Harvard Classics, Volume XLI
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English Poetry II:
From Collins to Fitzgerald
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Table of Contents
Harvard Classics, Volume XLI
William Collins (1720—1759)
294. Fidele
295. Ode Written in MDCCXLVI
296. The Passions
297. To Evening
298. The Dying Man in His Garden
George Sewell (d. 1726)
299. The Flowers of the Forest
Alison Rutherford Cockburn (1712—1794)
300. Lament for Flodden
Jane Elliot (1727—1805)
301. A Song to David
Christopher Smart (1722—1770)
302. Willy Drowned in Yarrow
Anonymous
303. The Braes of Yarrow
John Logan (1748—1788)
304. A Hunting Song
Henry Fielding (1707—1754)
305. Tom Bowling
Charles Dibdin (1745—1814)
Samuel Johnson (1709—1784)
306. On the Death of Dr. Robert Levet
307. A Satire
Oliver Goldsmith (1728—1774)
308. When Lovely Woman Stoops
309. Retaliation
310. The Deserted Village
311. The Traveller
312. If Doughty Deeds
Robert Graham of Gartmore (1735—1797)
313. For Lack of Gold
Adam Austin (1726(?)—1774)
William Cowper
314. Loss of the Royal George
315. To a Young Lady
316. The Poplar Field
317. The Solitude of Alexander Selkirk
318. To Mary Unwin
319. To the Same
320. Boadicea: An Ode
321. The Castaway
322. The Shrubbery
323. On the Receipt of My Mother’s Picture out of Norfolk
324. The Diverting History of John Gilpin
325. Drinking Song
Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1751—1816)
326. Life
Anna Laetitia Barbauld (1743—1825)
327. Ca’ the Yowes to the Knowes
Isobel Pagan (?) (1741(?)—1821)
328. Auld Robin Gray
Lady Anne Lindsay (1750—1825)
329. Song from AElla
Thomas Chatterton (1752—1770)
Carolina Oliphant, Lady Nairne
330. The Land o’ the Leal
331. He’s Ower the Hills That I Lo’e Weel
332. The Auld House
333. The Laird o’ Cockpen
334. The Rowan Tree
335. Wha’ll Be King But Charlie?
336. Charlie Is My Darling
337. Wooed and Married and A’
Alexander Ross (1699—1784)
338. Tullochgorum
John Skinner (1721—1807)
339. To the Cuckoo
Michael Bruce (1746—1767)
340. Logie o’ Buchan
George Halket (d. 1756(?))
341. The Braes of Yarrow
William Hamilton of Bangour (1704—1754)
Hector MacNeil (1746—1818)
342. I Lo’ed Ne’er a Laddie but Ane
343. Come Under My Plaidie
Sir William Jones (1746—1794)
344. An Ode
345. On Parent Knees a Naked New-born Child
346. And Ye Shall Walk in Silk Attire
Susanna Blamire (1747—1794)
347. My Mother Bids Me Bind My Hair
Anne Hunter (1742—1821)
348. The Year That’s Awa’
John Dunlop (1755—1820)
Samuel Rogers (1763—1855)
349. A Wish
350. The Sleeping Beauty
William Blake (1757—1827)
351. The Tiger
352. Ah! Sun-Flower
353. To Spring
354. Reeds of Innocence
355. Night
356. Auguries of Innocence
357. Nurse’s Song
358. Holy Thursday
359. The Divine Image
360. Song
361. To-Morrow
John Collins (d. 1808(?))
Robert Tannahill (1774—1810)
362. Jessie, the Flower o’ Dunblane
363. Gloomy Winter’s Now Awa’
William Wordsworth
364. Ode on Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood
365. My Heart Leaps Up
366. The Two April Mornings
367. The Fountain
368. Written in March
369. Nature and the Poet
370. Ruth: Or the Influences of Nature
371. A Lesson
372. Michael
373. Yarrow Unvisited
374. Yarrow Visited
375. Yarrow Revisited
376. Lines
377. The Daffodils
378. To the Daisy
379. To the Cuckoo
380. The Green Linnet
381. Written in Early Spring
382. To the Skylark
383. The Affliction of Margaret
384. Simon Lee the Old Huntsman
385. Ode to Duty
386. She Was a Phantom of Delight
387. To the Highland Girl of Inversneyde
388. The Solitary Reaper
389. The Reverie of Poor Susan
390. To Toussaint L’Ouverture
391. Character of the Happy Warrior
392. Resolution and Independence
393. Laodamia
394. We Are Seven
395. Lucy
396. The Inner Vision
397. By the Sea
398. Upon WestminsterBridge
399. To a Distant Friend
400. Desideria
401. We Must Be Free or Die
402. England and Switzerland
403. On the Extinction of the Venetian Republic
404. London, MDCCCII
405. The Same
406. When I Have Borne
407. The World is Too Much With Us
408. Within King’s College Chapel, Cambridge
409. Valedictory Sonnet to the River Duddon
410. Composed at NeidpathCastle, the Property of Lord Queensberry
411. Admonition to a Traveller
412. To Sleep
413. The Sonnet
414. Dover Cliffs
William Lisle Bowles (1762—1850)
Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772—1834)
416. Kubla Khan
417. Youth and Age
418. Love
419. Hymn Before Sunrise, in the Vale of Chamouni
420. Christabel
421. Dejection: an Ode
422. After Blenheim
Robert Southey (1774—1843)
423. The Scholar
Robert Southey (1774—1843)
Charles Lamb (1775—1834)
424. The Old Familiar Faces
425. Hester
426. On an Infant Dying as Soon as Born
Sir Walter Scott
427. The Outlaw
428. To a Lock of Hair
429. Jock of Hazeldean
430. Eleu Loro
431. A Serenade
432. The Rover
433. The Maid of Neidpath
434. Gathering Song of Donald the Black
435. Border Ballad
436. The Pride of Youth
437. Coronach
438. Lucy Ashton’s Song
439. Answer
440. Rosabelle
441. Hunting Song
442. Lochinvar
443. Bonny Dundee
444. Datur Hora Quieti
445. Here’s a Health to King Charles
446. Harp of the North, Farewell!
James Hogg
447. Kilmeny
448. When the Kye Comes Hame
449. The Skylark
450. Lock the Door, Lariston
451. Barthram’s Dirge
Robert Surtees (1779—1834)
Thomas Campbell
452. The Soldier’s Dream
453. To the Evening Star
454. Ode to Winter
455. Lord Ullin’s Daughter
456. The River of Life
457. To the Evening Star
458. The Maid of Neidpath
459. Ye Mariners of England
460. Battle of the Baltic
461. Hohenlinden
462. Freedom and Love
J. Campbell
463. Hame, Hame, Hame
Allan Cunningham (1784—1842)
464. A Wet Sheet and a Flowing Sea
Allan Cunningham (1784—1842)
George Gordon, Lord Byron
465. Youth and Age
466. The Destruction of Sennacherib
467. Elegy on Thyrza
468. When We Two Parted
469. For Music
470. She Walks in Beauty
471. All for Love
472. Elegy
473. To Augusta
474. Epistle to Augusta
475. Maid of Athens
476. Darkness
477. Longing
478. Fare Thee Well
479. The Prisoner of Chillon
480. On the Castle of Chillon
481. Song of Saul Before His Last Battle
482. The Isles of Greece
483. On This Day I Complete My Thirty-Sixth Year
Thomas Moore (1779—1852)
484. The Light of Other Days
485. Pro Patria Mori
486. The Meeting of the Waters
487. The Last Rose of Summer
488. The Harp that Once Through Tara’s Halls
489. A Canadian Boat-Song
490. The Journey Onwards
491. The Young May Moon
492. Echo
493. At the Mid Hour of Night
494. The Burial of Sir John Moore At Corunna
Charles Wolfe (1791—1823)
Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792—1822)
495. Hymn of Pan
496. Hellas
497. Invocation
498. Stanzas Written in Dejection Near Naples
499. I Fear Thy Kisses
500. Lines to an Indian Air
501. To a Skylark
502. Love’s Philosophy
503. To the Night
504. Ode to the West Wind
505. Written Among the Euganean Hills, North Italy
506. Hymn to the Spirit of Nature
507. A Lament
508. A Dream of the Unknown
509. The Invitation
510. The Recollection
511. To the Moon
512. A Widow Bird
513. To a Lady, with a Guitar
514. One Word is Too Often Profaned
515. Ozymandias of Egypt
516. The Flight of Love
517. The Cloud
518. Stanzas—April, 1814
519. Music, When Soft Voices Die
520. The Poet’s Dream
521. The World’s Wanderers
522. Adonais
James Henry Leigh Hunt (1784—1859)
523. Jenny Kiss’d Me
524. Abou Ben Adhem
John Keats (1795—1821)
525. The Realm of Fancy
526. Ode on the Poets
527. The Mermaid Tavern
528. Happy Insensibility
529. Ode to a Nightingale
530. Ode on a Grecian Urn
531. Ode to Autumn
532. Ode to Psyche
533. Ode on Melancholy
534. The Eve of St. Agnes
535. La Belle Dame Sans Merci
536. On the Grasshopper and Cricket
537. On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer
538. To Sleep
539. The Human Seasons
540. Great Spirits Now on Earth Are Sojourning
541. The Terror of Death
542. Last Sonnet
Walter Savage Landor (1775—1864)
543. Rose Aylmer
544. Twenty Years Hence
545. Proud Word You Never Spoke
546. Absence
547. Dirce
548. Corinna to Tanagra, from Athens
549. Mother, I Cannot Mind My Wheel
550. Well I Remember
551. No, My Own Love
552. Robert Browning
553. The Death of Artemidora
554. Iphigeneia
555. ‘Do You Remember Me?’
556. For an Epitaph at Fiesole
557. On Lucretia Borgia’s Hair
558. On His Seventy-Fifth Birthday
559. To My Ninth Decade
560. Death Stands Above Me
561. On Living Too Long
Thomas Hood (1798—1845)
562. Fair Ines
563. The Bridge of Sighs
564. The Death Bed
565. Past and Present
566. Glengariff
Sir Aubrey De Vere (1788—1846)
567. She is Not Fair
Hartley Coleridge (1796—1849)
568. To Night
Joseph Blanco White (1775—1841)
569. The Loveliness of Love
George Darley (1795—1846)
Thomas Babington Macaulay, Lord Macaulay (1800—1859)
570. The Armada
571. A Jacobite’s Epitaph
573. The Babie
Hugh Miller (1802—1856)
574. Lament of the Irish Emigrant
Helen Selina, Lady Dufferin (1807—1867)
575. Letty’s Globe
Charles Tennyson Turner (1808—1879)
576. The Fair Hills of Ireland
Sir Samuel Ferguson (1810—1886)
Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806—1861)
577. A Musical Instrument
578. Sonnets from the Portuguese I
579. Sonnets from the Portuguese II
580. Sonnets from the Portuguese III
581. Sonnets from the Portuguese IV
582. Sonnets from the Portuguese V
583. Sonnets from the Portuguese VI
584. Sonnets from the Portuguese VII
585. Sonnets from the Portuguese VIII
586. Sonnets from the Portuguese IX
587. Sonnets from the Portuguese X
588. Sonnets from the Portuguese XI
589. Sonnets from the Portuguese XII
590. Sonnets from the Portuguese XIII
591. Sonnets from the Portuguese XIV
592. Sonnets from the Portuguese XV
593. Sonnets from the Portuguese XVI
594. Sonnets from the Portuguese XVII
595. Sonnets from the Portuguese XVIII
596. Sonnets from the Portuguese XIX
597. Sonnets from the Portuguese XX
598. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXI
599. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXII
600. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXIII
601. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXIV
602. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXV
603. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXVI
604. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXVII
605. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXVIII
606. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXIX
607. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXX
608. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXXI
609. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXXII
610. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXXIII
611. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXXIV
612. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXXV
613. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXXVI
614. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXXVII
615. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXXVIII
616. Sonnets from the Portuguese XXXIX
617. Sonnets from the Portuguese XL
618. Sonnets from the Portuguese XLI
619. Sonnets from the Portuguese XLII
620. Sonnets from the Portuguese XLIII
621. Sonnets from the Portuguese XLIV
622. The Sleep
623. Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam of Naishapur
Edward Fitzgerald (1809—1883)
William Collins (1720—1759)
294. Fidele
William Collins (1720—1759)
TO fair Fidele’s grassy tomb
Soft maids and village hinds shall bring
Each opening sweet of earliest bloom,
And rifle all the breathing Spring.
No wailing ghost shall dare appear
To vex with shrieks this quiet grove;
But shepherds lads assemble here,
And melting virgins own their love.
No wither’d witch shall here be seen,
No goblins lead their nightly crew;
The female fays shall haunt the green,
And dress thy grave with pearly dew.
The redbreast oft at evening hours
Shall kindly lend his little aid,
With hoary moss, and gather’d flowers,
To deck the ground where thou art laid.
When howling winds, and beating rain,
In tempests shake thy sylvan cell;
Or ’midst the chase, on every plain,
The tender thought on thee shall dwell;
Each lonely scene shall thee restore,
For thee the tear be duly shed;
Beloved, till life can charm no more;
And mourn’d, till Pity’s self be dead.
295. Ode Written in MDCCXLVI
William Collins (1720—1759)
HOW sleep the Brave, who sink to rest
By all their Country’s wishes blest!
When Spring, with dewy fingers cold,
Returns to deck their hallow’d mould,
She there shall dress a sweeter sod
Than Fancy’s feet have ever trod.
By fairy hands their knell is rung,
By forms unseen their dirge is sung:
There Honour comes, a pilgrim gray,
To bless the turf that wraps their clay;
And Freedom shall awhile repair
To dwell, a weeping hermit, there!
296. The Passions
An Ode for Music
William Collins (1720—1759)
WHEN Music, heavenly maid, was young,
While yet in early Greece she sung,
The Passions oft, to hear her shell,
Throng’d around her magic cell
Exulting, trembling, raging, fainting,
Possest beyond the Muse’s painting,
By turns they felt the glowing mind
Disturb’d, delighted, raised, refined:
’Till once, ’tis said, when all were fired,
Fill’d with fury, rapt, inspired,
From the supporting myrtles round
They snatch’d her instruments of sound,
And, as they oft had heard apart
Sweet lessons of her forceful art,
Each, for Madness ruled the hour,
Would prove his own expressive power.
First Fear his hand, its skill to try,
Amid the chords bewilder’d laid,
And back recoil’d, he knew not why,
E’en at the sound himself had made.
Next Anger rush’d, his eyes on fire,
In lightnings own’d his secret stings;
In one rude clash he struck the lyre
And swept with hurried hand the strings.
With woeful measures wan Despair,
Low sullen sounds, his grief beguiled;
A solemn, strange, and mingled air,
’Twas sad by fits, by starts ’twas wild.
But thou, O Hope, with eyes so fair,
What was thy delighted measure?
Still it whisper’d promised pleasure
And bade the lovely scenes at distance hail!
Still would her touch the strain prolong:
And from the rocks, the woods, the vale
She call’d on Echo still through all the song;
And, where her sweetest theme she chose,
A soft responsive voice was heard at every close;
And Hope enchanted smiled, and waved her golden hair;—
And longer had she sung:—but with a frown
Revenge impatient rose:
He threw his blood-stain’d sword in thunder down;
And with a withering look
The war-denouncing trumpet took
And blew a blast so loud and dread,
Were ne’er prophetic sounds so full of woe!
And ever and anon he beat
The doubling drum with furious heat;
And, though sometimes, each dreary pause between,
Dejected Pity at his side
Her soul-subduing voice applied,
Yet still he kept his wild unalter’d mien,
While each strain’d ball of sight seem’d bursting from his head.
Thy numbers, Jealousy, to nought were fix’d:
Sad proof of thy distressful state!
Of differing themes the veering song was mix’d;
And now it courted Love, now raving call’d on Hate.
With eyes up-raised, as one inspired,
Pale Melancholy sat retired;
And from her wild sequester’d seat,
In notes by distance made more sweet,
Pour’d through the mellow horn her pensive soul:
And dashing soft from rocks around
Bubbling runnels join’d the sound;
Through glades and glooms the mingled measure stole,
Or, o’er some haunted stream, with fond delay,
Round an holy calm diffusing,
Love of peace, and lonely musing,
In hollow murmurs died away.
But O! how alter’d was its sprightlier tone
When Cheerfulness, a nymph of healthiest hue,
Her bow across her shoulder flung,
Her buskins gemm’d with morning dew,
Blew an inspiring air, that dale and thicket rung,
The hunter’s call to Faun and Dryad known!
The oak-crown’d Sisters and their chaste-eyed Queen,
Satyrs and Sylvan Boys, were seen
Peeping from forth their alleys green:
Brown Exercise rejoiced to hear;
And Sport leapt up, and seized his beechen spear.
Last came Joy’s ecstatic trial:
He, with viny crown advancing,
First to the lively pipe his hand addrest:
But soon he saw the brisk awakening viol
Whose sweet entrancing voice he loved the best:
They would have thought who heard the strain
They saw, in Tempe ’s vale, her native maids
Amidst the festal-sounding shades
To some unwearied minstrel dancing;
While, as his flying fingers kiss’d the strings,
Love framed with Mirth a gay fantastic round:
Loose were her tresses seen, her zone unbound;
And he, amidst his frolic play,
As if he would the charming air repay,
Shook thousand odours from his dewy wings.
O Music! sphere-descended maid,
Friend of Pleasure, Wisdom’s aid!
Why, goddess, why, to us denied,
Lay’st thou thy ancient lyre aside?
As in that loved Athenian bower
You learn’d an all-commanding power,
Thy mimic soul, O nymph endear’d!
Can well recall what then it heard.
Where is thy native simple heart
Devote to Virtue, Fancy, Art?
Arise, as in that elder time,
Warm, energetic, chaste, sublime!
Thy wonders, in that god-like age,
Fill thy recording Sister’s page;—
’Tis said, and I believe the tale,
Thy humblest reed could more prevail
Had more of strength, diviner rage,
Than all which charms this laggard age,
E’en all at once together found
Cecilia’s mingled world of sound:—
O bid our vain endeavours cease:
Revive the just designs of Greece:
Return in all thy simple state!
Confirm the tales her sons relate!
297. To Evening
William Collins (1720—1759)
IF aught of oaten stop or pastoral song
May hope, chaste Eve, to soothe thy modest ear
Like thy own solemn springs,
Thy springs and dying gales;
O Nymph reserved,—while now the bright-hair’d sun
Sits in yon western tent, whose cloudy skirts,
With brede ethereal wove,
O’erhang his wavy bed,
Now air is hush’d, save where the weak-eyed bat
With short shrill shriek flits by on leathern wing,
Or where the beetle winds
His small but sullen horn,
As oft he rises midst the twilight path,
Against the pilgrim borne in heedless hum,—
Now teach me, maid composed,
To breathe some soften’d strain.
Whose numbers, stealing through thy darkening vale,
May not unseemly with its stillness suit;
As, musing slow, I hail
Thy genial loved return.
For when thy folding-star arising shows
His paly circlet, at his warning-lamp
The fragrant Hours, and Elves
Who slept in buds the day,
And many a Nymph who wreathes her brows with sedge
And sheds the freshening dew, and, lovelier still,
The pensive Pleasures sweet,
Prepare thy shadowy car.
Then let me rove some wild and heathy scene;
Or find some ruin midst its dreary dells,
Whose walls more awful nod
By thy religious gleams.
Or, if chill blustering winds or driving rain
Prevent my willing feet, be mine the hut
That, from the mountain’s side,
Views wilds and swelling floods,
And hamlets brown, and dim-discover’d spires;
And hears their simple bell; and marks o’er all
Thy dewy fingers draw
The gradual dusky veil.
While Spring shall pour his showers, as oft he wont,
And bathe thy breathing tresses, meekest Eve!
While Summer loves to sport
Beneath thy lingering light;
While sallow Autumn fills thy lap with leaves;
Or Winter, yelling through the troublous air,
Affrights thy shrinking train
And rudely rends thy robes;
So long, regardful of thy quiet rule,
Shall Fancy, Friendship, Science, smiling Peace,
Thy gentlest influence own,
And love thy favourite name!
298. The Dying Man in His Garden
George Sewell (d. 1726)
WHY, Damon, with the forward day
Dost thou thy little spot survey,
From tree to tree, with doubtful cheer,
Pursue the progress of the year,
What winds arise, what rains descend,
When thou before that year shalt end?
What do thy noontide walks avail,
To clear the leaf, and pick the snail,
Then wantonly to death decree
An insect usefuller than thee?
Thou and the worm are brother-kind,
As low, as earthy, and as blind.
Vain wretch! canst thou expect to see
The downy peach make court to thee?
Or that thy sense shall ever meet
The bean-flower’s deep-embosom’d sweet
Exhaling with an evening blast?
Thy evenings then will all be past!
Thy narrow pride, thy fancied green
(For vanity’s in little seen)
All must be left when Death appears,
In spite of wishes, groans, and tears;
Nor one of all thy plants that grow
But Rosemary will with thee go.
299. The Flowers of the Forest
Alison Rutherford Cockburn (1712—1794)
I’VE seen the smiling
Of Fortune beguiling;
I’ve felt all its favours, and found its decay;
Sweet was its blessing,
Kind its caressing;
But now it is fled—fled far away.
I’ve seen the forest
Adorned the foremost,
With flowers of the fairest, most pleasant and gay;
Sae bonnie was their blooming!
Their scent the air perfuming!
But now they are withered and a’ wede away.
I’ve seen the morning
With gold the hills adorning,
And loud tempest storming before the mid-day.
I’ve seen Tweed ’s silver streams,
Shinning in the sunny beams
Grow drumly and dark as he rowed on his way.
Oh, fickle Fortune!
Why this cruel sporting?
Oh, why still perplex us, poor sons of a day?
Nae mair your smiles can cheer me,
Nae mair your frowns can fear me;
For the flowers of the forest are a’ wede away.
300. Lament for Flodden
Jane Elliot (1727—1805)
I’VE heard them lilting at our ewe-milking,
Lasses a’ lilting before dawn o’ day;
But now they are moaning on ilka green loaning—
For the Flowers of the Forest are a’ wede away.
At bughts, in the morning, nae blythe lads are scorning,
Lasses are lonely and dowie and wae;
Nae daffin’, nae gabbin’, but sighing and sabbing,
Ilk ane lifts her leglin and hies her away.
In har’st, at the shearing, nae youths now are jeering,
Bandsters are lyart, and runkled, and gray;
At fair or at preaching, nae wooing, nae fleeching—
The Flowers of the Forest are a’ wede away.
At e’en, in the gloaming, nae younkers are roaming
’Bout stacks wi’ the lasses at bogle to play;
But ilk ane sits drearie, lamenting her dearie—
The Flowers of the Forest are weded away.
Dool and wae for the order sent our lads to the Border!
The English, for ance, by guile wan the day;
The Flowers of the Forest, that fought aye the foremost,
The prime of our land, are cauld in the clay.
We’ll hear nae mair lilting at the ewe-milking;
Women and bairns are heartless and wae;
Sighing and moaning on ilka green loaning—
The Flowers of the Forest are a’ wede away.
301. A Song to David
Christopher Smart (1722—1770)
O THOU, that sitt’st upon a throne,
With harp of high, majestic tone,
To praise the King of kings:
And voice of heaven, ascending, swell,
Which, while its deeper notes excel,
Clear as a clarion rings:
To bless each valley, grove, and cost,
And charm the cherubs to the post
Of gratitude in throngs;
To keep the days on Zion ’s Mount,
And send the year to his account,
With dances and with songs:
O servant of God’s holiest charge,
The minister of praise at large,
Which thou mayst now receive;
From thy blest mansion hail and hear,
From topmost eminence appear
To this the wreath I weave.
Great, valiant, pious, good, and clean,
Sublime, contemplative, serene,
Strong, constant, pleasant, wise!
Bright effluence of exceeding grace;
Best man! the swiftness and the race,
The peril and the prize!
Great—from the lustre of his crown,
From Samuel’s horn, and God’s renown,
Which is the people’s voice;
For all the host, from rear to van,
Applauded and embraced the man—
The man of God’s own choice.
Valiant—the word, and up he rose;
The fight—he triumphed o’er the foes
Whom God’s just laws abhor;
And, armed in gallant faith, he took
Against the boaster, from the brook,
The weapons of the war.
Pious—magnificent and grand,
’Twas he the famous temple plann ’d,
(The seraph in his soul:)
Foremost to give the Lord his dues,
Foremost to bless the welcome news,
And foremost to condole.
Good—from Jehudah’s genuine vein,
From God’s best nature, good in grain,
His aspect and his heart:
To pity, to forgive, to save,
Witness En-gedi’s conscious cave,
And Shimei’s blunted dart.
Clean—if perpetual prayer be pure,
And love, which could itself inure
To fasting and to fear—
Clean in his gestures, hands, and feet,
To smite the lyre, the dance complete,
To play the sword and spear.
Sublime—invention ever young,
Of vast conception, towering tongue,
To God the eternal theme;
Notes from yon exaltations caught,
Unrivalled royalty of thought,
O’er meaner strains supreme.
Contemplative—on God to fix
His musings, and above the six
The Sabbath-day he blessed;
’Twas then his thoughts self-conquest pruned,
And heavenly melancholy tuned,
To bless and bear the rest.
Serene—to sow the seeds of peace,
Remembering, when he watched the fleece,
How sweetly Kidron purled—
To further knowledge, silence vice,
And plant perpetual paradise,
When God had calmed the world.
Strong—in the Lord, who could defy
Satan, and all his powers that lie
In sempiternal night;
And hell, and horror, and despair
Were as the lion and the bear
To his undaunted might.
Constant—in love to God, the Truth,
Age, manhood, infancy, and youth:
To Jonathan his friend
Constant, beyond the verge of death;
And Ziba, and Mephibosheth,
His endless fame attend.
Pleasant—and various as the year;
Man, soul, and angel without peer,
Priest, champion, sage, and boy;
In armour or in ephod clad,
His pomp, his piety was glad;
Majestic was his joy.
Wise—in recovery from his fall,
Whence rose his eminence o’er all,
Of all the most reviled;
The light of Israel in his ways,
Wise are his precepts, prayer, and praise,
And counsel to his child.
His muse, bright angel of his verse,
Gives balm for all the thorns that pierce,
For all the pangs that rage;
Blest light, still gaining on the gloom,
The more than Michal of his bloom,
The Abishag of his age.
He sang of God—the mighty source
Of all things—the stupendous force
On which all strength depends;
From Whose right arm, beneath Whose eyes,
All period, power, and enterprise
Commences, reigns, and ends.
Angels—their ministry and meed,
Which to and fro with blessings speed,
Or with their citterns wait;
Where Michael, with his millions, bows,
Where dwells the seraph and his spouse,
The cherub and her mate.
Of man—the semblance and effect
Of God and love—the saint elect
For infinite applause—
To rule the land, and briny broad,
To be laborious in his laud,
And heroes in his cause.
The world—the clustering spheres He made,
The glorious light, the soothing shade,
Dale, champaign, grove, and hill;
The multitudinous abyss,
Where Secrecy remains in bliss,
And Wisdom hides her skill.
Trees, plants, and flowers—of virtuous root;
Gem yielding blossom, yielding fruit,
Choice gums and precious balm;
Bless ye the nosegay in the vale,
And with the sweetness of the gale
Enrich the thankful psalm.
Of fowl—even every beak and wing
Which cheer the winter, hail the spring,
That live in peace or prey;
They that make music, or that mock,
The quail, the brave domestic cock.
The raven, swan, and jay.
Of fishes—every size and shape,
Which nature frames of light escape,
Devouring man to shun:
The shells are in the wealthy deep,
The shoals upon the surface leap,
And love the glancing sun.
Of beasts—the beaver plods his task;
While the sleek tigers roll and bask,
Nor yet the shades arouse;
Her cave the mining coney scoops;
Where o’er the mead the mountain stoops,
The kids exult and browse.
Of gems—their virtue and their price,
Which, hid in earth from man’s device,
Their darts of lustre sheath;
The jasper of the master’s stamp,
The topaz blazing like a lamp,
Among the mines beneath.
Blest was the tenderness he felt,
When to his graceful harp he knelt,
And did for audience call;
When Satan with his hand he quelled,
And in serene suspense he held
The frantic throes of Saul.
His furious foes no more maligned
As he such melody divined,
And sense and soul detained;
Now striking strong, now soothing soft,
He sent the godly sounds aloft,
Or in delight refrained.
When up to heaven his thoughts he piled,
From fervent lips fair Michal smiled,
As blush to blush she stood;
And chose herself the queen, and gave
Her utmost from her heart—‘so brave,
And plays his hymns so good.’
The pillars of the Lord are seven,
Which stand from earth to topmost heaven;
His Wisdom drew the plan;
His Word accomplished the design,
From brightest gem to deepest mine,
From CHRIST enthroned to Man.
Alpha, the cause of causes, first
In station, fountain, whence the burst
Of light and blaze of day;
Whence bold attempt, and brave advance,
Have motion, life, and ordinance,
And heaven itself its stay.
Gamma supports the glorious arch
On which angelic legions march,
And is with sapphires paved;
Thence the fleet clouds are sent adrift,
And thence the painted folds that lift
The crimson veil, are waved.
Eta with living sculpture breathes,
With verdant carvings, flowery wreathes,
Of never-wasting bloom;
In strong relief his goodly base
All instruments of labour grace,
The trowel, spade, and loom.
Next Theta stands to the supreme—
Who formed in number, sign, and scheme,
The illustrious lights that are;
And one addressed his saffron robe,
And one, clad in a silver globe,
Held rule with every star.
Iota’s tuned to choral hymns
Of those that fly, while he that swims
In thankful safety lurks;
And foot, and chapiter, and niche,
The various histories enrich
Of God’s recorded works.
Sigma presents the social droves
With him that solitary roves,
And man of all the chief;
Fair on whose face, and stately frame,
Did God impress His hallowed name,
For ocular belief.
Omega! greatest and the best,
Stands sacred to the day of rest,
For gratitude and thought;
Which blessed the world upon his pole,
And gave the universe his goal,
And closed the infernal draught.
O David, scholar of the Lord!
Such is thy science, whence reward,
And infinite degree;
O strength, O sweetness, lasting ripe!
God’s harp thy symbol, and thy type
The lion and the bee!
There is but One who ne’er rebelled,
But One by passion unimpelled,
By pleasures unenticed;
He from himself hath semblance sent,
Grand object of his own content,
And saw the God in Christ.
Tell them, I AM, Jehovah said
To Moses; while earth heard in dread,
And, smitten to the heart,
At once above, beneath, around,
All Nature, without voice or sound,
Replied, ‘O Lord, THOU ART.’
Thou art—to give and to confirm,
For each his talent and his term;
All flesh thy bounties share:
Thou shalt not call thy brother fool:
The porches of the Christian school
Are meekness, peace, and prayer.
Open and naked of offence,
Man’s made of mercy, soul, and sense:
God armed the snail and wilk;
Be good to him that pulls thy plough;
Due food and care, due rest allow
For her that yields thee milk.
Rise up before the hoary head,
And God’s benign commandment dread,
Which says thou shalt not die:
‘Not as I will, but as Thou wilt,’
Prayed He, whose conscience knew no guilt;
With Whose blessed pattern vie.
Use all thy passions! love is thine,
And joy and jealousy divine;
Thine hope’s eternal fort,
And care thy leisure to disturb,
With fear concupiscence to curb,
And rapture to transport.
Act simply, as occasion asks;
Put mellow wine in seasoned casks;
Till not with ass and bull:
Remember thy baptismal bond;
Keep thy commixtures foul and fond,
Nor work thy flax with wool.
Distribute; pay the Lord His tithe,
And make the widow’s heart-strings blithe;
Resort with those that weep:
As you from all and each expect,
For all and each thy love direct,
And render as you reap.
The slander and its bearer spurn,
And propagating praise sojourn
To make thy welcome last;
Turn from old Adam to the New:
By hope futurity pursue:
Look upwards to the past.
Control thine eye, salute success,
Honour the wiser, happier bless,
And for their neighbour feel;
Grutch not of mammon and his leaven,
Work emulation up to heaven
By knowledge and by zeal.
O David, highest in the list
Of worthies, on God’s ways insist,
The genuine word repeat!
Vain are the documents of men,
And vain the flourish of the pen
That keeps the fool’s conceit.
Praise above all—for praise prevails;
Heap up the measure, load the scales,
And good to goodness add:
The generous soul her Saviour aids,
But peevish obloquy degrades;
The Lord is great and glad.
For Adoration all the ranks
Of Angels yield eternal thanks,
And David in the midst:
With God’s good poor, which, last and least
In man’s esteem, Thou to Thy feast,
O Blessed Bridegroom, bidst.
For Adoration seasons change,
And order, truth, and beauty range,
Adjust, attract, and fill:
The grass the polyanthus checks;
And polished porphyry reflects,
By the descending rill.
Rich almonds colour to the prime
For Adoration; tendrils climb,
And fruit-trees pledge their gems;
And Ivis, with her gorgeous vest,
Builds for her eggs her cunning nest,
And bell-flowers bow their stems.
With vinous syrup cedars spout;
From rocks pure honey gushing out,
For Adoration springs:
All scenes of painting crowd the map
Of nature; to the mermaid’s pap
The scalèd infant clings.
The spotted ounce and playsome cubs
Run rustling ’mong the flowering shrubs.
And lizards feed the moss;
For Adoration beasts embark,
While waves upholding halcyon’s ark
No longer roar and toss.
While Israel sits beneath his fig,
With coral root and amber sprig
The weaned adventurer sports;
Where to the palm the jasmine cleaves,
For Adoration ’mong the leaves
The gale his peace reports.
Increasing days their reign exalt,
Nor in the pink and mottled vault
The opposing spirits tilt;
And by the coasting reader spied,
The silverlings and crusions glide
For Adoration gilt.
For Adoration ripening canes,
And cocoa’s purest milk detains
The western pilgrim’s staff;
Where rain in clasping boughs enclosed,
And vines with oranges disposed,
Embower the social laugh.
Now labour his reward receives,
For Adoration counts his sheaves,
To peace, her bounteous prince;
The nect’rine his strong tint imbibes,
And apples of ten thousand tribes,
And quick peculiar quince.
The wealthy crops of whitening rice
’Mongst thyine woods and groves of spice,
For Adoration grow;
And, marshalled in the fencèd land,
The peaches and pomegranates stand,
Where wild carnations blow.
The laurels with the winter strive;
The crocus burnishes alive
Upon the snow-clad earth;
For Adoration myrtles stay
To keep the garden from dismay,
And bless the sight from dearth.
The pheasant shows his pompous neck;
And ermine, jealous of a speck,
With fear eludes offence:
The sable, with his glossy pride,
For Adoration is described,
Where frosts the waves condense.
The cheerful holly, pensive yew,
And holy thorn, their trim renew;
The squirrel hoards his nuts;
All creatures batten o’er their stores,
And careful nature all her doors
For Adoration shuts.
For Adoration, David’s Psalms,
Lift up the heart to deeds of alms;
And he, who kneels and chants,
Prevails his passions to control,
Finds meat and medicine to the soul,
Which for translation pants.
For Adoration, beyond match,
The scholar bullfinch aims to catch
The soft flute’s ivory touch:
And, careless, on the hazel spray
The daring redbreast keeps at bay
The damsel’s greedy clutch.
For Adoration, in the skies,
The Lord’s philosopher espies
The dog, the ram, and rose;
The planets’ ring, Orion’s sword;
Nor is his greatness less adored
In the vile worm that glows.
For Adoration, on the strings
The western breezes work their wings,
The captive ear to soothe—
Hark!’tis a voice—how still, and small—
That makes the cataracts to fall,
Or bids the sea be smooth!
For Adoration, incense comes
From bezoar, and Arabian gums,
And from the civet’s fur:
But as for prayer, or e’er it faints,
Far better is the breath of saints
Than galbanum or myrrh.
For Adoration, from the down
Of damsons to the anana’s crown,
God sends to tempt the taste;
And while the luscious zest invites
The sense, that in the scene delights,
Commands desire be chaste.
For Adoration, all the paths
Of grace are open, all the baths
Of purity refresh;
And all the rays of glory beam
To deck the man of God’s esteem
Who triumphs o’er the flesh.
For Adoration, in the dome
Of CHRIST, the sparrows find a home;
And on his olives perch:
The swallow also dwells with thee
O Man of GOD’S humility,
Within his Saviour’s Church.
Sweet is the dew that falls betimes,
And drops upon the leafy limes;
Sweet, Hermon’s fragrant air:
Sweet is the lily’s silver bell,
And sweet the wakeful tapers’ smell
That watch for early prayer.
Sweet the young nurse, with love intense,
Which smiles o’er sleeping innocence;
Sweet when the lost arrive:
Sweet the musician’s ardour beats,
While his vague mind’s in quest of sweets
The choicest flowers to hive.
Sweeter, in all the strains of love,
The language of thy turtle-dove,
Paired to thy swelling chord;
Sweeter, with every grace endued,
The glory of thy gratitude.
Respired unto the Lord.
Strong is the horse upon his speed;
Strong in pursuit the rapid glede,
Which makes at once his game:
Strong the tall ostrich on the ground;
Strong through the turbulent profound
Shoots Xiphias to his aim.
Strong is the lion—like a coal
His eyeball—like a bastion’s mole
His chest against the foes:
Strong the gier-eagle on his sail,
Strong against tide the enormous whale
Emerges as he goes.
But stronger still in earth and air,
And in the sea, the man of prayer,
And far beneath the tide:
And in the seat to faith assigned,
Where ask is have, where seek is find,
Where knock is open wide.
Beauteous the fleet before the gale;
Beauteous the multitudes in mail,
Ranked arms, and crested heads;
Beauteous the garden’s umbrage mild
Walk, water, meditated wild,
And all the bloomy beds.
Beauteous the moon full on the lawn;
And beauteous when the veil’s withdrawn,
The virgin to her spouse:
Beauteous the temple, decked and filled,
When to the heaven of heavens they build
Their heart-directed vows.
Beauteous, yea beauteous more than these,
The Shepherd King upon his knees,
For his momentous trust;
With wish of infinite conceit,
For man, beast, mute, the small and great,
And prostrate dust to dust.
Precious the bounteous widow’s mite;
And precious, for extreme delight,
The largess from the churl:
Precious the ruby’s blushing blaze,
And alba’s blest imperial rays,
And pure cerulean pearl.
Precious the penitential tear;
And precious is the sigh sincere;
Acceptable to God:
And precious are the winning flowers,
In gladsome Israel ’s feast of bowers,
Bound on the hallowed sod.
More precious that diviner part
Of David, even the Lord’s own heart
Great, beautiful, and new;
In all things where it was intent,
In all extremes, in each event,
Proof—answering true to true.
Glorious the sun in mid career;
Glorious the assembled fires appear;
Glorious the comet’s train:
Glorious the trumpet and alarm;
Glorious the Almighty’s stretched-out arm;
Glorious the enraptured main:
Glorious the northern lights a-stream;
Glorious the song, when God’s the theme;
Glorious the thunder’s roar:
Glorious Hosannah from the den;
Glorious the catholic Amen;
Glorious the martyr’s gore:
Glorious,—more glorious,—is the crown
Of Him that brought salvation down,
By meekness called Thy Son;
Thou that stupendous truth believed;—
And now the matchless deed’s achieved,
Determined, Dared, and Done.
302. Willy Drowned in Yarrow
Anonymous
DOWN in you garden sweet and gay
Where bonnie grows the lily,
I heard a fair maid sighing say,
‘My wish be wi’ sweet Willie!
‘Willie’s rare, and Willie’s fair,
And Willie’s wondrous bonny;
And Willie hecht to marry me
Gin e’er he married ony.
‘O gentle wind, that bloweth south,
From where my Love repaireth,
Convey a kiss frae his dear mouth
And tell me how he fareth!
‘O tell sweet Willie to come doun
And hear the mavis singing,
And see the birds on ilka bush
And leaves around them hinging.
‘The lav’rock there, wi’ her white breast
And gentle throat sae narrow;
There’s sport eneuch for gentlemen
On Leader haughs and Yarrow.
‘O Leader haughs are wide and braid
And Yarrow haughs are bonny;
There Willie hecht to marry me
If e’er he married ony.
‘But Willie’s gone, whom I thought on,
And does not hear me weeping;
Draws many a tear frae true love’s e’e
When other maids are sleeping.
‘Yestreen I made my bed fu’ braid,
The night I’ll mak’ it narrow,
For a’ the live-lang winter night
I lie twined o’ my marrow.
‘O came ye by yon water-side?
Pou’d you the rose or lily?
Or came you by yon meadow green,
Or saw you my sweet Willie?’
She sought him up, she sought him down,
She sought him braid and narrow;
Syne, in the cleaving of a craig,
She found him drown’d in Yarrow!
303. The Braes of Yarrow
John Logan (1748—1788)
THY braes were bonny, Yarrow stream,
When first on them I met my lover;
Thy braes how dreary, Yarrow stream,
When now thy waves his body cover!
For ever now, O Yarrow stream!
Thou art to me a stream of sorrow;
For never on thy banks shall I
Behold my Love, the flower of Yarrow.
He promised me a milk-white steed
To bear me to his father’s bowers;
He promised me a little page
To squire me to his father’s towers;
He promised me a wedding-ring,—
Now he is wedded to his grave,
Alas, his watery grave, in Yarrow!
Sweet were his words when last we met;
My passion I as freely told him;
Clasp’d in his arms, I little thought
That I should never more behold him!
Scarce was he gone, I saw his ghost;
It vanish’d with a shriek of sorrow;
Thrice did the water-wraith ascend,
And gave a doleful groan thro’ Yarrow.
His mother from the window look’d
With all the longing of a mother;
His little sister weeping walk’d
The green-wood path to meet her brother;
They sought him east, they sought him west,
They sought him all the forest thorough;
They only saw the cloud of night,
They only heard the roar of Yarrow.
No longer from thy window look—
Thou hast no son, thou tender mother!
No longer walk, thou lovely maid;
Alas, thou hast no more a brother!
No longer seek him east or west
And search no more the forest thorough;
For, wandering in the night so dark,
He fell a lifeless corpse in Yarrow.
The tear shall never leave my cheek,
No other youth shall be my marrow—
I’ll seek thy body in the stream,
—The tear did never leave her cheek,
No other youth became her marrow;
She found his body in the stream,
And now with him she sleeps in Yarrow.
304. A Hunting Song
Henry Fielding (1707—1754)
THE DUSKY night rides down the sky,
And ushers in the morn;
The hounds all join in glorious cry,
The huntsman winds his horn,
And a-hunting we will go.
The wife around her husband throws
Her arms, and begs his stay;
‘My dear, it rains, and hails, and snows,
You will not hunt to-day?’
But a-hunting we will go.
‘A brushing fox in yonder wood
Secure to find we seek:
For why? I carried, sound and good,
A cartload there last week,
And a-hunting we will go.’
Away he goes, he flies the rout,
Their steeds all spur and switch,
Some are thrown in, and some thrown out,
And some thrown in the ditch;
But a-hunting we will go.
At length his strength to faintness worn,
Poor Reynard ceases flight;
Then, hungry, homeward we return,
To feast away the night.
Then a-drinking we will go.
305. Tom Bowling
Charles Dibdin (1745—1814)
HERE, a sheer hulk, lies poor Tom Bowling,
The darling of our crew;
No more he’ll hear the tempest howling,
For Death has broached him to.
His form was of the manliest beauty,
His heart was kind and soft;
Faithful below he did his duty,
And now he’s gone aloft.
Tom never from his word departed,
His virtues were so rare;
His friends were many and true-hearted,
His Poll was kind and fair:
And then he’d sing so blithe and jolly,
Ah, many’s the time and oft!
But mirth is turned to melancholy,
For Tom is gone aloft.
Yet shall poor Tom find pleasant weather,
When He, who all commands,
Shall give, to call Life’s crew together,
The word to ‘pipe all hands.’
Thus Death, who kings and tars dispatches,
In vain Tom’s life has doffed;
For though his body’s under hatches,
His soul is gone aloft.
Samuel Johnson (1709—1784)
306. On the Death of Dr. Robert Levet
Samuel Johnson (1709—1784)
CONDEMN’D to Hope’s delusive mine,
As on we toil from day to day,
By sudden blasts or slow decline
Our social comforts drop away.
Well tried through many a varying year,
See Levet to the grave descend,
Officious, innocent, sincere,