So oft the finer movements of the soul,That shun the sphere of pleasure's gay control,In the still shades of calm SECLUSION rise,And breathe their sweet, seraphic harmonies.PLEASURES OF MEMORY.
ON THE HEART.
SONNET.
Maid of my heart, for whom in happier timeOft may I twine the muse's modest flowers,Accept this humble gift of grateful rhyme,For bliss, affection lends my pensive hours:
Rude is the sketch; yet here thine eye may traceThro scattered lays some holier thoughts of youth,Which, tho unwreathed with flowers of classic grace,May speak the simple energy of truth.
Blest be thy days! as bright they glide along;May love and wisdom guide their calm career;And, when thy minstrel slumbers with his song,Oh! yield his shade a tributary tear:
The sweet return may sooth some pensive mood Of one unknown, the muse of solitude.
ANALYSIS OF THE FIRST PART.
THE poem opens with a description of the pleasures of Solitude, and the final cause of them is resolved into the laws of association and sympathy. Hence is derived the love of classic ruins, and of the retreats of departed,genius; hence also the love of sublime, picturesque, and beautiful, scenery; and these associated influences are exemplified in various historic allusions and descriptive pictures—The inefficacy of social scenes to afford consolation to the heart in the unfortunate incidents of life, in disease, despair, disappointment, and sorrow; and the corresponding benign influence of Solitude in awakening kind and benevolent emotions, and alleviating the miseries of life. The influence of Solitude on the various passions is next introduced; and hope, despair, and love, are represented, as deriving peculiar consolation and delight in retired life. The vanity of grandeur is next descanted on, and illustrated by historic details-The influence of Solitude in age, sorrow, and death, is attempted to be shewn in the tale of ST. AUBIN—Some reflections follow on the pleasures derived from the recollection of youthful scenes, particularly in the tranquillity of retired life—The cultivation of the more refined powers of the soul, tho often attended with pain, enlarges the circle of happiness, and elevates the character and sentiments to their highest perfection and dignity The argument thence derived of the immortality of the soul—The poem then concludes with an address to friendship.
THE
POWER OF SOLITUDE.
O'ER the dim glen when autumn's dewy raySheds the mild lustres of retiring day,While scarce the breeze with whispering murmur flowsTo hymn its dirge at evening's placid close:When awful silence holds her sullen reign,And moonlight sparkles on the dimpled main;Or thro some ancient, solitary towerDisport loose shadows at the midnight hour:Whence flows the charm these hallowed scenes impart,To warm the fancy, and affect the heart?Why swells the breast, alive at every pore,With throbs unknown, with pains unfelt before?Why turns the restless glance on every sideIn grateful gloom, or melancholy pride?Touched by quick sympathy's mysterious springThought's airy sprites in mazy circles wing,On the fine nerves impress a trembling thrill,And move obedient to the wakeful will,Till memory's trains in swift succession rise,And round retirement blend harmonic dyes.
Hence o'er the spot, where rest the storied dead, (1)[1]Where virtue triumphed, or where valor bled;Where classic ruins mid the wreck of timeIn tranquil grandeur lift their heads sublime;The lone enthusiast loves the lines to trace,Which genius chiselled on the bust of grace,To muse on elder lore, and studious thenceLight the pure thought, and nerve the manly sense.Still, as wild Avon winds in silent pride,His Shakespere's hautboy charms the listening tide;Still Arno trembles with the minstrel's note,And fancy's strains on tardy Mincio float,As when young Maro poured his matchless lay,And sweetly carolled to the god of day.
Sweet, trembling ecstasies, which swiftly rise,Melt the full soul, and press the rich surprise!What kindling verse shall dare those charms express,Now bathed in bliss, now steeped in tenderness,When the rapt thought, by sacred fancy. led,Paints to the living, what embalms the dead.When near the tomb, where Ilion's victor lay,The Granic hero paused to weep and pray, (2)What time the pathos of the bard of fireFlowed o'er his lips to calm his wakeful ire,Ah! who shall sketch in colors bright, as life,The moving agonies, the rapturous strife,The frequent sighs, which heaved his breast, to raiseA friend to sooth him, and a bard to praise?Vain were the toil, the mystic spring of thought,Like lightning, shivers, but can ne'er be caught.
Hence too, with majesty supremely rudeWhere nature frowns in deepest solitude,The local genius, as unawed he bravesImpending cataracts, or giant caves,Feels all his soul dilate with zeal sublime,Its grandeur heightening with the kindred clime.
Nor less the scenes, where varied beauties shine,To gentler feelings lend a charm divine;Silence and gloom a holier peace inspire,Free the prest heart, and cool the fierce desire;E'en sadness, pausing o'er her woes awhile,Relents her brow, and wakes a transient smile.
Blest link of being, whence successive thoughtLeaps into life, in social order wrought,What subtle powers connect thy airy train,Touch but the first, and myriads crowd the brain!From thee seclusion gains her magic art,To wake the mind, and elevate the heart,From thee, gay fancy every image gleans,Which breathes perfection o'er illusive scenes,And, urged by thee, the forms of memory trueThro cornean portals pass in bright review. (3)
'Tis evening's watch, while silver twilight fails,Scarce winds the seabreeze round the flaccid sails;Athwart his eyes oblique the moonlight cast,The jocund sailor climbs the giddy mast,Charmed, while he seems in distant sounds to hearSome ready welcome meet his listening ear.Hushed be each voice, the bursting joke suspend,Lo! on his soul the dreams of hope descend;At home he sits, the dangerous voyage o'er,Tells all his ills, and would the tale were more;Unbidden tears console for perils past,And each new smile seems lovelier, than the last;Round his rocked knee his sportive infants press,Ask the fresh kiss, and steal the fond caress;Joy follows joy, the welcome circles round,The tale repeated, and the bumper crowned;Love, fancy, hope, his glowing senses steep,And waft his visions o'er the bounding deep.
Yet there are those, whose souls of heavier mouldNo joys, like these, no chastened joys unfold;For them in vain in sober landscape reignThe mouldered turret and the moonlight main;For them bright fiction never taught to glowIn fairy tales or legendary woe;For them no spirits walk the dusky cave,No murmuring Naiads drink the lucid wave,No fine enchantments, raised at Wieland's call, (4)Convene her shadowy train to fancy's hall;Unsought, unwished, the curious scenery flows,Presiding dulness nods, and nods to doze!
But come, ye good, to mark her living power,Whom nature fashioned in a happier hour,Whose tender nerves, to nicer sense alive,Feel in each touch electric life revive;If high in wish, your ardent souls exploreEach secret haunt of wisdom's treasured lore;If proud in bliss, at Hymen's brightened shrineYe close the mutual hope in joy divine;Or, sad reverse! if cursed with every pain,Which crowds convulsion thro the trembling vein,Doomed lone and friendless life's drear paths to rove,The scorn of pride, or prey of injured love;Retire, and own seclusion's power to shedThe cheering beam round merit's drooping head,Retire, and there the moral lesson prestShall teach in blessing, how the heart is blest.
Why will ye tell of all the world can give?Say, can it teach the science, how to live?How best in generous deeds the soul employ,And form its views to virtue's blameless joy?Here all the glory lies, to fortune known,And here the cottage emulates the throne.What tho the courtly pomp of eastern prideDeck the rich couch, and o'er the feast preside,What tho from suppliant crowds the sceptre claimUnrivalled honours and unquestioned fame;Can these, where avarice haunts the pining mind,Calm the fierce rage, which preys on human kind?Can these, where conscience fills with deep dismay,Reverse the gloom, and change the night to day?Can these, where anguish holds her fiery reign,Raze out the written troubles of the brain?O'er the proud scene the sword of haggard careHangs to destroy, suspended by a hair!
Search the wide world, or, versed in classic lore,Mark the dread truth on Puteoli's shore;Mid gorgeous domes, and flattery's servile host,Ambitious Sylla roams a restless ghost; (5)In vain debauch her syren forms assumes,Care haunts his soul with visionary glooms,The world's proud conqueror asks a moment's ease,Cursed in decline, and loathsome in disease.
Alas! no balms the courted crowd dispenseTo heal the aching throes of sickened sense;There morbid interest plies her ceaseless artTo dull affection, and seduce the heart;There harsh disdain, to human misery steeled,With secret triumph hears the fault revealed;Or if perchance a gleam of pity shine,Its dubious aspect marks some base design.Yea, tho the generous smile, the polished grace,Like fair Apega, ask a false embrace, (6)Too oft its victim finds, the glittering toyLure to deceive, and flatter to destroy.
The lovely maid, whose native virtues flowChaste, as the airy web of printless snow,If in sad hour, the prey of treacherous toil,Her rifled honour fall some plunderer's spoil,How vain the hope to hide from public fameHer deep contrition and ingenuous shame!Where'er she turns, the circled crime prevails,In smiles reproaches, and in sneers assails,And, like some troubled ghost, in thin disguiseThe pointed insult meets her downcast eyes.In vain may eloquence in mercy pleadTo spare the person, yet detest the deed, (7)Ungenerous censure dooms to deadlier woeThe wretch, who suffered, than who dealt the blow.
Poor, wandering outcast, tho with arrowy swayImbittered memory haunt the fatal day,When life's bright visions with pollution fled,And virtue sickened with the tears she shed;No more returned the scenes of festive mirth,When youth and fancy cheered the social hearth,Or, tripped with truant steps the verdant heath,To watch the sunbeam, as it blushed in death:Yet shall meek solitude with temperate swayGild the deep shade, and light the closing day,Lull the keen pangs, thy bleeding breast that tore,And hallow transports, life can ne'er restore.
So to the picture's many coloured faceTime's secret touch imparts a ripening grace,Mellows each tint, and still, as dies the blaze,Each softer beauty on the canvass plays.
Ask not, in beauty's prime why Valiere strove (8)By pious vows to quench the throb of love,When royal pride with guilt, that ne'er shall fade,Spurned the fond victim, whom his art betrayed.Sweet maid, thy heart, by tenderness subdued,Too frail for virtue, and for vice too good,Mid the drear abbey's gloom could proudly KnowA joy in horror, and a charm in woe.—Where the cold coffin guards its virgin's sleep, (9)And holy penance lives to watch and weep,The lovelorn nymph, each human frailty o'er,Gave her fond heart to tremble and adore.
Supernal Power, tho pain, tho sickness press,Wing the sharp pang, and urge the keen distress,Tho drear confinement every feeling chill,Arrest the wish, and mock the imprisoned will,Thro every change thy active charm prevails,Each thought enlivens, and each sense regales,And, o'er the scene when darker horror lowers,Illumes with moral light the weary hours.
Lo, where the torches throw reverted light,What solemn pageants crowd the funeral rite!Shrill winds the blast, and thro some broken cloudGleam the wan moonbeams o'er the flapping shroud;Nor more is heard, save in some dismal pauseFrom rank to rank a sullen murmur draws,And save, where, perch'd the neighbouring yews among,The boding raven croaks his hateful song.Hark! from the tombs the faultering service read,Dust to the dust consigned, and dead to dead;The victim fell in youth's unblemished pride,A darling sister, and a destined bride,Cropped, like some flower in native beauty gay,That greets the morn to blush its life away.One moment hence, to freeze the soul of mirth,On the sunk coffin pelts the rattling earth!Ungracious sound! at whose disasterous taleThe live flesh quivers, and the moon grows pale:Shriek follows shriek, the fainting mourners yearn,And close the delved house, whence is no return.
Sure, if one scene in misery's darkest hourE'er thro the soul diffused a deadly power,That scene were here, when midnight's startling chillCrawls o'er the flesh in mockery of the will!Yet deem not hence, distempered fancy ledSuch lonely rituals o'er sepulchered dead;From glooms, like these, the kindred soul shall gleanThose holier sentiments, that work unseen,From human ills shall snatch a zeal sublime,Its trust in heaven, its triumph over time.
Go, view the convent's dull, monastic gloom,Cold, as despair, and silent, as the tomb,Where harsh religion rules with bigot swayThe lingering hour, and damps the tedious day;Where rayless horror o'er the embrio joyHangs, like some fiend, to strangle and destroy;In vain the bosom heaves with passion's sigh,Rubies the lip, or melts the azure eye;In vain the cheek with love's carnation glows,Or thro the heart voluptuous riot flows;Since here the virgin pines in holy dread,Spouse of despair, and tenant with the dead.
Still here are charms, by mental truth refined,To lure affliction from the wounded mind;Here vestal zeal on rapt devotion soars,With faith's keen eye the future world explores,Leads faultering hope thro error's dubious road,And lights the trembling soul to heaven's abode.
Hark, from yon cloisters, wrapt in gloom profound,The solemn organ peals its midnight sound;The choral anthem swells along the aisle,Bursts the deep vaults, and shakes the echoing pile,While trembling gleams, as distant tapers move,Sweep the cold walls, and fringe the cypress grove.With cautious reverence round their glimmering shrinePress the meek nuns, and raise the prayer divine;Here, weeping penance lifts her reddened eye,Pours the weak plaint, and breathes the heartfelt sigh;There, wan devotion bends with wistful gaze,Or chants the vocal hymn of vesper praise;While, pure in thought as sweet responses rise,Each grief subsides, each wild emotion dies,Heaven's calm delights their erring souls employ,And sweet seclusion whispers promised joy.
Else, when bold freedom late in thunder's voice (10)Burst their dim cells, and bade the dead rejoice,Recalled the victims from despair's embrace,And rent the vestal veil from beauty's face,Why did the lingering train with anxious viewHang o'er the walls, and weep and wave adieu?Why ask with suppliant tears the warlike braveTo grant a cloister's life, a cloister's grave?Ah! then remembrance with convulsive startRenewed those scenes, erewhile which soothed the heart,When kind religion, as the vespers closed,Each wish attempered, and each care composed.
So chained by tyrant power in cursed Bastile,Whose weeping walls uncounted wrongs reveal,Fate's hopeless victim, prey of cankerous care,On torture feeds, and surfeits on despair.But hark! the portal on its hinges jars,And freedom's arm unbolts the ponderous bars,Enwrapt in flames she melts his chains away,And leads the astonished captive forth to day:Yet lo, what sadness wastes his shrivelled cheek, (11)What strangled utterance mocks the wish to speak!His muttered sighs implore from generous fateThe flinty pillow, and the dayless grate.Alas! with light reflection woke her reign,And turned at memory's touch the whole to pain:No glance of welcome meets his searching eye,No pitying children echo sigh for sigh;In vain he asks a home from door to door,The place, which knew him once, knows now no more;E'en the few friends, whom heaven had taught his woes,The narrow house had lodged in long repose:Nought, nought, remained to sooth the stranger's care,Save the lone walls, his prison, and his prayer!
But where to mark seclusion's happiest art,Shall reason search the chambers of the heart?Since all the passions own her moral sway,By turns support her, and by turns obey:Love, hope, and joy, thro all her shades disport,Her dreams enliven, and her presence court;While grief and anguish every pang dismiss,Or hail in fancy images of bliss.
When the fond mother o'er the cradle bendsTo trace each joy familiar fancy lends,Tho from her heart perturbed emotions rise,While mutely earnest turn her aching eyes,Since every smile, that lights her cherub's face,And every look, that marks the father's grace,Tells her lone heart in agonies of careOf joys departed, and 'of days that were:'Yet think not hence, existence darkly teemsWith shapes more dreadful, than the murderer's dreams;Think not, that grief usurps with strong control,Resistless empire o'er the widowed soul;Still, where affection's softening influence wakes,Thro the deep shades a milder lustre breaks,Hope spans the years, that dimly float between,And lights with opening bliss the distant scene.
Nor pause we here, but mark hope's silent swayPervade the soul to chase its cares away,When love unblest the morn of life consumesIn deep regrets and visionary glooms.Oft will she rise, and o'er the night diffuseIdeal charms in fancy's golden hues,And, while seclusion's moral comforts bless,By sweetly tempering, what defies redress,Round memory's eye her freshened twilight playsWith the calm images of former days.
So hapless Eloise, whose passioned lines (12)Breathe the pure sense, that softens and refines,At every vein when injured virtue bled,And anguish froze the tears by passion shed,While yet young beauty's rich, transparent dyeBlushed in her cheek, and mantled in her eye,Sought the dim cell, where changeless rigor reigns,And wan repentance clanks her wasting chains,Where the cold walls of Paraclete aspire,And bigot horrors feed religion's fire.E'en there love shed a soft enchantment round,When midnight dews enwrapt the charnel ground;From the full choir, as pealing anthems rose,Or dying requiems hymned divine repose,The mingling strain with warm devotion stoleTo breathe a holy languor o'er the soul:Or thro the shades by fancy's guiding lightSt. gildas opened on her wishful sight;Again she seemed that voice of love to hear,Whose early music won her credent ear;Again sweet converse cheered the classic bower,Where science lingered many a social hour;Forgot the dismal years, which swept between,Since vestal duties closed each earthly scene;Forgot the matin rite, the chanted air,A lovelier image stole her virgin prayer;Resistless hope, to mental feelings true,O'er the deep gloom its rich perspective threw.
Blest be that power, which chased the fiends of care,And called his trembling spirit from despair,When crazed with love, by treacherous wiles betrayed,Desponding Petrarch sought Vauclusa's shade. (13)There loved the bard mid rocks grotesque and boldHis liberal converse with the dead to hold;Above, dark woods, o'er dizzy torrents hung,Thro winding vales their giant shadows flung;Below, from springs, where scarce a bubble whirled,Thro verdant glens the silver Sorgia purled;The landscape round in pure luxuriance smiled;Here, soft, and calm; there, grand, abrupt, and wild;Claude's finest genius seemed to touch the placeWith witching gloom and melancholy grace:Haunts, meet for joy to muse the Lesbian strain,But rife with perils, when the passions reign;In every shade the visioned maid descends,And, fancy's captive, low the minstrel bends!Seen is her form, as when in proud St. Claire (14)The lovely damsel blushed divinely fair;Transparent green with violet purflew swimsRound her fair breast, and clasps her prisoned limbs;Light o'er her snowy neck in volumes rolled,The mantling ringlets sport their flowing gold;The sparkling eye thro auburn lashes plays,Flash follows flash; and blaze succeeds to blaze;She breathes, the dews of richest heaven distil;She speaks, and music pours its sweetest trill;Grace on her lips with magic virtue dwells,Truth weaves the text, and love the comment spells:Too dangerous charms! in vain the lover flies,Voluptuous visions meet his startled eyes;The woods, the streams, the echoing rocks confess,A present angel haunts the charmed recess!—E'en now the pilgrim, as with musing paceHis anxious steps the classic ruin trace,Still marks the spot, by circling shades enclosed,Where the fond lover oft at noon reposed;Still hears his voice along the vocal groveBreathe the sad harmonies of thoughtful love;Still hears, "my Laura" rustle thro the trees,Float on the tide, and echo on the breeze,More sweet, than Ariel's strains enchanted stole (15)To sooth to peace the shipwrecked stranger's soul;More soft, than Memnon's harp its music plays, (16)Trilled by the sportive touch of orient rays.
So, where gay Hagley, drest in sylvan pride, (17)Reflects its image on the tranquil tide,The widowed minstrel loved his reed to play,And dream of Lucy thro the livelong day.
So plaintive Shaw in grief's spontaneous strain (18)Sung his lost Emma to the sylvan train,And round his Leasowes to the listening groveSo Shenstone warbled notes of hopeless love.
For injured feeling when fond hope has flown,What can suffice, and what in price atone?What blest Siloam shall to health restoreThe cheerless wretch, who bleeds at every pore?Faint on despair, the stinted kindness shines,Faint, as the wintry sun on Siber's mines,The distant gleam with sullen contrast falls,Flits o'er the past, and every grief recals.
The piteous youth beside yon straggling thorn,His hair dishevelled, and his look forlorn,Whose hollow eyes, by midnight watchings pale,With mute reproach upbraid the piercing gale,Once shone, like thee, howe'er matured in grace,The manly glory of an ancient race;Once, skilled in lore, informed with brilliant sense,And poured Hyblæan strains of eloquence;Once gaily pleased, for love his heart beguiled,And mutual passion ripened, while she smiled;But fate's stern angel, foe of all that's fair,With sickening envy eyed the faithful pair,Sped the fell shaft, which bade perfection die,And cut the knot, he never could untie. (19)
Oft as the village sports at evening close,And westering twilight sinks to short repose,Pale, as some withered corpse, with muttered criesThe pensive mourner thro the churchyard hies,Bends o'er Maria's grave in speechless grief,With looks, that ask, yet seem to mock relief,And, crazed with anguish, turns his frantic glare,Raves to the wind, or breathes convulsive prayer:Hah! 'tis his voice, that on the ravening galeHeaves the deep plaint, and pours the tender wail,It seems in fitful strains his woes to moan,Or half suppressed remurmurs in a groan.And can the scenes of idle tumult lend.One gleam of comfort for his perished friend?Can social glee Iapian balms impartTo chase one anguish from his harrowed heart?Yet shall retirement yield some mystic leafTo staunch the wounds of solitary grief;And, while in softer tones and milder woeRound memory's eye the imaged sorrows flow,Fond hope, as life decays, with sweet control (20)To fancy's dreams shall harmonize his soul.
But when the passions, urged by darker strife,Prey on the soul to burst the springs of life,Or brood o'er human ills with sleepless careTo fix some purpose of convulsed despair;If harshly doomed those deadly pangs to feel,Which time can ne'er subdue, nor fancy heal,To mark with frenzied glare parental prideFrown on thy hopes, and crush thy destined bride;Parental pride! whose withering prudence spiesNo worth, but interest, thro its jaundiced eyes,And stands unawed, in sacred fury wild,The lustful murderer of its bartered child;If such thy doom, with eager steps evadeThe glen, the stream, the twilight, and the glade;Fly from thyself, nor rouse in sullen moodThe lurid thoughts, from hell's worst sorcery brewed;Lest thy quick wrath indignant smite the airWith muttered curses on the blighted fair,Or injured honor burn with impious ireTo point destruction on the guilty sire:Fly the rich page, where gloomy genius drewHis Werter bleeding, and his crazed St. Preux,Where schemes of dreadful presage win the mindIn spells, that fasten, and in charms, that blindLest in some hour, when cautious reason sleeps,Thy weary footsteps pace Leucadian steeps,Love, hatred, vengeance, death, thy soul divide,And wroth distraction woo to suicide.
Nor seek the crowd, whose jealous vice lays bareIn senseless rage the wounds of fixed despair;Keen to destroy, there lurks the insidious smile,Corrupt in hatred, and in kindness vile;There lovelorn anguish claims no generous tear,The look, half pity, kindling barbs a sneer.Yea, as the funeral flames unwedded rose,Disdained alliance, and abhorred to close,When fierce in death the rival brothers lay, (21)On the same pyre, in Thebes' disastrous day:So be thy life from maddening riot free,Its baleful commerce, and its heartless glee,Eternal warfare urge thy closing breath,And stern division triumph over death.But on the breast of some fond friend recline,Whose joys commune, whose sorrows melt with thine;So shall a holier dew from heaven distilled,Hush the sharp throb, and quench the sigh unwilled;So pensive memory lose the sense of pain,Charmed into peace beneath affection's reign.
Nor less we own seclusion's magic skillTo mould the temper, as she guides the will;Beneath her shades the kindred virtues meet,Blend in gay groups, and twine in union sweet;Resigned their rage the fiery passions rest,And gentlest musings woo the softened breast;Tranquil, yet bright, each beauteous image flowsTo lull the soul in fancy's witched repose.E'en those we love, more winning graces gainFrom the strange sweetness of a twilight plain;We wake, we live, the talisman's controlWith nice attraction draws the mellowed soul,Joy swells the pulse, and pity's trembling sighSteals from each nerve responsive sympathy.
How blest that state, where mingling hearts unite,Blend in desire, and hail the nuptial rite!Then all is peace, for nature's charms combineTo sooth each passion, and each sense refine;Then all is peace, and many an artless wileSteals from domestic care its grateful smile;Seductive converse flows from eye to eye,Speaks in a tear, and utters in a sigh;Each wish declared, ere from the lips it part,With magnet influence finds its kindred heart;Each virtue brightened gives the soul to traceIn conscious love, its grandeur and its grace.
O! wake with passion's fine, creative powerHer rich enchantment, her ecstatic hour;She, holy cherub, o'er the couch of death,Bends with mild gaze to stay the parting breath,From wan despair averts the impending storm,And lights a smile on horror's haggard form!Lo, where she turns, what instant beauties rise,Flowers blush to life, and carols peal the skies;Ambrosial dews their nectared balms dispense,To charm with varying sweets the ravished sense;Responsive echoes wind the rifted steeps,Dance the live groves, the amorous mountain leaps;High swells the Lesbian hymn, old ocean hears,And rules immortal love, and shakes the spheres.
Without her presence where shall bliss reside?E'en fair Calypso loathed her deathless pride: (22)On wings divine aërial spirits shotTen thousand odors thro her sparkling grot,Round her rich couch with warbling echoes played,And arched the myrtle's salutary shade,With fragrant breath the cooling zephyrs wove;But all was sadness in thine absence, love!Immortal life had lost the power to please,And health and beauty languished for disease.
Mysterious power! what thrilling transports pain,What fine sensations pass the trembling brain,When thy first smile suspends the gazing eye,Veiled in the blush of hope, and asks reply!Quick flies the pulse with interrupted leap,Then flows in sweetness, then subsides to sleep;But wak'd once more, what gentle tumults rise,What swift vibrations speed renewed surprise!From each fine nerve impetuous motions wingDelirious joys to life's ecstatic spring,Round the brisk eye enchanted scenery floats,Thro the spelled ear distil ethereal notes,Voluptuous bliss the tingling senses chains,And o'er the whole one bright Elysium reigns.
So felt Apelles, when his hand essayed, (23)With trembling touch, to sketch the Persian maid:With gradual grace beneath his mimic artGlow the fresh smiles, the swelling beauties start;But when, as life, the perfect figure stood,Like Venus blushing from the conscious flood,The wondering artist gazed with tenderer thought,And bowed the slave of charms his pencil wrought.
But say, what climes her genial presence greets,What blest Arcadia owns her fond retreats?Dwells she, where pride to fashion's altar rearsThe gathered follies of an age of years?Dwells she, where envy, veiled in friendship's guise,Matures her plots, and murders by surmise?Far other scenes invite her aid divine,Far other votaries throng her favored shrine;There, like sepulchral flames, by darkness fed,Her glimmered raptures scarcely light the dead.She seeks the tranquil hours of social mirth,The mild communion, the domestic hearth;Her sister rites with meek devotion pays,And round the Lares twines with melting gaze;Her ready choice, affection's pensive mood,Her best reliance, peace and solitude.
Transcendant bliss! which souls sublime respire,Steeped in the streams of rapture's purest fire;Whence all thy powers, thy charms beyond compare,Let thy rapt votary's panting heart declare,What time gay hope disports in blushing youth,And bright illusion wins to manly truth.O! he can tell, what pure emotions spring,Thrill the live soul, and nerve its lofty wing!When from some cliff, whose caves reechoing roar,He eyes the wild surf heave the trembling shore,Or dares at midnight's hour devoutly strayThe churchyard thro with melancholy gray,Marks the pale crescent ride her chariot high,"Or pores upon the brook, that babbles by."O! he can tell, the varied prospect teemsWith more, than poets paint in eastern dreams;Pants not a breeze, but through the rustling groveIts soft responses whisper notes of love;Springs not a thought, but o'er its secret viewsThe wizard, fancy, sheds her rainbow hues;Glows not a wish, but wings its chaste desireMore pure, than incense lit by vestal fire:Such wonderous charms the sorceress bids advance,Caught from the fairy realms of wild romance!And such to bless shall mild affection own,When youth and health and fortune's gifts are flown;And such to bless shall gild seclusion's reign,While memory lights, or fiction haunts the brain;Those leave the peace to conscious merit given,And these with wisdom teach the joys of heaven.
But these are charms, which genuine taste bestows,These only virtue, blameless virtue, knows:In vain Seclusion boasts a mystic powerTo steal from vice one agonizing hour;Stern conscience fixes on her fated preyWith sullen anguish, and diseased dismay.
Unhappy truth, by kings and slaves confest, (24)How sure thy sway shall Cromwell's fate attest!He, when a world his proud command obeyed,Shrunk from himself, and feared his moving shadeOn every side guilt saw with strange alarmThe airy dagger, and the murderous arm.
Perhaps ye deem, where grandeur holds the throne,No odious cares invade, no faultering groan;But loves and graces lead their circling dance,Gay, as the forms rehearsed in wild romance.Delusive thoughts! that haunt the domes of state,False, as the dreams, dismissed the ivory gate: (25)Far different tests severe experience bringsTo point its moral on the fate of kings.
Ask lovely Maintenon, when fortune smiled (26)To deck with regal charms its favorite child,Why mid St. Cyr's lone walls she loved to dwell,And pace with musing step the vestal's cellHer conscious lips the motive could declare,Beneath the purple lurks the fiend of care.
So to the shades of calm ripaille's retreat,Savoy's proud monarch turned his pilgrim feet, (27)When age had damped ambition's vivid flame,And taught, that royal pomp usurps—a name.
And lo, where zehrah's lofty turrets riseWith marble grandeur to the genial skies,What curious beauties seize the wondering sense,Profuse in wealth, in luxury intense!Blaze the vast domes, inwrought with fretted gold,The sumptuous pavements veins of pearl unfold;Arch piled on arch with columned pride ascend,Grove link'd to grove their mingling shadows bend;From thousand springs pavilioned fountains playRefreshing coolness thro the sultry day;Fruits, flowers, and fragrance all at once conspireTo thrill the soul, and renovate desire:Yet hear the caliph of the bright domain, (28)When fifty suns had graced his golden reign,When war's last triumph left no theme for praise,And peace and victory led their golden days;Yet hear the sage, whose sobered thought confinedTo half a moon his real bliss of mind;"Vain are the gifts deluded mortals prize;"Place not thy trust, O man, beneath the skies!"
In life's thronged paths how few with safety tread,Nor mourn their virtues stained, their hopes misled;How few approve, in judgment's tranquil hour,The vain pursuit of wealth, the strife for power;Heedless that time the summer dreams will shroud,We seek a goddess, and embrace a cloud! (29)"Man wants but little here, nor wants that long,"Sung the sweet muse of melancholy song;Soon must this goodly frame dissolve and die,Swept, like a vapor, from the wintry sky;The treasured ore, the pageantry of state,In vain delay the insidious march of fate;On higher views the immortal soul must rise,Than wealth or power or eloquence supplies,In that stern hour, when shivering on the bourn,Whence love and genius know no blest return,On moral views, from lettered wisdom caught,And formed and cherished in sequestered thought.
When age has quenched the eye's impassioned fire,And joy's faint colorings glimmer to expire,Where shall he turn, whose drooping soul sustainsThe heavy load, which clogs life's fluttering veins?Far hence removed the friends of early youth,Whose smile was rapture, and whose language, truth,Himself alone of all the numerous train,Whose careless laughter swept the breezy plain,Like some rude column desolately cast,Left to record decay, and tell the past!Too oft the good man on his spirit preys,Sunk in neglect with glory's latter days;Too oft, unfriended by the slaves he fed,Like Belisarius, begs his daily bread, (30)Till worn with secret griefs he sighs distrest,"My age is past, O! lay me down to rest."
Then let the gentler sympathies combineTo slope the way to nature's slow decline;Sweet is the task to sooth the unequal strife,"And rock the cradle of enfeebled life;"There shall the cherub, love, with fond employPress round the soul some chaste, domestic joy;There cheering friendship watch with sleepless eye,True, as the needle points the polar sky,Brightening till death, and faithful in decay,Compose with pious hands the senseless clay.
Nor let the virtuous fear time's secret rage,Theirs are delights, which every pain assuage,Which still, as life declines, with soothing charmIts rigors soften, and its cares disarm;For them retirement decks her fragrant bower,Culls every herb, and sweetens every hour;For them hope weaves a balmy couch of peace,Lifts the faint heart, and bids its flutterings cease;Bright, yet serene, religion's prospects rise,Like evening twilight breathed from summer skies.
Far from the world, its pleasures and its strife,The good St. Aubin passed his tranquil life;Deep in a glen the rural mansion rose,And half an acre spanned its modest close;Just by the door a living streamlet rolled,Whose pebbly bottom gleamed with sandy gold,There first the woodlark hailed propitious spring,The humming insect dipped his glossy wing,The branching elms in ancient grandeur spread,Inweaved with myrtles, near its babbling head.Behind, vast mountains closed the wonderous view,Hung o'er the horizon veiled in hazy blue,Save when the shutting eve mid vapors oarRolled its last gleams their woody summits o'er,And, seen at distance, thro some opening brakeTransparent brightness lit the neighbouring lake.
Scenes, where salvator's soul had joyed to climbMid wilds abrupt, and images sublime,Or caught with kindling glance the bold designs,Where horror's form on beauty's lap reclines.
Meek was St. Aubin's soul, his gentle air (31)Spoke to the searching glance the man of care;Unlike the giant oak, which propped on high,Looks o'er the storm, and dares its bolts defy,But as the humbler reed, whose pliant trainBend to the breeze, and rise to bloom again.His ready smile relieved the welcome poor,Who thronged with daily joy his opening door;Unskilled by worldly arts the soul to scan,His social nature loved the race of man;Nor sought by godly rites religious praise,More pleased to pay obeisance, than to raise;Nor wished the booktaught lore, whose schemes confinedTo one small spot the charities of mind.Let the vain Levite pass the other sideIn courtly pomp, in dull, official pride,His proffered alms the wandering stranger found,Wine for his heart, and ointment for his wound,The cheer reply, the scholar's modest jest,In want a shelter, and a home for rest.
One darling daughter claimed the good man's care,Gay, as the lark, but scarce more gay, than fair;Light were the sportive locks, whose curls profuseHung o'er her neck in native wildness loose;Blue were the speaking eyes, whose bended lashHalf hid and half betrayed a fluttering flash;Health's glowing rose, in shadowed lustre sleek,Diffused its virgin blush o'er either cheek;Love in her form its bright perfection traced,Yet drest the model, still to nature chaste;No sober tricks, no mawkish whims confinedHer lively ease, her innocence of mind;A parent's taste each pure refinement taught,And fixed the polish, when it formed the thought,To fancy's lustre lent the touch of art,And gave the judgment force to guide the heart.
Up with the morn the hermit skimmed the dew,And thro the echoing woods his shrill horn blew;At noon well pleased beside some rippling streamWove blameless fiction's legendary dream,Or, lulled to peace, with curious love pursuedThe courteous muse thro every changing mood,Wept at her woes of many a tear beguiled,And felt her joys, and acted o'er the child.
But when the curfew tolled the hour of rest,And eve's fine blush imbued the glowing west,Beneath a shadowy bower, with myrtles crowned,His moral lectures constant audience found.Charmed to his knees his cheerful infant cameTo lisp with trembling voice a father's name,Rehearsed her early task, and pleased awhileWith earnest sweetness drew his anxious smile.There too in riper age the artless JanePoured in wild tones her melancholy strain,Or touched the lute with many a pensive air,Or breathed her grateful soul in thanks and prayer;Such holy rites the good man loved to keep,Till praise and blessing brought the hour of sleep.
Well may remembrance love the favored dayMy truant footsteps chanced to pass that way,When on his doorstone sat the sage and told,How mind and sense their gradual powers unfold;Then higher raised the moral pleasures traced,Whose touch harmonious charms the nascent taste,With love and rapture warms the poet's page,Or moulds to deeds divine a slothful age;And thence, as holier purpose fired his soul,Sung the first Cause, whose wisdom formed the whole.
The while he spoke, methought his spirit shedSome heavenly dew of mingled hope and dread;Mysterious influence seemed to haunt the shade,And round his face transfiguring brightness played.
But all is past, and scarce the eye can traceOne ruined monument of former grace.Short is the tale, nor power, nor harsh disdain,With lordly triumph grasped his small domain,Nor base seduction lured by syren charmsHis rifled treasure from a father's arms:Heaven frowned severe, its awful mandate sent,And claimed the darling hope its bounty lent.
Beside the couch, where Jane expiring lay,The hermit knelt, and prayed, or seemed to pray,Dim were his eyes, with anxious vigils worn,Yet spoke a soul with no harsh tumults torn;E'en in the agonies of dumb despair,Devotion's smile was seen and cherished there:And, as the lingering powers of life decayed,Faith beamed her radiance thro the deepening shade,With firm reliance drank the parting breath,Kissed the pale lips, and closed the eyes in death,Thro brighter realms the unbodied cherub sought,Realms pure in bliss beyond the soar of thought,
Slow thro the narrow path, by misery worn,Passed the veiled corpse, in shrouded silence borne;No vain parade, no courtly pageant spreadTheir sickly honors round the virgin dead;Strewed o'er the bier some vernal flowers were seen,And here and there a sweetbriar fell between.The father came in sorrow's holiest gloom,His raised eye fixed on hopes beyond the tomb,Still, as the tempest, hushed in dread suspense,Yet mild, as twilight greets the wakening sense;No muttered groans, no stiffed anguish shookHis meek repose, his calm, unaltered look,Save, when the ritual closed its sainted strain,And o'er the coffin rolled the earth again,One lingering tear, that seemed the man to speak,With briny lustre trickled down his check,One lingering tear was all his spirit gave,Then bowed a last farewell, and left the grave!
Yet had not memory lost her soothing art,Nor fancy closed her empire in the heart:When up the groves unclouded moonlight streamedAt the lone hour, to goblins sacred deemed,When sober day, mid vapory glooms descried,Shot its faint crimson round at eventide,Oft would he rove some mountain's brow along,And pour in shattered tones his plaintive song,Kiss the stray flowers, which drest the streamlet's marge,Or row athwart the lake his aged barge;And when some spot, where Jane was wont to roam,Some favorite pastime called his spirit home,If once a sigh his heaving bosom pressed,His trust in heaven was all, that sigh expressed.Oft would he trim his wintry hearth, and courtRemembered scenes of pleasantry and sport,Mark, where the lute secured its dusty płace,The needled landscape on the wainscot trace,The quaint remark, the evening task review,And chase the fleeting shades, and dream anew.
Nor smile, ye proud, if thoughts, like these, engageThe friendless soul in melancholy age,More sweet, than all the hymns of active joy,One moment sacred to this chaste employ,One pious hour, to moral musing given,Its relish truth, its harmonies from heaven!And, as the hapless wretch, by storms o'ercast,Clings, shuddering clings him, to the fatal mast,So hope and love, yet buoyant on the wave,Shall snatch their relics from the ravenous grave,And most, as life recedes, with fond alarmsFold the dear types immortal in their arms.
Near where a cypress shades the lonely heath,Long has St. Aubin slept the sleep of death;O'er the rude hillock waves the rank grass high,And moans the wild blast, as it hurtles by:One simple stone, with village rhymes bedight,Just tells the tale to every passing wight,And bids his drooping soul aspire to raiseSuch love in life, in death such honest praise.
Sure, if one blessing heaven to mortals lend,'Tis this pure peace, that calms the good man's end;'Tis this transcendant power, whose views refined,Control the passions, and correct the mind:This, tho the pride of fortune melt away,And drowsy age on sickening fancy prey,Still lights the mind to feeling's gentler rest,And sheds around 'the sunshine of the breast!'
When, warm with life, unclouded fancy glows,How loves the mind to roam at evening's close;Beside some murmuring brook, by memory led,To light the classic torch, and search the dead;Or raise each shadowy form of youthful mirth,Love's plighted hour, and friendship's wintry hearth!For these are scenes, tho marked on childhood's page,Whence flows a charm beyond the waste of age.Evoke its trains, evoke its noisy sports,Its breezy woodwalks, and its green resorts,Where every eve the little heroes prest,To catch with eager ears some circling jest,The passing creed, thro many a story spun,Of witch or goblin, murdered knight or nun;Or feats of pith, to every truant known,Amused the crowd, and won the victor's crown;How bright their shades in swift procession pass,Seen thro the distant glimpse of memory's glass!How sweetly speak the moral voice to youth,In tones of love, yet eloquence of truth!
But thus not always on the chart of timeGlow the light forms of childhood's golden prime;Oft shall the tear of warm regret be shed,When many a peril past, a tempest fled,The aged pilgrim sits him down to traceSome dream of early life, some infant grace,And oft his bosom heave unbidden sighsO'er the sad wreck of friendship's severed ties.
And is there here no blest Elysian grove,Whose golden branches shield the fruits of love?Are all the scenes, which vigorous genius frames,But vain illusions, and ideal names?Pants but the soul for higher joys to throwOn human ills a visionary woe?Let narrow prudence boast its groveling art,To chill the generous sympathies of heart,Teach to subdue each thought sublimely wild,And crush, like Herod, fancy's newborn child;The cultured mind, which active sense inspires,For nobler flights shall trim its slumbering fires,From airy dreams, tho weaved in fiction's loom,Point virtue's triumph o'er the closing tomb,For happier climes its destined glory plan,And lend immortal life to mortal man.
Come then, sweet Friendship, who in Harvard's bowersWith calm enjoyment winged my youthful hours,Whose cheering power consoles the dying slave,Recals the sleeping Lazarus from his grave,In soothest sorcery binds the maniac's cell,And lulls to peace the monster hags of hell;Come, and with solitude's serene employChase every care, and ripen every joy,Till this distracted heart forget to weep,Locked in the grave's inviolable sleep.
