’Tis grateful in these scenes at closing day,

From vapid joys and irksome cares remote,

To wander by the rising moon’s pale ray,

As night’s melodious bird attunes her note:

And the young shepherd’s mellow whistled strain,

Or love-cross’d ballad while he folds his flock,

Softens the sullen heaving of the main,

Dashing the pebbled shore and pointed rock.

Now deepen’d shades and sounds of falling night

In solemn reveries entrance the soul,

And raise her, with a spirit’s rapid flight,

Where purer spheres in higher regions roll,

Exists there one, who carelessly can view

The vivid glory of the sun’s last gleams

On the green wave reflect a vermil hue,

And upward cast pale heat-portending beams?

When the white cliff receives the ruddy glow,

And the splendid flushes smooth its craggy side;

When the glaz’d windows of the war-ship throw

A sparkling radiance o’er the crimson’d tide;

When rising Venus sheds her light of love,

Fresh from the main, as erst the Goddess rose;

When in his circuit shines the belted Jove,

And further orbs their twinkling sparks disclose:

Now high reflected radiance richly warms

The blue horizon with vermilion streaks,

And of To-morrow’s renovated charms,

Propitiously the ev’ning glory speaks.

But why, oh Hope! will thy confiding heart

To-morrow’s pledge so credulously trust?

Deceitful as to-day will she depart,

Like her to ev’ry previous vaunt unjust.

Yet Hope’s enchantment robes the distant scene,

Fair seems To-morrow in perspective view,

False will she be, as former days have been,

But though the dream deceive, its bliss is true:

Upon the silver willow’s trembling leaves

The varying hues of Ev’ning radiance glow,

Its last sigh there the breeze of sunset heaves,

And dimples with soft kiss the rill below.

The tenants of the field in pastime close

Their festive day, their verdant couch resume,

And silent nature sweetly breathes repose,

As Luna’s beams the twilight shade illume.

The balm and freshness of a summer eve,

Just as brown Night her starry eye unseals,

The languid qualms of baffled hope relieve,

And her sick heart for one blest moment heals.

Still may I, Evening, hear thy farewell sigh,

Whisper of peace, and on the willow die.

Tread softly, lest you interrupt her strains,

Nought but the Nightingale could breathe those
notes;

She, urg’d by fervid June, from arid plains,

Her farewell song to these cool hills devotes.

Mark you that knoll by spreading beeches crown’d,

Down whose green side a silver riv’let streams,

And at its base describes a flower fring’d round,

Where to the Moon the quiv’ring aspin gleams:

There, at the verge where od’rous woodbines flaunt,

Where rears the low white cot its roof of straw,

Is Philomela’s latest annual haunt,

From Vecta’s summer’s sun ere she withdraw.

Daughter of Heav’n, Queen of the train of
Night,

The silver glory of thy brows unveil,

The envious vapours dim thine eye of light,

And drizzling, on the sighing breezes sail,

Bid mourning Night assume her azure stole,

Shed on her dreary course the lambent flame.

That fires or melts to tenderness the soul,

And purifies the intellectual frame.

They whom affection joins and fortune parts

Make thee the centre of their distant views,

And from the sympathy of plighted hearts

Each feels that each the darling theme renews.

These nodding battlements the dusk embrowns,

And that huge fractur’d and impending mass

Through the dark veil of night more sternly
frowns,

And seems to shake, as waves its mantling grass.

View from that hollow oak of giant bulk,

Stay’d by the yawning wall, its branches prop,

In muffling garb the meager outlaw skulk,

Irresolutely fly, look round and stop.

He gazes, starts, and listens—all is still,

All but the breeze that waves his matted hair,

Then wildly speeds where purls the shallow rill,

Drinks, and explores the scrip one friend left
there;

Wroxall! though thou art dreary, dull, and
cold,

Though May, when she returns to cheer the isle,

Still finds thee numbed in Winter’s icy fold,

And scarcely warms thee with her parting smile;

Though ’mid the straggling cots about thee
spread,

Nor sacred pile, nor manse, nor lordly dome,

Raises its tower’d, or meek, or haughty head;

I prize thee as my rustic peaceful home.

I love to steal along thy lonely ways,

Verg’d with wild flow’rs in ev’ning dew impearl’d,

Behold no mortal in my wide-stretch’d gaze,

And seem alone in a deserted world.

When blushing on the bosom of the main,

The sun in his cærulean path descends;

Seeking his cottage-home, the cheerful swain

Whistles, rejoicing one day’s labour ends.

For ’tis but pleasure for himself to toil,

To cultivate and store his narrow plot,

To hive his swarm, to teach the vine to coil

With willing clasp around his shelter’d cot,

While the full moon peeps o’er surrounding hills,

And pensive twilight lingers in her ray,

And his last notes the piping blackbird trills,

And infant voices join the peasant’s lay.

What, infant Spring! though Winter’s breath
embrown

Thy budding wreaths, thy frequent tears congeal;

Though sobbing gusts thy whisper’d promise
drown,

Though veiling mists thy youthful charms conceal;

I mark the buds beneath thy finger rise,

And often hear thy voice, and feel thy sigh,

When through the parting clouds that gloom the
skies

Gleams the blue lustre of thy humid eye.

But most I feel and greet thee, infant Spring!

In the light evening of increasing day,

When first the skylark tries his trembling wing,

And carols to the setting sun his lay.

Dost thou, sweet Thrush! the youthful Spring
salute,

And on her tender ear with rapture pour

The warbled triumph of a favour’d suit;

And for thy mate her shelt’ring hand implore?

Or did the object of thy early choice

With wing’d disdain repulse thy softest prayer?

And dost thou modulate thy mellow voice

To charm the gloomy spirit of despair?

Did she with partial flights thy love amuse,

Then mock, and leave thee, widow’d and forlorn?

And would’st thou not, wild minstrel, rather lose

The prize of cherish’d hope, by death, than
scorn?

Welcome cold vigil of the gladsome day,

So greeted by the simple past’ral race;

But now, alas! the wish’d return of May

No festive tribes, with strains of rapture, grace.

Those better times, if e’er those times were known,

When Plenty, with Contentment, bless’d the
shed,

And Innocence in hamlets found her throne,

Beyond remembrance and recal are fled.

But then it was, as ancient poets sung,

(And poets still throw fiction’s veil on truth)

That round the Maypole with fresh garlands
hung,

Danc’d each fair nymph with her enamour’d
youth;

To tend’rer feeling, and more soft regret,

The pensive soul impulsively inclines,

When summer suns in temper’d glory set,

And Evening in her stole of amber shines;

Then, through the glowing ether’s trackless road

The constant spirit on a moon-beam rides

To the familiar, though remote, abode,

Where with one well belov’d the heart resides;

With true affection never thrill’d his breast,

His passion nought of sentiment implies,

Who, mindless of the being, lov’d the best,

Views the meek radiance of the Evening skies;

The solemn moon-beams fall, soft dews distil,

While now in pensive mood I lonely walk;

Come sullen spirit of the breezy hill,

Convince a sceptic, and before me stalk.

Skimm’st thou by night the heath’s impurpled
bloom,

To view the rocks abrupt, and white sail’d bark,

While Luna’s rays the sea and coast illume,

Gilding stack’d farm, woods, meads, and mansion’d
park?Open note a01-rota
Appoldurcomb Park.

Wast thou a bard enkindling martial rage?

Wast thou a mighty chief in combat slain,

Still doom’d to haunt this once embattl’d stage,

And guard the barrow’d urns from aught profane?

Morning! the Muse rejects thee as her theme;

Thy breath ne’er kindled her poetic fire;

She never felt thy renovating beam,

Make vocal hers, as erst old Memnon’s lyre.

Morning! with thee no solemn stillness dwells;

Action, light, life, and joy before thee play;

The settling thoughts thy moving scene dispels,

And interrupts the meditated lay,

Preceded by the shrill-voic’d herald lark.

Morn, in thy court the King of Day may
reign;

But more I love the glimmering glow-worm’s
spark,

And, in the moonlight glade, the night-bird’s
strain.

When Love releas’d thy erst unfetter’d tongue,

Thou mover of the passions! thy sweet lyre

The tender god to soft expression strung,

And tun’d to Feeling’s voice the vocal wire.

Still to those tones the faithful string responds,

And speaks not to the heart but in that key;

For Nature, by indissoluble bonds,

United Feeling and true Poesy.

Where Feeling is not, by no studied lore

An unblest bard awakes a touching strain;

His heavy measures drag, or feebly soar;

The breast they move not, though they reach
the brain.

Thou com’st upon Imagination’s wing,

Invention, to inspire the poet’s dream;

To harmonize the wildly-warbling string,

And give to tender Sentiment a theme.

When the strong line comes rushing on the
thought,

When powerful feeling in expression breaks,

Thou, child of Genius! by thy parent taught,

Find’st the conveyance which that feeling
seeks.

Thy faculties no narrow bounds confine;

The incidents of life, at thy command,

To form for thee, still varying groupes, combine,

And yield new subjects to thy plastic hand.

Thee, native Muse! thou solace of my days,

Thou sole Nepenthe of external care,

Who smooth’st my passage o’er uneven ways;

Who from my spirit driv’st the fiend Despair;

Who for my pastime, in Seclusion’s hours,

Tun’st thy wild lyre, beguiling languid Thought

From the prospective where dark Fortune tow’rs,

And bring’st the balm which Hope so vainly
sought;

Thee shall I quit—my last and sole resource!—

Because thou art untutor’d, plain, and wild?

Thee, dearly lov’d! from my fond mind divorce,

And wed, in lieu, scholastic Form’s cold child?

Power of the well-compos’d and manner’d mien,

Of chasten’d feeling and experience born,

Who never see’st what better were unseen,

Who from contempt withhold’st the whip of
scorn—

Discretion! thee, so long unknown, I woo!

O’er warm emotion with cold hand preside,

The impulse which, indulg’d, would harm, subdue,

And to propriety rash conduct guide.

Discretion! thee I call; and should’st thou hear,

Teach me to seem unhurt when prob’d and
sore;

Suppress the ill-tim’d smile, th’unbidden tear;

Wrongs let me bear as though no wrongs I
bore;

What airy form in varying vest appears?

Her changeful looks a fickle mind display,

Like clouds and sunshine of an April day,

Her sudden frown or smile congeals or cheers.

Lur’d by her strain, her easy dupes forget

That friendship is a plant of gradual growth,

That falsehood lurks within the oft-sworn oath,

That love unmerited leaves but regret.

Affection dwells not in her fond embrace.

Break from her fold; her proffer’d kindness
spurn;

For she will warmly clasp; then coldly turn,

And gaze on yours as on a strangers face.

Shun that thin form, compos’d of Hate and Scorn:

She gives her sharpness to the air she breathes;

She blights the fruits in Plenty’s brimful horn,

And nettles binds in Pleasure’s rosy wreaths.

Banish the witch! she but exists to tease,

To aggravate, and to engender ill!

To coil a serpent round the heart of Ease,

And Comfort’s most delightful warmth to chill.

Sour Discontent, as life’s worst foe, abjure!

To weal or bliss she forms the fellest bar:

Her shadow will the clearest views obscure;

A cherub symphony her discords mar.

Reserve! cold mistress of the manner’d mind!

Whose mean, repulsive form Politeness hides

Beneath the mask of Deference refin’d,

Which still assents, but never once confides.

Preceptress of the deep and sanction’d guile,

Trust to entice without return of trust!

To counterfeit Good-Nature’s winning smile!

While at thy heart the social feelings rust.

Ne’er was this breast for thy direction made:

At thy approach instinctively it shrinks,

And clings more closely to the honest shade

Where speaks Veracity what Nature thinks.

Hiding his quiver in a flowery coil—

Demure, with lip just curv’d, and flashing eye—

Wrapped in a cloak, the vulgar guess to foil—

Behold the subtile archer, Irony!

Parthian like, most, when he feigns to fly

From all engagement in the angry broil,

Will, with reverted aim, his arrows ply,

And, slily, his antagonist despoil.

Hark! he harangues the mute, surrounding tribe!

What smooth applause his specious tongue
conveys:

But sense and conscious shame detect the gibe,

Which lurks to wound the heart in undue
praise.

To thee, inspirer of the hallow’d train

Of kind emotions, Sympathy! to thee

Friendship and Love a votive wreath decree,

And bless the tender influence of thy reign.

Thy tears have power to sooth the fiercest pain,

The sinking heart of half its load to free:

Thy cheering smiles to Rapture’s highest key

Raise and refine Enjoyment’s lively strain.

As Feeling leads, thou seek’st the lonely bow’r

Where solitary Grief retires and weeps;

Or that where social Joy his revels keeps,

And blithly laughs away the jocund hour.

Why view the sage with such suspicious eyes?

Why from him turn as from a secret foe,

Because he says Deceit too often lies

Conceal’d beneath Endearment’s specious
show?

He warns thee only to avert the blow

Of Disappointment, and prevent the grief,

The bitter tears, which from her fountain flow,

And leave thee rueful of thy fond belief.

He cautions thee but of a lurking thief,

Who comes to steal thy peace, he tells thee
nought,

Save that of knowledge immature and brief.

The bond of amity is rarely wrought.

Prosperity! to gild thy summer day

The cloudless sun of partial favour shines,

And blooming fully in the fervid ray,

With Pleasure’s roses Love’s green myrtle
twines,

And with their lavish blossoms strew thy way.

Allur’d by thee, from her superior height

The Muse descends; and, blushing, wreathes her
bay

To grace thy brow, and with her robe of light

Thy form invests.—Why change the scenes so
bright?

Why sinks the sun? Why droop thy clustered
flowers?

Why falls thy chaplet? And what adverse powers

Rend and distain thy vesture erst so white?

Were you attracted by th’enlivening song

Of youthful Mirth? and in its festive bow’rs

Did you, amid the animated throng,

Steal from the grasp of Care some joyous
hours?

Yes: then you felt the renovating powers

Of Pleasure’s draught; for Innocence, still
gay,

Enwreath’d the goblet with her vernal flowers,

Infusing freely, in her frolic play,

Her height’ning zest: and bore not you away

A soul by Rapture’s thrilling touch refin’d?

A Muse that felt, in her awaked lay,

The inspiration of a gladden’d mind?

Nymph of the laughing eye, and sportive mien,

In whose blithe smile exists a potent spell

To charm the spirit of the moody spleen,

And from thy circle the black fiend expel,

Come, Cheerfulness! and in my bosom dwell!

Me from disquieting emotions wean:

Teach me the tones, that, thrilling from thy
shell

Arouse the dormant joys of each dull scene;

The lighter ills of life—a countless train—

That in their bud the blooms of Pleasure
blast;

That taint, on Plenty’s board, the sweet repast,

And wither Comfort with corrosive bane;—

These ills—in social scenes so thickly strown—

Where Cheerfulness presides, are ills unknown!

Idol of ardent Youth’s impassion’d pray’r!

God of the flushing cheek and glance of fire!

Whose inspiration wakes the sleeping lyre!

Who cheatest Fancy with thy forms of air!

Thy sacrifice let other hands prepare:

Remotely, wily boy! let me admire

“Thy purple light, and bloom of young Desire.”

Adapt for love my heart, but come not there.

Mine be it to conceive, not feel thy sway.

Upon me, at unhurtful distance, shine;

But ne’er may I, in blind submission, lay

My reason, peace, and judgment, on thy
shrine!

Poets, locality to Peace assign,

And feign her inmate of the rustic cot,

Whose walls are shaded by the cluster’d vine,

Whose casement opens on a blooming plot.

When views the wand’rer a sequester’d spot,

Where Nature and her handmaid Neatness
shine,

In fancy, Peace is there; her simple lot

A rustic nymph, not of the servile line.

To her, the flow’rets seem to owe their bloom,

The bowering umbrage its luxuriant shoot;

Her breath to lend the breeze its rich perfume;

Her glow to redden in the ripening fruit.

Thou, potent mistress of the viewless spells!

Whose magic touch upon the passions plays,

Moves without beauty, without reason sways,

And in Discretion’s spite the heart impels!

With thee, Enchantress! fickle Cupid dwells;

And near thee sweet Persuasion ever stays,

With powers to force involuntary praise,

Even when Judgment at Applause rebels.

Thou, to Simplicity and grace allied,

And by well hidden bonds to Art enchain’d;

Whose hand round Venus erst that cestus tied,

Which Juno borrow’d and her Jove regain’d—

Who, with meek face, and eye of deference, glides

To gen’ral love, and yet whom each arraigns;

Whose art, for polish’d, social life, provides

The daily bread which its frail form sustains?

She Flattery is: where’er she sanction gains,

She boldly snares the weak; and o’er the wise,

That she may throw her mind-degrading chains,

And win shy Confidence, each wile she tries:

Implores, in humble Merit’s bashful guise;

Enchants, as candid Friendship neatly drest;

Imposes, in blunt Honesty’s plain vest;

And lulls Suspicion, when conceal’d she lies

One still observant of the mode, and smart;

With simpering face, and briskly wand’ring
eye;

More form’d to catch the view than seize the
heart;

Varies her airs, and prattling “trips it by.”

Observe you how her restless glances fly

Around the circle, watchful of the gaze

Of wondering Folly? while, smooth-tongued and
sly,

Flattery supports her with suspicious praise.

Who knows not Vanity? her influence sways

The better part of men: to her they give,

With fealty most true, their nights and days;

For her they study, speak, move, act, and live;

Ere that my thoughts to other claims I bend,

Let me proclaim the sacred debt I owe

To thee, preceptor! second father! friend!

From whom proceeds the little all I know.

When, helpless, I near Folly’s vortex stray’d,

A giddy being, by rash Impulse led,

Thou, pitying, saw’st; and, reaching timely aid,

Preserv’dst me from the snares Example spread;

And often now, in retrospective mood,

I view my state, and feel the truths so taught,

That mere existence was a dubious good,

And life’s best pleasures lay in cultur’d thought.

Poetic thoughts and measur’d diction fly,

When grateful friendship feels a mortal blow;

No music rises with the genuine sigh,

And silence is the eloquence of woe.

Could I with epitaph inscribe thy tomb?

By composition’s rule thy merit mete?

No; let a firmer heart and pen assume

A task which sorrow never could complete.

Yet would I mark thy grave with genuine tears,

And wish its deep repose were rather mine;

That I had died, and my remaining years

Imparted length to such a life as thine.

Adieu, my friend! the wish’d, the farewell lay

Take, as it freely flows from warm esteem;

That with regret, while you remotely stray,

Will make your gentle worth a frequent theme.

Now in your mind contending feelings rise—

Sorrow and chasten’d Joy by turns command—

Held to your home by Kindred’s bosom ties,

And drawn away by Hymen’s stronger band.

Then go, my friend! where happy Hymen draws,

To green Madeira’s mild, vine-shaded isle;

And may success await and crown your cause,

Should chance your steps to further climes beguile.

Admir’d I flow’rets in the gay parterre,

Knotted by whim in fanciful conceits,

Which claim attention by obtrusive glare,

And pall the finer sense with vulgar sweets?

And o’er the violet pass’d my heedless eye,

As she from notice modestly withdrew,

And on the dewy evening’s balmy sigh

Her taintless fragrance diffidently threw?

Now, as I mark the fair retiring bloom,

Mark, and distinguish from the primrose flower,

I bless the gale which bore her fresh perfume,

And drew my steps within the shelt’ring bow’r.

With deep concern and sympathy, I view

Thee, Mary, lovely, juvenile, and pure,

With musing mien the studious walk pursue,

Where Pleasure draws with Information’s lure.

Seek not amusements, simple maid, which wind,

To painful tension, Feeling’s tender ties;

Which to expansion raise the powers of mind,

While narrow Fortune wrings them as they rise.

Correct this habit, Mary, as thy bane;

Thy senses, now too keen, let dulness sear;

Join the illiterate, vulgar, and inane;

Confine thy joys and notions to thy sphere:

And when thou canst not modify the light,

Above its action ne’er refine thy sight.

I would indeed, my friend, that peace were
thine;

That Fortune’s wrongs of thee were all redress’d;

I wish thee ease, another ease than mine,

Not the indiff’rence of a hardening breast.

Ne’er be thou stung till stings no more molest;

But to my prayer for thee may heav’n incline,

And Chance with Nature thee to bless combine,

’Till thou art, Anne, in all thy wishes blest.

Envy thou not my solitary ease,

But ponder on its consequence and cost,

The wish departing with the pow’r to please,

And pleasure with the pow’r of pleasing lost.

As the soft flower, engemm’d with glitt’ring dew,

Its meek and blushing head to earth inclines,

But soon revives its tone and brilliant hue,

When cheering Phœbus in his glory shines;

As o’er its petals lucid dew-drops glide,

And still the blossom bright and dry remains,

More sweetly glowing from the grateful tide,

Without or humid trace or with’ring stains:

So now thou droop’st thy lovely head, my friend;

So pearly tears thy rosy cheek suffuse;

So shall, ere long, a happy light ascend,

To chase the woe which that fresh cheek bedews.

Daughter of genius, sentiment, and soul,

Whom nature, youth, and tenderness inspire;

And who, like Plato, hides the poet’s lyre

Beneath impassion’d Rhetoric’s graceful stole;

Enchanting Owenson! who best portrays,

In vivid hues, luxuriant as refin’d,

The changeful features of the female mind,

Accept an unknown sister’s humble lays:

She loves your flight of thought, your native taste,

And more, that, while through Feeling’s every
stage

You lead the heart, strict Virtue hails the page

As love and innocence, as warm and chaste;

Ev’n o’er this humble cot Desertion throws

Dark Melancholy’s heart-depressing chill;

Now on its hearth no crackling brushwood glows,

The ear no shouts of cherub children fill.

In this small plot, with grass and weeds o’ergrown,

Grew ruddy cloves, pinks, aromatic thyme;

The topaz wall-flow’r bloom’d in crevic’d stone,

And tender myrtle brav’d the changeful clime;

Neglect and Solitude their cold marks stamp,

And o’er forsaken homes like horror shed,

As o’er the mortal house when quench’d life’s
lamp,

And stillness, shews the tenant spirit fled.

Then, wretched widow, thy lov’d child is dead,

Consum’d by fell Disease’s lingering tooth;

Ne’er o’er her cheek Health’s rosy bloom was shed;

E’en now I see, slow stalking, pallid Ruth.

Widow! thou sigh’st, by no kind tears reliev’d;

Thy child of age, the partner of thy youth,

Are gone forever. Now, of all bereav’d,

Thou droop’st in mute despair o’er silent Ruth.

Thee (still as she) sole inmate of thy room,

Thine only room, no sympathy can sooth;

While round thee hangs deep Sorrow’s awful
gloom,

And fixt thy glaz’d sunk eyes on lifeless Ruth.

How lingers Thought on those departed scenes

Where Time’s dull foot assum’d Enjoyment’s
wings;

But Pleasure’s wither’d roses Mem’ry gleans,

And o’er the urn of Hope the garland flings.

Frigid and gloomy is the deep’ning shade

Which parted joys o’er present misery throw,

Their ling’ring spirits every spot invade,

And rise to break the bleeding heart of Woe.

If Hope beguile, she blesses as she cheats;

But Mem’ry with high colours falsely paints,

Casts in our cup the dregs of long-drain’d sweets,

And with regret the passing pleasure taints.

While her fond heart against the deed rebels,

While to her buried lord her hopes ascend,

Maternal love the widow’s vows impels,

To gain her only child one fost’ring friend.

True to the mem’ry of her former love,

Rather a victim than a bride she seems;

Her feign’d and cheerless smiles deep sighs reprove;

From her dim eye the tear unbidden streams;

Sorrow conflicts with duty in her breast.

The mournful privilege of grief destroy’d,

Too feelingly her glowing looks attest

Esteem can never fill Affection’s void;

Go, boy! thy widow’d mother’s only stay,

With all the fortune that its wrecks afford,

Thy father’s name, his glory and his sword,

Fight thro’ a boist’rous world thy troubled way.

The spotless honours of an ancient name

To thee, the last of all thy race, descend;

And may they now with thy existence end

Rather than catch from thee a tinge of shame.

To rear thy tender age I strove with pain,

Nor want, nor toil, for thee refus’d to meet;

Yet be it mine to weave thy winding-sheet,

If thou in Glory’s cause no trophy gain.

Then thou art gone, my son! and with thee goes

My heart’s, my widow’d heart’s, sole earthly
stay!

Soon o’er me, too, thy father’s grave shall close;

Soon shall we join with him the cherub’s lay.

With him I liv’d a few short years of bliss:

He died—and I existed but for thee,

For thee whose being form’d the pride of his!

Now, thou art dead, and life has nought for
me:

And though, alas! in thy untimely fall,

Again, to me, thy honour’d father dies,

Yet would I not the brave exploit recall,

Which lifts our name with glory to the skies!

Why, buried tenant of this falling shed,

As still expecting thee, look I around,

And, missing in the chimney-nook thy head,

Glance o’er the garden’s now uncultur’d
ground?

There none to welcome me his labour leaves,

Nor culls with grateful hand the choicest fruit;

But there her swarming web the blight-worm
weaves,

And o’er the dying grafts the wild stocks shoot.

Long may I seek, but thee shall never meet;

Ne’er sooth again the oft-repeated woes,

Now deeply lull’d in that profound retreat,

Where every human suffering finds repose;

Heed not the clashing element’s affray,

But, bowing down thy head, its force evade;

The storms which fret thee waste the troubled
Day,

And bring still Evening on with all her shade.

Quickly will life and its turmoils decay;

The throbbing heart will beat itself to rest;

And while vexations on thy spirits prey,

They speed the hour which nothing shall molest.

Thine eye beyond the present isthmus cast

On the vast track before thee, and behind

The shadowy future, and the dreary past,

The opening stage and gulf of human kind.

So! thou art calm, insensible, and chill,

Proficient in the art of self controul,

And canst subdue thy feelings to thy will,

And look unmov’d when quakes convuls’d thy
soul?

Talk thou to others thus, but not to me;

To me who pierce the foldings of thy mind,

And can, beneath its feign’d indiff’rence, see

A sensibility too much refin’d.

Have I not mark’d thee turning oft to quell

Or hide th’emotions of thy lab’ring breast?

And oft, to wipe the rebel tear which fell

Upon the cheek, in smiles most falsely dress’d?

I mourn to see thee—thee! in guile unskill’d,

On the fair promise, pledg’d without design,

So fondly thus thy schemes of pleasure build;

So, in security compos’d, recline.

Thou little reck’st how manifold the ways

Evasion finds to break Engagement’s bound;

And still to seem, while from its pale she strays,

By Honour guided from the sacred ground.

Thou seest not danger in that subtle speech,

Which binds the faith, and gives no mutual
ties;

Heeds lit’ral truth, but mocks its virtual breach,

And thy attempt at seizing proof defies.

Once—and to me still present are the days,

Tho’ swallow’d in the gulf of former years—

I saw those blue eyes dart Affection’s rays,

Or lovelier beam through sympathetic tears.

That smile, the language of the blandest mind,

To hope and tenderness could thaw despair;

And, to those teeth, poor are the pearls which bind

The glossy tangles of that pale brown hair.

Those eyes, those lips, are clos’d to ope no more;

The dust of death those wavy tresses soils;

On that smooth bosom, and the heart it bore,

The flesh-worm banquets, and, reposing, coils.

In this lone scene, fast sinking in decay,

What sweet illusions, cheating thought, restore;

Those happy hours of childhood’s fleeting day,

Which, save in Fancy’s dreams, return no more!

O’er this sunk porch, with grass and grey moss
lin’d,

The fruitful fig her mantling verdure threw;

Round her dark bole the honeysuckle twin’d,

And at her foot the spring’s first violets grew.

On that cold hearth, glaz’d with the dew-snail’s
slime;

On those oak seats, with hoary mould defil’d,

Sat an ag’d pair, form’d in the good old time,

And on their children’s children fondly smil’d.

What visions of past times and joys arise,

What fond regrets on pensive feeling prey,

When, o’er a natal dwelling in decay,

Maturity, with life disgusted, sighs!

Once, when all nature glow’d with Hope’s first
gloss,

Near this rent wall, then barely crack’d, I
stood,

To watch the red-breast tend her callow brood,

And o’er the crevice drew the shelt’ring moss.

Where thrusts the crocus through the matted
sward,

Her bloom of silver, gold, and azure hue,

Cultur’d by me, the choicest flow’rets grew,

And but to call them mine was my reward.

While you, blest child, with cares unburthen’d,
wend

Chaunting wild ditties, through the woodland
bowers,

Why cull, to cast away, the flaunting flowers,

And, gathering more, your arms and vestments
rend?

Are those unpluckt more fragrant or more gay

Than were the blooms now lying at your feet?

Ah, no! they were as lovely, fresh, and sweet;

But, gain’d with ease, with scorn were thrown
away.

The temper of your more mature pursuit

I now behold in its expanding germ,

The object priz’d for expectation’s term,

For distant flowers, forsaken present fruit;

Her natural bias woman should correct,

Not melt her waxen mind at Passion’s flame;

With life her purity of thought protect,

And let her studies brace her mental frame.

If for her pen she frigid subjects choose,

She makes them with her glowing spirit warm;

Woman’s will ever be a tender Muse,

Which throws in rugged themes a softening
charm.

Learn’d Carter, pious Moore, and Barbauld, knew

To lull the passions while the feelings woke;

Affection’s chasten’d sentiments they drew,

But ne’er in vapid Love’s weak jargon spoke.

The ancient bards amid the sanguine fray,

While savage chiefs their scythe-arm’d chariots
wheel’d,

Pour’d in the warrior’s ear the ardent lay,

And his bare breast with Valour’s buckler
steel’d.

They sang—“The souls of valiant men who die

To save their country, or their rights assert,

Around mankind as watchful guardians fly,

Their good accelerate, their ills avert.”

A vivid flame, from fires celestial drawn,

The epic Muse around the hero throws;

Which, as the day-star of a glorious dawn,

Predictive of meridian splendour, glows.

Cold as the mildew’d tomb which guards thy
rest,

And keeps inviolate thy mould’ring bones,

Must be the throbbing tenant of this breast

When it thy claim of gratitude disowns.

Me and thy child, now, as myself, mature,

Thy cares instructed by the toys of youth;

To information drew by pleasure’s lure,

And led from trifles to important truth.

I owe to thee the bias of my thought,

And now from thy low grave ascends my pray’r,

My grateful pray’r, for thee whose kindness
sought

And screen’d my childhood from a tainted air.

When on the earth the shade of Midnight steals,

When Guilt and Mis’ry on their pallets toss,

The eye of Ease and Health, Composure seals,

And no appalling dreams its slumbers cross.

Toil and fatigue will render soft the bed

That lightly swells not with elastic down,

And smooth the pillow for the weary head,

Though no composing bowl the senses drown.

When Fortune’s shaft the guileless bosom rends,

When sighs the spirit with its wakeful woes,

Hope at the couch of Innocence attends,

And lulls the troubled mind to calm repose:

What gloomy shades her view of life embrown,

Whose fortune thwarts the wishes of her heart;

On whom Conviction, Hope, and Mem’ry frown;

From whose young days the joys of youth depart!

And who, exempted from the sweet controul

Of ties to feeling and to nature dear,

An alien lives, in sentiment and soul,

To all within her fate-contracted sphere.

For her, no ray of Hope illumines Thought,

No sympathies her dormant feelings rouse;

Her intellect, perchance, with talent fraught,

Beneath the influence of Despondence bows.

Start not at her, who, in fantastic guise,

Comes wildly chaunting in a dirge-like tone,

With big tears trembling in her vacant eyes,

And uncoif’d tresses by the breezes blown.

Recoil not from the harmless idiot maid,

Who often from a rugged beldame creeps

To yon deserted cottage in the shade,

And its fallen stones, to guard the entrance,
heaps.

There was the home where pass’d her early
years

With parents now withdrawn to final rest,

Who prov’d how infant helplessness endears;

And of a numerous offspring lov’d her best.

Now wails she, as she rudely blocks the door,

“They both are in, and will come out no more.”

What dims the eye where animation shone,—

Hushes the voice which charm’d the list’ning
ear;

Why, once so social, roam’st thou now alone,

Forgetting even her once held so dear?

Thy breast once flam’d with Passion’s brightest
fires,

But now no glow thy torpid feelings own,

And Apathy has o’er thy manners thrown

A chill, which Pity and Dislike inspires.

Yet say’st thou well, that tenderness retires

From that Despair whose woes no balms relieve;

That Friendship’s solace ends when friends
deceive;

That Passion dies when fostering Hope expires;

Now, Fortune! now, said one, thy rage I dare;

He may defy thee who has nought to lose,

And to thy fellest wrongs that bosom bare,

Whose wounds already all relief refuse.

Once could thy promises my faith amuse;

I thought thee true because thou seem’dst so fair;

But now no speciousness my hope renews;

It is not thine to save me from despair.

Once was I wealthy, but my wealth is fled—

Chief of the scene, and now expell’d the stage—

A husband, but my wife is worse than dead—

A father, but my children sham’d my age:—

Forget it!—no—the pleasures of the past,

The guileless glee of Childhood’s fleeting days,

Conspire to make its fairy scenes the last

The hand of Time will from remembrance raze.

Its name revives to Thought’s reverted gaze,

The offspring Fancy nurtur’d in its bowers,

When her false pencil drew Life’s opening
maze—

A smooth, green vista strew’d with fragrant
flowers.

Forget it!—no—whene’er Misfortune lowers,

And o’er the future casts her gloomy shade;

When anxious Expectation sinks, dismay’d,

And Hope, subdu’d by Disappointment, cowers;

Lov’st thou to pace the downland’s mounded
green

In Night’s still hour, when their fantastic maze

Dance lightly round, the feather-footed fays,

Beneath the silent moon’s love-beaming sheen?

Nor trip they on their verdant ring unseen

To the inspired bard’s enthusiast gaze,

When, to the measure of the night-bird’s lays,

They follow up their dream-presiding queen.

Or, when the bowery walk thy step invites,

Where the fond glow-worm, like Leander’s
bride,

Gilding the dark, the torch of Cupid lights,

The course of her approaching love to guide,

With full and varied bloom the rose-bush bends:

Come, and a flow’ret for your chaplet choose;

This one to Zephyr’s wing an odour lends,

But, fully blown, too faded are its hues.

In that, with vivid lustre fragrance blends,

Yet, not enough its silken leaves expand:

This flow’r, half open’d, most invites the hand;

But, ah! its thorny stem the touch offends.

Why should we thus irresolutely stand?

Lo! while we pause, th’ungather’d blossoms
fade,

And each, by sep’rate claims to form our braid

Of Reason’s choice, some pref’rence may command.

Spirit of plaintive Tenderness! refine

The breathings which to sound her name aspire!

Hers! who, of Inspiration’s fount divine,

Most deeply quaff’d of Britain’s female choir!

On the pale willow, drooping o’er her tomb,

Still, and unstrung, suspended rests her lyre;

The silence of the grave its mournful doom,

For no inferior hand can brace its wire.—

Departed Poetess! the bitter woe

Which nipp’d thy hopes, in Youth’s expanding
bloom,

And ting’d thy soft effusions with its gloom,

Shall sweetly to succeeding ages flow;

While Nature breath’d the pray’r of praise
around,

The Greeks with dance and song their gods
ador’d;

Libations of the vine to Bacchus pour’d,

And early sheaves with poppy chaplets bound

For Ceres, whose rich boons with plenty crown’d

Their smiling plains: and at the hallow’d board,

On grateful Mirth’s light wing, their spirits
soar’d,

And festive sports rejoic’d the sacred ground.

And, shall benevolence through all prevail,

Smile in mild eve, laugh in the jocund day,

Impart its vivid freshness to the gale,

And, bouyant, through the range of being
play—

Mark’d you, by yon thatch’d farm that skirts
the down—

Though, but for neatness, could she draw your
eye—

A maid, in apron white, and russet gown,

Who drove her kine, and pass’d, low court’sying,
by?

She, in whose grange her cares and pleasures
lie;

Whose wishes never, in their loftiest flights,

Beyond the confines of her station fly:

She, in whose taste the wake or feast unites,

Of mortal gladness, the supreme delights—

Who all of fame concentres, in the boast

That hers, of dairies, is esteem’d the most;

She, of her sex, my envy most excites.

Repose be to thine ashes, gentle shade!

And still her tend’rest tears shall Mem’ry shed

On the damp sod, which canopies the bed

Where Friendship’s mortal part, for aye, is laid.

And Sorrow oft, by Recollection led,

The budding wreaths of early spring shall
twine

Around the urn that guards thy pillow’d head,

Thou worship’d idol of her sacred shrine.

Nor would she then the solemn tears resign,

Drawn from the fountain of remember’d worth,

For all the joys which Fancy’s pow’rs combine,

To dance amid the sportive train of Mirth.

In Exultation’s scale it weighs not light,

Cooly to turn upon conceding Pride;

And, with superior disregard, to slight

The favours erst to meek Request denied.

And well it ranks on Triumph’s noblest side,

When falls Disdain from her commanding
height,

To stretch the hand, once haughtily decried,

And raise the grov’ler from her humbled plight.

Nor is—though noted last—of least amount,

The lofty consciousness of high desert;

Which, taking not of vulgar wrongs account,

Finds that, unheeded, they can never hurt;

And which, though accidents impede its rise

To greatness, on the wing of Genius flies.

What though Vexation, still attendant, strews

Sharp thorns and wormwood in thy varied way;

What though the wreathes which Friendship
wove decay,

And no enchantment Hope’s sweet spells renews;

If it be thine, led by the willing Muse,

With Fancy, in Illusion’s bowers to stray;

To give to sportive Thought its wildest play,

And colour Life with Fiction’s lustrous hues;

Thou canst in Lethe drown thy worldy care,

In blissful visions tranquillise distress,

While forms more bright than mortal pleasures
wear,

Thy waking dreams with heavenly raptures
bless;

Thinkest, oh youth! the pensive elder said,

That Age is deaf to Mis’ry’s pleading sigh;

That in my breast the softer feelings die,

Because, at thy distress, no tears I shed?

Misdeem not thus: when thou, like me, hast sped

Thro’ Life’s dark vale; and when around thee
fly

Misfortune’s shafts—when bursts each tender
tie,

And Mem’ry lives to mourn Enjoyment dead:

Thou wilt, like me, a grave composure keep,

Whene’er Affliction’s plaintive groans arise;

With fellow-suff’rers often sympathize,

But feel, while bleeds thy heart, thou canst not
weep.

The Queen of Night has only thrice renew’d

The pearly lustre of her changeful sphere,

Since we, with ling’ring eyes and steps, pursu’d

The paths now found so rugged and so drear.

And then, our way to solace and to cheer,

Summer her blushing sweets before us strew’d,

And, to her spicy breath, the bearded ear

Its green head nodded; and we, pausing, view’d

The full-fledg’d lark, fruit of the vernal nest,

Stretch the young wing, yet dubious of its pow’r;

Then, warbling new-found strains, erect his
crest,

And, more embolden’d, in the welkin tower.

A dreadful gloom oppress’d the vital air

With its dead weight—th’incumber’d bosom
shrunk—

And the fell sounds of sorrow and despair

I heard, and trembled, and astounded sunk.

While gloomy apparitions came, to scare

My shuddering sense, a friendly vision rose,

Whose awful presence lull’d each mortal care

In the deep stillness of profound repose,

And bade the eye of stern Reflection close

Upon the frivolous and the narrow scene

Whence sprung the panic dread, the nervous
spleen,

And all the legion of ideal woes.

Though dimpled Joy upon the cheek bestow

A flush, than calm Content’s mild hue more
deep;

Tho’ seems the heart at Pleasure’s call to leap,

And the brisk eye to catch a radiant glow;

Tho’ peals the laugh, the tears may inly flow.

Its unseen gush the closing eyes may steep,

And they, alas! may open but to weep,

As troubled dreams are chas’d by wakeful woe.

Thou little know’st, and may’st thou never know,

How painful to the soul, how hard the task,

The bleeding bosom’s agonising throe,

In easy Gaiety’s blithe smile, to mask—

Feel’st thou all pleasures, on enjoyment, cloy—

The anxious cares which, from abundance,
grow

Desire of wealth, thy restless spirits buoy,

And, from possession, disappointment flow?

Feel’st thou the discontents which poison joy,

In its pellucid cup their venom throw;

Its vivid glow and spicy zest destroy,

And give the dulcet draught the taste of woe?

Nor blame nor fault within the object lies,

Thy mind alone the charge of both must bear;

Thou art a creature destin’d for the skies,

And happiness for thee is centred there.

Then onward press, without repining go,

And, in contentment, taste of heaven below.

Yes, the cold stagnant tide draws near its ebb,

Upon the confines of the grave I tread;

Fate now unravels Life’s entangled web,

And on a point suspends the fine-drawn thread.

Now, in the hour, of all my hours the last,

In vivid lines to Retrospection rise

The stern and rugged features of the past,

But Hope half stifles Recollection’s sighs.

Few gleams of sunshine cheer’d my stormy day;

By Passion blown, I whirled on Folly’s shoal;

Now, all but wreck’d, I work my feeble way,

Where Death, on Trouble’s sea, erects a mole;

That voice, so broken, tremulous, and low;

That dim, sunk eye; that flush’d, yet sallow,
cheek;

That short, quick step, so stagg’ring and so
weak;

That silenc’d wail of pain, e’en while its throe

Augments to torture, in the smother’d shriek;

While, on the throbbing temples, start and
flow

The chilly drops; I must observe and know

The language such expressive symptoms speak.

And, in th’impending, see the certain blow

No human art can soften or avert;

But when it falls, and soon, thou, Jane, must
go

Where Happiness awaits to crown Desert.

Thou, man! to labour doom’d, to pain and dole,

Who risest but to feel thy wants at morn

Who liest down at eve but more forlorn,

In thy mortality thyself console.

Thou see’st a bark upon the billows roll,

Rock’d by the surges, by the winds distress’d,

’Till gain’d the port; when, moor’d in Safety’s
breast,

It mocks the mountain wave and treach’rous
shoal.

The ocean, which incessant storms infest,

Is Life; and thou, weak man! the reeling bark;

The grave the harbour, silent, calm, and dark,

Where rage no tempests, and no cares molest.

Another winter, dreary, cold, and slow,

O’er shiv’ring Albion drags his icy wain;

Arrests the limpid current’s murmuring flow,

And stills the music of the woodland train.

To rescue Nature from the torpid chain

Which numbs, in her fair frame, the vital glow,

The melting breath of genial Spring shall blow,

And Summer clothe, and Autumn strip the plain,

And winter re-assume his frigid reign,

Ere we, my friend—late found, and early lost—

To share the flow of soul, shall meet again;

Shall meet—if not by frowning Fortune cross’d—

Still grant me, Heav’n! while I remain below,

To wear the moments of Life’s fleeting hour,

With calm Contentment, in Seclusion’s bow’r,

Too high to dread contemptuous Pride, too low

To fear sly Envy’s sting or ambush’d blow.

Ne’er let me, Heav’n, intreat a boon of Pow’r,

Nor to its minion’s aught of homage show,

Nor ever measure Merit by her dow’r.

Be no professions mine at Truth’s expense,

But make me, feeling right, speak as I feel;

Still from opinion to my heart appeal,

And rule demeanour by the moral sense.

I mourn’d the woes which marr’d the little span

From puling Infancy to doating Age.

Reflection stood, the depth of ills to guage;

But sick’ning on the melancholy plan,

She paus’d, and sigh’d, and oped, ere she began

(To fortify the heart) the gorgon page,

The horrors which Ambition, Av’rice, Rage,

Stamp on the records of deluded man.

She clos’d the dreadful book, acquitting Fate

Of man’s most dire and self-created ills,

And found, extraneous to his native state,

Most that embitters life, and most that kills.

I pray’d, when struggl’ing with vexatious care,

To be, in heav’n, from all such troubles free;

But, ah! not Piety inspir’d my pray’r,

For still the thought of heav’n associates thee.

I sought not Death, but far away to flee

From such distresses as were hard to bear.

“Would I could die,” I said; but then, to me,

To die to anxious doubt and dread despair,

Were but to live for thee, my bosom friend;

To be thine all, as thou to me hast been;

To feel thee but on me for bliss depend,

As I on thee for all my pleasures lean.

Yes, I beheld him, in his prosp’rous day,

By Fortune favour’d, by her slaves caress’d,

Then when his planet shed its happy ray,

And his high mien his conscious worth express’d.

The erring world believ’d him proud and blest,

But I regarded him with other eyes;

And, woe for him! because most true, the best

Was my instructed and profound surmise.

I saw his heart against his reason rise,

And ev’ry lofty faculty controul;

And all the anguish of a noble soul

Compell’d to love the thing it must despise.

The goods of life why from Enjoyment lock,

Till frozen Age thy faculties benumb,

Or till that day of desolation come,

When Reason staggers at Affliction’s shock?

Thou little reck’st what mighty bars may block

Th’uncertain avenues of distant Bliss;

Its painted shade thy void embrace may mock;

Or thy outstretch’d and eager hand may miss

The substance lying just within thy grasp;

Or it (mischance far more perverse than this)

May change its form and nature in thy clasp,

And with disgust repay thy first fond kiss,

while o’er thee Fortune, Youth, and Pleasure
shine;

While, from the bloom that in their radiance
glows,

The Loves for thee, in height’ning contrast, twine

Idalia’s myrtle with her budding rose.

And while o’er thy encrimson’d lip yet flows

The purple nectar of the gen’rous vine,

Say, from the joy each sated sense bestows,

Is happiness or hollow transport thine?

Not happiness; for ’midst what these impart,

Dost thou not feel a something unpossess’d,

“A craving void left aching in thy breast,”

A blank of being, and a want of heart?

Trembling for thee, oh sanguine youth! I view

That, at the name or thought of future days,

A beamy smile o’er thy fair visage plays;

And that thy judgement, to thy wishes true,

Forewarns thee not how feeble and how few

The reasons are that prop this hope of thine;

That in thy op’ning path a knotless clue,

Thee to conduct to happiness, will twine.

Let staid Reflection teach thee to resign

The expectations Fancy built in air;

That though on high with dazzling light they
shine,

Yet of th’illusive meteor-fire beware:

Why fret thyself with unavailing care?

But from one source do woman’s blessings flow?

And must she every hold of bliss forego,

Because one cherish’d tie dissolv’d in air?

Come warm thy freezing breast with Friendship’s
glow;

And from its core, with vig’rous effort, tear

The love that vibrates with its hurried throe—

Love, nurtur’d at the bosom of Despair.

Are talents, health, and independence thine,

To be to stupid Apathy consign’d?

Arise! be vigilant, and make thy mind

A worthy off’ring for a nobler shrine.

Again, I say, arise! repel this sloth,

To aught of great or good so fell a bar;

And whence, at first, arose, with rapid growth,

The ill imputed to your evil star.

Yourself it is, be you assur’d, who mar

The web of Bliss by smiling Fortune wrought.

Yes, you it is, and not the Fates, who war

To bring both hers and Nature’s boons to nought.

Security, of self-defence is bought;

And he who combats not, himself to save,

And is all passively to slav’ry brought,

Was, ere his thraldom, morally a slave.

Thou novice of the world, whose sanguine heart,

Yet adolescent, and by Woe untaught,

Mistakes the map of life for Pleasure’s chart,

And gives the colour of the wish to Thought;

Enjoy thy trance, with blissful visions fraught,

While dance thy spirits to the song of Joy,

Ere Time untwist the web which Fancy wrought,

And with rude shocks thy fairy dreams destroy.

Delight thee, while thou canst, with each gay toy

Which Whim invents for Expectation’s play;

Soon Disappointment will thy sports alloy;

Soon in Satiety their zest decay.

Now grasp with glee the forms of painted air—

No real substances such radiance wear.

What though the warm affections cool beneath

The sighs of dying Hope, and shed the bloom

Imagination once was wont to wreath,

For Fancy’s model, in her mimic loom:

And what though wither’d in ungenial gloom,

Torn from the roots, the rosy blossoms lie;

And tho’ these roots, chill’d by relentless doom,

Within the desolated bosom die;

Yet soon will Thought an energy supply,

To blunt the keenness of Affliction’s edge.

Soon Genius to his mental height shall fly,

And with the plumes of Love his pinions fledge;

When Fortune round thee sheds her dazzling
rays,

And in the glitter every aspect glows

With Frienship’s tender smile, and smoothly
flows,

From honey’d tongues, the dulcet stream of praise;

When suppliant minions watch thy meaning gaze,

T’ anticipate thy wish, ere yet it grows

To full expression; when thy thoughts repose

On Pleasure’s bosom, and the future days

To Fancy rise, in present rapture drest;

Beware! at once thy fond affections wrest

From Fortune’s baseless goods. She spreads her
wings—

She flies—and then, tho’ fetter’d to thy breast,

Why thus, my friend, unsocial in thy woe?

Say, why with smother’d sighs thou turn’st
aside,

The silent but expressive tears to hide,

Which from the source of injur’d Feeling flow?

With unreserve thy confidence bestow:

Is Friendship’s band but by Enjoyment tied;

And must its knot of Sympathy divide

Beneath Affliction’s agonising blow?

Thou better know’st; and as, in thy blest hours,

Thy pleasure and prosperity were mine,

So now, when o’er thy head Misfortune low’rs,

My heart, my energies, my all are thine!

Ye cold realities of life, away!

Nor Thought’s best joys in Fancy’s grave inhume:

And ye, illusions of Delight! resume

O’er this devoted mind your wonted sway.

Come, raptur’d visions! with your glowing ray

The fading eye of weeping Hope relume,

The moulting pinion of the Muse replume,

And to Renown exalt her soaring lay.

Why linger ye, ye dear deceits, which cheer

The gloomy breast of Care with gladsome glow;

That chase from Mis’ry’s eye the starting tear,

Or raise a smile to catch its grateful flow?

Arise, belov’d! the twilight hour steals on,

And glooms retiring Evening’s dusky veil;

Ere Night obscure the scene, let us begone,

And in this time of pleasantness inhale

The grateful freshness of the dewy gale:

For well thou lov’st, with pausing step, to stray

On thymy hill, smooth lawn, or bow’ry dale,

Till fades the glowing west. Then come, away!

Short life affords no season for delay;

Self-treason ’tis to slight, or misemploy,

Or hesitate inertly, till decay

The few short periods Fate assigns to Joy.

Yes, let the tyrant, in the rage of pow’r,

With galling bonds a subject race enslave,

With trampled rights the road of Rapine pave,

And let the dogs of War his country scour,

Till Plague and Want the fugitives devour;

Till groaning man, beneath his bloody sway,

Implore of Heav’n dread Retribution’s hour.

Lo! hungry Vengeance eyes her fated prey,

Unsheathes her talons, sharpen’d by delay,

And crouches, with collected force, to spring,

When Vigilance shall drop her wearied wing,

And traitor inmates softly point the way.

Erase the tender sympathies, that wring

Your soul! to Pity’s touch your bosom steel!

And in your heart the fertilising spring

Of Feeling in its kindly flow congeal!

But think you then, lull’d in the lap of weal,

To revel in the joys your wishes bring?

Forget you, then, that, as you cease to feel,

Enjoyment flags on Languor’s leathern wing?

From Sensibility alone can flow

The exquisite, the keenly-thrilling sense;

And if ’tis hers to barb the shaft of Woe,

’Tis hers to render Rapture more intense.

In vain you seek to win th’unwilling Muse;

Whene’er she comes to bless, she comes unsought,

And, with self-sounding shell, Attention wooes,

Teaching such strains as Study never taught.

She brings the waking dream with rapture
fraught;

Enrobes the dreary scene in vivid hues;

Gives life to sentiment, and soul to thought,

And waning Hope with Fancy’s fire renews.

She—child of Heav’n, and Heav’n’s peculiar gift—

Descends t’obliterate, in the chosen breast,

All Fortune’s injuries, and its heart to lift

Above the cares that vulgar souls molest.