Scatter, as, from an unextinguished hearth,
Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!
Be through my lips to unawakened earth
The trumpet of a prophecy! O wind, ·
If winter comes, can spring be far behind?

$215. Stanzas written in Dejection, near
Naples. SHELLEY.

THE sun is warm, the sky is clear,

The waves are dancing fast and bright, Blue isles and snowy mountains wear

The purple noon's transparent light
Around its unexpanded buds;

Like many a voice of one delight,
The winds, the birds, the ocean floods,
The City's voice itself is soft, like Solitude's.

I see the Deep's untrampled floor

With green and purple sea-weeds strown; I see the waves upon the shore,

Like light dissolv'd in star-showers thrown: I sit upon the sands alone,

The lightning of the noontide ocean

Is flashing round me, and a tone

Arises from its measur'd motion;

Yet lookest down with pity from on high,
'Midst airs of immortality:
O, with what pure and never-ending song,"
Song that, uplift upon the wings of love,
May gain access to that celestial throng,
Shall I now soar above,

And in the silver flood of morning play,
And view thy face, and brighten into day?

Forgive me, then, O love-enlarged soul,
Or love itself in pure felicity,

If, questioning my nature's fast control,
I slip my bonds, and wander unto thee;
But, ah! too well I know

That this may not be so,

Till that prefixed doom from heaven be spent
Then for a little while,

If measure may beguile,

Let thy sweet deeds become my argument;
That all the wide hereafter may behold
Thy mind more perfect than refined gold.

But this is to enlarge the liberal air,
And pour fresh light into the diamond,
To herald that the fragrant rose is fair,
And that the sun in beauty doth abound;

How sweet! did any heart now share in my So vain, and so excessful is the thought

emotion.

Alas! I have nor hope nor health,

Nor peace within, nor calm around,
Nor that content surpassing wealth,

The sage in meditation found,
And walk'd with inward glory crown'd-
Nor fame, nor power, nor love, nor leisure.
Others I see whom these surround-

Smiling they live, and call life pleasure;
To me that cup has been dealt in another

measure.

Yet now despair itself is mild,

Ev'n as the winds and waters are ;
I could lie down like a tir'd child,
And weep away the life of care
Which I have borne, and yet must bear,
Till death, like sleep, might steal on me,
And I might feel in the warm air

My cheek grow cold, and hear the sea
Breathe o'er my dying brain its last monotony.
Some might lament that I were cold,

As I, when this sweet day is gone,
Which my lost heart, too soon grown old,
Insults with this untimely moan;
They might lament, for I am one

Whom men love not; and yet regret,
Unlike this day, which, when the sun
Shall on its stainless glory set,

Will linger, though enjoy'd, like joy in me-
mory yet.

216. A Song to Sir Philip Sidney.
THURLOW.

SPIRIT, whose bliss beyond this cloudy sphere
Is with the rising and the setting light,
Who, far remov'd from all that grieves us here,
For ever happy, and for ever bright,

To add to Sidney aught:

Yet cannot I forego the sweet delight,
More sweet to me than music or the spring,
Or than the starry beams of summer's night,
Thy sweetest praise, O Astrophel, to sing;
Till the wide woods, to which I teach the same,
Shall echo with thy name;

And ev'ry fount, that in the valley flows,
Shall stay it's fall, and murmur at the close.

Nor yet shall time, à thing not understood,
Nor weary space, forbid me my desire ;
The nimble mind can travel where it would,
More swift than winds, or than the greedy fire;
So shall my thoughts aspire

To that eternal seat, where thou art laid
In brightness without shade;
Thy golden locks, that in wide splendor flow,
Crowned with lilies, and with violets,
And amaranth, which that good angel sets
With joy upon thy radiant head to blow;
(Soft flow'rs, unknown to woe,

That in the blissful meads of heav'n are found ;)
The whilst full quires around
With silver hymns, and dulcet harmony,
Make laud unto the glorious throne of grace,
And fill thy ears with true felicity;
Such is the happy place,

Which thou by thy heroic toil hast won,
Such is the place, to which my sacred verses run.

Then I believe, that at thy birth was set
Some purer planet in the lofty sky,
Which a sweet influence did on earth beget;
That all the shepherds which on ground did lie,
Beholding there that unexampled light,
That made like day the night,
Were fill'd with hope and great expectancy,
That Pan himself would on the earth appear,
To bless th' unbounded year.

217. Ode to a Nightingale. KEATS.
My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains
My sense as though of hemlock I had drunk,
Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains
One minute past, and lethe-wards had sunk :
'Tis not through envy of thy happy lot,
But being too happy in thine happiness,-
That thou, light-winged dryad of the trees,

In some melodious plot
Of beechen green, and shadows numberless,
Singest of summer in full-throated ease.

O, for a draught of vintage! that hath been
Cool'd a long age in the deep-delved earth,
Tasting of Flora and the country green,
Dance, and Provencal song, and sunburnt
mirth!

O, for a beaker full of the warm south,
Full of the true, the blushful Hippocrene,
With beaded bubbles winking at the brim,
And purple-stained mouth;

That I might drink, and leave the world un-
seen,

And with thee fade away into the forest dim:

Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget What thou among the leaves hast never known,

The weariness, the fever, and the fret

Here, where men sit and hear each other groan;

Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gray hairs, Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies;

Where but to think is to be full of sorrow

And leaden-eyed despairs,
Where beauty cannot keep her lustrous eyes,
Or new love pine at them beyond to-mor-

row.

Away! away! for I will fly to thee,

Not charioted by Bacchus and his bards,
But on the viewless wings of poesy,
Though the dull brain perplexes and retards:
Already with thee! tender is the night,

C

And haply the Queen-Moon is on her throne,
Cluster'd around by all her starry fays;
But here there is no light,

Save what from heaven is with the breezes
blown

Through verdurous glooms and winding
mossy ways.

I cannot see what flowers are at my feet,
Nor what soft incense hangs upon the boughs,
But, in embalmed darkness, guess each sweet
Wherewith the seasonable month endows

The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-tree wild;
White hawthorn, and the pastoral eglantine;
Fast fading violets cover'd up in leaves;
And mid-May's eldest child,
The coming musk-rose, full of dewy wine,
The murmurous haunt of flies on summer

eves.

|Darkling I listen; and, for many a time,

I have been half in love with easeful Death,
Call'd him soft names in many a mused rhyme,
To take into the air my quiet breath;

Now, more than ever, seems it rich to die,
To cease upon the midnight with no pain,
While thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad
In such an ecstasy!
[vain-
Still wouldst thou sing, and I have ears in
To thy high requiem become a sod.
Thou wast not born for death, immortal bird!

No hungry generations tread thee down;
The voice I hear this passing night was heard
Perhaps the self-same song that found a path
In ancient days by emperor and clown:
Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick
for home,

She stood in tears amid the alien corn;

The same that oft-times hath [foam Charm'd magic casements, opening on the Of perilous seas, in fairy lands forlorn. Forlorn! the very word is like a bell

To toll me back from thee to my sole self!
Adieu! the fancy cannot cheat so well

As she is fam'd to do, deceiving elf.
Adieu! adieu! thy plaintive anthem fades
Past the near meadows, over the still stream,
Up the hill-side; and now 'tis buried deep
In the next valley-glades:

Was it a vision, or a waking dream?
Fled is that music :-do I wake or sleep?

218. The last Song. CORN wall. MUST it be?-then farewell, Thou whom my woman's heart cherished so [long : Farewell, and be this song The last, wherein I say "I loved thee well.” Many a weary strain

(Never yet heard by thee) hath this poor breath
Uttered, of love and death,

And maiden grief, hidden and chid in vain.
Oh! if in after years

The tale that I am dead shall touch thy heart,
But shed, over my grave, a few sad tears.
Bid not the pain depart;
Think of me-still so young,
Silent, though fond, who cast my life away,
Daring to disobey

The passionate spirit that around me clung.
Farewell, again; and yet,

Must it indeed be so ?-and on this shore
Together see the sun of the summer set ?
Shall you and I no more
For me, my days are gone:
No more shall I, in vintage times, prepare
Chaplets to bind my hair,
As I was wont: oh, 'twas for you alone.
But on my bier I'll lay

Me' down in frozen beauty, pale and wan
Martyr of love to man,

And, like a broken flower, gently decay.

Bright things which gleam unreck'd of, and in vain ;

Keep, keep thy riches, melancholy Sea,
We ask not such from thee!

Yet more, the depths have more! what wealth untold

Far down, and shining through their stillness

Thou hast the starry gems, the burning gold, Won from ten thousand royal Argosies. Sweep o'er thy spoils, thou wild and wrathful Main;

Earth claims not these again! Yet more, the depths have more! thy waves have roll'd

Above the cities of a world gone by! Sand hath fill'd up the palaces of old, Sea-weed o'ergrown the halls of revelry! Dash o'er them, Ocean! in thy scornful play! Man yields them to decay!

But one:-to me, when Fancy stirs
My thoughts, ye seem Heaven's Messengers,
Who leave no path untrod;

And when, as now, at midnight's hour,
I hear your voice in all its power,
It seems the VOICE OF GOD.

222. Lines written in the Church-yard of

Richmond, Yorkshire. KNOWLES.

"It is good for us to be here."-Matt. xvii. 4.
METHINKS it is good to be here,
If thou'lt let us build-but for whom?
Nor Elias nor Moses appear,
But the shadows of eve that encompass the
gloom,
[tomb.
The abode of the dead, and the place of the

Shall we build to Ambition? ah, no!
Affrighted he shrinketh away:

For, see! they would pin him below,

In a small, narrow cave, and begirt with cold clay,

To the meanest of reptiles a peer and a prey.

To Beauty? ah, no! she forgets
The charms which she wielded before,

Nor knows the foul worm, that he frets
The skin which, but yesterday, fools could adore
For the smoothness it held, or the tints which
it wore.

Shall we build to the purple of Pride,
The trappings which dizen the proud?
Alas! they are all laid aside :

And here's neither dress nor adornment al-
low'd,
[the shroud.
But the long winding-sheet, and the fringe of

To Riches? alas! 'tis in vain-
Who hid, in their turns have been hid:
The treasures are squander'd again;
And here in the grave are all metals forbid
But the tinsel that shines on the dark coffin-lid.

To the pleasures which Mirth can afford,
The revel, the laugh, and the jeer?
Ah! here is a plentiful board,

But the guests are all mute as their pitiful cheer,
And none but the worm is a reveller here.

Shall we build to Affection and Love?
Ah, no! they have wither'd and died,
Or fled with the spirit above; [side:
Friends, brothers, and sisters are laid side by
Yet none have saluted, and none have replied.

Unto Sorrow? the dead cannot grieve-
Not a sob nor a sigh meets mine ear,

The first tabernacle to Hope we will build,
And look for the sleepers around us to rise!
The second to Faith which ensures it ful-
· fill'd;

The third to the Lamb, on whom virtue relies
For a glorious abode with himself in the skies.

§ 223. The Hindoo Widow on the Eve of sa-
crificing herself at her Husband's funeral
Pile. ANONYMOUS.

WHERE is thy dwelling, my early love?
Is it where those clouds are dancing?
Is it where those stars are glancing?
Is thy home in the bright blue sky above?
Yes, thou art gone to those starry bowers,
Where the golden waves are glowing
Over gems in music flowing,

Where never storm ruffles the summer flowers.
But is not thy bright home sad to thee?
Can another world give bliss
Dearer than our love in this?

Dost thou not sigh in thy bower for me?
Think how we dwelt in the desert place;
How I lov'd the setting sun,
When the toil of day was done,
And you came with the spoil of the hunter's

race.

But our love was like the dawn-flower's bloom,
In the morn,
like that morning's light,
Faded when all else is bright;
Yet a memory's left in its lone perfume.
We were too happy to be so long;

We were so blest in our lonely bower:
But the storm hangs over the sunniest hour,
And the serpent follows the sweetest song.
Yet again our hour of meeting's nigh;

I left my father's halls for thee;
Death for thy sake is sweet to me;
Our love was form'd for eternity.
My only child is sleeping there,
With smile too young for aught of grief,
Like Love upon a lotus leaf,
Calm as spring, as summer fair.
My boy, the kiss I give 's the last

Thy lips will ever have from me;
Now I have said Farewell to thee,
The bitterness of death is past.
Come, give the bridal robe, and twine

The crimson blossoms round my brow:
My step is on the pile; and now,
My love, my life, I'm ever thine.

224. By-past Time. ANONYMOUS,
THE sky is blue, the sward is green,
The wind comes from the balmy west,
The leaf upon the bough is seen,
The little songster builds its nest,
The bee hums on from flower to flower,
Till twilight's dim and pensive hour;
The joyous year arrives; but when
Shall by-past times come back again?