PROSPECT OF SOCIETY

BY

OLIVER GOLDSMITH

BEING THE EARLIEST FORM OF HIS POEM

THE TRAVELLER

NOW FIRST REPRINTED FROM THE UNIQUE ORIGINAL

WITH A REPRINT OF THE FIRST EDITION OF

THE TRAVELLER

EDITED BY Bertram Dobell

LONDON

PUBLISHED BY THE EDITOR

77 CHARING CROSS ROAD, W.C.

WE

ΤΟ

AUSTIN DOBSON, Esq.

ELL named, our Goldsmith in true metal wrought, With patient loving art and strenuous thought: A prodigal of well-directed toil,

He laboured till to labour more would spoil;
No detail slurred, allowed no careless touch,
Never a thought too little or too much :
His work no baser element alloyed,

His unbought pen no grovelling theme employed;
An age corrupt in him no evil bred,

His stainless page no youth or maid misled.

No gaudy colours did his muse array,

'Twas fresh and wholesome as a morn of May.
No fawner on the great, no faction's tool,
No satirist sour, no flatterer of a fool,

His name, with but one other's,* shines above
All whom we honcur not so much as love.

As Shakespeare seems to us the type of all
That in his age was most majestical;
As Milton sums up all that was sublime,
And noble in a dark tempestuous time;
So Goldsmith stands for all that in his day
Did tenderness and gentleness display;

* Charles Lamb.

His age's cynic coarseness touched him not,
Nor on his fine sweet nature left a blot.

A Shakespeare mortals ne'er may see again,
Nor Milton's narrower yet intenser brain;
Nor e'en another Goldsmith, since our earth
But at its own good time gives genius birth,
And genius, though for endless cycles made,
Is still in colours of its time arrayed.

Yet though a Goldsmith we no more may view,
I dare to say, my friend! there shines in you
Much of his fine humanity; his clean
Unjaundiced view of life: the outlook keen
That with a sunny brightness gilds whate'er
It looks upon, and ever findeth there

The good that serves its grossness to redeem,
And sees of light in deepest shade a gleam.
You, too, though with a difference, possess
His playful humour, void of bitterness;
You see, as he, men's faults and follies, yet
Do not their better qualities forget,
And ever while you rally them you show
Your raillery from sympathy doth flow.
His patient art is yours likewise, which ne'er
Doth time or thought upon your subject spare,
Which rests not till to perfect form 'tis brought,
A finished fabric from the loom of thought.

To you, a poet, I, a rhymer, send

These lines that I, for once, may call you friend!