Classic Poem

HERE , where his rapid flood the T AMAR leads
Through desert cliffs, wild woods, and pathless meads,
Or where, in conflict with the lessening shores,
Up the sweet inland-vale the A TLANTIC pours,
While with the thrush the seamew blends her notes,
Or on the rocking surge in slumber floats,
And oft the ploughman stays his team to mark
The drooping flag of many a captured bark
Following the conqueror's course, as on he rides,
And stems, with foaming prow, the murmuring tides,
Here, once again I bid the world adieu,
And my heart turns to friendship and to you.
Friend of my youth! who first, with fostering ray,
Play'd round my morn of life, now gild my day,
(Nor shall one sullen vapour rise to lour,
And cloud its influence o'er my evening hour)
While you, in plighted faith, and mutual love,
Find joys on earth resembling those above,
And, proud a father's hallowed name to bear,
Taste pleasure's cordial in the cup of care,
Sad through a solitary world I stray,
With none to cheer my steps, nor chide my stay.
Not ours to slumber in supine content,
Or only wake to weep o'er time misspent:
To man a task is set, a blessing given,
To do the will, and earn the joys of heav'n.
Engrafted on the stock of DUTY rise
Fruits ever fair, transplanted from the skies,
And far more rare, more precious, than of old,
Bloom'd on the Hesperian tree in living gold:
Than those more subtle to revive and save
Which to the wandering Chief great H ERMES gave.
Or H ELEN crush'd to drug the wondrous bowl
That sooth'd his son, and stay'd his drooping soul;
For these have power the wounded mind to heal,
And bid remorse itself forget to feel;
And these are yours, who, gifted to excel,
Preferr'd in peace and privacy to dwell,
And chose the safe, sequester'd path, that steals
Far from the highway-crowd, and crash of wheels:
Who, skilled in that rare art, the art to live,
Ask not the world for more than it can give;
But, taught to fear its strife, and shun its noise,
Disdain its honours, and distrust its joys,
Have sought content, not wealth, esteem, not fame,
And have deserved, though not desired, a name.
To thy pure mind reveal'd, in early youth,
The seeming paradox, but sovereign truth,
(Oft to the aged and the wise unknown)
That seeking others' good we find our own.
Generous self-love! whose dictates to pursue
(Alas! the unenvied privilege of few!)
Fills with such sweet employment every hour,
That whether wayward Fortune shine or lour,
Whether above ambition or below,
A bliss unborrow'd of the world we know,
And, blest in blessing, proudly can disclaim
Rank, riches, power, and (harder task!) ev'n fame.
The social Passions their own bliss create,
A bliss that's scarcely subject even to Fate.
Friendship though call'd to suffer or endure:
Love without hope, that finds, that seeks, no cure;
Than can persist unknown, persist unshar'd,
For Love, like Virtue, is its own reward:
Pity though unavailing; vain Regret
For those we see no more, but ne'er forget,
(As pensive Memory all the past restores,
Yearns for the absent, or the lost deplores)
The Fear that watches in a mother's eye
When first her infant breathes its feeble cry,
That never sleeps, but guards him, as he strays,
Through all the perils of his early days:
Even these, exposed to pain, alarm, or grief,
In their own generous nature find relief;
Nay, often, in the sharpest wounds they feel
There springs a balm that can do more than heal,
That can delight, as well as ease, impart,
A subtler pleasure kindle in the heart
Than selfish triumphs, or the dead repose,
The sullen quiet, that the Stoic knows.
Cold on the mountain-heath, exposed and bare,
The lone oak shudders in the troubled air,
Around his stem her arms no woodbine flings,
Beneath his shade no tender sapling springs;
His leaf untimely falls; his shattered form
Shrinks from the fury of the driving storm;
But born in happier soil, in grove or wood,
Shelter'd, his spreading branches long had stood,
And borne their annual honours green in age,
Safe from the summer-blaze, the winter's rage.
Emblem of him whose solitary cares
No partner of his pleasures more than shares:
For love too proud, for happiness too wise,
He looks on beauty with undazzled eyes,
Computes, compares, and gravely, sagely cold,
In cautious folly, rash delay, grows old;
Doubts till fastidious youth his suit derides,
And Time (the coward's fortitude) decides.
Haply he seeks in mercenary arms
Love's modest pleasures, and mysterious charms,
Presumes to hope its transports can be sold,
Trusting the weak omnipotence of gold.
But these wealth cannot buy; Vice cannot know;
Pure are the countless sources whence they flow;
From faith long tried, from lives that blend in one;
From many a soft word spoken, kind deed done;
Too small, perhaps, for each to have a name,
Too oft recurring much regard to claim:
As in fair constellations may combine
The stars that, singly, undistinguish'd shine.
Love, too, is proud, and will not be controll'd;
Timid, and must be rather guess'd than told;
Would be divined, but then by only one,
And fain the notice of all else would shun;
It stays not to forgive, it cannot see
The failings from which none, alas! are free;
Blind but to faults, quick-sighted to descry
Merit oft hid from a less searching eye;
Ever less prone to doubt than to believe;
Ever more glad to give than to receive;
Constant as kind, tho' changing nature, name;
Many, yet one; another, yet the same:
'Tis Friendship, Pity, Joy, Grief, Hope, nay Fear,
Not the least tender when in form severe.
It dwells with every rank, in every clime,
And sets at nought the malice even of Time;
In youth more rapturous, but in age more sure,
Chief blessing of the rich, sole comfort of the poor.
But mark the evening of the lone man's life!
Deserted then! perhaps disturbed by strife!
Ah then! in dreary age, 'tis his to sigh
For tender care, and soothing sympathy.
By his sick bed no long-lov'd face appears;
No well-known step, no well-known voice he hears:
Strangers, for hire, his last sad moments tend;
No children's prayers relenting heav'n ascend;
He dies, and is forgot! — Scarce known his doom;
And weeds soon hide his unfrequented tomb.
Start from thy trance, thou fool! awake in time!
Snatch the short pleasures of thy fleeting prime!
While yet youth's healthful fever warms the blood,
And the pulse throbs in vigour's rapid flood;
While love invites, whose spells possess the power
Ages of bliss to crowd into an hour!
Though to fond memory each blest hour appears
Rich with the transports of eventful years!
To Love alone such magic can belong:
The present still so short! the past so long!
But youth is on the wing, and will not stay;
Fair morn too oft of a foul wintery day!
A warm but watery gleam extinguished soon
In storm, or vapour, gathering o'er its noon:
And should the unwearied Sun shine on, till night
Quench his hot ray and cloud his cheerful light,
How fast the shadow o'er the dial flies!
While to himself fond man a debtor dies,
Trusting to-morrow still, or misemploy'd
He leaves the world unknown, and unenjoy'd.
Haste then as nature dictates dare to live;
Ask of thy youth the pleasures youth should give:
So shall thy manhood and thy age confess
That of the past the present learns to bless;
And thou shalt boast, with mingling joy and pride,
The wife, the mother, dearer than the bride,
And own, as on thy knees thy children grow,
That home becomes an early heav'n below.
There still an angel hovers o'er the fence,
To drive with flaming sword all evil thence:
There, in a little grove of kindred, rise
Those tender plants, the human charities,
Which, in the world's cold soil and boisterous air,
Withhold their blossoms, and refuse to bear,
Or all unsheltered from the blaze of day,
Their golden fruit falls premature away.
Hail holy marriage! hail indulgent law!
Whose kind restraints in closer union draw
Consenting hearts and minds: — By thee confin'd
Instinct's ennobled, and desire refined,
Man is a savage else, condemn'd to roam
Without companion, and without a home:
And helpless woman, as alone she strays,
With sighs and tears her new-born babe surveys;
But chusing, chosen, never more to part,
New joys, new duties blending in her heart,
Endow'd alike to charm hiMand to mend,
Man gains at once a mistress and a friend:
In one fair form obtaining from above
An angel's virtues and a woman's love:
Then guarded, cherish'd, and confest her worth,
She scorns the pangs that give his offspring birth,
Lifts for his father's kiss the laughing boy,
And sees and shares his triumph and his joy.
Source of our bliss, and solace of our woe,
To thee our value as our joy we owe;
On thee all morals, and all laws depend,
And, reft of thee, society must end!
This earth, resplendent in her rich array!
Herb, tree, fruit, flower; yon radiant orb of day!
The moon, fair mirror of his soften'd light!
The stars that crowd the purple vault of night!
The wandering comet's bright, portentous train!
The expanse of heav'n! th' illimitable main!
The storm that lifts its billows to the sky!
The bursting cloud whence fiery arrows fly!
The awful voice of thunder! and the shock
Of earthquakes, when the Globe's huge pillars rock!
Its countless flocks and herds! the savage brood
That shake the forest with their cries for food!
The unwieldy sovereigns of the living deep!
The shoals half-sentient in her caves that sleep!
The swarms that revel on each leaf and blade
In rainbow-hues, and burning gold array'd!
The exulting tenants of the peopled sky!
Those worlds on worlds that mock the assisted eye!
Stupendous Scene! — Could less than heav'n create
The parts so wond'rous of a whole so great?
— Without their lord, the moral being Man,
Say what are all? — a Chaos, not a plan;
Man placed on earth, behold the full design
Declares aloud its author is divine:
And hark! a voice from heav'n proclaims his will
That favour'd man's immortal race should fill
The world's wide fields, o'er ev'ry tribe should reign,
Crown the whole work, and nought be made in vain.