A clouded aspect, and a burning cheek, Where the whole poisoned soul, malignant, sits, And frightens love away. Ten thousand fears Invented wild, ten thousand frantic views Of horrid rivals, hanging on the charms For which he melts in fondness, eat him up With fervent anguish and consuming rage. In vain reproaches lend their idle aid, Deceitful pride, and resolution frail, Giving false peace a moment. Fancy pours, Afresh, her beauties on his busy thought, Her first endearments twining round the soul, With all the witchcraft of ensnaring love.
Straight the fierce storm involves his mind anew, 1100 Flames through the nerves, and boils along the veins While anxious doubt distracts the tortured heart:
For e'en the sad assurance of his fears
Were ease to what he feels. Thus the warm youth, Whom love deludes into his thorny wilds,
Through flowery-tempting paths, or leads a life Of fevered rapture or of cruel care;
His brightest aims extinguished all, and ail
His lively moments running down to waste.
But happy they! the happiest of their kind! Whom gentler stars unite, and in one fate Their hearts, their fortunes, and their beings blend. 'Tis not the coarser tie of human laws, Unnatural oft, and foreign to the mind,
That binds their peace, but harmony itself, Attuning all their passions into love;
Where friendship full exerts her softest power, Perfect esteem enlivened by desire
Ineffable, and sympathy of soul;
Thought meeting thought, and will preventing will, With boundless confidence: for nought but love 112 Can answer love, and render bliss secure. Let him, ungenerous, who, alone intent To bless himself, from sordid parents buys
The loathing virgin, in eternal care, Well merited, consume his nights and days. Let barbarous nations, whose inhuman love Is wild desire, fierce as the suns they feel; Let eastern tyrants from the light of heaven Seclude their bosom-slaves, meanly possessed Of a mere lifeless, violated form; While those whom love cements in holy faith, And equal transport, free as Nature live, Disdaining fear. What is the world to them, Its pomp, its pleasure, and its nonsense all? Who in each other clasp whatever fair High fancy forms, and lavish hearts can wish; Something than beauty dearer, should they look Or on the mind, or mind-illumined face; Truth, goodness, honor, harmony, and love, The richest bounty of indulgent Heaven. Meantime a smiling offspring rises round, And mingles both their graces. By degrees, The human blossom blows; and every day, Soft as it rolls along, shows some new charm, The father's lustre, and the mother's bloom. Then infant reason grows apace, and calls For the kind hand of an assiduous care.
Delightful task! to rear the tender thought, To teach the young idea how to shoot, To pour the fresh instruction o'er the mind, To breathe th' enlivening spirit, and to fix The generous purpose in the glowing breast. O, speak the joy! ye, whom the sudden tear Surprises often, while you look around,
And nothing strikes your eye but sights of bliss All-various Nature pressing on the heart: An elegant sufficiency, content,
Retirement, rural quiet, friendship, books, Ease and alternate labor, useful life, Progressive virtue, and approving Heaven'
These are the matchless joys of virtuous love, And thus their moments fly. The Seasons thus, As ceaseless round a jarring world they roll, Still find them happy; and consenting SPRING Sheds her own rosy garland on their heads: Till evening comes at last, serene and mild; When, after the long vernal day of life, Enamored more, as more remembrance swells With many a proof of recollected love, Together down they sink in social sleep, Together freed, their gentle spirits fly
To scenes where love and bliss immortal reign
The subject proposed. Invocation. Address to Mr. Dodington An introductory reflection on the motion of the heavenly bodies; whence the succession of the Seasons. As the face of Nature in this season is almost uniform, the progress of the poem is a description of a summer's day. The dawn. Sun-rising. Hymn to the sun. Forenoon. Summer insects described. Haymaking. Sheep-shearing. Noonday. A woodland retreat. Group of herds and flocks. A solemn grove: how it affects a contemplative mind. A cataract, and rude scene. View of Summer in the to rid zone. Storm of thunder and lightning A tale. The storm over, a serene afternoon. Bathing. Hour of walking. Transition to the prospect of a rich; well-cultivated country; which introduces a panegyric on Great Britain. Sunset. Evening. Night. Summer meteors. A comet. whole concluding with the praise of philosophy.
FROM brightening fields of ether fair disclosed, Child of the Sun, refulgent SUMMER comes,
In pride of youth, and felt through Nature's depth He comes attended by the sultry Hours, And ever-fanning breezes, on his way; While, from his ardent look, the turning Spring A verts her blushful face; and earth and skies, All smiling, to his hot dominion leaves.
Hence, let me haste into the midwood shade, Where scarce a sunbeam wanders through the gloom; And on the dark-green grass, beside the brink
Of haunted stream, that by the roots of oak Rolls o'er the rocky channel, lie at large, And sing the glories of the circling year. Come, Inspiration! from thy hermit-seat,
By mortal seldom found: may Fancy dare, From thy fixed serious eye, and raptured glance Shot on surrounding heaven, to steal one look
Creative of the Poet, every power Exalting to an ecstasy of soul.
And thou, my youthful Muse's early friend, In whom the human graces all unite:
Pure light of mind, and tenderness of heart, Genius, and wisdom; the social sense, By decency chastised; goodness and wit, In seldom-meeting harmony combined; Unblemished honor, and an active zeal For Britain's glory, Liberty, and Man; O Dodington! attend my rural song, Stoop to my theme, inspirit every line, And teach me to deserve thy just applause.
With what an awful, world-revolving power
Were first the unwieldy planets launched along Th' illimitable void! thus to remain, Amid the flux of many thousand years,
That oft has swept the toiling race of men
And all their labored monuments away,
Firm, unremitting, matchless, in their course;
To the kind-tempered change of night and day,
And of the seasons ever stealing round,
Minutely faithful: such th' All-perfect Hand,
That poised, impels, and rules the steady whole!
When now no more th' alternate Twins are fired,
And Cancer reddens with the solar blaze, Short is the doubtful empire of the night; And soon, observant of approaching day, The meek-eyed Morn appears, mother of dews, At first faint-gleaming in the dappled east: Till far o'er ether spreads the widening glow; And, from before the lustre of her face,
White break the clouds away With quickened step, Brown Night retires: young Day pours in apace,
And opens all the lawny prospect wide.
The dripping rock, the mountain's misty top,
Swell on the sight, and brighten with the dawn.
Blue, through the dusk, the smoking currents shine,
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