COLTON - Modern Antiquity, and Other Poems - 1835 PDF

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MODERN
ANTIQUITY,
&c.
MODERN ANTIQUITY
AND OTHER POEMS.
THE LATE REV.

AUTHOR OF
"
C. C.
LACON,"
COLTON,
&c.
FROM THE ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPT; IN THE POSSESSION

OF MARKHAM SHERWILL.
LONDON:
B
B.
K I N G, M O N U M E N T
A. H.
BAILY &
CO.,
YARD:
CORNHILL.
PREFACE.
the
most
mediocrity, would meet
with readers
in
the present day; but,
when we
Poem,
as to its
consider the following
extent or
either
variety, or the masterly
its
which that diversity

that none
no poetry, having
willingly admit that
slightest taint of
who
"Hypocrisy,"
is
handled,
we
manner
feel
in
assured
are in possession of " Lacon," or

will
deem
their libraries
complete
without the assistance-of this their sister Muse.
The dying request of my much-esteemed

the author of
be printed
"Modern Antiquity,"
after
his
death,
task of great difficulty.
that
involved
say,
it
it
should
me
was a
a 3
friend,
in
difficult
upon me,
task imposed
because he desired
would write explanatory Notes

it
as
to such parts of
should find necessary to be relieved from
He
an almost unavoidable obscurity.

the idea that
was
fully
conceived
acquainted with
all
the
matter which his master-mind has endeavoured

to express
on the subject now before
Mr. Colton, however he might

after
feel
us.
But
convinced,
my
my power,
an acquaintance of twenty years, of
readiness to serve him to the extent of
deceived himself
much
as to
my
capability for
such a task, and had formed too high an opinion

of that which appears but too insignificant in the
execution.
few hours previous to his death, Mr. Colton
dictated
the
four
last
stanzas
of
" Modern
Antiquity," and at the same time expressed a
wish that they had been more creditable to him
and
to
fit
how
the subject:
was well founded
is
far
his
apprehension
for those to decide
judges and liberal
critics.
who
are
That the poem would have been retouched by

his powerful pen, there
that he
deep thought,
1
can be
would have added
know
to
little
a long train of
fitting the subject
he had in view,
have been his intention,
" Hope and Patience" which he
pain and
felt
had quitted
for ever!
It may be said by some, that the

poem is of little worth, or that it
moral
to
if
not wholly deprived him of that
disease had
him
doubt; and
it
to
object of this
possesses no
the fact of there being no moral attached
it, is
certainly less reprehensible than if
a bad
culcated
one.
it
in-
The subject had been
treated on before the late Mr. Colton gave
it its
present splendid form, as Bacon was the
first
writer to dispute the validity of the claims of
our forefathers to true antiquity;
have produced much that
more that
is
claims that
deplorable,
absurd.
" True talent
is
is
the ray that flings
novel light o'er
common
things."
if
not
In the following pages
we
find
many
of those
thoughts that would have been beautiful even in

their simplicity
and nakedness of nature, and
are certainly not less so
now
that they are pre-
sented in the best drapery and ornaments of art:
we should be
formity,
equally capable of detecting de-
w ere she arrayed

r
in costly trinkets.
poem we observe that

almost invariably thrown upon
the
word; which, however
accomplish,
In this
difficult to
the rhyme
a rule that our poet strictly attended

Antithesis
skilful
cases
is
strongest
is
to.
became a powerful engine
hands as those of our author; and
in
such
in
most
we may acknowledge that it had Truth for

and Wit for its fairest blossom. For
its
root,
his
images and
illustrations,
he had recourse to
the whole material and intellectual world; his
researches were deep, and he frequently chose

the most obvious as the most expressive, not-
withstanding the chance that they had been anticipated
while at other
moments he
selected
PREFACE.
some
less clear
and
because they
less evident,
were novel, although they might possess the
dis-
advantage of being somewhat obscure.
Metaphors have been described as the algebra

of language, and their use or abuse
unerring test of talent:
is
that the abuse of this elegant figure

to be found in this
an almost
we may venture
poem;
to assert
scarcely
is
for our author
was not
when mounted
on a metaphor, generally break down or bolt.
of that class of bad poets, who,
have heard Mr. Colton say, that, when he

his poem " Hypocrisy," (now out of
was writing
print,)
he had no books
wrote;
that
and
it
in the
room
in
which he
was only when he had finished
work that he examined with the
originals
the quotations he applied, in order to ascertain
memory had been correct. That he wrote

" Modern Antiquity" under the same circum-
if his
stances,
would not be
difficult for
During the progress of

appear at a loss
his writing,
for those close
me
to aver.
he did not
and remote
re-
semblances on which
pend.
His
all wit
memory was
dinary and extensive: she
and
illustration de-
certainly very extraoris
generally the friend
of wit, though but too often the treacherous ally

of invention;
sometimes assuming her shape,
sometimes counterfeiting her signature, and

so clumsily, that
who
it
suspects the fraud the least, and whose cre-
dit suffers the
He
most.
observed to
speaking to him on
that, if the
to
this
deceives none but him alone
me one
day,
when
was
apparent want of books,
his
mind be well
stored, the less
we have
do with books during the period of composi-
tion the better.
certainly
The
exemplified
truth of this remark was

in
our
immortal
bard,
Milton, whose works lost nothing by his blindness.
Although "Modern Antiquity" was written

the winter of his
life,
in
which was somewhat rough
and boisterous, Mr. Colton has shown
sufficient
proof that his mind retained to the last
all
the
freshness
of spring,
and
all
fecundity of
the
autumn.
Mr. Colton
(as
have already stated
in
former page,) was labouring under great pain,
from an old and inveterate complaint, at the
During the
time he finished the present poem.

last
four-and-twenty hours of his chequered
he expressed
to
me more
life,
than once great doubt
as to the probability of his recovery.
may
say
that he entertained a fear of death, and, while
apprehending that
aberration of
strange,
mind
their
spair,
it
sudden
to his relief!
How
that which he dreaded most, he courted
as his only cure.
when
moment,
awful
called
We
have witnessed moments
the best and the most learned
men
resigned
powers of reflection into the hands of de-
and abandoned the idea that good even
may be
inculcated by an example of courage and
resignation.
The
Mr, Colton was
insufferable
afflicted,
agony with which
seemed
at
once
to de-
throne his reason, and render him the victim of
derangement.*
Let us hope, in consideration of
his respectable
and extensive connexions, that a
drawn over those deviations which
pall will be
humanity
subject
is
may have done
to.
That the good which he
should not be
evil
but just that we should here state
spoken
how
of, it is
invariably
cautious he was of respect towards every hallowed

subject;
frequent in alleviating the miseries of
when
others, even
It
in affliction
may be presumed
come more frequent

advance, as
it
tributes very
himself; and last-
that suicide will unhappily be-
and
as civilization
its
improvements
proceeds from causes that such a state con-
much
to
create
and multiply.
There are
eloquent though silent actors, that but too often succeed

in tempting us from our right path
they are to be found
in this our age,
which has been termed an age of
ment; and,
they do exist elsewhere, they have not
if
refine-
attained a sufficient influence to produce any fatal results

for
we hear
of few instances of suicide
barbarous tribes
lift
among rude and
ready to destroy one another, they rarely
the murderous hand against themselves.
PREFACE.
Xlli.
ing will be the benefits of his aphorisms to the

studious and contemplative, and which,
fully gleaned,
must
still
if
the voice of the
and avenger, forcing even such
care-
enemy
to tread lightly
over the ashes of his untimely grave.

It
was erroneously
stated,
at the
Mr. Colton's death, that he was
in
moment
dering on poverty: such was not the truth.
had been
by
for a
his family,
of
a state bor-
He
long time substantially assisted
which
is
confirmed by a letter he
wrote to his aged mother only a few days before

the awful
moment
thanked her
We have
for
of his decease,
in
which he
her ample remittances.
spoken of Mr. Colton's high respect
towards every hallowed subject.
In his frequent
and unrestrained conversations with me on the

possibility of a future state of immortality, his
opinions and conclusions always tended to this
one great truth, that "

its difficulties
He would
this
world cannot explain
without the assistance of another."
strongly urge the necessity of a ge-
neral acceptation of the Christian doctrines, as
the safe side
" they are," said he, " the only
thing that can give permanent consistency to

or
virtue,
alarm
appal
vice
are a solace to our minds.

state," continued he,
being of society
many
apprehension
with
and
they give solidity to our happiness, and
"
is
belief in a future
necessary to the well-
without that belief, an oath, in
instances our sole guide to truth, becomes
an empty sound."
I
asked him, one day, what he considered the
strongest proof in favour of Revelation

plied,
he re-
" The History of the Life of Christ, par-
ticularly as exhibited in the Gospels,
morality adducible from
it:
and the
they are so pure and
perfect, so salutary to our nature, so suitable to
our condition, that they are
in
every respect
worthy of that high source from whence they are

supposed to emanate."
"The
Life of Christ,"
he continued, " was so perfect, that, without an

original, the
copy could not have been drawn
the corruption introduced

tice of Christianity
is
by men
into the prac-
no argument against the
purity of Christianity itself."
Such were the general opinions and convictions of the
Author of "Lacon," expressed
unreserved conversations with

interesting
By
and most important
Memoirs of
singular as
it
line of this
his
own
in
these highly
subjects.
the sudden death of Mr. Colton
be deprived of a great literary

the
me on
feast,
we
shall
inasmuch as
Life, extraordinary
was, remain unfinished.
work promised much:
it
and
The outwas
richly
adorned with the characters of the most leading
men
of his time and of the age; the Notes indigreat variety of matter and anecdote,
cate a
which
it
was
his intention to
the shape of opinion of

their public
conduct and literary productions,
finely
worked up with
satire
which marked
tion.
throw into them, in
men, with a review of
that acute language
his writings
and
and conversa-
Writing was to Mr. Colton an intellectual
pleasure of such a magnitude, that latterly he
sought no other; and his nights were dedicated

to this recreation rather than to sleep.
which
terials with
mind was
his
The ma-
so well stored,
could never cloy or remain idle
rating his mental powers, the
constant exercise
far
from deterio-
of those materials seemed only to invigorate.

In one of the Notes connected with his
Memoirs, he says,
live
my
life
"I
own
one would rejoice
for
to
over again to please myself, but cer-
tainly should think

to please others."
it
hard
to
But, alas
be obliged to do so
!
we have seen by
this short sketch, that there exists
too
common
live
who wish
to
humanity
to die,
a paradox but
which
and those
is,
that those
die that have the
greatest desire to live.
Mr. Colton complained

failure of his eyesight
to
me
even from
lately of the
this
circum-
stance he would draw a conclusion that would
not occur to every one: "

he,
" to shut up
all
It is
a warning," said
books, to study our
own
we may amend, and
character, that
those former readings
have been,
the
were,
that
benefit
by
or ought to
occupation of our youth and
manhood.
I
have already said that,
in the sketches
Mr. Col ton's papers intended

the career of
but
it
many
worldly
for his
men
is
among
memoirs,
finely traced
must not be understood that they are
written with disgusted misanthropic disappoint-
ment, or with the querulous debility of old age
he considered the arrangement of these memoirs

as a recreation, a reaction to be attempted at less
cost;
and not more a matter of amusement
himself, than
like
many
advantage
of his former works, of great profit and

to the reader.
The best recompense
that
.a
man can
posterity,
who has passed through
eccentric
life,
well written.
may
to
they certainly would have been,
offer to
a long and an
certainly would be to offer a
life
Examples, otherwise pernicious,
thus be converted into warnings, and our
may
defects
little skill
teach others to conquer.
or prudence
What
we may have evinced may
be rendered more beneficial to others, by candidly
examining the how, the when, and the where;

and, should our wisdom or our sagacity not have
accomplished
all
that might have been done,
what they have accomplished may have been

for a
moment
tarnished by an intoxication of
success.
Markham Sherwill.
CONTENTS.
PREFACE
V.
MODERN ANTIQUITY
NOTES TO DITTO
.......
.
to 38
39
MISCELLANEOUS POEMS.
59
SOCIETY
ON BEING ASKED, BY A LADY, WHAT

OLD AGE
....
IS
.
WIT?
...
.
63
65
ON THE CIRCUMSTANCE OF OLMEDO, THE POET LAUREATE OF PERU, HAVING BEEN SELECTED BY THAT
REPUBLIC TO NEGOTIATE ANOTHER LOAN IN LONDON. 66
AMBITION
67
CONTENTS.
ON SEEING THE BUST OF SOCRATES IN A DEBATING
SOCIETY
ib.
REDDES DULCE LOQUI
.68
HOPE
69
HUMAN HAPPINESS
70
.71
A TRUISM
DESPAIR
72
ON THE STATUE OF THE VENUS DE MED1CIS
73
.......
......
ODE ON THE DEATH OF LORD BYRON

FRIENDSHIP
NEQUE SEMPER ARCUM

NAPOLEON
ib.
79
80
81
FAME
82
EXAMPLE
lb.
JEU DE MOT, ON MR. HUNT'S ADDRESS TO THE RADICALS, AT
THE CROWN AND ANCHOR TAVERN.
83
THE FATES
84
FAITH AND HOPE
ib.
HUMILITY
85
CONFESSION
86
PRETEXTS AND MOTIVES
87
AURUM POTENTIUS
TO THE TRUE POET
ICTU FULMINEO
.88
89
CONTENTS.
PAIN.
XXl.
WRITTEN DURING A PERIOD OF SEVERE AGONY.
...
..*....
........
TO DR. PARR'S BIOGRAPHERS
JULIUS AND JULIA
ALARMISTS
JUDGMENTS
"OREMUS UT
SIT
MENS SANA IN CORPORE SANO"
90
91
93
lb.
94
95
WISDOM AND FOLLY
96
WRITTEN AT MIDNIGHT
97
BLESSINGS IN DISGUISE
98
TIME
99
PERSECUTION
ib.
ADVERSITY
100
PRAYER
101
......
PROLIXITY
CONCORDIA DISCORS
" LUMENQUE JUVENT^ PURPUREUM"
104
105
103
IMPROMPTU ON THE BISHOP OF ATX, WHO LATELY
BEQUEATHED HIS HEART TO THE JESUITS.
UNDE ET QUO
A MISTAKE
BIOGRAPHERS.
........
LINES
BEING
106
107
108
AN ANSWER TO A LET-
TER FROM AN OCTOGENARIAN, INFORMING ME THAT

HE HAD GIVEN UP AUTHORSHIP, AND THAT A FRIEND
OF HIS WAS ABOUT TO WRITE HIS LIFE.
109
CONTENTS.
XX11.
INSTINCT
BAYLE
.Ill
.*
.
113
A CHARACTER
114
AN IMPROMPTU ON FFRST HEARING THE NEWS OF LORD

BYRON'S DEATH
"QUISQUE
VOLTAIRE
116
118
THE BARD
SOCRATES
115
FORTUNE FABER EST"
SUÊ
122
JEALOUSY
124
125
LINES ADDRESSED TO LANE FOX, ESQ., WHOSE HOUSE
WAS DESTROYED BY
FIRE,
IMMEDIATELY AFTER THE
CONFLAGRATION OF YORK MINSTER
TOWARDS THE
RESTORATION OF WHICH HE MUNIFICENTLY GAVE A
THOUSAND POUNDS.
.....
126
COURAGE
127
COMPENSATION
128
DEATH
129
AVARICE
HOPE
FORTITUDE
VICE
131
.
AND VIRTUE
WIT AND TRUTH
132
ib.
134
135
CONTENTS.
XX1I1.
QUANDOQUE BONUS DORMITAT HOMERUS
.lb,
BURNS
136
A NAME.
VIDET
RIDET.
THE VILLAGE HERO
138
........
........
CEREUS IN VIT1UM FLECTI.
ENERGY
LIFE
GRJECI/E
PARALLEL CASE.
MALEDICTIO
POLEMICS
LORD BACON
IN
LINGUA ?"
FRIENDSHIP AND INGRATITUDE.
"DUM TENER
A
AN ALLEGORY.
143
144
147
152
153
INANE EST!
REVENGE
140
141
148
" AN TIBI VIRTUS VENTOSA
TINNIT
137
154
.
WORD TO THE WISE
NOTES TO THE MISCELLANEOUS POEMS
155
IN CUNIS JAM JOVE DIGNUS erat"
156
lb.
.157
MODERN
"Ea
nostris
ANTIQUITY,
enim pro vera antiquitate habenda

tribui debet,
non juniori
The
qualis
sun
old, as
is
may be known
spots around his brightness thrown;
The sea
is
old, as
still
appears,
"Whene'er his hoary head he rears
And
earth, that hath for ages
Her giddy
circle
Must burn,
To
apud
Lord Bacon.
quos fuit."
From
quae temporibus
est,
mundi
astati
spun
round the sun,
or beg the Polar Bear
cool her axle, scorched with wear
anti-
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
'I
The
stars, to
music of the spheres
Their twinkling feet and listening ears
Have
lent so long, that
Have
quitted,
So
old
for a
some the dance
welcome trance.
and ancient are the
Their date a musty proverb
And
By
all
the
that
fire
frost of ages
The
is
hills,
fills
warmed
their breast,
suppressed; 2
rivers are so far
from youth,
They Ve worn both rock and pebble smooth
And
some, with pioneering wave,
Have dug
their
But Thou3 that
Thy
own
gigantic grave.
o'er th'
crystal wall,
Egyptian hurled
and didst a world
Both made and marred record, Oh, deign
to tell,
Seer of the pillared flame, and granite well!
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
Who
taught old Mother Earth to hide
The
lava's age-repeated tide,
And
bid,
though
centuries toiled in vain,
Her thousandth Eden bloom again
Or
solve
Of
flood and flame, rived hill
Have
what
rolled
shock
seras, since the
to turn to flint
The Bison's horn
and rock,
and stone
the Mammoth's bone!
Imbedded deep and dark they
lie,
'Neath mountains heaped on mountains high;
So
long, their very race
They
exist
But who
is
spent,
but in their monument
their
mausoleum made?
Did earthquakes wield that mighty spade

That renders
all
thy Babel piled
But the card-castle of a
child
b 2
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
Strange
that Creation can't afford
Such pomp
But
to shroud her sixth-day's Lord,
gives each
That burial
mean
or monstrous thing
she denies her king!
These are Earth's secrets
but to gain
Those of that Deep thou rent
in twain,
'Twere worth a dull eternity
Of common
life
to question thee.
Call to thy council,
That
all
the scribes
Israel trained in all her tribes,
Canst thou, or they, by scale or
Of
Matter,
What
With
line
Measure, Weight,define
giant4 reared those isles that brave

coral
A world
brow the southern wave,
reconquered from her foe,
And conquering
still,
doomed
still
to grow.
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
Thy Noah saw one world
destroyed,
His sons are better far employed
They
To
build an ark
find out worlds already
Compared
Till
to which, the
but an atom,
their father's trade
last a
made;
works of man,
span
Though Archimedes
the compass bent,
And Choeops
myriads lent
all his
View, sons of Egypt, Rome, and Greece,
What Time
Your
And
can't mar, but
rules remodel,
must increase
and reform,
seek your master in a
worm
Canst find a plummet more profound
Than
these immortal builders
sound
Dire fathoms deep, and then detect
grub
the mighty Architect
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
Proud
What
cities! hives of
now
are ye
With hoof unshod
prouder men,
th'
Hysena's den
the Zebra bounds
O'er prone Palmyra's mouldering mounds.
Who laid your shroud of sable on,

O Tadmor, Thebes, and Babylon!
Then
left,
your spectred forms to deck,
Nought but
the ruin of the wreck?
But Time himself
is
aged grown,
His teeth are gone with crushing stone

His might to
mow
his scythe forbids,
'Twas shattered on the Pyramids.
Then we,
Must be
The
that on these days are thrown,
the oldest Ancients
earliest,
Was Adam,
known
modern Earth hath
in his
apron green.
seen,
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
He
lived
when young' Creation pealed
Her morning hymn

Till all
To
o'er flood
and
field,
came
her infant offspring
that great christening for a name._
While Earth, a virgin then, repaid

His gentle
toil
And, decked
To
without a spade
in flowrets,
Then
in his teens, a stripling blithe,
Time worked
his wing,
His leisure, pleasure
To
ripen beauty
Unyoked by
but not his scythe,

his
employ
not destroy.
science to the
Young zephyrs
sail,
sported in the gale,
Or wantoned with
dared the plough
trace a wrinkle on her brow.
the jocund wave,-
truant then, but since a slave.
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
The youthful Sun, with

Kissed ocean
bridal smile,
continentand
isle
No Joshua curbed, no comet quailed,

No dim eclipse his glory veiled.
Then he that would
the Ancients
know,
Must forward come, not backward go

The learned lumber
Shows nothing
of the shelves
older than ourselves.
Yet Prejudice discovers true

Antiquity, where
all his
And more
perversely
That
new
all is
new
still
where
doth hold
all is old.
Prescribing, with dogmatic pen,
Her milk of babes,
Nor kens
Still
as
meat
to
men
the river's mighty bed,
poring o'er the fountain-head.
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
But who
in older times
Shall live
That
than we
infant
on the knee, 5
See sights to us were never shown,
And
secrets
He on
know
to us unknown.
that 'vantage-ground shall stand,
That must
By each
far
nobler views
successive
command
hand or head,
With grandeur clothed
or verdure fed.
Each buried sage might beg the boy
To read a
On
lecture
his toy,
principles profounder planned
Than Boyle
And,
divined, or
ere his lip with
He might instruct
Till,
on
wrapped
in
Bacon scanned
down be
their
spread,
hoary head
wonder, o'er his tongue
The pensive shade of Newton hung.
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
10
For man alone
of
In ocean, earth, or
all
air
Light from his fellows7
By
tracing-
O'er
alone,
:
that has been retrospects,
all
And where
beacon
Keen
Man
backward, marches on
And hence on
that lives
derives
to
all
that
is
reflects
success or failure steers,
or
a Pharos rears.
one point, beyond
it
blind,
Could Instinct here compete with Mind,
Some change had marked
the spider's loom,
Bee's fragrant cell, or beaver's room:
Then might yon ape be taught
And
Or
to swell
feed the flame, he loves so well ; 8
India's ant to
Where
all his
shun the bank
van by millions sank. p
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
For Instinct
as
is
The hour-hand
But
can
ne'er
By such
its
slow degrees,
the time of day
a circumscribed survey
But Man
On
one that sees
trace
tell
his firm foundation lays
past experience, and surveys
His Sons
progressing
through darkness
in their
Like Time
Through darkness
When
might
as
through light
with man's nonage
blent,
each unconquered element,
Not hope, but havoc did
By
11
afford
turns man's tyrant or his lord.
when ray with ray combined,
Through
light
Collects,
by mind propelling mind,
From
earth, air, or ocean yield,
all
Safety or strength
a sword
or shield.
10
:
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
12
By
time deciduous, scooped by worms,
Docked
in ravines,
and launched by storms,
that sculked from
The bark,
11
nook
to nook,
And
feared a wreck in every brook,
Bore
in her rotten
womb
the plan
That changed the destinies of man,
Dominion gave,
and bid him
roll
The Thunderer's peal from Pole
Wedded
to Pole.
the Nations, joined their hands,
Their goods, their chattels, and their lands,
Made
all
No more
that
's
viewed from Andes' ridge
a barrier, but a bridge
Transplanted half that
Anak brood
That Earth o'ershadows,
And
forests launched,
That blast had
'.
to the flood,
but bend before
levelled
them on
shore.
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
But whether
art,
by entreaty
With phantom-forms amuse
Or
bid her tube Protean
Thy
13
'guiled,
the child,
ope
Kaleidoscope;
fairy freaks,
Or, soaring view from silken ball
The
Or
12
Condor's watery double wall
dive with Davy's net, to tame
As Vulcan, Mars
Yet
still
the fettered flame
with her ! what
's
meanest tends
Full oft to mightiest, loftiest ends,
Bids Newton's apple, Franklin's kite,
Give laws to Lightning and to Light.
The hoary Sage, 13
that
Slow steaming from
The
subtle Vapour,
first
did raise,
his faggot's blaze,
instant hailed
Alcides, in his cradle veiled
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
14
Reason and Force, too

For once
their
Combined to
This
full
hands
rear,
and pledged
Then, limb by limb
And
opposed,
their troth,
epitome of both.
A Sampson e'en
Matured
oft
resistless closed,
the giant
in
rose,
swaddling clothes
he changed Earth's form and
half subjected time and space
face,
Pierced through the mountain's bowels deep,
Where
And,
sunless, countless treasures sleep,
like a
Nero, ripped the
From whence
The
his iron sinews
womb
come
cost of all his outfit, told
And summed,
And where
he paid a thousand
fold;
the barren desert frowned,
The ransom of a Croesus found.
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
Thy hundred arms,

To match with
His
Briareus,
his, 'twere little use,
to dust thy
flail
15
bones would grind,
His winnow blow them to the wind.
Command his speed, and quick elope,

And double distance th' antelope 14
;
Or dare him, and
From
all
Or task
the race he'll win
that feather hath, or fin
his strength,
and
straight
embark
With
all
Then
mast-less, sail-less, oar-less ride
that lumbered Noah's ark;
Triumphant against wind and
tide;
15
Yet can those giant fingers ply
The spindle
for his
Omphaly,
Her cestus weave and broidered zone,
Mould
all
her trinkets one by one.
MODERN ANTIQUITY,
16
Her mirror form, her
tresses fold
In microscopic mesh of gold
Or spread the gossamer

Her beauties
Though prompt
shroud
to
as the moon a cloud.

to pile,
if
needs be done,
pyramid, by set of sun, 16
Or mountains move, might
Of harnessed
Wouldst
fit
gall a train
elephants in vain
him
for the field ,
proclaim
All former strife a truant's game,

'Tis
but a wreck
war no longer
Of helmed
head, and bridled neck
Not
spoil,
but havoc
Not
rout, but ruin
That fought
The
none are
remain,
ta'en
all
but not a tongue
fate that all alike befel
to tell
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
Still foot
by
foot,
and year by year,
This giant gains in growth and gear,
But what he shall
be,
none can say
But those that bide the Judgment-day;
Or wait some deluge thundering
forth
His hundredth ploughshare o'er the earth;
Then those might

They invented
boast, that chance survived,
that, they but revived.
But Time, nor rhyme, can
As
tell
the throes
perfect from imperfect rose
Of minds
that writhed in Error's yoke,
Ere from Art's acorn burst her oak. 17
Long was
the labour, tough the
toil,
Ceaseless the conflict and turmoil
Of those,
that
Prejudice 13
that old
Antseus braved, and half controlled
17
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
18
As Cacus brutes he
And
men,
fetters
drags them backwards to his den,
Puts out
And
their eyes, then bids
guide their brethren
Then
'tis
his
wont
them go
that have two
when sorely pressed.
To rouse some buried name from
rest,
His prowess vaunt, expose his head,
And
He
scare the living with the dead.
crotchets had, and
But who denied them
He 'd
many
a whim,
woe him,
many thought
to
lash or lecture,
'Twas better to be flogged than taught.
He
did maintain 'twas not the blade
But scabbard that the faulchion made,
And
that the merits of a steed
Lay
in his trappings,
not his speed.
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
He
19
swore no living mortal, yet,
E'er got beyond his Alphabet;
Termed
cities
nought but Riot's schools,
The masters dead
He
the scholars
fools
said, the seed that held the tree
Must, of the two, the greater be
And
that the Nile, at fountain-head,
Was
mightier far than in his bed
He
held a feast, and there and then
Served meat to babes, and milk to men,
And swore 'twas proper, will or nill,

And crammed it down with club or quill.
An
old decrepit dwarf he kept,
That never talked but when he

This was his oracle, he
All these his babblings
'd
slept,
note
down, and quote
c2
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
20
He sunk a well, at vast expence

Of time and cost, and drew from thence
Some muddy water this he swore
,
Excelled the
He dubbed
The
river at his
door
the faggots from his
wood
best logicians since the flood,
That threw more
Than
light
on things unknown
e'en from truth or reason shone;
Strong slaves he had, and not a few,
But how
to rule
them never knew,
Their rebel hands but ruin spread,
And sometimes broke
He brought
their master's
head
a parrot up, to speak
All languages, and whistle Greek;
What pleased him most, when all was done,

Was this He could talk sense in none;
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
He
trained an elephant, with skill,
His teapot night and morn to
At length the
Of
O'er
a guide
all his
fill,
beast, from sheer excess
food, succumbed,
He had
19
and idleness;
knew
that
the
way
grounds, by night or day
But him he kept
At
'21
cost of his
in
own
durance
shins
These freaks of
his, to
Irrelevant unto
my
close,
and nose.
some may seem
theme,
But those who through the surface

Will see the Moral of
my
pierce,
verse
His neighbours, these vagaries sad
Had watched, and deemed him
daft, or
Albeit he sometimes dealt a hint
That had a world of method
in 't;
mad,
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
22
At length they mustered
To
force his
And hand
Over
all their
keep and storm

;
power
his tower,
him, bound, by hook or crook,
or
to Bedlam,-
St.
Luke;
If 'twas a task his cave to force,
To
clear
Its
age
and cleanse
augmented
Had worn
th'
it
was a worse;
trash to rout,
Augsean besom out;
For Prejudice had been,
An
And any
To
in truth,
antiquarian from his youth,

rubbish,
his chaotic
He dragged
so 'twas old,
hoard he rolled
the mile-stone from
That Ajax hurled
its
bed
at Hector's head,
On
which was graved, what must destroy
All
20
cavil "Seven Miles from Troy!"
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
Here
pile
on
pile,
23
embattled stood,
All reading,
none could read or would;
Huge
ranged, but not for show!
folios
With these he
levelled
many
foe.
Systems, by others or themselves

O'erthrown,
Nor
one,
all settled
on
his shelves,
so 'twas exploded,
lacked,
But, chose them, like old China, cracked;
Flawed astronomic cycles, charts
From Tycho, Ptolemy,
Descartes,
Old armour too that buckled on

'Twas vain alike to fight or run
With lantern of Diogenes,

Empedocles, 21
And
slipper of
And
self-same ink-horn, and ink too
That Martin
at the Devil
threw
22
;
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
24
He showed
the very shoes that shod
The Giant-race
before the flood,
And
And
"clouted" too, yet would they

tightly
fit
common
suit
foot!
The bones of martyrs he'd parade,
second army might have made,
And
Was
if
or
'twas even some had two
a head, or heart
scant
But most he prized
th' identic
Of him who proved a
And
hat
ball w&sflat;
a huge jack, his mightiest feat,
That made the grate turn,
He had
not the meat
a tube that spied out true
Antiquity, where
Reversed,
That
so,
all is
it
all
was new;
as correctly told
new, where
all is old.
MODERX ANTIQUITY.
And an
Who
25
old almanack to show
live the longest,
youngest grow,
And
that the world, as here displayed,
Was
oldest,
when
it first
was made! 23
Think of
their toil, that did
To
and cleanse
force
this
embark
second ark,
While "many a rude repeated stroke"
Of
sledge and axe the portal broke;
But Prejudice
So much
who hated nought
as Innovation,
Most manfully
to
fought
keep aloof
These rough reformers from
his roof:
Some then he mangled, some he
And
others to the
And some He
He'd try them
fire
took, these
but
all-
slew,
he threw,
made
first
a boast,
would
roast
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
26
But finding that the
He had
More imps and

Than
fight
grew warm,
recourse to spell and charm
e'er
goblins
summoned he
beleagured Anthony.
But, once an entrance gained, they found
Much more
And clouds
to frighten, than to
Turned out but dust
At length
in his
He thought
wound,
of fancied enemies
it
to blind their eyes.
own Donjon penned,
time to call a friend
Skilled to divide, distract, or
make
His foes their very selves mistake;
The despot Doubt, 24
that some hath taught
They're not of bone or body wrought: 25
And
others in a trance control,
From which
they wake without a soul
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
Doubt
Anarch oldthat staggers
The mighty vulgar

Claims from
all
27
all
26
as the small,
hearts th' allegiance won,
Yet satisfaction gives to none;
And
still
Dreaded
resisted,
still
must
reign,
abhorred reviled
Sole tyrant he, that
While any of
still
in vain,
must
his subjects live
thrive,
!
The
stoutest
Still
strongest in the strongest minds;
Who
And
fastest binds,
struggles hardest, suffers worst,

tightens bands he cannot burst.
Doubt
to his loathed
One goddess
Hope
She
arm he
fairest
with
embraces woos
that would
fain refuse;
daughter of the
skies,
Him droops without Him
dies;
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
28
Fear
his mistress,
is
she
in sooth
Flies not, but seeks him, nothing loth,
His converse courts, by bed or board,
And
more than
loves
herself, her lord:
Their union teemed one monster grim,
More
false
Suspense,
than her
more
His Mother's heart
Till
than him
his Father's
Like Hannibal with Rome,
Doubt
fell
that blends our double dread,
sneers eternal
head!
from youth
war with Truth,
with one voice, both Truth and Time,
Doubt and Death
O'er
But
till
their
that hour arrive
To whisper down
he
Psean chime;
tries
these enemies,
And
hints 'twere better trust a spark.
Than
risk their rendering all things
dark
MODERN ANTIQUITY,
29
Thus those reversions that inspire

A Wilson's zeal, a Sydney's fire,
Doubt would
And
but Faith
forbids
destroy,
cancel the security
For Wisdom would with Virtue wed,
And
e'en
on earth
Might Angels
Unite
their nuptial
bless,
their
but Doubt forbids the banns
Shows just enough of future
To make us pause
And
bed
and Heaven
just
ill
but not stand
still,
enough of future grace
To make us start not run
the race
But He -that made the struggle hard,

Hath heightened
also the reward;
Th' uncertain haven, and the storm,
Tis these
a Palinurus form
hands
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
30
Doubt most dreads Truth, and
right before
Her
portal stands, and bolts the door;
Her
choicest treasures too hath he
Locked up
but cannot find the key;
For nought illumes
his
tower or wall,
Let him that scales them heed a
Or take a
Hath
he,
nor
Shrouded
fall,
torch, for scarce a spark

fights
in night,
but
in the
dark;
the random blows,
He deals alike on friends and foes,

Had made the one-eyed Cyclops shun,
This mightier giant, that hath none i
Sampson
Would'st bind
this
Alas
is
wake with
One
foe
sure to
can
foil
him
Nor seek that dread
sleeping?
thee
but beware
Despair
ally
He
MODERN ANTIQUITY,
31
Doubt's castle on Conjecture's sea,

Stable from instability,
Rides,
lashed
Than
art
Yet hath
it
Hath made
By
weathered
many
a gale,
the loftiest structures quail,
awhile, then sink in sand;
Whether by
O'er
craft
Chaldean, thrown
Memnon's head, and Dendrah's
Or marble dome,
or wisdom sound;
master-builders proudly planned,
To stand
By
moorings more profound
to
can solve
zone,
or ruin wild,
Phidias carved, or Druid piled
ye
that followed long the torch
That beamed from
O mourn
with
me
And one by one
stoa, grove, or porch,

their
lamps puffed out,
by breath of Doubt
!!
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
32
His household troops, that neutral ground
Command,
and darkness, found
'twixt light
space strown thick, and wide, and
With wrecks and
Few
ruins of the
far,
war
pierce this limbo-land of cloud,
But doff
their
And
leave
armour
for their
to cheer their
Their trophies
and
Yet inroads on
this
shroud,
comrades on
their skeleton
gloomy realm,
That mists and shadows overwhelm,
Are made,-
Must
for all that
And through
this Vestibule
All master-minds
And
Truth would
force this frontier line, or
the
first,
hail,
fail;
have passed
as last,
inch by inch, and day by day,
Have cut
their road, or fought their
way;
MODERN ANTIQUITY
Yet good from
Who
The
evil
33
may be wrought:
never doubted
never thought
but the truce

want of use;
battle brightens,
Rusts out the blade
Who
thinks as others, and agrees
With
Did
for
all,
all
and
finds nought,
accord, then
Stock-still,
all
little sees;
might stand
and darkness drown the land
" Complacent dullness," witnessed
but
All
men agreed
No
Discord jarred her gentle rule,
Nor
ruffled Error's stagnant pool;
all
long-
men wrong,
E'en Luther, harnessed out by Truth,
Proud Leo fought,
Or he
the
or Henry, both;
Wizard deemed,
allied
His Talisman to reason's side
MODERN ANTIQUITY,
34
Their thunder pealed o'er papal
Rome,
Braved her anathemas, her gloom

Dispelled, and struck her conclave mute,
Trembling to threaten, or refute
True talent
is
the ray that flings
novel light o'er
common
things;
And
those that dead most followers boast,
Alive
with others
differed most;
Think with the crowd, and present blame
Thou
And
shalt escape,
live at ease,
and future fame,
but vainly
sigh
For Harvey's immortality
Columbus differed,but he found

The
And
prize his
bid a
The rooted
mighty mission crowned,
new world
rise, t'
errors of the Old 1
unfold
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
But
tell
Your
35
Val d'Arno ! Fiesole !
starry pilgrim's destiny;
What was your
Galileo's life?
For truth a race,
with Doubt a
strife
Alike decried, alike deplored,

Alive rejected, dead adored;
The first did

The second
galling fetters bind,
in a
dungeon pined i
But think not such,
When
Or
their fate bewailed,
friendship frowned, or fortune failed,
life!
Death but ensured
As night hides earth
t'
their prize,
unveil the skies
27
I
True fame 's a plant that seems to need
A body
And
buried
for its seed
ere the churlish sucklings thrive,
The parent-stock must cease
to live!
d2
!!
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
36
The good, the

Are
little
Nor
till
find
they
're
dust,
perceive another's worth
and count
The noisome
cell
Thus Indians
For
till
they mutter "Earth to earth,"
Can men
To
great, the wise, the just,
valued
search, so travellers
finest pearls
Thus great
or
his merits o'er
of Death explore,
the putrid shell
little,
Doubtful or certain,
Discordant
tell,
28
old or new,
false or true;
else, all aid
my
rhyme,
Prove time by truth, and truth by time.
Who
To
lived the longest
he but
staid
witness the foundation laid,
Or he
that outlived
And saw
Solomon
that seventh
wonder done
MODERN ANTIQUITY.
And
6i
science ere her wing was grown,
Like eaglet, from his craggy throne
Delayed,
Her
Wisdom
Still
flight
for strength
trial
won,
by time,
alone, refreshed
marches onward to her prime,
Doomed,
like the lines
To approach
Who
by
adventurous to the sun.
it
never
29
herself can teach,
never reach.
lived before us did in truth
See Wisdom's childhood;^we, her youth;
But men
nor days, unborn, untold,
Shall ever witness
Wisdom
old
Time's light, and depth, and breadth, and length,
Add
To
force to force,
and strength
that alone that cannot die,
Nor even touch maturity.
to strength,
MODERN ANTIQUITY,.
38
Then
let
not error's pedant head
Subject the living to the dead;
But break her old inverted
rule,
That sent the master back to school.
Replant the tree of knowledge, thrown
By book- winked bigots upside down;

And bury what they ate the roots,
And what they buried, eat, the fruits.
Till universal
Truth
shall gain
Her empyrean, Doubt must
then
The
let
circle,
reign;
Truth the centre be,
Unanimity
NOTES
TO MODERN ANTIQUITY.
Note
" The
stars, to
1
,
page
2.
music of the spheres
Their twinkling feet and listening ears
Have lent so long,

Have quitted, for
Lost
of the
that
a
some the dance
welcome trance."
Pleiades and the
stars, as, for instance, in the
tail
Ram.
Note
2
,
page
* So old and ancient are the
2.
hills,
Their date a musty proverb
And all
By frost
the
fire
of ages
that
is
fills
warmed
their breast,
suppressed."
The tops of many mountains bear signs of having once

been volcanoes, now extinct.
NOTES TO MODERN ANTIQUITY.
40
Not e
3
,
page
2.
"But Thou that o'er th' Egyptian hurled

Thy crystal wall, and didst a world
Both made and marred record, Oh, deign
to
Seer of the pillared flame, and granite well
The
questions addressed to
Moses
tell,
!
in this and the fol-
lowing stanzas, are beautifully poetical, and hint, as our

author very justly observes, at some of " Earth's secrets :"
while to question "the seer of the pillared flame" on other

facts,
" were worth a dull eternity."
Note*, page
'
The
What
giant reared those
With
coral
reefs.
giant that formed and
is
that brave
brow the southern wave."
the Isle of France and other
wave"
4.
isles
still
continues to increase
islands in "the southern
the small zoophite insect that inhabits the coral
This pigmy architect,
like his brother
fisb,
the
madrepore, (the original builder of the islands of Malta
and of Gozo,) commences
at the
bottom of the
sea, the

foundation of the embryo
to
isle,
augment the testaceous
41
and continues through ages
fabric, until at
length
it
reaches
above the waves, and presents a resting-place for birds
in
process of time these newly erected points become solid,
and some enterprising navigator designates them as newly
Should not the gigantic labours of
discovered islands.
these insects humble the arrogance of haughty
man 1 and
should not the reflections called forth by such mighty
wonders make the atheist
" Your
And
to adore the Creator of all?
remodel and reform.
rules
seek your master in a worm."
Note
"But who in older
5
,
page
times than
9.
we
Shall live? That infant on the
knee,
See sights to us were never shown,
And
The debt
secrets
us unknown.''
of respect and reverence entailed
the efforts of those

this
know to
who
lived before us,
is
upon us by
a just debt; but
debt has been consigned to some who, in their zeal for
their clients,
would gladly foreclose the mortgage, and
seize on the estate.
It
might with safety be affirmed, that
42
NOTES TO MODERN' ANTIQUITY.
science
is at this
moment
in such a state of rapid progres-
sion, that the tyro of the next century will be
competent
to instruct the ablest proficient of the present, in
some
of
the most important secrets in " rerum natura," could the
hoary scholar be brought up
to take the benefit of the ac-
quirements of his juvenile preceptor.
Note
**
page
9.
Each buried sage might beg the boy
To
read a lecture on his toy,
On
principles profounder planned
Than Boyle
We
divined, or
Bacon scanned."
must, of course, read this line to refer to far more
noble discoveries than the mere whipping a top, or flying

a kite.
It is, perhaps, unfortunate that
many
of the later
discoveries will have a tendency of a destructive, rather
than of a salutary nature

that philosophy, like
light,
the
and
it is
not on
all
safety-lamp, while
prevents the conflagration.
occasions
she gives
Note
page
7
,
" For man alone, of
all
43
10.
that lives
In ocean, earth, or air, derives
Light from his fellows;
By
Man
alone,
tracing backward, marches on."
Buftbn, in his introduction to the history and general

character of Parrots, has written
much on
the power of
imitation in birds and animals, and, after explaining the
two
"Nous
n'apprendrons
perfectionner
d'eux-memes.
distinct sorts of imitation, says,
jamais
aux
animaux a
se
Chaque individu peut emprunter de nous sans que l'espece

en profite
aucun ne peut communiquer aux autres ce
qu'il a recu de nous."
Note
R
,
page
10.
" Then might yon ape be taught

And
to swell
feed the flame, he loves so well."
well-known
fact, that a monkey will sit by a fire,

warm himself with great delight but
he was never yet known to "feed the flame," by adding
It is a
rub his hands, and
any kind of
fuel to the
dying embers.
44
Note
" Or
9
,
India's ant to
Where
all his
page 10.
shun the bank
van by millions sank."
Travellers have observed, particularly in America, where

the ants are in
much
greater quantities than in Europe,
that the destruction of millions of their tribes in the rapid

rivers of that country, is no warning to those that follow
They
by
the same track, of the certain fate that awaits them.
arrive at the bank, and such is their instinct, unaided
they seek to follow those gone before their
reflection, that
certain destruction is another clear proof that instinct is

'
Keen
to
one point
Note
''But
On
Man
10
,
beyond
it,
page
1 1
blind."
his firm foundation lays
past experience, and surveys
His Sons progressing in their might
Like
The march
Time through
darkness as through light."
of knowledge, like the
march of time, pro-
gresses in the darkness, no less than in the light
antece-
NOTES TO MODERN ANTIQUITY,
45
dent ignorance has mainly contributed to present advance-
ment
the very errors of those that lived before us, like
buoys anchored on shoals, have warned us what
to avoid,
while their efforts at discovery have also taught us, like

beacons, what to pursue.
Note ll
*
page
12.
By time
deciduous, scooped by worms,
Docked
in ravines,
and launched by storms,
The
bark, that sculked from nook to nook,
And
feared a wreck in every brook."
Boats, similar to the chance-formed canoes here spoken

of
by the author, and of which worms are the unconscious
artists,
are to this day used in the narrow rivers and
streams in Greece, and are called by the natives " Monoxolos,"
wood.
signifying a boat formed of a single piece of
46
Note
"Or,
page 13.
soaring, view
The
The Condor
12
from silken
ball
Condor's watery double wall."
is,
I believe, the largest of the vulture tribe,
and inhabits chiefly the lofty mountains of Peru, whose

height
is
about twenty thousand
Tbe "
feet.
silken ball,"
or air-balloon, has surpassed this elevation, from
which
the adventurous traveller might see the two oceans, which
our author designates under the
title
of "
The Condor's
watery double wall."
Note n page 13.

,
" The hoary Sage, that

Slow steaming from
first
did raise,
his faggot's blaze,
The subtle Vapour, instant hailed

Alcides, in his cradle veiled."
The venerable person
here
alluded
to
is
Edward
Somerset, Marquis of Worcester, whose political history
during the reign of Charles the Second

to
be alluded to in tbis note
ourselves to that part of his
life
we
is
too well
known
shall therefore confine
which
relates to his philo-
The Encyclopaedia
sophical experiments and discoveries.
edited
47
by Dr. Rees, Dr. John Robison of Edinburgh,
Dr. T. Young-, and other celebrated writers on the subject

of mechanical philosophy, have one and all attributed to
the Marquis of Worcester the invention of the application
of steam, as the
primum
now
" The Scantling of One Hundred Inven-
existing.
tions," perhaps better
tury
of
Inventions,"
appeared in 1663.
mobile of the wonderful machines
known by the
title
written by this
of
"The Cen-
"hoary Sage,"
In his 68th invention, he speaks of the
discovery he had made, of which he received the
first
idea
while he was a prisoner in the Tower of London, after his

return from France, to which country he
Ireland.
quis,
Is
it
during his stay in France, had seen the
edition of the
that period
Mar-
second
works of Salomon de Caus, printed there
at
and that he retained some notion of the vari-
ous experiments mentioned by

a
had escaped from
not possible, nay probable, that the
De Caus
as connected with
steam apparatus, that he had invented some time previ-
ous to 1663, the date of the publication of the

of Inventions," printed,
as
we
before
" Century
by the
stated,
Marquis of Worcester?
Without positively fixing the period of the discovery of

the
power of steam
who
to the lifetime of
Heron of Alexandria,
lived about 120 years before the birth of our Saviour,
NOTES TO MODERN ANTrQUTTY.
48
we
will
come
at
once to a much later period
certainly admit that the
and must
power of steam was known
in
Spain 150 years before the invention of the Marquis in the
Tower
of London.
Blasco de Garay, a captain in the Spanish navy, in

1543, applied the power of steam to a vessel of two hun-
dred tons, and proved to a large concourse of persons with
what
facility a ship
could be moved, backwards and for-
wards, by these means only, without the aid of winds, oars,

or tides. This experiment
was made, and repeated by order
of Charles the Fifth, before an assembly of learned
and so completely
investigate this
the
satisfied
menj
were the persons appointed
new discovery and important
to
secret, that
Emperor conferred a pension and other favours on
Blasco de Garay, as appears by records kept at Simancas,

in Catalonia, and
which bear date " Barcelona, 17 June,
Thus we have authentic evidence
1543."
that the
power
of steam was not only known, but practically applied, 120

years before the Marquis of Worcester published
"Century of Inventions. "
The
late
partly in error in attributing to the
hoary Sage" this
we have sufficiently proved that it was known

continent many years before but we may admit,
discovery
on the
<f
his
Mr. Colton was
that the
Marquis of Worcester was the
who nourished
this infant Alcides.
first
Englishman
Note
" Command
The Antelope
is,
page
his speed,
And double
ped
14
49
15.
and quick elope,

;"
distance th' antelope
I believe, the swiftest of the
quadru-
tribe.
15
Note
" Then mast-less,
page
15.
sail-less, oar-less
ride
Triumphant against wind and tide;"
With
respect to the advantages
we now
enjoj over the
earlier world, it is impossible to overlook the accession of
strength obtained
by the force
of steam, as applied to every
It is manifest that those powerful
species of machinery.
auxiliaries of warfare are here alluded to, which, like the
slumbering whirlwind, only await the
hand,
them.
sufficiently strong, not only
Their power
at present too
is
already
unmanageable
to
too dangerous to be subservient.
call
of some skilful
to raise, but to rule
known
but
it is
power
be applied, and therefore
Note
" Though prompt
pyramid, by
16
,
page
to pile, if needs be done,
set
of sun,
Or mountains move, might
Of harnessed elephants
M. Dupin,
16.
gall a train
in vain;"
a French, writer, but one
who has most
pro-
foundly investigated the resources of England, gives the

following observations on the almost incredible effects that
it
would be possible
to produce,
on a supposition (of
course, for the sake of argument,) that the whole steam-
power
of
England could be concentrated in one focus, and

" The great pyramid of
brought to bear on one object.
Egypt required
sand
men
for
for its erection
twenty years; but,
above one hundred thouif it
were again required
to raise the stones from the quarries, and place
them
at
their present height, the action of the steam-engines of
England, which are at most managed by thirty thousand
men, would be
hours.
If
it
would take
sufficient to
were required
to
produce this
to
effect in eighteen
know how long
cut the stones, and
a time they
move them from
tbe
quarries to the pyramid, a very few days would be found

sufficient."
Note
17
,
page
" But Time, nor rhyme,
can
51
17.
tell
the throes
As perfect from imperfect rose
Of minds that writhed
in Error's yoke,
Ere from Art's acorn burst her oak."
The
last
fifteen
stanzas,
descriptive of
the
various
powers of the steam-engine, give a most perfect picture of

the miscellaneous arts to which those powers are applied.
It
were
difficult to find
a poetic description of noise and
smoke, which so well conveys to the mind a just idea of

that which, as our author
''
shrewdly observes,
Has half subjected time and space."
Note w page
,
17.
" Long was the labour, tough the

Ceaseless the conflict
Of
those, that
toil,
and turmoil
Prejudice
that old
Antseus braved, and half controlled."
The
or
personification of Prejudice, in the following thirty
five-and-thirty stanzas,
is
admirable
the allegory is
E2
52
well kept up, and the sarcasm, that deals
many
a deadly
blow, shews the lamented author to have had more poig-
nant wit than badness of heart.
Note
" He had
O'er
We
l9
,
page 2
a guide that
all his
knew
the
way
grounds, by night or day;"
are inclined to think that this stanza implies
compass.
Note
" He dragged
20
,
page 22.
the mile-stone from
That Ajax hurled
its
bed
at Hector's head,
On which was graved, what must destroy

Seven Miles from Troy
All cavil
!'
'
Antiquaries often destroy the
identity,
proofs they bring forward to support
it.
by the very
Note
" With
And
"
page 23.
lantern of Diogenes,
Empedocles,"
slipper of
Ardentem
frigidus
Êtnam
"
Insiluit
It is not
21
53
known whether
whose name
the philosopher,
is
here introduced, discovered the secrets of the mountain
but
it is
This instance might have heen
secret of the philosopher.
the
first,
on record, that the mountain did not keep the
but
it
certainly has not been the last, wherein a
slipper has led to
some very
interesting and
awkward
dis-
closures.
Note
22
,
page 23.
" And self-same ink-horn, and ink too

That Martin
It is well
is
known
at the Devil threw ;"
that this incident in the
life
held in great veneration at Wittenberg; at
person
who shows
of Luther
least,
by the
the room in which he was sitting
his satanic majesty appeared.
The black spot
is
when
renewed
54
every year, and the indenture in the wall occasioned by

the inkhorn very carefully preserved, as
can attest, from
ocular demonstration.
Note
" And an
Who
And
old
23
,
almanack
show
to
live the longest, youngest
grow,
that the world, as h ere displayed,
Was oldest, when
The advocates
some
page 25.
for the
it first
was made
!"
system of early antiquity will
difficulty in getting
find
over this truth.
Note 2 \ page 26.

" The despot Doubt, &c.
Almost
all
persons
who
are
wedded
to Prejudice,
when
they find themselves powerfully assailed, begin to entertain Doubt.

fruit.
Sad illusion
for incredulity is the certain
Note
To
,
" The despot Doubt
page 26.
that some hath taught
They're not of bone or body wrought."
The
two writers who endeavoured
allusion here to
prove, the one that
have no soul,
is
we have no
introduced most happily, as arising from
When we
"the despot Doubt."
we know
to
body, and the other that we
consider
how very
little
of tbose-mysterious arcana upon which most of
our speculations must of necessity be built;
when we find
ourselves obliged in candour to confess that our knowledge

of
them hardly amounts
them; we pause.
to
the
power even of
matter and motion,
and death
life
less extraordinary, that
then
it will
we have no
souls,
other philosopher so irrefutably to prove that

;
while we,
who
appear the
one philosopher should have writ-
ten so plausibly to prove that
body
defining
Take, for instance, time and space,
and an-
we have no
are no philosophers, find that this
abstraction of the parts has not diminished the whole, but

that
we continue
the same, in the full enjoyment both of
our souls and of our bodies, in spite of those philosophers.
56
Note
'*
Doubt
page 27.
Anarch old that staggers
Doubt may be useful
all"
in science; but, in
to
morality and religion,
is
by
far a
26
all
that relates
a rank poison to tbe soul
it is
more serious enemy
to our happiness
doing than mere prejudice, and not at
all to
it
and well-
be laughed
at,
like the latter.
Note
*"
9
" But think not such,
When friendship
Or
life
page 35.
their fate bewailed,
frowned, or fortune failed,
Death but insured their prize,
As night hides earth
We may venture
to
t'
unveil the skies
!"
pronounce this idea as one of the
most beautifully expressed in the English language. The

same thought exists in " Lacon ;" so that the author probably
felt
the chasteness of the line to be sufficiently
perfect to permit
There
is
him
to repeat it in
" Modern Antiquity."
no monotony in the repetition of an original and
beautiful idea,
Note n , page 36.

"
To
find
and count
The noisome cell

Thus Indians
For
On
up
his merits o'er
of Death explore,
search, so travellers
finest pearls
the putrid
shell
tell,
!"
the coast of Coromandel, the pearl oysters are laid
in heaps to rot
and putrify, in order that they may more
easily surrender their treasure.
Note
" Wisdom
Still
29
,
page 37.
alone, refreshed
by time,
marches onward to her prime,
Doomed,
like the lines herself can teach,
To approach it
The Asymptotes,
never
never reach."
or certain lines in that part of mathe-
matics called the conic sections, that constantly approach

nearer and nearer to each other, yet can never meet, though
continued infinitelv.
SOCIETY,
Where joy
but works some other's woe,
Each good, some
And
poverty
is
That overflows
Where gain
Each
And
rise,
bloated
But
is
other's
drain'd, the
to
cup
fill
but another's
another's
pomp
ill,
loss,
fall,
bedizens one
at the cost of all;
MISCELLANEOUS POEMS
60
Where gold a
willing servant finds
In each, in most
And law
Can
a slave;
the just and righteous cause
insolently brave:
Where dungeons unadmonisK d
guilt
In double darkness bind,
Or from the body
To
loose the chain,
brutalize the
Where those that
mind
rule,
Are hoodwink'd from
To
by those that
serve,
their birth,
blind the royal bird, and fix
His fetter'd
Where
vice
is
flight to earth
tax'd, the spendthrift
Of public waste
And
to aid,
legalised, that void to
fill
That want of virtue made:
hand
61
Where
bigots, led
by knaves, destroy
With serpent fang the dove

And, with a demon's rancour arm'd,
Approach the god of love
Where man
And
is
train'd to
murder man,
art destruction schools
To multiply the work of death,
By
scientific rules
Where
e'en each gracious element
That heaven or earth supplies,
We
teach,
by knowledge better
Against ourselves to
This
is
The
Of
rise
that boasted thing that

social
compact term
folly, vice,
and misery
The forced but
fatal
hid,
germ.
men
62
This to
th'
Italians crooked code
An air of truth supplied,

And plann'd for knaves the
To
better
men
This to Geneva's
His triumph
rich
reward
denied.
madman
lent
o'er the sage,
And half redeem'd the bitter sneer

Of Swift's indignant page.
Oh
warn'd by woe, and taught by time,
Shall reason, full of years,
O'er brutes boast but her sole and sad
Prerogative of tears?
Oh when
!
will
man each boon
That makes a brother moan
And
seek, where
In other's bliss
it
despise
alone resides,
their
own
63
ON BEING ASKED BY A LADY,
WHAT
What's
wit?
WIT?
'Tis strange that
That you possess

'Tis
IS
know
to
you should ask
wisdom's arrow, barb'd by truth,
Launch'd from Apollo's bow.
Brief as the lightning
but the darts,
Like those your eyes surround,
Make e'en the pierced their brilliance own,

And half forgive the wound.
To
toil
denied, or art,
Th' immediate
gift
Wit
is
of heaven,
Like Pallas, from the brain of Jove,

In perfect armour, riven.
64
It fastest
And
binds the freest minds,
Can Argus' hundred
And
eyes eclipse,
chain Briareus' hands.
Wit can,
With
While
commands
willing slaves
like Nile, the desert's dearth
life
all
and verdure grace;
the
fertile
grandeur own,
But none the source can
'Tis
the mind's beauty;
Abound, who dares

Th' unconscious
fair
trace!
but where both
to teach
what
either
Will rue the force of each
is,
OLD AGE.
Thou, anticlimax
in life's wrinkled page,
Worse end of bad beginning
helpless
Age
That sow'st the thorn, though long the
flow'r
hath fled
Alive to torment, but to transport dead
Imposing
still,
through time's
still
rough'ning
road,
With strength
diminish'd, an
Slow herald of the tomb
augmented load
sent but to
make
Man curse that giftless gift thou wilt not take,

When hope and patience both give up the strife,
Death
is
thy cure
for
thy disease
is life.
66
ON THE CIRCUMSTANCE OF OLMEDO, THE POET LAUREATE OF PERU, HAVING BEEN SELECTED BY THAT
REPUBLIC TO NEGOTIATE ANOTHER LOAN IN LONDON.
The Poet
Laureate from Peru,
In want of ready rhino,
many nearer home, that you,

And some, perhaps, that I know,
Like
Selected
is
wind;
to raise the
choice discreetly
The mission
To borrow
made
suits the poet's

is
mind,
their trade.
But, as both fact and fable are

Blent in poetic diction,
The borrowing
The payment
will
be
fact,
but a
we
fiction
fear
!
67
AMBITION.
thou, that bidd'st the brightest close

Their intellectual eye,
And
to thy dizzy,
dangerous height,
Like hooded falcons, 1
fly
What is thy summit, but the source

Whence tears and blood career
height that leaves us nought to hope,
But everything
to fear
ON SEEING THE BUST OF SOCRATES

IN A DEBATING SOCIETY.
Gods! who'd have sought,
in
such a place!
The philosophic Greek ?

'Tis well for
him, he cannot hear
For you, he cannot speak.
f2
MISCELLANEOUS POEMS-
68
REDDES DULCE LOQUI.

'Tis all in vain
Nor
Though doom'd
have no more
force nor fire at will,
the trodden round to tread,-
race-horse in a mill.
Like that forlorn and flaunting form,
The
Whom
rake's
To wear
My
abandoned toy,
grief forbids, but
want compels
the face of joy,
woeworn Muse, too long
By sorrow,
assailed
sickness, pain,
In vain resumes the lighter note,

Thalia's
jocund
strain.
69
HOPE.
Hope
for
And
But only
And
This
is
To
Experience boldly
steers,
gains that chilling shore,

to be wreck'd
sink, to rise
on
ice,
no more.
that hope whose sordid views
earth alone are given
That hope that wreck nor ruin
Her anchor
fears,
casts in heaven.
For he that would outride the storm,
Though whirlwinds waked

Makes
That
that his
all
first
the blast,
and only hope,
must make
their last.
MISCELLANEOUS FOEiMS.
70
HUMAN
O
thou, that
HAPPINESS.
all
admire, adore,
Pursue, but ne'er possess,
Away;
delude some
easier fool,
Thou phantom, Happiness!
Thou
art life's
long disastrous game,
That can the
craftiest beat;
While Death looks on, but
When
Safe
is
'tis
to reveal
too late, the cheat.
the whirlwind's boding calm,
And true the treacherous sea,

And real all the mirage paints,
Compared, thou dream, with thee
A TRUISM.
Thy
still
retreating Paradise
Flies, as
71
we near
the spot
land from hope our Pisgah
still,
Explor'd, but enter'd not.
Delusion, Salem's dotard king
In pleasures past could see
Who
kens the same
Is wiser far
in those to
come
than he.
A TRUISM.
No man
can give,
'tis
falsely thought,
Another what he has not got:

Nelson, that not a grain could boast
Of
fear himself,
And many
Can
gave others most;
a muse, that never nods,
lull to sleep
both
men and
gods.
72
DESPAIR.
Time, on thy shield of adamant,
Shivers his scythe
Is as the
the shock
wave that breaks
Around
th'
Fate's direst page

Is thine,
in
foam
impassive rock.
unmoved
to read
and thine alone;
Thy Gorgon glance both Hope and Fear

Hath
petrified to stone.
Full oft before thy withering scowl
Death drops
his
dark design;
Or, grasping thee, recoils to find
An
icier
hand
in thine
73
ON THE
STATUE OF THE VENUS DE MEDICIS.

Discomfited, dejected here!
Both Time and Nature stand

This
This
his destructive scythe distrusts,
her creative hand.
ODE ON THE DEATH OF LORD BYRON.
We
mourn thy wreck
that mighty mind
Did whirlwind passions whelm.

While wisdom wavered, half inclined
To
quit the dangerous helm.
Thou wast an Argosy of cost,

Equipped, enriched
Of gods
the work, of
in vain;
men
the boast,
Glory thy port; and doomed to gain
That splendid haven, only
to be lost:
74
Lost, e'en
Thy
Then
blest,
sighs from Valour's mailed breast,
And
Oh
when Greece, with conquest
gallant bearing hailed
tears of
Beauty
failed.
hadst thou in the battle died,
Triumphant e'en
The
in death,
patriot's as the poet's pride,
While both Minervas twined thy wreath
Then had thy full career malice and
fate defied
What architect, with choice design,

Of Rome, or Athens styled,
E'er
left
And
all
monument
like thine?
from ruins piled
prouder motto marks thy stone
Than Archimedes's tomb
He
asked a fulcrum; thou demandedst none.
But, reckless of past, present, and to come,

Didst on thyself depend, to shake the world
alone.
ON THE DEATH OE LORD BYRON.
Thine eye, to
And
And,
all
lb
extremes and ends
opposites, could turn;
like the
congelated lens,
Could sparkle,
burn
freeze, or
But, in thy mind's abyss profound,
As
in
some limbo
vast,
More shapes and monsters

To
set the
did abound,
wondering world aghast,
Than wave-worn Noah
fed,
or
starry
Tuscan
found.
Was Love
Her
car,
Was Hate
thy lay,
Cythaera
and own'd the

thy theme,
For hotter
that murky fiend
earth, left hell
The palaced crown,
Moved but thy

Thy
rein'd
spell
the cloistered cowl,
spleen, or mirth
smile was deadlier than thy scowl
In guise unearthly didst thou roam the earth,

Screen'd in Thalia's mask, to drug the tragic
bowl.
76
Lord of thine own imperial sky,

In virgin " pride of place,"
Thou
soaredst, where others could not fly,
And
hardly dared to gaze.
The Condor thus
his
pennoned vane
O'er Cotopaxa spreads
But should he ken the prey,
Nor
chilling height, nor
From Ande's
or scent the slain,
burning depth he dreads,
crystal crag, to Lima's sultry plain.
Like Lucan's, early was thy tomb,
And more than

For
still
The
Bion's mourned;
such lights themselves consume;
brightest, briefest
But from thy blazing
burned
shield recoiled
Pale Envy's bolt of lead;

She, but to work thy triumphs toiled,
Then, muttering coward curses,

Thee, thine
own
Milo,
fled,
strength alone, like matchless
foil'd-.
ON THE DEATH OF LORD BYRON.
We prize
77
thee that thou didst not fear
What stoutest hearts might rack,

And didst the diamond Genius wear,
That tempts, yet foils the attack
We
mourn
thee, that thou wouldst not find,
While prison'd
in
thy clay,
(Since such there were,) some kindred mind;
For Friendship
And doth
lasts
through
Life's
long day,
with surer chain than love or beauty
bind:
We
blame thee, that with baleful light
Thou
did'st
astound the world
comet, plunging from his height,
And
into chaos hurled;
Accorded King of Anarch power,
And
talent misapplied,
That hid thy god
in evil hour,
Or showed him only
And
to deride,
o'er the gifted blaze of thine
ness lour.
own
bright-
'o
Thy
fierce volcanic breast, o'ercast
With Hecla's
frosty cloke,
All earth with fire impure could blast,
And darken heaven
with smoke:
O'er ocean, continent, and
isle,
The conflagration ran

Thou, from thy throne of
ice,
the while,
Did'st the red ruin calmly scan,
And tuned
Apollo's harp, with Nero's ghastly
smile.
What now
avails that
Muse
of
fire
Her nothing of a name

That master hand, and matchless
What have
they gained,
Fame, Fancy's
On
child,
lyre,
but Fame
by Folly
fed
breath of meanest things;
phantom woo'd
in virtue's stead,
That Envy to the living brings,
And
silent,
solemn mockery to the dead.
FRIENDSHIP.
79
Ne'er since the deep-toned Theban sung
Unto the
Hath
listening Nine,
classic hill or valley
With harmony
Who now
shall
rung
like thine
wake
that
widowed
lyre
There breathes but one, 2 that dares
To
that Herculean task aspire;
But
less
And
than thou for
Fame he
cares,
scorns both hope and fear, ambition and

desire.
FRIENDSHIP.
To
the flavv'd falchion trust your
The
shatter'd mirror
But hope not
The
life,
mend
fractured once
link that lock'd a friend
to join
80
'Twere
vain
all in
That hearts
Was
not of
steel,
And, broken,
that charmed
link
concord held,
in
but adamant,
will
not weld I 3
NEQUE SEMPER ARCUM.

The calms of life, without the
Were but a stagnant pool;
One
long, but
Robb'd of
Joy
zest
holiday,
the school.
for her truest tablet takes
Some
And
listless
its
storms,
sorrow's parting shroud,
paints her richest, brightest hues,
Like
Iris,
on a
cloud.
81
NAPOLEON.
He won
the laurels, and with
But
them both,
lost
And, sworn
When
to
conquer
sorry change,
Two foes
Oh had
!
crown
list
would
the substance
swell;
made
for the
shade
to the million clings,
forms to facts prefer, and names to things.
Triumphant
He'd
to a
fasces, for the sceptre
Untaught what madness
Who
them renown,
them
king's, self-conquer'd fell,
he himself the royal
And, with the
to shape
for a space,
by
craft
unconquer'd,
he
left
he
for true glory
and crime,
Truth and Time
shaped
'scaped repentance living
his course,
dead, remorse!
8 '2
FAME.
What
is
Fame, when the spade our
last
bed
hath design'd,
But a tune
to the deaf, or a torch to the blind
An ovation
decreed, though the hero be fled:
Like the trump of
th'
archangel,
'tis
blown
o'er
the dead
But, unlike that dread blast, none but fools
it
amazes
And
you'll find,
when
too late,
it
nor rouses nor
raises.
EXAMPLE.
His
faults, that in a private station sits,
Do mainly harm him
only that commits
Those placed on high a bright example owe,
Much
to themselves,
more
to the
crowd below.
JEU DE MOT.
83
paltry watch, in private pocket borne,
Misleads but him alone by
whom
But the town-clock, that domes
By going wrong,
'tis
worn
or towers display,
leads half the world astray.
JEU DE MOT,
ON MR. HUNT'S ADDRESS TO THE RADICALS, AT THE
CROWN AND ANCHOR TAVERN; WHEN HE INFORMED

THEM THAT HE HAD EVEN RELINQUISHED HIS TEA,
BECAUSE IT PAID A TAX, ALTHOUGH TEA CONSTITUTED ONE OF HIS GREATEST COMFORTS.
Hunt
And
rose4 to
expound with what violence
stoical struggle,
abandon'd
he,
his tea:
An abandonment truly both safe and in

For Treason, if T be omitted, is reason.
g2
season^
MISCELLANEOUS POEMS,
84
THE FATES.
Haste, haste, ye
Your welcome
And
fatal sisters three,
scissors take,
cut this woeworn thread of
Or
else
methinks
't
life,
will break.
And ere another skein you spin

From such a dismal thread,
May Minos
break your wheel, and send
Ixion's in
its
stead.
FAITH AND HOPE.

'Mid
total darkness,
Is, like
Hope
herself
the diamond, dark
But Faith, "mid murkiest Erebus,

Emits her brightest spark
HUMILITY.
85
spark that death's contrasted gloom
But with more

As
light supplies;
night's black pall, that hides the earth,
More
clearly
shows the skies!
HUMILITY.
The
loaded bee the lowest
The
richest pearl the deepest lies;
The
stalk the
flies;
most replenished
Doth bow the most
its
Thus deep humility we
modest head
find
The mark of every master-mind;

The highest
And
gifted lowliest bends,
merit meekest condescends,
And shuns
the fame that fools adore, -
That puff that bids a feather
soar.
CONFESSION.
Confession,
like physic, 'mid mortal extremes,
In the hands of a skilful concoctor,
an excellent thing
Is
Though not
Hence, some
for the patient,
it
seems,
quite so good for the doctor.
spiritual
quacks, in attending their
sick,
On
the virtues insist of confessions
But should a small thorn
their
own
consciences
prick,
Their sole lenitive
As
pills
are professions.
to tears for our sins, if
An
And
ounce-phial
too
little
full,
amendment
ample perhaps
the Heidelberg tun,
At the bottom the seeds of
if
it
work,
is;
there lurk
relapses.
PRETEXTS AND MOTIVES.
But confession
what
is 't ?
87
but to lighten the
ship,
With a cargo of
To be
fish'd
sins, that
up again,
for
a.
hard ride did;
fair weather
The moment the storm has subsided.
PRETEXTS AND MOTIVES.

Dost think those
gilt
and hollow cones
That front an organ cause the tones

Ah, no
From
those pealing notes proceed
tubes of baser metal hid.
This same remark,
Holds good
In front the
we might advance,
in life's
mysterious dance
pompous
pretext find,
But the mean motive skulks behind,
trip.
88
AURUM POTENTIUS
That
In
ICTU FULMINEO.
universal idol, Gold,
homage
all
unites
Without a temple,
And
't is
adored,
has no hypocrites.
Nay, more, Gold's warmest devotees

Strive
most
to hide their zeal
And he that loves this idol most,

Would most that love conceal.
This idol has prerogatives
Peculiar and
Unlike
Nor
its
its
own
brother idols,
'tis
block, nor stock, nor stone.
TO THE TRUE POET.
89
can give eyes unto the blind,
It
And
dumb
tongues unto the
Nay, more, can make the lynx a mole,
And
elocution
mum!
TO THE TRUE POET.

Creation's
heir,
and Fancy's
fav'rite child,
Thou
canst, from India's wealth, or Afric's wild,
From
far or near,
from depth or dizzy height,
Cull thy rich stores,
t'
Abundance draw from
instruct us, or delight
dearth,
and radiance from
night.
Thus, to
th'
alembic of thy glowing mind
All nature comes,
but comes
Each thought that feculence
Thy
wit or
Till all
to be refined
or grossness stains
judgment sublimates or
strains,
the alloy be purged, and nought but gold
remains.
90
Thus Ocean drinks the
When
flood
foul
and turbid
tide,
and torrent plough the mountain's
side
But soon
in genial
showers he sends them forth,
Pure as the pearls that deck Aurora's
To
birth,
feed the famish'd land, and cheer the
jocund
earth.
PAIN.
WRITTEN DURING A PERIOD OF SEVERE AGONY.
Pain, thou
The body
sole perfect thing to earth assign'd,
take, but spare, oh, spare the
Wreck'd on thy rocks, or on thy billows
mind
Oh, save the compass, though the bark be
Here reason's
And,
self not
like the needle,
tost,
lost!
without fear presides,

trembles while she guides.
91
TO DR. PARR'S BIOGRAPHERS.

Ye
little
wits, that buzz'd awhile
Around the Doctor's wig,

With scraps of Latin and of Greek,
Fresh from your idol big,
In pity both to us and him,
And
to yourselves,
be dumb,
Nor with your learned lumber load

The mighty Grecian's tomb.
The wit that ex

Is dull at
You have
We
re natd shone
second hand
the fiddle,
fear,
but the
stick,
you can't command.
92
The joke 'mid smoke, and

I
fear will
You want,
"
ween, your master's
Ex fumo
Would
We
When
At
But
art,
dare lucem."
Bloomfield undertake the task,
might digest the story

scholar doth on scholar write,
least 'tis
oft
our
" con amore"
own remains
Against ourselves to
tale 'mid ale,
but traduce him
are
made
rise,
grovelling, Grub-street, buzzing brood
Of maggots, worms, and
flies
93
JULIUS
This happy
To
AND
pair the
JULIA.
day and night
tax each other waste,
With every
failing
under heaven,
Except a want of
taste.
In one thing only both agree,
And mutual
He Julia joins,
discord waive,
to
wet with tears
Her former husband's grave
ALARMISTS.
There
are, that
Must
While
still
fact
Turn up
when they wet
their
turn propheciers,
and date, both obstinate,

to prove
them
liars.
pen
94
For Britain's land
Much
But she
evil
is
When
this
croaking band
have been brewing
sure to thrive the more,
such predict her ruin.
JUDGMENTS.
DIVISUM IMPERIUM CUM JOVE CjESAR HABET.
When
nations celebrate their rights,
Should storm or cloud
arise,
Behold a judgment, 5 cry the
And vengeance from

Should heaven's
That splendid
priests,
the skies
artillery
mar the day
mummery
suits,
Oh, then the lightnings salvoes
And
thunder's roar salutes.
flash,
95
'OREMUS UT
MENS SANA
SIT
IN
CORPORE
SANO."
The body and

More
the mind,
firm than
For better or
for
by
man and
links
wife,
worse are wed,
In banns that last for
life.
Like too ill-coupled hounds, a sad
And snarling pair, they start;

Two friends, alas! that can't agree;
Two foes that cannot part!
This would the noblest
And
But
this to filth
And
game pursue,
course the lion's track;
and garbage stoops
pulls his brother back.
96
Happy, when both,
precisely match'd
In courage, speed, and breath,

Life's
come cheerful
course well run,
Together
in
at the death
WISDOM AND FOLLY.

To borrow
Folly's cap
Though Wisdom
Yet Folly,
bells
to her cost, doth find
That Wisdom never
That Wisdom
Is
and
oft descends,
oft
lends.
hath play'd the
fool,
seen in every age;
But here the bargain ends,
Hath Folly play'd
for ne'er
the sage.
WRITTEN AT MIDNIGHT.
The mind, by worldly wants and common cares
Too much incumber'd, scarce herself appears,
When
day, with
all its toil
and turmoil, brings
T' impede her flight, or discompose her wings,

It's
idly strenuous
hours, and host of trivial
things.
But solemn midnight
Wakes
all
all her force inspires,
her strength, and fans her dormant
fires,
Each earth-bred mist and vapour puts
to flight,
Till the rapt soul, like Isr'el's pillar'd light,
Clok'd
in a
night
cloud by day, becomes a torch by
98
BLESSINGS IN DISGUISE.
Calamities are sent
for
ends
That prove them true but
bitter friends,
That wiser make the wise
And,
like those book-devouring- flames
That Alexandria's 6
"Are
tale proclaims,
blessings in disguise:"
These saved us from those

In outward
From
And
We
pomp
ills
that had
of wisdom clad,
others' follies
grown;
fierce affliction's fiery dart
thank,
And
if it
amend
the heart,
save us from our own.
99
TIME.
T time's
telescope more wonderful appears
E'en than his scythe, and deeper truths conveys;

His tube7 prospective lengthens days to years;
Reversed, our years
Then ponder
well the substance, and the
Of what, unscann'd,
Valued
aright,
Time past
is
shortens into days
it
sum
a contradiction seems;
compared with time
to
come,
but the wealth of him that dreams.
PERSECUTION.
Ripe Persecution,
like the plant
Whose nascence Mocha
Some
bitter fruit
Was
boasted,
produced, whose worth
never known,
till
roasted.
ii
100
Such odour from that holocaust8

In fragrant incense rose,
That Truth a deathless vigour gain'd,

That half redeem'd her
foes.
ADVERSITY.
Adversity misunderstood
Becomes a double curse
Her chastening hand improves the good,
But makes the wicked worse.
Thus clay more obdurate becomes,
To
the fierce flame consign'd;
While gold
in that red ordeal melts,
But melts
to be refln'd.
101
PRAYER.
Arrested suns and
To heav'n and
tranquill'd seas declare
earth th' omnipotence of prayer,
That gives the hopeless hope, the

Outruns the
swift,
feeble might,
and puts the strong
The noontide arrow
foils,
to flight,
and plague that
stalks
by night:
Unmatch'd
in
power, unbounded in extent,
As omnipresent
as omnipotent,
To no meridian nor clime
Man
'Tis hers, in links
But
confined,
with his fellow man, and mind to mind,
farther
still
of love and charity, 9 to bind.
extends her awful reign
To her indeed belongs
that golden chain
102
From fabled God and
their
Olympus
riv'n;
But, since to Truth and her adorers given,
E'en with his
Maker man
and earth
to join,
with heav'n.
Then
We
let
those lips that never pray'd, begin
must
or cease to pray, or cease to sin;
Each earth-born want and wish, a
grov'lling
brood,
Are
mistaken, or misunderstood
oft
But who could dare
Not
to
that our prayers
pray
for
ought that
is
not
make Heav'n more prompt
to give,
But they make us more worthy

There
is
to receive
in that celestial treasury
Wealth inexhaustible, admission

But he that never prays,
free
rejects the golden key.
103
PROLIXITY.
To make
their
To some no
But the small
volume
little
little, is
task;
phial oft contains
The essence of the
cask.
Her book-debts Wisdom pays
But Dullness, though she
Your
coffers to the very brim,
It is
Words
but copper
are but
still.
Wisdom's counters, which
In circulation sent,
She
in gold,
fill
limits to the capital
And
wealth they represent.
104
Cloy'd by prolixity, we search
An
intellectual feast,
From those
And
yet
that most deserve our time,
demand
the least.
CONCORDIA DISCORS.
Who
least conform, the best agree;
For
salient points of
mind,
In those that in our friend recede,
closer contact find
Like pasteboard maps for children plann'd,
They
dovetail into one
But spheres
that into contact rush,
Each other seek
to shun.
;
:
105
"
LUMENQUE JUVENT7E
PURPUREUM."
Eyes
that nor tears nor sorrows dim,
The cloudless brow,

That seem'd on
th' elastic limb,
air to tread,
With thoughts that made
And
bliss
enough
witchery
it
to breathe
and
be,
These, these, with youth, are fled

Fled, but not mourn'd: remembrance wakes
No
bitter
pang
mourn
The dread
Sad
for
for
realities
substitutes for
Each generous
yet
by
dreams of youth,
feeling
fraud,
Nor ask'd
of truth,
bosom wrings.
This, this the
As
what Time takes
what he brings
unsubdued
that friendship woo'd,
the costly price
106
Alas! though quell'd, cannot be kill'd,
But droop, by cold experience

Like now'rets lock'd in
chill'd,
ice.
Youth's jocund suns, and seasons blithe,
When
time had wings, but not a scythe,
With
these
calmly part;
But, as the wreck that braves the deep,
Oh,
let
me
though broken, keep
still,
The fragments
of
a heart
IMPROMPTU
ON THE BISHOP OF AIX, WHO LATELY BEQUEATHED
HIS
That
prelate shrewdly play'd his part
That
HEART TO THE JESUITS.
left
the Jesuits his heart
head they had,
But
'twere
mad
to
doubt
as to heart, they were without
it.
it,
107
UNDE ET QUO.
From whence
fever'd
to
where we know not,
dream
Then sink from darkness

This
to live,
't is
and
Christ touch'd those
And
sent,
to try,
into night
die
ears that could not hear,
eyes that could not see,
And'said, Leave whence you came to God,
But where you go
Then
to the
to
Me!
Star of Jacob bow
All ye that love the light
Without him, wisdom
And
all
is
a dream,
our knowledge
night.
108
A MISTAKE.
Since
fools alone all things believe
In cloister hatch'd, or college,
Some, by believing nothing, think

They're at the height of knowledge.
And
yet, to
More
For
10
have no
faith
than
is
faith
demands
supposed,
sceptics have their creed,
of things
Incredible composed.
Some
truths above our reason,
Reject not, but receive:
Against
all
reason, infidels
Unnumber'd
lies believe.
we
109
LIKES;
BEING AN ANSWER TO A LETTER FROM AN
OCTOGENARIAN, INFORMING ME THAT HE HAD GIVEN
UP AUTHORSHIP, AND THAT A FRIEND OF HIS WAS

ABOUT TO WRITE HIS LIFE.
BIOGRAPHERS.
POL ME OCCIDISTIS AMICI.
May
If
And
you
't is
live to jive score,
but to write more,
delight with instruction to blend
But your
life,
strange to note,
E'en your death might promote,
So beware of your good-natured
friend.
110
Both
his zeal
and
his love
He'll officiously prove,
In a
way
that your ghost
may
distress
He'll suggest your invention
Was
And
but a pretension,
the zest of your wit but finesse.
He'll swear your best thought
From
And
the Sanscrit you caught,
the pride of your

Till, 'twixt
Nought
That you
muse from the Grecian
hint and surmise,
is left
but surprise
e'er reach'd a
second edition.
I'm afraid, I'm afraid,
Like the rest of their trade,
Undertakers of fame too perpend

Their pay but half won,
And
their job
That does not
but half done,
in a burial end.
Ill
INSTINCT.
Undertakers of
Fame
Never scent out a name,

Till
corruption the carcase assault;
And
their sheets,
Like
t'
meant
for binding-,
others term'd winding,
But a subject prepare
for a vault!
INSTINCT.
Man
cannot estimate
his bright
Prerogative too high,

If to the skies
Upon
But ponder
Of reason
How
it
point,
and
rests
humility:
well, th' o'erweening pride
to confute,
oft she stoops to gather light
And
counsel from the brute.
112
See unassuming instinct
all
Perform, but nought profess,
Yet seldom
And
suffer
from mistake,
never from excess
Behold her
fly
the
common
ill,
Or, with prospective care,
That
baffles reason,
And
Then
master
it
means
to
meet
prepare.
let these truths,
from Nature culPd,
E'en though they humble, guide

Reveal'd man's wisdom to promote,
And
to restrain his pride.
113
BAYLE.
Who
had escaped the tomb, could wit
Or wisdom ?
prevail,
Wit and Wisdom answer, Bayle
Star of a lowering sky that shunn'd the light,
more refulgent from surrounding night,
Still
He
wielded Luther's force, without his rage,
Erasmus and Melancthon of his age:
Young
eyes, that o'er his ponderous folios pore,
Deem them
too
much, yet read and wish them
more,
And
to that feast return, divided quite
Betwixt instruction, wonder, and delight.
Yet he that knew so much decided nought.

Lost in perplexity, or depth of thought,
Holding the key of Truth within
On
his
hand,
Doubt, 11 her vestibule, behold him stand,
And
point, like Moses, to that brighter spot,
Pursued, explored, attain'd, but enter'd not.
MISCELL AN EG US PO KM S
114
A CHARACTER.
Ventosus,
in
each deed, and thought, and speech,
Still strives the lofty
Not over
To seek
and the grand
to reach;
wise, for he could ne'er descend
instruction from his
bosom
friend
He would be proud, but place them
side
side,
With him Religion higher stands than

So high, she occupies
his
pride;
head alone,
And
ther^ exalted
But
ne'er descends, to melt the heart, or free
The
liberal
sits,
as
on a throne,
hand, or bow the stubborn knee.
by
115
AN IMPROMPTU
ON FIRST HEARING THE NEWS OF LORD BYRON'S
DEATH.
Wiiy
didst thou live? or, living, die?
When
Greece, for righteous victory,
Call'd on thy sword and pen
To ennoble more thy noble name,

While both Minervas crown'd thy fame,
In both, the
knew
And
first
thee well
of men!
that
high chivalric
stirring
spirit,
mind,
twined
With Heliconian wreath,
Had
spurr'd thee to the noblest field
E'er
won by sword,
or lost, in shield
That bore thee thence
in death.
i
116
That forms, and
And
Is
fools,
foul hypocrisy,
and knaves, should triumph high,
more than we can scan
That cant should
live,
When most we want
is
woe
but such
"QUISQUE
Blame
SVJE
and
talent die,
her energy,
is
man
FORTUNE
FABER, EST.
not the stars nor destinies,
In thine
own 12 hand thy prowess
Thy map
of
The march was
By some
life
lies;
review:
plain, but thou, beguiled
short cut, or prospect wild,
Hast wandered from the
true.
QUISQUE SVMj &C.
Self-pride, of
Still
good and
ill
the source,
prompts again the tortuous course
Of error
to begin;
Blames, for the ruin and the rout
Of
all
Not
our hopes, the foe without,

the false friend 13 within.
What wonder
if
Of winds and
waves, outran the port,
And havoc
all
thy bark, the sport
o'erwhelm,
If passions, sent to swell the gale,
But not
to steer, or trim the sail,
Drive reason from the helm.
117
118
VOLTAIRE.
Yes
Phoebus and the Nine might
Without the pen of Bayle,
form Monboddo might with rapture
And beg
With
hail,
to search minutely for the tail
scarce enough of muscle, nerve, or skin
To sheathe
despair,
all
to paint Voltaire
the trenchant wit that lurk'd within
wit that, like the tiger's velvet paw,
In deadly gambols dealt th' elastic claw
And, not unworthy of that form, a face
Made up
of half expression, half grimace,
That, struggling
And
With eye
And
For
Nor
still
latent scorn,
we
smile
smother a conceal'd
it
would hide
that secrets from
curling
all
to
what
lip,
all
reveal'd;
bosoms wrung,
that spoke without a tongue;
love, loathe, seek, or shun, nor tear
had they,
but
for the
whole a sneer;
VOLTAIRE.
Features that
We
but freeze our gaze, and yet
must remember
By
By
fix,
119
but would
fain forget.
bigots branded, but by sisters loved,
smatterers
more than by the wise approved;
Champion of freedom, but himself the
Of flatterers; hope and

At once
the magazine
slave
terror of the knave;
and mark of
wit,
didapper, as often miss'd as hit;
He
never strongly soar'd, nor deeply dived,
But muddied
truth, at which he ne'er arrived.
In rhyme a dabbler, but too proud to praise,
And
oft too
The swan
of
Could stoop
weak
Avon
t'
excel another's lays,
his
marauding muse
to pillage first,
and then abuse;
female pen, while Pallas smiled, rejects
With
wit the censure, and the crime detects.
120
Few friends had he; but, what is strange,

He found in Frederick, and in Rousseau:
a foe
His head the hero, not his heart rever'd;
The
sophist both decried, malign'd,
and
fear'd;
Yet he that march'd through conquest
to
throne,
philosophic despot, brighter shone
Than he that proffered
To brand with
Yet Ferney
And
friendship rudely spurned,
scorn, that on himself returned.
still
redeems her patron's fame,
grateful lauds her benefactor's
name;
Whilst some bright spots his panegyrists boast,
And
one transcendant act
itself
a host,
Unmix'd applause and approbation wins,
And Calas
covers multitudes of sins.
We grant, could Reason with a laugh be bribed,

Won
by a
jest, Or
by a jeer proscribed,
VOLTAIRE.
121
sneer the touchstone, ridicule the test,
His page the brightest shines,

But,
if
not the best
by Truth, these twinklers fade away,
foil'd
As minor
stars before the
Long had
the wits their bitterest gall applied,
He
still
survived them
Smother'd at
It
was
last in
doom an
his
The mark he aimed
all,
lamp of day.
and more defied
honey'd
flattery,
insect death to die.

at,
hardier
With bolder energy and
Harold
hit
brighter wit
Alike their object, and alike their fate,
Half doom'd
The
t'
idolatry,
and half
last, incompetent and
Ought but
to hate;
unskill'd,
a hovel or a stew to build;
Both, strong
To break
all
to pull a
church or palace down,
a crosier, or to shake a crown.
.MISCELLANEOUS POE2US.
122
THE BARD.
" 1GNEUS
EST OLLlS VIGOR, ET c.-elestis ouigo!"
That
beam
sacred
that
warms
the poet's
mind
E'en by himself can never be defined,
And,
like the
May
not delineated be, but
It is
not of the heart, nor of the head,
darkness that in Egypt dwelt,
But of the inmost soul,
By
felt:
sustain'd
and fed
that ambrosial feast to Israel given,
Gather'd on earth, 14 but sent direct from heaven
But envy
The
not, contented sons of clay,
rare possessor of this transcendant ray,
That dooms
full oft its earthly shrine to
The
Semele embraced by Jove
fate of
prove
THE BARD,
'T
is
a devouring- flame,
And
E'en thus
it
it,
death defies;
asks nor sculptured brass nor breathing bust
and "dust
To cancel "earth
to earth"
More dear
his very throes
Than
all
to
him
common
offspring bring to birth,
All time their heritage, their
That
fire
domain
that wastes his strength,
As sword the scabbard, wastes

Lights
Than
up a lamp
all
all
earth;
and day by day,
his
frame away,
that richer gifts bestows
the wealth that famed Aladdin's shows;
lamp whose dying rays the brightest
And
to dust;"
and pains
ambition gives, or avarice gains;
Throes that no
to illume
consume
seems to gross corporeal eyes,
But know that he that bears
He
1 '2
a torch
lighten others, but itself
their last
skies.
rise,
glimmerings beam an earnest of the
124
SOCRATES.
In
your philosophic drove,
all
From
stoa, colonade, or grove,
You had but one
And
him,
At nought,
To
Athens
alone;
!
Athens prized
you basely
flatter
sacrificed,
a buffoon.
Where was your famed Minerva then?

Did she
direct your wisest
men?
Did she concoct the bowl?
Ah no
with indignation fled
That goddess bright, but
To
in
rule, she left her owl.
her stead
I '25
"VULNUS ALIT VENfS
ET CCECO CARPITUR IGNI."
JEALOUSY.
O
thou,
for ever
doomed
to prove
The comrade and the curse of

The bravest thou canst
And
pierce
them through
Self-pride,, of other
More
The
fatal
ills
makes thy
their very shield
the cure,
shaft,
task thou settest,
love,
force to yield,
is
and
sure.
to guess
And watch our enemy's success

And what thy wages? but to know
The triumph of our

That
deadliest foe;
fatal secret, that conceal'd
Destroyed our peace, and more, reveal 'd:
Then, goaded on from bad to worse,
We
seek revenge, but find remorse;
Remorse
the serpent
for the dove,
Thy changeling Jealousy
for Love!
15
:
1*26
LINES
ADDRESSED TO LANE FOX,
WHOSE HOUSE WAS DESTROYED BY
AFTER
THE
CONFLAGRATION
TIRE,
ESQ.
IMMEDIATELY
OF YORK MINSTER;
TOWARDS THE RESTORATION OF WHICH HE MUNIFICENTLY GAVE A THOUSAND POUNDS.
Whose stately pile
is
that,
The dismal triumph of

'Tis his,
who
th'
whose wreck proclaims

o'erwhelming flames ?
sends, obedient to the rod,
thousand pounds, to build the House of God
That musty proverb
By
is
by thee reversed,
misers greeted; and by misery cursed,
Sent forth
Thy
in search of others'
charity begins abroad,
wants to roam,
and ends
at
home,
r27
COURAGE.
It
is
not fear, that on the brink
Of danger
shakes the bold
The pulse may
faulter,
but the mind
Bears onward, uncontroll'd.
There
is,
ere daring deeds be done,
A momentary
'Tis
strife
Nature's due, e'en
when we
Less than ourselves our
The
prize
life.
throbbing: heart, the quivering lip,
That shook a Marlborough's 16 frame,
Were but
Was
the throes,
the giant
birth
Blenheim's deathless name!
128
Thus mother Earth most dreadful
When
The nations from her trembling
And
is
she hath most to dread
cities
bow
fly,
their head.
COMPENSATION.
Those
that on Fancy's pinion soar
Triumphant
o'er their kind,
Oft to that venturous pennon join
A judgment
weak, or blind
Like those seraphic forms that stand

Before the King of kings;
So
these, whene'er
on Truth they gaze,
Their eves veil with their wings.
129
DEATH.
Thou King
The
of Terrors! better term'd
terror chief of kings;
Like them, what art thou? but a name,

If stripp'd of
The
outward things.
grief, the conflict,
These
these belong
and the pain,

to
life
The tempest hers, the mandate thine

That instant
stills
the
strife.
"\
The slimy worm, the mouldering
vault,
The ghastly grinning head,

These, these with freezing horror
The
living-
not the dead.
chill
130
But wretched man, of fabled woes
Or
fancied fears the prey,
Thy coming
dreads, yet blindly bears
What's heavier
Disgust of
life,
thy delay
and dread of death,
Like wave opposing wave,
A momentary calm command,

Man from himself to save!
Enough we know
to
make
the best
Life's giftless gift decry,
But not enough on death
to gaze
With Cato's Roman eye
Hence,
still life's
Of doubts
Would
fain the
More than
batter'd bark
we
steer,
or fears the sport;
tempest
fly,
but dread,
the storm, the port
131
AVARICE.
Pale
Avarice, in vulgar minds,
Ambition's place doth hold,
And,
as the tyrant's
The
miser's curse
The tyrant
at the
Beneath a
bane
is
banquet
falling
is steel,
gold.
sits
sword;
The miser amid plenty starves,

His only
feast, his
Both make that
hoard.
costly sacrifice
Unto the means of ends

Both
start alike, to gain a
good
That neither comprehends.
132
HOPE.
Hope
is
a goddess fairest seen
When Time
holds
Her charms
are of such doubtful hue,
up
They cannot bear a
his veil
closer view.
Approach can mar them,
And
between;
contact
brief possession blast
them
blight,-
quite.
FORTITUDE.
Then
Is like
neither
fail
nor quail: the Christian's breast
some land-lock'd haven,
Around
it
and beyond
it
skies
The tempest triumph, and
still
may
at rest;
scowl,
the whirlwind howl,
133
FORTITUDE.
But
all is
sunshine here; that placid eye
Proclaims the great sustaining deity,
To whom each power and

Fulfilling, as the
But
No
all
unrivall'd
earthly idol
passion
wind and storm,
must his temple
Give him the whole, or none,

stand
deferr'd;
word.
must the Godhead reign

stain.
Wouldst have his awful presence
And
is
his
fill
thine heart,
he scorns a
resolved, through
peril,
cloud,
To
doff thine armour only for thy shroud
To such
Defeat
is
alone, fulfill'd their mortal strife,

victory,
and death
is life.
part;
storm, or
134
VICE AND VIRTUE.
While
And
virtue lends a zest to joy,

bliss to
Our very
And
But
rapture warms,
tears she turns to smiles,
every pang disarms.
vice her foul Circean
May
E'en
In
Since
cup
medicate in vain
in
her mirth some sorrow lurks,
all
her pleasures, pain.
this,
That
He
with voice from heav'n, proclaims

that rules above
Doth on the
side of virtue stand,
Let fear be lost in love.
135
WIT AND TRUTH.

He
that his reason trusts to wit
Will often lose his way;
As he
that
would by lightning walk,
Not by the beam of day.
But
truth,
from depth of wisdom drawn,
Pure, permanent, profound,

Like that deep pearl that ocean yields,
Befits a
monarch crown'd.
QUANDOQUE BONUS DORMITAT HOMERUS.
We may
Wise
be learn' d from others' thoughts,
only from our own
Reflection
is
the calm repose
Of Wisdom, on her
throne,
136
If
Homer
nod, he nods to wake
With renovated
fire
Pale solar suns, that never
But
little
warmth
set,
inspire.
BURNS.
So
fine his
muse,
'tis
half a crime
Burns ever wrote without a rhime
But then
'Tis
Some
his prose so
pure and terse
is,
Reason's triumph o'er his verses

brains have so
We wish
bemuddled
either,
they had attempted neither.
137
A NAME.
VIDET
The
card-built house
The
child
RIDET.
amused our
was pleased; but
is
infant
the
age,
man more
sage?
breath could level childhood's tottering toy
See manhood
To
There
If
effort, art,
build that brittle
we
is
name
and time employ,

a whisper can destroy
a book where nought our name can
spot,
ourselves refuse to fix the blot;
Tis kept by
One
that sets alike at naught
The
tale with malice or with flatt'ry fraught,
He
reads the heart, and sees the whisper in the
thought.
138
THE VILLAGE HERO.

" IKSANAS CURAS, STUDIUMQUE IGNOBILE VULGI
TAHA, MENS HORUM SOBRIA POST HABUIT;

SED QUASI PER LATEBRAS, ET AMÊN A SILENTIA VALLIS,
INNOCUAM
Deep
SUSTINUERE VIAM."
in the vale of
Oft have
By
VIT.&
humble
seen the mortal
village hero
life,
strife
waged
Stretch'd on his pallet cold and scant,
With
destitution, sickness, want,
And
pain, at once engaged.
Deserted in his hour of need
By
friends, as false as
He
to
himself
is
broken reed,
true
Though unsupported by
But
the loud
senseless clamours of the crowd,
Or
plaudit of the few.
THE VILLAGE HERO.
One Eye
there is, and
that alone
This moral grandeur from His throne
Contemplates, and sustains
More high doth He

Than him
that peasant hold
that, canopied
by gold,
O'er subject millions reigns.
Then think no more
More
firm, because
Of
that virtue stands
admiring bands
friends or flatterers cheer
Through darkness,
silence, solitude,
By none
by nought subdued,
sustain'd,
She holds her bright
career.
Friendless, forlorn, with pain to cope,
And
peril
Are
Each
doom'd,
till
faith
and hope
in fruition lost
ill
surmounted, or o'erthrown,
She courts the ken of One alone,

But
finds that
One
a host!
139
140
Thus, throned on rocks, Missouri 17 takes

His giant leap, and thundering shakes
The depth of woods below!

His lone magnificence displays,
Where not an eye
the
pomp
But His that bade him
surveys,
flow.
CEREUS IN VITIUM FLECTI.

A
Who
PARALLEL
CASE.
knows the most of man,
will least
approve,
rarely love
Quench, cynic sage thy lantern's glimmering
Search thine own heart,

there
Will pity much, and often
!
'tis
livelier
test
ex-
press'd
How
feebly firm the strong,
the best
how dimly
bright
CEREITS IN VITIUM FLECTI.
18
The
faults,
We
catch and copy, though
As
141
alas! or follies of a friend,
we
can't
commend:
to his virtues, if these e'er create

rival effort,
'tis
constrain'd or late
These we commend, indeed, but seldom
Too
closely here the
Ills,
ailments, maladies of every kind,
From
all
around
us,
But, sons of Galen
imitate.
body apes the mind,
we contract with
who
shall
ease
count your
fees,
Could ye but render health as catching as

ease
soil,
whose rank luxuriance
ENERGY.
The
But
May
thistles, thorns,
yields
and weeds,
smile, with yellow Ceres crown'd,
Should culture sow the seeds.
dis-
142
But
't
To
were a waste of time and
till
toil
the Lybian sands
Here Art and Culture both despair,
And Prudence
holds her hands.
And thus it is with mind,

And energy misused
In
follies,
her force
or for purposes
More mischievous abused,
By
friendly counsel, arm'd with truth,
May
be directed right;
But where
The case
'tis
is
barren
all,
and waste,
hopeless quite.
143
LIFE.
"causa latet,
Nought
Is
Who
vis est notissima."
of this subtle principle
known, but
seeks
Destroys
it
its effects
in its citadel
but not detects.
This lamp, that lightens
all
that lives,
Like some 19 that guard the dead,
E'en by
To
th' intruder's
entrance
utter darkness sped
is
144
" NE CITO DECRESCAT TUA CRESCENS LUNA, CAVETO
BARBARE, SOLA POTEST CRUX SUPERA.RE CRUCEM. "
GRiECm MALEDICTIO.
Though
Still
No
still
Turk
in
dense Egyptian darkness bound,
to brother
Turk
is
faithful
found
turban d knave, to foreign fort or foss
Deserting, changed the crescent for the cross
This depth of crime, with double treason fraught,
The Turk believed
When
not,
to the stagger
till
the Christian wrought,
d Saracen he sold
Faith, freedom, honour, and himself, for gold.
But hark,
in
depth and eloquence of woe,
From widow'd Greece
these maledictions flow:
!;
145
GRvECI/E MALEDICTIO.
" Your
doing-
done,
your
murderous mission
sped,
Hide, recreants
hide from
your hated
earth
head
If
homeward-bound, may Freedom's funeral knell
Rouse the deaf surge, the slumbering whirlwind

swell
And, oh
should not avenging Heaven direct
All seas to 'whelm you,

Till
every sun and
soil
may
With scorpion scourge from
"
May
all
men
all
shores reject,
repulse your band
curse you!
their polluted land
and
the mother's
knee
Still
teach the curse to those that are to be!
Your very sons
will
spurn that
sire's
embrace
That stamp'd the mark of Cain upon
their race
146
Though
tears
may
scald their cheeks, and blushes
burn,
meet with
They'll
bitter
your loathed
scorn
return,
And hoot you back
to your barbarian clan
Base renegadoes both of
" But, oh
some
little
God and man

space,
Then change your present
And
fall
" Oh,
Alive
to
as
for
but to give
if
Full scope to general indignation,
live
your future
your precursor Judas
lost to
hell,
fell
honour! and, oh, dead to shame!
nought, but damning deathless fame
Oh, may the memory of your monstrous crime

Spread through
On
all
space, and occupy
all
time
earth forgotten ne'er, and ne'er forgiven
Revenged
in hell,
and
register'd in heaven.
POLEMICS.
"
May Truth,
inspired
147
by Byron's glowing- page,
Transmit your nauseous name from age to age,

In that strong infamy embalm 'd, that
To
rot for ever
And
let
one
what
Greek
this
dooms
ne'er consumes;
thousand
line ten
The Turk was
it
satires speak,
man's friend, his foe the
!"
Thus spake a form that from Colonna's height

!
Indignant plunged, and loathing spurn'd the light.
POLEMICS.
Polemics with Religion play,
As truant children
From hand
But
to
to
be
cast
hand the
lost*
flying ball,
at last.
l2
148
LORD BACON.
" QUI GENUS
HUMANUM INGENIO SUPERAVIT, ET OMNES

PRjESTINXIT STELLAS, EXORTUS UTI -ETHEREUS SOL!"
While
But
others
toil in
toil
t'
o'ertake celebrity,
vain, she pants to follow thee,
Yet lags outstripp'd behind
No
time to praise,
Thine intellectual eye
And
thy deeds afford
their praise
its
is
to record
lightnings hurl'd,
pierced the darkness that involved the world
Through
all
the realms
of
mind and matter
stray 'd,
But nothing greater than
itself
survey 'd
While Time, astounded, saw thy magic page
Advance mankind whole
And
to
Or thee
some
too
cent'ries in
an age!
error in his dates assign'd,
much
before, or
them too
far behind.
LORD BACON.
Some mountain
thus salutes the virgin ray,
Fresh from the sun,
fair
Views from
summit, clothed with
The
his lofty
vale where linger
Forgotten
Thy
title
And,
like
half,
49
herald of the day;
still
and half unknown
follows
light,
the shades of night.

to fame,
not precedes, thy name
some gilded
valet, apes in vain
His master's native dignity of mien.
Till
At
thy fam'd star arose, the schoolmen wrought

vast expense of every thing but thought;
Their tedious taskwork each revolving sun
Beheld beginning
still,
but ne'er begun
Such time was squander'd
in
adapting rules,
Adjusting instruments, and naming tools,

That, storeless, pow'rless,
fritter'd
Discovery lay, and rotted on the
No
skill to
To
rule her rudder,
down
to chips,
slips;
launch her, and no master-hand
and her course command,
150
She stood
till
thy proud
spirit
walk'd her deck,
In wisdom's way, a vast encumbering wreck?
Cramp'd by the Stagyrite, whose sons
Though domineering
still,
elect,
could nought direct,
Philosophy, on vague conjecture
Or metaphysic's misty mazes
tost,
lost,
'Mid subtleties and nice distinctions pined,
And
definitions ne'er to be defined
At length, through
cloister
shade and convent
gloom,
Through wrangling
hall,
voice was heard!
And shook
Woke
and lore-begirted dome,
She woke
as
from the dead,
the dust of ages from her head
as a giant,
when
To do thy bidding,
refresh'd with wine,
for
that
Freed from the schoolmen's
voice was
folios
thine
by thy pen,
She quits her cobweb's cage, and dwells with
LORD
\5l
BACO.V.
Looks, for a moment, backward to the night
From which
she merged, then forward to the
light
And
And
leaves (her childhood past) to bearded boys
Roman
pedantry her Greek and
toys.
Train'd by thy Dsedal hand, o'er earth and skies,
On
firmer wing than Icarus she flies;
Still
more
to strengthen
what she found
She brings the laws that made
And Cacus
error,
from
it
aright,
so to light,
his cavern strong,
Drags into day, and thus corrects the wrong.

Protecting
And
all,
by
Grateful for
all
protected, free,
all
giving freedom,
she
still
is,
she
bows
to
thee,
and more she hopes
to be
152
"
AN TIBI VIRTUS
VENTOSA IN LINGUA?"
Who
vainly strive on fulsome breath
Of their own
praise to rise,
The higher they themselves
We but the
The
more
lark that strains his
Doth but the
And
exalt,
despise.
little
wing
less appear.
tops the zenith of his flight,
But
to be lost in air
153
FRIENDSHIP AND INGRATITUDE.

AN ALLEGORY.
Ingratitude, by Friendship's
fostering-
hands
Planted and rear'd, her shadowy boughs expands,
But boughs with blossoms cluster'd,not with fruits;

And,
To
as to
heaven her head aspiring shoots,
Tart'rus nearer
still
descend her grovelling
roots.
the storm!
But,
lo,
And
to the towering
its
fury Friendship shuns,
trunk she fostered runs
That treacherous tree her very height applies
To
lure the livid lightning from the skies,
And
lifeless at
lies.
her foot the hand that rear'd her
154
TINNIT INANE EST!

Thy
bark, a coffin; helmsman, death;
narrow shroud, the
Thy
freight, corruption;
Of parting
life
sail;
and the breath
the gale
This makes all sense and sight disclose
Contemptible and mean
But Faith,
like
Ocean, riches knows,
Exhaustless, but unseen.
And, as that ocean wild, the moon
With
silver sceptre guides,
And, tranquil on her distant throne,

Controls the raging" tides;
155
So Faith, from her
celestial height,
Consoles the troubled breast,
And
calm, from consciousness of might,
Rebellion awes to
rest.
REVENGE.
Revenge
But
As the
to his
dread purpose
faster flies
flies,
Remorse
fell tigress,
of her whelps
Bereft, o'ertakes the horse
Remorse
To
And
that on
Revenge attends,
accuse, not curb the hand,
bring us, while on earth, the vain
Repentance of the damn'd.
156
"DUM TENER
IN CUNI3 JAM JOVE DIGNUS ERAT.
That promise autumn pays
And what
that spring began,
the schoolboy was, such
The sap and tender bud
And youth
in
is
the
the blossom gives
but age the
A WORD TO THE WISE.

"nugis addere pondus."
Vain
is
From
all
Reverse
thy labour, to create

that
it,
little is,
man
childhood shoot,
the great
turn the great
to little,
'T will suit thy genius to a tittle.
fruit.
NOTES
THE MISCELLANEOUS POEMS.
Note
"O
1
,
page 67.
thou, that bidd'st the brightest close
Their intellectual eye,
And
to thy dizzy, dangerous height,
Like hooded falcons,
If the falcon escapes with his
fly."
hood on, he soars perpen-
dicularly upwards, until be drops

to all birds that are blinded, if
a circumstance
common
they have the power and
liberty to fly.
Note
" Who now
shall
wake
There breathes but
To
page 79.
widowed
lyre
one, that dares
that Herculean task aspire."
The author
be dead or
that
is
not aware whether the one here alluded to,
alive.
]58
NOTES TO MISCELLANEOUS POEMS.
Nole
<
'Twere
all
That
Was
jmge 80.
in vain
that charmed
link
hearts in concord held.
not of
but adamant,
steel,
And, broken,
will not weld!
nd iron are the only metals that
Note
will iveld.
page 83.
" Hunt rose to expound with what violence he,
And
stoical struggle,
An abandonment
For Treason,
This
trifle
if
abandon'd his tea
truly both safe
be omitted,
is
and
in season,
reason."
had the honour of being taken
to the
House of
Peers by Lord Erskine, and was afterwards sent by a friend

of mine to a
little
periodical, entitled
"The
Gleaner."
Note
" When
5
,
page 94.
nations celebrate their rights
Should storm or cloud
arise,
Behold a judgment, cry the
And vengeance from
The
priests,
the skies."
dreadful earthquake at the Caraccas took place on
the anniversary of the birth of their independence,

the whole population
w as assembled
T
being an high festival.

into a
169
when
in the churches, it
This, of course, was construed
judgment of Providence by
a certain party, and its
absurdity forces on us a not unprofitable remark on judg-
ments in general
it is
namely, that,
not unwise to examine our
wben any
own
sider such calamities as judgments,

ourselves
but
it is
evils befall us,
conduct, and to con-
when they happen
same construction on those misfortunes that happen

another.
to
both unwise and uncharitable to put the

to
160
Note
" And,
like those
page 98.
book-devouring flames
That Alexandria's
Are blessings
tale proclaims,
in disguise.'
"
In setting out on his voyage, Mr. Locke strongly recom-
mends
the
ing
the useless lumber overboard.
all
young noviciate of science
to
Had
begin by throwthe Alexandrian
whole crew must have been
library escaped the flames, the
converted into lumber-men, before the vessel could have
been cleared
for her voyage.
tors,
and what hosts of
upon
us,
What
critics,
had these overwhelming
descended unto us
a cloud of
commenta-
would have been entailed

relics of earlier prolixity
Those lucubrations
that, applied to
the baths, kept the Alexandrians in hot water for some
months, might have performed the same kind

the whole world for as
many
office
for
ages, had not the expurga-
tory decree of the Caliph forbidden such a misfortune.
Our eyes
fail
us
are perhaps the
and
it
first
of our senses that begin to
has sometimes struck
gentle hint that there
is a
period
me
that this is a
when we should
cease to
pore over the works of others, and begin to examine our
NOTES TO MISCELLANEOUS POEMS,
own, and
to cease
from reading, that reflection may begin-
In ascertaining the
ask two questions,
and what
161
real value of
what
is
any thing, we of course
the difficulty of acquiring it!
when acquired
is its utility,
In order to be an
object worthy of our pursuit, the answer to each query
must be
in the affirmative
may
dancing and fiddling,

useful
is this
form, that
many
things, like rope-
but not very
difficult,
may
be useful,
but not
short rule to get at the true value of any sci:
ask yourself, candidly, what
value that any one
who
you cannot 1
querist triumphantly,
tics,
for
and many other things
difficult.
ence
be very
chemistry, &c.
is
there of real
master of such a science can per-
is
Some
as
sciences would answer the
astronomy, mathema-
algebra,
others,
whose
pompous, would here be mute.
titles
What
is
are
somewhat
there, for in-
stance, that a logician, or a metaphysician, or a craniologist can perform by aid of their science, that others cannot
effect as well, or better,
without
it ?
162
Note
'
7
,
puge 99.
Time's telescope more wonderful appears

E'en than h is scythe, and deeper truths conveys
His tube prospective lengthens days to years;

Reversed, our years
it
shortens into days
!"
have elsewhere observed, that one reason
why
time
pastappears so very much diminished, compared with time

thît is to
come,
is this
when we
look back into time past,
we must of necessity
fix
our attention upon some particular
Xow, with
all
the circumstances connected with
period.
this period
we
are pretty well acquainted, because they
have taken place
when we
ferent
all
is
therefore, the
much
this therefore is
aluminous point.
look forward into time to come, the case
as he
darkness and obscurity.
mind
would
is
be,
In this instance,
own
position, as
in the
middle of a
deceived by her
who, stationed
But
is dif-
dark vista, was called upon to decide on the comparative

distance of each end, one having a lamp at
and the other none.
its
termination,
Note
8
,
" Such odour from
163
page 100.
that holocaust
In fragrant incense rose.
That Truth a
deathless vigour gain'd,
That half redeem'd her
foes."
Martyrs prove nothing but their own sincerity.
who threw themselves under
Those
the wheels of Jaggernaut
must be discharged from the imputation of knavery, but
by no means from
that of folly.
to die for religion than to live for
It is so
much more easy

how-
it,
that
ever absurd, have had their martyrs.
To
dom
and gratitude, two
to its full share of our admiration
things are necessary:
martyr dies should, from

itself the
wisdom
that the religion for

its
sects,
entitle martyr-
which the
purity in precept, bear within
stamp of having proceeded from the deepest

and, from
evidence that
The
all
it
its utility in practice,
carry outward
was the result of the highest goodness.
Christian's scheme in both these points
is perfect.
164
Note
" Unmatch'd
9
,
in power,
page 101.
unbounded
in extent,
As omnipresent as omnipotent,
To no meridian nor clime confined,

Man with his fellow man, and mind
'Tis hers, in links of love
We
to
mind,
and charity, to bind."
ought to pray as those do that expect every thing
from God, and act as those do that expect every thing

from themselves.
Farthermore,
rious passages in
Scripture,
we
are borne out
by va-
in attributing a very high
degree of efficacy to the prayers of the living for the

living:
it
is
others, does
to our
a labour of love, that
Maker.
Prayer
it is
be of service to
that gives
benevolence, enabling Christians,

another, or
may
improve ourselves, and must be acceptable
who have been divided by
asunder by danger,
other's good, in a
munion of prayer.
to
become
moment and
universality
who have never
to
seen one
distance, or kept
spiritually united for each

at will,
by the awful com-
Note
" And
yet, to
More
For
1G
page 108.
have no faith demands
faith than
sceptics
165
is
supposed,
have their creed
of things
Incredible composed."
has often struck me, that a work might be written on
It
a principle that scepticism of every grade, either partial or
universal,
would
find it difficult to confute.
stone of such a work, one position
As
the key>
might be insisted on,
which the most confirmed Pjrrhonist could not but admit;

and which, being admitted, would involve consequences
from which he could not escape.
to is neither
more nor
less than this,
future state of retribution.

most awful possibility:
deny
it;
first,
secondly, because
More
responsibilities.
it
The
position I allude
the possibility of a
Now
this
because
happens
it is
to
be a
impossible to
embraces such tremendous
fully to understand the nature of
these responsibilities, the author of the work contemplated
would do well
to
dedicate
some of
his lucubrations to an
examination of the real value of any good, and the true

estimate of any evil, attached to this present
life.
From
166
such an examination
man
wise
is
it
would
distinctly appear, that no
warranted in allowing bis eternal interests to
be put in jeopardy, even by the possibility of a future

state
because, as compared to such a bare possibility,
the goods and evils of tbe present
all
life
become an evanes-
cent point, and sink into nothingness.
Tins truth might
be submitted to the rigid test of tbe strictest calculation,
and would be
still
We
might ask,
the
life
more confirmed by so severe an
for instance,
of a Parr or a Jenkins?
plished.
But,
if
we
men
ordeal.
seconds composed
task easily accom-
we may wait
ask a second question,
long enough for the answer,
such
how many
How many collective lives of
as Parr and Jenkins
would be
requisite to
make
up an eternity?
We
can answer the
first
question, because a second is an
absolute and component part of the
life
of
man
but
we
man
cannot answer the second, because the longest
life
of
The longest
life
of man,
is
as
no component part of eternity.
compared
to eternity, is so trifling, that it
becomes an
evanescent point, a thing not to be taken into the calculation.
What, then,
these facts?
are the consequences deducible from
First, that the longest life of
man
bears a
smaller proportion to eternity than a single second does to
the longest
short of a
life
of
man
madman, who,
and, secondly, that he
to avoid
any
evil or gain
167
is little
any good
here, puts himself within the possibility of injuring his

eternal interests; because he
wounds these
interests for
the sake of a gratification, the duration of which bears a

shorter proportion to eternity than a single second does to
life.
Note
" Holding
page 113.
the key of Truth within his hand,
On Doubt,
And
11
her vestibule, behold
him
stand,
point, like Moses, to that brighter spot,
Pursued, explored, attain'd, but enter'd not."
One reason why

acumen
those minds
endowed with the keenest
of observation, and the greatest vigour of thought,
so often leave the subject of their speculations in a state of
uncertainty most embarrassing to themselves, and most

unsatisfactory to others,
lies at the
we
would seem
to be this
ignorance
bottom of all human knowledge, and the deeper
penetrate the nearer
we
arrive unto
it.
After certain
points have been passed, and certain lines, as
it
were, of
168
demarcation penetrated,
we
invariably meet with certain
obstacles
which we cannot pass, and which seem
all efforts
of
human wisdom, "Thus
far shalt
to
say to
thou go, and
no farther, and here shall thy proud waves be stayed."
Take any branch of science you please, and pursue the

light it gives
you
to its very extremity, it will infallibly
bring you at last to the point where the philosopher will
be no wiser than the peasant; and the only difference
is,
that the ignorance of the one lies nearer the surface, whilst
the want of knowledge in the other
is
found
at the
end of
the labyrinth.
Note
" Blame not
In thine
page 116.
the stars nor destinies,
own hand
Thy map
of
life
The march was

By some
12
the prowess
lies
review
plain, but thou, beguiled
short cut, or prospect wild,
Hast wandered from the true."
That every man
is
more or
less
the fabricator of his
fortune, is too obvious to be insisted on
worth observing, that the more applies
to
but this
those
own
may be
who
avail
NOTES TO MISCELLANEOUS VOEMS.
themselves of opportunity, the
We
less
to those
180
who do
not.
have, however, two great authorities against us on
this subject,
Shakspeare and Butler.
" There
is
The
first
observes
a Providence that shapes our ends^
Rough-hew them how we
One would conceive
it difficult
will."
to
express this thought
better; and yet Shakspeare has perhaps been surpassed by
Butler, who, with his usual pregnant brevity, thus ex-
presses himself:
'<
For whatsoe'er we perpetrate,
We
do but row,
we are
steer'd
by
fate."
Texts, however, of an opposite tendency might easily be

cited from Shakspeare,
who, in common with
all
good dra-
matists, assimilates the sentiments to the characters

utter them.
on
life
But
to return:
All who
who
are about to enter
should be most strongly recommended never
neglect opportunity.
to
Opportunity has effected more than
fortune, or even talent
she has often taken them both by
the hand, and found eyes for the one, and ears for the
other.
Therefore, should Opportunity knock at your door,
neglect her not; and
remember
this, that,
inasmuch as she
170
always makes the first advances, she
on that account
is
particularly sensible of rebuff.
Note y\ page 117.

*'
Self-pride, of
good and
ill
the source.
prompts again the tortuous course
Still
Of
error to begin
Blames, for the ruin and the rout
Of
our hopes, the foe without,
all
Not the
'Stop, sir,"
observed Napoleon
" you are mistaken
self alone to blame,
me."
This
is
false friend within."
to
Barry O'Meara:
I had no enemy_ but myself ; I have my-
for
all
the disasters that happened unto
the short history of most, who, having failed
in their undertakings, waste that time in complaining of

their misfortunes
which were better occupied
their mistakes.
I believe there are
choose to live their
life
over again
their second existence to profit
acquired in the
would refuse
it.
first,
An
in correcting
very few that would

but, allow
them
in
by the experience they had
then indeed there are very few that

actor on the
mimic
stage, preparatory
appearance before the public,
to his
but, in the eventful
allowed.
drama of
Furthermore,
audience remarkable for
and
we
its
allowed a rehearsal
no rehearsal
real life,
are called
upon
life
when we
is
to please an
predispositions not
season of
at the precise
is
171
to be pleased,
are least aware
of the value of character, and least able to follow the dictates of
prudence
this is the very time
when we
are ex-
pected to lay the foundation of the one, and practise

the precepts of the other
all
Note l \ page 122.

"
It is
not of the heart, nor of the head,
But of the inmost soul, sustain'd and fed
By
that ambrosial feast to Israel given,
Gather'd on earth, but sent direct from heaven
The
earth
true poet
must of necessity
collect his
!"
images from
but the inspiration that invigorates them with
life,
and enriches them with beauty,
like the fabled fire that
animated the Promethean clay,
is
heaven.
not of earth, but of
172
Note
"O
15
,
thou, for ever
The comrade and
strikes
race
doomed
to prove
the curse of love,
The
bravest thou canst force to yield,
And
pierce
them through
Seeing that Jealousy

self-pride
page 125.
which
is
inflicts
their very shield."
her wounds through that
our shield on
all
other occasions,
by no means
deficient in honour, sensibility,
and high
feeling, very rarely resort to atrocious or desperate
dies under the influence of this
the solution of the difficulty
wounds
it
one as somewhat remarkable that Frenchmen, a
inflicted
gloomy passion.
is this:
reme-
Perhaps
their vanity heals the
on their pride, and, instead of revenging
themselves on the
fair
inconstant, they content themselves
by pitying the bad taste she has evinced,
one so worthy of admiration; and they
in
abandoning
finish the matter,
not by destroj'ing their former idol, but by seeking another,
whose discernment
shall enable her not only to select such
merit, but also to preserve
it.
173
Note w page 127.

,
" The throbbing

That shook
Were but
Was
It is a
well-known
" This
is
about
to
a Marlborough's frame,
the giant birth
the throes,
Blenheim's deathless
was always greatly

to say,
heart, the quivering lip,
fact, that
name
!"
Duke
the
of Marlborough
agitated on going into action
little
body trembles
at
what
he used
this great soul
perform."
Note
ir
,
" Thus, throned on
page 140.
rocks, Missouri takes
His giant leap, and thundering shakes
The depth
of woods below
His lone magnificence displays,
Where not an eye
the
pomp
But His that bade him
The
surveys
flow."
cataract of the Missouri is very rarely seen, except
by such enterprising
travellers as
Humboldt
have been informed that this cataract

world
tions,
is
that of Niagara did not quite equal
it struck me
or Clarke.
the grandest in the
as being minor fama.
my
expecta-
174
Note
" The
faults, alas
We catch
As
1S
,
page 141.
or follies of a friend,
and copy, though we
commend
can't
to his virtues, if these e'er create

rival effort, 'tis constrain'd or late
These we commend indeed, but seldom imitate."
In confirmation of the above position,
marked, tbat large
cities,
camps,
it
may
be re-
manufactories, or any
other establishment, whereby large masses of population

are concentrated on any particular spot, have invariably
demoralised society, rather than ameliorated

son
is this,
The
it.
rea-
bad habits are more rapidly communicated than
those that are good. But some will farther ask,
they be more rapidly communicated?

that vicious courses always proffer
some
We
why
should
would reply,
trivial
but imme-
diate gratification or enjoyment; but those that are virtu-
ous are followed up with
difficulty,
and rewarded late
temptation paj-s in ready money, but self-denial draws a

bill.
As
far as
equally true, and

health
is
the
body
is
concerned, the parallel
almost as deplorable
for,
is
although
constantly catching disease from another's sick-
ness, yet sickness never yet caught .supitv from another's

health.
KOTPS TO MISCELLANEOUS POEMS.
Note
'
19
,:page 143.
This lamp that lightens
all
that lives,
Like some that guard the dead,

E'en by
To
th' intruder's
entrance
is
utter darkness sped!"
Rosi crucian lamps
Note
20
,
page 147.
" Polemics with Religion

As truant children
From hand
But
to
play,
cast
hand the
flying ball,
to be lost at last."
This can only happen when controversy is carried on with

that degree of acrimony and bitterness, that
it
destruction of the brightest part of that which

to defend.
But most
evils
religion at present is in
than persecution,
induces the
we combat
have their concomitant good
more danger from indifference
from the supineness of the calm, rather
than the devastation of the hurricane.
Minds
that are
176
energetic in opposition are too often torpid in acquiescence,
and souls that dose in harmony are alert in discord.

this
particular they
may be compared
to
Tn
that Turkish
envoy, who, on his appearance at the Opera, astonished

the Parisians bv bestowing
all
his applause and animation
on the din produced by the tuning of the instruments, but
was observed
to
be fast asleep the moment the concert
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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

THE LATE REV.

FROM THE ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPT; IN THE POSSESSION

mediocrity, would meet

the present day; but,

consider the following

variety, or the masterly

which that diversity

willingly admit that

are in possession of " Lacon," or

without the assistance-of this their sister Muse.

The dying request of my much-esteemed

task of great difficulty.

would write explanatory Notes

should find necessary to be relieved from

an almost unavoidable obscurity.

matter which his master-mind has endeavoured

on the subject now before

Mr. Colton, however he might

an acquaintance of twenty years, of

readiness to serve him to the extent of

such a task, and had formed too high an opinion

few hours previous to his death, Mr. Colton

Antiquity," and at the same time expressed a

wish that they had been more creditable to him

was well founded

for those to decide

judges and liberal

That the poem would have been retouched by

would have added

fitting the subject

have been his intention,

" Hope and Patience" which he

It may be said by some, that the

not wholly deprived him of that

the fact of there being no moral attached

certainly less reprehensible than if

The subject had been

treated on before the late Mr. Colton gave

present splendid form, as Bacon was the

writer to dispute the validity of the claims of

our forefathers to true antiquity;

have produced much that

" True talent

the ray that flings

novel light o'er

In the following pages

thoughts that would have been beautiful even in

and nakedness of nature, and

are certainly not less so

that they are pre-

sented in the best drapery and ornaments of art:

equally capable of detecting de-

w ere she arrayed

poem we observe that

word; which, however

a rule that our poet strictly attended

became a powerful engine

hands as those of our author; and

we may acknowledge that it had Truth for

the whole material and intellectual world; his