5

ONE effort more, one cheerful sally more,
Our destined course will finish; and in peace
Then, for an offering sacred to the powers
Who lent us gracious guidance, we will then
Inscribe a monument of deathless praise,
Of my adventurous song. With steady speed
Long hast thou, on an untried voyage bound,
Sail'd between earth and heaven: hast now survey'd
Stretch'd out beneath thee, all the mazy tracts
Of passion and opinion; like a waste
Of sands and flowery lawns and tangling woods,
Where mortals roam bewilder'd: and hast now
Exulting soar'd among the worlds above,
Or hover'd near the eternal gates of heaven,
If haply the discourses of the Gods,

A curious, but an unpresuming guest,

10

15

Thou might'st partake and carry back some strain Of divine wisdom, lawful to repeat,

And apt to be conceived of man below.
A different task remains; the secret paths
Of early genius to explore: to trace

Those haunts, where Fancy her predestin'd sons,
Like to the Demigods of old, doth nurse,
Remote from eyes profane. Ye happy souls
Who now her tender discipline obey,

20

25

Where dwell ye? What wild river's brink at eve
Imprint your steps? What solemn groves at noon
Use ye to visit, often breaking forth
In rapture 'mid your dilatory walk
Or musing, as in slumber, on the green?
-Would I again were with you!-O ye dales

Of Tyne, and ye most ancient woodlands; where
Oft as the giant flood obliquely strides,
And his banks open, and his lawns extend,
Stops short the pleased traveller to view
Presiding o'er the scene some rustic tower
Founded by Norman or by Saxon hands:
O ye Northumbrian shades, which overlook
The rocky pavement and the mossy falls
Of solitary Wensbeck's limpid stream;
How gladly I recall your well-known seats
Beloved of old, and that delightful time,
When all alone, from many a summer's day,
I wander'd through your calm recesses, led
In silence by some powerful hand unseen.

30

35

40

45

In vulgar bosoms, and unnoticed lie
These pleasing stores, unless the casual force
Of things external prompt the heedless mind
To recognise her wealth. But some there are
Conscious of nature, and the rule which man
O'er nature holds: some who, within themselves
Retiring from the trivial scenes of chance
And momentary passion, can at will
Call up these fair examplars of the mind;
Review their features; scan the secret laws
Which bind them to each other and display
By forms, or sounds, or colours, to the sense
Of all the world their latent charms display:
Even as in nature's frame (if such a word,
If such a word, so bold, may from the lips
Of man proceed) as in this outward frame
Of things, the great artificer portrays
His own immense idea. Various names
These among mortals bear, as various signs
They use, and by peculiar organs speak
To human sense. There are who by the flight
Of air through tubes with moving stops distinct,
Or by extended chords in measure taught
To vibrate, can assemble powerful sounds
Expressing every temper of the mind
From every cause, and charming all the soul
With passion void of care. Others meantime
The rugged mass of metal, wood, or stone
Patiently taming; or with easier hand
Describing lines, and with more ample scope
Uniting colours; can to general sight
Produce those permanent and perfect forms,
Those characters of heroes and of gods,

He offereth all its treasures. Him the hours,
The seasons him obey; and changeful Time
Sees him at will keep measure with his flight,
At will outstrip it. To enhance his toil,
He summoneth from the uttermost extent
Of things which God hath taught him, every form
Auxiliar, every power; and all beside

115

Excludes imperious. His prevailing hand

Gives, to corporeal essence, life and sense

55

And every stately function of the soul. The soul itself to him obsequious lies,

120

For thus far

60

Of honourable fame, of truth divine
Or moral, and of minds to virtue won
By the sweet magic of harmonious verse;
The themes which now expect us.
On general habits, and on arts which grow
Spontaneous in the minds of all mankind,
Hath dwelt our argument; and how self taught,
Though seldom conscious of their own employ,
In nature's or in fortune's changeful scene
Men learn to judge of beauty, and acquire
Those forms set up, as idols in the soul

For love and zealous praise. Yet indistinct,

65

Like matter's passive heap; and as he wills,
To reason and affection he assigns

Their just alliances, their just degrees:

Whence his peculiar honours; whence the race 125
Of men who people his delightful world,
Men genuine and according to themselves,
Transcend as far the uncertain sons of earth,

As earth itself to his delightful world
The palm of spotless beauty doth resign.

130

BOOK I.

ODE I.

PREFACE.

I.

ON yonder verdant hillock laid,
Where oaks and elms, a friendly shade,"
O'erlook the falling stream,

O master of the Latin lyre
Awhile with thee will I retire

From summer's noontide beam.

II.

And, lo, within my lonely bower,
The industrious bee from many a flower
Collects her balmy dews:

"For me," she sings," the gems are born, For me their silken robe adorn,

Their fragrant breath diffuse."

III.

Sweet murmurer! may no rude storm
This hospitable scene deform,

Nor check thy gladsome toils;
Still may the buds unsullied spring,
Still showers and sunshine court thy wing
To these ambrosial spoils.

IV.

Nor shall my Muse hereafter fail
Her fellow-labourer thee to hail;
And lucky be the strains!

For long ago did nature frame
Your seasons and your arts the same,
Your pleasures and your pains.

V.

Like thee, in lowly, sylvan scenes,
On river-banks and flowery greens
My Muse delighted plays
Nor through the desert of the air
Though swans or eagles triumph there,
With fond ambition strays.
VI.

Nor where the boding raven chants,
Nor near the owl's unhallow'd haunts
Will she her cares employ;
But flies from ruins and from tombs,
From superstition's horrid glooms,
To day-light and to joy.

VII.

Nor will she tempt the barren waste :
Nor deigns the lurking strength to taste
Of any noxious thing;

But leaves with scorn to envy's use
The insipid nightshade's baneful juice,
The nettle's sordid sting.

VIII.

From all which nature fairest knows,
The vernal blooms, the summer rose,

She draws her blameless wealth;
And, when the generous task is done,
She consecrates a double boon,
To pleasure and to health..

THE radiant ruler of the year
At length his wintery goal attains;
Soon to reverse the long career,
And northward bend his steady reins.
Now piercing half Potosia's height,
Prone rush the fiery floods of light
Ripening the mountain's silver stores
While, in some cavern's horrid shade,
The panting Indian hides his head,
And oft the approach of eve implores.
II.

But lo, on this deserted coast
How pale the sun! how thick the air!
Mustering his storms, a sordid hest,
Lo, winter desolates the year.
The fields resign their latest bloom;
No more the breezes waft perfume,
No more the streams in music roll
But snows fall dark, or rains resound;
And, while great nature mourns around,
Her griefs infect the human soul.

III.

Hence the loud city's busy throngs
Urge the warm bow! and splendid fire:
Harmonious dances, festive songs,
Against the spiteful heaven conspire.
Meantime perhaps with tender fears
Some village-dame the curfew hears,
While round the hearth her children play
At morn their father went abroad:
The moon is sunk and deep the road;
She sighs, and wonders at his stay.

IV.

But thou, my lyre, awake, arise,
And hail the sun's returning force:
Even now he climbs the northern skies,
And health and hope attend his course.
Then louder howl the aerial waste,
Be earth with keener cold embraced,
Yet gentle hours advance their wing:
And fancy, mocking winter's might,
With flowers and dews and streaming light
Already decks the new-born spring.

V.

O fountain of the golden day,
Could mortal vows promote thy speed,
How soon before thy vernal ray
Should each unkindly damp recede !
How soon each hovering tempest fly,
Whose stores for mischief arm the sky,
Prompt on our heads to burst amain,
To rend the forest from the steep,
Or, thundering o'er the Baltic deep,
To whelm the merchant's hopes of gain.
VI.

But let not man's unequal views
Presume o'er nature and her laws:
'Tis his with grateful joy to use
The indulgence of the sovran cause;

Ye too, the slow-eyed fathers, of the land With whom dominion steals from hand to hand Unown'd, undignified by public choice, I go where liberty to all is known, And tells a monarch on his throne, He reigns not but by her preserving voice.

II. 1.

O my loved England, when with thee Shall I sit down, to part no more? Far from this pale, discolour'd sea, That sleeps upon the reedy shore, When shall I plough thy azure tide ? When on thy hills the flocks admire, Like mountain snows; till down their side I trace the village and the sacred spire, [vide? While bowers and copses green the golden slope di

II. 2.

Ye nymphs who guard the pathless grove,
Ye blue-eyed sisters of the streams,

With whom I wont at morn to rove,
With whom at noon I talk'd in dreams;

O! take me to your haunts again,

The rocky spring, the greenwood glade; To guide my lonely footsteps deign, To prompt my slumbers in the murmuring shade, And soothe my vacant ear with many an airy strain.

II. 3.

And thou, my faithful harp, no longer mourn Thy drooping master's inauspicious hand: Now brighter skies and fresher gales return, Now fairer maids thy melody demand. Daughters of Albion, listen to my lyre! O Phoebus, guardian of the Aonian choir, Why sounds not mine harmonious as thy own, When all the virgin deities above With Venus and with Juno move In concert round the Olympian father's throne?

III. 1.

Thee too, protectress of my lays,
Elate with whose majestic call
Above degenerate Latiuni's praise,
Above the slavish boast of Gaul,

I dare from impious thrones reclaim,
And wanton sloth's ignoble charms,
The honours of a poet's name

To Somers' counsels, or to Hambden's arms, Thee, freedom, I rejoin, and bless thy genuine flame.

III. 2.

Great citizen of Albion! Thee
Heroic valour still attends,

And useful science pleased to see

How art her studious toil extends.

While truth, diffusing from on high

A lustre unconfined as day,

Fills and commands the public eyes

Till, pierced and sinking by her powerful ray, Tame faith and monkish awe, like nightly demons, fly.

III. 3.

Hence the whole land the patriot's ardour shares ;

Hence dread religion dwells with social joy; And holy passions and unsullied cares, In youth, in age, domestic life employ. O fair Britannia, hail!-With partial love The tribes of men their native seats approve, Unjust and hostile to each foreign fame: But when for generous minds and manly laws A nation holds her prime applause, There public zeal shall all reproof disclaim.

ODE IX.

To Curio. 1744.

I.

THRICE hath the spring beheld thy faded fame
Since I exulting grasp'd the tuneful shell:
Eager through endless years to sound thy name,
Proud that my memory with thine should dwell.

How hast thou stain'd the splendor of my choice Those godlike forms which hover'd round thy voice,

Laws, freedom, glory, whither are they flown? What can I now of thee to time report, Save thy fond country made thy impious sport, Her fortune and her hope the victims of thy own? II.

There are with eyes unmoved and reckless heart Who saw thee from thy summit fall thus low, Who deem'd thy arm extended but to dart The public vengeance on thy private foe. But, spite of every gloss of envious minds, The owl-eyed race whom virtue's lustre blinds, Who sagely prove that each man hath his price. I still believed thy aim from blemish free, I yet, even yet, believe it, spite of thee And all thy painted pleas to greatness and to vice.

Is this the man in freedom's cause approved? The man so great, so honour'd, so beloved? Whom the dead envied, and the living bless'd? This patient slave by tinsel bonds allured ? This wretched suitor for a boon abjured? Whom those that fear'd him, scorn; that trusted him, detest?

IX.

O lost alike to action and repose!
With all that habit of familiar fame,
Sold to the mockery of relentless foes,

And doom'd to exhaust the dregs of life in shame,
To act with burning brow and throbbing heart
A poor deserter's dull exploded part,

To slight the favour thou canst hope no more, Renounce the giddy crowd, the vulgar wind, Charge thy own lightness on thy country's mind, And from her voice appeal to each tame foreign shore.

X.

But England's sons, to purchase thence applause, Shall ne'er the loyalty of slaves pretend, By courtly passions try the public cause; Nor to the forms of rule betray the end. O race erect! by manliest passions moved, The labours which to virtue stand approved, Prompt with a lover's fondness to survey; Yet, where injustice works her wilful claim, Fierce as the flight of Jove's destroying flame, Impatient to confront, and dreadful to repay.

XI.

These thy heart owns no longer. In their room See the grave queen of pageants, Honour, dwell, Couch'd in thy bosom's deep tempestuous gloom Like some grim idol in a sorcerer's cell. Before her rites thy sickening reason flew, Divine persuasion from thy tongue withdrew. While laughter mock'd, or pity stole a sigh: Can wit her tender movements rightly frame Where the prime function of the soul is lame? Can fancy's feeble springs the force of truth supply?

XII.

But come: 'tis time: strong destiny impends To shut thee from the joys thou hast betray'd: With princes fill'd, the solemn fane ascends, By Infamy, the mindful demon, sway'd. There vengeful vows for guardian laws effaced, From nations fetter'd, and from towns laid waste, For ever through the spacious courts resound: There long posterity's united groan And the sad charge of horrors not their own, Assail the giant chiefs, and press them to the ground.

XIII.

In sight old Time, imperious judge, awaits:
Above revenge, or fear, or pity, just,
He urgeth onward to those guilty gates
The Great, the Sage, the Happy, and August.
And still he asks them of the hidden plan
Whence every treaty, every war began,
Evolves their secrets and their guilt proclaims:
And still his hands despoil them on the road
Of each vain wreath by lying bards bestow'd,
And crush their trophies huge, and rase their
sculptured names.
XIV.

Ye mighty shades, arise, give place, attend;
Here his eternal mansion Curio seeks:
-Low doth proud Wentworth to the stranger

bend,

And his dire welcome hardy Clifford speaks: "He comes, whom fate with surer arts prepared To accomplish all which we but vainly dared; Whom o'er the stubborn herd she taught to reign: Who soothed with gaudy dreams their raging Even to its last irrevocable hour; [power Then baffled their rude strength, and broke them to the chain."

XV.

But ye, whom yet wise liberty inspires, Whom for her champions o'er the world she claims,

Drive ye this hostile omen far away; Their own fell efforts on her foes repay; Your wealth, your arts, your fame, be hers alone: Still gird your swords to combat on her side; Still frame your laws her generous tests to abide; And win to her defence the altar and the throne.

(That household godhead whom of old your sires Sought in the woods of Elbe and bore to Thames)

D

XVI.

Protect her from yourselves, ere yet the flood
Of golden luxury, which commerce pours,
Hath spread that selfish fierceness through your
blood,

Which not her lightest discipline endures:
Snatch from fantastic demagogues her cause:
Dream not of Numa's manners, Plato's laws:
A wiser founder, and a nobler plan,
O sons of Alfred, were for you assign'd:
Bring to that birthright but an equal mind,
And no sublimer lot will fate reserve for man.

ODE X.

To the Muse.

I.

QUEEN of my songs, harmonious maid, Ah why hast thou withdrawn thy aid? Ah why forsaken thus my breast With inauspicious damps oppress'd ? Where is the dread prophetic heat, With which my bosom wont to beat? Where all the bright, mysterious dreams Of haunted groves and tuneful streams, That woo'd my genius to divinest themes?

II.

Say, goddess, can the festal board,
Or young Olympia's form adored;
Say, can the pomp of promised fame
Relume thy faint, thy dying flame?
Or have melodious airs the power
To give one free, poetic hour?
Or, from amid the Elysian train,
The soul of Milton shall I gain,

To win thee back with some celestial strain?

III.

O powerful strain! O sacred soul! His numbers every sense control: And now again my bosom burns; The Muse, the Muse herself returns. Such on the banks of Tyne, confess'd, I hail'd the fair, immortal guest, When first she seal'd me for her own, Made all her blissful treasures known, And bade me swear to follow her alone.

ODE XI.

On Love to a Friend.

I.

NO, foolish youth-To virtuous fame If now thy early hopes be vow'd, If true ambition's nobler flame Command thy footsteps from the crowd, Lean not to love's enchanting snare; His songs, his words, his looks beware, Nor join his votaries, the young and fair.

II.

By thought, by dangers, and by toils, The wreath of just renown is worn; Nor will ambition's awful spoils The flowery pomp of ease adorn: But love unbends the force of thought By love unmanly fears are taught; And love's reward with gaudy sloth is bought.