering dells 
 
 Proudly ramparted with rocks) 
 And Ocean mid his uproar wild 
 Speaks safety to his island-child, 
 
 Hence for many a fearless age 
 
 Has social Quiet loved thy shore ; 
 Nor ever proud invader's rage 
 Or sacked thy towers, or stained thy fields with gore. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Abandoned of Heaven ! mad avarice thy guide, 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 127 
 
 At cowardly distance, yet kindling- with pride — 
 Mid thy herds and thy corn-fields secure thou hast 
 
 stood, 
 And joined the wild yelling- of famine and blood ! 
 The nations curse thee ! They with eager wondering 
 Shall hear Destruction, like a vulture, scream ! 
 Strange-eyed Destruction ! who with many a 
 dream 
 Of central fires through nether seas upthundering 
 
 Soothes her fierce solitude ; yet as she lies 
 By livid fount, or red volcanic stream, 
 If ever to her lidless dragon-eyes, 
 Albion ! thy predestined ruins rise, 
 The fiend-hag on her perilous couch doth leap, 
 Muttering distempered triumph in her charmed 
 sleep 
 
 Away, my soul, away ! 
 In vain, in vain the birds of warning sing — 
 And hark ! I hear the famished brood of prey 
 Flap their lank pennons on the groaning- wind ! 
 Away, my soul, away ! 
 I unpartaking of the evil thing, 
 With daily prayer and daily toil 
 Soliciting for food my scanty soil, 
 Have wailed my country with a loud Lament. 
 Now I recentre my immortal mind 
 
 In the deep sabbath of meek self-content ; 
 Cleansed from the vaporous passions that bedim 
 God's Image, sister of the Seraphim. 
 
128 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 FRANCE. AN ODE. 
 
 Ye Clouds ! that far above me float and pause, 
 Whose pathless march no mortal may -control ! 
 Ye Ocean- Waves ! that, wheresoe'er ye roll, 
 
 Yield homage only to eternal laws ! 
 
 Ye Woods ! that listen to the night-birds singing, 
 Midway the smooth and perilous slope reclined, 
 
 Save when your own imperious branches swinging, 
 Have made a solemn music of the wind ! 
 
 Where, like a man beloved of God, 
 
 Through glooms, which never woodman trod, 
 How oft, pursuing fancies holy, 
 
 My moonlight way o'er flowering weeds I wound, 
 Inspired, beyond the guess of folly, 
 
 By each rude shape and wild unconquerable sound ! 
 
 O ye loud Waves ! and O ye Forests high ! 
 And O ye Clouds that far above me soared ! 
 
 Thou rising Sun ! thou blue rejoicing Sky ! 
 Yea, every thing that is and will be free ! ' 
 Bear witness for me, wheresoe'er ye be, 
 With what deep worship I have still adored . 
 The spirit of divinest Liberty. 
 
 When France in wrath her giant-limbs upreared, 
 And with that oath, which smote air, earth and sea, 
 
SIBY] LINE LE WES. 129 
 
 Stamped her strong foot and said she would be 
 free, 
 Bear witness for me, how I hoped and feared ! 
 With what a joy my lofty gratulation 
 
 Unawed I sang, amid a slavish band : 
 And when to whelm the disenchanted nation, 
 
 Like fiends embattled by a wizard's wand, 
 The Monarchs marched in evil day, 
 And Britain joined the dire array; 
 
 Though dear her shores and circling ocean, 
 Though many friendships, many youthful loves 
 
 Had swol'n the patriot emotion 
 And flung a magic light o'er all her hills and groves ; 
 Yet still my voice, unaltered, sang defeat 
 
 To all that braved the tyrant-quelling lance, 
 And shame too long delayed and vain retreat ! 
 For ne'er, O Liberty ! with partial aim 
 I dimmed thy light or damped thy holy flame ; 
 
 But blessed the paeans of delivered France, 
 And hung my head and wept at Britain's name. 
 
 in. 
 
 "And what," I said, "though Blasphemy's loud 
 scream 
 With that sweet music of deliverance strove I 
 Though all the fierce and drunken passions wove 
 A dance more wild than e'er was maniac's dream ! 
 Ye storms, that round the dawning east assem- 
 bled, 
 The Sun was rising, though ye hid his light ! " 
 
 VOL. I. K 
 
1 30 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 And when, to soothe my soul, that hoped and 
 trembled, [bright ; 
 
 The dissonance ceased, and all seemed calm and 
 When France her front deep-scarr'd and gory- 
 Concealed with clustering wreaths of glory ; 
 
 When, insupportably advancing, 
 Her arm made mockery of the warrior's tramp ; 
 
 While timid looks of fury glancing, 
 Domestic treason, crushed beneath her fatal 
 stamp, 
 Writhed like a wounded dragon in his gore ; 
 
 Then I reproached my fears that would not flee ; 
 " And soon," I said, "shall Wisdom teach her lore 
 In the low huts of them that toil and groan ! 
 And, conquering by her happiness alone, 
 
 Shall France compel the nations to be free, 
 Till Love and Joy look round, and call the Earth 
 their own." 
 
 Forgive me, Freedom ! O forgive those dreams ! 
 
 I hear thy voice, I hear thy loud lament, 
 
 From bleak Helvetia's icy cavern sent — 
 I bear thy groans upon her blood-stained streams ! 
 
 Heroes, that for your peaceful country perished, 
 And ye that, fleeing, spot your mountain-snows 
 
 With bleeding wounds ; forgive me, that I che- 
 rished 
 One thought that ever blessed your cruel foes ! 
 
 To scatter rage, and traitorous guilt, 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 131 
 
 Where Peace her jealous home had built ; 
 A patriot-race to disinherit 
 Of all that made their stormy wilds so dear ; 
 
 And with inexpiable spirit 
 To taint the bloodless freedom of the mountaineer — 
 O France, that mockest Heaven, adulterous, blind, 
 
 And patriot only in pernicious toils, 
 Are these thy boasts, Champion of human kind ? 
 
 To mix with Kings in the low lust of sway, 
 Yell in the hunt, and share the murderous prey ; 
 To insult the shrine of Liberty with spoils 
 
 From freemen torn ; to tempt and to betray ? 
 
 The Sensual and the Dark rebel in vain, 
 Slaves by their own compulsion ! In mad game 
 They burst their manacles and wear the name 
 
 Of Freedom, graven on a heavier chain ! 
 Liberty ! with profitless endeavour 
 Have I pursued thee, many a weary hour; 
 
 But thou nor swell'st the victor's strain, nor ever 
 Didst breathe thy soul in forms of human power. 
 Alike from all, howe'er they praise thee, 
 (Nor prayer, nor boastful name delays thee) 
 
 Alike from Priestcraft's harpy minions, 
 And factious Blasphemy's obscener slaves, 
 Thou speedest on thy subtle pinions, 
 The guide of homeless winds, and playmate of the 
 
 waves ! 
 And there I felt thee ! — on that sea- cliff's verge, 
 
132 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Whose pines, scarce travelled by the breeze 
 
 above, 
 
 Had made one murmur with the distant surge ! 
 
 Yes, while I stood and gazed, my temples bare, 
 
 And shot my being through earth, sea and air, 
 
 Possessing all things with intensest love, 
 
 O Liberty ! my spirit felt thee there. 
 
 February, 1797. 
 
 FEARS IN SOLITUDE. 
 
 WRITTEN IN APRIL, 1798, DURING THE ALARM 
 
 OF AN INVASION. 
 
 A green and silent spot, amid the hills, 
 
 A small and silent dell ! O'er stiller place 
 
 No singing sky-lark ever poised himself. 
 
 The hills are heathy, save that swelling slope, 
 
 Which hath a gay and gorgeous covering on, 
 
 All golden with the never-bloomless furze, 
 
 Which now blooms most profusely : but the dell, 
 
 Bathed by the mist, is fresh and delicate 
 
 As vernal corn-field, or the unripe flax, 
 
 When, through its half-transparent stalks, at eve, 
 
 The level sunshine glimmers with green light. 
 
 Oh ! 'tis a quiet spirit-healing nook ! 
 
 Which all, methinks, would love ; but chiefly he, 
 
 The humble man, who, in his youthful years, 
 
 Knew just so much of folly, as had made 
 
^SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 133 
 
 His early manhood more securely wise ! 
 Here he might lie on fern or withered heath, 
 While from the singing-lark (that sings unseen 
 The minstrelsy that solitude loves best,) 
 And from the sun, and from the breezy air, 
 Sweet influences trembled o'er his frame ; 
 And he, with many feelings, many thoughts, 
 Made up a meditative joy, and found 
 Religious meanings in the forms of nature ! 
 And so, his senses gradually wrapt 
 In a half sleep, he jdreams of better worlds, 
 And dreaming hears thee still, singing-lark j 
 That singest like an angel in the clouds ! 
 
 My God ! it is a melancholy thing 
 For such a man, who would full fain preserve 
 His soul in calmness, yet perforce must feel 
 For all his human brethren — O my God ! 
 It weighs upon the heart, that he must think 
 What uproar and what strife may now be stirring 
 This way or that way o'er these silent hills — 
 Invasion, and the thunder and the shout, 
 And all the crash of onset ; fear and rage, 
 And undetermined conflict — even now, 
 Even now, perchance, and in his native isle : 
 Carnage and groans beneath this blessed sun ! 
 We have offended, Oh ! my countrymen ! 
 We have offended very grievously, 
 And been most tyrannous. From east to west 
 A groan of accusation pierces Heaven ! 
 
134 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 The wretched plead against us ; multitudes 
 
 Countless and vehement, the sons of God, 
 
 Our brethren ! Like a cloud that travels on, 
 
 Steamed up from Cairo's swamps of pestilence 
 
 Even so, my countrymen ! have we gone forth 
 
 And borne to distant tribes slavery and pangs, 
 
 And, deadlier far, our vices, whose deep taint 
 
 With slow perdition murders the whole man, 
 
 His body and his soul ! Meanwhile, at home, 
 
 All individual dignity and power 
 
 Engulfed in courts, committees, institutions, 
 
 Associations and societies, 
 
 A vain, speech-mouthing, speech-reporting guild, 
 
 One benefit-club for mutual flattery, 
 
 We have drunk up, demure as at a grace, 
 
 Pollutions from the brimming cup of wealth ; 
 
 Contemptuous of all honourable rule, 
 
 Yet bartering freedom and the poor man's life 
 
 For gold, as at a market ! The sweet words 
 
 Of Christian promise, words that even yet 
 
 Might stem destruction, were they wisely preached, 
 
 Are muttered o'er by men, whose tones proclaim 
 
 How flat and wearisome' they feel their trade : 
 
 Rank scoffers some, but most too indolent 
 
 To deem them falsehoods or to know their truth. 
 
 Oh ! blasphemous ! the book of life is made 
 
 A superstitious instrument, on which 
 
 We gabble o'er the oaths we mean to break ; 
 
 For all must swear — all and in every place, 
 
 College and wharf, council and justice-court ; 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 135 
 
 All, all must swear, the briber and the bribed, 
 Merchant and lawyer, senator and priest, 
 The rich, the poor, the old man and the young ; 
 All, all make up one scheme of perjury, 
 That faith doth reel ; the veiy name of God 
 Sounds like a juggler's charm ; and, bold with joy, 
 Forth from his dark and lonely hiding-place, 
 (Portentous sight !) the owlet Atheism, 
 Sailing on obscene wings athwart the noon, 
 Drops his blue-fringed lids, and holds them close, 
 And hooting at the glorious sun in Heaven, 
 Cries out, " Where is it?" 
 
 Thankless too for peace, 
 (Peace long preserved by fleets and perilous seas) 
 Secure from actual warfare, we have loved 
 To swell the war-whoop, passionate for war ! 
 Alas ! for ages ignorant of all 
 Its ghastlier workings, (famine or blue plague, 
 Battle, or siege, or flight through wintry-snows,) 
 We, this whole people, have been clamorous 
 For war and bloodshed; animating sports, 
 The which we pay for as a thing to talk of, 
 Spectators and not combatants ! No guess 
 Anticipative of a wrong unfelt, 
 No speculation or contingency, 
 However dim and vague, too vague and dim 
 To yield a justifying cause ; and forth, 
 (Stuffed out with big preamble, holy names, 
 And adjurations of the God in Heaven,) 
 
136 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 We send our mandates for the certain death 
 
 Of thousands and ten thousands ! Boys and girls, 
 
 And women, that would groan to see a child 
 
 Pull off an insect's leg, all read of war, 
 
 The best amusement for our morning-meal ! 
 
 The poor wretch, who has learnt his only prayers 
 
 From curses, who knows scarcely words enough 
 
 To ask a blessing from his Heavenly Father, 
 
 Becomes a fluent phraseman, absolute 
 
 And technical in victories and defeats, 
 
 And all our dainty terms for fratricide ; 
 
 Terms which we trundle smoothly o'er our tongues 
 
 Like mere abstractions, empty sounds to which 
 
 We join no feeling and attach no form ! 
 
 As if the soldier died without a wound ; 
 
 As if the fibres of this godlike frame 
 
 Were gored without a pang ; as if the wretch, 
 
 Who fell in battle, doing bloody deeds, 
 
 Passed off to Heaven, translated and not killed ; 
 
 As though he had no wife to pine for him, 
 
 No God to judge him ! Therefore, evil days 
 
 Are coming on us, O my countrymen ! 
 
 And what if all-avenging Providence, 
 
 Strong and retributive, should make us know 
 
 The meaning of our words, force us to feel 
 
 The desolation and the agony 
 
 Of our fierce doings ! 
 
 Spare us yet awhile, 
 Father and God ! O ! spare us yet awhile ! 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 137 
 
 Oh ! let not English women drag their flight 
 Fainting beneath the burthen of their babes, 
 Of the sweet infants, that but yesterday 
 Laughed at the breast ! Sons, brothers, husbands, all 
 Who ever gazed with fondness on the forms 
 Which grew up with you round the same fire-side, 
 And all who ever heard the sabbath-bells 
 Without the infidel's scorn, make yourselves pure ! 
 Stand forth ! be men ! repel an impious foe, 
 Impious and false, a light yet cruel race, 
 Who laugh away all virtue, mingling mirth 
 With deeds of murder ; and still promising 
 Freedom, themselves too sensual to be free. 
 Poison life's amities, and cheat the heart 
 Of faith and quiet hope, and all that soothes 
 And all that lifts the spirit ! Stand we forth ; 
 Render them back upon the insulted ocean, 
 And let them toss as idly on its waves 
 As the vile sea- weed, which some mountain-blast* 
 Swept from our shores ! And oh ! ,may we return 
 Not with a drunken triumph, but with fear, 
 Repenting of the wrongs with which we stung 
 So fierce a foe to frenzy ! 
 
 I have told, 
 Britons ! O my brethren ! I have told 
 Most bitter truth, but without bitterness. 
 Nor deem my zeal or factious or mis-timed ; 
 For never can true courage dwell with them, 
 Who, playing tricks with conscience, dare not look 
 
138 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 At their own vices. We have been too long 
 
 Dupes of a deep delusion ! Some, belike, 
 
 Groaning with restless enmity, expect 
 
 All change from change of constituted power ; 
 
 As if a Government had been a robe, 
 
 On which our vice and wretchedness were tagged 
 
 Like fancy-points and fringes, with the robe 
 
 Pulled off at pleasure. Fondly these attach 
 
 A radical causation to a few 
 
 Poor drudges of chastising Providence, 
 
 Who borrow all their hues and qualities 
 
 From our own folly and rank wickedness, 
 
 Which gave them birth and nursed them. Others, 
 
 meanwhile, 
 Dote with a mad idolatry ; and all 
 Who will not fall before their images, 
 And yield them worship, they are enemies 
 Even of their country ! 
 
 Such have I been deemed — 
 But, O dear Britain ! O my Mother Isle ! 
 Needs must thou prove a name most dear and holy 
 To me, a son, a brother, and a friend, 
 A husband, and a father ! who revere 
 All bonds of natural love, and find them all 
 Within the limits of tby rocky shores. 
 O native Britain ! O my Mother Isle ! 
 How shouldst thou prove aught else but dear and 
 
 holy 
 To me, who from thy lakes and mountain-hills, 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 139 
 
 Thy clouds, thy quiet dales, thy rocks and seas, 
 Have drunk in all my intellectual life, 
 All sweet sensations, all ennobling' thoughts, 
 All adoration of the God in nature, 
 All lovely and all honourable things, 
 Whatever makes this mortal spirit feel 
 The joy and greatness of its future being ? 
 There lives nor form nor feeling in my soul 
 Unborrowed from my country. O divine 
 And beauteous island ! thou hast been my sole 
 And most magnificent temple, in the which 
 I walk with awe, and sing my stately songs, 
 Loving the God that made me ! 
 
 May my fears, 
 My filial fears, be vain ! and may the vaunts 
 And menace of the vengeful enemy 
 Pass like the gust, that roared and died away 
 In the distant tree: which heard, and only heard 
 In this low dell, bowed not the delicate grass 
 
 But now the gentle dew-fall sends abroad 
 The fruit-like perfume of the golden furze : 
 The light has left the summit of the hill, 
 Though still a sunny gleam lies beautiful, 
 Aslant the ivied beacon. Now farewell, 
 Farewell, awhile, O soft and silent spot ! 
 On the green sheep-track, up the heathy hill, 
 Homeward I wind my way ; and lo ! recalled 
 From bodings that have well nigh wearied me 
 
140 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 I find myself upon the brow, and pause 
 
 Startled ! And after lonely sojourning 
 
 In such a quiet and surrounded nook, 
 
 This burst of prospect, here the shadowy main. 
 
 Dim tinted, there the mighty majesty 
 
 Of that huge amphitheatre of rich 
 
 And elmy fields, seems like society — 
 
 Conversing with the mind, and giving it 
 
 A livelier impulse and a dance of thought I 
 
 And now, beloved Stowey ! I behold 
 
 Thy church-tower, and, methinks, the four huge 
 
 elms 
 Clustering, which mark the mansion of my friend ; 
 And close behind them, hidden from my view, 
 Is my own lowly cottage, where my babe 
 And my babe's mother dwell in peace ! With light 
 And quickened footsteps thitherward I tend, 
 Remembering thee, O green and silent dell ! 
 And grateful, that by nature's quietness 
 And solitary musings, all my be art 
 Is softened, and made worthy to indulge 
 Love, and the thoughts that yearn for human kind. 
 
 Nether Stowey, 
 April 28th, 1798. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 141 
 
 FIRE, FAMINE, AND SLAUGHTER 
 
 A WAR ECLOGUE. WITH AN APOLOGETIC PREFACE. 1 
 
 The Scene a desolated Tract in la Vendee. 
 
 Famine is discovered lying on the ground ; 
 
 to her enter Fire and Slaughter. 
 
 Fam. Sisters ! sisters ! who sent you here ? 
 
 •Slau. [to Fire]. I will whisper it in her ear. 
 
 Fire. No ! no ! no ! 
 
 Spirits hear what spirits tell : 
 'Twill make a holiday in Hell. 
 
 No ! no ! no ! 
 Myself, I named him once below, 
 And all the souls, that damned be, 
 Leaped up at once in anarchy, 
 Clapped their hands and danced for glee. 
 They no longer heeded me ; 
 But laughed to hear Hell's burning rafters 
 Unwillingly re-echo laughters ! 
 
 No ! no ! no ! 
 Spirits hear what spirits tell : 
 'Twill make a holiday in Hell ! 
 
 Fam. Whisper it, sister ! so and so ! 
 In a dark hint, soft and slow. 
 
 1 Printed at the end of this volume. 
 
142 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Slau. Letters four do form his name-— 
 And who sent you ? 
 
 Both. The same ! the same ! 
 
 Slau. He came by stealth, and unlocked my den, 
 And I have drunk the blood since then 
 Of thrice three hundred thousand men. 
 
 Both. Who bade you do it? 
 
 Slau. The same ! the same ! 
 
 Letters four do form his name. 
 He let me loose, and cried Halloo ! 
 To him alone the praise is due. 
 
 Fam. Thanks, sister, thanks ! the men nave 
 bled, 
 Their wives and their children faint for bread. 
 I stood in a swampy field of battle ; 
 With bones and skulls I made a rattle. 
 To frighten the wolf and carrion-crow 
 And the homeless dog — but they would not go. 
 So off I flew : for how could I bear 
 To see them gorge their dainty fare ? 
 I heard a groan and a peevish squall, 
 And through the chink of a cottage-wall — 
 Can you guess what I saw there ? 
 
 Both. Whisper it, sister ! in our ear. 
 
 Fam. A baby beat its dying mother : 
 I had starved the one and was starving the other ! 
 
 Both. Who bade you do't ? 
 
 Fam. The same ! the same ! 
 
 Letters four do form his name. 
 He let me loose, and cried, Halloo ! 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 143 
 
 To him alone the praise is due. 
 
 Fire. Sisters ! I from Ireland came ! 
 Hedge and corn-fields all on flame, 
 I triumphed o'er the setting sun ! 
 And all the while the work was done, 
 On as I strode with my huge strides, 
 I flung back my head and I held my sides, 
 It was so rare a piece of fun 
 To see the sweltered cattle run 
 With uncouth gallop through the night, 
 Scared by the red and noisy light ! 
 By the light of his own blazing cot 
 Was many a naked rebel shot : 
 The house-stream met the flame and hissed, 
 While crash ! fell in the roof, I wist, 
 On some of those old bed-rid nurses, 
 That deal in discontent and curses. 
 Both. Who bade you do't ? 
 Fire. The same ! the same I 
 
 Letters four do form his name. 
 He let me loose, and cried Halloo ! 
 To him alone the praise is due. 
 
 All. He let us loose, and cried Halloo ! 
 How shall we yield him honour due ? 
 
 Fam. Wisdom comes with lack of food. 
 I'll gnaw, I'll gnaw the multitude, 
 Till the cup of rage o'erbrim : 
 They shall seize him and his brood — 
 
 Slau. They shall tear him limb from limb ! 
 Fire. thankless beldames and untrue 1 
 
J 44 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 And is this all that you can do 
 For him, who did so much for you ? 
 Ninety months he, by my troth ! 
 Hath richly catered for you both ; 
 And in an hour would you repay 
 An eight years' work ? — Away ! away ! 
 I alone am faithful ! I 
 
 Cling to him everlastingly* 
 
 % 
 1796. 
 
II. LOVE POEMS. 
 
 Quas humilis tenero stylus olim efFudit in asvo, 
 
 Perlegis hie lacrymas, et quod pharetratus acuta 
 
 Hie puer puero fecit mihi cuspide vulnus. 
 
 Omnia paulatim consumit longior aetas, 
 
 Vivendoque simul morimur, rapimurque manendo. 
 
 Ipse mihi collatus enim non ille videbor : 
 
 Frons alia est, moresque alii, nova mentis imago, 
 
 Voxque aliud sonat — 
 
 Pectore nunc gelido calidos miseremur amantes, 
 
 Jamque arsisse pudet. Veteres tranquilla tumultus 
 
 Mens horret, relegensque alium putat ista locutum. 
 
 PETRARCH. 
 
 LOVE. 
 
 All thoughts, all passions, all delights, 
 Whatever stirs this mortal frame, 
 All are but ministers of Love, 
 And feed his sacred flame. 
 
 Oft in my waking dreams do I 
 Live o'er again that happy hour, 
 When midway on the mount I lay, 
 Beside the ruined tower. 
 
 The moonshine, stealing o'er the scene 
 Had blended with the lights of eve ; 
 
 VOL. I. L 
 
146 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 And she was there, my hope, my joy, 
 My own dear Genevieve ! 
 
 She lean'd against the armed man, 
 The statue of the armed knight ; 
 She stood and listened to my lay, 
 Amid the lingering light. 
 
 Few sorrows hath she of her own. 
 My hope ! my joy ! my Genevieve ! 
 She loves me best, whene'er I sing 
 The songs that make her grieve. 
 
 I played a soft and doleful air, 
 I sang an old and moving story — 
 An old rude song, that suited well 
 That ruin wild and hoary. 
 
 She listened with a flitting- blusn. 
 With downcast eyes and modest grace ; 
 For well she knew, I could not choose 
 But gaze upon her face. 
 
 I told her of the Knight that wore 
 Upon his shield a burning brand ; 
 And that for ten long years he wooed 
 The Lady of the Land. 
 
 I told her how he pined : and ah I 
 The deep, the low, the pleading tone 
 
SIBYLLIKE LEAVES. 147 
 
 With which I sang- another's love, 
 Interpreted my own. 
 
 She listened with a flitting 1 blush, 
 With downcast eyes, and modest grace ; 
 And she forgave me, that I gazed 
 Too fondly on her face ! 
 
 But when I told the cruel scorn 
 That crazed that bold and lovely Knight, 
 And that he crossed the mountain-woods, 
 Nor rested day nor night ; 
 
 That sometimes from the savage den, 
 And sometimes from the darksome shade, 
 And sometimes starting up at once 
 In green and sunny glade, — 
 
 There came and looked him in the face 
 An angel beautiful and bright ; 
 And that he knew it was a Fiend, 
 This miserable Knight ! 
 
 And that unknowing what he did, 
 He leaped amid a murderous band, 
 And saved from outrage worse than death 
 The Lady of the Land ; — 
 
 And how she wept, and clasped his knees ; 
 And how she tended him in vain — 
 
148 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 And ever strove to expiate 
 
 The scorn that crazed his brain ; — 
 
 And that she nursed him in a cave ; 
 And how his madness went away, 
 When on the yellow forest-leaves 
 A dying man he lay ; — 
 
 His dying- words — but when I reached 
 That tenderest strain of all the ditty, 
 My faltering voice and pausing harp 
 Disturbed her soul with pity ! 
 
 All impulses of soul and sense 
 Had thrilled my guileless Genevievfe ; 
 The music and the doleful tale, 
 The rich and balmy eve ; 
 
 And hopes, and fears that kindle hope, 
 An undistinguishable throng, 
 And gentle wishes long subdued, 
 Subdued and cherished long ! 
 
 She wept with pity and delight, 
 She blushed with love, and virgin shame ; 
 And like the murmur of a dream, 
 I heard her breathe my name. 
 
 Her bosom heaved — she stepped aside, 
 As conscious of my look she stept — 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. ] 49 
 
 Then suddenly, with timorous eye 
 She fled to me and wept. 
 
 She half inclosed me with her arms, 
 She pressed me with a meek embrace ; 
 And bending back her head, looked up, 
 And gazed upon my face. 
 
 'Twas partly love, and partly fear, 
 And partly 'twas a bashful art, 
 That I might rather feel, than see. 
 The swelling of her heart. 
 
 I calmed her fears, and she was calm. 
 And told her love Avith virgin pride ; 
 And so I won my Genevieve, 
 
 My bright and beauteous Bride. 
 
150 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 THE BALLAD OF THE DARK LAD1E. 
 
 A FRAGMENT. 
 
 Beneath .yon birch with silver bark, 
 
 And boughs so pendulous and fair, 
 
 The brook falls scatter'd down the rock : 
 
 And all is mossy there ! 
 
 And there upon the moss she sits, 
 
 The Dark Ladie in silent pain ; 
 
 The heavy tear is in her eye, 
 
 And drops and swells again. 
 
 Three times she sends her little page 
 
 Up the castled mountain's breast, 
 
 If he might find the Knight that wears 
 
 The Griffin for his crest. 
 
 The sun was sloping down the sky, 
 
 And she had lingered there all day, 
 
 Counting moments, dreaming fears — 
 
 wherefore can he stay ? 
 
 She hears a rustling o'er the brook, 
 
 She sees far off a swinging bough ! 
 
 " Tis He ! 'Tis my betrothed Knight ! 
 
 Lord Falkland, it is Thou!" 
 
 She springs, she clasps him round the neck, 
 
 She sobs a thousand hopes and fears, 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 151 
 
 Her kisses glowing on his cheeks 
 She quenches with her tears. 
 
 ***** 
 
 " My friends with rude ungentle words 
 They scoff and bid me fly to thee ! 
 
 give me shelter in thy breast! 
 
 O shield and shelter me ! 
 
 " My Henry, I have given thee much, 
 
 1 gave what I can ne'er recall, 
 
 I gave my heart, I gave my peace, 
 Heaven! I gave thee all." 
 
 The Knight made answer to the Maid, 
 While to his heart he held her hand, 
 " Nine castles hath my noble sire, 
 None statelier in the land. 
 
 " The fairest one shall be my love's, 
 The fairest castle of the nine ! 
 Wait only till the stars peep out, 
 The fairest shall be thine : 
 
 " Wait only till the hand of eve 
 Hath wholly closed yon western bars, 
 And through the dark we two will steal 
 Beneath the twinkling stars !" — 
 
 " The dark ? the dark ? No ! not the dark ? 
 The twinkling stars ? How, Henry ? How ? 
 God ! 'twas in the eye of noon 
 He pledged his sacred vow] 
 
1 52 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 " And in the eye of noon, my love, 
 Shall lead me from my mother's door, 
 Sweet boys and girls all clothed in white 
 Strewing flow'rs before : 
 
 " But first the nodding minstrels go 
 With music meet for lordly bow rs, 
 The children next in snow-white vests, 
 Strewing buds and flow'rs ! 
 
 " And then my love and I shali pace, 
 My jet black hair in pearly braids, 
 Between our comely bachelors 
 And blushing: bridal maids." 
 
 LEWTI, 
 
 OR THE CIRCASSIAN LOVE-CHAUNT. 
 
 At midnight by the stream I roved, 
 To forget the form I loved. 
 Image of Lewti ! from my mind 
 Depart ; for Lewti is not kind. 
 
 The Moon was high, the moonlight gleam 
 
 And the shadow of a star 
 Heaved upon Tamaha's stream ; 
 
SIBYLLIKE LEAVES. 
 
 But the rock shone brighter far, 
 The rock half sheltered from my view 
 By pendent boughs of tressy yew — 
 So shines my Lewti's forehead fair, 
 Gleaming through her sable hair. 
 Imag*e of Lewti ! from my mind 
 Depart ; for Lewti is not kind. 
 I saw a cloud of palest hue, 
 
 Onward to the moon it passed ; 
 Still brighter and more bright it grew, 
 With floating colours not a few, 
 
 Till it reached the moon at last : 
 Then the cloud was wholly bright, 
 With a rich and amber light ! 
 And so with many a hope I seek, 
 
 And with such joy I find my Lewti ; 
 And even so my pale wan cheek 
 
 Drinks in as deep a flush of beauty ! 
 Nay, treacherous image ! leave my mind. 
 If Lewti never will be kind. 
 
 The little cloud — it floats away, 
 
 Away it goes ; away so soon ? 
 Alas ! it has no power to stay : 
 Its hues are dim, its hues are grey — 
 
 Away it passes from the moon ! 
 How mournfully it seems to fly, 
 
 Ever fading more and more, 
 To jojdess regions of the sky — ■ 
 
 And now 'tis whiter than before ! 
 
154 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 As white as my poor cheek will be, 
 
 When, Lewti ! on my couch I lie, 
 A dying man for love of thee. 
 Nay, treacherous image ! leave my mind — 
 And yet, thou did'st not look unkind. 
 
 I saw a vapour in the sky, 
 
 Thin, and white, and very high; 
 I ne'er beheld so thin a cloud : 
 
 Perhaps the breezes that can fly 
 
 Now below and now above, 
 Have snatched aloft the lawny shroud 
 
 Of Lady fair — that died for love. 
 For maids, as well as youths, have perished 
 From fruitless love too fondly cherished. 
 Nay, treacherous image ! leave my mind— 
 For Lewti never will be kind. 
 
 Hush ! my heedless feet from under 
 Slip the crumbling banks for ever : 
 
 Like echoes to a distant thunder, 
 They plunge into the gentle river. 
 
 The river-swans have heard my tread, 
 
 And startle from their reedy bed. 
 
 O beauteous birds ! methinks ye measure 
 Your movements to some heavenly tune ! 
 
 beauteous birds ! 'tis such a pleasure 
 To see you move beneath the moon, 
 
 1 would it were your true delight 
 To sleep by day and wake all night. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 155 
 
 I know the place where Lewti lies, 
 When silent night has closed her eyes : 
 
 It is a breezy jasmine-bower, 
 The nightingale sings o'er her head : 
 
 Voice of the night ! had I the power 
 That leafy labyrinth to thread, 
 And creep, like thee, with soundless tread, 
 I then might view her bosom white 
 Heaving lovely to my sight, 
 As these two swans together heave 
 On the gently swelling wave. 
 
 Oh ! that she saw me in a dream, 
 And dreamt that I had died for care ; 
 
 All pale and wasted I would seem, 
 Yet fair withal, as spirits are ! 
 
 I'd die indeed, if I might see 
 
 Her bosom heave, and heave for me ! 
 
 Soothe, gentle image ! soothe my mind ! 
 
 To-morrow Lewti may be kind. 
 
 1795. 
 
 THE PICTURE, 
 
 OR THE LOVER'S RESOLUTION. 
 
 Through weeds and thorns, and matted underwood 
 I force my way; now climb, and now descend 
 O'er rocks, or bare or mossy, with wild foot 
 Crushing the purple whorts ; while oft unseen, 
 
156 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Hurrying along the drifted forest-leaves, 
 The scared snake rustles. Onward still I toil 
 I know not, ask not whither ! A new joy, 
 Lovely as light, sudden as summer gust, 
 And gladsome as the first-born of the spring, 
 Beckons me on, or follows from behind, 
 Playmate, or guide ! The master-passion quelled, 
 I feel that I am free. With dun-red bark 
 The fir-trees, and the unfrequent slender oak, 
 Forth from this tangle wild of bush and brake 
 Soar up, and form a melancholy vault 
 High o'er me, murmuring like a distant sea. 
 
 Here Wisdom might resort, and here Remorse ; 
 
 Here too the love-lorn man, who, sick in soul, 
 
 And of this busy human heart aweary, 
 
 Worships the spirit of unconscious life 
 
 In tree or wild-flower. — Gentle lunatic ! 
 
 If so he might not wholly cease to be, 
 
 He would far rather not be that, he is ; 
 
 But would be something, that he knows not of, 
 
 In winds or waters, or among the rocks ! 
 
 But hence, fond wretch ! breathe not contagion 
 here ! 
 No myrtle-walks are these : these are no groves 
 Where Love dare loiter ! If in sullen mood 
 He should stray hither, the low stumps shall gore 
 His dainty feet, the brier and the thorn 
 Make his plumes haggard. Like a wounded bird 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 157 
 
 Easily caught, ensnare him, O ye Nymphs, 
 Ye Oreads chaste, ye dusky Dryades ! 
 And you, ye Earth-winds ! you that make at morn 
 The dew-drops quiver on the spiders' webs ! 
 You, O ye wingless Airs ! that creep between 
 The rigid stems of heath and bitten furze, 
 Within whose scanty shade, at summer-noon, 
 The mother-sheep hath worn a hollow bed — 
 Ye, that now cool her fleece with dropless damp, 
 Now pant and murmur with her feeding lamb. 
 Chase, chase him, all ye Fays, and elfin Gnomes ! 
 With prickles sharper than his darts bemock 
 His little Godship, making him perforce 
 Creep through a thorn-bush on yon hedgehog's back. 
 
 This is my hour of triumph ! I can now 
 With my own fancies play the merry fool, 
 And laugh away worse folly, being free. 
 Here will 1 seat myself, beside this old, 
 Hollow, and weedy oak, which ivy-twine 
 Clothes as with net- work : here will I couch my 
 
 limbs, 
 Close by this river, in this silent shade, 
 As safe and sacred from the step of man 
 As an invisible world — unheard, unseen, 
 And listening only to the pebbly brook 
 That murmurs with a dead, yet tinkling sound ; 
 Or to the bees, that in the neighbouring trunk 
 Make honey-hoards. The breeze, that visits me 
 Was never Love's accomplice, never raised 
 
158 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 The tendril ringlets from the maiden's brow, 
 And the blue, delicate veins above her cheek ; 
 Ne'er played the wanton — never half disclosed 
 The maiden's snowy bosom, scattering 1 thence 
 Eye-poisons for some love-distempered youth, 
 Who ne'er henceforth may see an aspen-grove 
 Shiver in sunshine, but his feeble heart 
 Shall flow away like a dissolving thing. 
 
 Sweet breeze ! thou only, if I guess aright, 
 Liftest the feathers of the robin's breast, 
 That swells its little breast, so full of song, 
 Singing above me, on the mountain-ash. 
 And thou too, desert stream ! no pool of thine, 
 Though clear as lake in latest summer-eve, 
 Did e'er reflect the stately virgin's robe, 
 The face, the form divine, the downcast look 
 Contemplative ! Behold ! her open palm 
 Presses her cheek and brow ! her elbow rests 
 On the bare branch of half-uprooted tree, 
 That leans towards its mirror ! Who erewhile 
 Had from her countenance turned, or looked by 
 
 stealth, 
 (For fear is true love's cruel nurse), he now 
 With steadfast gaze and unoffending eye, 
 Worships the waterv idol, dreaming hopes 
 Delicious to the soul, but fleeting, vain, 
 E'en as that phantom-world on which he gazed, 
 But not unheeded gazed: for see, ah ! see, 
 The sportive tyrant with her left hand plucks 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 159 
 
 The heads of tall flowers that behind her grow, 
 Lychnis, and willow-herb, and fox-glove bells : 
 And suddenly, as one that toys with time, 
 Scatters them on the pool ! Then all the charm 
 Is broken — all that phantom-world so fair 
 Vanishes, and a thousand circlets spread, 
 And each mis-shape the other. Stay awhile, 
 Poor youth, who scarcely dar'st lift up thine eyes . 
 The stream will soon renew its smoothness, soon 
 The visions will return ! And lo ! he stays : 
 And soon the fragments dim of lovely forms 
 Come trembling back, unite, and now once more 
 The pool becomes a mirror ; and behold 
 Each wild-flower on the marge inverted there, 
 And there the half-uprooted tree — but where, 
 where the virgin's snowy arm, that leaned 
 On its bare branch ? He turns, and she is g'one ! 
 Homeward she steals through many a woodland maze 
 Which he shall seek in vain. Ill-fated youth ! 
 Go, day by day, and waste thy manly prime 
 In mad love-yearning by the vacant brook, 
 Till sickly thoughts bewitch thine eyes, and thou 
 Behold'st her shadow still abiding there, 
 The Naiad of the mirror ! 
 
 Not to thee, 
 wild and desert stream ! belongs this tale : 
 Gloomy and dark art thou — the crowded firs 
 Spire from thy shores, and stretch across thy bed, 
 Making thee doleful as a cavern-well : 
 
160 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Save when the shy king-fishers build their nest 
 On thy steep banks, no loves hast thou, wild stream ! 
 
 This be my chosen haunt — emancipate 
 From passion's dreams, a freeman, and alone, 
 I rise and trace its devious course. O lead, 
 Lead me to deeper shades and lonelier glooms. 
 Lo ! stealing through the canopy of firs, 
 How fair the sunshine spots that mossy rock, 
 Isle of the river, whose disparted waves 
 Dart off asunder with an angry sound, 
 How soon to re-unite ! And see ! they meet, 
 Each in the other lost and found : and see 
 Placeless, as spirits, one soft water-sun 
 Throbbing within them, heart at once and eye ! 
 With its soft neighbourhood of filmy clouds, 
 The stains and shadings of forgotten tears, 
 Dimness o'erswum with lustre ! Such the hour 
 Of deep enjoyment, following love's brief feuds ; 
 And hark, the noise of a near waterfall ! 
 I pass forth into light — I find myself 
 Beneath a weeping birch (most beautiful 
 Of forest-trees, the lady of the woods,) 
 Hard by the brink of a tall weedy rock 
 That overbrows the cataract. How bursts 
 The landscape on my sight ! Two crescent hills 
 Fold in behind each other, and so make 
 A circular vale, and land-locked, as might seem, 
 With brook and bridge, and grey stone cottages, 
 Half hid by rocks and fruit-trees. At my feet, 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 161 
 
 The whortle-berries are bedewed with spray, 
 Dashed upwards by the furious waterfall. 
 How solemnly the pendent ivy-mass 
 Swings in its winnow ; all the air is calm. 
 The smoke from cottage chimneys, tinged with light, 
 Rises in columns ; from this house alone, 
 Close by the waterfall, the column slants, 
 And feels its ceaseless breeze. But what is this ? 
 That cottage, with its slanting chimney-smoke, 
 And close beside its porch a sleeping child, 
 His dear head pillowed on a sleeping dog — 
 One arm between its fore legs, and the hand 
 Holds loosely its small handful of wild-flowers, 
 Unfilletted, and of unequal lengths. 
 A curious picture, with a master's haste 
 Sketched on a strip of pinky-silver skin, 
 Peeled from the birchen bark ! Divinest maid ! 
 ion bark her canvass, and those purple berries 
 Her pencil ! See, the juice is scarcely dried 
 On the fine skin ! She has been newly here ; 
 And lo ! yon patch of heath has been her couch — 
 The pressure still remains ! O blessed couch ! 
 For this mayst thou flower early, and the sun, 
 Slanting at eve, rest bright, and linger long 
 Upon thy purple bells ! O Isabel ! 
 Daughter of genius ! stateliest of our maids ! 
 More beautiful than whom Mcaeus wooed 
 The Lesbian woman of immortal song ! 
 child of genius ! stately, beautiful, 
 And full of love to all, save only me, 
 
 VOL. I. M 
 
162 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 And not ungentle e'en to me ! My heart, 
 Why beats it thus ? Through yonder coppice-wood 
 Needs must the pathway turn, that leads straight- 
 way 
 On to her father's house. She is alone ! 
 The night draws on — such ways are hard to hit — 
 And fit it is I should restore this sketch, 
 Dropt unawares no doubt. Why should I yearn 
 To keep the relique ? 'twill but idly feed 
 The passion that consumes me. Let me haste ! . 
 The picture in my hand which she has left ; 
 She cannot blame me that I followed her : 
 And I may be her guide the long wood through. 
 
 THE NIGHT-SCENE: 
 A DRAMATIC FRAGMENT. 
 
 Sandoval. You loved the daughter of Don Man- 
 rique ? 
 
 Earl Henry. Loved ? 
 
 Sandoval. Did you not say you wooed her? 
 
 Earl Henry. Once I loved 
 
 Her whom I dared not woo ! 
 
 Sandoval. And wooed, perchance, 
 
 One whom you loved not ! 
 
 Earl Henry. Oh ! I were most base, 
 
 Not loving Oropeza. True, I wooed her, 
 Hoping- to heal a deeper wound ; but she 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 163 
 
 Met my advances with impassioned pride, 
 
 That kindled love with love. And when her sire, 
 
 Who in his dream of hope already grasped 
 
 The golden circlet in his hand, rejected 
 
 My suit with insult, and in memory 
 
 Of ancient feuds poured curses on my head, 
 
 Her blessings overtook and baffled them ! 
 
 But thou art stern, and with unkindly countenance 
 
 Art inly reasoning whilst thou listenest to me. 
 
 Sandoval. Anxiously, Henry ! reasoning anx- 
 iously. 
 But Oropeza — ■ 
 
 Earl Henry. Blessings gather round her ! 
 Within this wood there winds a secret passage, 
 Beneath the walls, which opens out at length 
 Into the gloomiest covert of the garden. — 
 The night ere my departure to the army, 
 She, nothing trembling, led me through that gloom, 
 And to that covert by a silent stream, 
 Which, with one star reflected near its marge, 
 Was the sole object visible around me. 
 No leaflet stirred ; the air was almost sultry ; 
 So deep, so dark, so close, the umbrage o'er us ! 
 No leaflet stirred ; — yet pleasure hung upon 
 The gloom and stillness of the balmy night-air. 
 A little further on an arbour stood, 
 Fragrant with flowering trees — I well remember 
 What an uncertain glimmer in the darkness 
 Their snow-white blossoms made — thither she led 
 
164 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 To that sweet bower ! Then Oropeza trembled — 
 I heard her heart beat — if 'twere not my own. 
 
 Sandoval. A rude and scaring* note, my friend . 
 
 Earl Henry. Oh ! no ! 
 
 I have small memory of aught but pleasure. 
 The inquietudes of fear, like lesser streams 
 Still flowing, still were lost in those of love : 
 So love grew mightier from the fear, and Nature, 
 Fleeing from pain, sheltered herself in joy. 
 The stars above our heads were dim and steady, 
 Like eyes suffused with rapture. — Life was in us; 
 We were all life, each atom of our frames 
 A living soul — I vowed to die for her : 
 With the faint voice of one who, having spoken, 
 Relapses into blessedness, I vowed it : 
 That solemn vow, a whisper scarcely heard^ 
 A murmur breathed against a lady's ear. 
 Oh ! there is joy above the name of pleasure, 
 Deep self-possession, an intense repose. 
 
 Sandoval [with a sarcastic smile]. No other 
 than as eastern sages paint, 
 The God, who floats upon a lotos leaf, 
 Dreams for a thousand ag-es ; then awaking, 
 Creates a world, and smiling at the bubble, 
 Relapses into bliss. 
 
 Earl Henry. Ah ! was that bliss 
 
 Feared as an alien, and too vast for man ? 
 For suddenly, impatient of its silence, 
 Did Oropeza, starting, grasp my forehead. 
 I caugnt her arms ; the veins were swelling- on them. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. ] 65 
 
 Through the dark bower she sent a hollow voice ; — 
 " Oh ! what if all betray me ? what if thou ?" 
 I swore, and with an inward thought that seemed 
 The purpose and the substance of my being, 
 I swore to her, that wei:e she red with guilt, 
 I would exchange my unblenched state with hers. — 
 Friend ! by that winding passage, to that bower 
 I now will go — all objects there will teach me 
 Unwavering love, and, singleness of heart. 
 Go, Sandoval ! I am prepared to meet her — 
 Say nothing of me — I myself will seek her — 
 Nay, leave me, friend '. I cannot bear the torment 
 And keen inquiry of that scanning eye. — 
 
 [Ear.l Henry retires into the wood.] 
 Sandoval [alone]. O Henry! always striv'st 
 
 thou to be great 
 By thine own act — yet art thou never great 
 But by the inspiration of great passion. 
 The whirl-blast comes, the desert-sands rise up 
 And shape themselves : from earth to heaven 
 
 they stand, 
 As though they were the pillars of a temple, 
 Built by Omnipotence in its own honour ! 
 But the blast pauses, and their shaping spirit 
 Is fled : the mighty columns were but sand, 
 And lazy snakes trail o'er the level ruins ! 
 
166 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 TO AN UNFORTUNATE WOMAN, 
 
 WHOM THE AUTHOR HAD KNOWN IN THE DAYS OF 
 
 HER INNOCENCE. 
 
 Myrtle-leaf that, ill besped, 
 
 Pinest in the gladsome ray, 
 Soiled beneath the common tread, 
 
 Far from thy protecting spray ! 
 
 When the partridge o'er the sheaf 
 
 Whirred along the yellow vale, 
 Sad I saw thee, heedless leaf! 
 
 Love the dalliance of the gale. 
 
 Lightly didst thou, foolish thing ! 
 
 Heave and nutter to his sighs, 
 While the flatterer, on his wing, 
 
 Wooed and whispered thee to rise 
 
 Gaily from thy mother-stalk 
 
 Wert thou danced and wafted hi°'h — 
 
 D 
 
 Soon on this unsheltered walk 
 Flung to fade, to rot and die 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 167 
 
 TO AN UNFORTUNATE WOMAN AT 
 THE THEATRE. 
 
 Maiden, that with sullen brow 
 Sitt'st behind those virgins gay, 
 
 Like a scorched and mildewed bough, 
 Leafless 'mid the blooms of May ! 
 
 Him who lured thee and forsook, 
 Oft I watched with angry gaze, 
 
 Fearful saw his pleading look, 
 Anxious heard his fervid phrase. 
 
 Soft the glances of the youth, 
 
 Soft his speech, and soft his sigh ; 
 
 But no sound like simple truth, 
 But no true love in his eye. 
 
 Loathing thy polluted lot, 
 
 Hie thee, Maiden, hie thee hence ! 
 Seek thy weeping Mother's cot, 
 
 With a wiser innocence. 
 
 Thou hast known deceit and folly, 
 Thou hast felt that vice is woe : 
 
 With a musing melancholy 
 Inly armed, go, Maiden ! go. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Mother sage of self-dominion, 
 Firm thy steps, O Melancholy ! 
 
 The strongest plume in wisdom's pinion 
 Is the memory of past folly. 
 
 Mute the sky-lark and forlorn, 
 
 While she moults the firstling plumes, 
 
 That had skimmed the tender corn, 
 Or the beanfield's odorous blooms. 
 
 Soon with renovated wing 
 Shall she dare a loftier flight, 
 
 Upward to the day-star spring, 
 And embathe in heavenly light. 
 
 LINES COMPOSED IN A CONCERT-ROOM. 
 
 Nor cold, nor stern, my soul ! yet I detest 
 These scented rooms, where, to a gaudy throng, 
 
 Heaves the proud harlot her distended breast 
 In intricacies of laborious song. 
 
 These feel not Music's genuine power, nor deign 
 To melt at Nature's passion-warbled plaint ; 
 
 But when the long-breathed singer's uptrilled 
 strain 
 Bursts in a squall— they gape for wonderment. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 169 
 
 Hark ! the deep buzz of vanity and hate ! 
 
 Scornful, yet envious, with self-torturing 1 sneer 
 
 My lady eyes some maid of humbler state, 
 While the pert captain, or the primmer priest, 
 Prattles accordant scandal in her ear. 
 
 give me, from this heartless scene released, 
 To hear our old musician, blind and gray, 
 
 (Whom stretching from my nurse's arms I kissed,) 
 His Scottish tunes and warlike marches play, 
 
 By moonshine, on the balmy summer-night, 
 The while I dance amid the tedded hay 
 
 With meny maids, whose ringlets toss in light. 
 
 Or lies the purple evening on the bay 
 Of the calm glossy lake, O let me hide 
 
 Unheard, unseen, behind the alder-trees, 
 For round their roots the fisher's boat is tied, 
 
 On whose trim seat doth Edmund stretch at ease, 
 And while the lazy boat sways to and fro, 
 
 Breathes in his flute sad airs, so wild and slow, 
 That his own cheek is wet with quiet tears. 
 
 But 0, dear Anne I when midnight wind careers, 
 
 And the gust pelting on the out-house shed 
 
 Makes the cock shrilly on the rain storm crow, 
 To hear thee sing some ballad full of woe, 
 
 Ballad of ship-wrecked sailor floating dead, 
 Whom his own true-love buried in the sands ! 
 
 Thee, gentle woman, for thy voice re-measures 
 
170 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Whatever tones and melancholy pleasures 
 
 The things of Nature utter ; birds or trees 
 Or moan of ocean-gale in weedy caves, 
 Or where the stiff grass mid the heath-plant waves, 
 Murmur and music thin of sudden breeze. 
 
 THE KEEPSAKE. 
 
 The tedded hay, the first fruits of the soil, 
 The tedded hay and corn-sheaves in one field, 
 Show summer gone, ere come. The foxglove tall 
 Sheds its loose purple bells, or in the gust, 
 Or when it bends beneath the up-springing lark, 
 Or mountain-finch alighting. And the rose 
 (In vain the darling of successful love) 
 Stands, like some boasted beauty of past years, 
 The thorns remaining, and the flowers all gone. 
 Nor can I find, amid my lonely walk 
 By rivulet, or spring, or wet road-side, 
 That blue and bright-eyed floweret of the brook, 
 Hope's gentle gem, the sweet Forget-me-not ! x 
 So will not fade the flowers which Emmeline 
 
 1 One of the names (and meriting to be the only one) of 
 the Myosotis Scorpioides Palustris, a flower from six to twelve 
 inches high, with blue blossom and bright yellow eye. It 
 has the same name over the whole Empire of Germany 
 ( Vergismein nicht) and, I believe, in Denmark and Sweden. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 171 
 
 With delicate fingers on the snow-white silk 
 Has worked, (the flowers which most she knew I 
 
 loved,) 
 And, more beloved than they, her auburn hair. 
 
 In the cool morning- twilight, early waked 
 By her full bosom's joyous restlessness, 
 Softly she rose, and lightly stole along, 
 Down the slope coppice to the woodbine bower, 
 Whose rich flowers, swinging in the morning breeze, 
 Over their dim fast-moving shadows hung, 
 Making a quiet image of disquiet 
 In the smooth, scarcely moving river-pool. 
 There, in that bower where first she owned her love, 
 And let me kiss my own warm tear of joy 
 From off her glowing cheek, she sate and stretched 
 The silk upon the frame, and worked her name 
 Between the Moss-Rose and Forget-me-not — 
 Her own dear name, with her own auburn hair ! 
 That forced to wander till sweet spring* return, 
 I yet might ne'er forget her smile, her look, 
 Her voice, (that even in her mirthful mood 
 Has made me wish to steal away and weep,) 
 Nor yet the entrancement of that maiden kiss 
 With which she promised, that when spring 
 
 returned, 
 She would resign one half of that dear name. 
 And own thenceforth no other name but mine ! 
 
172 
 
 SIBYLUNE LEAVES. 
 
 TO A LADY. 
 
 WITH FALCONER'S " SHIPWRECK." 
 
 Ah ! not by Cam or Isis, famous streams 
 
 In arched groves, the youthful poet's choice ; 
 
 Nor while half-listening - , mid delicious dreams, 
 To harp and song from lady's hand and voice ; 
 
 Nor yet while gazing in sublimer mood 
 On cliff, or cataract, in Alpine dell ; 
 
 Nor in dim cave with bladdery sea-weed strewed, 
 Framing wild fancies to the ocean's swell ; 
 
 Our sea-bard sang this song ! which still he sings, 
 And sings for thee, sweet friend ! Hark, Pity, 
 hark ! 
 
 Now mounts, now totters on the tempest's wings, 
 Now groans, and shivers, the replunging bark ! 
 
 " Cling to the sbrouds !" In vain ! The breakers 
 roar-^- 
 
 Death shrieks ! With two alone of all his clan 
 Forlorn the poet paced the Grecian shore, 
 
 No classic roamer, but a ship-wrecked man ! 
 
 Say then, what muse inspired these genial strains 
 And lit his spirit to so bright a flame ? 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 173 
 
 The elevating thought of suffered pains, 
 
 Which gentle hearts shall mourn ; but chief, 
 the name 
 
 Of gratitude ! remembrances of friend, 
 
 Or absent or no more ! shades of the Past, 
 
 Which Love makes substance ! Hence to thee I 
 send, 
 O dear as long as life and memory last ! 
 
 I send with deep regards of heart and head, 
 Sweet maid, for friendship formed ! this work 
 to thee : 
 
 And thou, the while thou canst not choose but shed 
 A tear for Falconer, wilt remember me. 
 
 TO A YOUNG LADY. 
 
 ON HER RECOVERY FROM A FEVER. 
 
 Why need I say, Louisa dear ! 
 How glad I am to see you here, 
 
 A lovely convalescent* 
 Risen from the bed of pain and fear, 
 
 And feverish heat incessant. 
 
 The sunny showers, the dappled sky 
 The little birds that warble high, 
 
 Their vernal loves commencing, 
 Will better welcome you than I 
 
 With their sweet influencing. 
 
174 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Believe me, while in bed you lay, 
 Your danger taught us all to pray : 
 
 You made us grow devouter ! 
 Each eye looked up and seemed to say, 
 
 How can we do without her ? 
 
 Besides, what vexed us worse, we knew, 
 They have no need of such as you 
 
 In the place where you were going : 
 This World has angels all too few, 
 
 And Heaven is overflowing 1 ! 
 
 SOMETHING CHILDISH, BUT VERY NATURAL. 
 
 WRITTEN IN GERMANY. 
 
 If I had but two little wing's, 
 And were a little feathery bird, 
 To you I'd fly, my dear ! 
 But thoughts like these are idle things, 
 And I stay here. 
 
 But in my sleep to yon I fly : 
 
 I'm always with you in my sleep ! 
 The world is all one's own. 
 But then one wakes, and where am I ? 
 All, all alone. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 175 
 
 Sleep stays not, though a monarch bids : 
 
 So I love to wake ere break of day : 
 
 For though my sleep be gone, 
 
 Yet while 'tis dark, one shuts one's lids, 
 
 And still dreams on. 
 
 HOME-SICK. 
 
 WRITTEN IN GERMANY. 
 
 'Tis sweet to him, who all the week 
 
 Through city- crowds must push his way. 
 
 To stroll alone through fields and woods, 
 And hallow thus the Sabbath-day. 
 
 And sweet it is, in summer bower, 
 
 Sincere, affectionate and gay, 
 One's own dear children feasting round, 
 
 To celebrate one's marriage-day. 
 
 But what is all, to his delight, 
 
 Who having long- been doomed to roam, 
 Throws off the bundle from his back, 
 
 Before the door of his own home ? 
 
 Home-sickness is a wasting pang- ; 
 
 This feel I hourly more and more : 
 There's healing only in thy wings, 
 
 Thou Breeze that play'st on Albion's shore ! 
 
176 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 ANSWER TO A CHILD'S QUESTION. 
 
 Do you ask what the birds say ? The sparrow, the 
 
 dove, 
 The linnet and thrush say, " I love and I love !" 
 In the winter they're silent — the wind is so strong- 
 What it says, I don't know, but it sings a loud song 
 But green leaves, and blossoms, and sunny warm 
 
 weather, 
 And singing, and loving — all come back together. 
 But the lark is so brimful of gladness and love, 
 The green fields below him, the blue sky above, 
 That he sings, and he sings ; and for ever sings he— 
 " I love my Love, and my Love loves me !" 
 
 A CHILD'S EVENING PRAYER. 
 
 Ere on my bed my limbs I lay, 
 
 God grant me grace my prayers to say : 
 
 O God ! preserve my mother dear 
 
 In strength and health for many a year ; 
 
 And, O ! preserve my father too, 
 
 And may I pay him reverence due ; 
 
 And may I my best thoughts employ 
 
 To be my parents' hope and joy ; 
 
SIBVLLINE LEAVES. 177 
 
 And, O ! preserve my brothers both 
 From evil doings and from sloth, 
 And may we always love each other, 
 Our friends, our father, and our mother : 
 And still, O Lord, to me impart 
 An innocent and grateful heart, 
 That after my last sleep I may 
 Awake to thy eternal day ! 
 
 Amen. 
 
 THE VISIONARY HOPE. 
 
 Sad lot, to have no hope ! Though lowly kneeling 
 He fain would frame a prayer within his breast, 
 Would fain entreat for some sweet breath of healing, 
 That his sick body might have ease and rest ; 
 He strove in vain ! tbe dull sighs from his chest 
 Against his will the stifling load revealing, 
 Though Nature forced ; though like some captive 
 
 guest, 
 Some royal prisoner at his conqueror's feast, 
 An alien's restless mood but half concealing, 
 The sternness on his gentle brow confessed, 
 Sickness within and miserable feeling : 
 Though obscure pangs made curses of his dreams, 
 And dreaded sleep, each night repelled in vain, 
 Each night was scattered by its own loud screams : 
 Yet never could his heart command, though fain, 
 One deep full wish to be no more in pain. 
 
 VOL. I. N 
 
178 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 That Hope, which was his inward bliss and boast, 
 Which waned and died , yet ever near him stood, 
 Though changed in nature, wander where he 
 
 would — 
 For Love's despair is but Hope's pining ghost ! 
 For this one hope he makes his hourly moan, 
 He wishes and can wish for this alone ! 
 Pierced, as with light from Heaven, before its 
 
 gleams 
 (So the love-stricken visionary deems) 
 Disease would vanish, like a summer shower, 
 Whose dews fling sunshine from the noon-tide 
 
 bower ! 
 Or let it stay ! yet this one Hope should give 
 Such strength that he would bless his pains and 
 
 live. 
 
 THE HAPPY HUSBAND. 
 
 Oft, oft me thinks, the while with Thee 
 I breathe, as from the heart, thy dear 
 And dedicated name, I hear 
 
 A promise and a mystery, 
 
 A pledge of more than passing life, 
 Yea, in that very name of Wife ! 
 
 A pulse of love, that ne'er can sleep ! 
 A feeling that upbraids the heart 
 With happiness beyond desert, 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 179 
 
 That gladness half requests to weep ! 
 Nor bless I not the keener sense 
 And unalarming turbulence 
 
 Of transient joys, that ask no sting 
 From jealous .fears, or coy denying ; 
 But born beneath Love's brooding wing, 
 
 And into tenderness soon dying, 
 
 Wheel out their giddy moment, then 
 Resign the soul to love again ; — 
 
 A more precipitated vein 
 
 Of notes, that eddy in the flow 
 
 Of smoothest song, they come, they go, 
 
 And leave their sweeter understrain 
 Its own sweet self— a love of Thee 
 That seems, yet cannot greater be ! 
 
 RECOLLECTIONS OF LOVE. 
 
 How warm this woodland wild Recess ! 
 
 Love surely hath been breathing here ; 
 
 And this sweet bed of heath, my dear ! 
 Swells up, then sinks with faint caress, 
 
 As if to have you yet more near. 
 
3U SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 II. 
 
 Eight springs have flown, since last I lay- 
 On sea ward Quantock's heathy hills, 
 Where quiet sounds from hidden rills 
 
 Float here and there, like things astray, 
 And high o'er head the sky-lark shrills. 
 
 No voice as yet had made the air 
 Be music with your name ; yet why 
 That asking look ? that yearning sigh ? 
 
 That sense of promise every where ? 
 Beloved ! flew your spirit by ? 
 
 As when a mother doth explore 
 
 The rose-mark on her long lost child, 
 I met, I loved you, maiden mild ! 
 
 As whom I long had loved before — 
 Sp deeply, had I been beguiled. 
 
 You stood before me like a thought, 
 A dream remembered in a dream. 
 But when those meek eyes first did seem 
 
 To tell me, Love within you wrought — 
 O Greta, dear domestic stream ! 
 
 VI. 
 
 Has not, since then, Love's prompture deep 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 181 
 
 Has not Love's whisper evermore 
 Been ceaseless, as thy gentle roar ? 
 Sole voice, when other voices sleep, 
 Dear under-song; in clamor's hour. 
 
 ON REVISITING THE SEA-SHORE, 
 
 AFTER LONG ABSENCE, UNDER STRONG MEDICAL 
 RECOMMENDATION NOT TO BATHE. 
 
 God be with thee, gladsome Ocean ! 
 
 How gladly greet I thee once more ! 
 Ships and waves, and ceaseless motion, 
 
 And men rejoicing on thy shore. 
 
 Dissuading spake the mild physician, 
 
 " Those briny waves for thee are death !" 
 
 But my soul fulfilled her mission, 
 And lo ! I breathe untroubled breath ! 
 
 Fashion's pining sons and daughters, 
 That seek the crowd they seem to fly, 
 
 Trembling they approach thy waters ; 
 And what cares Nature, if they die ? 
 
 Me a thousand hopes and pleasures, 
 
 A thousand recollections bland, 
 Thoughts sublime, and stately measures, 
 
 Revisit on thy echoing strand : 
 
182 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Dreams, (the soul herself forsaking,) 
 Tearful raptures, boyish mirth ; 
 
 Silent adorations, making 
 
 A blessed shadow of this Earth ! 
 
 O ye hopes, that stir within me, 
 
 Health comes with you from above ! 
 
 God is with me, God is in me ! 
 I cannot die, if Life be Love. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 183 
 
 III. MEDITATIVE POEMS. 
 
 IN BLANK VERSE. 
 
 Yea, he deserves to find himself deceived, 
 Who seeks a Heart in the unthinking Man. 
 Like shadows on a stream, the forms of life 
 Impress their characters on the smooth forehead: 
 Nought sinks into the hosom's silent depth. 
 Quick sensibility of pain and pleasure 
 Moves the light fluids lightly ; but no soul 
 Warmeth the inner frame. schilleii. 
 
 HYMN 
 
 BEFORE SUN-RISE, IN THE VALE OF CHAMOUNI. 
 
 Besides the Rivers, Arve and Arveiron, which have their 
 sources in the foot of Mont Blanc, five conspicuous tor- 
 rents rush down its sides ; and within a few paces of the 
 Glaciers, the Gentiana Major grows in immense numbers 
 with its " flowers of loveliest blue." 
 
 Hast thou a charm to stay the morning-star 
 In his steep course ? So long he seems to pause 
 On thy bald awful head, O sovran Blanc ! 
 The Arve and Arveiron at thy base 
 Rave ceaselessly ; but thou, most awful Form ! 
 Risest from forth thy silent sea of pines, 
 How silently ! Around thee and above 
 Deep is the air and dark, substantial, black, 
 
184 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 An ebon mass : methinks thou piercest it, 
 As with a wedge ! But when I look again, 
 It is thine own calm home, thy crystal shrine, 
 Thy habitation from eternity ! 
 
 dread and silent Mount ! I gazed upon thee, 
 Till thou, still present to the bodily sense, 
 Didst vanish from my thought : entranced in prayer 
 
 1 worshipped the Invisible alone. 
 
 Yet, like some sweet beguiling melody, 
 So sweet, we know not we are listening to it, 
 Thou, the meanwhile, wast blending with my 
 
 thought, 
 Yea, with my life and life's own secret joy : 
 Till the dilating Soul, enrapt, transfused, 
 Into the mighty vision passing — there 
 As in her natural form, swelled vast to Heaven ! 
 
 Awake, my soul ! not only passive praise 
 Thou owest ! not alone these swelling tears, 
 Mute thanks and secret ecstasy ! Awake, 
 Voice of sweet song ! Awake, my Heart, awake! 
 Green vales and icy cliffs, all join my Hymn. 
 
 Thou first and chief, sole sovran of the Vale ! 
 O struggling with the darkness all the night, 
 And visited all nig'ht by troops of stars, 
 Or when they climb the sky or when they sink : 
 Companion of the morning-star at dawn, 
 Thyself Earth's rosy star, and of the dawn 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 185 
 
 Co-herald : wake, O wake, and utter praise ! 
 Who sank thy sunless pillars deep in Earth ? 
 Who filled thy countenance with rosy light ? 
 Who made thee parent of perpetual streams ? 
 
 And you, ye five wild torrents fiercely glad ! 
 Who called you forth from night and utter death, 
 From dark and icy caverns called you forth, 
 Down those precipitous, black, jagged Rocks, 
 For ever shattered and the same for ever ? 
 Who gave you your invulnerable life, 
 Your strength, your speed, your fury, and your joy, 
 Unceasing thunder and eternal foam ? 
 And who commanded (and the silence came,) 
 Here let the billows stiffen , and have rest ? 
 
 Ye ice-falls ! ye that from the mountain's brow 
 Adown enormous ravines slope amain — 
 Torrents, methinks, that heard a mighty voice, 
 And stopped at once amid their maddest plunge ! 
 Motionless torrents ! silent cataracts ! 
 Who made you glorious as the gates of Heaven 
 Beneath the keen full moon ? Who bade the sun 
 Clothe you with rainbows ? Who, with living 
 
 flowers 
 Of loveliest blue, spread garlands at your feet? — 
 God ! let the torrents, like a shout of nations, 
 Answer ! and let the ice-plains echo, God ! 
 God ! sing ye meadow-streams with gladsome voice ! 
 Ye pine-groves, with your soft and soul-like sounds ! 
 
186 
 
 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 And they too have a voice, yon piles of snow, 
 And in their perilous fall shall thunder, God ! 
 
 Ye living flowers that skirt the eternal frost ! 
 Ye wild goats sporting round the eagle's nest ! 
 Ye eagles, play-mates of the mountain-storm ! 
 Ye lightnings, the dread arrows of the clouds ! 
 Ye signs and wonders of the element ! 
 Utter forth God, and fill the hills with praise ! 
 
 Thou too, hoar Mount ! with thy sky-pointing 
 
 peaks, 
 Oft from whose feet the avalanche, unheard, 
 Shoots downward, glittering through the pure 
 
 serene 
 Into the depth of clouds, that veil thy breast — 
 Thou too again, stupendous Mountain ! thou 
 That as I raise my head, awhile bowed low 
 In adoration, upward from thy base 
 Slow travelling with dim eyes suffused with tears, 
 Solemnly seemest, like a vapoury cloud, 
 To rise before me — Rise, O ever rise, 
 Rise like a cloud of incense, from the Earth ! 
 Thou kingly Spirit throned among the hills, 
 Thou dread ambassador from Earth to Heaven, 
 Great hierarch ! tell thou the silent sky, 
 And tell the stars, and tell yon rising sun, 
 Earth, with her thousand voices, praises God. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 187 
 
 LINES 
 
 WRITTEN IN THE ALBUM AT ELBINGERODE, 
 IN THE HARTZ FOREST. 
 
 I stood on Brocken's 1 sovran height, and saw 
 Woods crowding 1 upon woods, hills over hills, 
 A surging scene, and only limited 
 By the blue distance. Heavily my way 
 Downward I dragged through fir groves evermore, 
 Where bright green moss heaves in sepulchral 
 
 forms 
 Speckled with sunshine ; and, but seldom heard, 
 The sweet bird's song became a hollow sound ; 
 And the breeze, murmuring indivisibly, 
 Preserved its solemn murmur most distinct 
 From many a note of many a waterfall, 
 And the brook's chatter ; 'mid whose islet stones 
 The dingy kidling with its tinkling bell 
 Leaped frolicsome, or old romantic goat 
 Sat, his white beard slow waving. I moved on 
 In low and languid mood : 2 for I had found 
 
 1 The highest mountain in the Hartz, and indeed in 
 North Germany. 
 
 2 When I have gazed 
 
 From some high eminence on goodly vales, 
 And cots and villages embowered below, 
 The thought would rise that all to me was strange 
 Amid the scenes so fair, nor one small spot 
 Where my tired mind might rest, and call it home. 
 
 Southey's Hymn to the Penates. 
 
188 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 That outward forms, the loftiest, still receive 
 Their finer influence from the Life within ; — 
 Fair cyphers else : fair, but of import vague 
 Or unconcerning, where the heart not finds 
 History or prophecy of friend, or child, 
 Or gentle maid, our first and early love, 
 Or father, or the venerable name 
 Of our adored country ! O thou Queen, 
 Thou delegated Deity of Earth, 
 O dear, dear England ! how my longing eye 
 Turned westward, shaping in the steady clouds 
 Thy sands and high white cliffs ! 
 
 My native Land ! 
 Filled with the thought of thee this heart was proud, 
 Yea, mine eye swam with tears : that all the view 
 From sovran Brocken, woods and woody hills, 
 Floated away, like a departing dream, 
 Feeble and dim ! Stranger, these impulses 
 Blame thou not lightly ; nor will I profane, 
 With hasty judgment or injurious doubt, 
 That man's sublimer spirit, who can feel 
 That God is everywhere ! the God who framed 
 Mankind to be one mighty family, 
 Himself our Father, and the World our Home. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 189 
 
 ON OBSERVING A BLOSSOM ON THE 
 FIRST OF FEBRUARY, 
 
 1796. 
 
 Sweet Flower ! that peeping from thy russet stem 
 
 Unfoldest timidly, (for in strange sort 
 
 This dark, frieze-coated, hoarse, teeth-chattering 
 
 Month 
 Hath borrowed Zephyr's voice, and gazed upon thee 
 With blue voluptuous eye) alas, poor Flower ! 
 These are but flatteries of the faithless year. 
 Perchance, escaped its unknown polar cave, 
 E'en now the keen North-East is on its way. 
 Flower that must perish ! shall I liken thee 
 To some sweet girl of too too rapid growth 
 Nipped by consumption mid untimely charms ? 
 Or to Bristowa's bard, 1 the wondrous boy ! 
 An amaranth, which Earth scarce seemed to own, 
 Till disappointment came, and pelting wrong 
 Beat it to Earth ? or with indignant grief 
 Shall I compare thee to poor Poland's hope, 
 Bright flower of Hope killed in the opening bud ? 
 Farewell, sweet blossom ! better fate be thine 
 And mock my boding ! Dim similitudes 
 Weaving in moral strains, I've stolen one hour 
 From anxious self, Life's cruel task-master ! 
 
 1 Chatterton. 
 
190 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 And the warm wooings of this sunny day- 
 Tremble along my frame, and harmonize 
 The attempered organ, that even saddest thoughts 
 Mix with some sweet sensations, like harsh tunes 
 Played deftly on a soft-toned instrument. 
 
 THE EOLIAN HARP. 
 
 COMPOSED AT CLEVEDON, SOMERSETSHIRE. 
 
 My pensive Sara ! thy soft cheek reclined 
 Thus on mine arm, most soothing sweet it is 
 To sit beside our cot, our cot o'ergrown 
 With white -flowered jasmin, and the broad-leaved 
 
 myrtle, 
 (Meet emblems they of Innocence and Love !) 
 And watch the clouds, that late were rich with light, 
 Slow saddening round, and mark the star of eve 
 Serenely brilliant (such should wisdom be) 
 Shine opposite ! How exquisite the scents 
 Snatched from yon bean-field ! and the world so 
 
 hushed ! 
 The stilly murmur of the distant sea 
 Tells us of silence. 
 
 And that simplest lute, 
 Placed length-ways in the clasping casement, hark! 
 How by the desultory breeze caressed, 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 191 
 
 Like some coy maid half yielding to her lover, 
 It pours such sweet upbraiding, as must needs 
 Tempt to repeat the wrong '. And now, its strings 
 Boldlier swept, the long sequacious notes 
 Over delicious surges sink and rise, 
 Such a soft floating witchery of sound 
 As twilight Elfins make, when they at eve 
 Voyage on gentle gales from Fairy-Land, 
 Where Melodies round honey-dropping flowers, 
 Footless and wild, like birds of Paradise, 
 Nor pause, nor perch, hovering on untamed wing! 
 the one life within us and abroad, 
 Which meets all motion and becomes its soul, 
 A light in sound, a sound-like power in light 
 Rhythm in all thought, and joyance every where — 
 Methinks, it should have been impossible 
 Not to love all things in a world so filled ; 
 Where the breeze warbles, and the mute still air 
 Is Music slumbering on her instrument. 
 
 And thus, my love ! as on the midway slope 
 Of yonder hill I stretch my limbs at noon, 
 Whilst through my half-closed eye-lids I behold 
 The sunbeams dance, like diamonds, on the main, 
 And tranquil muse upon tranquillity ; 
 Full many a thought uncalled and undetained, 
 And many idle flitting phantasies, 
 Traverse my indolent and passive brain, 
 As wild and various as the random gales 
 That swell and flutter on this subject lute ! 
 
192 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 And what if all of animated nature 
 Be but organic harps diversely framed, 
 That tremble into thought, as o'er them sweeps 
 Plastic and vast, one intellectual breeze, 
 At once the Soul of each, and God of All ? 
 
 But thy more serious eye a mild reproof 
 Darts, O beloved woman ! nor such thoughts 
 Dim and unhallowed dost thou not reject, 
 And biddest me walk humbly with my God. 
 Meek daughter in the family of Christ ! 
 Well hast thou said and holily dispraised 
 These shapings of the unregenerate mind ; 
 Bubbles that glitter as they rise and break 
 Oavvaih Philosophy's aye-babbling spring. 
 For never guiltless may I speak of him, 
 The Incomprehensible ! save when with awe 
 I praise him, and with Faith that inly feels ; 
 Who with his saving mercies healed me, 
 A sinful and most miserable man, 
 Wildered and dark, and gave me to possess 
 Peace, and this cot, and thee, heart-honoured 
 Maid! 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 193 
 
 REFLECTIONS 
 
 ON HAVING LEFT A PLACE OF RETIREMENT. 
 
 Sermoni propriora. — hor. 
 
 Low was our pretty Cot : our tallest rose 
 Peeped at the chamber-window. We could hear 
 At silent noon, and eve, and early morn, 
 The sea's faint murmur. In the open air 
 Our myrtles blossomed ; and across the porch 
 Thick jasmins twined : the little landscape round 
 Was green and woody, and refreshed the eye. 
 It was a spot which you might aptly call 
 The Valley of Seclusion ! Once I saw 
 (Hallowing his Sabbath-day by quietness) 
 A wealthy son of commerce saunter by, 
 Bristowa's citizen: methought, it calmed 
 His thirst of idle gold, and made him muse 
 With wiser feelings : for he paused, and looked 
 With a pleased sadness, and gazed all around, 
 Then eyed our Cottage, and gazed round again, 
 And sighed, and said, it was a Blessed Place. 
 And we were blessed. Oft with patient ear 
 Long-listening to the viewless sky-lark's note 
 (Viewless, or haply for a moment seen 
 Gleaming on sunny wings) in whispered tones 
 I've said to my beloved, " Such, sweet girl ! 
 The inobtrusive song of happiness, 
 vol. 1. o 
 
194 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Unearthly minstrelsy ! then only heard 
 
 When the soul seeks to hear; when all is hushed, 
 
 And the heart listens I" 
 
 But the time, when first 
 From that low dell, steep up the stony mount 
 I climbed with perilous toil and reached the top, 
 Oh ! what a goodly scene ! Here the bleak mount, 
 The bare bleak mountain speckled thin with sheep ; 
 Gray clouds, that shadowing 1 spot the sunny fields ; 
 And river, now with bushy rocks o'erbrowed, 
 Now winding bright and full, with naked banks ; 
 And seats, and lawns, the Abbey and the wood, 
 And cots, and hamlets, and faint city-spire ; 
 The Channel there, the Islands and white sails, 
 Dim coasts, and cloud-like hills, and shoreless 
 
 Ocean — 
 It seemed like Omnipresence ! God, methought, 
 Had built him there a temple : the whole World 
 Seemed imaged in its vast circumference, 
 No wish profaned my overwhelmed heart. 
 Blest hour ! It was a luxury, — to be ! 
 
 Ah 1 quiet dell ! dear cot, and mount sublime I 
 I was constrained to quit you. Was it right, 
 While my unnumbered brethren toiled and bled, 
 That I should dream away the entrusted hours 
 On rose-leaf beds, pampering the coward heart 
 With feelings all too delicate for use ? 
 Sweet is the tear that from some Howard's eye 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES 195 
 
 Drops on the cheek of one he lifts from earth : 
 
 And he that works me good with unmoved face, 
 
 Does it but half: he chills me while he aids, 
 
 My benefactor, not my brother man ! 
 
 Yet even this, this cold beneficence 
 
 Praise, praise it, O my Soul! oft as thou scann'st 
 
 The sluggard Pity's vision-weaving tribe ! 
 
 Who sigh for wretchedness, yet shun the wretched, 
 
 Nursing in some delicious solitude 
 
 Their slothful loves and dainty sympathies ! 
 
 I therefore go, and join head, heart, and hand, 
 
 Active and firm, to fight the bloodless fight 
 
 Of science, freedom, and the truth in Christ. 
 
 Yet oft when after honourable toil 
 Rests the tired mind, and waking loves to dream, 
 My spirit shall revisit thee, dear Cot ! 
 Thy jasmin and thy window-peeping rose., 
 And myrtles fearless of the mild sea-air. 
 And I shall sigh fond wishes — sweet abode ! 
 Ah ! — had none greater ! And that all had such ! 
 It might be so — but the time is not yet. 
 Speed it, O Father ! Let thy kingdom come I 
 
195 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 TO THE REV. GEORGE COLERIDGE 
 
 OF OTTERY ST. MARY, DEVON. WITH SOME POEMS. 
 
 Notus in fratres animi paterni. 
 
 Hor. Carm. lib. 1. 2. 
 
 A blessed lot hath he, who having passed 
 His youth and early manhood in the stir 
 And turmoil of the world, retreats at length, 
 With cares that move, not agitate the heart, 
 To the same dwelling where his father dwelt ; 
 And haply views his tottering little ones 
 Embrace those aged knees and climb that lap, 
 On which first kneeling his own infancy 
 Lisped its brief prayer. Such, O my earliest Friend ! 
 Thy lot, and such thy brothers too enjoy. 
 At distance did ye climb life's upland road, 
 Yet cheered and cheering : now fraternal love 
 Hath drawn you to one centre. Be your days 
 Holy, and blest and blessing may ye live ! 
 
 To me the Eternal Wisdom hath dispensed 
 A different fortune and more different mind — 
 Me from the spot where first I sprang to light 
 Too soon transplanted, ere my soul had fixed 
 Its first domestic loves ; and hence through life 
 Chasing chance-started friendships. A brief while 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 197 
 
 Some have preserved me from life's pelting ills ; 
 But, like a tree with leaves of feeble stem, 
 If the clouds lasted, and a sudden breeze 
 Ruffled the boughs, they on my head at once 
 Dropped the collected shower ; and some most false, 
 False and fair foliaged as the Manchineel, 
 Have tempted me to slumber in their shade 
 E'en mid the storm ; then breathing subtlest damps, 
 Mixed their own venom with the rain from Heaven, 
 That I woke poisoned ! But, all praise to Him 
 Who gives us all things, more have yielded me 
 Permanent shelter ; and beside one friend, 
 Beneath the impervious covert of one oak, 
 I've raised a lowly shed, and know the names 
 Of husband and of father ; not unhearing 
 Of that divine and nightly-whispering voice, 
 Which from my childhood to maturer years 
 Spake to me of predestinated wreaths, 
 Bright with no fading colours ! 
 
 Yet at times 
 My soul is sad, that I have roamed through life 
 Still most a stranger, most with naked heart 
 At mine own home and birth-place : chiefly then, 
 When I remember thee, my earliest friend ! 
 Thee, who didst watch my boyhood and my youth ; 
 Didst trace my wanderings with a father's eye ; 
 And boding evil yet still hoping good, 
 Rebuked each fault, and over all my woes 
 Sorrowed in silence ! He who counts alone 
 
198 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 The beatings of the solitary heart, 
 
 That being knows, how 1 have loved thee ever, 
 
 Loved as a brother, as a son revered thee ! 
 
 Oh ! 'tis to me an ever new delight, 
 
 To talk of thee and thine : or when the blast 
 
 Of the shrill winter, rattling our rude sash. 
 
 Endears the cleanly hearth and social bowl ; 
 
 Or when as now, on some delicious eve, 
 
 We in our sweet sequestered orchard-plot 
 
 Sit on the tree crooked earth-ward ; whose old 
 
 boughs, 
 That hang above us in an arborous roof, 
 Stirred by the faint gale of departing May, 
 Send their loose blossoms slanting o'er our heads ! 
 
 Nor dost not thou sometimes recall those hours, 
 When with the joy of hope thou gav'st thine ear 
 To my wild firstling-lays. Since then my song 
 Hath sounded deeper notes, such as beseem 
 Or that sad wisdom folly leaves behind, 
 Or such as, tuned to these tumultuous times, 
 Cope with the tempest's swell ! 
 
 These various strains, 
 Which I have framed in many a various mood, 
 Accept, my brother ! and (for some perchance 
 Will strike discordant on thy milder mind) 
 If aught of error or intemperate truth 
 Should meet thine ear, think thou that riper age 
 Will calm it down, and let thy love forgive it ! 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 199 
 
 INSCRIPTION 
 
 FOR A FOUNTAIN ON A HEATH. 
 
 This Sycamore, oft musical with bees, — ■ 
 
 Such tents the Patriarchs loved ! long unharmed 
 
 May all its aged boughs o'er-canopy 
 
 The small round basin, which this jutting stone 
 
 Keeps pure from falling leaves ! Long may the 
 
 Spring, 
 Quietly as a sleeping infant's breath, 
 Send up cold waters to the traveller 
 With soft and even pulse ! Nor ever cease 
 Yon tiny cone of sand its soundless dance, 
 Which at the bottom, like a Fairy's page, 
 As merry and no taller, dances still, 
 Nor wrinkles the smooth surface of the Fount. 
 Here twilight is and coolness : here is moss, 
 A soft seat, and a deep and ample shade. 
 Thou may'st toil far and find no second tree. 
 Drink, Pilgrim, here ; Here rest! and if thy heart 
 Be innocent, here too shalt thou refresh 
 Thy Spirit, listening to some gentle sound, 
 Or passing gale or hum of murmuring bees ! 
 
200 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 A TOMBLESS EPITAPH. 
 
 Tis true, Idoloclastes Satyrane ! 
 (So call him, for so mingling blame with praise, 
 And smiles with anxious looks, his earliest friends, 
 Masking his birth-name, wont to character 
 His wild-wood fancy and impetuous zeal,) 
 'Tis true that, passionate for ancient truths, 
 And honouring with religious love the great 
 Of elder times, he hated to excess, 
 With an unquiet and intolerant scorn, 
 The hollow puppets of a hollow age, 
 Ever idolatrous, and changing ever 
 Its worthless idols ! learning, power, and time, 
 (Too much of all) thus wasting in vain war 
 Of fervid colloquy. Sickness, 'tis true, 
 Whole years of weary days, besieged him close, 
 Even to the gates and inlets of his life ! 
 But it is true, no less, that strenuous, firm, 
 And with a natural gladness, he maintained 
 The citadel unconquered, and in joy 
 Was strong to follow the delightful Muse. 
 For not a hidden path, that to the shades 
 Of the beloved Parnassian forest leads, 
 Lurked undiscovered by him ; not a rill 
 There issues from the fount of Hippocrene, 
 But he had traced it upward to its source, 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 201 
 
 Through open glade, dark glen, and secret dell, 
 Knew the gay wild flowers on its banks, and culled 
 Its med'cinable herbs. Yea, oft alone, 
 Piercing the long-neglected holy cave, 
 The haunt obscure of old Philosophy, 
 He bade with lifted torch its starry walls 
 Sparkle, as erst they sparkled to the flame 
 Of odorous lamps tended by Saint and Sage. 
 framed for calmer times and nobler hearts ! 
 studious Poet, eloquent for truth ! 
 Philosopher ! contemning wealth and death, 
 Yet docile, childlike, full of Life and Love ! 
 Here, rather than on monumental stone, 
 This record of thy worth thy Friend inscribes, 
 Thoughtful, with quiet tears upon his cheek. 
 
 THIS LIME-TREE BOWER MY PRISON. 
 
 In the June of 1797, some long-expected Friends paid a 
 visit to the author's cottage ; and on the morning of their 
 arrival, he met with an accident, which disabled him from 
 walking during the whole time of their stay. One evening, 
 when they had left him for a few hours, he composed the 
 following lines in the garden-bower. 
 
 Well, they are gone, and here must I remain, 
 This lime-tree bower my prison ! I have lost 
 Beauties and feelings, such as would have been 
 Most sweet to my remembrance even when age 
 
202 SIBYLLINE LEAVES.' 
 
 Had dimmed mine eyes to blindness ! They, mean- 
 while, 
 Friends, whom I never more may meet again, 
 On springy heath, along the hill-top edge, 
 Wander in gladness, and wind down, perchance, 
 To that still roaring dell, of which I told ; 
 The roaring dell, o'erwooded, narrow, deep, 
 And only speckled by the mid-day sun ; 
 Where its slim trunk the ash from rock to rock 
 Flings arching like a bridge ; — that branchless ash, 
 Unsunned and damp, whose few poor yellow leaves 
 Ne'er tremble in the gale, yet tremble still, 
 Fanned by the water-fall ! and there my friends 
 Behold the dark green file of long lank weeds, i 
 That all at once (a most fantastic sight !) 
 Still nod and drip beneath the dripping edge 
 Of the blue clay-stone. 
 
 Now, my friends emerge 
 Beneath the wide wide Heaven — and view again 
 The many-steepled tract magnificent 
 Of hilly fields and meadows, and the sea, 
 With some fair bark, perhaps, whose sails light up 
 The slip of smooth clear blue betwixt two Isles 
 Of purple shadow ! Yes ! they wander on 
 In gladness all ; but thou, methinks, most glad, 
 
 1 Of long lank weeds.~\ The asplenium scolopendrium, 
 called in some countries the Adder's Tongue, in others the 
 Hart's Tongue : but Withering gives the Adder's Tongue 
 as the trivial name of the ophioglossum only. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 203 
 
 • 
 
 My gentle -hearted Charles ! for thou hast pined 
 And hungered after Nature, many a year, 
 In the great City pent, winning thy way 
 With sad yet patient soul, through evil and pain 
 And strange calamity ! Ah ! slowly sink 
 Behind the western ridge, thou glorious sun ! 
 Shine in the slant beams of the sinking orb, 
 Ye purple heath-flowers ! richlier burn, ye clouds ' 
 Live in the yellow light, ye distant groves ! 
 And kindle, thou blue ocean ! So my Friend 
 Struck with deep joy may stand, as I have stood, 
 Silent with swimming sense ; yea, gazing round 
 On the wide landscape, gaze till all doth seem 
 Less gross than bodily ; and of such hues 
 As veil the Almighty Spirit, when yet he makes 
 Spirits perceive his presence. 
 
 A delight 
 Comes sudden on my heart, and I am glad 
 As I myself were there ! Nor in this bower, 
 This little lime-tree bower, have I not marked 
 Much that has soothed me. Pale beneath the blaze 
 Hung the transparent foliage ; and I watched 
 Some broad and sunny leaf, and loved to see 
 The shadow of the leaf and stem above 
 Dappling its sunshine ! And that walnut-tree 
 Was richly tinged, and a deep radiance lay 
 Full on the ancient ivy, which usurps 
 Those fronting elms, and now, with blackest mass 
 Makes their dark branches srleam a lighter hue 
 
204 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 • 
 
 Through the late twilight: and though now the bat 
 Wheels silent by, and not a swallow twitters, 
 Yet still the solitary humble bee 
 Sings in the bean-flower ! Henceforth I shall know 
 That Nature ne'er deserts the wise and pure ; 
 No plot so narrow, be but Nature there, 
 No waste so vacant, but may well employ 
 Each faculty of sense, and keep the heart 
 Awake to Love and Beauty ! and sometimes 
 'Tis well to be bereft of promised good, 
 That we may lift the Soul, and contemplate 
 With lively joy the joys we cannot share. 
 My gentle-hearted Charles ! when the last rook 
 Beat its straight path along the dusky air 
 Homewards, I blest it ! deeming, its black wing 
 (Now a dim speck, now vanishing in light) 
 Had crossed the mighty orb's dilated glory, 
 While thou stood'st gazing ; or when all was still, 
 J Flew creeking o'er thy head, and had a charm 
 For thee, my gentle-hearted Charles, to whom 
 No sound is dissonant which tells of Life. 
 
 1 Flew creeking.] Some months after I had written this 
 line, it gave me pleasure to find that Bartram had ob- 
 served the same circumstance of the Savanna Crane. 
 " When these Birds move their wings in flight, their 
 strokes are slow, moderate and regular ; and even when at 
 a considerable distance or high above us, we plainly hear 
 the quill-feathers ; their shafts and webs upon one another 
 creek as the joints or working of a vessel in a tempestuous 
 sea. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 205 
 
 TO A FRIEND 
 
 WHO HAD DECLARED HIS INTENTION OF WRITING 
 NO MORE POETRY. 
 
 Dear Charles ! whilst yet thou wert a babe, I ween 
 
 That Genius plunged thee in that wizard fount 
 
 Hight Castalie : and (sureties of thy faith) 
 
 That Pity and Simplicity stood by, 
 
 And promised for thee, that thou shouldst renounce 
 
 The world's low cares and lying vanities, 
 
 Steadfast and rooted in the heavenly Muse, 
 
 And washed and sanctified to Poesy. 
 
 Yes — thou wert plunged, but with forgetful hand 
 
 Held, as by Thetis erst her warrior son : 
 
 And with those recreant unbaptized heels 
 
 Thou 'rt flying from thy bounden minist'ries— 
 
 So sore it seems and burthensome a task 
 
 To weave unwithering flowers ! But take thou need : 
 
 For thou art vulnerable, wild-eyed boy, 
 
 And I have arrows x mystically dipt, 
 
 Such as may stop thy speed. Is thy Burns dead ? 
 
 And shall he die unwept, and sink to earth 
 
 " Without the meed of one melodious tear ?" 
 
 Thy Burns, and Nature's own beloved bard, 
 
 Who to the " Illustrious 2 of his native Land 
 
 1 Pind. Olymp. ii. 1. 150. 
 
 2 Verbatim from Burns' dedication of his Poem to the 
 Nobility and Gentry of the Caledonian Hunt. 
 
206 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 So properly did look for patronage." 
 Ghost of Maecenas ! hide thy blushing face ! 
 They snatched him from the sickle and the plough — 
 To gauge ale-firkins. 
 
 Oh ! for shame return ! 
 On a bleak rock, midway the Aonian mount, 
 There stands a lone and melancholy tree, 
 Whose aged branches to the midnight blast 
 Make solemn music : pluck its darkest bough, 
 Ere yet the unwholesome night-dew be exhaled, 
 And weeping wreath it round thy Poet's tomb. 
 Then in the outskirts, where pollutions grow, 
 Pick the rank henbane and the dusky flowers 
 Of night-shade, or its red and tempting fruit, 
 These with stopped nostril and glove-guarded hand 
 Knit in nice intertexture, so to twine, 
 The illustrious brow of Scotch Nobility. 
 
 1796. 
 
 TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. 
 
 COMPOSED ON THE NIGHT AFTER HIS RECITATION 
 
 OF A POEM ON THE GROWTH OF AN 
 
 INDIVIDUAL MIND. 
 
 Friend of the wise ! and teacher of the good ! 
 Into my heart have I received that lay 
 More than historic, that prophetic lay 
 Wherein (high theme by thee first sung aright) 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 207 
 
 Of the foundations and the building up 
 
 Of a Human Spirit thou hast dared to tell 
 
 What may be told, to the understanding mind 
 
 Revealable ; and what within the mind 
 
 By vital breathings secret as the soul 
 
 Of vernal growth, oft quickens in the heart 
 
 Thoughts all too deep for words ! — 
 
 Theme hard as high . 
 Of smiles spontaneous, and mysterious fears, 
 (The first-born they of Reason and twin-birth) 
 Of tides obedient to external force, 
 And currents self-determined, as might seem, 
 Or by some inner power ; of moments awful, 
 Now in thy inner life, and now abroad, 
 When power streamed from thee, and thy soul re- 
 ceived 
 The light reflected, as a light bestowed — 
 Of fancies fair, and milder hours of youth, 
 Hyblean murmurs of poetic thought 
 Industrious in its joy, in vales and glens 
 Native or outland, lakes and famous hills ! 
 Or on the lonely high-road, when the stars 
 Were rising ; or by secret mountain-streams, 
 The guides and the companions of thy way ! 
 
 Of more than Fancy, of the Social Sense 
 Distending wide, and man beloved as man, 
 Where France in all her towns lay vibrating 
 Like some becalmed bark beneath the burst 
 
208 Sl'BVLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Of Heaven's immediate thunder, when no cloud 
 
 Is visible, or shadow on the main. 
 
 For thou wert there, thine own brows garlanded, 
 
 Amid the tremor of a realm aglow, 
 
 Amid a mighty nation jubilant, 
 
 When from the general heart of human kind 
 
 Hope sprang forth like a full-born Deity ! 
 
 Of that dear Hope afflicted and struck down, 
 
 So summoned homeward, thenceforth calm and sure 
 From the dread watch-tower of man's absolute self, 
 With light un waning on her eyes, to look 
 Far on — herself a glory to behold, 
 The Angel of the vision ! Then (last strain) 
 Of Duty, chosen laws controlling choice, 
 Action and joy ! — An Orphic song indeed, 
 A song divine of high and passionate thoughts 
 To their own music chanted ! 
 
 O great Bard ! 
 Ere yet that last strain dying awed the air, 
 With steadfast eye I viewed thee in the choir 
 Of ever-enduring men. The truly great 
 Have all one age, and from one visible space 
 Shed influence ! They, both in power and act, 
 Are permanent, and Time is not with them, 
 Save as it worketh for them, they in it. 
 Nor less a sacred roll, than those of old, 
 And to be placed, as they, with gradual fame 
 Among the archives of mankind, thy work 
 Makes audible a linked lay of Truth, 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 209 
 
 Of Truth profound a sweet continuous lay, 
 
 Not learnt, but native, her own natural notes ! 
 
 Ah ! as I listened with a heart forlorn, 
 
 The pulses of my being beat anew : 
 
 And even as life returns upon the drowned, 
 
 Life's joy rekindling roused a throng of pains — 
 
 Keen pangs of Love, awakening as a babe 
 
 Turbulent, with an outcry in the heart ; 
 
 And fears self-willed, that shunned the eye of 
 
 hope ; 
 And hope that scarce would know itself from fear; 
 Sense of past youth, and manhood come in vain, 
 And genius given, and knowledge won in vain; 
 And all which I had culled in wood-walks wild, 
 And all which patient toil had reared, and all, 
 Commune with thee had opened out — but flowers 
 Strewed on my corse, and borne upon my bier, 
 In the same coffin, for the self-same grave ! 
 
 That way no more ! and ill beseems it me, 
 Who came a welcomer in herald's guise. 
 Singing of glory, and futurity, 
 To wander back on such unhealthful road, 
 Plucking the poisons of self-harm ! And ill 
 Such intertwine beseems triumphal wreaths 
 Strewed before thy advancing ! 
 
 Nor do thou, 
 Sage Bard ! impair the memory of that hour 
 Of thy communion with my nobler mind 
 
 VOL. I. p 
 
210 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 By pity or grief, already felt too long 1 ! 
 Nor let my words import more blame than needs. 
 The tumult rose and ceased : for peace is nigh 
 Where wisdom's voice has found a listening heart. 
 Amid the howl of more than wintiy storms, 
 The halcyon hears the voice of vernal hours 
 Already on the wing. 
 
 Eve following eve, 
 Dear tranquil time, when the sweet sense of Home 
 Is sweetest ! moments for their own sake hailed 
 And more desired, more precious for thy song, 
 In silence listening, like a devout child, 
 My soul lay passive, by thy various strain 
 Driven as in surges now beneath the stars, 
 With momentary stars of my own birth, 
 Fair constellated foam, 1 still darting off 
 Into the darkness ; now a tranquil sea, 
 Outspread and bright, yet swelling to the moon. 
 
 And w r hen — O Friend ! my comforter and guide \ 
 Strong in thyself, and powerful to give strength ! — 
 Thy long sustained Song finally closed, 
 
 1 " A beautiful white cloud of foam at momentary in- 
 tervals coursed by the side of the vessel with a roar, and 
 little stars of flame danced and sparkled and went out in 
 it : and every now and then light detachments of this white 
 cloud-like foam darted off from the vessel's side, each with 
 its own small constellation, over the sea, and scoured out 
 of sight like a Tartar troop over a wilderness." — The 
 Friend, p. 220. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 211 
 
 And thy deep voice had ceased— yet thou thyself 
 Wert still before my eyes, and round us both 
 That happy vision of beloved faces — 
 Scarce conscious, and yet conscious of its close 
 I sate, my being blended in one thought 
 (Thought was it ? or aspiration ? or resolve ?). 
 Absorbed, yet hanging still upon the sound— 
 And when I rose, I found myself in prayer. 
 
 THE NIGHTINGALE ; 
 
 A CONVERSATION POEM. APRIL, 1798. 
 
 No cloud, no relique of the sunken day 
 Distinguishes the West, no long thin slip 
 Of sullen light, no obscure trembling hues. 
 Come, we will rest on this old mossy bridge ! 
 You see the glimmer of the stream beneath, 
 But hear no murmuring : it flows silently, 
 O'er its soft bed of verdure. All is still, 
 A balmy night ! and though the stars be dim, 
 Yet let us think upon the vernal showers 
 That gladden the green earth, and we shall find 
 A pleasure in the dimness of the stars. 
 And hark ! the Nightingale begins its song, 
 " Most musical, most melancholy" bird ! ' 
 
 1 " Most musical, most melancholy ."] This passage in 
 Milton possesses an excellence far superior to that of mere 
 
2 1 2 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 A melancholy bird ! Oh ! idle thought ! 
 In nature there is nothing melancholy. 
 But some night-wandering man whose heart was 
 
 pierced 
 With the remembrance of a grievous wrong, 
 Or slow distemper, or neglected love, 
 (And so, poor wretch ! filled all things with himself, 
 And made all gentle sounds tell back the tale 
 Of his own sorrow) he, and such as he, 
 First named these notes a melancholy strain. 
 And many a poet echoes the conceit ; 
 Poet who hath been building up the rhyme 
 When he had better far have stretched his limbs 
 Beside a brook in mossy forest-dell, 
 By sun or moon -light, to the influxes 
 Of shapes and sounds and shifting elements 
 Surrendering his whole spirit, of his song 
 And of his fame forgetful ! so his fame 
 Should share in Nature's immortality, 
 A venerable thing! and so his song 
 Should make all Nature lovelier, and itself 
 Be loved like Nature ! But 'twill not be so ; 
 And youths and maidens most poetical, 
 Who lose the deepening twilights of the spring 
 In ball-rooms and hot theatres, they still 
 
 description. It is spoken in the character of the melancholy 
 man, and has therefore a dramatic propriety. The author 
 makes this remark, to rescue himself from the charge of 
 having; alluded with levity, to a line in Milton. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 213 
 
 Full of meek sympathy must heave their sighs 
 O'er Philomela's pity-pleading strains. 
 
 My Friend, and thou, our Sister ! we have learnt 
 A different lore : we may not thus profane 
 Nature's sweet voices, always full of love 
 And joyance ! "Pis the merry Nightingale 
 That crowds, and hurries, and precipitates 
 With fast thick warble his delicious notes, 
 As he were fearful that an April night 
 Would be too short for him to utter forth 
 His love-chant, and disburthen his full soul 
 Of all its music ! 
 
 And I know a grove 
 Of large extent, hard by a castle huge, 
 Which the great lord inhabits not ; and so 
 This grove is wild with tangling underwood, 
 And the trim walks are broken up, and grass, 
 Thin grass and king-cups grow within the paths. 
 But never elsewhere in one place I knew 
 So many nightingales ; and far and near, 
 In wood and thicket, over the wide grove, 
 They answer and provoke each other's song, 
 With skirmish and capricious passagings, 
 And murmurs musical and swift jug jug, 
 And one low piping sound more sweet than all — 
 Stirring the air with such a harmony, 
 That should you close your eyes, you might almost 
 Forget it was not day ! On moon-lit bushes, 
 
214 SIBYLLIKE LEAVES. 
 
 Whose dewy leaflets are but half disclosed, 
 You may perchance behold them on the twigs, 
 Their bright, bright eyes, their eyes both bright 
 
 and full, 
 Glistening, while many a glow-worm in the shade 
 Lights up her love-torch. 
 
 A most gentle Maid, 
 Who dwelleth in her hospitable home 
 Hard by the castle, and at latest eve 
 (Even like a Lady vowed and dedicate 
 To something more than Nature in the grove) 
 Glides through the pathways ; she knows all their 
 
 notes, 
 That gentle Maid ! and oft a moment's space, 
 What time the moon was lost behind a cloud, 
 Hath heard a pause of silence ; till the moon 
 Emerging, hath awakened earth and sky 
 With one sensation, and these wakeful birds 
 Have all burst forth in choral minstrelsy, 
 As if some sudden gale had swept at once 
 A hundred airy harps ! And she hath watched 
 Many a nightingale perched giddily 
 On blossomy twig still swinging from the breeze, 
 And to that motion tune his wanton song 
 Like tipsy joy that reels with tossing head. 
 
 Farewell, O Warbler ! till to-morrow eve, 
 And you, my friends ! farewell, a short farewell ! 
 We have been loitering long and pleasantly, 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 215 
 
 And now for our dear homes. — That strain again ! 
 
 Full fain it would delay me ! My dear babe, 
 
 Who, capable of no articulate sound, 
 
 Mars all things with his imitative lisp, 
 
 How he would place his hand beside his ear, 
 
 His little hand, the small forefinger up, 
 
 And bid us listen ! And I deem it wise 
 
 To make him Nature's play-mate. He knows well 
 
 The evening-star ; and once, when he awoke 
 
 In most distressful mood (some inward pain 
 
 Had made up that strange thing, an infant's 
 
 dream. — ) 
 I hurried with him to our orchard-plot, 
 And he beheld the moon, and, hushed at once, 
 Suspends his sobs, and laughs most silently, 
 While his fair eyes, that swam with undropped tears, 
 Did glitter in the yellow moon-beam ! Well ! — 
 It is a father's tale : But if that Heaven 
 Should give me life, his childhood shall grow up 
 Familiar with these songs, that with the night 
 He may associate joy. — Once more, farewell, 
 Sweet Nightingale ! Once more, my friends ! fare- 
 well. 
 
216 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 FROST AT MIDNIGHT. 
 
 The frost performs its secret ministry, 
 Unhelped by any wind. The owlet's cry 
 Came loud — and hark, again ! loud as before. 
 The inmates of my cottage, all at rest, 
 Have left me to that solitude, which suits 
 Abstruser musings : save that at my side 
 My cradled infant slumbers peacefully. 
 'Tis calm indeed ! so calm, that it disturbs 
 And vexes meditation with its strange 
 And extreme silentness. Sea, hill, and wood, 
 This populous village ! Sea, and hill, and wood, 
 With all the numberless goings on of life, 
 Inaudible as dreams ! the thin blue flame 
 Lies on my low burnt fire, and quivers not ; 
 Only that film, which fluttered on the grate, 
 Still flutters there, the sole unquiet thing. 
 Methinks, its motion in this hush of nature 
 Gives it dim sympathies with me who Jive, 
 Making it a companionable form. 
 Whose puny flaps and freaks the idling Spirit 
 By its own moods interprets, every where 
 Echo or mirror seeking of itself, 
 And makes a toy of Thought. 
 
 But O ! how oft, 
 How oft, at school, with most believing mind, 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 217 
 
 Presageful, have I gazed upon the bars, 
 To watch that fluttering stranger ! and as oft 
 With unclosed lids, already had I dreamt 
 Of my sweet birth-place, and the old church-tower, 
 Whose bells, the poor man's only music, rang 
 From morn to evening, all the hot Fair-day, 
 So sweetly, that they stirred and haunted me 
 With a wild pleasure, falling on mine ear 
 Most like articulate sounds of things to come ! 
 So gazed I, till the soothing things I dreamt 
 Lulled me to sleep, and sleep prolonged my dreams ! 
 And so I brooded all the following morn, 
 Awed by the stern preceptor's face, mine eye 
 Fixed with mock study on my swimming book : 
 Save if the door half opened, and I snatched 
 A hasty glance, and still my heart leaped up, 
 For still I hoped to see the stranger's face, 
 Townsman, or aunt, or sister more beloved, 
 My play-mate when we both were clothed alike ! 
 
 Dear Babe, that sleepest cradled by my side, 
 Whose gentle breathings, heard in this deep calm, 
 Fill up the interspersed vacancies 
 And momentary pauses of the thought ! 
 My babe so beautiful ! it thrills my heart 
 With tender gladness, thus to look at thee, 
 And think that thou shalt learn far other lore 
 And in far other scenes ! For I was reared 
 In the great city, pent 'mid cloisters dim, 
 And saw nought lovely but the sky and stars. 
 
218 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 But thou, my babe ! shalt wander like a breeze 
 By lakes and sandy shores, beneath the crags 
 Of ancient mountain, and beneath the clouds, 
 Which image in their bulk both lakes and shores 
 And mountain crags : so shalt thou see and hear 
 The lovely shapes and sounds intelligible 
 Of that eternal language, which thy God 
 Utters, who from eternity doth teach 
 Himself in all, and all things in himself. 
 Great universal Teacher ! he shall mould 
 Thy spirit, and by giving make it ask. 
 
 Therefore all seasons shall be sweet to thee, 
 Whether the summer clothe the general earth 
 With greenness, or the redbreast sit and sing 
 Betwixt the tufts of snow on the bare branch 
 Of mossy apple-tree, while the nigh thatch 
 Smokes in the sun-thaw; whether the eve-drops fall 
 Heard only in the trances of the blast, 
 Or if the secret ministry of frost 
 Shall hang them up in silent icicles, 
 Quietly shining to the quiet Moon. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 219 
 
 THE THREE GRAVES. 
 
 A FRAGMENT OF A SEXTON'S TALE. 
 
 [The Author has published the following humble fragment, 
 encouraged by the decisive recommendation of more than 
 one of our most celebrated living Poets. The language was 
 intended to be dramatic ; that is suited to the narrator ; and 
 the metre corresponds to the homeliness of the diction. It 
 is therefore presented as the fragment, not of a Poem, but 
 of a common Ballad-tale. Whether this is sufficient to justify 
 the adoption of such a style, in any metrical composition 
 not professedly ludicrous, the Author is himself in some 
 doubt. At all events, it is not presented as poetrv, and it 
 is in no way connected with the Author's judgment con- 
 cerning poetic diction. Its merits, if any, are exclusively 
 psychological. The story which must be supposed to have 
 been narrated in the first and second parts is as follows. 
 
 Edward, a young farmer, meets at the house of Ellen her 
 bosom-friend Mary, and commences an acquaintance, which 
 ends in a mutual attachment. With her consent, and by 
 the advice of their common friend Ellen, he announces his 
 hopes and intentions to Mary's mother, a widow-woman 
 bordering on her fortieth year, and from constant health 
 the possession of a competent property, and from having 
 had no other children but Mary and another daughter (the 
 father died in their infancy), retaining for the greater part, 
 her personal attractions and comeliness of appearance ; but 
 a woman of low education and violent temper. The answer 
 which she at once returned to Edward's application was 
 remarkable — " Well, Edward ! you are a handsome young 
 fellow, and you shall have my daughter." From this time 
 all their wooing passed under the mother's eye ; and, in 
 fine, she became herself enamoured of her future son-in-law, 
 and practised every art, both of endearment and of calumny, 
 
220 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 to transfer his affections from her daughter to herself. (The 
 outlines of the Tale are positive facts, and of no very dis- 
 tant date, though the author has purposely altered the 
 names and the scene of action, as well as invented the 
 characters of the parties and the detail of the incidents.) 
 Edward, however, though perplexed by her strange de- 
 tractions from her daughter's good qualities, yet in the in- 
 nocence of his own heart still mistaking her increasing 
 fondness for motherly affection ; she at length, overcome by 
 her miserable passion, after much abuse of Mary's temper 
 and moral tendencies, exclaimed with violent emotion — " O 
 Edward ! indeed, indeed, she is not fit for you — she has 
 not a heart to love you as you deserve. It is I that love 
 you ! Marry me, Edward ! and I will this very day settle 
 all my property on you." The Lover's eyes were now opened ; 
 and thus taken by surprise, whether from the effect of the 
 horror which he felt, acting as it were hysterically on his 
 nervous system, or that at the first moment he lost the 
 sense of guilt of the proposal in the feeling of its strange- 
 ness and absurdity, he flung her from him and burst into a 
 fit of laughter. Irritated by this almost to frenzy, the 
 woman fell on her knees, and in a loud voice that ap- 
 proached to a scream, she prayed for a curse both on him 
 and on her own child. Mary happened to be in the room di- 
 rectly above them, heard Edward's laugh, and her mother's 
 blasphemous prayer, and fainted away. He, hearing the 
 fall, ran up stairs, and taking her in his arms, carried her 
 off to Ellen's home ; and after some fruitless attempts on 
 her part toward a reconciliation with her mother, she was 
 married to him. — And here the third part of the Tale 
 begins. 
 
 1 was not led to choose this story from any partiality to 
 tragic, much less to monstrous events (though at the time 
 that I composed the verses, somewhat more than twelve 
 years ago, I was less averse to such subjects than at pre- 
 sent), but from finding in it a striking proof of the possible 
 effect on the imagination, from an Idea violently and sud- 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 221 
 
 denly impressed on it. I had been reading Bryan Ed- 
 wards's account of the effect of the Oby witchcraft on the 
 Negroes in the West Indies, and Hearne's deeply interest- 
 ing anecdotes of similar workings on the imagination of 
 the Copper Indians (those of my readers who have it in 
 their power will be well repaid for the trouble of referring 
 to those works for the passages alluded to) and I conceived 
 the design of showing that instances of this kind are not 
 peculiar to savage or barbarous tribes, and of illustrating 
 the mode in which the mind is affected in these cases, and 
 the progress and symptoms of the morbid action on the 
 fancy from the beginning. 
 
 The Tale is supposed to be narrated by an old Sexton, 
 in a country church-yard, to a traveller whose curiosity 
 had been awakened by the appearance of three graves, close 
 by each other, to two only of which there were grave- 
 stones. On the first of these was the name, and dates, as 
 usual : on the second, no name, but only a date, and the 
 words, " The Mercy of God is infinite."] 
 
 1818. 
 
 The grapes upon the Vicar's wall 
 
 Were ripe as ripe could be ; 
 And yellow leaves in sun and wind 
 
 Were falling from the tree. 
 
 On the hedge-elms in the narrow lane 
 
 Still swung the spikes of corn : 
 Dear Lord ! it seems but yesterday — 
 
 Young Edward's marriage-morn. 
 
 Up through that wood behind the church, 
 There leads from Edward's door 
 
 A mossy track, all over boughed, 
 For half a mile or more. 
 
222 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 And from their house-door by that track 
 The bride and bridegroom went ; 
 
 Sweet Mary, though she was not gay, 
 Seemed cheerful and content. 
 
 But when they to the church-yard came, 
 
 I've heard poor Mary say, 
 As soon as she stepped into the sun, 
 
 Her heart it died away. 
 
 And when the Vicar joined their hands, 
 Her limbs did creep and freeze ; 
 
 But when they prayed, she thought she saw 
 Her mother on her knees. 
 
 And o'er the church-path they returned — 
 
 I saw poor Mary's back, 
 Just as she stepped beneath the boughs 
 
 Into the' mossy track. 
 
 Her feet upon the mossy track 
 
 The married maiden set : 
 That moment — I have heard her say — 
 
 She wished she could forget. 
 
 The shade o'er-flushed her limbs with heat — 
 
 Then came a chill like death: 
 And when the merry bells rang out, 
 
 They seemed to stop her breath. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 223 
 
 Beneath the foulest mother's curse 
 
 No child could ever thrive : 
 A mother is a mother still, 
 
 The holiest thing alive. 
 
 So five months passed : the mother still 
 
 Would never heal the strife ; 
 But Edward was a loving man, 
 
 And Mary a fond wife. 
 
 " My sister may not visit us, 
 My mother says her nay : 
 
 Edward ! you are all to me, 
 
 1 wish for your sake I could be 
 
 More lifesome and more gay. 
 
 " I'm dull and sad ! indeed, indeed 
 
 I know I have no reason ! 
 Perhaps I am not well in health, 
 
 And 'tis a gloomy season." 
 
 'Twas a drizzly time — no ice, no snow ! 
 
 And on the few fine days 
 She stirred not out, lest she might meet 
 
 Her mother in the ways. 
 
 But Ellen, spite of miry ways 
 
 And weather dark and dreary, 
 Trudged every day to Edward's house, 
 
 And made them all more cheery. 
 
224 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Oh ! Ellen was a faithful friend, 
 
 More dear than any sister ! 
 As cheerful too as singing lark ; 
 And she ne'er left them till 'twas dark, 
 
 And then they always missed her. 
 
 And now Ash- Wednesday came — that day 
 
 But few to church repair : 
 For on. that day you know we read 
 
 The Commination prayer. 
 
 Our late old Vicar, a kind man, 
 
 Once, Sir, he said to me, 
 He wished that service was clean out 
 
 Of our good liturgy. 
 
 The mother walked into the church — 
 
 To Ellen's seat she went : 
 Though Ellen always kept her church 
 
 All church-days during Lent. 
 
 And gentle Ellen welcomed her 
 With courteous looks and mild : 
 
 Thought she " what if her heart should melt, 
 And all be reconciled !" 
 
 The day was scarcely like a day — 
 The clouds were black outright : 
 
 And many a night, with half a moon, 
 I've seen the church more li^ht. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 225 
 
 The wind was wild ; against the glass 
 
 The rain did beat and bicker ; 
 The church-tower swinging over head, 
 
 You scarce could hear the Vicar ! 
 
 And then and there the mother knelt, 
 
 And audibly she cried — 
 " Oh ! may a clinging curse consume 
 
 This woman by my side ! 
 
 O hear me, hear me, Lord in Heaven, 
 Although you take my life — 
 
 curse this woman, at whose house 
 Young Edward woo'd his wife. 
 
 By night and day, in bed and bower, 
 
 O let her cursed be !" 
 So having prayed, steady and slow, 
 
 She rose up from her knee, 
 And left the church, nor e'er again 
 
 The church-door entered she. 
 
 1 saw poor Ellen kneeling still, 
 
 So pale, I guessed not why : 
 When she stood up, there plainly was 
 A trouble in her eye. 
 
 And when the prayers were done, we all 
 Came round and asked her why : 
 
 Giddy she seemed, and sure, there was 
 A trouble in her eye. 
 VOL. i. Q 
 
226 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 But ere she from the church-door stepped 
 She smiled and told us why : 
 
 " It was a wicked woman's curse," 
 Quoth she, " and what care I ?" 
 
 She smiled, and smiled, and passed it off 
 Ere from the door she stept — 
 
 But all agree it would have been 
 Much better had sbe wept. 
 
 And if her heart was not at ease, 
 This was her constant cry — 
 
 " It was a wicked woman's curse- 
 God's good, and what care I ?" 
 
 There was a hurry in her looks, 
 Her struggles she redoubled : 
 
 " It was a wicked woman's curse, 
 And why should I be troubled ?" 
 
 These tears will come — I dandled her 
 When 'twas the merest fairy — 
 
 Good creature ! and she hid it all : 
 She told it not to Mary. 
 
 But Mary heard the tale : her arms 
 Round Ellen's neck she threw ; 
 
 " Ellen, Ellen, she cursed me, 
 And now she hath cursed you !" 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 227 
 
 I saw young- Edward by himself 
 
 Stalk fast adown the lee, 
 He snatched a stick from every fence, 
 
 A twig from every tree. 
 
 He snapped them still with hand or knee, 
 
 And then away they flew ! 
 As if with his uneasy limbs 
 
 He knew not what to do ! 
 
 You see, good sir ! that single hill ? 
 
 His farm lies underneath : 
 He heard it there, he heard it all, 
 
 And only gnashed his teeth. 
 
 Now Ellen was a darling love 
 
 In all his joys and cares : 
 And Ellen's name and Mary's name 
 Fast-linked they both together came, 
 
 Whene'er he said his prayers. 
 
 And in the moment of his prayers 
 
 He loved them both alike : 
 Yea, both sweet names with one sweet joy 
 
 Upon his heart did strike ! 
 
 He reach'd his home, and by his looks 
 
 They saw his inward strife : 
 And they clung round him with their arms, 
 
 Both Ellen and his wife. 
 
228 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 And Mary could not check her tears, 
 So on his breast she bowed ; 
 
 Then frenzy melted into grief, 
 And Edward wept aloud. 
 
 Dear Ellen did not weep at all, 
 But closelier did she cling 1 , 
 
 And turned her face and looked as if 
 She saw some frightful thing. 
 
 THE THREE GRAVES. 
 
 PART IV. 
 
 To see a man tread over graves 
 
 I hold it no good mark ; 
 'Tis wicked in the sun and moon, 
 
 And bad luck in the dark ! 
 
 You see that grave ? The Lord he gives, 
 
 The Lord he takes away : 
 O Sir ! the child of my old age 
 
 Lies there as cold as clay. 
 
 Except that grave, you scarce see one 
 
 That was not dug by me ; 
 I'd rather dance upon 'em all 
 
 Than tread upon these three ! 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 229 
 
 " Ay, Sexton ! 'tis a touching tale." 
 
 You, Sir ! are but a lad ; 
 This month I'm in my seventieth year, 
 
 And still it makes me sad. 
 
 And Mary's sister told it me, 
 
 For three good hours and more ; 
 Though I had heard it, in the main, 
 
 From Edward's self before. 
 
 Well ! it passed off ! the gentle Ellen 
 
 Did well nigh dote on Mary ; 
 And she went oftener than before, 
 And Mary loved her more and more : 
 
 She managed all the dairy. 
 
 To market she on market-days, 
 
 To church on Sundays came ; 
 All seemed the same : all seemed so, Sir ! 
 
 But all was not the same ! 
 
 Had Ellen lost her mirth ? Oh ! no ! 
 
 But she was seldom cheerful ; 
 And Edward looked as if he thought 
 
 That Ellen's mirth was fearful. 
 
 When by herself, she to herself 
 
 Must sing some merry rhyme ; 
 She could not now be glad for hours, 
 
 Yet silent all the time. 
 
230 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 And when she soothed her friend, through all 
 
 Her soothing words 'twas plain 
 She had a sore grief of her own, 
 
 A haunting in her brain. 
 
 And oft she said, I'm not grown thin ! 
 
 And then her wrist she spanned ; 
 And once when Mary was down-cast, 
 
 She took her by the hand, 
 And gazed upon her, and at first 
 
 She gently pressed her hand ; 
 
 Then harder, till her grasp at length 
 
 Did gripe like a convulsion ! 
 Alas ! said she, we ne'er can be 
 
 Made happy by compulsion ! 
 
 And once her both arms suddenly 
 
 Round Mary's neck she flung, 
 And her heart panted, and she felt 
 
 The words upon her tongue. 
 
 She felt them coming, but no power 
 Had she the words to smother ; 
 
 And with a kind of shriek she cried, 
 
 " Oh Christ ! you're like your mother !" 
 
 So gentle Ellen now no more 
 
 Could make this sad house cheery ; 
 
 And Mary's melancholy ways 
 Drove Edward wild and weary. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 231 
 
 Lingering he raised his latch at eve, 
 
 Though tired in heart and limb : 
 He loved no other place, and yet 
 
 Home was no home to him. 
 
 One evening he took up a book, 
 
 And nothing in it read ; 
 Then flung it down, and groaning cried, 
 
 " Oh ! Heaven ! that I were dead." 
 
 Mary looked up into his face, 
 
 And nothing to him said ; 
 She tried to smile, and on his arm 
 
 Mournfully leaned her head. 
 
 And ne burst into tears, and fell 
 
 Upon his knees in prayer : 
 " Her heart is broke ! O God ! my grief, 
 
 It is too great to bear!" 
 
 'Twas such a foggy time as makes 
 
 Old sextons, Sir! like me, 
 Rest on their spades to cough ; the spring 
 
 Was late uncommonly. 
 
 And then the hot days, all at once, 
 They came, we knew not how : 
 
 You looked about for shade, when scarce 
 A leaf was on a bough. 
 
232 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 It happened then ('twas in the bower 
 
 A furlong 1 up the wood : 
 Perhaps you know the place, and yet 
 
 I scarce know how you should, — ) 
 
 No path leads thither, 'tis not nigh 
 
 To any pasture-plot ; 
 But clustered near the chattering brook, 
 
 Lone hollies marked the spot. 
 
 Those hollies of themselves a shape 
 
 As of an arbour took, 
 A close, round arbour ; and it stands 
 
 Not three strides from a brook. 
 
 Within this arbour, which was still 
 
 With scarlet berries hung, 
 Were these three friends, one Sunday morn 
 
 Just as the first bell rung. 
 
 'Tis sweet to hear a brook, 'tis sweet 
 
 To hear the Sabbath-bell, 
 'Tis sweet to hear them both at once, 
 
 Deep in a woody dell. 
 
 His limbs along the moss, his head 
 
 Upon a mossy heap, 
 With shut-up senses, Edward lay : 
 That brook e'en on a working day 
 
 Might chatter one to sleep. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 233 
 
 And he had passed a restless night, 
 
 And was not well in health ; 
 The women sat down by his side, 
 
 And talked as 'twere by stealth. 
 
 " The sun peeps through the close thick leaves, 
 
 See, dearest Ellen ! see ! 
 'Tis in the leaves, a little sun, 
 
 No bigger than your ee ; 
 
 " A tiny sun, and it has got 
 
 A perfect glory too ; 
 Ten thousand threads and hairs of light, 
 Make up a glory, gay and bright, 
 
 Round that small orb, so blue." 
 
 And then they argued of those rays, 
 
 What colour they might be ; 
 Says this, " they're mostly green ;" says that, 
 
 " They're amber-like to me." 
 
 So they sat chatting, while bad thoughts 
 
 Were troubling Edward's rest; 
 But soon they heard his hard quick pants, 
 
 And the thumping in his breast. 
 
 " A mother too 1" these self-same words 
 
 Did Edward mutter plain ; 
 His face was drawn back on itself, 
 
 With horror and huge pain. 
 
234 SIBYLLINE LEAVES, 
 
 Both groaned at once, for both knew well 
 What thoughts were in his mind ; 
 
 When he waked up, and stared like one 
 That hath been just struck blind. 
 
 He sat upright ; and ere the dream 
 
 Had had time to depart, 
 " O God, forgive me! (he exclaimed) 
 
 I have torn out her heart." 
 
 Then Ellen shrieked, and forthwith burst 
 
 Into ungentle laughter ; 
 And Mary shivered, where she sat, 
 
 And never she smiled after. 
 
 Carmen reliquum in futurum tempus relegatum. To- 
 morrow ! and To-morrow ! and To-morrow ! 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 235 
 
 ODES AND MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 
 
 DEJECTION: AN ODE. 
 
 Late, late yestreen I saw the new Moon, 
 With the old Moon in her arms ; 
 And I fear, I fear, my Master dear ! 
 We shall have a deadly storm. 
 
 BALLAD OF SIR PATRICK SPENCE. 
 
 Well ! If the Bard was weather-wise, who made 
 The grand old ballad of Sir Patrick Spence, 
 This night, so tranquil now, will not go hence 
 Unroused by winds, that ply a busier trade 
 Than those which mould yon cloud in lazy flakes, 
 Or the dull sobbing draft, that moans and rakes 
 Upon the strings of this Eolian lute, 
 Which better far were mute. 
 For lo ! the New-moon winter-bright ! 
 And overspread with phantom light, 
 (With swimming phantom light o'erspread 
 But rimmed and circled by a silver thread) 
 I see the old Moon in her lap, foretelling 
 
 The coming on of rain and squally blast. 
 And oh ! that even now the gust were swelling, 
 And the slant nisrht-shower driving loud and fast ! 
 
236 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Those sounds which oft have raised me, whilst they 
 And sent my soul abroad, [awed, 
 
 Might now perhaps their wonted impulse give, 
 Might startle this dull pain, and make it move and 
 live ! 
 
 A grief without a pang, void, dark, and drear, 
 A stifled, drowsy, unimpassioned grief, 
 Which finds no natural outlet, no relief, 
 In word, or sigh, or tear — 
 
 Lady ! in this wan and heartless mood, 
 To other thoughts by yonder throstle woo'd, 
 
 All this long eve, so balmy and serene, 
 Have I been gazing on the western sky, 
 
 And its peculiar tint of yellow green : 
 And still I gaze — and with how blank an eye ! 
 And those thin clouds above, in flakes and bars, 
 That give away their motion to the stars ; 
 Those stars, that glide behind them or between, 
 Now sparkling, now bedimmed, but always seen : 
 Yon crescent Moon as fixed as if it grew 
 In its own cloudless, starless lake of blue ; 
 
 1 see them all so excellently fair, 
 
 I see, not feel how beautiful they are ! 
 
 in. 
 
 My genial spirits fail ; 
 And what can these avail 
 To lift the smothering weight from off my breast? 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 237 
 
 It were a vain endeavour, 
 
 Though I should gaze for ever 
 On that green light that lingers in the west : 
 I may not hope from outward forms to win 
 The passion and the life, whose fountains are within. 
 
 Lady ! we receive but what we give, 
 And in our life alone does nature live : 
 Ours is her wedding-garment, ours her shroud ! 
 
 And would we aught behold, of higher worth, 
 Than that inanimate cold world allowed 
 To the poor loveless ever-anxious crowd, 
 
 Ah ! from the soul itself must issue forth, 
 A light, a glory, a fair luminous cloud 
 
 Enveloping the Earth — 
 And from the soul itself must there be sent 
 
 A sweet and potent voice, of its own birth, 
 Of all sweet sounds the life and element ! 
 
 v. 
 
 pure of heart ! thou need'st not ask of me 
 What this strong music in the soul may be ! 
 What, and wherein it doth exist, 
 This light, this glory, this fair luminous mist, 
 This beautiful and beauty-making power. 
 
 Joy, virtuous Lady! Joy that ne'er was given, 
 Save to the pure, and in their purest hour, 
 Life, and Life's effluence, cloud at once and 
 shower, 
 
238 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Joy, Lady ! is the spirit and the power, 
 Which wedding Nature to us gives in dower, 
 
 A new Earth and new Heaven, 
 Undreamt of by the sensual and the proud — 
 Joy is the sweet voice, Joy the luminous cloud — 
 
 We in ourselves rejoice ! 
 And thence flows all that charms or ear or sight, 
 
 All melodies the echoes of that voice, 
 All colours a suffusion from that light. 
 
 There was a time when, though my path was rough, 
 This joy within me dallied with distress, 
 
 And all misfortunes were but as the stuff 
 
 Whence Fancy made me dreams of happiness : 
 
 For hope grew round me, like the twining vine, 
 
 And fruits, and foliage, not my own, seemed mine. 
 
 But now afflictions bow me down to earth : 
 
 Nor care I that they rob me of my mirth, 
 But oh ! each visitation 
 
 Suspends what nature gave me at my birth, 
 Pvly shaping spirit of Imagination. 
 
 For not to think of what I needs must feel, 
 But to be still and patient, all I can ; 
 
 And haply by abstruse research to steal 
 
 From my own nature all the natural man — 
 This was my sole resource, my only plan : 
 
 Till that which suits a part infects the whole, 
 
 And now is almost grown the habit of mv soul. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 1239 
 
 Hence, viper thoughts, that coil around my mind, 
 
 Reality's dark dream! 
 I turn from you, and listen to the wind, 
 
 Which long has raved unnoticed. What a scream 
 Of agony by torture lengthened out 
 That lute sent forth ! Thou Wind, that ravest 
 without, 
 Bare craig - , or mountain-tairn, 1 or blasted tree, 
 Or pine-grove whither woodman never clomb, 
 Or lonely house, long held the witches' home, 
 
 Methinks were fitter instruments for thee, 
 Mad Lutanist! who in this month of showers, 
 Of dark brown gardens, and of peeping flowers, 
 Mak'st Devils' yule, with worse than wintry song, 
 The blossoms, buds, and timorous leaves among. 
 
 Thou Actor, perfect in all tragic sounds '. 
 Thou mighty Poet, e'en to frenzy bold ! 
 What tell'st thou now about ? 
 'Tis of the rushing of a host in rout, 
 With groans of trampled men, with smarting- 
 wounds — 
 At once they groan with pain, and shudder with 
 the cold ! 
 
 1 Tairn is a small lake, generally if not always applied 
 to the lakes up in the mountains, and which are the 
 feeders of those in the valleys. This address to the Storm- 
 wind will not appear extravagant to those who have heard 
 it at night, and in a mountainous country. 
 
240 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 But hush ! there is a pause of deepest silence ' 
 
 And all that noise, as of a rushing crowd, 
 With groans, and tremulous shudderings — all is 
 over — 
 It tells another tale, with sounds less deep and 
 A tale of less affright, [loud ! 
 
 And tempered with delight, 
 As Otway's self had framed the tender lay, 
 'Tis of a little child 
 Upon a lonesome wild, 
 Not far from home, but she hath lost her way : 
 And now moans low in bitter grief and fear, 
 And now screams loud, and hopes to make her 
 mother hear. 
 
 'Tis midnight, but small thoughts have I of sleep : 
 Full seldom may my friend such vigils keep ! 
 Visit her, gentle Sleep ! with wings of healing, 
 
 And may this storm be but a mountain-birth, 
 May all the stars hang bright above her dwelling, 
 
 Silent as though they watched the sleeping 
 With light heart may she rise, [Earth! 
 
 Gay fancy, cheerful eyes, 
 
 Joy lift her spirit, joy attune her voice ; 
 To her may all things live, from pole to pole, 
 Their life the eddying of her living soul ! 
 
 O simple spirit, guided from above, 
 Dear Lady ! friend devoutest of my choice, 
 Thus mayest thou ever, evermore rejoice. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 241 
 
 ODE TO GEORGIANA, 
 
 DUCHESS OF DEVONSHIRE, ON THE TWENTY- 
 FOURTH STANZA IN HER " PASSAGE 
 OVER MOUNT GOTHARD." 
 
 " And hail the chapel ! hail the platform wild" 
 Where Tell directed, the avenging dart, 
 
 With well strung arm, that first preserved his child, 
 Then aimed the arrow at the tyrant's heart." 
 
 Splendour's fondly fostered child ! 
 And did you hail the platform wild, 
 
 Where once the Austrian fell 
 
 Beneath the shaft of Tell ! 
 O Lady, nursed in pomp and pleasure ! 
 Whence learn'd you that heroic measure ? 
 
 Light as a dream your days their circlets ran, 
 From all that teaches brotherhood to Man 
 Far, far removed! from want, from hope, from fear ! 
 Enchanting music lulled your infant ear, 
 Obeisance, praises soothed your infant heart : 
 
 Emblasonments and old ancestral crests, 
 With many a bright obtrusive form of art, 
 
 Detained your eye from nature : stately vests, 
 That veiling strove to deck your charms divine, 
 Rich viands and the pleasurable wine, 
 
 vol. i. R 
 
242 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Were yours unearned by toil ; nor could you see 
 The unenjoying toiler's misery. 
 And yet, free Nature's uncorrupted child, 
 You hailed the chapel and the platform wild, 
 Where once the Austrian fell 
 Beneath the shaft of Tell ! 
 O Lady, nursed in pomp and pleasure ! 
 Whence learn'd you that heroic measure ? 
 
 There crowd your finely-fibred frame, 
 
 All living faculties of bliss ; 
 And Genius to your cradle came, 
 His forehead wreathed with lambent flame, 
 And bending low, with godlike kiss 
 Breath'd in a more celestial life ; 
 But boasts not many a fair compeer, 
 
 A heart as sensitive to joy and fear ? 
 And some, perchance, might wage an equal strife, 
 Some few, to nobler being wrought, 
 Corrivals in the nobler gift of thought. 
 Yet these delight to celebrate 
 Laurelled war and plumy state ; 
 Or in verse and music dress 
 Tales of rustic happiness — 
 Pernicious tales ! insidious strains 1 
 That steel the rich man's breast, 
 And mock the lot unblest, 
 The sordid vices and the abject pains, 
 Which evermore must be 
 The doom of ignorance and penury ! 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 243 
 
 But you, free Nature's uncorrupted child, 
 You hailed the chapel and the platform wild, 
 
 Where once the Austrian fell 
 
 Beneath the shaft of Tell ! 
 
 Lady, nursed in pomp and pleasure ! 
 Whence learn'd you that heroic measure ? 
 
 You were a mother ! That most holy name, 
 Which Heaven and Nature bless, 
 
 1 may not vilely prostitute to those 
 
 Whose infants owe them less 
 Than the poor caterpillar owes 
 Its gaudy parent fly. 
 You were a mother ! at your bosom fed 
 
 The babes that loved you. You, with laughing 
 eye, 
 Each twilight-thought, each nascent feeling read, 
 Which you yourself created. Oh ! delight ! 
 A second time to be a mother, 
 
 Without the mother's bitter groans : 
 Another thought, and yet another, 
 By touch, or taste, by looks or tones 
 O'er the growing sense to roll, 
 The mother of your infant's soul ! 
 The Angel of the Earth, who, while he guides 
 
 His chariot-planet round the goal of day, 
 All trembling gazes on the eye of God, 
 
 A moment turned his awful face away ; 
 And as he viewed you, from his aspect sweet 
 New influences in your being rose, 
 
244 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Blest intuitions and communions fleet 
 
 With living Nature, in her joys and woes ! 
 Thenceforth your soul rejoiced to see 
 The shrine of social Liberty ! 
 O beautiful ! Nature's child ! 
 Twas thence you hailed the platform wild, 
 
 Where once the Austrian fell 
 
 Beneath the shaft of Tell ! 
 O Lady, nursed in pomp and pleasure ! 
 Thence learn'd you that heroic measure. 
 
 ODE TO TRANQUILLITY. 
 
 Tranquillity ! thou better name 
 Than all the family of Fame ! 
 Thou ne'er wilt leave my riper age 
 To low intrigue, or factious rage ; 
 For oh ! dear child of thoughtful Truth, 
 To thee I gave my early youth, 
 And left the bark, and blest the steadfast shore, 
 Ere yet the tempest rose and scared me with its 
 roar. 
 Who late and lingering seeks thy shrine, 
 On him but seldom, Power divine 
 Thy spirit rests ! Satiety 
 And Sloth, poor counterfeits of thee, 
 Mock the tired worldling. Idle hope 
 And dire remembrance interlope, 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 245 
 
 To vex the feverish slumbers of the mind : 
 
 The bubble floats before, the spectre stalks behind. 
 
 But me thy gentle hand will lead 
 At morning through the accustomed mead ; 
 And in the sultry summer's heat 
 Will build me up a mossy seat ; 
 And when the gust of Autumn crowds, 
 And breaks the busy moonlight clouds, 
 Thou best the thought canst raise, the heart attune, 
 Light as the busy clouds, calm as the gliding moon. 
 
 The feeling heart, the searching soul, 
 To thee I dedicate the whole ! 
 And while within myself I trace 
 The greatness of some future race, 
 Aloof with hermit-eye I scan 
 The present works of present man — 
 A wild and dream-like trade of blood and guile, 
 Too foolish for a tear, too wicked for a smile ! 
 
246 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 TO A YOUNG FRIEND, 
 
 ON HIS PROPOSING TO DOMESTICATE WITH THE 
 AUTHOR. COMPOSED IN 1796. 
 
 A mount, not wearisome and bare and steep, 
 
 But a green mountain variously up-piled, 
 Where o'er the jutting rocks soft mosses creep, 
 Or coloured lichens with slow oosing weep ; 
 
 Where cypress and the darker yew start wild ; 
 And 'mid the summer torrent's gentle dash 
 Dance brightened the red clusters of the ash ; 
 
 Beneath whose boughs, by those still sounds 
 beguiled, 
 Calm Pensiveness might muse herself to sleep ; 
 
 Till haply startled by some fleecy dam, 
 That rustling on the bushy cliff above, 
 With melancholy bleat of anxious love, 
 
 Made meek enquiry for her wandering lamb : 
 
 Such a green mountain 'twere most sweet to climb, 
 E'en while the bosom acbed with loneliness — 
 How more than sweet, if some dear friend should 
 bless 
 
 The adventurous toil, and up the path sublime 
 Now lead, now follow : the glad landscape round 
 Wide and more wide, increasing without bound ! 
 
 then 'twere loveliest sympathy, to mark 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 247 
 
 The berries of the half-uprooted ash 
 
 Dripping and bright; and list the torrent's dash,^- 
 
 Beneath the cypress, or the yew more dark, 
 Seated at ease, on some smooth mossy rock; 
 In social silence now, and now to unlock 
 The treasured heart ; arm linked in friendly arm, 
 Save if the one, his muse's witching charm 
 Muttering brow-bent, at unwatched distance lag ; 
 
 Till high o'er head his beckoning friend appears 
 And from the forehead of the topmost crag 
 
 Shouts eagerly : for haply there uprears 
 That shadowing pine its old romantic limbs, 
 
 Which latest shall detain the enamoured sight 
 Seen from below, when eve the valley dims, 
 
 Tinged yellow with the rich departing light ; 
 
 And haply, basoned in some unsunned cleft, 
 A beauteous spring, the rock's collected tears, 
 Sleeps sheltered there, scarce wrinkled by the 
 gale ! 
 
 Together thus, the world's vain turmoil left, 
 Stretched on the crag, and shadowed by the pine, 
 
 And bending o'er the clear delicious fount, 
 Ah ! dearest youth ! it were a lot divine 
 To cheat our noons in moralizing mood, 
 While west- winds fanned our temples toil-bedewed ; 
 
 Then downwards slope, oft pausing, from the 
 mount, 
 To some lone mansion, in some woody dale, 
 Where smiling with blue eye, domestic bliss 
 Gives this the husband's, that the brother's kiss ! 
 
248 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Thus rudely versed in allegoric lore, 
 The Hill of Knowledge I essayed to trace ; 
 That verdurous hill with many a resting-place, 
 And many a stream, whose warbling waters pour 
 
 To glad and fertilize the subject plains ; 
 That hill with secret springs, and nooks untrod, 
 And many a fancy-blest and holy sod 
 
 Where Inspiration, his diviner strains 
 Low murmuring, lay ; and starting from the rocks 
 Stiff evergreens, whose spreading foliage mocks 
 Want's barren soil, and the bleak frosts of age, 
 And bigotry's mad fire-invoking rage ! 
 O meek retiring spirit ! we will climb, 
 Cheering and cheered, this lovely hill sublime ; 
 
 And from the stirring world up-lifted high, 
 (Whose noises, faintly wafted on the wind, 
 To quiet musings shall attune the mind, 
 
 And oft the melancholy theme supply) 
 
 There, while the prospect through the gazing eye 
 
 Pours all its healthful greenness on the soul, 
 We'll smile at wealth, and learn to smile at fame, 
 Our hopes, our knowledge, and our joys the same, 
 
 As neighbouring fountains image, each the whole : 
 Then when the mind hath drunk its fill of truth 
 
 We'll discipline the heart to pure delight, 
 Rekindling sober joy's domestic flame. 
 They whom I love shall love thee, honoured youth ! 
 
 Now may Heaven realize this vision bright ! 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 249 
 
 LINES TO W. L. 
 
 WHILE HE SANG A SONG TO PURCELL's MUSIC. 
 
 While my young cheek retains its healthful hues, 
 
 And I have many friends who hold me dear ; 
 
 L ! methinks, I would not often hear 
 
 Such melodies as thine, lest I should lose 
 All memory of the wrongs and sore distress, 
 
 For which my miserable brethren weep ! 
 
 But should uncomforted misfortunes steep 
 My daily bread in tears and bitterness ; 
 And if at death's dread moment I should lie 
 
 With no beloved face at my bed-side, 
 To fix the last glance of my closing eye, [guide, 
 
 Methinks, such strains, breathed by my angel- 
 Would make me pass the cup of anguish by, 
 
 Mix with the blest, nor know that I had died ! 
 
 ADDRESSED TO A YOUNG MAN OF FORTUNE 
 
 WHO ABANDONED HIMSELF TO AN INDOLENT 
 AND CAUSELESS MELANCHOLY. 
 
 Hence that fantastic wantonness of woe, 
 Youth to partial Fortune vainly dear ! 
 
 To plundered want's half-sheltered hovel go, 
 Go, and some hunger-bitten infant hear 
 
250 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Moan haply in a dying mother's ear : 
 Or when the cold and dismal fog-damps brood 
 O'er the rank church-yard with sear elm-leaves 
 
 strewed, 
 Pace round some widow's grave, whose dearer part 
 
 Was slaughtered, where o'er his uncoffined limbs 
 The nocking flesh-birds screamed ! Then, while 
 thy heart 
 
 Groans, and thine eye a fiercer sorrow dims, 
 Know (and the truth shall kindle thy young mind) 
 What nature makes thee mourn, she bids thee heal ! 
 
 O abject ! if, to sickly dreams resigned, 
 All effortless thou leave life's common-weal 
 
 A prey to tyrants, murderers of mankind. 
 
 SONNET TO THE RIVER OTTER. 
 
 Dear native brook ! wild streamlet of the West ! 
 
 How many various-fated years have past, 
 
 What happy, and what mournful hours, since 
 last 
 I skimmed the smooth thin stone along thy breast, 
 Numbering its light leaps ! yet so deep imprest 
 Sink the sweet scenes of childhood, that mine eyes 
 
 I never shut amid the sunny ray, 
 But straight with all their tints thy waters rise, 
 
 Thy crossing plank, thy marge with willows grey, 
 And bedded sand that, veined with various dyes, 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 251 
 
 Gleamed through thy bright transparence ! On 
 my way, 
 
 Visions of childhood ! oft have ye beguiled 
 Lone manhood's cares, yet waking fondest sighs 
 
 Ah ! that once more I were a careless child ! 
 
 SONNET. 
 
 COMPOSED ON A JOURNEY HOMEWARD; THE AUTHOR 
 
 HAVING RECEIVED INTELLIGENCE OF THE 
 
 BIRTH OF A SON, SEPT. 20, 1796. 
 
 Oft o'er my brain does that strange fancy roll 
 Which makes the present (while the flash doth 
 
 last) 
 Seem a mere semblance of some unknown past 
 Mixed with such feelings, as perplex the soul 
 Self-questioned in her sleep ; and some have said 
 We lived, ere yet this robe of flesh we wore. 
 
 my sweet baby ! when I reach my door, 
 If heavy looks should tell me thou art dead, 
 (As sometimes, through excess of hope, I fear) 
 I think that I should struggle to believe 
 
 Thou wert a spirit, to this nether sphere 
 Sentenced for some more venial crime to grieve ; 
 Did'st scream, then spring to meet Heaven's quick 
 reprieve, 
 
 While we wept idly o'er thy little bier ! 
 
 1 *E.v 7rov rj[j,aiv i) ^vxv irpiv Iv Tififie Tip avSrpoJTrii'tp 
 tiSti ytveaSrai. — Plat, in Phadon. 
 
252 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 SONNET. 
 
 TO A FRIEND WHO ASKED, HOW I FELT WHEN THE 
 NURSE FIRST PRESENTED MY INFANT TO ME. 
 
 Charles ! my slow heart was only sad, when first 
 I scanned that face of feeble infancy : 
 
 For dimly on my thoughtful spirit burst 
 All I had been, and all my child might be ! 
 
 But when I saw it on its mother's arm, 
 And hanging at her bosom (she the while 
 Bent o'er its features with a tearful smile) 
 
 Then I was thrilled and melted, and most warm 
 
 Impressed a father's kiss : and all beguiled 
 Of dark remembrance and presageful fear, 
 I seemed to see an angel-form appear — 
 
 'Twas even thine, beloved woman mild ! 
 
 So for the mother's sake the child was dear, 
 
 And dearer was the mother for the child. 
 
 THE VIRGIN'S CRADLE-HYMN. 
 
 COPIED FROM A PRINT OF THE VIRGIN, IN A ROMAN 
 CATHOLIC VILLAGE IN GERMANY. 
 
 Dormi, Jesu ! Mater ridet 
 Quae tam dulcem somnum videt, 
 
 Dormi, Jesu ! blandule ! 
 Si non dormis, Mater plorat, 
 Inter fila cantans orat, 
 
 Blande, veni, somnule. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 253 
 
 ENGLISH. 
 
 Sleep, sweet babe ! my cares beguiling : 
 Mother sits beside thee smiling ; 
 
 Sleep, my darling, tenderly ! 
 If thou sleep not, mother mourneth, 
 Singing as her wheel she turneth : 
 
 Come, soft slumber, balmily ! 
 
 EPITAPH ON AN INFANT. 
 
 Its balmy lips the infant blest 
 Relaxing from its mother's breast, 
 How sweet it heaves the happy sigh 
 Of innocent satiety ! 
 
 And such my infant's latest sigh ! 
 tell, rude stone ! the passer by, 
 That here the pretty babe doth lie, 
 Death sang to sleep with Lullaby. 
 
 MELANCHOLY. 
 
 A FRAGMENT. 
 
 Stretch'd on a mouldered Abbey's broadest wall, 
 Where ruining ivies propped the ruins steep — 
 
 Her folded arms wrapping her tattered pall, 
 Had melancholv mus'd herself to sleep. 
 
254 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 The fern was press'd beneath her hair, 
 The dark green adder's tongue was there ; 
 And still as past the flagging sea-gale weak, 
 The long lank leaf bowed fluttering o'er her cheek. 
 
 That pallid cheek was flushed : her eager look 
 Beamed eloquent in slumber ! Inly wrought, 
 Imperfect sounds her moving lips forsook, 
 And her bent forehead worked with troubled 
 thought. 
 Strange was the dream 
 
 TELL'S BIRTH-PLACE. 
 
 IMITATED FROM STOLBERG. 
 I. 
 
 Mark this holy chapel well ! 
 The birth-place, this, of William Tell. 
 Here, where stands God's altar dread, 
 Stood his parents' marriage-bed. 
 
 ii. 
 Here, first, an infant to her breast, 
 Him his loving mother prest ; 
 And kissed the babe, and blessed the day, 
 And prayed as mothers use to pray. 
 
 in. 
 " Vouchsafe him health, O God ! and give 
 The child thy servant still to live !" 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 255 
 
 But God had destined to do more 
 
 Through him, than through an armed power. 
 
 God gave him reverence of laws, 
 
 Yet stirring blood in Freedom's cause — 
 
 A spirit to his rocks akin, 
 
 The eye of the hawk, and the fire therein ! 
 
 To Nature and to Holy Writ 
 Alone did God the boy commit : 
 Where flashed and roared the torrent, oft 
 His soul found wings, and soared aloft ! 
 
 VI. 
 
 The straining oar and chamois chase 
 Had formed his limbs to strength and grace 
 On wave and wind the boy would toss, 
 Was great, nor knew how great he was J 
 
 He knew not that his chosen hand, 
 Made strong by God, his native land 
 Would rescue from the shameful yoke 
 Of Slavery — the which he broke ! 
 
256 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 A CHRISTMAS CAROL. 
 
 The shepherds went their hasty way, 
 
 And found the lowly stable-shed 
 Where the Virgin-Mother lay : 
 
 And now they checked their eager tread, 
 For to the Babe, that at her bosom clung, 
 A mother's song the Virgin- Mother sun°\ 
 
 They told her how a glorious light, 
 
 Streaming from a heavenly throng, 
 Around them shone, suspending night ! 
 While sweeter than a mother's song, 
 Blest Angels heralded the Saviour's birth, 
 Glory to God on high ! and Peace on Earth. 
 
 She listened to the tale divine, 
 
 And closer still the Babe she prest ; 
 And while she cried, the Babe is mine ! 
 The milk rushed faster to her breast : 
 Joy rose within her, like a summer's morn ; 
 Peace, Peace on Earth ! the Prince of Peace is born. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Thou Mother of the Prince of Peace, 
 Poor, simple, and of low estate ! 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 257 
 
 That strife should vanish, battle cease, 
 O why should this thy soul elate ? 
 
 Sweet music's loudest note, the poet's story, 
 
 Did'st thou ne'er love to hear of fame and glory ? 
 
 And is not War a youthful king, 
 
 A stately hero clad in mail ? 
 Beneath his footsteps laurels spring ; 
 Him Earth's majestic monarchs hail 
 Their friend, their playmate ! and his bold bright 
 
 eye 
 Compels the maiden's love-confessing sigh. 
 
 " Tell this in some more courtly scene, 
 
 To maids and youths in robes of state ! 
 I am a woman poor and mean, 
 And therefore is my soul elate. 
 War is a ruffian, all with guilt defiled, 
 That from the aged father tears his child ! 
 
 " A murderous fiend, by fiends adored, 
 
 He kills the sire and starves the son ; 
 The husband kills, and from her board 
 Steals all his widow's toil had won ; 
 Plunders God's world of beauty; rends away 
 All safety from the night, all comfort from the 
 day. 
 
 VOL. I. S 
 
258 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 " Then wisely is my soul elate, 
 
 That strife should vanish, battle cease : 
 I'm poor and of a low estate, 
 
 The Mother of the Prince of Peace. 
 Joy rises in me, like a summer's morn : [born." 
 Peace, Peace on Earth ! the Prince of Peace is 
 
 HUMAN LIFE, 
 
 ON THE DENIAL OF IMMORTALITY. 
 
 If dead, we cease to be ; if total gloom 
 
 Swallow up life's brief flash for aye, we fare 
 As summer-gusts, of sudden birth and doom, 
 
 Whose sound and motion not alone declare, 
 But are their whole of being ! If the breath 
 
 Be life itself, and not its task and tent, 
 If even a soul like Milton's can know death ; 
 
 O Man ! thou vessel purposeless, unmeant, 
 Yet drone-hive strange of phantom purposes! 
 
 Surplus of nature's dread activity, 
 Which, as she gazed on some nigh-finished vase, 
 Retreating slow, with meditative pause, 
 
 She formed with restless hands unconsciously ! 
 Blank accident ! nothing's anomaly ! 
 
 If rootless thus, thus substanceless thy state, 
 Go, weigh thy dreams, and be thy hopes, thy fears, 
 The counter- weights ! — Thy laughter and thy tears 
 
 Mean but themselves / each fittest to create, 
 And to repay the other ! Why rejoices 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 259 
 
 Thy heart with hollow joy for hollow good ? 
 
 Why cowl thy face beneath the mourner's hood, 
 Why waste thy sighs, and thy lamenting voices, 
 
 Image of image, ghost of ghostly elf, 
 That such a thing as thou feel'st warm or cold ? 
 Yet what and whence thy gain, if thou withhold 
 
 These costless shadows of thy shadowy self ? 
 Be sad ! be glad ! be neither ! seek, or shun ! 
 Thou hast no reason why ! Thou can'st have none ; 
 Thy being's being is contradiction. 
 
 MOLES. 
 
 — They shrink in, as Moles 
 (Nature's mute monks, live mandrakes of the 
 
 ground) 
 Creep back from Light — then listen for its sound; — 
 See but to dread, and dread they know not why — 
 The natural alien of their negative eye. 
 
 THE VISIT OF THE GODS. 
 
 IMITATED FROM SCHILLER. 
 
 Never, believe me, 
 Appear the Immortals, 
 Never alone : 
 Scarce had I welcomed the sorrow-beguiler, 
 
260 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 Iacchus ! but in came boy Cupid the smiler ; 
 Lo ! Phoebus the glorious descends from his throne ! 
 They advance, they float in, the Olympians all ! 
 With divinities fills my 
 Terrestrial hall ! 
 
 How shall I yield you 
 Due entertainment. 
 Celestial quire ? 
 Me rather, bright guests ! with your wings of up- 
 
 buoyance 
 Bear aloft to your homes, to your banquets of joy- 
 
 ance, 
 That the roofs of Olympus may echo my lyre ! 
 Hah ! we mount ! on their pinions they waft up 
 my soul ! 
 
 give me the nectar ! 
 O fill me the bowl ! 
 Give him the nectar ! 
 Pour out for the poet, 
 Hebe ! pour free ! 
 Quicken his eyes with celestial dew. 
 That Stvx the detested no more he may view, 
 And like one of us Gods may conceit him to be ! 
 Thanks, Hebe ! I quaff it ! Io Paean, I cry ! 
 The wine of the Immortals 
 Forbids me to die! 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 261 
 
 ELEGY, 
 
 IMITATED FROM ONE OF AKENSIDE's BLANK- 
 VERSE INSCRIPTIONS. 
 
 Near the lone pile with ivy overspread, 
 
 Fast by the rivulet's sleep-persuading sound, 
 
 Where " sleeps the moonlight" on yon verdant bed — 
 humbly press that consecrated ground ! 
 
 For there does Edmund rest, the learned swain ! 
 
 And there his spirit most delights to rove : 
 Young Edmund ! famed for each harmonious strain, 
 
 And the sore wounds of ill-requited love. 
 
 Like some tall tree that spreads its branches wide, 
 And loads the west- wind with its soft perfume, 
 
 His manhood blossomed : till the faithless pride 
 Of fair Matilda sank him to the tomb. 
 
 But soon did righteous Heaven her guilt pursue ! 
 
 Where'er with wildered step she wandered pale, 
 Still Edmund's image rose to blast ber view, 
 
 Still Edmund's voice accused her in each gale. 
 
 With keen regret, and conscious guilt's alarms, 
 Amid the pomp of affluence she pined ; 
 
 Nor all that lured her faith from Edmund's arms 
 Could lull the wakeful horror of her mind. 
 
 Go, Traveller ! tell the tale with sorrow fraught : 
 Some tearful maid perchance, or blooming youth, 
 
 May hold it in remembrance ; and be taught 
 That riches cannot pay for Love or Truth. 
 
262 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 SEPARATION. 
 
 A sworded man whose trade is blood, 
 In grief, in anger, and in fear, 
 
 Thro' jungle, swamp, and torrent flood, 
 I seek the wealth you hold so dear ! 
 
 The dazzling charm of outward form, 
 The power of gold, the pride of birth, 
 
 Have taken Woman's heart by storm — 
 Usurp'd the place of inward worth. 
 
 Is not true Love of higher price 
 
 Than outward Form, tho' fair to see, 
 
 Wealth's glittering fairy-dome of ice, 
 Or echo of proud ancestry ? — 
 
 O ! Asra, Asra ! couldst thou see 
 Into the bottom of my heart, 
 
 There's such a mine of Love for thee, 
 As almost might supply desert ! 
 
 (This separation is, alas ! 
 
 Too great a punishment to bear ; 
 O ! take my life, or let me pass 
 
 That life, that happy life, with her !) 
 
 The perils, erst with steadfast eye 
 Encounter'd, now I shrink to see — ■ 
 
 Oh ! I have heart enough to die — 
 Not half enough to part from Thee ! 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 263 
 
 ON TAKING LEAVE OF , 1817. 
 
 To know, to esteem, to love — and then to part, 
 Makes up life's tale to many a feeling heart ! 
 for some dear abiding-place of Love, 
 O'er which my spirit, like the mother dove, 
 Might brood with warming wings ! — O fair as kind, 
 Were but one sisterhood with you combined, 
 (Your very image they in shape and mind) 
 Far rather would I sit in solitude, 
 The forms of memory all my mental food, 
 And dream of you, sweet sisters, (ah, not mine !) 
 And only dream of you (ah dream and pine !) 
 Than have the presence, and partake the pride, 
 And shine in the eye of all the world beside ! 
 
 THE PANG MORE SHARP THAN ALL. 
 
 AN ALLEGORY. 
 
 I. 
 
 He too has flitted from his secret nest, 
 Hope's last and dearest Child without a name !- 
 Has flitted from me, like the warmthless flame, 
 That makes false promise of a place of rest 
 To the tir'd Pilgrim's still believing mind ; — 
 Or like some Elfin Knight in kingly court, 
 Who having won all guerdons in his sport, 
 Glides out of view, and whither none can find ! 
 
264 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 II. 
 
 Yes ! He hath flitted from me— with what aim, 
 Or why, I know not ! 'Twas a home of bliss, 
 And He was innocent, as the pretty shame 
 Of babe, that tempts and shuns the menaced kiss, 
 From its twy-cluster'd hiding place of snow ! 
 Pure as the babe, I ween, and all aglow 
 As the dear hopes, that swell the mother's breast— 
 Her eyes down gazing o'er her clasped charge ;— 
 Yet gay as that twice happy father's kiss, 
 That well might glance aside, yet never miss, 
 Where the sweet mark emboss'd so sweet a targe— 
 Twice wretched he who hath been doubly blest ! 
 
 in. 
 
 Like a loose blossom on a gusty night 
 
 He flitted from me— and has left behind 
 
 (As if to them his faith he ne'er did plight) 
 
 Of either sex and answerable mind 
 
 Two playmates, twin-births of his foster- dame : — 
 
 The one a steady lad (Esteem he hight) 
 
 And Kindness is the gentler sister's name. 
 
 Dim likeness now, tho' fair she be and good 
 
 Of that bright Boy who hath us all forsook ;— 
 
 But in his full-eyed aspect when she stood, 
 
 And while her face reflected every look, 
 
 And in reflection kindled — she became 
 
 So like Him, that almost she seem'd the same ! 
 
 IV. 
 
 Ah ! He is gone, and yet will not depart!— 
 Is with me still, yet I from Him exil'd ! 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 265 
 
 For still there lives within my secret heart 
 The magic image of the magic Child, 
 Which there He made up-grow by his strong art, 
 As in that crystal 1 orb— wise Merlin's feat,— 
 The wondrous " World of Glass," wherein inisl'd 
 All long'd for things their beings did repeat ;— 
 And there He left it, like a Sylph beguiled, 
 To live and yearn and languish incomplete ! 
 
 Can wit of man a heavier grief reveal ? 
 
 Can sharper pang from hate or scorn arise ?— 
 
 Yes ! one more sharp there is that deeper lies, 
 
 Which fond Esteem but mocks when he would heal. 
 
 Yet neither scorn nor hate did it devise, 
 
 But sad compassion and atoning zeal ! 
 
 One pang more blighting-keen than hope betray 'd ! 
 
 And this it is my woful hap to feel, 
 
 When at her Brother's hest, the twin-born Maid 
 
 With face averted and unsteady eyes, 
 
 Her truant playmate's faded robe puts on ; 
 
 And inly shrinking from her own disguise 
 
 Enacts the faery Boy that's lost and gone. 
 
 worse than all ! O pang all pangs above 
 
 Is Kindness counterfeiting absent Love ! 
 
 1 Faerie Queene, b. m. c. 2. s. 19. 
 
266 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 KUBLA KHAN: OR, A VISION 
 IN A DREAM. 
 
 A FRAGMENT. 
 
 In the summer of the year 1797, the Author, then in ill 
 health, had retired to a lonely farm house between Porlock 
 and Linton, on the Exmoor confines of Somerset and De- 
 vonshire. In consequence of a slight indisposition, an 
 anodyne had been prescribed, from the effect of which he 
 fell asleep in his chair at the moment that he was reading the 
 following' sentence, or words of the same substance, in " Pur- 
 chas's Pilgrimage :" " Here the Khan Kubla commanded a 
 palace to be built, and a stately garden thereunto : and thus 
 ten miles of fertile ground were inclosed with a wall." 
 The author continued for about three hours in a profound 
 sleep, at least of the external senses, during which time he 
 has the most vivid confidence, that he could not have com- 
 posed less than from two to three hundred lines ; if that 
 indeed can be called composition in which all the images 
 rose up before him as things, with a parallel production 
 of the correspondent expressions, without any sensation or 
 consciousness of effort. On awaking he appeared to him- 
 self to have a distinct recollection of the whole, and taking 
 his pen, ink, and paper, instantly and eagerly wrote down 
 the lines that are here preserved. At this moment he was 
 unfortunately called out by a person on business from Por- 
 lock, and detained by him above an hour, and on his return 
 to his room, found, to his no small surprise and mortification, 
 that though he still retained some vague and dim recollec- 
 tion of the general purport of the vision, yet, with the 
 exception of some eight or ten scattered lines and images, 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 267 
 
 all the rest had passed away like the images on the surface 
 of a stream into which a stone had been cast, but, alas ! 
 without the after restoration of the latter : 
 
 Then all the charm 
 Is broken — all that phantom-world so fair 
 Vanishes, and a thousand circlets spread, 
 And each mis-shape the other. Stay awhile, 
 Poor youth ! who scarcely dar'st lift up thine eyes — 
 The stream will soon renew its smoothness, soon 
 The visions will return ! And lo ! he stays, 
 And soon the fragments dim of lovely forms 
 Come trembling back, unite, and now once more 
 The pool beomes a mirror. 
 
 Yet from the still surviving recollections in his mind, the 
 Author has frequently purposed to finish for himself what 
 had been originally, as it were, given to him. Avpiov 
 uSiov dcrio : but the to-morrow is yet to come. 
 
 As a contrast to this vision, I have annexed a fragment 
 of a very different character, describing with equal fidelity 
 the dream of pain and disease. — 1816. 
 
 KUBLA KHAN. 
 
 In Xanadu did Kubla Khan 
 A stately pleasure-dome decree : 
 Where Alph, the sacred river, ran 
 Through caverns measureless to man 
 
 Down to a sunless sea. 
 So twice five miles of fertile ground 
 With walls and towers were girdled round : 
 And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills 
 Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree ; 
 
268 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 And here were forests ancient as the hills, 
 Enfolding sunny spots of greenery. 
 
 But oh ! that deep romantic chasm which slanted 
 Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover ! 
 A savage place ! as holy and enchanted 
 As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted 
 By woman wailing for her demon-lover ! 
 And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seeth- 
 ing, 
 As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing, 
 A mighty fountain momently was forced : 
 Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst 
 Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail, 
 Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail : 
 And mid these dancing rocks at once and ever 
 It flung up momently the sacred river. 
 Five miles meandering with a mazy motion 
 Through wood and dale the sacred river ran, 
 Then reached the caverns measureless to man, 
 And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean : 
 And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far 
 Ancestral voices prophesying war ! 
 
 The shadow of the dome of pleasure 
 
 Floated midway on the waves ; 
 
 Where was heard the mingled measure 
 
 From the fountain and the caves. 
 It was a miracle of rare device, 
 A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice I 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 269 
 
 A damsel with a dulcimer 
 
 In a vision once I saw : 
 
 It was an Abyssinian maid, 
 
 And on her dulcimer she played, 
 
 Singing of Mount Abora. 
 
 Could I revive within me 
 
 Her symphony and song, 
 
 To such a deep delig-ht 'twould win me 
 That with music loud and long, 
 I would build that dome in air, 
 That sunny dome ! those caves of ice ! 
 And all who heard should see them there, 
 And all should cry, Beware ! Beware ! 
 His flashing eyes, his floating hair ! 
 Weave a circle round him thrice, 
 And close your eyes with holy dread, 
 For he on honey-dew hath fed, 
 And drunk the milk of Paradise. 
 
270 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 THE PAINS OF SLEEP. 
 
 EitE on my bed my limbs I lay, 
 
 It hath not been my use to pray 
 
 With moving lips or bended knees ; 
 
 But silently, by slow degrees, 
 
 My spirit I to Love compose, 
 
 In humble trust mine eye-lids close, 
 
 With reverential resignation, 
 
 No wish conceived, no thought exprest, 
 
 Only a sense of supplication ; 
 
 A sense o'er all my soul imprest 
 
 That I am weak, yet not unblest, 
 
 Since in me, round me, every where 
 
 Eternal strength and wisdom are. 
 
 But yester-night I prayed aloud 
 
 In anguish and in agony, 
 
 Up-starting from the fiendish crowd 
 
 Of shapes and thoughts that tortured me : 
 
 A lurid light, a trampling throng, 
 
 Sense of intolerable wrong, 
 
 And whom I scorned, those only strong \ 
 
 Thirst of revenge, the powerless will 
 
 Still baffled, and yet burning still ! 
 
 Desire with loathing strangely mixed 
 
 On wild or hateful objects fixed. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES-. 271 
 
 Fantastic passions ! maddening brawl ! 
 And shame and terror over all ! 
 Deeds to be hid which were not hid, 
 Which all confused I could not know, 
 Whether I suffered, or I did : 
 For all seemed guilt, remorse or woe, 
 My own or others still the same 
 Life-stifling fear, soul-stifling shame. 
 
 So two nights passed : the night's dismay 
 
 Saddened and stunned the coming day. 
 
 Sleep, the wide blessing, seemed to me 
 
 Distemper's worst calamity. 
 
 The third night, when my own loud scream 
 
 Had waked me from the fiendish dream, 
 
 O'ercome with sufferings strange and wild, 
 
 I wept as I had been a child ; 
 
 And having thus by tears subdued 
 
 My anguish to a milder mood, 
 
 Such punishments, I said, were due 
 
 To natures deepliest stained with sin, — 
 
 For aye entempesting anew 
 
 The unfathomable hell within 
 
 The horror of their deeds to view, 
 
 To know and loathe, yet wish and do ! 
 
 Such griefs with such men well agree, 
 
 But wherefore, wherefore fall on me ? 
 
 To be beloved is all I need, 
 
 And whom I love, I love indeed. 
 
272 
 
 SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 
 
 LIMBO. 
 
 Tis a strange place, this Limbo ! — not a Place, 
 Yet name it so ; —where Time and weary Space 
 Fettered from flight, with night-mare sense of 
 
 fleeing, 
 Strive for their last crepuscular half-being ; — 
 Lank Space, and scytheless Time with branny hands 
 Barren and soundless as the measuring sands, 
 Not mark'd by flit of Shades, — unmeaning they 
 As moonlight on the dial of the day ! 
 But that is lovely — looks like human Time, — 
 An old man with a steady look sublime, 
 That stops his earthly task to watch the skies ; 
 But he is blind — a statue hath such eyes ; — 
 Yet having moonward turn'd his face by chance. 
 Gazes the orb with moon-like countenance, 
 With scant white hairs, with foretop bald and high, 
 He gazes still, — his eyeless face all eye ; — 
 As 'twere an organ full of silent sight, 
 His whole face seemeth to rejoice in light ! — 
 Lip touching lip, all moveless, bust and limb-- 
 He seems to gaze at that which seems to gaze on him ! 
 No such sweet sights doth Limbo den immure, 
 Wall'd round, and made a spirit-jail secure, 
 By the mere horror of blank Naught-at-all 
 Whose circumambience doth these ghosts enthral. 
 
SIBYLLINE LEAVES. 273 
 
 A lurid thought is growthless, dull Privation, 
 
 Yet that is but a Purgatory curse ; 
 
 Hell knows a fear far worse, 
 
 A fear — a future state ; — 'tis positive Negation 
 
 NE PLUS ULTRA. 
 
 Sole Positive of Night ! 
 Antipathist of Light ! 
 Fate's only essence ! primal scorpion rod — 
 The one permitted opposite of God ! — 
 Condensed blackness and abysmal storm 
 Compacted to one sceptre 
 Arms the Grasp enorm — 
 The Intercepter — 
 The Substance that still casts the shadow Death ! 
 The Dragon foul and fell — 
 The unrevealable, 
 And hidden one, whose breath 
 Gives wind and fuel to the fires of Hell ! — 
 Ah ! sole despair 
 Of both th' eternities in Heaven ! 
 Sole interdict of all-bedewing prayer, 
 The all-compassionate ! 
 Save to the Lampads Seven 
 Reveal'd to none of all th' Angelic State. 
 Save to the Lampads Seven, 
 That watch the throne of Heaven ! 
 
 VOL. I. T 
 
APOLOGETIC PREFACE. 
 
 TO " FIRE, FAMINE, AND SLAUGHTER."* 
 
 At the house of a gentleman, who, by the principles and 
 corresponding virtues of a sincere Christian, consecrates a 
 cultivated genius and the favourable accidents of birth, 
 opulence, and splendid connexions, it was my good fortune 
 to meet, in a dinner-party, with more men of celebrity in 
 science or polite literature, than are commonly found col- 
 lected round the same table. In the course of conversa- 
 tion, one of the party reminded an illustrious poet, then 
 present, of some verses which he bad recited that morning, 
 and which had appeared in. a newspaper under the name of 
 a War-Eclogue, in which Fire, Famine, and Slaughter 
 were introduced as the speakers. The gentleman so ad- 
 dressed replied, that he was rather surprised that none of 
 us should have noticed or heard of the poem, as it had 
 been, at the time, a good deal talked of in Scotland. It 
 may be easily supposed, that my feelings were at this mo- 
 ment not of the most comfortable kind. Of all present, one 
 only knew, or suspected me to be the author ; a man who 
 would have established himself in the first rank of Eng- 
 land's living poets, if the Genius of our country had not 
 decreed that he should rather be the first in the first rank of 
 its philosophers and scientific benefactors. It appeared the 
 general wish to hear the lines. As my friend chose to re- 
 main silent, I chose to follow his example, and Mr. ***** 
 recited the poem. This he could do with the better grace, 
 being known to have ever been not only a firm and active 
 Anti-Jacobin and Anti-Gallican, but likewise a zealous ad- 
 mirer of Mr. Pitt, both as a good man and a great states- 
 man. As a poet exclusively, he had been amused with the 
 
 * See page 141. 
 
APOLOGETIC PREFACE. 275 
 
 Eclogue ; as a poet he recited it ; and in a spirit, whicb 
 made it evident, that he would have read and repeated it 
 with the same pleasure, had his own name been attached to 
 the imaginary object or agent. 
 
 After the recitation, our amiable host observed, that in 
 his opinion Mr. ***** had over-rated the merits of the 
 poetry ; but had they been tenfold greater, they could not 
 have compensated for that malignity of heart, which could 
 alone have prompted sentiments so atrocious. I perceived 
 that my illustrious friend became greatly distressed on my 
 account ; but fortunately I was able to preserve fortitude 
 and presence of mind enough to take up the subject without 
 exciting even a suspicion how nearly and painfully it 
 interested me. 
 
 What follows, is the substance of what I then replied, 
 but dilated and in language less colloquial. It was not my 
 intention, I said, to justify the publication, whatever its 
 author's feelings might have been at the time of composing 
 it. That they are calculated to call forth so severe a repro- 
 bation from a good man, is not the worst feature of such 
 poems. Their moral deformity is aggravated in proportion 
 to the pleasure which they are capable of affording to vin- 
 dictive, turbulent, and unprincipled readers. Could it be 
 upposed, though for a moment, that the author seriously 
 wished what he had thus wildly imagined, even the attempt 
 to palliate an inhumanity so monstrous would be an insult 
 to the hearers. But it seemed to me worthy of considera- 
 tion, whether the mood of mind, and the general state of 
 sensations, in which a poet produces such vivid and fan^ 
 tastic images, is likely to co-exist, or is even compatible 
 with, that gloomy and deliberate ferocity which a se- 
 rious wish to realize them would pre-suppose. It had 
 been often observed, and all my experience tended to con- 
 firm the observation, that prospects of pain and evil to 
 others, and in general, all deep feelings of revenge, are 
 commonly expressed in a few words, ironically tame, and 
 mild.. The mind under so direful and fiend-like an in- 
 
276 APOLOGETIC PREFACE. 
 
 fluence seems to take a morbid pleasure in contrasting the 
 intensity of its wishes and feelings, with the slightness or 
 levity of the expressions by which they are hinted ; and 
 indeed feelings so intense and solitary, if they were not 
 precluded (as in almost all cases they would be) by a con- 
 stitutional activity of fancy and association, and by the spe- 
 cific joyousness combined with it, would assuredly them- 
 selves preclude such activity. Passion, in its own quality, 
 is the antagonist of action ; though in an ordinary and 
 natural degree the former alternates with the latter, and 
 thereby revives and strengthens it. But the more intense 
 and insane the passion is, the fewer and the more fixed are 
 the correspondent forms and notions. A rooted hatred, an 
 inveterate thirst of revenge, is a sort of madness, and still 
 eddies round its favorite object, and exercises as it were a 
 perpetual tautology of mind in thoughts and words, which 
 admit of no adequate substitutes. Like a fish in a globe 
 of glass, it moves restlessly round and round the scanty 
 circumference, which it cannot leave without losing its 
 vital element. 
 
 There is a second character of such imaginary represen- 
 tations as spring from a real and earnest desire of evil to 
 another, which we often see in real life, and might even 
 anticipate from the nature of the mind. The images, I 
 mean, that a vindictive man places before his imagination, 
 will most often be taken from the realities of life : they will 
 be images of pain and suffering which he has himself seen 
 inflicted on other men, and which he can fancy himself as 
 inflicting on the object of his hatred. I will suppose that 
 we had heard at different times two common sailoTS, each 
 speaking of some one who had wronged or offended him : 
 that the first with apparent violence had devoted every 
 part of his adversary's body and soul to all the horrid 
 phantoms and fantastic places that ever Quevedo dreamt 
 of, and this in a rapid flow of those outrageous and wildly 
 combined execrations, which too often with our lower classes 
 serve for escape- valves to carry off the excess of their pas- 
 
APOLOGETIC PREFACE. 277 
 
 sions, as so much superfluous steam that would endanger 
 the vessel if it were retained. The other on the contrary, 
 with that sort of calmness of tone which is to the ear what 
 the paleness of anger is to the eye, shall simply say, " If I 
 chance to be made boatswain, as I hope I soon shall, and 
 can but once get that fellow under my hand (and I shall 
 be upon the watch for him,) I'll tickle his pretty skin! 
 I wont hurt him ! oh no ! I'll only cut the — - — to the 
 liver !" I dare appeal to all present, which of the two 
 they would regard as the least deceptive symptom of de- 
 liberate malignity 1 nay, whether it would surprise them to 
 see the first fellow, an hour or two afterwards, cordially 
 shaking hands with the very man, the fractional parts of 
 whose body and soul he had been so charitably disposing 
 of; or even perhaps risking his life for him. What lan- 
 guage Shakespeare considered characteristic of malignant 
 disposition, we see in the speech of the good-natured Gra- 
 tiano, who spoke " an infinite deal of nothing more than any 
 man in all Venice ;" 
 
 " Too wild, too rude and bold of voice!" 
 
 the skipping spirit, whose thoughts and words reciprocally 
 ran away with each other ; 
 
 "O be thou damn'd, inexorable dog! 
 
 And for thy life let justice be accused!" 
 
 and the wild fancies that follow, contrasted with Shylock's 
 tranquil " I stand here for Law." 
 
 Or, to take a case more analogous to the present subject, 
 should we hold it either fair or charitable to believe it to 
 have been Dante's serious wish, that all the persons men- 
 tioned by him, (many recently departed, and some even 
 alive at the time,) should actually suifer the fantastic and 
 horrible punishments, to which he has sentenced them in 
 his Hell and Purgatory"! Or what shall we say of the 
 passages in which Bishop Jeremy Taylor anticipates the 
 state of those who, vicious themselves, have been the cause 
 of vice and misery to their fellow-creatures. Could we 
 
278 APOLOGETIC PREFACE. 
 
 endure for a moment to think that a spirit, like Bishop 
 Taylor's, burning with Christian love ; that a man consti- 
 tutionally overflowing with pleasurable kindliness ; who 
 scarcely even in a casual illustration introduces the image 
 of woman, child, or bird, but he embalms the thought with 
 so rich a tenderness, as makes the very words seem beauties 
 and fragments of poetry from Euripides or Simonides ; — 
 can we endure to think, that a man so natured and so dis- 
 ciplined, did at the time of composing this horrible picture, 
 attach a sober feeling of reality to the phrases ? or that he 
 would have described in the same tone of justification, in 
 the same luxuriant flow of phrases, the tortures about to be 
 inflicted on a living individual by a verdict of the Star- 
 Chamber'! or the still more atrocious sentences executed 
 on the Scotch anti-prelatists and schismatics, at the com- 
 mand, and in some instances under the very eye of the Duke 
 of Lauderdale, and of that wretched bigot who afterwards 
 dishonoured and forfeited the throne of Great Britain 1 Or 
 da we not rather feel and understand, that these violent 
 words were mere bubbles, flashes and electrical apparitions, 
 from the magic cauldron of a fervid and ebullient fancy, 
 constantly fuelled by an unexampled opulence of language. 
 Were I now to have read by myself for the first time the 
 poem in question, my conclusion, T fully believe, would be, 
 that the writer must have been some man of warm feelings 
 and active fancy ; that he had painted to himself the cir- 
 cumstances that accompany war in so many vivid and yet 
 fantastic forms, as proved that neither the images nor the 
 feelings were the result of observation, or in any way 
 derived from realities. I should judge, that they were the 
 product of his own seething imagination, and therefore 
 impregnated with that pleasurable exultation which is ex- 
 perienced in all energetic exertion of intellectual power ; 
 that in the same mood he had generalized the causes of the 
 war, and then personified the abstract and christened it by 
 the name which he had been accustomed to hear most often 
 associated with its management and measures. I should 
 
APOLOGETIC PREFACE. 279 
 
 guess that the minister was in the author's mind at the mo- 
 ment of composition, as completely cnraSryg, avaifioaapKOQ, 
 as Anacreon's grasshopper, and that he had as little notion 
 of a real person of flesh and blood, 
 
 "Distinguishable in member, joint, or limb," 
 
 as Milton had in the grim and terrible phantoms ('half per- 
 son, half allegory) which he has placed at the gates of Hell. 
 I concluded by observing, that the poem was not calculated 
 to excite passion in any mind, or to make any impression 
 except on poetic readers ; and that from the culpable levity, 
 betrayed at the close of the eclogue by the grotesque union 
 of epigrammatic wit with allegoric personification, in the 
 allusion to the most fearful of thoughts, I should conjecture 
 that the " rantin' Bardie," instead of really believing, much 
 less wishing, the fate spoken o"f in the last line, in application 
 to any human individual, would shrink from passing the 
 verdict even on the Devil himself, and exclaim with poor 
 Burns, 
 
 But fare ye weel, auld Nickie-ben ! 
 Oh ! wad ye tak a thought an' men ! 
 Ye aiblins might — I dinna ken — 
 
 Still hae a stake — 
 I'm wae to think upon you den, 
 
 Ev'n for your sake ! 
 
 I need not say that these thoughts, which are here dilated, 
 were in such a company only rapidly suggested. Our kind 
 host smiled, and with a courteous compliment observed, 
 that the defence was too good for the cause. My voice fal- 
 tered a little, for I was somewhat agitated ; though not so 
 much on my own account as for the uneasiness that so kind 
 and friendly a man would feel from the thought that he 
 had been the occasion of distressing me. At length I 
 brought out these words : " I must now confess, Sir ! that 
 I am author of that poem. It was written some years ago. 
 I do not attempt to justify my past self, young as I then 
 was ; but as little as I would now write a similar poem, so 
 
280 
 
 APOLOGETIC PREFACE. 
 
 far was I even then from imagining, that the lines would 
 be taken as more or less than a sport of fancy. At ail 
 events, if 1 know my own heart, there was never a moment 
 in my existence in which I should have been more ready, 
 had Mr. Pitt's person been in hazard, to interpose mv own 
 body, and defend his life at the risk of my own." 
 
 I have prefaced the poem with this anecdote, because to 
 have printed it without any remark might well have been 
 understood as implying an unconditional approbation on my 
 part, and this after many years' consideration. But if it be 
 asked why I re-published it at all, I answer, that the poem 
 had been attributed at different times to different other 
 persons ; and what I had dared beget, I thought it neither 
 manly nor honourable not to dare father. From the same 
 motives I should have published perfect copies of two 
 poems, the one entitled The Devil's Thoughts, and the 
 other, The Two round Spaces on the Tomb-Stone,* but that 
 the first three stanzas of the former, which were worth all 
 the rest of the poem, and the best stanza of the remainder, 
 were written by a friend of deserved celebrity ; and because 
 there are passages in both, which might have given offence 
 to the religious feelings of certain readers. I myself in- 
 deed see no reason why vulgar superstitions, and absurd 
 conceptions that deform the pure faith of a Christian, 
 should possess a greater immunity from ridicule than 
 stories of witches, or the fables of Greece and Rome. But 
 there are those who deem it profaneness and irreverence 
 to call an ape an ape, if it but wear a monk's cowl on its 
 head ; and I would rather reason with this weakness than 
 offend it. 
 
 The passage from Jeremy Taylor to which I referred, is 
 found in his second Sermon on Christ's Advent to Judg- 
 ment ; which is likewise the second in his year's course of 
 sermons. Among many remarkable passages of the same 
 
 * See post 2nd volume. 
 
APOLOGETIC PREFACE. 281 
 
 character in those discourses, ] have selected this as the 
 most so. " But when this Lion of the tribe of Judah shall 
 appear, then Justice shall strike, and Mercy shall not hold 
 her hands ; she shall strike sore strokes, and Pity shall not 
 break the blow. As there are treasures of good things, so 
 hath God a treasure of wrath and fuiy, and scourges and 
 scorpions ; and then shall be produced the shame of lust 
 and the malice of envy, and the groans of the oppressed 
 and the persecutions of the saints, and the cares of covet- 
 ousness and the troubles of ambition, and the indolence of 
 traitors and the violences of rebels, and the rage of ano-er 
 and the uneasiness of impatience, and the restlessness of 
 unlawful desires ; and by this time the monsters and 
 diseases will be numerous and intolerable, when God's 
 heavy hand shall press the sanies and the intolerableness, 
 the obliquity and the unreasonableness, the amazement and 
 the disorder, the smart and the sorrow, the guilt and the 
 punishment, out from all our sins, and pour them into one 
 chalice, and mingle them with an infinite wrath, and make 
 the wicked drink off all the vengeance, and force it down 
 their unwilling throats with the violence of devils and ac- 
 cursed spirits." 
 
 That this Tartarean drench displays the imagination rather 
 than the discretion of the compounder ; that, in short, this 
 passage and others of the same kind are in a bad taste, few 
 will deny at the present day. It would, doubtless, have 
 more behoved the good bishop not to be wise beyond what 
 is written on a subject in which Eternity is opposed to 
 Time, and a death threatened, not the negative, but the 
 positive Opposite of Life ; a subject, therefore, which must 
 of necessity be indescribable to the human understanding 
 in our present state. But I can neither find nor believe, 
 that it ever occurred to any reader to ground on such pas- 
 sages a charge against Bishop Taylor's humanity, or good- 
 ness of heart. I was not a little surprised therefore to find, 
 in the Pursuits of Literature and other works, so horrible a 
 sentence passed on Milton's moral character, for a passage 
 
282 
 
 APOL0GETTC PREFACE. 
 
 in his prose writings, as nearly parallel to this of Taylors 
 •da two passages can well be conceived to be. All his 
 merits, as a poet, forsooth— all the glory of having wri^pn 
 the Paradise Lost, are light in the scale, nay, kick the 
 beam, compared with the atrocious malignity of heart, ex- 
 pressed in the offensive paragraph. I remembered, in 
 general, that Milton had concluded one of his works on 
 Reformation, written in the fervour of his youthful imagi- 
 nation, in a high poetic strain, that wanted metre only to 
 become a lyrical poem. I remembered that in the former 
 part he had formed to himself a perfect ideal of human 
 virtue, a character of heroic, disinterested zeal and devotion 
 for Truth, Religion, and public Liberty, in act and in suf- 
 fering, in the day of triumph and in the hour of martyr- 
 dom. Such spirits, as more excellent than others, he 
 describes as having a more excellent reward, and as distin» 
 guished by a transcendant glory : and this reward and this 
 glory he displays and particularizes with an energy and 
 brilliance that announced the Paradise Lost as plainly, as 
 ever the bright purple clouds in the east announced the 
 coming of the Sun. Milton then passes to the gloomy 
 contrast, to such men as from motives of selfish ambition 
 and the lust of personal aggrandizement should, against 
 their own light, persecute truth and the true religion, and 
 wilfully abuse the powers and gifts entrusted to them, to 
 bring vice, blindness, misery and slavery, on their native 
 country, on the very country that had trusted, enriched and 
 honored them. Such beings, after that speedy and appro- 
 priate removal from their sphere of mischief which all good 
 and humane men must of course desire, will, he takes for 
 granted by parity of reason, meet with a punishment, an 
 ignominy, and a retaliation, as much severer than other 
 wicked men, as their guilt and its consequences were more 
 enormous. His description of this imaginary punishment 
 presents more distinct pictures to the fancy than the ex 
 tract from Jeremy Taylor ; but the thoughts in the latter 
 are incomparably more exaggerated and horrific. All this 
 
APOLOGETIC PREFACE. 283 
 
 I knew ; but I neither remembered, nor by reference and 
 careful re-perusal could discover, any other "meaning, either 
 in Milton or Taylor, but that good men will be rewarded, 
 and the impenitent wicked punished, in proportion to their 
 dispositions and intentional acts in this life; and that if 
 the punishment of the least wicked be fearful beyond con- 
 ception, all words and descriptions must be so far true, 
 that they must fall short of the punishment that awaits the 
 transcendantly wicked. Had Milton stated either his ideal 
 of virtue, or of depravity, as an individual or individuals 
 actually existing ? Certainly not. Is this representation 
 worded historically, or only hypothetically ? Assuredly the 
 latter. Does he express it as his own wish, that after 
 death they should suffer these tortures ? or as a general 
 consequence, deduced from reason and revelation, that 
 such will be their fate 1 Again, the latter only. His wish 
 is expressly confined to a speedy stop being put by Provi- 
 dence to their power of inflicting misery on others. But 
 did he name or refer to any persons living or dead '.' No. 
 But the calumniators of Milton dare say (for what will 
 calumny not dare say V) that he had Laud and Strafford in 
 his mind, while writing of remorseless persecution, and the 
 enslavement of a free country, from motives of selfish am- 
 bition. Now, what if a stern anti-prelatist should dare say, 
 that in speaking of the insolencies of traitors and the 
 violences of rebels, Bishop Taylor must have individualised 
 in his mind, Hampden, Hollis, Pym, Fairfax, Ireton, and Mil- 
 ton ? And what if he should take the liberty of concluding, 
 that, in the after description, the Bishop was feeding and 
 feasting his party-hatred, and with those individuals before 
 the eyes of his imagination enjoying, trait by trait, horror 
 after horror, the picture of their intolerable agonies 1 Yet 
 this bigot would have an equal right thus to criminate the 
 one good and great man, as these men have to criminate 
 the other. Milton has said, and 1 doubt not but that Tay- 
 lor with equal truth could have said it, ' ' that in his whole 
 life he never spake against a man even that his skin should 
 
284 APOLOGETIC PREFACE. 
 
 be grazed." He asserted this when one of his opponents 
 (either Bishop Hall or his nephew) had called upon the 
 women and children in the streets to take up stones and 
 stone him (Milton). It is known that Milton repeatedly 
 used his interest to protect the royalists ; hut even at a 
 time when all lies would have been meritorious against 
 him, no charge was made, no story pretended, that he had 
 ever directly or indirectly engaged or assisted in their per- 
 secution. Oh! methinks there are other and far better 
 feelings, which should be acquired by the perusal of our 
 great elder writers. When I have before me on the same 
 table, the works of Hammond and Baxter : when I reflect 
 with what joy and dearness their blessed spirits are now 
 loving each other : it seems a mournful thing that their 
 names should be perverted to an occasion of bitterness 
 among us, who are enjoying that happy mean which the 
 human too-much on both sides was perhaps necessary to 
 produce. " The tangle of delusions which stifled and dis- 
 torted the growing tree of our well-being has been torn 
 away ; the parasite-weeds that fed on its very roots have 
 been plucked up with a salutary violence. To us there 
 remain only quiet duties, the constant care, the gradual 
 improvement, the cautious unhazardous labours of the indus- 
 trious though contented gardener— to prune, to strengthen, 
 to engraft, and one by one to remove from its leaves and 
 fresh shoots the slug and the caterpillar. But far be it from 
 us to undervalue with light and senseless detraction the 
 conscientious hardihood of our predecessors, or even to 
 condemn in them that vehemence, to which the blessings it 
 won for us leave us now neither temptation nor pretext. 
 We ante-date the feelings, in order to criminate the authors, 
 of our present liberty, light and toleration."* 
 
 If ever two great men might seem, during their whole 
 lives, to have moved in direct opposition, though neither 
 cf them has at any time introduced the name of the other, 
 
 * The Friend, p. 5+. 
 
APOLOGETIC 1'IIEFACE. 285 
 
 Milton and Jeremy Taylor were they. The former com- 
 menced his career by attacking the Church-Liturgy and all 
 net forms of prayer. The latter, hut far more successfully, 
 by defending both. Milton's next work was then against 
 the Prelacy and the then existing Church-Government — 
 Taylor's in vindication and support of them. Milton be- 
 Game more and more a stern republican, or rather an advo- 
 cate for that religious and moral aristocracy which, in his 
 day, was called republicanism, and which, even more than 
 royalism itself, is the direct antipode of modern jacobinism. 
 Taylor, as more and more sceptical concerning the fitness of 
 men in general for power, became more and more attached 
 to the prerogatives of monarchy. From Calvinism with a 
 still decreasing respect for Fathers, Councils, and for 
 Church-antiquity in general, Milton seems to have ended 
 in an indifference, if not a dislike, to all forms of ecclesias- 
 tic government, and to have retreated wholly into the 
 inward and spiritual church-communion of his own spirit 
 with the Light, that lighteth every man that cometh into 
 the world. Taylor, with a growing reverence for authority, 
 an increasing sense of the insufficiency of the Scriptures 
 without the aids of tradition and the consent of authorized 
 interpreters, advanced as far in his approaches, (not indeed 
 to Popery, but) to Roman-Catholicism, as a conscientious 
 minister of the English Church could well venture. Milton 
 would be, and would utter the same, to all, on all occasions : 
 he would tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the 
 truth. Taylor would become all things to all men, if by any 
 means he might benefit any ; hence he availed himself, in 
 his popular writings, of opinions and representations which 
 stand often in striking contrast with the doubts and convic- 
 tions expressed in his more philosophical works. He 
 appears, indeed, not too severely to have blamed that 
 management of truth (istam falsitatem dispensativam) au- 
 thorised and exemplified by almost all the fathers : Integrum 
 omnino doctoribus et cretus Christiani antistitibus esse, ut 
 dolos versent, falsa veris intermisceant et imprimis religi- 
 
286 
 
 APOLOGETIC PREFACE. 
 
 onis hostes fallant, dummodo veritatis commodis et utilitati 
 inserviant. 
 
 The same antithesis might be carried on with the ele- 
 ments of their several intellectual powers. Milton, austere, 
 condensed, imaginative, supporting his truth by direct 
 enunciation of lofty moral sentiment and by distinct visual 
 representations, and in the same spirit overwhelming what 
 he deemed falsehood by moral denunciation and a succes- 
 sion of pictures appalling or repulsive. In his prose, so 
 many metaphors, so many allegorical miniatures. Taylor, 
 eminently discursive, accumulative, and (to use one of his 
 own words) agglomerative ; still more rich in images than 
 Milton himself, but images of fancy, and presented to the 
 common and passive eye, rather than to the eye of the ima- 
 gination. Whether supporting or assailing, he makes his 
 way either by argument or by appeals to the affections, un- 
 surpassed even by the schoolmen in subtlety, agility, and 
 logic wit, and unrivalled by the most rhetorical of the 
 fathers in the copiousness and vividness of his expressions 
 and illustrations. Here words that coavey feelings, and 
 words that flash images, and words of abstract notion, flow- 
 together, and whirl and rush onward like a stream, at once 
 rapid and full of eddies ; and yet still interfused here and 
 there, we see a tongue or islet of smooth water, with some 
 picture in it of earth or sky, landscape or living group of 
 quiet beauty. 
 
 Differing, then, so widely, and almost contrariantly, 
 wherein did these great men agree 1 wherein did they re- 
 semble each other'! In genius, in learning, in unfeigned 
 piety, in blameless purity of life, and in benevolent aspi- 
 rations and purposes for the moral and temporal improve- 
 ment of their fellow-creatures ! Both of them wrote a 
 Latin Accidence, to render education less painful to 
 children ; both of them composed hymns and psalms 
 proportioned to the capacity of common congregations ; 
 both, nearly at the same time, set the glorious ex 
 ample of publicly recommending and supporting general 
 
APOLOGETIC PREFACE. 287 
 
 toleration, and the liberty both of the pulpit and the 
 press ! In the writings of neither shall we find a single 
 sentence, like those meek deliverances to God's mercy, 
 with which Laud accompanied his votes for the mutilations 
 and loathsome dungeoning of Leighton and others ! — no 
 where such a pious prayer as we find in Bishop Hall's 
 memoranda of his own life, concerning the subtle and 
 witty atheist that so grievously perplexed and gravelled 
 him at Sir Robert Drury's till he prayed to the Lord to 
 remove him, and behold ! his prayers were heard : for 
 shortly afterward this Philistine-combatant went to Lon- 
 don, and there perished of the plague in great misery ! In 
 short, no where shall we find the least approach, in the 
 lives and writings of John Milton or Jeremy Taylor, to 
 that guarded gentleness, to that sighing reluctance, with 
 which the holy brethren of the Inquisition deliver over a 
 condemned heretic to the civil magistrate, recommending 
 him to mercy, and hoping that the magistrate will treat the 
 erring brother with all possible mildness ! — the magistrate, 
 who too well knows what would be his own fate, if he 
 dared offend them by acting on their recommendation. 
 
 The opportunity of diverting the reader from myself to 
 characters more worthy of his attention, has led me far be- 
 yond my first intention ; but it is not unimportant to 
 expose the false zeal which has occasioned these attacks on 
 our elder patriots. It has been too much the fashion, first 
 to personify the Church of England, and then to speak of 
 different individuals, who in different ages have been rulers 
 in that church, as if in some strange way they constituted 
 its personal identity. Why should a clergyman of the 
 present day feel interested in the defence of Laud or Shel- 
 don 1 Surely it is sufficient for the warmest partizan of our 
 establishment, that he can assert with truth, — when our 
 Church persecuted, it was on mistaken principles held in 
 common by all Christendom ; and at all events, far less 
 culpable was this intolerance in the Bishops, who were 
 maintaining the existing laws, than the persecuting spirit 
 
288 
 
 APOLOGETIC PREFACE. 
 
 afterwards shown by their successful opponents, who had 
 no such excuse, and who should have been taught mercy 
 by their own sufferings, and wisdom by the utter failure of 
 the experiment in their own case. We can say, that our 
 Church, apostolical in its faith, primitive in its ceremonies, 
 unequalled in its liturgical forms ; that our Church, which 
 has kindled and displayed more bright and burning lights of 
 genius and learning, than all other protestant churches 
 since the reformation, was (with the single exception of 
 the times of Laud and Sheldon) least intolerant, when all 
 Christians unhappily deemed a species of intolerance their 
 religious duty ; that Bishops of our church were among the 
 first that contended against this error ; and finally, that 
 since the reformation, when tolerance became a fashion, the 
 Church of England in a tolerating age, has shown herself 
 eminently tolerant, and far more so, both in spirit and in 
 fact, than many of her most bitter opponents, who profess 
 to deem toleration itself an insult on the rights of mankind ! 
 As to myself, who not only know the Church-Establishment 
 to be tolerant, but who see in it the greatest, if not the sole 
 safe bulwark of toleration, I feel no necessity of defending 
 or palliating oppressions under the two Charleses, in order 
 to exclaim with a full and fervent heart, Esto perpetua ! 
 
 END OF VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON : 
 PRINTED BY C. WHITTINOHAK, TOOKS COUIIT. 
 

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