Licentious satire, song, and play;

The world defrauded of the high design,

Profaned the God-given strength, and marr'd the lofty line.

[1823

From Prelude to Macduff's Cross.

BUT mark,—a wizard born on Avon's bank,
Tuned but his harp to this wild northern theme,
And lo! the scene is hallow'd.

Shake

speare.

None shall pass,

Now, or in after days, beside that stone,

But he shall have strange visions; thoughts and

words,

That shake, or rouse, or thrill the human heart,

Shall rush upon his memory when he hears

The spirit-stirring name of this rude symbol ;-
Oblivious ages, at that simple spell,

Shall render back their terrors with their woes,
Alas! and with their crimes-and the proud
phantoms

Shall move with step familiar to his eye,

And accents which, once heard, the ear forgets not,
Though ne'er again to list them.

From The Bridal of Triermaine. [1813

BUT if thou bid'st, these tones shall tell
Of errant knight, and damozelle;
Of the dread knot a wizard tied,
In punishment of maiden's pride,
In notes of marvel and of fear,
That best may charm romantic ear.

Collins.

For Lucy loves,-like Collins, ill-starr'd name
Whose lay's requital, was that tardy fame,
Who bound no laurel round his living head,
Should hang it o'er his monument when dead,-
For Lucy loves to tread enchanted strand,
And thread, like him, the maze of fairy land;
Of golden battlements to view the gleam,
And slumber soft by some Elysian stream.

Shake

speare.

Otway.

IN Venice Tasso's echoes are no more,
And silent rows the songless gondolier;
Her palaces are crumbling to the shore,
And music meets not always now the ear:
Those days are gone-but Beauty still is here.
States fall, arts fade-but Nature doth not die,
Nor yet forget how Venice once was dear,
The pleasant place of all festivity,
The revel of the earth, the masque of Italy!

But unto us she hath a spell beyond
Her name in story, and her long array
Of mighty shadows, whose dim forms despond
Above the dogeless city's vanish'd sway;
Ours is a trophy which will not decay
With the Rialto; Shylock and the Moor,
And Pierre, can not be swept or worn away-
The keystones of the arch! though all were o'er,
For us repeopled were the solitary shore.

Churchill's Grave,

A fact literally rendered.

I STOOD beside the grave of him who blazed
The comet of a season, and I saw

The humblest of all sepulchres, and gazed
With not the less of sorrow and of awe
On that neglected turf and quiet stone,

[1816

With name no clearer than the names unknown,
Which lay unread around it; and I ask'd
The gardener of that ground, why it might be
That for this plant strangers his memory task'd
Through the thick deaths of half a century;
And thus he answer'd-"Well, I do not know
Why frequent travellers turn to pilgrims so;
He died before my day of sextonship,
And I had not the digging of this grave."
And is this all? I thought,-and do we rip
The veil of Immortality? and crave
I know not what of honour and of light
Through unborn ages, to endure this blight?
So soon and so successless? As I said,
The Architect of all on which we tread,
For Earth is but a tombstone, did essay
To extricate remembrance from the clay,
Whose minglings might confuse a Newton's thought
Were it not that all life must end in one,
Of which we are but dreamers ;-as he caught
As 'twere the twilight of a former Sun,
Thus spoke he,-"I believe the man of whom
You wot, who lies in this selected tomb,
Was a most famous writer in his day,

And therefore travellers step from out their way

P

Pope.

Pope. Dryden.

To pay him honour,-and myself whate'er
Your honour pleases,"-then most pleased I shook
From out my pocket's avaricious nook

Some certain coins of silver, which as 'twere
Perforce I gave this man, though I could spare
So much but inconveniently ;-ye smile,

I see ye, ye profane ones! all the while,
Because my homely phrase the truth would tell.
You are the fools, not I-for I did dwell
With a deep thought and with a soften'd eye,
On that old Sexton's natural homily,

In which there was Obscurity and Fame,
The Glory and the Nothing of a Name.

From English Bards and Scotch
Reviewers.

[1809

THEN should you ask me, why I venture o'er
The path which Pope and Gifford trod before;
If not yet sicken'd you can still proceed :

Go on; my rhyme will tell you as you read.
"But hold!" exclaims a friend,-" here's some
neglect ;

This-that-and t' other line seem incorrect."
What then? The self-same blunder Pope has got,
And careless Dryden--" Ay, but Pye has not :
Indeed!-'tis granted, faith !—but what care I?
Better to err with Pope, than shine with Pye.
Time was, ere yet in these degenerate days
Ignoble themes obtain'd mistaken praise,
When sense and wit with poesy allied,
No fabled graces, flourish'd side by side;
From the same fount their inspiration drew,
And rear'd by taste, bloom'd fairer as they grew.

Then, in this happy isle, a Pope's pure strain
Sought the rapt soul to charm, nor sought in vain ;
A polish'd nation's praise aspired to claim,
And raised the people's, as the poet's fame.
Like him great Dryden pour'd the tide of song,
In stream less smooth indeed, yet doubly strong.
Then Congreve's scenes could cheer, or Otway's
melt-

For nature then an English audience felt.
But why these names, or greater still, retrace,
When all to feebler bards resign their place?
Yet to such times our lingering looks are cast,
When taste and reason with those times are past.
Now look around, and try each trifling page,
Survey the precious works that please the age;
This truth at least let satire's self allow,
No dearth of bards can be complain'd of now.
The loaded press beneath her labour groans,
And printer's devils shake their weary bones;
While Southey's epics cram the creaking shelves,
And Little's lyrics shine in hot-press'd twelves.

Behold in various throngs the scribbling crew,
For notice eager, pass in long review :
Each spurs his jaded Pegasus apace,

And rhyme and blank maintain an equal race;
Sonnets on sonnets crowd, and ode on ode;
And tales of terror jostle on the road;
Immeasurable measures move along ;
For simpering folly loves a varied song,
To strange mysterious dulness still the friend,
Admires the strain she cannot comprehend.
Thus Lays of Minstrels-may they be the last!

Pope.

Dryden.

Congreve and Otway.

Southey.
Moore.

Scott.