Ye spirits of the free!
Can ye forever see
Your brother — man,
A yok'd and tortur'd slave,
Scourg'd to an early grave, —
And raise no hand to save,
E'en when you can?

Shall tyrants from the soul,
That they in pomp may roll,
God's image tear,
And call the wreck their own; —
While, from th' eternal throne,
They shut the stifled groan,
And bitter pray'r?

Shall he a slave be bound,
Whom God hath doubly crown'd
Creation's lord?
Shall men of Christian name,
Without a blush of shame,

Shepherd, wouldst thou here obtain
Pleasure unalloy'd with pain?
Joy that suits the rural sphere?
Gentle shepherd, lend an ear.

Learn to relish calm delight,
Verdant vales and fountains bright;
Trees that nod o'er sloping hills,
Caves that echo tinkling rills.

If thou canst no charm disclose
In the simplest bud that blows;
Go, forsake thy plain and fold;
Join the crowd, and toil for gold.

Tranquil pleasures never cloy;
Banish each tumultuous joy;
All but love — for love inspires
Fonder wishes, warmer fires.

Out upon it, lack-a-day,
Foolishly I swore,
Vowed that I would keep away
For a week or more —
Now each day it seems a year;
I must break my oath I fear
And to-morrow see my dear
If I don't before.

Prithee, Venus, blot my word
On the mindful scroll,
Say my vow you never heard,
Wipe it from the roll.
Sure it would too cruel be
Angry gods as well as she
If they both should take from me
Punishment for toll.

Now the buttercups of May
Twinkle fainter day by day,
And the stalks of flowering clover
Make the June fields red all over, —

Now the cuckoo, like a bell,
Modulates a sad farewell,
And the nightingale, perceiving
Love's warm tokens, ends her grieving, —

Let us twain arise and go
Where the freshening breezes blow,
Where the granite giant moulders
In his circling cairn of boulders!

Just a year ago to-day,
Friend, we climbed the self-same way,
Through the village-green, and higher

Who lives not in the heart of woman, lives
In God's heart never, though the hand may press
God's hand. Who knows not the divine caress
Knows not the holiest rapture God's touch gives.
Who wills to win the most, the most receives:
Who never knew the glory of a rose
Full little of God's inmost glory knows
Or of the height of rapture love achieves.

In holiest pureness seek the kiss divine:
Make all its perfect subtle fragrance thine:
Find God revealed in woman's wondrous face.
Did God make woman for a temptress? Nay,

During the ferment occasioned by the Popish Bill of Toleration

Removed, thank God! from fierce contentions;
Unknown to parties or C ONVENTIONS ;
Alike averse to rage and folly,
And foe to gloomy melancholy;
Amid confusion, war, and zeal,
Accept these lines from Bard M ACNEILL .

When morning comes, my breakfast down,
Composed and wrapped in flannel gown,
Till Andrew comes my brains to muddy,
I dedicate some hours to study,—
Behold me, then, in elbow chair,
Turn o'er a leaf with serious air;
Or seized with strong poetic fit,

If Love should faint, and half decline
Below the fit meridian sign,
And shorn of all his golden dress,
His royal state and loveliness,
Be no more worth a heart like thine,
Let not thy nobler passion pine,
But, with a charity divine,
Let Memory ply her soft address
If Love should faint;
And oh! this laggard heart of mine,
Like some halt pilgrim stirred with wine,
Shall ache in pity's dear distress,
Until the balms of thy caress
To work the finished cure combine,
If Love should faint.

Here, in cool grot and mossy cell,
We rural fays and fairies dwell;
Though rarely seen by mortal eye,
When the pale moon, ascending high,
Darts through yon lines her quivering beams,
We frisk it near these crystal streams.

Her beams, reflected from the wave,
Afford the light our revels crave;
The turf, with daisies broider'd o'er,
Exceeds, we wot, the Parian floor;
Nor yet for artful strains we call,
But listen to the water's fall.

Would you then taste our tranquil scene,
Be sure your bosoms be serene;

Upon the meadow land rests now the noon.
No wing, track, shadow in the blue and green.
Smoke whitens in the sun, grows thin, and soon
no more is seen.

I have a whirlpool chiming in my ear;
perhaps the distant shepherd bells; and hark!
amidst the blue suspended, I can hear
carol of lark.

O wind of Provence, subtle wind that blows
Through coverts of the impenetrable rose,
O musical soft wind, come near to me,
Come down into these hollows by the sea,
O wind of Provence, heavy with the rose!

How once along the blue sea's battlements
Thy amorous rose-trees poured their spicy scents!
The heavy perfume streamed down granite walls,
Where now the prickly cactus gibes and crawls
Down towards cold waves from grim rock-battlements.

Of all the attar, sharp and resinous,
The spines and stalles alone are left for us,