Those smiling cyes, attempering every ray, You rais'd these hallow'd walls; the desert smil And Paradise was opend in the wild, And only vocal with the Maker's praise. In these lone walls, (their days eternal bound) Nor envy them that fleaven I lose for thee. These moss-grown domes with spiry turrets crown'd, How oft, when pressd to marriage, have I said, Where awful arches make a noon-day night, Thy eyes diffus'd a reconciling ray, Come thou, my father, brother, husband, friend ! And bids them make inistaken mortals groan, Ah, let thy handinaid, sister, daughter, move, Who seek in love for aught but love alone. And all those tender names in one, thy love! Should at my feet the world's great master fall, The darksome pines that o'er yon rocks reclin'd Himself, his throne, his world, I'd scorn theia all : Wave high, and inurmur to the hollow wind, Not Cæsar's empress would I deign to prove; Thewandering streams that shine between the hills, No, make me mistress to the man I love. The grots that echo to the tivkling rills, If there be yet altiother name more free, 'The dying gales that pant upon the trees, More fond than mistress, make me that to thee! The lakes that quiver to the curling brecze; Oh, happy state! when souls each other draw, No more these scenes my meditation aid, When love is liberty, and Nature law : Or lull to rest the visionary maid : All then is full, possessing and possess'd, But o'er the twilight groves and dusky caves, Shades every flower and darkens every green, And breathes a browner horrour on the woods Canst thou forget that sad, that solemn day,. Ah, wretch! believ'd the spouse of God in vain, When rictims at yon altar's fuot we lay? Covfess'd within the slave of love and man. Ev'y here where frozen Chastity retires, I view my criine, but kindle at the view, Now think of thee, and curse my innocence. 'Tis sure the hardest science to forget! Still on that breast enamour'd let me lie, How shall I lose the sin, yet keep the sense, Still drink delicious poison from thy eye, And love th' offender, yet detest th' offence! Pant on thy lip, and to thy heart be prese'd ; How the dear objert from the criinc remove, Give all thou canst and let me ircam the rest. Or how distinguish p:'nitence froin love? Ah, no! instruct ine other joys to prize, l'nequal task! a passion to resign, With other beauties charm my partial cyes, For Hearts so touh'd, so piercd, so lost as mine ! Full in my view set all the bright abode, Fre such a soul regains its peaceful state, And make my soul quit Abelard for Gul. How often must it love, how often hate! Ah, think at least thy fock deserves thy care, How often hope, despair, resent, regret, Plants of thy hand, and children of thy prayer. Conceal, disdain,- do all things but forget! From the false world in early yonth they fled, But let Heaven seize it, all at once 'tis fir'd: By thee to mountains, wilds, and deserts lech Not louch'd, but rapt; not waken'd, but inspir'd! Oh, come, oh, teach me Nature to subdue, One thought of thee puts all the pomp to flight, Renounce my love, my life, inyself--and you. Priests, tapers, temples, swim before my sight: Fill my fond heart with God alone, for he In seas of flame my plunging soul is drown'd, Alone can rival, can succeed to thee. While altars blaze, and angels tremble ronnd. How happy is the blaineless vestal's lot; While prostrate here in humble grief Ilie, The world forgetting, by the world forgot! Kind, virtuous drops just gathering in my eye, Eternal sun-shine of the spotless mind! While, praying, trembling, in the dust I roli, Each prayer accepted, and each wish resign'd; And dawning grace is opening on my soul: Labour and rest that equal periods keep; Come, if thou dar'st, all charming as thou art ! “ Obedient sluinbers that can wake and weep;" Oppose thyself to Heaven; dispute my heart; Desires compos'd, affections ever even; Ceme, with one glance of those deluding eyes Tears that delight, and sighs that waft to Heaven. Blot out each bright idea of the skies; (tears; Grace shines around her with erencst beams, Take back that grace, those sorrows, and those And whispering angels prompt her golden dreams. Take back my fruitless penitence and prayers; For her th' unfading rose of Eden blooms, Snatch me, just mounting, from the blest abode And wings of seraphs shed divine perfumes; Assist the tiends, and tear me from my God! For her the spouse prepares the bridal ring; No, fy mne, fly me, far as pole from pole; For her white virgins hymenæals sing ; Rise Alps between us! and whole occans ioll! To sonnds of heavenly harps she dics away, Ah, come not, write not, think not once of me, And melts in visions of eternal day. Vor share one pang of all I felt for thee. Far other dreams my erring soul employ, Thy oaths I quit, thy memory resign! Far other raptures of unholy joy : Forget, renounce me, hate whate'er was mine. When, at the close of each sad, sorrowing day, Fair eyes, and tempting looks, (which yet I view !) Fancy restores what Vengeance snatch'd away, Long lov'd, ador'd ideas, all adieu ! Then Conscience sleeps, and leaving Nature free, O Grace screne! O Virtue heavenly fair ! All my louse soul unbounded springs to thee. Divine oblivion of low-thoughted Care! O curst, dear horrours of all-cousious night! Fresh-blooming Hope, gay daughter of the sky! How glowing guilt exalts the keen delight! And Faith, our early immortality! Provoking demons all restraint remove, Enter, each mild, each amicable guest; And stir within me every source of love. Receive and wrap me in eternal rest! i hear thee, view thee, gaze o'er all thy charms, See in her cell sad Eloïsa spread, And round thy phantom glue my clasping arıns. Propt on some tomb, a neighbour of the dead. I wake :--no more I hear, no more I view, In each low wind methinks a spirit calls, 'The phantom flies me, as unkind as you. And more than Echoes talk along the walls. I call aloud; it hears not what I say: Here, as I watch'd the dying lamp around, I stretch my empty arms; it glides away. Froin yonder shrine I heard a hollow sound. To dream once more I close my willing eyes; Comie, sister, come!” (it said, or seem'd to say) Ye soft illusions, dear deceits, arise ! Thy place is here, sad sister, come away! Alas, no more! mcthinks we wandering go Once like thyself, I trembled, wept, and pray'd, Through dreary wastes, and weep each other's woe, Love's victim then, though now a sainted maid : Where round some mouldering tower pale ivy creeps, But all is calm in this eternal sleep; And low-brow'd rocks hang nodding o'er the deeps. Here Grief forgets to groan, and Love to weep : Sudden you mount, you beckon from the skies; Ev'n Superstition loses every fear; Clouds interpose, waves roar, and winds arise. For God, not man, absolves our frailties here." I shriek, start up, the same sad prospect find, I come, I come! prepare your roseate bowers, And wake to all the griefs I left behind. Celestial palms, and ever-blooming flowers. For thee the Fates, severely kind, ordain Thither, where sinners may have rest, I go, A coul suspense from pleasure and from puin; Where flames refin'd in breasts seraphic glow; Thy life a long dead calm of fix'd repo e; Thou, Abelard! the last sad office pay, No pulse that riots, and no blood that glows. Aud smooth my passage to the realms of days Still as the sea, "Te winds were taught to blow, See my lips tremble, and my eye-balls roll, Or moving spirit bade the waters flow; Suck my last breath, and catch my flying soul! Soft as the slumbers of a saint forgiven, Ah, no-in sacred vestments mayst thou stand, And mild as opening gleams of promis'd Heaven. The hallow'd taper trembling in thy hand, Come, Abelard ! for what hast thou to dread ? Present the cross before my lifted cye, Teach me at once, and learn of me to die. It will be then no crime to gaze on me. What scenes appear where'er I turn my view! Till every motion, pulse, and breath be o'er; The dear ideas, where I sy, pursue, And ev'n my Abelard be lov'd no more. Rise in the grove, before the altar rise, O Death all eloquent ! you only prove Stain all ins soul, and wanton in iç cyes. What dust we doat on, when 'tis man we love.' I waste the inatin lamp in sighs for ther, Then too, when Fate shall thy fair frame de Thy iroage steals between my God and ine, (That cause of all my guilt, and all my joy) (stroy, Thy voice I seem in every hymu to hear, In trance extatic may thy pangs be drown'd. With every bcad I drop too soft a tear. Bright clouds descend, and angels watch thee round, When froin the cens.r clouds of fragrance roll, From opening skies may streaming gl.ics shine, And swelling organus lift the rising soul, And saints embrace thee with a love like mine! May one kind grave unite cach hapless name, Amid that scene if some relenting eye TRANSLATIONS AND IMITATIONS. ADVERTISEMENT. The following Translations were selected from many others done by the author in his youth; for the most part indeed but a sort of exercises, while he was improving himself in the languages, and carried by his early bent to poetry to perform them rather in verse than prose. Mr. Dryden's Fables came out about that time, which occasioned the Translations from Chaucer. They were first separately printed in Miscellanies by J. Tonson and B. Lintot, and afterwards collected in the quarto edition of 1717. The Imitations of English authors, which follow, were done as early, some of thein at fourteen or fifteen years old. THE When opening buds salute the welcome day, And earth relenting feels the genial ray; As balıny sleep had charm’d my cares to rest, And love itself was banish'd from my breast, While purer slumbers spread their golden wings) A train of phantoms in wild order rose, I stood, methought, betwixt earth, seas and manner entirely altered, the descriptions and The whole creation open to my eyes : (skies; 11 most of the particular thoughts my owul; yet I In air self-balanc'd liung the globe below, could not suffer it to be printed without this ac Where mountains rise, and circling oceans flow; knowledgment. The reader, who would com Here naked rocks, and empty wastes were seen ; pare this with Chaucer, may begin with his There towering cities, and the forests green: third book of Fame, there being nothing in the Here sailing ships delight the wandering eyes; two first books that answers to their title: There trees and intermingled temples rise: wherever any hint is taken from him, the pas- The transient landscape now in clouds decayse Now a clear sun the shining scene displays; sage itself is set down in the marginal notes. The poem is introduced in the manner of the Pro O'er the wide prospect as I gaz'd around, vençal poets, whose works were for the most Sudden I heard a wild promiscuous sound, Like broken thunders that at distance roar, part visions, or picces of imagination, and constantly descriptive. From these, Petrarch and Or billows murmuring on the hollow shore : Chaucer frequently boríowed the idca of their poems. See the Trionfi of the former, and the Dream, Flower and the leaf, &c. of the latter following of Chancer, Book ii. Ver. 11, &c.] These verses are hinted from the The author of this therefore chose the same sort Thougli beheld I fields and plains, of exordium. Now hills and now mountains, Now valeis, and now forestes, And now unneth great bestes, Now rivers, now citces, In that soft season, when descending showers Now towns, now great trees, Call forth the greens, and win the rising flowers; Now shippes sayling in the see. IMITATIONS. Then gazing up, a glorious pile beheld, (ceal'd. Their names inscrib'd unnumber'd ages past frost) The gather'd winter of a thousand years, And fix their own, with labour, in their place : On this foundation Pame's high temple stands ; Their own, like others, soon their place resign'd, Stupendous pile! not rear'd by mortal hands, Or disappear'd, and left the first behind. Whate'er proud Rome or artful Greece beheld, Nor was the work impair'd by storms alone, 41 Or elder Babylon, its frame excell'd!. But felt th' approaches of too warm a sun; Four faces had the dome, and every face, Por Fame, impatient of extremes, decays Of various structure, but of equal grace! Not more by Envy, than excess of Praise. Four brazen gates, on columns lifted high, Yet part no injuries of Heaven could feel, 45 Salute the different quarters of the sky. Like crystal faithful to the graving steel: Here fabled chicfs in darker ages born, The walls in venerable order grace: Heroes in animated marble frown, Westward, a sumptuous frontispiece appear'd, It stood upon so high a rock, On Doric pillars of white marble rear'd, Higher standeth none in Spayne Crown'd with an architrave of antique mold, What manner stone this rock was, And sculpture rising on the roughen'd gold, For it was like a lyined glass, In shaggy spoils here Theseus was beheld, But that it shone full more clere; And Perseus dreadful with Minerva's shield: But of what congeled matere There great Alcides, stooping with his toil, It was, I niste redily; Rests on his club, and holds th' Hesperian spoil : Bat at the last espied I, Here Orpheus sings ; trees moving to the sound And found that it was every dele, Start from their roots, and form a shade around: A rock of ice, and not of stele. Amphion there the loud creating lyre Ver. 31. Inscriptions here, &c.] Strikes, and behold a sudden Thebes aspire! Cythæron's echoes answer to his call, And half the mountain rolls into a wall: There might you see the lengthening spires ascend, The domes swell up, the widening arches bend, The growing towers like exhalations rise, And the huge columns heave into the skies, The easieru front was glorious to behold, With diamond flaming, and Barbaric gold, There Ninus shone, who spread th’ Assyrian fame, And the great founder of the Persian name : There in long robes the royal Magi stand, And Brachmans, deep in desert woods rever'd. That they were molte away for heate, These stopp'd the Moon, and call'd th' unbody'd And not away with storines beate, shades Ver. 45. Yet part no injuries, &c.] To midnight banquets in the glimmering glades; For on that other side I sey, Made visionary fabrics round them rise, Of that hill which northward ley, And airy specires skim before their eyes; How it was written full of names Of talisinans and sigils knew the power, Superior, and alone, Confucius stood, But on the sonth, a long majestic race Of Egypt's priests the gilded niches grace, But well I wiste what it made; Who ineasur'd Earth, describ'd the starry spheres, It was conserved with the shade And trac'd the long records of lunar years. (All the writing that I sye) High on his car Sesostris struck my view Of the castle that stoode on high, Whom scepter'd slaves in golden barness drew: And stood eke in so cold a place, His hands a bow and pointed javelin hold; That heat might it not deface, His giant limbs are arm'd in scales of gold. Between the statues obelisks were plac'd, But in the centre of the hallow'd choir, And the learn'd walls with hieroglyphics grac'd. Six pompous columns o'er the rest aspire ; 179 Of Gothic structure was the northern side, Around the shrine itself of Fame they stand, O’erwrought with ornaments of barbarous pride. Hold the chief honours, and the fane command. There huge Colosses rose, with trophies crown'd, High on the first, the mighty Homer shone; 182 And Runic characters were grav'd around. Eternal adamant compos'd his throne ; There sat Zamolxis with erected eyes, Father of verse! in holy fillets drest, And Odin here in mimic trances dies. His silver beard wav'd gently o'er his breast; There on rude iron columns, smeard with blood, Though blind, a boldness in his looks appears ; The horrid forms of Scythian heroes stood, 11 years he seem'd, but not impair'd by years. Druids and bards (their once loud harps unstrung) The wars of Troy were round the pillar seen: And youths that died to be by poets sung. Here fierce Tydides wounds the Cyprian queen; These and a thousand more of doubtful fame, Here Hector glorious from Patroclus' fall, To whom old fables gave a lasting name, Here dragg’d in triumph round the Trojan wall. In ranks adoru'd the temple's outward face ; Motion and life did every part inspire, The wall in lustre and effect like glass, 132 Bold was the work, and prov'd the master's fire; Which, o'er each object casting various dyes, A strong expression most he seem'd t'affect, Enlarges some, and others multiplies : And here and there disclos'd a brave neglect. Nor void of emblem was the mystic wall, A golden column next in rank appear'd, 196 For thus romantic Fame increases all. On which a shrine of purest gold was rear'd; Great without pride, in modest majesty. The Latian wars, and haughty Turnus dead; found, IMITATIONS. From the Jees many a pillere, That was of lede and iron fine, Him of the sect Saturnine, Upon an iron pillere strong, That painted was ail endlong, And şoarce detested in his country's fate. With tigers' blood in every place, But chief were those, who not for empire fought, The Tholosan that hight Stace, But with their toils their people's safety bought: That bear of Thebes up the name, &c. High o'er the rest Epaminondas stood; Ver. 182.) Timoleon, glorious in his brother's blood; Full wonder high on a pillere Bold Scipio, saviour of the Roman state; Of iron, he the great Oinet, Great in his triumphs, in retirement great ; And with bim Dares and Titus, &c. And wise Aurelius, in whose well-taught mind Ver. 196, &c.) There saw I stand on a pillere That was of tinned iron cleere, The I atin poet Virgyle, claim, Those of less noisy, and less guilty fame, That hath bore up of a great while Fair Virtue's silent train : supreme of these The fame of pious Æneas: And n:'xt him on a pillere was Of copper, Venus' clerke Ovide, 'That hath sowen wondrous wide At all times just, but when he sign’d the shell : Here his abode the inartyr'd Phocion claims, The great god of love's fanicWith Agis, not the last of Spartan names: Tho saw I on a pillere by Of iron wrolight full sternly, The great poet Dan Lucan, As hye as that I might see, The fame of Julius and Pompee. And next him on a pillere stode Of sulphure, like as he were wode, Dan Claudian, sotle for to tell, That bare up all the fame of Hell, &c. |