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PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 TRANSLATED FROM THE GREEK 
 
 OF 
 
 AESCHYLUS. 
 
 AND MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 
 
 a 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 TRANSLATED FROM THE GREEK 
 
 OF 
 
 /ESCHYLUS. 
 
 AND MISCELLANEOUS POEMS, 
 BY THE TRANSLATOR, 
 
 AUTHOR OF “ AN ESSAY ON MIND,” WITH OTHER POEMS. 
 
 T& TTplV KaWlCFTOS - 
 
 Mimnerjius. 
 
 ’E77 vdev uv\r)Trjpos aeiao/xcu - 
 
 Theognis. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY A. J. YALPY, M.A. 
 
 RED LION COURT, FLEET STREET. 
 
 1833. 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2018 with funding from 
 University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill 
 
 https://archive.org/details/prometheusbound00aesc_0 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 Although, among the various versions which have 
 appeared of various ancient writers, we may recognise 
 the dead, together with much of the living letter; a 
 literal version, together with a transfusion of poetical 
 spirit;—why should we, on that account, consider our¬ 
 selves charmed away from attempting another trans¬ 
 lation ? A mirror may he held in different lights by 
 different hands; and, according to the position of 
 those hands, will the light fall. A picture may be 
 imitated in different ways,—by steel engraving, or stone 
 engraving; and, according to the vocation of the 
 
 b 
 
VI 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 artist, will the copy be. According to Dr. Bentley, 
 Pope’s translation of Homer is not Homer; it is 
 Spondanus: he might have said, it is not even 
 Spondanus—it is Pope. Cowper’s translation is a 
 different Homer altogether; not Spondanus, nor 
 Pope, nor the right Homer either. We do not 
 blame Pope and Cowper for not having faithfully 
 represented Homer: we do not blame Pope and 
 Cowper for being Pope and Cowper. It is the na¬ 
 ture of the human mind to communicate its own cha¬ 
 racter to whatever substance it conveys, whether it 
 convey metaphysical impressions from itself to an¬ 
 other mind, or literary compositions from one to 
 another language. It is therefore desirable that the 
 same composition should be conveyed by different 
 minds, that the character of the medium may not be 
 necessarily associated with the thing conveyed. All 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 Til 
 
 men, since iEsop’s time and before it, have worn va¬ 
 rious-coloured spectacles. They cannot part with 
 their colour, which is their individuality ; but they 
 may correct the effects of that individuality by itself. 
 If Potter show us JEschylus through green spectacles, 
 and another translator, though in a very inferior man¬ 
 ner, show us JEschylus through yellow ones, it will 
 become clear to the English reader, that green and 
 yellow are not inherent properties of the Greek poet: 
 and in this respect, both the English reader and the 
 Greek poet are benefited. 
 
 But the present age says, it has no need of translations 
 from classic authors. It is, or it would be, an original 
 age: it will not borrow thoughts with long genealogies, 
 nor walk upon a pave, nor wear a costume, like Queen 
 Anne’s authors and the French dramatists. Its 
 poetry shall not be cold and polished and imitative 
 
Vlll 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 poetry; but shall dream undreamt of dreams, and 
 glow with an unearthly frenzy. If its dreams be 
 noble dreams, may they be dreamt on; if its frenzy 
 be the evidence of inspiration, “ may I,” as Prome¬ 
 theus says, “ be mad.” But let the age take heed.— 
 There is one step from dreaming nobly to sleeping 
 inertly ; and one, from frenzy to imbecility. 
 
 I do not ask, I would not obtain, that our age 
 should be servilely imitative of any former age. 
 Surely it may think its own thoughts and speak its 
 own words, yet turn not away from those who have 
 thought and spoken well. The contemplation of ex¬ 
 cellence produces excellence, if not similar, yet paral¬ 
 lel. We do not turn from green hills and waving 
 forests, because we build and inhabit palaces; nor do 
 we turn towards them, that we may model them in 
 painted wax. We make them subjects of contem- 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 IX 
 
 plation, in order to abstract from them those ideas of 
 beauty, afterwards embodied in our own productions; 
 and, above all, in order to consider their and our 
 Creator under every manifestation of his goodness 
 and his power. Ail beauties, whether in nature or 
 art, whether in physics or morals, whether in compo¬ 
 sition or abstract reasoning, are multiplied reflections, 
 visible in different distances and under different posi¬ 
 tions, of one archetypal beauty. If we owe gratitude to 
 Him, who created and unveiled its form, should we re¬ 
 fuse to gaze upon those reflections? Because they rest 
 even upon heathen scrolls, should we turn away from 
 those scrolls? Because thorns and briers are the pro¬ 
 duct of the earth, should we avert our eyes from that 
 earth ? The mind of man and the earth of man are 
 cursed alike. 
 
 But the age would not be “ classical.” “ O, that 
 
X 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 profaned name!” What does it mean, and what is 
 it made to mean ? It does not mean what it is made 
 to mean : it does not mean what is necessarily regu¬ 
 lar, and polished, and unimpassioned. The ancients, 
 especially the ancient Greeks, felt, and thought, and 
 wrote antecedently to rules : they felt passionately, 
 and thought daringly ; and wrote because they felt 
 and thought. Shakspeare is a more classical writer 
 than Racine. 
 
 Perhaps, of all the authors of antiquity, no one 
 stands so forward to support this hypothesis, as iEs- 
 chylus; and of all the works of iEschylus, no one 
 stands more forward to support it, than his work of 
 the Prometheus Bound. He is a fearless and impe¬ 
 tuous, not a cautious and accomplished poet. His 
 excellences could not be acquired by art, nor could 
 his defects exist separately from genius. It would be 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 xi 
 
 nearly equally impossible for the mere imitator to 
 compass either; for if we would stand in the mist, we 
 must stand also on the mountain. His excellences 
 consist chiefly in a vehement imaginativeness, a strong 
 but repressed sensibility, a high tone of morality, a 
 fervency of devotion, and a rolling energetic diction : 
 and as sometimes his fancy rushes in, where his judg¬ 
 ment fears to tread, and language, even the most co¬ 
 pious and powerful of languages, writhes beneath its 
 impetuosity ; an occasional mixing of metaphor, and 
 frequent obscurity of style, are named among his chief 
 defects. He is pompous too, sometimes; but his 
 pomposity has not any modern, any rigid, frigid effect. 
 When he walks, like his actors, on cothurni, we do 
 not say “ how stiff he is!” but “ how majestic !” 
 
 Whether the Prometheus be, or be not, the finest 
 production of its author, it will not, I think, be con- 
 
XU 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 tested, that Prometheus himself is the character, in 
 the conception and development of which, its author 
 has concentrated his powers in the most full and effi¬ 
 cient manner. There is more gorgeousness of imagery 
 in the Seven Chiefs; and more power in the Eume- 
 nides; and I should tremble to oppose any one scene 
 in Prometheus, to the Cassandra scene in Agamem¬ 
 non. The learned Mr. Boyd, who, in addition to 
 many valuable and well-known translations , 1 has fur¬ 
 nished the public with an able version of that obscure 
 
 1 Author of, among other works, Select Passages from St. 
 Chrysostom, St. Gregory Nazianzen, and St. Basil, translated from 
 the Greek. To produce such eloquent translations, the “judicium 
 subtile limatumque,” the “ teretes et religiosas aures,” attributed 
 to Middleton in Dr. Parr’s Preface to Bellendenus, were necessary. 
 But what ears must those be, who deny their sensibility to the 
 “ most excellent music” of the writings of the Fathers ? We can 
 go to Phrygia for their similitude. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 xm 
 
 tragedy, considers the scene in question to be “ un- 
 approached and unapproachable by any rival.” But 
 I would rest the claims of the Prometheus upon 
 one fulcrum, the conception of character. Tt 
 is not in the usual manner of JEschylus to produce 
 upon his canvass any very prominent figure, to which 
 
 l 
 
 every other is made subordinate, and to which the 
 interest of the spectator is very strongly and almost 
 exclusively attached. Agamemnon’s n\r]y))v we 
 do not feel within our hearts. In the Seven Chiefs, there 
 is a clear division of interest; and the reader willingly 
 agrees with Antigone, that Polynices should be as 
 honorably buried as Eteocles. In the Supplices, we 
 are called upon to exercise universal charity towards 
 
 >*S; 
 
 fifty heroines. In the Persae, we cannot weep with 
 Atossa over the misfortunes of Xerxes ; not even over 
 what she most femininely considers to be his greatest 
 
XIV 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 misfortune —fiuXiara b' rjbe rrvfjupopa baKveL- —his wear-* 
 ing a tattered garment. Perhaps we know more of 
 Orestes than of any personage, always excepting 
 Prometheus, introduced by JEschylus : and yet both 
 in the Choephorce and Eumenides, we are interested in 
 his calamities, rather from their being calamities than 
 from their being his. But Prometheus stands emi¬ 
 nent and alone ; one of the most original, and grand, 
 and attaching characters ever conceived by the mind 
 of man. That conception sank deeply into the soul 
 of Milton, and, as has been observed, rose from thence 
 in the likeness of his Satan. But the Satan of Milton 
 and the Prometheus of JEschylus stand upon ground 
 as unequal, as do the sublime of sin and the sublime of 
 virtue. Satan suffered from his ambition ; Prome¬ 
 theus from his humanity : Satan for himself; Pro¬ 
 metheus for mankind : Satan dared perils which he 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 XV 
 
 had not weighed ; Prometheus devoted himself to 
 sorrows which he had foreknown. “ Better to rule 
 in hell,” said Satan ; “ Better to serve this rock,” 
 said Prometheus. But in his hell, Satan yearned to 
 
 N « 
 
 associate man ; while Prometheus preferred a solitary 
 agony : nay, he even permitted his zeal and tender¬ 
 ness for the peace of others, to abstract him from that 
 agony’s intenseness. 
 
 iEschylus felt the force of his own portraiture : he 
 never removes his Prometheus from the spectator’s 
 sight. The readers of iEschylus feel it: they are im¬ 
 patient at Io’s long narrations; not because those nar¬ 
 rations are otherwise than beautiful, but because they 
 would hear Prometheus speak again : they are impa¬ 
 tient even at Prometheus’s prophetic replies to Io, 
 because they would hear him speak only of Prome¬ 
 theus. Prom the moment of the first dawning of his 
 
XVI 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 character upon their minds, its effect is electrifying* 
 He is silent: he disdains as much to answer the im¬ 
 potent and selfish compassion of Vulcan, as to murmur 
 beneath the brutal cruelty of Strength. It was not 
 thus that he pitied in his days of joy : it was not thus 
 that he acted in his days of power: and his spirit is 
 above them, and recks not of them ; and when their 
 pity and their scoffs pollute his ears no more, he pours 
 out his impassioned sorrows to the air, and winds, and 
 waters, and earth, and sun, whom he had never visited 
 with benefits, and “ taxed not with unkindness.” The 
 striking nature of these, our first ideas of Prometheus, 
 is not enfeebled by any subsequent ones. We see 
 him daring and unflinching beneath the torturing and 
 dishonoring hand, yet keenly alive to the torture and 
 dishonor ; for himself fearless and rash, yet for others 
 considerate and wary; himself unpitied, yet to others 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 XVII 
 
 pitiful. And when, at the last, he calls no longer 
 upon the sun, and earth, and waters, from whom the 
 Avenger is secluding him ; but demands of JEther, 
 who is rolling light to all eyes excepting his, whether 
 he beholds how he suffers by injustice;—our hearts rise 
 up within us, and bear witness that the suffering is 
 indeed unjust. 
 
 It is apparent with what bitter feeling the con- 
 ceiver of this character must have regarded the trans¬ 
 ferred praise and love of Athens—of his country. 
 “ Are you not ashamed,” said Menander to Phile¬ 
 mon, “ to conquer me in comedy?” Such a reproach 
 might iEschylus have used to his dramatic rival, and 
 extracted as deep a blush as ever stained Philemon’s 
 cheek. But he did not. Silent as his own Prome¬ 
 theus, he left for ever the Athens on whom he had 
 conferred the immortality of his name and works; and 
 
xviii PREFACE. 
 
 went to Sicily, to die. In tiiat place of exile he 
 wrote his epitaph instead of tragedies, calling with 
 his dying voice on the grove of Marathon 1 and the 
 conquered Persians, as the only witnesses of his 
 glory. “ If thorns be in thy path,” saith Marcus 
 Antoninus , 2 “ turn aside.” But where should he turn, 
 
 who would avoid the ingratitude and changefuiness 
 of man ? 
 
 Among those who have passed judgment upon JEs- 
 chylus, it is remarkable how many have passed a si¬ 
 milar one to that of the Athenians, when, according 
 to Suidas, they “ broke down the benches” previous 
 to his departure for Sicily;—a phrase interpreted by 
 Scaliger to signify a final condemnation of his work, lie 
 is “ damn'd by faint praise by an alternate acknow- 
 
 1 See the epitaph which is attributed to him. 
 
 2 Lib. viii. cap. 5. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 xix 
 
 iedgment of his genius, and censure of his taste ; and 
 by an invidious opposition to Sophocles and Euripides. 
 Of the three great critics of antiquity,—Longinus, 
 Dionysius of Halicarnassus, and Quintilian,—Diony¬ 
 sius alone does not measure his criticism to twice the 
 length of his commendation. Quintilian calls him 
 “ rudis in plerisque et incompositus,” which my sense 
 of justice almost gives me courage to call a false cri¬ 
 ticism. Longinus—Longinus ! ! uses similar language: 
 —eviore u£itoi dKarepyaarovs kcu oloi’ei 7roKoeibe~is ras 
 evvoias xai dfxctXu^Tovs (pepovros. Mow there are, un¬ 
 deniably, some things in iEscliylus, which, like the 
 expressions of Caliisthenes, would properly fall under 
 the censure of Longinus, as being ov% vxprjXa, aXXa 
 /nerewpa. But according to every principle by which 
 he himself could urge his immortal claim upon pos¬ 
 terity, the Homer of criticism should have named 
 
XX 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 with less of coldness and more of rapture, the Homer 
 of dramatic poetry. 
 
 With regard to the execution of this attempt, it is 
 not necessary for me to say many words. 1 have 
 rendered the iambics into blank verse, their nearest 
 parallel; and the choral odes and other lyric inter¬ 
 mixtures, into English lyrics, irregular and rhymed. 
 Irregularity I imagined to be indispensable to the 
 conveyance of any part of the effect of the original 
 measure, of which little seems to be understood by 
 modern critics, than that it is irregular. To the literal 
 sense I have endeavoured to bend myself as closely as 
 was poetically possible : but if, after all,—and it is 
 too surely the case,—“ quantum mutatus!” must be 
 applied ; may the reader say so rather sorrowfully 
 than severely, and forgive my English for not being 
 Greek, and myself for not being iEschylus. 
 
PREFACE. xxi 
 
 And will iEschylus forgive, among my many other 
 offences against him, the grave offence of profaning 
 his Prometheus, by attaching to it some miscellaneous 
 poems by its translator ? Will he not rather retort 
 upon me, his chorus’s strongly expressed disapproba¬ 
 tion of unequal unions ? And how can I defend 
 myself? cnroXe/Aos obe y b xoXefios. 
 

CONTENTS 
 
 Page 
 
 PREFACE . v 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND.1 
 
 THE TEMPEST.81 
 
 A SEA SIDE MEDITATION.93 
 
 A VISION OF LIFE AND DEATH . . . . .102 
 
 EARTH.109 
 
 THE PICTURE GALLERY AT PENSHURST . . . .113 
 
 TO A POET'S CHILD.117 
 
 MINSTRELSY.122 
 
 TO THE MEMORY OF SIR UVEDALE PRICE, BART. . 126 
 
 THE AUTUMN.131 
 
 THE DEATH-BED OF TERESA DEL RIEGO . . . .134 
 
 TO VICTOIRE, ON HER MARRIAGE.137 
 
 TO A BOY.140 
 
 REMONSTRANCE AND REPLY.144 
 
XXIV 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 Page 
 
 AN EPITAPH. 147 
 
 THE IMAGE OF GOD.. • .148 
 
 THE APPEAL.151 
 
 IDOLS. 156 
 
 HYMN.159 
 
 WEARINESS .162 
 
 f 
 
 * 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
PERSONS OF THE DRAMA. 
 
 Prometheus. 
 
 Vulcan. 
 
 Strength. 
 
 Force. 
 
 Oceanus. 
 
 Hermes. 
 
 Io. 
 
 Chorus of sea-nymphs. 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Scene in European Scythia. Rocks facing the 
 
 Eujcine Sea. 
 
 Prometheus , 1 Vulcan, Strength 2 and Force. 
 
 Strength. Ve have attain’d the utmost bound of 
 earth, 
 
 The Scythian way, th’ unpeopled wilderness; 
 
 And now it fits thee, Vulcan, to perforin 
 The father’s will; and this audacious god 
 Fix to the lofty-browed rocks, by links 
 Infrangible of adamantine chains. 
 
 Thy crown, the glory of constructive fire, 
 
 Stole he, and gave to men; for which offence 
 
 A 
 
2 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 ’Tis just he pay to gods exacted vengeance ; 
 
 So may he learn t’ admit Saturnius’ sway, 
 
 And make cessation from his love of man. 
 
 Vul. O Strength and Force ! for you, doth Jove’s 
 command 
 
 Look to its end unhinder’d. But for me, 
 
 To bind with forceful hands a kindred god 
 Against this tempest-riven precipice, 
 
 Is wdiat I dare not: yet, necessity 
 Maketh me dare—neglect of Jove were awful. 
 
 Oh ! of sagacious Themis, sagest son, 
 
 Thee loath, I loath, with chains insoluble 
 Shall fix against this desolated rock,— 
 
 Where never voice nor form of mortal man 
 Shall meet thee friend of man—where, ’stablished 
 ’Neath the fierce sun, thy brow’s white flower shall 
 fade— 
 
 Star-broider’d night enshadow thee well pleased, 
 
 And day disperse the morning dews again ! 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 3 
 
 But ever shall the present sense of woe 
 Gnaw at thy heart; for no deliv’rer comes ! 
 
 Such fruit thou cullest from thy love of man ! 
 
 Bor thou a god, denying fear to gods, 
 
 Gavest to mortals honor unbefit. 
 
 For which things thou shalt guard this joyless rock, 
 Erect, unslumb’ring, bending not the knee, 
 
 And many wailings and unfruitful groans 
 Shalt utter. For Jove’s mind is obdurate, 
 
 And ever cruel is a new-made king. 
 
 Strength. Amen !—Why laggest thou with vain 
 compassion ? 
 
 Why hat’st thou not a god Vvho hateth gods— 
 
 W ho yielded up thy glory unto men ? 
 
 Vuh Strong is the tie of kindred and of friendship ! 3 
 Strength. I grant it. But how canst thou disobey 
 The father? Doth not this affright thee more ? 
 
 Vul. Aye wert thou stern and full of hardihood. 
 Strength. Because it booteth not, bewailing him ; 
 
4 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Nor labour thou for what can profit nought. 
 
 Vul. Oh hateful hateful art, learn’d by mine 
 hands ! 
 
 Strength. Why hate it? For in simple sooth, 
 thine art 
 
 Is not the cause of any present ill. 
 
 Vul. Would that another used it! 
 
 Strength. Every thing 
 
 Is full of sorrow, save to rule the gods :— 4 
 For none is free, save Jove. 
 
 Vul. I have known that; 
 
 And can in nothing contradict thy words. 
 
 Strength. Why then not hasten to encompass round 
 This god with chains, lest Jove behold thee lagging ? 
 Vul. The manacles are here. 
 
 Strength. Then , seizing him, 
 
 On either side his hands, with nervous might 
 Strike with the hammer,—fix him to the rocks. 
 
 Vul. The work is done, and not imperfectly. 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Strength. Strike with a stronger stroke, compress, 
 relax not :— 
 
 He can find ways where others find no ways. 
 
 Vul. This arm is fix’d indissolubly. 
 
 Strength. " Now 
 
 Bind fast the other—let the sophist learn 
 He is less wise than Jove. 
 
 Vul. Except Prometheus, 
 
 None can upbraid me justly ! 
 
 Strength. Firmly fix 
 
 Athwart his breast the pertinacious jaw 
 Of adamantine w T edge. 
 
 Vul. Alas ! alas ! 
 
 Prometheus, I am mourning o’er thy fate ! 
 
 Strength. Art thou a dastard ? For the foes of 
 Jove 
 
 Mourn’st thou? Take heed, lest thou bewail thyself. 
 Vul. A spectacle thou seest, sad to see. 
 
 Strength. I see this god endure just punishment. 
 
c> 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 But fetter now his sides. 
 
 Vul. Necessity 
 
 Compelleth this ; but urge not thou too much. 
 
 Strength. Yea, I will urge, and iterate mine 
 urging— 
 
 Go down, and forcibly enchain his limbs. 
 
 Vul . ’Tis done, and by no lengthen’d toil. 
 
 Strength. And now 
 
 Strongly the perforating shackles, strike— 
 
 Strike thou—for he, whose work thou dost, is stern. 
 Vul. Thy tongue speaks words as rugged as thy 
 form. 
 
 Strength. Be soft and tender thou, but me re¬ 
 proach not 
 
 \ 
 
 For the firm will and anger resolute. 
 
 Vul. Depart we. Iron nets enfold his limbs. 
 Strength. Here now insult ! And having spoil’d 
 the gods 
 
 Of glories, bless man with them. Tell me how 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 7 
 
 Thy well-loved mortals can deliver thee 
 
 From all these woes. The gods have named thee falsely 
 
 Prometheus the Provider, who thyself 
 
 Need’st a provider for escaping hence. 
 
 Prometheus alone . 
 
 O holy aether, and swift-winged winds. 
 
 And river founts, and dimples numberless 
 Of oceanic waves—all-fost’ring earth, 
 
 And, all-beholding sun, on thee I call, 
 
 Behold me, what I bear—a god, from gods. 
 
 Behold me, by what anguish worn, 
 
 These eyes of mine shall weary turn 
 Unto time’s myriad years. 
 
 So harsh a chain of suffering, 
 
 Hath form’d for me heav’n’s new-made king ! 
 
 Alas ! alas ! my tears 
 Alike for present and for future flow ! — 
 
 Where lies the bound’ry of my mighty woe ? 
 
8 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 What do I say ? all things, all future things, 
 I view unclouded ; nor can sorrow come 
 Strange to my soul. It doth behove to bear 
 Calmly what Fate ordaineth, knowing that 
 Necessity hath force impugnable. 
 
 Yet can I not be silent, or unsilent, 
 
 Of these my woes. To these necessities, 
 Because I gave to man a glorious gift, 
 
 I have been yoked—because I stole away 
 The ferule-treasured secret fount of fire , 5 
 Teacher of every art, high help to mortals— 
 For such sin I endure such punishment; 
 Rock-fixed, in the desert air, in chains. 
 
 Ah me ! ah me ! ah me ! what sound. 
 What viewless odour hovers round? 
 From god or man, or half divine 
 Being, who nears this rock of mine, 
 This limit of the earth, to see 
 My woes, or seek—whate’er it be ? 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 View me a bound and sorrowing god, 
 
 The foe of Jove, the hate of such 
 -As Jove’s imperial courts have trod ; 
 
 Because I loved man too much. 
 
 Ah me ! ah me ! what sound I hear 
 Of coming birds ! Air murm’ring sings, 
 Beneath the soft light stroke of wings— 
 
 And all society is fear. 
 
 Prometheus and Chorus. 
 
 Chorus. 
 
 Fear nothing. Lo ! This friendly train 
 On the fast-flashing oar of pinions, 
 
 Draws nigh; but scarce such boon could gain 
 From him who hokleth sea dominions. 
 
 Me too the rapid winds have borne afar. 
 
 Deep thro’ our caves the clank of iron came— 
 Forth from my cheek was struck the blush of shame 
 And rush’d I shoonless on my winged car . 6 
 
10 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Prometheus. 
 
 Ah me ! ah me ! ah me ! 
 
 Children of Tethys, who hath given birth 
 To many, and involveth all the earth 
 With an unsleeping sea ! 
 Daughters of old Oceanus, 
 
 Behold, look on me, how constrained thus, 
 By chains to this exalted rocky steep, 
 
 Sad vigil I must keep. 
 
 Chorus. 
 
 Prometheus, I do look on thee !—but now 
 A cloud is o’er mine eyes, 
 
 A trembling cloud surcharged with many tears ; 
 When I would gaze where rock-constrained thou 
 Hangest consumed by iron miseries— 
 
 Because new gods th’ Olympian hill obtaineth, 
 And by new laws the son of Saturn reigneth— 
 And past the mighty things of former years. 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 11 
 
 Prometheus. 
 
 Would that under earth, beneath 
 Haides, the host of death, 
 
 Into baseless Tartarus, 
 
 He had hurl’d me shackled thus 
 Cruelly, infrangibly ! 
 
 Then, neither god nor man could be 
 llejoicer o’er Prometheus’ woes : 
 
 Now, motion’d by each wind that blows, 
 
 I gladden—wretched me !—my foes. 
 
 Chorus. 
 
 Who of the gods so stern as to be gladden’d ? 
 
 Who by thy fate unsadden’d ? 
 
 Who of the gods, save Jove ? He, ever lending 
 To wrath his soul unbending, 
 
 Ruleth the heav’ns, nor e’er shall cease from ill, 
 Until his heart be satiate, or until 
 By fraud the sceptre’s strength be wrested from his will. 
 
12 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Prometheus. 
 
 Yea ! even me, albeit indeed 
 By fetter strong consumed I lie, 
 
 The ruler of the blest shall need— 
 
 To show that counsel new whereby 
 He loseth honor, sov’reignty. 
 
 And honey’d, suasive words shall be, 
 Though charm’d, no spell to soften me ; 
 Nor iron threats shall move me e’er 
 By fear this counsel to declare, 
 
 Before he break my cruel chain. 
 
 And pay the price of all this pain. 
 
 Chorus. 
 
 Daring thou art, nor aught to bitter woe 
 
 Dost yield, but speakest words too free— 
 And fear doth vex and pierce my spirit thro’! 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 13 
 
 I fear the fate attending- thee, 
 
 Where thou shalt voyage ere thou see 
 The shore of grief: for none can move 
 The will, or melt the heart of Jove. 
 
 Prometheus. 
 
 I know that Jove is cruel ; that he hath 
 For his sole justice, his own will. 
 
 Yet shall he soft and tender be, 
 
 Moved by this threaten’d ill; 
 
 And calming his unconquerable wrath, 
 
 He shall not hasten less than I, 
 
 To concord and to amity. 
 
 Cho. Remove the veil from all things, and narrate 
 In what offences, Jove detecting thee, 
 
 Imposed such cruel and dishon’ring woe. 
 
 Instruct us, if th’ instruction grieve thee not. 
 
 Pro . Grievous to me to speak of what is past: 
 Grievous, to speak not—each way miserable !— 
 
14 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 What time the gods their primal wrath began, 
 And ’mid their ranks arose the mutual strife, 
 Some eager to thrust Saturn from his throne, 
 That Jove forsooth should fill it; some averse, 
 Hesolved that Jove should never rule the gods— 
 Did I by wisest counsel seek to move 
 The Titans, children of the heav’ns and earth ; 
 But fail’d in power. For all my courteous guile, 
 Contemning with inexorable mind, 
 
 They thought to lord it, without toil, by force. 
 Oft had my mother Themis, yea, and Gaia, 
 (Albeit one, she beareth many names) 
 
 Foretold to me what future was to come ; 
 
 That not by fortitude or force but fraud, 
 
 The victors were to vanquish. Such decree 
 When I unfolded in mine arguments, 
 
 They deigned not to view the whole ; what time 
 Meseem’d it best of every present ill, 
 
 That having won my mother to my side, 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 15 
 
 I willing should assist the willing Jove— 
 
 And by my counsel the Tartarean pit, 
 
 Based in darkness, covers ancient Saturn, 
 
 And with him his allies. The King of gods, 
 Being by me so benefited, now 
 Hath paid me back with this ill recompense; 
 Because there lies inbred in royalty, 
 
 A rank disease—distrustfulness of friends. 
 
 But that which ye demand, the cause wherefrom 
 He doth afflict me, 1 will render clear. 
 
 What time he sate upon his father’s throne, 
 
 First, unto various deities he gave 
 
 Gifts various, and arranged his government; 
 
 But reck’d he nothing of unhappy man, 
 
 Eager to rase his universal kind, 
 
 And generate another ; which desire 
 None dared resist, save I : but I, with daring 
 Interposition, rescued mortal man 
 From sinking into hell, exterminate. 
 
16 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Wherefrom beneath this anguish am I bent. 
 
 Grievous to suffer, piteous to behold; 
 
 And I who pitied man, am deem’d myself 
 Unmeet for pity ; but am harp’d on thus 
 By Jove’s fell hand, dishonor’d spectacle ! 
 
 Cho. Oh, iron-hearted, formed from the rock, 
 
 Is he, Prometheus, who lamenteth not 
 Thy woes. I yearned, not to look on them, 
 
 And, having look’d, mine heart was anguish’d. 
 
 Pro. Yea ; 
 
 To friends I am a piteous spectacle. 
 
 Cho . But didst thou not offend in more than this? 
 Pro. I smote with blindness man’s prophetic sight, 
 Cho. What drug devising for their malady? 
 
 Pro. Blind hopes I sent among them. 
 
 Cho. Mighty help 
 
 Thereby thou didst afford to men. 
 
 Pro. Besides, 
 
 I yielded them the gift of fire— 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 17 
 
 Clio. And now 
 
 Th’ ephemerals possess the red-eyed fire—— 
 
 Pro. By which they shall be learn’d in many arts. 
 Cho. For such crimes doth the hand of Jove afflict, 
 And loosen not the chain of chastisement? 
 
 Is there prescribed no limit to thy woe ? 
 
 Pro. No limit — none; save what seems good to 
 him. 
 
 Cho. And how will it seem good ? What hope 
 remains ? 
 
 Seest thou not, thou hast sinn’d ? To say, thou hast, 
 Gives me no joy, and may increase thy grief: 
 
 So let that pass, and seek out thy deliv’rance. 
 
 Pro. Easy for him, whose foot is free from toils 
 Of grief, to counsel and reproach the grieved ! 
 
 But all these things I knew. By mine own will— 
 Bv mine own will, I sinn’d—and will confess— 
 
 And, aiding mortals, met with woe myself. 
 
 Indeed I thought not, by such chastisement, 
 
18 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Attenuate, against the lofty rocks, 
 
 To guard this tenantless and lonely hill — 
 Nathless bewail not o’er my present woes, 
 
 But on the plain descending, what shall come, 
 Attend, that ye may learn the perfect whole, 
 Obey me, nymphs, obey me; labour with 
 Him who is toiling now ; for wand’ring Woe 
 Sits at the feet of every one by turns. 
 
 Chorus. 
 
 Not on the loath thou dost enforce thy words, 
 Prometheus ; and with lightsome feet, 
 Leaving my quickly-motion’d seat, 
 Leaving the holy air, the way of birds, 
 
 Anon I reach this promontory. 
 
 And yearn to hear thy woful story. 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 19 
 
 Prometheus, Chorus, and Oceanus. 
 
 Oceanus. 
 
 I come, my weary travel ending, 
 
 Prometheus, unto thee; 
 
 My steed’s wing’d course by counsel bending; 
 
 Of bridle he is free. 
 
 Behold, 1 sorrow in thy woe ! 
 
 I ween that mutual kindred so 
 Impels me ; but, without our line, 
 
 The fate of none would I combine 
 With blessing, more than thine. 
 
 My faithfulness thy soul will know ; 
 
 No flatteries false my lips attend ; 
 
 Then, can I serve thee, troubled thus? 
 
 Thou shalt not say thou hast a friend 
 Firmer than Oceanus. 
 
 Pro, IXa ! what is this? Thou, too, of my distress 
 
20 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Comest spectator ? Wherefore hast thou dared, 
 Leaving the tides that bear thy name, the caves 
 Rock-roof’d and self-create, to visit earth, 
 
 The mother of this iron ? Didst thou come 
 To look upon my griefs, and grieve withal ? 
 
 Behold a spectacle !—me, friend of Jove— 
 
 Me, the creator of his royalty— 
 
 Beneath what torture from his hand I bow ! 
 
 Ocea. Prometheus, I behold, and fain would lend 
 Thine ear my chiefest counselling, albeit 
 Thou hast a subtle mind. Know thine own self, 
 
 And change thy ways, since heav’n hath changed her 
 king; 
 
 For if thou thus eject stern arrowy words, 
 
 Though far above thee the Saturnian throne, 
 
 Jove may attend, and all his present wrath 
 Beseem a very sport at chastisement. 
 
 Unhappy god ! what ire thou hast, expel, 
 
 And seek an egress from these circling pangs. 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 21 
 
 For tho’ perchance my words, an olden saw 
 May seem, Prometheus, such the recompense 
 Attending lofty speech ! But thou, in nought 
 Abased, to sorrow yieldest not, and fain 
 Wouldst add unto thy present, future ill! 
 Therefore bv me instruct, thou never more 
 Wilt kick against the goad,7 seeing that Jove, 
 
 Is cruel, and to none accountable. 
 
 And now depart I from thee, and will strive, 
 
 If aught I can, to work thy liberty. 
 
 Calm thy roused soul, nor passion in thy speech ! 
 Hast thou not learned, who art learn’d in much, 
 That ruin presses on the idle tongue? 
 
 Pro. I honor thee, who uncompell’d, partak’st 
 My present curse, and darest that to come. 
 
 Now, rest—forget me !—thou wilt move not him : 
 He is unmoving ; rather heed thyself, 
 
 Lest visiting my grief should stir his vengeance. 
 Ocea. More subtle far thou art for others’ weal, 
 
22 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Than thine : I witness it by deeds, not words. 
 
 Me moved to act, thou shalt not backward draw— 
 
 Because I glory—glory, that to me 
 
 The hand of Jove shall grant thy freedom’s boon. 
 
 Pro . Truly I praise thee, and shall ever praise; 
 For thou hast shrunk from nought of kindness. Yet, 
 Toil not for me; since vainly thou wilt toil, 
 Whate’er thou toilest, profiting me nought. 
 
 Be calm, and save thyself: for not because 
 I needs must sorrow thus, my spirit wills 
 That others should be sorrowful like me. 
 
 No, in good truth ; upon my heart, the fate 8 
 Of Atlas—of my brother, weighs,—who stands 
 Westward, upon his shoulder balancing 
 The column of the heav’n and earth ; a burden 
 For strength gigantic. I have also seen. 
 
 And pitied, by superior force subdued, 
 
 The earth-born tenant of Cilician caves, 
 
 Th’ embattled monster, him o’ the hundred heads,9 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 23 
 
 Vehement Typhon, who opposed the gods, 
 Out-hissing slaughter from his horrid jaws. 
 
 Forth from his eyes the fearful splendour glared, 
 
 As to annihilate the throne of Jove ; 
 
 But him did Jove’s unsleeping arrow find, 
 
 The headlong thunderbolt out-breathing fire, 
 
 And smote him from his boast majestical : 
 
 For stricken to the very soul, his strength 
 
 Was scorch’d and thunder-blasted from him. Now 
 
 A useless and immeasurable form, 
 
 Fie lies beside the oceanic strait, 
 
 Compressed underneath Mount iEtna’s roots; 
 
 Upon whose highest summit Vulcan sits, 
 
 Beating his iron ; and from whence erupt 
 Rivers of fire, that gnaw with savage jaws, 
 
 The fair wide plains of fruitful Sicily. 
 
 Such wrath doth Typhon bubble forth, with darts 
 Hot, unapproachable, of fiery storm, 
 
 Though turn’d to cinder by the bolt of Jove. 
 
24 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 But thou possessest wisdom, nor dost need 
 My teaching: by thy knowledge save thyself. 
 
 For me, I quaff this cup of present fate, 
 
 Until the soul of Jove take breath from venoeance. 
 
 o 
 
 Ocea. Therefore, Prometheus, art thou ignorant 
 That words do med’cine the disease of wrath ? 
 
 Pro. Yea ; if the heart they opportunely soothe, 
 And do not sear the tumours of the soul. 
 
 Ocea. For him who wisely thinks and nobly acts, 
 Seest thou inherent punishment ? Instruct me. 
 
 Pro. Labour superfluous—foolishness inane ! 
 
 Ocea. Yet, suffer me to faint ’neath this disease 
 Of folly, since it profits that the wise 
 Appear unwise. 
 
 Pro. This will appear my sin. 
 
 Ocea. In sooth, thy counsel drives me to mine home. 
 
 Pro. Lest my bewailing drive thee into wrath. 
 
 Ocea . His wrath, who newly sitteth on the seat 
 Omnipotent ? 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Pro. 
 
 Him. 
 
 Take heed, lest thou provoke 
 
 Ocea. O, Prometheus, thy calamity 10 
 Shall be my teacher. 
 
 I* 7 ' 0 ' Go ; depart, preserve 
 
 Thy present prudence. 
 
 Ccea. Unto me forth rushin 
 
 I hou iteratest this desire for now 
 
 My flying courser beateth with his wines 
 
 O 
 
 The wide expanse of aether, and well-pleased 
 Would crouch within his oceanic cave. 
 
 g, 
 
 
 Prometheus and Chorus. 
 
 Chorus. 
 
 Strophe 1. 
 
 I mourn thy ruin’d destinies, 
 Prometheus ! From my tender eyes 
 
 B 
 
2G 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 A tear-distilling stream doth break, 
 With humid fount to dew my cheek ; 
 Because Saturnius, cruel still, 
 
 Ruling by his proper will. 
 
 Doth the royal sceptre bear, 
 Subversive of the gods who were. 
 
 Antistrophe 1. 
 
 All this land, of far extent, 
 
 Deeply sighing, doth lament 
 
 Thy brethren’s chastisement and thine, 
 
 Unworthy of an ancient line. 
 
 And mortals all, who find abode 
 On holy Asia’s neighb’ring sod, 
 Sorrow with thee, who art lying 
 In a sorrow meet for sighing :— 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 27 
 
 Strophe 2. 
 
 And habitants of Colchis’ land ; 
 
 Virgins, who untrembling stand 
 In war ; and they of Scythia’s band, 
 Who for a home earth’s limit take, 
 Round about Mseotis’ lake :— 
 
 Antistrophe 2. 
 
 And Arabia’s battle-crown, 11 
 They who ’habit in the town 
 Lofty-pinnacled and near 
 Caucasus—a race of fear, 
 
 Thund’ring with the pointed spear. 
 
 Epode. 
 
 Another only Titan have 1 view’d, 
 
 In adamantine grief by gods subdued ;— 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 2S 
 
 Atlas,—who with eterne surpassing might. 
 Doth groan beneath the freight 
 Of the supernal pole. 
 
 For him the tides of ocean wailing roll, 
 
 And earthly caves emit a deep’ning sigh ; 
 
 And hell’s obscure recesses sound reply ; 
 
 And fountains, whence the limpid rivers flow, 
 Murmur a pitying woe. 
 
 Pro. Think not that indolence or arrogance 
 Maketh me silent thus ; 1 gnaw mine heart 
 With thought, contemplating mine outraged form. 
 Yet to these newly-crowned gods, what hand, 
 Saving this hand, gave out the gifts of empire ? 
 Which things, I silent pass; for I would speak 
 To you who own their knowledge. Dather hear 
 What crimes I perpetrated touching man ; 
 
 How from his idiot state I made him wise 
 And mind-possessive. Blaming him in nought, 
 But making clear my gifts’ beneficence, 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 29 
 
 I will describe them. In the olden time, 
 
 Men seeing, saw in vain, and did not hear 12 
 Hearing ; but similar to shades of dreams, 
 
 Long mingled all things in confusedness ; 
 
 Nor knew by tiled roofs t’ oppose the sun, 
 
 Nor knew device of wood ; but underground, 
 Abode like sorry ants in sunless caves. 
 
 To them, of winter shone no certain sign, 13 
 Nor yet of flow’ry spring, nor fruitful summer; 
 But all things did they void of sapiency— 
 Until I show’d the rising of the orbs, 
 
 And mystic setting. Yea ; and I devised 
 Numbers—high art!— and letters’ composition, 
 And memory, effector of all things, 
 
 And mother of the Muses ; I the first 
 Join’d unto fitting yokes enslaved beasts, 
 Vicarious in the greatest toils, of man ; 
 
 I led rein-loving coursers to the chariot, 
 
 The pride of gold-abounding luxury ; 
 
30 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 And none, save I, contrived the linen-wing’d, 14 
 Sea-vvand’ring ships, whereon the sailors ride. 
 
 Now, I unhappy, who such arts devised 
 For mortal man, myself have no device, 
 
 Whereby I may escape my present woe. 
 
 Cho, Thou hast endured unseemly punishment 
 Madden’d by error; and, as leech unskill’d 
 Who falleth sick, thou yieldest to despair, 
 
 Nor findest ’mid thy drugs thy proper cure. 
 
 Pro. More wilt thou wonder, having heard the rest, 
 Touching what arts and manners I devised ;— 
 
 The greatest, this. Of old, were any sick. 
 
 There was no help, nor esculent, nor liquid, 
 
 Nor yet anointive ; but men lay outworn 
 For lack of drugs, till I declared to them 
 The combinations of soft remedies, 
 
 Whereby all sicknesses were warded off. 
 
 And divination’s many rules I fix’d, 
 
 And first adjudged what dreams possess the mark 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 n i 
 
 a 1 
 
 Of revelation ; and I taught them omens 
 
 Hard to distinguish ; and I eke defined 
 
 Signs by the way, and flight of crook-claw’d birds ; 
 
 And which are, by their nature, fortunate, 
 
 Which contrary, and what the food of each ; 
 
 And how among them there are mutually 
 Loves, and societies, and enmities; 
 
 The lightness of the entrails, and what hue 
 Possessing, they contribute joy to gods— 
 
 The lungs’ and liver’s fair variety— 
 
 And having burnt fat-cover’d limbs and loins, 
 Toward an art complex’d I led the way, 
 
 And render’d clear the fiery signs, erst dark. 
 
 Enough of this! What lieth underneath 
 The bosom of the earth, the helps of man, 
 
 Gold, silver, iron, copper—who can say 
 He track’d them ere my wisdom track’d them ? None 
 I have sure knowledge—if the boaster’s part 
 He vainly choose not. Learn in brief the whole: — 
 
32 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 .All science came to mortals from Prometheus ! 
 
 Clio. Take heed, lest thou unfittingly assist 
 Mortals, neglecting thy sad self. For me, 
 
 I have good hope that thou, escaped from chains, 
 
 Wilt put on strength, omnipotent as Jove’s. 
 
 Pro. Not yet—not so, doth Fate, the Perfecter, 
 Perform these things ; but having bow’d beneath 
 Toils, griefs unnumber’d, thus I ’scape the chain. 
 
 Far weaker than necessity is art. 
 
 V 
 
 Clio. Who holds the helm of that necessity ? 
 
 Pro. The threefold Fates, and unforgetting 
 Furies. 
 
 Clio. Is Jove less absolute than these are ? 
 
 Pro. Yea; 
 
 i 
 
 And therefore cannot ’scape what is ordain’d. 
 
 Clio. What is ordain’d for Jove, except to rule ? 
 Pro. Thou mayst not hear; nor question me again. 
 Cho. Is that which thou involv’st in mystery, 
 
 Of sacred import ? 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 32 
 
 Pro . Of ray other words 
 
 Be mindful; these, ’tis not. the hour to speak 
 But to veil closely; for, preserving these, 
 ’Scape I the anguish and the fetter’s shame. 
 
 Chorus . 
 
 Strophe 1. 
 
 O, never may almighty Jove 
 Oppose his will to my desire ! 
 
 Nor e’er with sacrificial fire, 
 Bull-consuming, sanctified, 
 
 By my father’s deathless tide, 
 
 May I godward cease to move! 
 
 Nor e’er my lips offend in pride ! 
 
 But may this counsel aye abide; 
 
 And never from its source be dried. 
 
34 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Antistrophe 1. 
 
 Tis sweet, our life to lengthen out 
 With hopes unshadow’d o’er by doubt; 
 The soul enriched all the while 
 With joys that wear a golden smile ! 
 But Titan, shudd’ring I behold thee, 
 What time a thousand woes enfold thee 
 With macerating power; because 
 Thou didst not tremble at Jove’s laws ; 
 But gavest, with unbending mind, 
 
 Too much weal to human kind. 
 
 Strophe 2. 
 
 Lo ! all thy gifts gave nought to thee ! 
 Where is thy help, beloved, say ? 
 
 What help from men who last a day ? 
 And dost thou not the weakness see, 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 35 
 
 Slow, vision-like, by which is found 
 The hood-wink’d race of mortals, bound ? 
 Man’s counsels ne’er can rise above 
 The purposed fixedness of Jove. 
 
 Antistrophe 2. 
 
 Prometheus, I have learn’d these things, 
 Viewing thy ruin’d fate : 
 
 Unlike that song which waved its wings 
 Upon my lips of late ; 
 
 Which sweetly round the baths I sung, 
 Hymning thy nuptial hour, 
 
 When, suasive with thy presents’ power, 
 Hermione thou wedd’st, our sister young. 
 
36 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Prometheus, Chorus, and Io. 
 
 Io. 
 
 What land ? what habitants ? and who 
 The being that I look unto, 
 
 Tempested in rock and chain ? 
 
 For what crime dost thou sustain 
 Such chastisement ? and, oh, declare 
 Where have I hapless wander’d—where ? 
 
 Ah me ! ah me ! ah me ! 
 
 Again the gad-fly spurs me, wretched maid ! 
 
 Oh earth, avert the earth-born Argus’ shade ! 
 
 I fear mine eyes should be 
 On him, the thousand-eyed 
 Herdsman, who walketh, looking craftily ; 
 Whom, albeit dead, the grave hath fail’d to hide ; 
 But, passing from the shades, who doggeth me, 
 Making me wander famine-worn beside 
 The sand-encircled sea : 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 37 
 
 While imdertonecl his waxen reed doth keep 
 A tune engend’ring sleep. 
 
 Oh woe ! oh woe ! 
 
 Where are, ye gods, my wand’rings wide directed ? 
 Me, in what crime, thou Jove, what crime, detected, 
 Yok’st thou to sufFring, so, 
 
 And thus to goading terror dost thou doom me 
 Wretched and madden’d? Oh, with fire consume me, 
 Hide me with earth, to beasts my body ding: 
 
 Spurn not my prayer, oh king! 
 
 » 
 
 Too many wand’rings on my strength have press’d, 
 Nor know I where I shall attain to rest. 
 
 Cho. What saith the horned virgin, hearest thou? 15 
 Pro. How can I hear not the fly-goaded maid, 
 
 The child of Inachus, who warm’d with love 
 Saturnius’ breast; and now, by Juno’s hate, 
 
 Is forced to tread the ever-length’ning ways ? 
 
38 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Io. 
 
 Whence didst thou utter forth my father’s name ? 
 
 Say to the sorrowing one—who canst thou be, 
 
 Oh miserable thou, who dost acclaim 
 Such true discourse to miserable me ? 
 
 Naming the Jove-impelled malady, 
 
 Which goads with furious sting, my strength down¬ 
 sweeping ; 
 
 And with the hungry scourges of whose leaping, 
 Urged wildly on, I sought this path. 
 
 Subdued by Juno’s wily wrath? 
 
 Of those acquaint with misery. 
 
 Who, alas ! are sad as I ? 
 
 But, now what suffering waits me, plainly show ; 
 
 And what, oh, what, the med’cine of my woe. 
 
 Speak to the wand’ring maid, if aught thou know. 
 Pro. And plainly will I speak whate’er thou 
 wouldst; 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 39 
 
 Weaving no secret meaning, but in words 
 Simple, as fits it to converse with friends. 
 
 Thou seest Prometheus, who gave fire to mortals. 
 
 Io. Oh universal help of mortal man— 
 
 Sad Titan ! wherefore dost thou suffer thus ? 
 
 Pro. I scarce have ceased bewailing o’er my woes. 
 
 Io. And therefore wilt not grant this boon to me ? 
 
 Pro. Say what thou askest: thou mayst hear the 
 whole. 
 
 Io. Declare who 'gainst this rock hath prison’d thee. 
 
 Pro. Jove’s counsel, Vulcan’s hand. 16 
 
 Io. And for what crimes 
 
 Hast thou such chastisement ? 
 
 Pro. Enough for thee 
 
 What now I have declared. 
 
 Io. Yea : besides, 
 
 To me, unhappy maiden, show what time 
 Shall be the limit of my wanderings. 
 
 Pro. Better to learn not, than to learn these things. 
 
40 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Io. Conceal not from me that which I shall suffer. 
 Pro. It is not that I grudge the boon. 
 fo. Then, wherefore 
 
 Delayest thou to tell me all ? 
 
 Pro. Not grudging. 
 
 But that I fear to wring thine heart. 
 
 Io. Be not 
 
 More careful for me than is grateful to me. 
 
 Pro. Since thou art eager, I will speak. Then, 
 hear me. 
 
 Cho. Nay ; make me also sharer in the boon. 
 
 First, we would fain inquire her malady, 
 
 Herself narrating her consuming woes : 
 
 And be what toils remain declared by thee. 
 
 Pro. Io, ’tis thine t’ attend these nymphs’ request * 
 The more, because they are thy father’s sisters; 
 
 Since to bewail and weep one’s destiny, 
 
 Where it is possible to draw a tear 
 
 From those who hearken, is a well-paid labour. 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 41 
 
 Io. I know not why I should distrust you, nymphs; 
 And all ye fain would learn, will I unfold 
 In clearest speech : albeit, ev’n in speech, 
 
 Touching the Jove-impelled tempesting, 
 
 And the corruption of my human form, 
 
 The cause which wing’d them to me, thrills my soul : 
 
 For dreams nocturnal ever ’habiting 
 
 Within my virgin chamber, me beguiled 
 
 With honey’d words :—* Oh, blessed, blessed maid, 
 
 Wherefore so long unwedded, when ’tis thine 
 
 To meet with noblest spousals? since for thee 
 
 Jove is consumed by an arrowy love, 
 
 And yearns to win thee; maiden, spurn not thou 
 The vows of Jove ; but hence to Lerne’s plain. 
 Enrich’d with hocks and ox-stalls of thy sire, 
 
 That so Saturnius’ eye may quench its love.’ 
 
 Unhappy me ! each night I was constrain’d 
 By visions thus, until I dared narrate 
 Unto my father the night-haunting dream. 
 
42 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 He unto Pytho sent, and to Dodona’s 
 Sagacious prophets, that he hence might learn 
 Whereby in act or speech to please the gods— 
 Nathless his messengers return’d, announcing 
 Various, and dark, and mystic oracles. 
 
 At length, an unambiguous answer came 
 To Inachus, which urged him, ’monished him, 
 
 T’ expel me from my home and native land, 
 
 That so abandon’d, I might wander on 
 To earth’s extremest verge : if he refused, 
 
 It threaten’d that a fire-eyed thunderbolt 
 Should fall from Jove t’ exterminate his race. 
 Persuaded by the Loxian prophecies, 
 
 He drove me forth, and barr’d me from my home 
 He loath, me loath ; but Jove’s coercive bit 
 Constrain’d him to the act. Immediately 
 Perverted were my human form and mind ; 
 
 And, horned as ye see, and goaded on 
 By pungent insect, with emadden’d leap 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 43 
 
 Unto Cenchrea’s pleasant wave I rush’d, 
 
 And Lerne’s height.' 17 The herdsman born of earth, 
 Argos, invincible of ire, pursued, 
 
 Tracking my footsteps with his myriad eyes. 
 
 Him, an uulook’d-for, instantaneous fate 
 Deprived of life ; but I, instinct with fury, 
 
 Am driv’n, by scourge divine, from land to land. 
 Thou hearest what is past. What is to come 
 Of trouble, oh, declare, if aught thou can ; 
 
 Nor, pitying, flatter me with soothless words ; 
 
 For I would name til’ ignoblest sin—deceit. 
 
 Chorus. 
 
 Stay, lo, stay ! Alas ! alas ! 
 
 I thought not such discourse would pass— 
 Such strange discourse—mine ear : 
 
 Nor that such sights of grief and fear, 
 
 So sad to view, and hard to bear, 
 
4 4 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Would chili, with double edge, ray spirit through. 
 Fate ! fate ! I shudder, seeing Io’s woe. 
 
 Pro. Too soon thou wailest, and art full of fear: 
 Restrain thy passion, till thou hear the rest. 
 
 Cho. Speak, teach ! There is a charm for those 
 who grieve, 
 
 In viewing without cloud their future grief. 
 
 Pro. Your former boon ye did obtain from me 
 Lightly; for ye desired to learn her woes. 
 
 Herself narrating them. Now hear the rest— 
 
 What future woe, there is necessity 
 
 That this young maiden should endure from Juno. 
 
 And, Io, let thy soul revolve ray words, 
 
 That thou mayst learn where end thy wanderings. 
 First, from this spot toward the orient sun 
 Turning thy steps, traverse uncultured lands ; 
 
 And thou shalt reach the Scythian hordes who dwell 
 On high, ’neath woven roofs, on wheeled cars, 
 
 Arm’d with far-darting bows : to whom approach not; 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 43 
 
 But to the sea-resounding rocky coast 
 Bending thy footsteps, from their clime depart. 
 
 Upon the left, abide the Chalybes, 
 
 Workers in iron mines, of whom beware, 
 
 Because ungentle they, nor bland to strangers: 
 
 And thou shalt reach Hybristes, well-named stream; 
 Which strive not thou to pass—for hard the passage— 
 Or ere thou come to Caucasus, of hills 
 The most exalt, and from whose pinnacle, 
 
 The river pours its strength : and having: clomb 
 His star-encount’ring summit, journey thou 
 Along the southward way, until thou reach 
 The Amazonian squadrons, hating man, 
 
 Who now Themiscyra inhabit, round 
 Therrnodon’s stream, whereby is Salmydessus 
 The iron jaw of ocean, merciless 
 To sailors, and the stepmother of ships. 
 
 They, with glad spirits, will conduct thee on : 
 
 And in the lake’s close portals thou wilt find 
 
4G 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Cimmeria’s isthmus, which it thee behoves 
 To leave, and traverse the Maeotian strait: 
 
 And ever among men a mighty fame 
 
 Shall mark thy traversing, whence Bosphorus 
 
 It shall be called : leaving Europe’s plain, 
 
 Thy feet shall stand on Asia’s continent. 
 
 And think ye that the tyrant of the gods 
 Is obdurate alike in all things ? He, 
 
 A god, desiring union with this mortal, 
 
 Hath smote her with the curse of wandering. 
 
 Ah, maiden ! thou hast met a cruel spouse ; 
 
 For all the words, which erewhile thou hast heard, 
 Are not yet in their prologue. 
 
 Io. Woe! woe! woe! 
 
 Pro. Thou also dost acclaim and groan ! IIow r 
 wilt thou, 
 
 What time thou hearest thy remaining griefs ? 
 
 Io. Some grief remaining canst thou name to me ? 
 Pro. A tempest-troubled sea of fateful woe. 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 47 
 
 Io. Then what avail eth me my life ? Why not 
 Hurl myself headlong from this rigid rock ; 
 
 That, dashing ’gainst the plain, I may be freed 
 From all mine anguish? Better once to die, 
 
 Than suffer miserably all my days. 
 
 Pro. A heavy burden, wouldst thou find my pangs, 
 To whom the Fates have not appointed death; 
 
 For death had loosed the fetter and the woe: 
 
 But now before my sight there lies no bound 
 To agony—ere Jove from empire fall. 
 
 Io. But can Jove ever from dominion fall ? 
 
 Pro. Thou wouldst rejoice, I ween, to see that 
 sight. 
 
 Io. Why should I not, who suffer ills from Jove ? 
 Pro. Then learn, that it is even so. 
 
 Io. By whom 
 
 Shall he be spoiled of his imperial sceptre ? 
 
 Pro. Himself will do it, by his counsel weak. 
 
 Io. But how ? Discover—if thou canst unharm’d. 
 
48 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Pro. A marriage union will he form, whereof 
 He after shall repent. 
 
 Io. Divine or human ? 
 
 If it be utterable, speak. 
 
 Pro. And wherefore 
 
 Should I determine which? It is not meet 
 That these things should be spoken. 
 
 Io. Shall he then 
 
 Be from his throne uprooted by his spouse ? 
 
 Pro. Whose son shall be his sire’s superior. 
 
 Io. Is there no refuge for him, from this fate ? 
 
 Pro. No refuse, until I from fetter freed— 
 
 Io. And who shall free thee, if Jove will it not? 
 
 Pro. Fate hath appointed one from thee descended. 
 
 Io. How say’st thou ? Shall my son deliver thee ? 
 
 Pro. The third in generation after ten . 18 
 
 Io. The prophecy is still obscure. 
 
 Pro. Nor seek 
 
 To learn thy proper woes. 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 49 
 
 Io. A benefit 
 
 Having foreshown me, now despoil me not. 
 
 Pro. Of two discourses, I will give thee one. 
 
 Io. What two ? Declare; and yield the choice 
 to me. 
 
 Pi ■o. I yield it. Choose that I should clearly name 
 Thy future woes, or my deliverer. 
 
 Cho. Vouchsafe one grace to her, and one to me ; 
 Nor do dishonor to our mutual prayers; 
 
 To her narrate her future wandering; 
 
 To me, who shall deliver. This I yearn for. 
 
 Pro. Since ye desire it, I will question not, 
 Narrating all ye would. Io, to thee, 
 
 Thy various wand’rings I will first unfold. 
 
 Which in the book-memorial of thy mind 1 ^ 
 
 Do thou inscribe. What time thy steps have pass'd 
 The strait, the boundary of continents, 
 
 Toward the fire-eyed, sun-track’d orient— 
 
 * * * * * * * * 
 
 c 
 
50 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Daring* the ocean’s mighty roar, until 
 Thou come unto Cisthenes’ Gorgon plains, 
 
 Where dwell the Phorcides, three ancient maids, 
 Swan-form’d, possessive of one common eye, 
 
 And single-tooth’d ; on whom doth never gaze 
 The rayed sun, nor yet the nightly moon. 
 
 And near them are their winged sisters three, 
 
 The Gorgons, serpent-hair’d and man-abhorr’d , 20 
 Whom mortal cannot look upon and live ; 
 
 I warn thee against such : but hearken now 
 Unto another dreary spectacle. 
 
 Beware of Jove’s sharp-mouth’d, unbarking dogs, 
 The griffins ; and the Arimaspian host, 
 
 One-eyed, horse-governing, who dwell beside 
 The gold-imbubbling wave of Pluto’s stream : 
 
 To whom approach not. To a distant clime 
 Thou com’st, a dusky race, that sojourns near 
 The fountain of the Sun, where Niger flows. 
 Wind thou along her shores, until thou reach 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 51 
 
 Cleft ground, where from the hills of Byblinus, 22 
 The Nile outpours his holy, pleasant wave. 
 
 He will conduct thee to the Niiean land, 
 
 Triangular, whereon a long abode 
 Tate hath ordained for thy sons and thee. 
 
 If aught I speak obscure, or aught perplex’d, 
 
 Repeat thy question, make thy knowledge clear. 
 Behold, I have more leisure than I covet. 
 
 Cko. If thou can utter aught remaining still, 
 
 Or aught omitted, of her wasting woes, 
 
 Say on : but if the all be now reveaTd, 
 
 Yield us the pray’d-for grace thou wottest of. 
 
 Pro. Her ear hath heard her wand’ring’s utmost 
 bound ; 
 
 And that she eke may know she heard not vainly, 
 
 1 will declare her toils already past, 
 
 Giving this witness to my prophecies. 
 
 Words multitudinous I leave, and seek 
 
 The goal from whence her wand’rings first began ; 
 
52 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 For thou didst wander to Molossian plains, 
 
 Around sublime Dodona, where abide 
 The seat and oracle of Jove Thesprotian ; 
 
 And, sign incredible ! the prophet oaks, 
 
 By whom, without enigma, lucidly, 
 
 Hailed thou wast as one about to be 
 Jove’s glorious bride—if thee that title charm ! 
 
 From thence impelled, thou didst rush along 
 The sea-side path to Rhea’s mighty bay, 
 
 Whence thou wast driv’n with wand’rings retrograde; 
 And time shall come, when that recess of sea, 
 
 Know soothly, shall be named Ionian, 
 
 Memorial unto all men of thy steps. 
 
 To thee these words are signals of my mind, 
 
 How it views more than what is visible : 
 
 But unto you, and her, I will in common 
 Declare the rest, pursuing the same track 
 Of previous words. There is a town, Canobus, 
 Earth’s bourne, upon the mouth and banks of Nile. 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 5Ci 
 
 There Jove will give thee back thy perfect mind, 
 Laying upon thee in thy solitude, 
 
 A hand unterrible ; and named from 
 That touch corrective, thou shalt bear a son 
 To Jove, dark Epaphus, who fruit shall cull 
 From every soil bedew’d by llowing Nile. 
 
 Nathless, of generations after him 
 The fifth in number, fifty maids, again 
 To Argos shall return unwillingly, 
 
 Flying the nuptials of their uncle’s sons. 
 
 They, passion'd in their souls, as hawks pursue 
 Closely on doves, shall go to hunt a quarry 
 They should not hunt—but Heav’n shall cross their 
 will— 
 
 And Graecia shall receive them, vanquished 
 By woman war, night-guarded fortitude : 
 
 For every husband, will a wife destroy. 
 
 Bathing in blood her doubly-edged sword— 
 
 Would that such nuptials graced mine enemies! 
 
54 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 One only maiden, love will melt to spare 
 Her spouse : she shall be blunted in her purpose ; 
 Of two things, choosing one ; more glad to be 
 Unfamed for courage than pollute with blood: 
 Who, in that land, shall bear a royal race. 
 
 Long speech is needful to narrate these things 
 Clearly. Enough, that from sue!) seed shall spring 
 The daring and the bow-distinguish’d, he 
 Who shall be my deliv’rer; for e’en thus 
 Mine ancient mother, Themis, prophesied : 
 
 The how and wherefore, needeth lengthen’d speech 
 To show, nor, learning, wouldst thou profit aught. 
 
 io. 
 
 Ah me ! ah me ! 
 
 The gangrene and insanity 
 
 Which striketh to my soul, are burning: 
 
 The fiery sting is pricking me ; 
 
 My throbbing heart my breast is spurning. 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 55 
 
 And round and round mine eyes are wheeling, 
 And from their course my steps are reeling, 
 By frenzy’s blast impell’d to motion : 
 
 My tongue is all without a chain, 
 
 And beat my turbid words in vain 
 ’Gainst dreary Ate’s ocean. 
 
 Prometheus and Chorus. 
 
 Chorus. 
 
 Strophe. 
 
 Wise he, who first consider’d this. 
 
 And spake it with his tongue; 
 
 That happier far a marriage is, 
 
 Our equals form’d among : 
 
 That ne’er the poor should loving be 
 To those corrupt with luxury, 
 
 Nor yet to those of high degree. 
 
56 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Antistrophe. 
 
 Never, O Parcae, may ye view me 
 The wedded spouse of Jove ! 
 
 And never may a bridegroom woo me. 
 
 Of those who dwell abave ! 
 
 Because I fear, beholding late 
 Io’s spouse-hating virgin state, 
 
 Tortured by Juno with a wand’ring fate. 
 
 Epode. 
 
 I fear no equal unions. Never may 
 The eyes of mightiest gods, which I can flee not, 
 Their love upon me fling! 
 
 Quenchless the strife, impassable the way ! 
 
 I know not what I should become ; I see not 
 How I should ’scape Saturnius’ counselling. 
 
 Pro. And yet, albeit absolute of mind, 
 
 Jove shall wax weak. A marriage he prepares, 
 
 T’ accomplish which, shall hurl him power-extinct 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 57 
 
 From empire’s seat: and thus shall Saturn’s curse 
 In every tittle be consummated, 
 
 Which cursed he, falling from his ancient throne. 
 To Jove no refuge from adversity 
 Can any god reveal, excepting me : 
 
 I know the refuge, and the means. And now 
 Let him reign on with boldness, confident 
 In the supernal roar, and brandishing 
 In both his hands the dart of fiery breath. 
 
 Naught shall avail him that he should not fall— 
 Fall shamed, an intolerable fall. 
 
 For he himself against himself prepares 
 A foe, a portent irresistible— 
 
 Devising lire t’ outllash the lightning lire, 
 
 And mighty sound the thunder to outroar, 
 
 And shatt’ring old Neptunius’ trident spear, 
 
 That oceanic plague, which shaketh earth ! 
 
 Yea ! stricken by this evil, Jove shall learn 
 What difference lies between a king and slave. 
 
68 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Cho. In sooth, thou threat’nest Jove with what 
 thou wouldst. 
 
 Pro. With what I would, and also what will be. 
 Cho. And must we look for one to master Jove ? 
 Pro. These chains weigh lighter than his future 
 grief. 
 
 Cho. Dost thou not fear, such daring words ejecting ? 
 Pro. What should / fear, who cannot die? 
 
 Cho. But he 
 
 Can visit thee with woe more dread than death. 
 
 Pro. Whate’er can be accomplish’d, I foreknow. 
 Cho. Wise are the worshippers of Adrastia. 23 
 Pro. Fear, worship, datter—whosoever reigns ! 
 
 To me your reigning Jove is less than naught. 
 
 Let him act on, reign on, for a brief time, 
 
 E’en as he will: he will not rule us long. 
 
 But, lo ! I see the errand-boy of Jove,— 
 
 The newly-crowned tyrant’s servile drudge : 
 
 Doubtless he comes, announcing something new. 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 59 
 
 Prometheus, Chorus, and Hermes. 
 
 Her. Thee, sophist, who dost pass in bitterness 
 Thy bitter woes; thee, sinner ’gainst the gods, 
 
 And honorer of men, and thief of fire; 
 
 Thee do I hail ! Our Sire commandeth thee 
 To say what marriage moves thy glorying, 
 
 By which he shall be hurl’d from empire’s seat: 
 
 And this, in naught obscurely, but in all 
 Clearly reveal; nor cast before me, Titan, 
 
 Thy double paths. Thou may si perceive that Jove 
 Is not appeased by such policy. 
 
 Pro. Thy words are dignified, and full of wisdom, 
 As doth befit the menial of the gods. 
 
 New gods, ye newly reign, and think forsooth 
 T’ inhabit citadels impregnable. 
 
 Have I not seen two tyrants hurled thence ? 
 
 Yea ! and the third, the now King, I shall see, 
 Disgracefully and quickly. Seem I not 
 
GO PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 To quail and tremble ’neath the modern gods ? 
 
 Far be it from my spirit! But for thee, 
 
 Along the way thou earnest hasten back ; 
 
 For naught which thou demandest shalt thou hear. 
 
 Her. And yet, of old, by such audacities, 
 
 Into this woe thou didst impel thyself. 
 
 Pro. I would not barter—thou mayst learn that 
 from me— 
 
 My state of woe for thine of servitude. 
 
 Better, I ween, to serve this rock, than be 
 The faithful messenger of father Jove. 
 
 Thus unto scoffers we retort their scoffs. 
 
 Her. Thou seem’st to glory in this state of thine. 
 Pro. /glory ! Would that I could see my foes 
 So glorying ! and ’mong them I name thee. 
 
 Her. Me also dost thou inculpate in aught 
 Of thy misfortunes? 
 
 Pro. In one word, I hate 
 
 The universal gods, who wrongfully, 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 til 
 
 For all my kindness, paid me back unkindness. 
 
 Her. I hear thee raging in a mighty madness. 
 
 Pro. If it be madness to abhor my foes, 
 
 May I be mad ! 
 
 Her . If thou wert prosperous, 
 
 Thou wouldst not be endurable. 
 
 Pro. Alas! 
 
 Her. Jove knoweth not that word. 
 
 Pro. Maturing Time 24 
 
 Teacheth ail things. 
 
 Her. Yet thou hast learn’d no wisdom. 
 
 Pro. None—since I commune with a slave like thee. 
 Her. Of all our Sire demands, thou utt’rest nought. 
 Pro. In very sooth, I owe him gratitude ! 
 
 Her. Thou tauntest me, as if I were a child. 
 
 Pro. No child thou art, but weaker than a child, 
 If thou expect to gather aught from me. 
 
 Nor is there chast’ning, nor device, whereby 
 Jove shall constrain me to reveal these things, 
 
62 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Or ere he loosen my pernicious chains. 
 
 Then let the torrid flame be headlong hurl'd : 
 
 With white-wing’d snows and subterranean thunders, 
 Let him commingle and astonish all. 
 
 Nothing shall bend me, to declare by whom 
 He will be hurled from dominion. 
 
 Her. See now, if these things will avail thee aught 
 Pro. They have been all foreseen, precounselled. 
 Her. Endure, vain Titan, O, at last, endure 
 To turn a prudent brow on present pain. 
 
 Pro. In vain thou ehafest me with exhortation,' 5 
 As waves the rock. Admit not in thy thought 
 That T, fear-struck by Jove, shall prove a woman, 
 And supplicate him, loathed as he is, 
 
 With feminine upliftings of mine hands. 
 
 To free me from these chains. Far be it from me ! 
 
 Her. It seems that I have spoken much and vainly; 
 For nothing art thou soften’d or appeased 
 By prayers of mine ; but, gnawing at the bit, 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 63 
 
 E’en as a new-yoked courser, strugglest thou, 
 
 And wariest ’gainst the rein ; and gath’rest strength 
 From thy weak sophisms. But ’mong th’ unwise. 
 Weaker than nothing is self-will, self-taught. 
 
 Lo ! if thou be unmoved by my words, 
 
 What tempest and inevitable wave 
 Of evil will o’erwhelm thee ! First, our Sire 
 Will cleave with thunder, and with bolted flame 
 This pinnacle of rock, and hide thy form; 
 
 And there its stony arms shall rivet thee. 
 
 Having accomplish’d a long lapse of time, 
 
 Thou shalt revisit light ; and Jove’s wing’d dog, 
 Sanguineous, the ferocious eagle, cow’ring 
 All day, an uninvited banqueter, 
 
 The ragged garment of thy form shall rend, 
 
 And make his feast upon thy dusky liver. 
 
 Nor any issue to such woe expect, 
 
 Or ere some god, vicarious in thy pangs, 
 
 Appear, and visit unillumined hell, 
 
04 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 And the Tartarean depth caiiginous. 
 
 Therefore take counsel: this is not a boast, 
 
 Vainly devised, but actually denounced. 
 
 The lips of Jove are impotent to lie, 
 
 And consummation waiteth on the word. 
 
 Weigh well and ponder : thou shouldst not esteem 
 Self-will abetter guide than prudent counsel. 
 
 Cko. Hermes appears to us to argue well : 
 
 For he exhorts thee to deliver up 
 Self-willedness, and seek for prudent counsel. 
 Yield thou : the error of the wise is shame. 
 
 Prometheus. 
 
 This embassy he doth vociferate 
 To me, foreknowing all. 
 
 For those who hate, to injure those who hate, 
 Not strangely doth befal. 
 
 Then let the shaggy lightning be 26 
 With double sharpness cast on me ! 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 6 
 
 Let air be lacerate with thunder, 
 
 And with the savage wind’s convulsion ; 
 And earth’s foundations rooted under, 
 Shudder to the blast’s impulsion ; 
 
 And let the waters of the deep 
 Their foam with dreadful roaring heap 
 Along the planets’ heav’nly way; 
 
 And let him hurl my body low 
 To Tartarus, imped'd to go 
 By eddies strong of fated woe ! 
 
 Yet me he hath not power to slay. 
 
 Hermes. 
 
 Such words and counsels we may gain 
 From those of madness-stricken brain : 
 For what of madness seems not his? 
 And if indeed he joy in this, 
 
 Why should he loosen frenzy’s chain ? 
 But ye, who in the Titan’s pain 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Bind communion griefs, with speed 
 From this region recede, 
 
 Lest the thunder's roaring be 
 Your blaster into idiocy. 
 
 Chorus. 
 
 Some other counsel, speak, advise, 
 Whereby thou mayst persuade me aught 
 For this, by thy perversion, lies 
 A thing repugnant to my thought. 
 Wherefore dost thou counsel me 
 To work out such iniquity ? 
 
 It is my will to share his fate : 
 
 For traitors I have learn’d to hate— 
 Nor any sin our being bears, 
 
 More hateful to my soul than theirs. 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 G7 
 
 Hermes. 
 
 Remember then what I foreshow ; 
 
 Nor, hunted by the dogs of woe, 
 Accuse your fortunes, and maintain 
 Jove sent you unexpected pain. 
 Yourselves have done it. Knowingly, 
 From guile and sudden influence free, 
 Through your own folly have ye met 
 The toils of Ate’s mighty net. 
 
 Prometheus. 
 
 In deed—in word no more— 
 
 From her stillness Earth is thrust! 
 
 And growls the thunder’s echoed roar ; 
 And glares the lightning’s eddied Are ; 
 And the whirlwinds wheel the dust; 
 And blasts of every wind outleap, 
 
 Each to each with confluent ire; 
 
 And air is mingled with the deep. 
 
68 
 
 PROMETHEUS BOUND, 
 
 Such fearful curses visibly 
 Jove’s right-hand impelleth hither. 
 O, my mother’s pride !—O, aether ! 
 To all light-rolling; dost thou see 
 How I suffer wrongfully ? 
 
NOTES TO PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Note 1. Page 1. 
 
 The fable of Prometheus, as narrated by iEschylus, widely dif¬ 
 fers from Hesiod’s account; and since it is not drawn from any 
 sources which we can examine, there appears to be no reason for 
 doubting the powers of his own invention as developed upon it. 
 All that every body has seen or imagined under the mask of Pro¬ 
 metheus, I could not narrate here without changing this note into an 
 essay. Sir Isaac Newton saw the nephew of Sesostris, and Le 
 Clerc saw the grandson of Noah, and Bryant saw Noah himself, and 
 Joannes Muller a resemblance to Job; and a great many others saw 
 a great deal besides. But a translator is not, or at least need not 
 be, a speculator. 
 
 Note 2. Page 1. 
 
 Vide Theogony, vs. 385. This personification of Strength is 
 introduced in only one other place, as far as I am aware, in the 
 extant writings of iEschylus. See the Choephoroe, vs. 234. 
 
 M 6vov K paras re /cat Altai £vv rep rp'ircp 
 ndvrwv fieylcrrcp Zt)v\ cuy^ivoird croi. 
 
70 
 
 NOTES TO 
 
 Note 3. Page 3. 
 
 Strong is the tie of kindred and of friendship. 
 
 See the Andromache, vs. 98G. rb £vyyeves yap 8 eiv6v. 
 
 Note 4. Page 4. 
 
 Every thing 
 
 Is full of sorrow , save to rule the gods. 
 
 I have preferred Blomfield’s iiraxOri to iirpax^y. 
 
 Note 5. Page 8. 
 
 The ferule-treasured secret fount of fire. 
 
 T t)v iv vapQriKi OrjcravpicxOeTcrai/, says Hesychius. The ferule was 
 hollow, and capable of containing fire. 
 
 Note G. Page 9. 
 
 And rush’d I slioonless on my winged car. 
 
 Bishop Blomfield considers the word slioonless as being ex¬ 
 pressive of extreme haste ; and he quotes several passages from 
 ancient writers as illustrative of this view. With regard to his 
 quotation from Bion’s elegy— 
 
 aua bpvpus aXdXyrai 
 HevQaAea v^ttAc/ctos aadrSaAos’ 
 
 it might be observed, with submission, that the word acrdvbaAos 
 appears to indicate the negligence of sorrow rather than of haste. 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 71 
 
 Perhaps the shoonless state of the sea-nymphs is to be attributed 
 to an agitation arising from both causes : at least, it may be more 
 poetical to think so. 
 
 Note 7. Page 21. 
 
 - kick against the goad. 
 
 irpbs KtitTpct K&Xov sktsvus. This proverb occurs also, and more 
 exactly in the words of Scripture, in the Agamemnon, vs. 1614. 
 irpbs Keurpa pii] AaKrife. Also in Pindar, Pyth. ii. 173. and Euripides, 
 Fragm. Peliad. 
 
 Note 8. Page 22. 
 
 No, in good truth; upon my heart, the fate. 
 
 Before the time of Elmsley, this was the opening line to a speech 
 of Oceanus. With admirable judgment, he removed the landmark ; 
 and restored one of the sublimest passages of poetry to lips most 
 worthy to pronounce it,—to the lips of Prometheus. 
 
 Note 9. Page 22. 
 
 , -- him o’ the hundred heads. 
 
 In a fragment of Pindar, preserved by Strabo, Typhon is repre¬ 
 sented as having only fifty heads : but it seems to be thought cor¬ 
 rupted. See Julian’s fourth letter. He is called “ hundred-headed ” 
 in the 1st and 8th Pythian. 
 
72 
 
 NOTES TO 
 
 Note 10. Page 25. 
 
 - thy calamity 
 
 Shall be my teacher. 
 
 See the Medea, vs. 1200. 
 
 T vxv v 7 hp el’xojue?' diddernaAov. 
 
 Note 11. Page 27. 
 
 And Arabia’s battle-crown. 
 
 The introduction of Arabia in this place has been a wonder 
 among critics. Butler explains it by extending its boundary; 
 and a learned writer, in the Edinburgli Review, perhaps more satis¬ 
 factorily, by limiting Aeschylus’s geographical information. 
 
 Note 12. Page 29. 
 
 Men seeing , saw in vain; and did not hear, 
 
 Hearing. 
 
 The twenty-first verse of the fifth chapter of Jeremiah is sug¬ 
 gested to us by this passage in a profane writer. The resemblance 
 can scarcely be accidental. 
 
 Note 13. Page 29. 
 
 To them, of winter shone no certain sign. 
 
 See Apollonius Rhodius, lib. i. vs. 490. 
 
 ’H5’ is epnredov alev ev aldepi rea/aap exovenp 
 ’As pa, aeAnjralr] re, nal yeAioio neAevQoi. 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 73 
 
 Note 14. Page 30. 
 
 And none, save I, contrived the linen-wing'd, 
 
 Sea-wand'ring ships. 
 
 Euripides ascribes the invention of navigation to some one of the 
 gods. See the speech of Theseus in the Supplices, from vs. 201 to 
 213. Euripides must have had Prometheus in his mind. Among 
 the obligations, due from man to deity, he records— 
 
 7 t6vtov re vav(rroXi]p.ad' ws (kaXXayas 
 exoipev b.XXr\Xoicnv, oou irevoiro yrp 
 & 8 s ear' dcrrijxa kov aa<prj , yivdurKop.ev 
 els nvp /3Xe7rovT€S, /ecu Kara (nrXdyxvosv m jJ^as 
 fxavreis TTpo<J7)p.aivovcnv, oluvuv r &tto. 
 
 Sophocles, in the first choral ode of his (Edipus Coloneus, ascribes 
 the invention to Neptune. 
 
 Note 15. Page 37. 
 
 What saith the horned virgin, hearest thou ? 
 
 Hermann and Elmsley, followed by Blomfield, attach this line 
 to the preceding speech of lo: and after all, I have ventured to 
 adhere to the old editions. It certainly does seem to me finer and 
 more characteristic, that Io, hurried on by the vehemence of anguish, 
 should appear to have forgotten the presence of Prometheus, than 
 that she should give utterance to anguish, with the mere object of 
 describing it to him. Bishop Blomfield observes, that in the case 
 of this line being attributed to the Chorus, to the Chorus must also 
 
 I) 
 
74 
 
 NOTES TO 
 
 be attributed the conclusion of Io’s next speech. I confess my 
 inability to feel the full force of this remark, or indeed to see any 
 necessary connection between the two passages. Io, in her next 
 speech, has become aware of Prometheus’s superior wisdom, and 
 her whole object is to profit by it. 
 
 Note 16. Page 39. 
 
 Jove's counsel, Vulcan’s hand. 
 
 In a fragment of the Prometheus Solutus preserved in the trans¬ 
 lation of Attius, a line occurs very similar to this:— 
 
 Saturnius me sic infixit Jupiter, 
 
 Jovisque numen Mulcibri ascivit manus. 
 
 Note 17. Page 43. 
 
 And Lerne’s height. 
 
 Bishop Blomfield has received Canter’s Acpvqs re up^v^v into his 
 text; but he mentions in a note, a conjecture, which “ nuper in 
 mentem venit,” and “ magis placet,”— ukt^v tc Aepvrjs. It pleases 
 me much more : it is picturesque, and varies the scene ; and as we 
 are just now looking at “ Cenchrea’s pleasant wave,” nobody can 
 be solicitous about having “ Lerne’s fount” besides— kov pLiywrai 
 vZaaiv vdap. Butler and Scliolefield retain A cpurjs Hupav : and the 
 latter observes in a note, that it is an allusion to the rocks hanging 
 over Lerne. He seems, however, to doubt the accuracy of the 
 reading. 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 75 
 
 Note 18. Page 48. 
 
 The third in generation after ten. 
 
 Bishop Blomfield has enumerated thirteen :—Epaphus, Libya, 
 Belus, Danaus, Hypermnestra, Abas, Proetus, Acrisius, Danae, 
 Perseus, Electryon, Alcmena, and Hercules the Deliverer. The 
 predicted spouse, whose son was to be superior to his father, was 
 Thetis. In submission to the prophecy, she married Peleus in¬ 
 stead of Jupiter, and her Achilles fulfilled it. 
 
 Note 19. Page 49. 
 
 Which in the book-memorial of thy mind . 
 
 See the opening of the tenth Olymp,, and Sophocles’s 0es S’ iv 
 (ppevbs deAroiai rovs i/xovs A6yovs. Parallel thoughts respecting 
 the tablet of Hamlet’s memory will be written upon the reader’s. 
 
 Note 20. Page 50. 
 
 The Gorgons, serpent-hair’d, and man-abhorr’d. 
 
 The Pythian priestess exclaims, in her powerful description of 
 the Furies (vide Eumenid. vs. 48.) “ ovroi yvva'inas, aAAa TopyoVas 
 Aeyctf.” It may therefore be humbly conjectured that Gorgons 
 had some kind of horrible family likeness to Furies ;—an honor, to 
 which the priestess will by no means admit Harpies. 
 
76 
 
 NOTES TO 
 
 Note 21. Page 50. 
 
 Beware of Jove’s sharp-mouth’d, unbarking dogs. 
 
 Erfurdt has justly observed, that the Greek poets have called the 
 most fearful monsters dogs. In this place griffins are called dogs; a 
 little further on, and in the Agamemnon, eagles are called dogs ; 
 in the (Edipus Tyrannus of Sophocles, the sphinx is called a dog; 
 in the Hercules Furens of Euripides, the hydra is called a dog; in 
 the Electra, both of Sophocles and Euripides, the Furies are called 
 dogs; in Apollonius Rhodius, the Harpies are called dogs ; in the 
 Andromache of Euripides, (what a climax !) a woman is called a 
 dog; and Synesius goes a step higher, and calls the Devil a dog : 
 in short, Brutus did not know the strength of his own expression 
 when he said that he would “ rather be a dog.” 
 
 Note 22. Page 51. 
 
 Cleft ground, where from the hills of Byblinus. 
 
 Bishop Blomfield supposes the poet to be here speaking of the 
 Catadupa of the Nile, where that river is precipitated from the 
 mountains. 
 
 Note 23. Page 58. 
 
 Wise are the ivorshippers of Adrastia. 
 
 Bishop Blomfield notices this word in a learned and interesting 
 manner in his Glossary. He observes that Adrastia is to be iden- 
 
PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 77 
 
 tified with Nemesis, the goddess of temperance ; and that the 
 Greeks, in order to avert envy, were in the habit of saying, “ I do 
 homage to Nemesis,”— irpoaKwca Nej ueaiu. 
 
 Note 24. Page 61. 
 
 Maturing Time 
 
 Teacheth all things. 
 
 See Pindar’s tenth Olymp. 
 
 8 t 5 e£e Aeyx<*>v p.6vos 
 ’AXadeiav £Tf)TVf/.ov 
 XpSvos. 
 
 “Time, the corrector when our judgments err; 
 
 The test of love, truth ; sole philosopher; 
 
 For all besides are sophists! ” Childe Harold, Canto 4. 
 
 Note 25. Page 62. 
 
 In vain thou chafest me with exhortation, 
 
 As waves the rock. 
 
 Gataker, in his annotations on Marcus Antoninus, has many in¬ 
 teresting observations on this idea, which he traces up to Homer. 
 Elmsley and Blomfield endeavour to turn the wave into Prome¬ 
 theus instead of into Mercury ; and against Morell and Butler, and 
 the disciples of Apostolius. It is a poetical, not a grammatical ques¬ 
 tion ; and I cannot help thinking that poetry decides as my trans¬ 
 lation has done. 
 
78 
 
 NOTES TO PROMETHEUS BOUND. 
 
 Note 26. Page 64. 
 
 Then let the shaggy lightning he. 
 
 The hair of the lightning—literally. In the Agamemnon there 
 is a great beard of light; and that of Gray’s Minstrel, which 
 streamed like a meteor, would never have done so without 
 AEschylus. 
 
MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 
 
THE TEMPEST. 
 
 A FRAGMENT. 
 
 “ Mors erat ante oculos.” 
 
 Lucan, lib. is. 
 
 ******** 
 
 The forest made my home—the voiceful streams 
 My minstrel throng : the everlasting hills,— 
 
 Which marry with the firmament, and cry 
 Unto the brazen thunder, 4 Come away. 
 
 Come from thy secret place, and try our strength,—’ 
 Enwrapp’d me with their solemn arms. Here, light 
 Grew pale as darkness, scared by the shade 
 O’ the forest Titans. Here, in piny state, 
 
 Reign’d Night, the ^Ethiopian queen, and crown’d 
 
82 
 
 THE TEMPEST. 
 
 The charmed brow of Solitude, her spouse. 
 
 ******* 
 
 ******* 
 
 * 
 
 * 
 
 * * * * 
 
 * * * 
 
 A sign was on creation. You beheld 
 All things encolour’d in a sulph’rous hue, 
 
 As day were sick with fear. The haggard clouds 
 O’erhung the utter lifelessness of air; 
 
 The top boughs of the forest all aghast 
 
 Stared in the face of Heav’n ; the deep-mouth’d wind, 
 
 That hath a voice to bay the armed sea, 
 
 Fled with a low cry like a beaten hound ; 
 
 And only that askance the shadows, flew 
 Some open-beaked birds in wilderment, 
 
 Naught stirr’d abroad. All dumb did Nature seem, 
 In expectation of the coming storm. 
 
 It came in power. You soon might hear afar 
 The footsteps of the martial thunder sound 
 
THE TEMPEST, 
 
 S3 
 
 Over the mountain battlements; the sky 
 Being deep-stain’d with hues fantastical, 
 
 Red like to blood, and yellow like to fire, 
 And black like plumes at funerals; overhead 
 You might behold the lightning faintly gleam 
 Amid the clouds which thrill and gape aside, 
 And straight again shut up their solemn jaws, 
 As if to interpose between Heaven’s wrath 
 And Earth’s despair. Interposition brief! 
 Darkness is gathering out her mighty pall 
 Above us, and the pent-up rain is loosed, 
 Down trampling in its fierce delirium. 
 
 Was not my spirit gladden’d, as with wine, 
 
 To hear the iron rain, and view the mark 
 Of battle on the banner of the clouds ? 
 
 Did I not hearken for the battle-cry, 
 
 And rush along the bowing woods to meet 
 
84 
 
 THE TEMPEST. 
 
 The riding Tempest—skyey cataracts 
 Hissing around him with rebellion vain ? 
 
 I ea ! and I lifted up my glorying voice 
 In an ‘ All hailwhen, wildly resonant, 
 
 As brazen chariots rushing from the war. 
 
 As passion’d waters gushing from the rock, 
 
 As thousand crashed woods, the thunder cried : 
 And at his cry the forest tops were shook 
 As by the woodman s axe ; and far and near 
 Stagger’d the mountains with a mutter’d dread. 
 
 All hail unto the lightning ! hurriedly 
 H is lurid arms are glaring through the air, 
 
 Making the face of heav’n to show like hell ! 
 
 Let him go breathe his sulphur stench about, 
 
 A Ad, pale with death’s own mission, lord the storm 
 Again the gleam—the glare : I turn’d to hail 
 Death’s mission : at my feet there lay the dead ! 
 
THE TEMPEST. 
 
 83 
 
 The dead—the dead lay there ! I could not view 
 (For Night espoused the storm, and made all dark) 
 Its features, but the lightning in his course 
 Shiver’d above a white and corpse-like heap, 
 Stretch’d in the path, as if to show his prey, 
 
 And have a triumph ere he pass’d. Then I 
 Crouch’d down upon the ground, and groped about 
 Until I touch’d that thing of flesh, rain-drench’d, 
 And chill, and soft. Nathless, I did refrain 
 My soul from natural horror ! I did lift 
 The heavy head, half-bedded in the clay. 
 
 Unto my knee; and pass’d my fingers o’er 
 The wet face, touching every lineament, 
 
 Until I found the brow; and chafed its chill, 
 
 To know if life yet linger’d in its pulse. 
 
 And while I was so busied, there did leap 
 From out the entrails of the firmament, 
 
 The lightning, who his white unblenching breath 
 Blew in the dead man’s face, discovering it 
 
86 
 
 THE TEMPEST. 
 
 As by a staring day. I knew that face— 
 
 His, who did hate me—his, whom I did hate ! 
 
 I shrunk not—spake not—sprang not from the ground 
 But felt my lips shake without cry or breath, 
 
 And mine heart wrestle in my breast to still 
 The tossing of its pulses ; and a cold, 
 
 Instead of living blood, o’ercreep my brow. 
 
 Albeit such darkness brooded all around, 
 
 I had dread knowledge that the open eyes 
 Of that dead man were glaring up to mine, 
 
 With their unwinking, unexpressive stare; 
 
 And mine I could not shut nor turn away. 
 
 The man was my familiar. I had borne 
 Those eyes to scowl on me their living hate, 
 
 Better than I could bear their deadliness: 
 
 I had endured the curses of those lips, 
 
 Far better than their silence. Oh constrain’d 
 And awful silence !—awful peace of death ! 
 
THE TEMPEST. 
 
 87 
 
 There is an answer to all questioning, 
 
 That one word— death . Our bitterness can throw 
 No look upon the face of death, and live. 
 
 The burning thoughts that erst my soul illumed, 
 Were quench’d at once ; as tapers in a pit 
 Wherein the vapour-witches weirdly reign 
 In charge of darkness. Farewell all the past! 
 
 It was out-blotted from my memory’s eyes, 
 
 When clay’s cold silence pleaded for its sin. 
 
 Farewell the elemental war ! farewell 
 The clashing of the shielded clouds—the cry 
 Of scathed echoes ! I no longer knew 
 Silence from sound, but wander’d far away 
 Into the deep Eleusis of mine heart, 
 
 To learn its secret things. When armed foes 
 Meet on one deck with impulse violent, 
 
 The vessel quakes thro’ all her oaken ribs. 
 
 And shivers in the sea; so with mine heart: 
 
88 
 
 THE TEMPEST. 
 
 For there had battled in her solitudes, 
 
 Contrary spirits ; sympathy with power, 
 
 And stooping unto power;—the energy 
 And passiveness,—the thunder and the death ! 
 
 Within me was a nameless thought: it closed 
 The Janus of my soul on echoing hinge, 
 
 And said ‘Peace !’ with a voice like War’s. I bow 
 And trembled at its voice ; it gave a key, 
 Empower’d to open out all mysteries 
 Of soul and flesh ; of man, who doth begin, 
 
 But endeth not; of life, and after life . 
 
 ******** 
 
 Day came at last: her light show’d gray and sad, 
 As hatch’d by tempest, and could scarce prevail 
 Over the shaggy forest to imprint 
 Its outline on the sky—expressionless, 
 
 Almost sans shadow as sans radiance : 
 
 An idiocy of light. I waken’d from 
 
THE TEMPEST. 
 
 My deep unslumb’ring dream, but utter’d naught. 
 My living I uncoupled from the dead. 
 
 And look’d out, ’mid the swart and sluggish air, 
 For place to make a grave. A mighty tree 
 Above me, his gigantic arms outstretch’d, 
 
 Poising the clouds. A thousand mutter’d spells 
 Of every ancient wind and thund’rous storm, 
 
 Had been off-shaken from his scathless bark. 
 
 He had heard distant years sweet concord yield, 
 And go to silence; having firmly kept 
 Majestical companionship with Time. 
 
 Anon his strength wax’d proud : his tusky roots 
 Forced for themselves a path on every side, 
 
 Riving the earth ; and, in their savage scorn, 
 Casting it from them like a thing unclean, 
 
 Which might impede his naked clambering 
 Unto the heavens. Now blasted, peel’d, he stood, 
 Ry the gone night, whose lightning had come in 
 And rent him, even as it rent the man 
 
90 
 
 THE TEMPEST. 
 
 Beneath his shade : and there the strong and weak 
 Communion join’d in deathly agony. 
 
 There, underneath, I lent my feverish strength, 
 
 To scoop a lodgment for the traveller’s corse. 
 
 I gave it to the silence and the pit, 
 
 And strew’d the heavy earth on all: and then — 
 
 I—I, whose hands had form’d that silent house,— 
 
 I could not look thereon, but turn’d and wept! 
 
 ^ ^ ^ 
 
 * * 
 
 Oh Death- oh crowned Death—pale-steeded Death 
 Whose name doth make our respiration brief. 
 Muffling the spirit’s drum ! Thou, whom men know 
 Alone by charnel-houses, and the dark 
 Sweeping of funeral feathers, and the scath 
 Of happy days,—love deem’d inviolate !— 
 
 Thou of the shrouded face, which to have seen 
 Is to be very awful, like thyself l— 
 
THE TEMPEST. 
 
 91 
 
 Thou, whom all flesh shall see !—thou, who dost call, 
 And there is none to answer !—thou, whose call 
 Changeth all beauty into what we fear, 
 
 Changeth all glory into what we tread, 
 
 Genius to silence, wrath to nothingness, 
 
 And love—not love !—thou hast no change for love ! 
 Thou, who art Life’s betroth’d, and bear’st her forth 
 To scare her with sad sights,-—who hast thy joy 
 Where’er the peopled towns are dumb with plague,— 
 Where’er the battle and the vulture meet,— 
 
 Where’er the deep sea writhes like Laocoon 
 Beneath the serpent winds, and vessels split 
 On secret rocks, and men go gurgling down, 
 
 Down, dowm, to lose their shriekings in the depth ! 
 Oh universal thou ! who comest aye 
 Among the minstrels, and their tongue is tied ;— 
 Among the sophists, and their brain is still;— 
 Among the mourners, and their wail is done ;— 
 Among the dancers, and their tinkling feet 
 No more make echoes on the tombing earth ;— 
 
92 
 
 THE TEMPEST. 
 
 Among the wassail rout, and all the lamps 
 
 Are quench’d ; and wither’d the wine-pouring hands 
 
 Mine heart is armed not in panoply 
 Of the old Roman iron, nor assumes 
 The Stoic valour. ’Tis a human heart, 
 
 And so confesses, with a human fear ;— 
 
 That only for the hope the cross inspires, 
 
 That only for the man who died and lives, 
 
 ’Twouhl crouch beneath thy sceptre’s royalty, 
 
 With faintness of the pulse, and backward cling 
 
 % 
 
 To life. But knowing what I soothly know. 
 
 High-seeming Death, I dare thee ! and have hope, 
 
 In God’s good time, of showing to thy face 
 
 An unsuccumbing spirit, which sublime 
 
 May cast away the low anxieties 
 
 That wait upon the flesh—the reptile moods ; 
 
 And enter that eternity to come, 
 
 Where live the dead, and only Death shall die. 
 
A SEA-SIDE MEDITATION. 
 
 “ Ut per aquas quae nunc rerum simulacra videmus.” 
 
 Lucretius, lib. i. 
 
 Go, travel ’mid the hills! The summer’s hand 
 Hath shaken pleasant freshness o’er them all. 
 
 Go, travel ’mid the hills! There, tuneful streams 
 Are touching myriad stops, invisible ; 
 
 And winds, and leaves, and birds, and your own 
 thoughts, 
 
 (Not the least glad) in wordless chorus, crowd 
 Around the thymele* of Nature. 
 
 * The central point of the choral movements in the Greek 
 
 theatre. 
 
91 
 
 A SEA-SIDE MEDITATION. 
 
 GrO, 
 
 And travel onward. Soon shall leaf and bird, 
 Wind, stream, no longer sound. Thou shalt behold 
 Only the pathless sky, and houseless sward; 
 
 O’er which anon are spied innumerous sails 
 Of lisher vessels like the wings o’ the hill, 
 
 And white as gulls above them, and as fast.— 
 
 But sink they—sink they out of sight. And now 
 
 The wind is springing upward in your face; 
 
 % 
 
 And, with its fresh-toned gushings, you may hear 
 Continuous sound which is not of the wind, 
 
 Nor of the thunder, nor o’ the cataract’s 
 
 Deep passion, nor o’ the earthquake’s wilder pulse; 
 
 But which rolls on in stern tranquillity, 
 
 As memories of evil o’er the soul;— 
 
 Boweth the bare broad Heav’n.—What view you 
 sea—and sea ! 
 
 The sea—the glorious sea ! from side to side. 
 
A SEA-SIDE MEDITATION. 
 
 95 
 
 Swinging the grandeur of his foamy strength, 
 
 And undersweeping the horizon,—on— 
 
 On—with his life and voice inscrutable. 
 
 Pause : sit you down in silence ! I have read 
 Of that Athenian, who, when ocean raged, 
 Unchain’d the prison’d music of his lips, 
 
 By shouting to the billows, sound for sound. 
 
 I marvel how his mind would let his tongue 
 Affront thereby the ocean’s solemness. 
 
 Are we not mute, or speak restrainedly. 
 
 When overhead the trampling tempests go, 
 
 Dashing their lightning from their hoofs? and when 
 We stand beside the bier? and when we see 
 The strong bow down to weep—and stray among 
 Places which dust or mind hath sanctified ? 
 
 Y ea! for such sights and acts do tear apart 
 The close and subtle clasping of a chain. 
 
 Form’d not of gold, but of corroded brass, 
 
 Whose links are furnish’d from the common mine 
 
96 
 
 A SEA-SIDE MEDITATION. 
 
 Of every day’s event, and want, and wish ; 
 
 From work-times, diet-times, and sleeping-times : 
 And thence constructed, mean and heavy links 
 Within the pandemonic walls of sense, 
 
 Enchain our deathless part, constrain our strength, 
 And waste the goodly stature of our soul. 
 
 Howbeit, we love this bondage ; we do cleave 
 Onto the sordid and unholy thing, 
 
 Fearing the sudden wrench required to break 
 Those clasped links. Behold ! all sights and sounds 
 In air, and sea, and earth, and under earth, 
 
 All flesh, all life, all ends, are mysteries; 
 
 And all that is mysterious dreadful seems, 
 
 And all we cannot understand we fear. 
 
 Ourselves do scare ourselves : we hide our sight, 
 
 In artificial nature from the true, 
 
 And throw sensation’s veil associative 
 On God’s creation, man’s intelligence ; 
 
A SEA-SIDE MEDITATION. 
 
 97 
 
 Bowing our high imaginings to eat 
 Dust, like the serpent, once erect as they ; 
 
 Binding conspicuous on our reason’s brow 
 Phylacteries of shame ; learning to feel 
 By rote, and act by rule, (man’s rule, not God’s !) 
 XJntil our words grow echoes, and our thoughts 
 A mechanism of spirit. 
 
 Can this last ? 
 
 No ! not for aye. We cannot subject aye 
 The heav’n-born spirit to the earth-born flesh. 
 Tame lions will scent blood, and appetite 
 Carnivorous glare from out their restless eyes. 
 Passions, emotions, sudden changes, throw 
 Our nature back upon us, till we burn. 
 
 What warm’d Cyrene’s fount ? As poets sing, 
 The change from light to dark, from dark to light. 
 
 All that doth force this nature back on us, 
 
 All that doth force the mind to view the mind, 
 
 E 
 
98 
 
 A SEA-SIDE MEDITATION. 
 
 Engend’reth what is named by men, sublime . 
 
 Thus when, our wonted valley left, we gain 
 
 The mountain’s horrent brow, and mark from thence 
 
 The sweep of lands extending with the sky ; 
 
 Or view the spanless plain ; or turn our sight 
 Upon yon deep’s immensity;—we breathe 
 As if our breath were marble : to and fro 
 Do reel our pulses, and our words are mute. 
 
 We cannot mete by parts, but grapple all: 
 
 We cannot measure with our eye, but soul 4 
 And fear is on us. The extent unused, 
 
 Our spirit, sends, to spirit’s element, 
 
 To seize upon abstractions : first on space, 
 
 The which eternity in place I deem ; 
 
 And then upon eternity ; till thought 
 Hath form’d a mirror from their secret sense, 
 Wherein we view ourselves, and back recoil 
 At our own awful likeness ; ne’ertheless, 
 
 Cling to that likeness with a wonder wild, 
 
A SEA-SIDE MEDITATION. 
 
 99 
 
 And while we tremble, glory—proud in fear. 
 
 So ends the prose of life : and so shall be 
 Unlock’d her poetry’s magnific store. 
 
 And so, thou pathless and perpetual sea, 
 
 So, o’er thy deeps, I brooded and must brood, 
 Whether I view thee in thy dreadful peace, 
 
 Like a spent warrior hanging in the sun 
 His glittering arms, and meditating death ; 
 
 Or whether thy wild visage gath’reth shades. 
 
 What time thou marshall’st forth thy waves who hold 
 A covenant of storms, then roar and wind 
 Under the racking rocks ; as martyrs lie 
 Wheel-bound ; and, dying, utter lofty words ! 
 Whether the strength of day is young and high, 
 
 Or whether, weary of the watch, he sits 
 
 Pale on thy wave, and weeps himself to death ;— 
 
 In storm and calm, at morn and eventide, 
 
 Still have I stood beside thee, and out-thrown 
 
100 
 
 A SEA-SIDE MEDITATION. 
 
 My spirit onward on thine element,— 
 
 Beyond thine element,—to tremble low 
 Before those feet which trod thee as they trod 
 Earth,—to the holy, happy, peopled place, 
 
 Where there is no more sea. Yea, and my soul, 
 Having put on thy vast similitude, 
 
 Hath wildly moaned at her proper depth, 
 
 Echoed her proper musings, veil’d in shade 
 Her secrets of decay, and exercised 
 An elemental strength, in casting up 
 Rare gems and things of death on fancy’s shore, 
 
 Till Nature said, ‘ Enough.’ 
 
 Who longest dreams. 
 
 Dreams not for ever; seeing day and night 
 And corporal feebleness divide his dreams, 
 
 And, on his elevate creations weigh 
 
 With hunger, cold, heat, darkness, weariness: 
 
 Else should we be like gods; else would the course 
 Of thought’s free wheels, increased in speed and might 
 
A SEA-SIDE MEDITATION. 
 
 101 
 
 By an eterne volution, oversweep 
 
 The heights of wisdom, and invade her depths: 
 
 So, knowing all things, should we have all power ; 
 For is not knowledge power? But mighty spells 
 Our operation sear: the Babel must, 
 
 Or ere it touch the sky, fall down to earth : 
 
 The web, half form’d, must tumble from our hands, 
 And, ere they can resume it, lie decay’d. 
 
 Mind struggles vainly from the flesh. E’en so, 
 
 Hell’s angel (saith a scroll apocryphal) 
 
 Shall, when the latter days of earth have shrunk 
 Before the blast of God, affect his heav’n ; 
 
 Lift his scarr’d brow, confirm his rebel heart, 
 
 Shoot his strong wings, and darken pole and pole,— 
 Till day be blotted into night; and shake 
 The fever’d clouds, as if a thousand storms 
 Throbb’d into life ! Vain hope—vain strength—vain 
 flight! 
 
 God’s arm shall meet God’s foe, and hurl him back ! 
 
A VISION OF LIFE AND DEATH. 
 
 Mine ears were deaf to melody, 
 
 My lips were dumb to sound: 
 
 Where didst thou wander, oh my soul, 
 
 When ear and tongue were bound ? 
 
 ‘ I wander’d by the stream of time, 
 
 Made dark by human tears : 
 
 I threw my voice upon the waves, 
 
 And they did throw me theirs.’ 
 
 And how did sound the waves, my soul ? 
 
 And how did sound the waves ? 
 
 ‘ Hoarse, hoarse, and wild !—they ever dash’d 
 ’Gainst ruin’d thrones and graves.’ 
 
A VISION OF LIFE AND DEATH. 
 
 .103 
 
 And what sight on the shore, my soul ? 
 
 And what sight on the shore ? 
 
 ‘ Twain beings sate there silently, 
 
 And sit there evermore.’ 
 
 Now tell me fast and true, my soul; 
 
 Now tell me of those twain. 
 
 ‘ One was yclothed in mourning vest, 
 And one, in trappings vain. 
 
 ‘ She, in the trappings vain, was fair. 
 
 And eke fantastical: 
 
 A thousand colours dyed her garb; 
 
 A blackness bound them all. 
 
 * In part her hair was gaily wreath’d, 
 In part was wildly spread: 
 
 Her face did change its hue too fast. 
 To say ’twas pale or red. 
 
104 
 
 A VISION OF LIFE AND DEATH. 
 
 ‘ And when she look’d on earth, 1 thought 
 She smiled for very glee : 
 
 But when she look’d to heav’n, I knew 
 That tears stood in her ee. 
 
 ‘ She held a mirror, there to gaze : 
 
 It could no cheer bestow ; 
 
 For while her beauty cast the shade, 
 
 Her breath did make it go. 
 
 * A harper’s harp did lie by her, 
 
 Without the harper’s hest; 
 
 A monarch’s crown did lie by her, 
 
 Wherein an owl had nest : 
 
 * A warrior’s sword did lie by her, 
 
 Grown rusty since the fight; 
 
 A poet’s lamp did lie by her:— 
 
 Ah me !—where was its light ?’ 
 
A VISION OF LIFE AND DEATH. 
 
 105 
 
 And what didst thou say, O ray soul, 
 
 Unto that mystic dame ? 
 
 4 I ask’d her of her tears, and eke 
 I ask’d her of her name. 
 
 * ,, *s 
 
 ‘ She said, she built a prince’s throne; 
 
 She said, he ruled the grave ; 
 
 And that the levelling worm ask’d not 
 If he were king or slave. 
 
 ‘ She said, she form’d a godlike tongue, 
 Which lofty thoughts unsheathed ; 
 
 Which roll’d its thunder round, and purged 
 The air the nations breathed. 
 
 * She said, that tongue, all eloquent, 
 
 With silent dust did mate ; 
 
 Whereon false friends betray’d long faith, 
 And foes outspat their hate. 
 
106 
 
 A VISION OF LIFE AND DEATH. 
 
 4 She said, she warm’d a student’s heart, 
 But heart and brow ? gan fade : 
 
 Alas, alas ! those Delphic trees 
 Do cast an upas shade ! 
 
 4 She said, she lighted happy hearths, 
 Whose mirth was all forgot: 
 
 She said, she tuned marriage bells. 
 Which rang when love was not. 
 
 4 She said, her name was Life; and then 
 Out laugh’d and wept aloud,— 
 
 What time the other being strange 
 Lifted the veiling shroud. 
 
 4 Yea! lifted she the veiling shroud, 
 And breathed the icy breath ; 
 
 Whereat, with inward shuddering, 
 
 I knew her name was Death. 
 
A VISION OF LIFE AND DEATH, 
 
 107 
 
 4 Yea ! lifted she her calm, calm brow, 
 Her clear cold smile on me : 
 
 Whereat within my deepness, leap’d 
 Mine immortality. 
 
 4 She told me, it did move her smile. 
 
 To witness how I sigh’d, 
 
 Because that what was fragile brake, 
 And what was mortal died : 
 
 4 As if that kings could grasp the earth, 
 Who from its dust began ; 
 
 As if that suns could shine at night, 
 
 Or glory dwell with man. 
 
 4 She told me, she had freed his soul. 
 Who aye did freedom love ; 
 
 Who now reck’d not, were worms below, 
 
 Or ranker worms above ! 
 
108 
 
 A VISION OF LIFE AND DEATH, 
 
 ‘ She said, the student’s heart had beat 
 Against its prison dim ; 
 
 Until she crush’d the bars of flesh, 
 
 And pour’d truth’s light on him. 
 
 ‘ She said, that they who left the hearth, 
 For aye in sunshine dwell; 
 
 She said, the funeral tolling brought 
 More joy than marriage bell! 
 
 * And as she spake, she spake less loud ; 
 The stream resounded more : 
 
 Anon I nothing heard but waves 
 That wail’d along the shore.’ 
 
 And what didst thou say, oh my soul, 
 Upon that mystic strife ? 
 
 ‘ I said, that Life was only Death, 
 
 That only Death was Life.’ 
 
EARTH. 
 
 How beautiful is earth ! my starry thoughts 
 Look down on it from their unearthly sphere, 
 And sing symphonious—Beautiful is earth ! 
 The lights and shadows of her myriad hills ; 
 The branching greenness of her myriad woods ; 
 Her sky-affecting rocks ; her zoning sea; 
 
 Her rushing, gleaming cataracts ; her streams 
 That race below, the winged clouds on high; 
 Her pleasantness of vale and meadow !- 
 
 Hush ! 
 
 Meseemeth through the leafy trees to ring 
 A chime of bells to falling waters tuned ; 
 
110 
 
 EARTH. 
 
 Whereat conies heathen Zephyrus, out of breath 
 With running up the hills, and shakes his hair 
 
 4 
 
 From off his gleesome forehead, bold and glad 
 With keeping blythe Dan Phoebus company ;— 
 And throws him on the grass, though half afraid; 
 First glancing round, lest tempests should be nigh 
 And lays close to the ground his ruddy lips, 
 
 And shapes their beauty into sound, and calls 
 On all the petall’d flowers that sit beneath 
 In hiding-places from the rain and snow. 
 
 To loosen the hard soil, and leave their cold 
 Sad idlesse, and betake them up to him. 
 
 They straightway hear his voice- 
 
 A thought did come, 
 
 And press from out my soul the heathen dream. 
 Mine eyes were purged. Straightway did I bind 
 Hound me the garment of my strength, and heard 
 Nature’s death-shrieking—the hereafter cry, 
 
EARTH. 
 
 Ill 
 
 When he o" the lion voice, the rainbow-crown’d, 
 Shall stand upon the mountains and the sea, 
 
 And swear by earth, by heaven’s throne, and Him 
 Who sitteth on the throne, there shall be time 
 No more, no more U Then, veil’d Eternity 
 Shall straight unveil her awful countenance 
 Unto the reeling worlds, and take the place 
 Of seasons, years, and ages. Aye and aye 
 Shall be the time of day. The wrinkled heav’n 
 Shall yield her silent sun, made blind and white 
 With an exterminating light: the wind. 
 Unchained from the poles, nor having charge 
 Of cloud or ocean, with a sobbing wail 
 Shall rush among the stars, and swoon to death. 
 Yea, the shrunk earth, appearing livid pale 
 Beneath the red-tongued flame, shall shudder by 
 From out her ancient place, and leave—a void. 
 Yet haply by that void the saints redeem’d 
 May sometimes stray ; when memory of sin 
 

 112 EARTH. 
 
 Ghost-like shall rise upon their holy souls; 
 
 And on their lips shall lie the name of earth 
 In paleness and in silentness; until 
 Each looking on his brother, face to face, 
 
 And bursting into sudden happy tears, 
 
 (The only tears undried) shall murmur—* Christ! ’ 
 
THE PICTURE GALLERY AT PENSHURST. 
 
 They spoke unto me from the silent ground. 
 
 They look’d unto me from the pictured wall: 
 
 The echo of my footstep was a sound 
 Like to the echo of their own footfall, 
 
 AVhat time their living feet were in the hall. 
 
 I breathed where they had breathed—and where 
 they brought 
 
 Their souls to moralize on glory’s pall, 
 
 / Walk’d with silence in a cloud of thought: 
 
 So, what they erst had learn’d, I mine own spirit taught. 
 
114 THE PICTURE GALLERY AT PENSHURST. 
 
 Ay ! with mine eyes of flesh, I did behold 
 The likeness of their flesh ! They, the great dead, 
 Stood still upon the canvass, while I told 
 The glorious memories to their ashes wed. 
 
 There, I beheld the Sidneys :—he, who bled 
 Freely for freedom’s sake, bore gallantly 
 His soul upon his brow;—he, whose lute said 
 Sweet music to the land, meseem’d to be 
 Dreaming with that pale face, of love and Arcadie. 
 
 Mine heart had shrined these. And therefore past 
 Were these, and such as these, in mine heart’s pride, 
 Which deem’d death, glory’s other name. At last 
 I stay’d my pilgrim feet, and paused beside 
 A picture,* which the shadows half did hide. 
 
 The form was a fair woman’s form ; the brow 
 Brightly between the clustering curls espied : 
 
 The cheek a little pale, yet seeming so 
 As, if the lips could speak, the paleness soon would go. 
 
 * Vandyke’s portrait of Waller’s Sacharissa. 
 
THE PICTURE GALLERY AT PENS HURST. n 5 
 
 And rested there the lips, so warm and loving, 
 That, they could speak, one might be fain to guess : 
 Only they had been much too bright, if moving, 
 
 To stay by their own will, all motionless. 
 
 One outstretch’d hand its marble seal ’gan press 
 On roses which look’d fading ; while the eyes, 
 Uplifted in a calm, proud loveliness, 
 
 Seem’d busy with their flow’ry destinies, 
 
 Drawing, for ladye’s heart, some moral quaint and wise. 
 
 She perish’d like her roses. I did look 
 On her, as she did look on them—to sigh ! 
 
 Alas, alas ! that the fair-written book 
 Of her sweet face, should be in death laid by, 
 
 As any blotted scroll! Its cruelty 
 
 \ 
 
 Poison’d a heart most gentle-pulsed of all. 
 
 And turn’d it unto song, therein to die: 
 
 For grief’s stern tension maketh musical, 
 
 Unless the strain’d string break or ere the music fall. 
 
116 THE PICTURE GALLERY AT PENSHURST. 
 
 Worship of Waller’s heart! no dream of thine 
 Reveal’d unto thee, that the lowly one, 
 
 Who sate enshadow’d near thy beauty’s shine, 
 Should, when the light was out, the life was done, 
 
 t 
 
 Record thy name with those by Memory won 
 From Time’s eternal burial. I am woo’d 
 By wholesome thoughts this sad thought hath 
 begun ; 
 
 For mind is strengthen’d when awhile subdued, 
 
 As he who touch’d the earth, and rose with power 
 renew’d. 
 
TO A POET’S CHILD, 
 
 A far harp swept the sea above ; 
 
 A far voice said thy name in love : 
 
 Then silence on the harp was cast; 
 
 The voice was chain’d—the love went last! 
 
 And as I heard the melodie, 
 
 Sweet-voiced Fancy spake of thee : 
 
 And as the silence o’er it came, 
 
 Mine heart, in silence, sigh'd thy name. 
 
 I thought there was one only place, 
 
 Where thou couldst lift thine orphan’d face; 
 A little home for prayer and woe;— 
 
 A stone above—a shroud below 
 
118 
 
 TO A POET’S CHILD. 
 
 That evermore, that stone beside, 
 
 Thy wither’d joys would form thy pride ; 
 As palm-trees, on their south sea bed, 
 Make islands with the flowers they shed. 
 
 Child of the Dead ! my dream of thee 
 Was sad to tell, and dark to see ; 
 
 And vain as many a brighter dream; 
 
 Since thou canst sing by Babel’s stream ! 
 
 For here, amid the worldly crowd, 
 
 ’Mid common brows, and laughter loud, 
 And hollow words, and feelings sere, 
 Child of the Dead ! I meet thee here ! 
 
 A nd is thy step so fast and light ? 
 
 And is thy smile so gay and bright ? 
 
 And canst thou smile, with cheek undim, 
 Upon a world that frown’d on him ? 
 
TO A POET’S CHILD. 
 
 119 
 
 The minstrel’s harp is on his bier; 
 
 » 
 
 What doth the minstrel’s orphan here ? 
 
 The loving moulders in the clay; 
 
 The loved,—she keepeth holyday ! 
 
 ’Tis well ! I would not doom thy years 
 Of golden prime, to only tears. 
 
 Fair girl! ’twere better that thine eyes 
 Should find a joy in summer skies, 
 
 As if their sun were on thy fate. 
 
 Be happy ; strive not to be great; 
 
 And go not, from thy kind apart, 
 
 With lofty soul and stricken heart. 
 
 Think not too deeply : shallow thought, 
 Like open rills, is ever sought 
 By light and flowers; while fountains deep 
 Amid the rocks and shadows sleep. 
 
120 
 
 TO A POET’S CHILD. 
 
 Feel not too warmly : lest thou be 
 Too like Cyrene’s waters free, 
 
 Which burn at night, when all around 
 In darkness and in chill is found. 
 
 Touch not the harp to win the wreath : 
 Its tone is fame, its echo death ! 
 
 The wreath may like the laurel grow, 
 Yet turns to cypress on the brow ! 
 
 And, as a flame springs clear and bright, 
 Yet leaveth ashes ’stead of light; 
 
 So genius (fatal gift!) is doom’d 
 To leave the heart it fired, consumed. 
 
 For thee, for thee, thou orphan’d one, 
 
 I make an humble orison ! 
 
 Love all the world; and ever dream 
 That all are true who truly seem. 
 
TO A POET’S CHILD. 
 
 1 
 
 Forget ! for, so, ’twill move thee not, 
 
 Or lightly move ; to be forgot! 
 
 Be streams thy music ; hills, thy mirth ; 
 Thy chiefest light, the household hearth. 
 
 So, when grief plays her natural part, 
 And visiteth thy quiet heart; 
 
 Shall all the clouds of grief be seen 
 To show a sky of hope between. 
 
 So, when thy beauty senseless lies, 
 
 No sculptured urn shall o’er thee rise ; 
 But gentle eyes shall weep at will, 
 
 Such tears as hearts like thine distil. 
 
 F 
 
MINSTRELSY. 
 
 One asked her once the resun why 
 She hadde delyte in minstrelsie, 
 
 She answered on this raanere. 
 
 Robert de Brunne. 
 
 For ever, since my childish looks 
 Could rest on Nature’s pictured books; 
 
 For ever, since my childish tongue 
 Could name the themes our bards have sung 
 So long, the sweetness of their singing 
 Hath been to me a rapture bringing !— 
 
 Yet ask me not the reason why 
 1 have delight in minstrelsy. 
 
MINSTRELSY. 
 
 I2:i 
 
 1 know that much whereof I sing, 
 
 Is shapen but for vanishing ; 
 
 I know that summer’s flower and leaf 
 And shine and shade are very brief, 
 
 And that the heart they brighten, may, 
 Before them all, be sheathed in clay !— 
 
 I do not know the reason why 
 I have delight in minstrelsy. 
 
 A few there are, whose smile and praise 
 My minstrel hope, would kindly raise: 
 But, of those few—Death may impress 
 The lips of some with silentness ; 
 
 While some may friendship’s faith resign, 
 And heed no more a song of mine.— 
 
 Ask not, ask not the reason why 
 I have delight in minstrelsy. 
 
121 
 
 MINSTRELSY. 
 
 The sweetest song that minstrels sing, 
 Will charm not Joy to tarrying ; 
 
 The greenest bay that earth can grow, 
 Will shelter not in burning woe ; 
 
 A thousand voices will not cheer, 
 When one is mute that aye is dear !— 
 ! s there, alas ! no reason why 
 I have delight in minstrelsy? 
 
 I do not know ! The turf is green 
 Beneath the rain’s fast-dropping sheen, 
 Yet asks not why that deeper hue 
 Doth all its tender leaves renew ; — 
 And I, like-minded, am content, 
 While music to my soul is sent, 
 
 To question not the reason why 
 I have delight in minstrelsy. 
 
MINSTRELSY. 
 
 Years pass—my life with them shall pass 
 And soon, the cricket in the grass 
 And summer bird, shall louder sing 
 Than she who owns a minstrel’s string. 
 Oh then may some, the dear and lew, 
 Recall her love, whose truth they knew ; 
 When all forget to question why 
 She had delight in minstrelsy ! 
 
 ♦ 
 
TO THE MEMORY OF 
 
 SIR UYEDALE PRICE, BART. 
 
 Farewell !—a word that human lips bestow 
 On all that human hearts delight to know : 
 
 On summer skies, and scenes that change as fast; 
 On ocean calms, and faith as fit to last; 
 
 On Life, from Love’s own arms, that breaks away 
 On hopes that blind, and glories that decay ! 
 
 And ever thus, ‘ farewell, farewell,’ is said, 
 
 As round the hills of lengthening time, we tread ; 
 As at each step, the winding ways unfold 
 Some untried prospect which obscures the old 
 
TO THE MEMORY OF SIR U. PRICE. 
 
 Perhaps a prospect brightly color’d o’er, 
 
 Yet not with brightness that we loved before; 
 
 And dull and dark the brightest hue appears 
 
 « 
 
 To eyes like ours, surcharged and dim with tears. 
 
 Oft, oft we wish the winding road were past, 
 
 And yon supernal summit gain’d at last; 
 
 Where all that gradual change removed, is found 
 At once, for ever, as you look around ; 
 
 Where every scene by tender eyes survey’d, 
 
 And lost and wept for, to their gaze is spread— 
 
 No tear to dim the sight, no shade to fall. 
 
 But Heaven’s own sunshine lighting, charming all. 
 
 Farewell!—a common word—and yet how drear 
 And strange it soundeth as I write it here ! 
 
 How strange that thou a place of death shouldst till 
 Thy brain unlighted, and thine heart grown chill! 
 And dark the eye, whose plausive glance to draw, 
 Incited Nature brake her tyrant’s law ! 
 
128 
 
 TO THE MEMORY OF SIR U. PRICE, 
 
 And deaf the ear, to charm whose organ true, 
 Meeonian music tuned her harp anew ! 
 
 And mute the lips where Plato’s bee hath roved ; 
 And motionless the hand that genius moved !— 
 
 Ah friend ! thou speakest not!—but still to me 
 Do Genius, Music, Nature, speak of thee !— 
 
 Still golden fancy, still the sounding line, 
 
 And waving wood, recall some word of thine; 
 
 Some word, some look, whose living light is o’er— 
 And Memory sees what Hope can see no more. 
 
 Twice,twice, thy voice hath spoken. Twice there came, 
 To us, a change, a joy—to thee, a fame ! 
 
 Thou spakest once ; a and every pleasant sight. 
 
 Woods waving wild, and fountains gushing bright, 
 Cool copses, grassy banks, and all the dyes 
 Of shade and sunshine gleam’d before our eyes. 
 
 1 Essay on the Picturesque. 
 
TO THE MEMORY OF SIR U. PRICE. 1 
 
 Thou spakest twice ;* and every pleasant sound 
 Its ancient silken harmony unwound, 
 
 From Doric pipe and Attic lyre that lay 
 Enclasp’d in hands whose cunning is decay. 
 
 And now no more thou speakest ! Death hath met 
 And won thee to him ! Oh remember’d yet! 
 
 W e cannot see, and hearken , and forget ! 
 
 My thoughts are far. I think upon the time, 
 
 When Foxley’s purple hilis and woods sublime 
 Were thrilling at thy step; when thou didst throw 
 Thy burning spirit on the vale below, 
 
 To bathe its sense in beauty. Lovely ground ! 
 There, never more shall step of thine resound ! 
 There, Spring again shall come, but find thee not, 
 And deck with humid eyes her favorite spot; 
 
 Strew tender green on paths thy foot forsakes, 
 
 And make that fair, which Memory saddest makes. 
 
 Essaj on the Pronunciation of the Ancient Languages. 
 
 i 
 
130 TO THE MEMORY OF SIR U. PRICE. 
 
 For me, all sorrowful, unused to raise 
 A minstrel song and dream not of thy praise, 
 Upon thy grave, my tuneless harp I lay, 
 
 Nor try to sing what only tears can say. 
 
 So warm and fast the ready waters swell— 
 
 So weak the faltering voice thou knewest well ! 
 Thy words of kindness calm’d that voice before ; 
 Now, thoughts of them but make it tremble more 
 And leave its theme to others, and depart 
 To dwell within the silence where thou art. 
 
THE AUTUMN. 
 
 Go, sit upon the lofty hill. 
 
 And turn your eyes around. 
 
 Where waving woods and waters wild 
 Do hymn an autumn sound. 
 
 The summer sun is faint on them— 
 
 The summer flowers depart— 
 
 Sit still —as all transform’d to stone, 
 Except your musing heart. 
 
 How there you sat in summer-time, 
 
 May yet be in your mind ; 
 
 And how you heard the green woods sin 
 Beneath the freshening wind. 
 
132 
 
 THE AUTUMN. 
 
 Though the same wind now blows around, 
 You would its blast recall; 
 
 For every breath that stirs the trees, 
 
 Doth cause a leaf to fall. 
 
 Oh ! like that wind, is all the mirth 
 That flesh and dust impart: 
 
 We cannot bear its visitings, 
 
 When change is on the heart. 
 
 Gay words and jests may make us smile, 
 When Sorrow is asleep ; 
 
 But other things must make us smile, 
 When Sorrow bids us weep! 
 
 The dearest hands that clasp our hands,— 
 Their pressure may be o’er : 
 
 The dearest voice that meets our ear, 
 
 That tone may come no more ! 
 
THE AUTUMN. 
 
 ] 33 
 
 Youth fades ; and then, the joys of youth, 
 Which once refresh’d our mind, 
 
 Shall come—as, on those sighing woods, 
 
 The chilling autumn wind. 
 
 Hear not the wind—view not the woods ; 
 
 Look out o’er vale and hill: 
 
 In spring, the sky encircled them— 
 
 The sky is round them still. 
 
 Come autumn’s scathe—come winter’s cold— 
 Come change—and human fate ! 
 
 Whatever prospect Heaven doth bound, 
 
 Can ne’er be desolate. 
 
THE DEATH-BED OF TERESA DEL RIEGO. 
 
 4 
 
 -Si fia muta ogni altra cosa, al fine 
 
 Parlera il mio morire, 
 
 E ti dira la morte il mio martire. 
 
 Guarini. 
 
 The room was darken’d; but a wan lamp shed 
 Its light upon a half-uncurtain’d bed, 
 
 Whereon the widow’d sate. Blackly as death 
 Her veiling hair hung round her, and no breath 
 Came from her lips to motion it. Between 
 Its parted clouds, the calm fair face was seen 
 In a snow paleness and snow silentness, 
 
 With eyes unquenchable, whereon did press 
 A little, their white lids, so taught to lie, 
 
 By weights of frequent tears wept secretly. 
 
THE DEATH-BED OF TERESA DEL RIEGO. 135 
 
 Her hands were clasp’d and raised—the lamp did fling 
 A glory on her brow’s meek suffering. 
 
 Beautiful form of wom&n ! seeming made 
 
 Alone to shine in mirrors, there to braid 
 
 The hair and zone the waist—to garland flowers— 
 
 To walk like sunshine through the orange bowers— 
 To strike her land’s guitar—and often see 
 In other eyes how lovely hers must be— 
 
 Grew she acquaint with anguish ? Did she sever 
 For ever from the one she loved for ever, 
 
 To dwell among the strangers? Ay ! and she, 
 
 Who shone most brightly in that festive glee. 
 
 Sate down in this despair most patiently. 
 
 Some hearts are Niobes ! In griefs down-sweeping, 
 They turn to very stone from over-weeping, 
 
 And after, feel no more. Hers did remain 
 In life, which is the power of feeling pain, 
 
136 THE DEATH-BED OF TERESA DEL RIEGO. 
 
 Pill pain consumed the life so call’d below. 
 
 She heard that he was dead !—she ask’d not how 
 For he was dead ! She wail’d not o’er his urn, 
 
 For he was dead—and in her hands, should burn 
 Ftis vestal flame of honor radiantly. 
 
 Sighing would dim its light—she did not sigh. 
 
 She only died. They laid her in the ground, 
 Whereon th’ unloving tread, and accents sound 
 Which are not of her Spain. She left behind, 
 For those among the strangers who were kind 
 Unto the poor heart-broken, her dark hair. 
 
 It once was gauded out with jewels rare; 
 
 It swept her dying pillow—it doth lie 
 Beside me, (thank the giver) droopingly, 
 
 And very long and bright! Its tale doth go 
 Flalf to the dumb grave, half to life-time woe, 
 Making the heart of man, if manly, ring 
 Like Dodonaean brass, with echoing. 
 
TO VTCTOIRE, ON HER MARRIAGE. 
 
 VTctgire ! I knew thee in thy land, 
 Where I was strange to all: 
 
 I heard thee ; and were strange to me 
 The words thy lips let fall. 
 
 I loved thee—for the Babel curse 
 
 Was meant not for the heart: 
 
 I parted from thee, in such way 
 
 As those who love may part. 
 
 And now a change hath come to us, 
 
 A sea doth rush between ! 
 
 I do not know if we can be 
 Again as we have been. 
 
TO VICTOIRE, ON HER MARRIAGE. 
 
 I sit down in mine English land, 
 
 Mine English hearth beside ; 
 
 And thou, to one I never knew, 
 
 Art plighted for a bride. 
 
 It will not wrong thy present joy, 
 
 With by-gone days to wend; 
 
 Nor wrongeth it mine English hearth, 
 To love my Gallic friend. 
 
 Bind, bind the wreath ! the slender ring 
 Thy wedded finger press ! 
 
 May he who calls thy love his own, 
 
 Cali so thine happiness ! 
 
 Be he Terpander to thine heart, 
 
 And string fresh strings of gold, 
 
 Which may out-give new melodies, 
 
 But never mar the old ! 
 
TO VICTOIRE, ON HER MARRIAGE. 139 
 
 And though I clasp no more thy hand 
 In my hand, and rejoice— 
 
 And though I see thy face no more, 
 
 And hear no more thy voice— 
 
 Farewell, farewell !—let thought of me 
 Visit thine heart! There is 
 In mine the very selfish prayer, 
 
 That prayeth for thy bliss ! 
 
 * 
 
TO A BOY. 
 
 When my last song was said for thee, 
 
 Thy golden hair swept, long and free, 
 
 Around thee ; and a dove-like tone 
 Was on thy voice—or Nature’s own : 
 
 And every phrase and word of thine 
 Went out in lispings infantine ! 
 
 Thy small steps faltering round our hearth— 
 Thine een out-peering in their mirth— 
 
 Blue een ! that, like thine heart, seem’d given 
 To be, for ever, full of heaven ! 
 
 Wert thou, in sooth, made up of glee, 
 
 When my last song was said for thee ? 
 
TO A BOY. 
 
 141 
 
 And now more years are finished,— 
 
 For thee another song- is said. 
 
 Thy voice hath lost its cooing tone; 
 
 The lisping of thy words is gone : 
 
 Thy step treads firm—thine hair not flings 
 Round thee its length of golden rings— 
 Departed, like all lovely things! 
 
 Yet art thou still made up of glee, 
 
 When my now song is said for thee. 
 
 Wisely and well responded they, 
 
 Who cut thy golden hair away. 
 
 What time I made the bootless prayer, 
 That they should pause awhile, and spare. 
 They said, 1 its sheen did less agree 
 With boyhood than with infancy.’ 
 
 And thus I know it aye must be. 
 
 Before the revel noise is done, 
 
 The revel lamps pale one by one. 
 
TO A BOY. 
 
 i <•> 
 
 Ay ! Nature loveth not to bring 
 Crown’d victims to life’s labouring. 
 
 The mirth-effulgent eye appears 
 
 Less sparkling—to make room for tears : 
 
 After the heart’s quick throbs depart, 
 
 We lose the gladness of the heart: 
 
 And, after we have lost awhile 
 The rose o’ the lip, we lose its smile ; 
 
 As Beauty could not bear to press 
 Near the death-pyre of Happiness. 
 
 This seemeth but a sombre dream ? 
 
 It hath more pleasant thoughts than seem. 
 The older a young tree doth grow, 
 
 The deeper shade it sheds below ; 
 
 But makes the grass more green—the air 
 More fresh, than had the sun been there. 
 And thus our human life is found, 
 
 Albeit a darkness gather round : 
 
TO A BOY. 
 
 For patient virtues, that their light 
 May shine to all men, want the night: 
 And holy Peace, unused to cope, 
 
 Sits meekly at the tomb of Hope, 
 Saying that ‘ she is risen !’ 
 
 3 43 
 
 Then 1 
 
 Will sorrow not at destiny,— 
 
 Though from thine eyes, and from thine heart, 
 The glory of their light depart; 
 
 Though on thy voice, and on thy brow, 
 
 Should come a fiercer change than now; 
 Though thou no more be made of glee. 
 
 When my next song is said for thee. 
 
REMONSTRANCE. 
 
 k 
 
 Oh say not it is vain to weep 
 That deafen’d bier above ; 
 
 Where genius has made room for death, 
 And life is past from love ; 
 
 That tears can never his bright looks 
 And tender words restore : 
 
 I know it is most vain to weep— 
 
 And therefore, weep the more ! 
 
 Oh say not I shall cease to weep 
 When years have wither'd by ; 
 
 That ever I shall speak of joy, 
 
 As if he could reply ; 
 
REMONSTRANCE. 
 
 That ever mine unquivering lips 
 Shall name the name he bore : 
 
 I know that I may cease to weep, 
 
 And therefore weep the more ! 
 
 Say, Time, who slew mine happiness, 
 Will leave to me my woe ; 
 
 And woe’s own stony strength shall chain 
 These tears’ impassion’d flow: 
 
 Or say, that these, my ceaseless tears, 
 May life to death restore ; 
 
 Tor then my soul were wept away, 
 
 And I should weep no more ! 
 
 REPLY. 
 
 To weep awhile beside the bier, 
 
 Whereon his ashes lie, 
 
 Is well !—I know that rains must fall 
 When clouds are in the sky : 
 
 G 
 
146 
 
 REMONSTRANCE. 
 
 I know, to die—to part, will cloud 
 The brightest spirit o’er ; 
 
 And yet, wouldst thou for ever weep, 
 
 When he can weep no more ? 
 
 Fix not thy sight, so long and fast, 
 
 Upon the shroud’s despair; 
 
 Look upward unto Zion’s hill, 
 
 For death was also there ! 
 
 And think, ‘ The death, the scourge, the scorn, 
 My sinless Saviour bore— 
 
 The curse—the pang, too deep for tears— 
 
 That / should weep no more ! ’ 
 
EPITAPH. 
 
 Beauty, who softly walkest all thy days, 
 
 In silken garment to the tunes of praise ;— 
 
 Lover, whose dreamings by the green-bank’d liver, 
 Where once she wander’d, fain would last for ever 
 King, whom the nations scan, adoring scan. 
 
 And shout ‘a god,’ when sin hath mark’d thee man 
 Bard, on whose brow the Hyblan dew remains, 
 Albeit the fever burneth in the veins;— 
 
 Hero, whose sword in tyrant’s blood is hot;— 
 Sceptic, who doubting, wouldst be doubted not; — 
 Man, whosoe’er thou art, whate’er thy trust;— 
 Respect thyself in me ;—thou treadest dust. 
 
THE IMAGE OF GOD. 
 
 “ I am God, and there is none like me.” 
 
 Isaiah xl\i. 9. 
 
 “ Christ, who is the image of God.” 
 
 2 Cor. iv. 4. 
 
 Thou ! art thou like to God ? 
 
 (I ask’d this question of the glorious sun) 
 
 Thou high unwearied one, 
 
 Whose course in heat, and light, and life is run ? 
 
 Eagles may view thy face—clouds can assuage 
 Thy fiery wrath—the sage 
 
 Can mete thy stature—thou shalt fade with age. 
 Thou art not like to God. 
 
 i 
 
THE IMAGE OF GOD. 
 
 U9 
 
 Thou ! art thou like to God ? 
 
 (I ask’d this question of the bounteous earth) 
 
 Oh thou, who givest birth 
 
 To forms of beauty and to sounds of mirth ? 
 
 Thy golden harvests stay 
 
 Tor seed and toii—thy power shall pass away. 
 Thou art not like to God. 
 
 Thou ! art thou like to God ? 
 
 (I ask’d this question of my deathless soul) 
 
 Oh thou, whose musings roll 
 
 Above the thunder, o’er creation’s whole ? 
 
 Thou art not. Sin, and shame, and agony 
 Within thy deepness lie : 
 
 They utter forth their voice in thee, and cry 
 ‘ Thou art not like to God.’ 
 
150 
 
 THE IMAGE OF GOD. 
 
 Then art Thou like to God ; 
 
 Thou, who didst bear the sin, and shame, and woe— 
 Oh Thou, whose sweat did flow— 
 
 Whose tears did gush—whose brow was dead and low 
 
 No grief is like thy grief; no heart can prove 
 Love like unto thy love ; 
 
 And none, save only Thou,—below, above,— 
 
 Oh God, is like to God ! 
 
THE APPEAL. 
 
 Children of our England! stand 
 On the shores that girt our land ; 
 
 The msds of whose cloud-white rock 
 
 o 
 
 Braveth Time’s own battle shock. 
 Look above the wide, wide world ; 
 Where the northern blasts have furl’d 
 Their numbed wings amid the snows, 
 Mutt’ring in a forced repose— 
 
 Or where the madden’d sun on high 
 Shakes his torch athwart the sky, 
 
 Till within their prison sere, 
 
 Chained earthquakes groan for fear ! 
 
152 
 
 THE APPEAL. 
 
 Look above the wide, wide world, 
 Where a gauntlet Sin hath hurl’d 
 To astonied Life ; and where 
 Death’s gladiatorial smile doth glare, 
 On making the arena bare. 
 
 Shout aloud the words that show 
 Jesus in the sands and snow ;— 
 Shout aloud the words that free, 
 Over the perpetual sea. 
 
 Speak ye. As a breath will sweep 
 Avalanche from Alpine steep, 
 
 So the spoken word shall roll 
 Fear and darkness from the soul. 
 
 Are ye men, and love not man? 
 
 Love ye, and permit his ban ? 
 
 Can ye, dare ye, rend the chain 
 Wrought of common joy and pain. 
 
THE APPEAL. 
 
 153 
 
 Clasping with its links of gold, 
 
 Man to man in one strong hold? 
 
 To ! if the golden links ye sever, 
 
 Ye shall make your heart’s flesh cpjiver; 
 And wheresoe’er the links are reft, 
 There, shall be a blood-stain left. 
 
 To earth’s remotest rock repair, 
 
 Ye shall find a vulture there: 
 
 Though for others sorrowing not, 
 
 Your own tears shall still be hot: 
 Though ye play a lonely part; 
 
 Though ye bear an iron heart;— 
 
 Woe, like Echetus, still must 
 Grind your iron into dust. 
 
 But children of our Britain, ye 
 Rend not man’s chain of sympathy ; 
 
 To those who sit in woe and night, 
 Denying tears and hiding light. 
 
154 
 
 THE APPEAL. 
 
 Ye have stretch'd your hands abroad 
 With the Spirit’s sheathless sword : 
 
 Ye have spoken—and the tone 
 To earth’s extremest verge hath gone: 
 
 East and west sublime it rolls, 
 
 Echoed by a million souls ! 
 
 The wheels of rapid circling years, 
 
 Erst hot with crime, are quench’d in tears, 
 llocky hearts wild waters pour, 
 
 That were chain’d in stone before : 
 
 Bloody hands, that only bare 
 Hilted sword, are clasp’d in prayer : 
 Savage tongues ,that wont to fling 
 Shout of war in deathly ring, 
 
 Speak the name which angels sing. 
 
 Dying lips are lit the while 
 With a most undying smile, 
 
 Which reposing there, instead 
 Of language, when the lips are dead, 
 
THE APPEAL. 
 
 Saith,—‘ No sound of grief or pain 
 Shall haunt us when we move again.’ 
 
 Children of our country ! brothers 
 To the children of all others ! 
 
 Shout aloud the words that show' 
 Jesus in the sands and snow ;— 
 Shout aloud the words that free. 
 Oyer the perpetual sea ! 
 
IDOLS. 
 
 How weak the gods of this world are—■ 
 
 And weaker yet their worship made me ! 
 
 I have been an idolater 
 
 Of three—and three times they betray’d me. 
 
 Mine oldest worshipping was given 
 To natural Beauty, aye residing 
 
 In bowery earth and starry heav’n, 
 
 In ebbing sea, and river gliding. 
 
 But natural Beauty shuts her bosom 
 To w T hat the natural feelings tell! 
 
 Albeit I sigh’d, the trees would blossom — 
 Albeit I smiled, the blossoms fell. 
 
IDOLS. 
 
 15 
 
 Then left I earthly sights, to wander 
 Amid a grove of name divine, 
 
 Where bay-reflecting streams meander, 
 
 And Moloch Fame hath rear’d a shrine. 
 
 Not green, but black, is that reflection ; 
 
 On rocky beds those waters lie; 
 
 That grove hath chilness and dejection.— 
 How could I sing ? I had to sigh. 
 
 Last, human Love, thy Lares greeting, 
 
 To rest and warmth I vow’d my years. 
 
 To rest? how wild my pulse is beating ! 
 
 To warmth ? ah me ! my burning tears. 
 
 Ay ! they may burn—though thou be frozen 
 By death, and changes wint’ring on ! 
 Fame—Beauty !—idols madly chosen— 
 Were yet of gold ; but thou art stone ! 
 
158 
 
 IDOLS. 
 
 Crumble like stone ! my voice no longer 
 
 Shall wail their names, who silent be : 
 
 There is a voice that soundeth stronger— 
 
 © 
 
 ‘ My daughter, give thine heart to me.* 
 
 Lord ! take mine heart! Oh first and fairest, 
 Whom all creation’s ends shall hear ; 
 ho deathless love in death declarest! 
 
 None else is beauteous—famous—dear ! 
 
1:1 Y M N. 
 
 “ Lord, I cry unto thee : make haste unto me.” 
 
 Psalm cxli. 
 
 “ The Lord is nigh unto all them that call upon him.” 
 
 Psalm cxlv. 
 
 Since without Thee we do no good, 
 And with Thee do no ill, 
 
 Abide with us in weal and woe,— 
 
 In action and in will. 
 
 In weal,—that while our lips confess 
 The Lord who ‘ gives,’ we may 
 Remember, with an humble thought. 
 The Lord who ‘ takes away.’ 
 
ICO 
 
 HYMN. 
 
 In woe,—that, while to drowning tears 
 Our hearts their joys resign, 
 
 We may remember who can turn 
 Such water into wine. 
 
 By hours of day,—that when our feet 
 O’er hill and valley run, 
 
 We still may think the light of truth 
 More welcome than the sun. 
 
 By hours of night,—that when the air 
 Its dew and shadow yields, 
 
 We still may hear the voice of God 
 In silence of the fields. 
 
 Oh ! then sleep comes on us like death, 
 All soundless, deaf and deep : 
 
 Lord ! teach us so to watch and pray, 
 That death may come like sleep. 
 
IiYMN. 
 
 ir> i 
 
 Abide with us, abide with us, 
 
 t 
 
 While flesh and soul agree; 
 And when our flesh is only dust, 
 Abide our souls with Thee. 
 
WEARINESS. 
 
 Mine eyes are weary of surveying 
 The fairest things, too soon decaying; 
 Mine ears are weary of receiving 
 The kindest words—ah, past believing 
 Weary my hope, of ebb and flow ; 
 Weary my pulse, of tunes of woe : 
 
 My trusting heart is weariest! 
 
 I would—I would, I were at rest! 
 
 For me , can earth refuse to fade ? 
 
 For me , can words be faithful made ? 
 Will my embitter’d hope be sweet? 
 My pulse forego the human beat ? 
 
WEARINESS. 
 
 163 
 
 No ! Darkness must consume mine eye— 
 Silence, mine ear—hope cease—pulse die— 
 And o’er mine heart a stone be press’d— 
 
 Or vain this,—* Would I were at rest ! 9 
 
 There is a land of rest deferr’d : 
 
 Nor eye hath seen, nor ear hath heard, 
 
 Nor Hope hath trod the precinct o’er; 
 
 For hope beheld is hope no more ! 
 
 There, human pulse forgets its tone— 
 
 There, hearts may know as they are known ! 
 Oh, for dove’s wings, thou dwelling blest. 
 
 To fly to thee , and be at rest! 
 
 THE END. 
 
PRINTED BY A. J. VAI.PY, 
 
 RED LION COURT, FLEET STREET. 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
* 
 
 RARE BOOK 
 COLLECTION 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY OF 
 NORTH CAROLINA 
 LIBRARY 
 
 PA3827 
 • P8 
 B7 
 
 1833