Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

Of two such lessons, why forget
The nobler and the manlier one?
You have the letters Cadmus gave-
Think ye he meant them for a slave?

Fill high the bowl with Samian wine!
We will not think of themes like these!

It made Anacreon's song divine:

He served but served Polycrates

A tyrant; but our masters then

Were still at least our countrymen.

The tyrant of the Chersonese

Was freedom's best and bravest friend;

That tyrant was Miltiades!

Oh! that the present hour would lend Another despot of the kind!

Such chains as his were sure to bind.

Fill high the bowl with Samian wine!
On Suli's rock, and Parga's shore,
Exists the remnant of a line

Such as the Doric mothers bore;
And there perhaps some seed is sown,
The Heracleidan blood might own.,

Trust not for freedom to the Franks

They have a King who buys and sells :
In native swords and native ranks,

The only hope of courage dwells;
But Turkish force, and Latin fraud
Would break your shield, however broad.

Fill high the bowl with Samian wine!
Our virgins dance beneath the shade-

I see their glorious black eyes shine;
But gazing on each glowing maid,
My own the burning tear-drop laves,
To think such breasts must suckle slaves.

Place me on Sunium's marbled steep-
Where nothing but the waves and I
May hear our mutual murmurs sweep:
There, swan like, let me sing and die:
A land of slaves shall ne'er be mine-
Dash down your cup of Samian wine!

Byron.

NEW YEAR'S HYMN.

He lives, who lives to God alone,
And all are dead beside ;

For other source than God is none,
Whence life can be supplied.

To live to God is to requite
His love as best we may :
To make his precepts our delight,
His promises our stay.

But life, within a narrow ring

Of giddy joys comprised,

Is falsely named, and no such thing,

But rather death disguised.

Can life in them deserve the name,

Who only live to prove

For what poor toys they can disclaim An endless life above?

Who trample order, and the day
Which God asserts his own,
Dishonour with unhallowed play
And worship chance alone?

If scorn of God's commands, impressed
On word and deed, imply

The better part of man unblessed
With life that cannot die;

Such want it, and that want, uncured
Till man resigns his breath,
Speaks him a criminal, assured
Of everlasting death.

Sad period to a pleasant course!

Yet so will God repay

Sabbaths profaned without remorse,

And mercy cast away.

Cowper.

VICTORY IN DEATH.

Away! thou dying saint, away!
Fly to the mansions of the blest,
Thy God no more requires thy stay,
He calls thee to eternal rest.

Thy toils at length have reached a close,

No more remains for thee to do;

Away, away to thy repose,

Beyond the reach of evil go.

Away to yonder realms of light,

Where multitudes, redeemed with blood,

Enjoy the beatific sight,

And dwell for ever with their God.

Go, mix with them, and share their joy,
In heaven behold the sinner's friend;
In pleasures share that never cloy,
In pleasures that will never end.

« AnteriorContinuar »