Aloof, with hermit-eye I scan The present works of present man— A wild and dream-like trade of blood and guile, TO A YOUNG FRIEND, ON HIS PROPOSING TO DOMESTICATE WITH THE COMPOSED IN 1796. AUTHOR. A MOUNT, not wearisome and bare and steep, But a green mountain variously up-piled, Where o'er the jutting rocks soft mosses creep, Or colored lichens with slow oozing weep; Where cypress and the darker yew start wild; Calm Pensiveness might muse herself to sleep; Made meek inquiry for her wandering lamb: The adventurous toil, and up the path sublime Now lead, now follow the glad landscape round, Wide and more wide, increasing without bound}/ O then 'twere loveliest sympathy, to mark The berries of the half-uprooted ash Dripping and bright; and list the torrent's dash,Beneath the cypress, or the yew more dark, Seated at ease, on some smooth mossy rock; While west-winds fanned our temples toil-bedewed: Then downwards slope, oft pausing, from the mount, To some lone mansion, in some woody dale, The Hill of Knowledge I essayed to trace; Low murmuring, lay; and starting from the rocks O meek retiring spirit! we will climb, There, while the prospect through the gazing eye Pours all its healthful greenness on the soul, We'll smile at wealth, and learn to smile at fame, Our hopes, our knowledge, and our joys the same, As neighboring fountains image, each the whole: Then when the mind hath drunk its fill of truth, We'll discipline the heart to pure delight, Rekindling sober joy's domestic flame. They whom I love shall love thee, honored youth! Now may Heaven realize this vision bright! LINES TO W. L. WHILE HE SANG A SONG TO PURCELL'S MUSIC. WHILE my young cheek retains its healthful hues, And I have many friends who hold me dear; Such melodies as thine, lest I should lose With no beloved face at my bed-side, To fix the last glance of my closing eye, Methinks, such strains, breathed by my angelguide, Would make me pass the cup of anguish by, Mix with the blest, nor know that I had died! A YOUNG MAN OF FORTUNE, WHO ABANDONED HIMSELF TO AN INDOLENT AND CAUSELESS MELANCHOLY. ENCE that fantastic wantonness of woe, HEN O Youth to partial Fortune vainly dear! To plundered Want's half-sheltered hovel go, Go, and some hunger-bitten infant hear Moan haply in a dying mother's ear: Or when the cold and dismal fog-damps brood O'er the rank church-yard with sear elm-leaves strewed, Pace round some widow's grave, whose dearer part Was slaughtered, where o'er his uncoffined limbs The flocking flesh-birds screamed! Then, while thy heart Groans, and thine eye a fiercer sorrow dims, Know (and the truth shall kindle thy young mind) What nature makes thee mourn, she bids thee heal! O abject if, to sickly dreams resigned, All effortless thou leave life's common-weal A prey to tyrants, murderers of mankind. But now afflictions bow me down to earth: Suspends what nature gave me at my birth, For not to think of what I needs must feel, From my own nature all the natural man- Hence, viper thoughts, that coil around my mind, Reality's dark dream! I turn from you, and listen to the wind, Which long has raved unnoticed. What a scream Of agony by torture lengthened out, That lute sent forth! without, Thou Wind, that ravest Bare craig, or mountain-tairn,* or blasted tree, Or pine-grove whither woodman never clomb, Or lonely house, long held the witches' home, Methinks were fitter instruments for thee, Mad Lutanist! who in this month of showers, Of dark brown gardens, and of peeping flowers, Mak'st Devils' yule, with worse than wintry song, The blossoms, buds, and timorous leaves among. Thou Actor, perfect in all tragic sounds! *Tairn is a small lake, generally, if not always applied to the lakes up in the mountains, and which are the feeders of those in the valleys. This address to the Stormwind will not appear extravagant to those who have heard it at night, and in a mountainous country. |