But that the omnipotent might send him forth
In sight of mortal and immortal powers,
As on a boundless theatre to run
The great career of justice; to exalt
His generous aim to all diviner deeds;
To shake each partial purpose from his breast;
And thro' the mists of passion and of sense,
And thro' the tossing tide of chance and pain
To hold his course unfalt'ring, while the voice
Of truth and virtue, up the steep ascent
Of nature, calls him to his high reward,
The applauding smile of heaven? else wherefore burns,
In mortal bosoms, this unquenched hope
That breathes from day to day sublimer things,
And mocks possession? wherefore darts the mind,
With such resistless ardour to embrace
Majestic forms; impatient to be free,
Spurning the gross controul of wilful might;
Proud of the strong contention of her toils;
Proud to be daring? Who but rather turns
To heaven's broad fire his unconstrained view,
Than to the glimmering of a waxen flame ?
Who that, from Alpine heights, his labʼring eye
Shoots round the wide horizon to survey
Nilus or Ganges rolling his broad tide
Thro' mountains, plains, thro' empires black with shade, 180
And continents of sand; will turn his gaze
To mark the windings of a scanty rill
That murmurs at his feet? The high born soul
Disdains to rest her heaven aspiring wing
Beneath its native quarry. Tired of earth
And this diurnal scene, she springs aloft
Thro' fields of air; pursues the flying storm ;
Rides on the volley'd lightning thro' the heavens ;
Or, yok'd with whirlwinds and the northern blast,
Sweeps the long tract of day. Then high she soars
The blue profound, and hovering o'er the sun
Beholds him pouring the redundant stream
Of light; beholds his unrelenting sway
Bend the reluctant planets to absolve
The fated rounds of time. Thence far effus'd
She darts her swiftness up the long career
Of devious comets; thro' its burning signs
Exulting circles the perennial wheel
Of nature, and looks back on all the stars,
Whose blended light, as with a milky zone,
Invests the orient. Now amaz'd she views
The empyreal waste, where happy spirits hold,
Beyond this concave heaven, their calm abode
And fields of radiance, whose unfading light
Has travel'd the profound six thousand years
Nor yet arriv'd in sight of mortal things.
Even on the barriers of the world untir'd
She meditates the eternal depth below;
Till, half recoiling, down the headlong steep
She plunges; soon o'erwhelmn'd and swallowed up
In the immense of being. There her hopes
Rest at the fated goal. For from the birth
Of mortal man, the sov'reign Maker said,
That not in humble or in brief delight,
Not in the fading echoes of renown
Power's purple robes, or pleasure's flow'ry lap
The soul should find enjoyment; but from these
Turning disdainful to an equal good,
Thro' all the ascent of things enlarge her view,
Till every bound at length should disappear,
And infinite perfection close the scene.
Call now to mind what high, capacious powers
Lie folded up in man; how far beyond
The praise of mortals, may the eternal growth
Of nature to perfection half divine,
Expand the blooming soul? What pity then
Should sloth's unkindly fogs depress to earth
Her tender blossom; choke the streams of life,
And blast her spring! Far otherwise design'd
Almighty wisdom; nature's happy cares
The obedient heart far otherwise incline.
Witness the sprightly joy when aught unknown
Strikes the quick sense, and wakes each active power
To brisker measures; witness the neglect
Of all familiar prospects, tho' beheld
With transport once; the fond, attentive gaze
Of young astonishment; the sober zeal
Of age, commenting on prodigious things,
For such the bounteous providence of heaven,
In every breast implanting this desire
Of objects new and strange, to urge us on
With unremitted labour to pursue
Those sacred stores that wait the ripening soul,
In truth's exhaustless bosom. What need words
To paint its power? For this the daring youth
Breaks from his weeping, mother's anxious arms,
In foreign climes to rove; the pensive sage,
Heedless of sleep or midnight's harmful damp,
Hangs o'er the sickly taper; and untir'd
The virgin follows, with enchanted step,
The mazes of some wild and wond'rous tale,
From morn to eve; unmindful of her form,
Unmindful of the happy dress that stole
The wishes of the youth, when every maid
With envy pin'd. Hence, finally, by night
The village matron, round the blazing hearth,
Suspends the infant audience with her tales,
Breathing astonishment! of witching rhymes,
And evil spirits; of the death-bed call
To him who robb'd the widow, and devour'd
The orphan's portion of unquiet souls
Ris'n from the grave to ease the heavy guilt
Of deeds in life conceal'd; of shapes that walk
At dead of night, and clank their chains, and wave
The torch of hell around the murderer's bed.
At every solemn pause the crowd recoil,
Gazing each other speechless, and congeal'd
With shivering sighs; till eager for the event,
Around the beldam all erect they hang,
Each trembling heart with grateful terrors quell'd.
But lo! disclos'd in all her smiling pomp,
Where beauty, onward moving, claims the verse
Her charms inspire: the freely flowing verse
In thy immortal praise, O form divine,
Smooths her mellifluent stream. Thee, beauty, thee,
The regal dome, and thy enlivening ray
The mossy roofs adore; thou, better sun!
For ever beamest on the enchanted heart
Love, and harmonious wonder, and delight
Poetic. Brightest progeny of heaven!
How shall I trace thy features? where select
The roseate hues to emulate thy bloom?
Haste then, my song, thro' nature's wide expanse,
Haste then, and gather all her comeliest wealth,
Whate'er bright spoils the florid earth contains,
Whate'er the waters, or the liquid air,
To deck thy lovely labour. Wilt thou fly
With laughing Autumn to the Atlantic isles,
And range with him th' Hesperian field, and see,
Where'er his fingers touch the fruitful grove,
The branches shoot with gold; where'er his step
Marks the glad soil, the tender clusters glow
With purple ripeness, and invest each hill
As with the blushes of an evening sky.
Or wilt thou rather stoop thy vagrant plume,
Where gliding thro' his daughter's honor'd shades,
The smooth l'eneus from his glassy flood
Reflects purpureal Tempe's pleasant scene?
Fair Tempe haunt belov'd of sylvan powers,
Of nymphs and fawns; where in the golden age
They play'd in secret on the shady brink
With ancient Pan; while round their choral steps
Young hours and genial gales with constant hand
Shower'd blossoms, odours, shower'd ambrosial dews
And spring's Elysian bloom. Her flowery store
To thee nor Tempe shall refuse; nor watch
Of winged Hydra guard Hesperian fruits
From thy free spoil. O bear then, unreprov'd,
Thy smiling treasures to the green recess
Where young Dione stays. With sweetest airs.
Entice her forth to lend her angel form
For beauty's honour'd image. Hither turn
Thy graceful footsteps; hither, gentle maid,
Incline thy polish'd forehead; let thy eyes
Effuse the mildness of their azure dawn;
And may the fanning breezes waft aside
The radiant locks, dissolving as it bends
With airy softness from the marble neck,
The cheek fair blooming, and the rosy lip
Where winning smiles and pleasure sweet as love,
With sanctity and wisdom, temp'ring blend
Their soft allurement. Then the pleasing force
Of nature, and her kind parental care,
Worthier I'd sing; then all the enamour'd youth
With each admiring virgin, to my lyre
Should throng attentive, while I point on high
Where beauty's living image, like the morn
That wakes in zephyr's arms the blushing May,
Moves onward; or as Venus, when she stood
Effulgent on the pearly car, and smil'd,
Fresh from the deep, and conscious of her form,
To see the Tritons tune their vocal shells,
And each coerulean sister of the flood
With fond acclaim attend her o'er the waves,
To seek the Idalian bower. Ye smiling band
Of youths and virgins, who, thro' all the maze
Of young desire, with rival steps pursue
This charm of beauty; if the pleasing toil
Can yield a moment's respite, hither turn
Your favourable ear, and trust my words.
I do not mean to wake the gloomy form
Of superstition drest in wisdom's garb,
To damp your tender hopes; I do not mean
To bid the jealous thund'rer fire the heaven
Or shapes infernal rend the groaning earth
To fright you from your joys; my cheerful song
With better omens calls you to the field,
Pleas'd with your gen'rous ardour in the chace,
And warm as you. Then tell me, for you know,
Does beauty ever deign to dwell where health
And active use are strangers? Is her charm
Confess'd in aught, whose most peculiar ends
Are lame and fruitless? Or did nature mean
This awful stamp the herald of a lye;
To hide the shane of discord and disease,
And catch with fair hypocrisy the heart
Of idle faith? O no! with better cares,
Th' indulgent mother, conscious how infirm
Her offspring tread the paths of good and ill,
By this illustrious image, in each kind
Still more illustrious where the object holds
Its native powers most perfect, she by this
Illumes the headlong impulse of desire,
And sanctifies his choice. The generous glebe
Whose bosom smiles with verdure, the clear tract
The lovely ministress of truth and good
In this dark world: for truth and good are one,
And beauty dwells in them, and they in her,
With like cipitation. Wherefore then,
O sons of earth! would you dissolve the tye?
O wherefore, with a rash, imperfect aim,
Seek you those flow'ry joys with which the hand
Of lavish fancy paints each flattering scene
Where beauty seems to dwell, nor once enquire
Where is the sanction of eternal truth,
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