University of Virginia Library

SYMPATHY.

BOOK I.

O'er yon fair lawn, where oft in various talk
The fav'ring Muses join'd our evening walk,
Up yonder hill that rears its crest sublime,
Where we were wont with gradual steps to climb,
To hear the Lark her earliest matin sing,
And woo the dew-bath'd zephyrs on the wing;
Fast by yon shed, of roots and verdure made,
Where we have paus'd, companions of the shade
In yonder cot just seated on the brow,
Whence, unobserv'd, we view'd the world below;
Whence oft we cull'd fit objects for our song,
From land or ocean widely stretch'd along;
The morning vapours passing thro' the vale,
The distant turret or the lessening sail,
The pointed cliff which overhangs the main,
The breezy upland, or the opening plain;
The misty traveller yet dimly seen,
And every hut which neighbours on the green,
Or down yon foot-way saunter'd by the stream,
Whose little rills ran tinkling to the theme,
More softly touch'd the woe in Hammond's lay,
Or laps'd responsive to the lyre of Gray;
O'er these dear bounds like one forlorn I roam,
O'er these dear bounds, I fondly call'd my home.
Whence this neglect? say, in thy lov'd domain,
Where all the virtues in thy presence reign;
Where gathering round thee, youth and age conspire,
While some as brother court thee, some as sire;
Where all the social passions fondly blend,
To give the smiling neighbourhood a friend;
Where somewhat of thy gentle heart is seen,
A grace, or goodness, adding to the green;
Where the babe lisps thy bounties on the knee,
And second childhood leans its crutch on thee;
Whence this neglect? Ingratitude retreat!
Go: and in shades less sacred fix thy seat:
Go to the treach'rous world, thy proper sphere;
But oh! forbear to scatter poisons here:
About this dwelling and these harmless bounds,
Friendship and love alone should take their rounds,
Fair as the blossoms which the walls sustain,
Rich as the fruits, and generous as the grain;
Secure as yonder warblers nesting near,
Like Honour steady, and like faith sincere.
“But soft, my friend! tho' shrubs and bow'rs remain
The fix'd productions of th' unconscious plain;
Though these no gentle sympathies can know,
But as the planter bends them learn to grow;
To higher parts as nature lifts her plan,
The kinder creatures, haply, feel for man;
The tame domestics, which attend his board,
Haply partake the fortune of their lord,
His presence hail, his absence long deplore,
Droop as he droops, and die when he's no more
Pleas'd at the thought, still onward let me tread,
Where flocks and herds diversify the mead,
Where breathing odours, winnow'd by the gale,
Fan the soft bosom of the smiling vale;
The rooks behind their brawling councils hold,
And the proud peacock trails his train of gold;
Around the doves their purple plumage show,
And clucking poultry saunter, pleas'd, below;
While there the house-dog, with accustom'd glee,
Fawns on the hind—as late he fawn'd on thee.
These crop the food, those press the flow'ry bed
Nor weep the absent, nor bewail the dead;
Their stinted feelings seem but half awake,
Dull as yon steer now slumbering on the brake.
Whence then the gloom that shrouds the summer sky?
Whence the warm tear now gathering in my eye?
And whence the change when bosom friends depart?
From fancy striking on the feeling heart.
Oh should I follow where she leads the way,
What magic meteor to her touch would play!
Then, far from thee, this sun which gilds my brow
In deep eclipse would darken all below;
The herds, tho' now plain reason sees them feed,
Smit by her touch would languish in the mead;
The breeze which now disports with yonder spray,
The flocks which pant beneath the heat of day,
The pendant copse in partial shadows drest,
The scanty herbage on the mountain's crest,
The balmy pow'rs that mix with every gale,
The glassy lakes that fertilize the dale,
Struck by her mystic sceptre all would fade,
And sudden sadness brood along the shade.
As poets sing, thus Fancy takes her range,
Whose winds æthereal waves a general change;
A change, which yielding Reason still obeys,
For scepter'd Reason oft with Fancy plays;
Soon as the gen'rous master leaves his home,
What vision'd sorrows deep invest the dome?
Soon as the much-lov'd mistress quits the scene,
No longer smiles the grateful earth in green:
In solemn sable ev'ry flow'r appears,
And skies relent in sympathising tears!
Scarce had the bard of Leasowe's lov'd domain
Clos'd his dimm'd eye upon the pensive plain,
Ere birds and beasts funereal honours paid,
Mourn'd their lov'd lord and sought the desart shade;
His gayest meads a serious habit wore,
His larks would sing, his lambs would frisk no more,
A deeper cadence murmur'd from his floods,
Cimerian horror brooded o'er his woods:
At ev'ry solemn pause, the raven scream'd,
The sun set sanguine, and the dog-star gleam'd;
But chief the conscious laurels droop'd their head,
While every bower its leafy honours shed;
Around his walks the Muses wander'd slow,
And hung their lyres on every naked bough.
Yet separate facts from fairy scenes like these,
Nature, we find, still keeps her first decrees;
The order due which at her birth was giv'n,
Still forms th' unchanging law of earth and heav'n,
In one fair tenor, on the circle goes,
And no obstruction no confusion knows.
When Shenstone, nay, when Shakespeare press'd the tomb,
The shrubs that saw their fate maintain'd their bloom;
Clear ran the streams to their accustom'd shore,
Nor gave one bubble less, one murmur more;
Nor did a single leaf, a simple flower,
Or fade or fall to mark their mortal hour.
But, is it Fancy all! what, no reserve?
From one dull course can nature never swerve?
Is change of seasons all the change she knows,
From autumn's sickly heats to winter snows;
From chilling spring, to summer's dog-star rage;
From boy to man, from man to crawling age?
These her transitions, ling'ring, sad, and slow,
Whence then, in these lov'd shades, my bosom's woe?
Ah! is it Fancy, that, with silent pace,
Impels me thus to range from place to place;
To see on ev'ry side an harvest bend,
Yet look on ev'ry side to find my friend?
Or is it fancy makes yon village train,—
For now 'tis ev'ning,—sport around in vain?
That plighted pairs, amidst the hazel boughs,
By me unseen, impart their tender vows;
While unsuspicious of a witness near,
They mix with Nature's language, Nature's tear?
That twilight's gentle grey which now comes on,
To wait, a sober hand-maid on the sun,
To watch his parting tinge, his soften'd fires,
Then blush with maiden grace as he retires;
The full-orb'd moon, which now ascending high
Her silver shade throws light across the sky;
The still serene that seems to lull the breeze,
Soft in a leafy cradle 'midst the trees;
The lessen'd sound of yonder distant bell,
Some mournful moral in each pausing knell;
The dropping dew that settles on my cheek,
The frugal lights that from each cottage break;
The just-dropp'd latch, the little lattice clos'd,
To shield from evening's damp the babe repos'd,
And note the hour when temperance and health
Yield the pale vigils of the night to wealth.
Say, is it vision'd Fancy works the charm,
When these blest objects lose their power to warm?
Ah! no; from other sources spring the smart,
Its source is here, hard pressing on my heart.
Yes, 'tis the heart, my friend, which rules the eye,
And turns a gloomy to a cloudless sky;
The soft magician governs ev'ry scene,
Blossoms the rock, or desolates the green;
Along the heath bids fancied roses blow,
And sunshine rise upon a world of snow.
Yes, 'tis the heart endears each smiling plain,
Or to his native mountain binds the swain;
His native mountain where his cottage stands,
More lov'd, more dear, than all the neighb'ring lands;
For tho' the blast be keen, the soil be bare,
His friends, his wife, his little ones are there.
Oh, had the brother of my heart been nigh,
When morning threw her mantle o'er the sky;
Or when gay noon a gaudier robe display'd,
Or modest ev'ning drew her softest shade;
Then had the shrubs breath'd forth their full perfume,
And like his flow'rs my feelings been in bloom
For still to prove the naturel bias right,
Should each fair season with each sense unite.
Man's favour'd soul then tracing thro' each state,
Behold it fitted for a social fate;
Behold how ev'ry link in nature tends
One chain to form of relatives and friends.
One chain, unnumber'd beings to confine,
Till all affimilate and all combine.
Yon spacious dome, which earth and sea commands,
Where Lelius dresses his paternal lands;
Where water gushes, and where woods extends,
To share each beauty, Lelius calls his friends;
A desert scene, 'till they adorn his bow'rs;
A naked waste, till they partake his flow'rs,
Nor this, though sweet, the greatest bliss he feels,
That greatest bliss his modesty conceals.
Pass the green slope which bounds his fair domain,
And seek the valley drooping from the plain;
There, in a blossom'd nook, by pomp unseen,
An aged couple lead a life serene;
And there, behind those elms, a sickly pair
Exchange their labours for a softer care:
'Twas Lelius that gave to sickness this repose,
And plac'd life's second cradle near th' rose;
In his own hall though louder joys prevail,
A dearer transport whispers from the vale;
Though mirth and frolic echo thro' the dome,
In those small cots his bosom finds a home.
Fame, fortune, friends, can Providence give more?
Go, ask of Heav'n the blessings of the poor!
A greater comfort would you still supply?
Then wipe the tear from Sorrow's streaming eye;
For social kindness to another shown,
Expands the bliss to make it more your own.
Lo! the rude savage, naked and untaught,
Shares with his mate what arts and arms have caught;
When winter darkness clouds his long, long night,
See how he strives to find the social light;
His woodland wife, his forest children dear,
Smooth the bleak storms that sadden half his year.
For them he tracks the monster in the snow;
For them he hurls his sling, and twangs his bow.
Nor scorching sunshine, nor the driving show'r,
Nor vollied thunder, nor the light'ning's pow'r,
Nor climes, where sickness pants in every breeze,
Nor worlds of ice, where nature seems to freeze,
Check the fair principle, which bursts away,
Like yon blest sun, when clouds attempt his ray.
Hence, ever lean the feeble on the strong,
As tender sires their children lead along;
While, by degrees, as transient life declines,
And blooming youth to withering age resigns,
The social passion shifts with place and time,
And tender sires are led by sons in prime;
The guide becomes the guided in his turn,
While child and parent different duties learn.
Not then from fancy only, from the heart,
Pours the keen anguish on th' immortal part,
And Truth herself destroys the bloom of May,
When Death or Fortune tears a friend away;
From virtuous passion, virtuous feeling, flows
The grief that dims the lily and the rose.
Drops a soft sorrow for a friend in dust?
There, Truth and Fancy both may rear the bust;
While one pours forth the tribute of the heart;
The other plies her visionary art,
Potent she calls her airy spectres round,
And bids them instant consecrate the ground;
Fancy presides as sov'reign of the scene,
And darkens every leaf of every green;
Whilst Reason loves to mix with her's the tear,
And the fair mourners form a league sincere;
Her airy visions Fancy may impart,
And Reason listen to the charmer's art.
In life's fair morn, I knew an aged seer,
Who sad and lonely past his joyless year;
Betray'd, heart-broken, from the world he ran,
And shunn'd, oh dire extreme! the face of man;
Humbly he rear'd his hut within the wood,
Hermit his vest, a hermit's was his food,
Nitch'd in some corner of the gelid cave,
Where chilling drops the rugged rockstone lave
Hour after hour, the melancholy sage,
Drop after drop to reckon, would engage
The ling'ring day, and trickling as they fell,
A tear went with them to the narrow well;
Then thus he moraliz'd as slow it past,
“This, brings me nearer Lucia than the last;
“And this, now streaming from the eye,” said he,
“Oh! my lov'd child, will bring me nearer thee?’
When first he roam'd, his dog with anxious care,
His wand'rings watch'd, as emulous to share;
In vain the faithful brute was bid to go,
In vain the sorrower sought a lonely woe.
The Hermit paus'd, th' attendant dog was near,
Slept at his feet, and caught the falling tear;
Up rose the Hermit, up the dog would rise,
And every way to win a master tries.
“Then be it so. Come, faithful fool,” he said;
One pat encourag'd, and they sought the shade;
An unfrequented thicket soon they found,
And both repos'd upon the leafy ground;
Mellifluous murm'rings told the fountains nigh,
Fountains, which well a pilgrim's drink supply.
And thence, by many a labyrinth it led,
Where ev'ry tree bestow'd an ev'ning bed;
Skill'd in the chace, the faithful creature brought
Whate'er at morn or moon-light course he caught;
But the sage lent his sympathy to all,
Nor saw unwept his dumb associates fall;
He was, in sooth, the gentlest of his kind,
And though a hermit, had a social mind:
“And why, said he, must man subsist by prey,
“Why stop yon melting music on the spray?
“Why, when assail'd by hounds and hunter's cry,
“Must half the harmless race in terrors die?
“Why must we work of innocence the woe?
“Still shall this bosom throb, these eyes o'erflow;
“A heart too tender here from man retires,
“A heart that aches, if but a wren expires.”
Thus liv'd the master good, the servant true,
'Till to its God the master's spirit flew;
Beside a fount which daily water gave,
Stooping to drink, the Hermit found a grave;
All in the running stream his garments spread,
And dark, damp verdure ill conceal'd his head;
The faithful servant from that fatal day
Watch'd the lov'd corpse, and hourly pin'd away:
His head upon his master's cheek was found,
While the obstructed waters mourn'd around.
But sordid fouls are ever in distress,
To bless himself each must a second bless;
Then kindle on 'till he the world embrace,
And in love's Cæstus gird the human race.
Thus social grief can finer joys impart
Than the dull pleasures of a miser's heart:
Thus with more force can melancholy warm,
Than wild ambition's solitary charm.
And oh, just heav'n, what gift canst thou bestow,
What gem so precious as a tear for woe?
A tear more full of thee, oh pow'r divine,
Than all the dross that ripens in the mine!
As man with man, with creature creature keeps,
In summer feeds in view, in winter creeps
More fondly close; but take the lamb apart
From its lov'd mother, then the social heart
'Plains in its voice, while sad, the dam around
Bleats at the theft, and leaves uncropt the ground.
In yonder huts, at this profound of night,
The twelfth hour striking as the line I write,
In yonder scatter'd huts, now ev'ry swain,
With ev'ry maid and matron of the plain,
In sleep's soft arms on wholsome pallets prest,
Breathe forth the social passion as they rest:
But should dire fate the father make its prey,
Or snatch untimely one lov'd child away;
Or bear the faithful housewife to the tomb,
Or should the damsel sicken In her bloom,
No aid from fancy seeks the sorrowing heart,
But truth, with force unborrow'd, points the dart.
For me, as weary of myself I rise,
To seek the rest which wakeful thought denies?
O'er the lov'd mansion as I lonely range,
Condemn'd at ev'ry step to feel the change;
Through each apartment, where so oft my heart
Hath shar'd each grace of nature and of art,
Where memory marks each object that I see,
And fills the bosom, oh my friend, with thee;
Through each apartment as I pass along,
Pause for relief, and then pursue my song;
For me, who now with midnight taper go,
To lose in sleep's oblivious shade my woe,
No greater good my closing thoughts can bless,
Ere this remember'd, little couch I press,
Than the sweet hope that at this sacred hour
My friend enjoys kind nature's balmy power;
Than the soft wish which on my bended knee,
I offer up, Eliza, warm for thee!
Wife of my friend, alike my faithful care,
Alike the object of each gentle pray'r;
Far distant tho' thou art, thy worth is near,
And my heart seals its blessing with a tear.

BOOK II.

And now again 'tis morn, the orient sun
Prepares once more his radiant course to run;
O'er yon tall trees I see his glories rise,
Tinge their green tops, and gain upon the skies;
The social principle resumes the shade,
Basks on the banks, or glides along the glade:
See how it pants, my friend, in yonder throng,
Where half a village bears the sheaves along;
Low stoops the swain to dress his native soil,
And here the housewife comes to soothe his toil;
While heav'n's warm beams upon her bosom dart,
She owns the fondness of her wedded heart,
From his damp brow the labour'd drop removes,
And dares to show with what a force she loves;
Where'er the mother moves, her race attend,
And often cull the corn, and often bend;
Or bear the scrip, or tug the rake along,
Or catch the burthen of the reaper's song;
Or shrinking from the sickle's curving blade,
Cling to the gown, half pleas'd, and half afraid;
While he who gave them life looks on the while,
And views his little houshold with a smile;
Imprints the kiss, then blessing ev'ry birth,
Carols his joy, and hails the generous earth.
But not to scenes of pleasantry confin'd,
Though, hap'ly, simpler there, as less refin'd,
Not circumscrib'd to these the social plan,
Which more extends, as more pursu'd by man.
Just as yon path-way, winding through the mead,
Grows broad and broader by perpetual tread,
The social passion turns the foot aside,
And prompts the swains to travel side by side;
Both edge, by turns, upon the bord'ring sod,
And the path widens as the grass is trod.
In cities thus, though trade's tumultuous train
Spurn at the homely maxims of the plain,
Not all the pride of rank, the trick of art,
Can chase the generous passion from the heart:
Nay more, a larger circle it must take,
Where men embodying, larger int'rests make,
And each, perforce, round each more closely twine,
Where countless thousands form the social line.
As slow to yonder eminence I bend,
Gradual the views of social life extend,
Where benches ease the steep ascent I stray,
And stop at each to take a just survey;
At every step, as sinks the vale behind,
A wider prospect opens on mankind.
Far to the right where those blue hills arise,
And bathe their swelling bosoms in the skies,
The barks of commerce set the flapping sail,
And the dark sea-boy sues the busy gale;
There the deep warehouse shows its native store,
There flame the riches of a foreign shore;
Thick swarm the sons of trade on every hand,
And either India breathes along the strand;
Gold, give me gold, each bustler cries aloud,
As hope or fear alternate seize the crowd;
To careless eyes the love of pelf alone,
Seems to drain off the golden tide for one;
But closer view'd a various course it takes,
And wide meanderings in its passage makes;
Through many a social channel see it run,
In splendid heritage from sire to son;
From thence in many a mazy stream it flows,
And feels no ebb, no dull stagnation knows;
Thus nature and necessity agree
The social chain to stretch from land to sea.
Thus e'en the miser, tho' his sordid soul
Loves but himself, befriends perforce the whole.
Ask you a stronger proof? Place wealth alone
With some hard niggard, lock up all his own:
Pile bills, and bags, and bonds upon his shelf,
And a close prisoner chain him to his pelf.
Unhappy man! from family and friends,
From all which heav'n in soft compassion sends,
From touch of kindred, tune of tender speech,
And exil'd from the social passion's reach;
How would he sigh, tho' every hope were vain,
And buy a glance at man with half his gain!
How, at some chink or crevice would he ply,
And envy each poor beggar limping by!
Far happier he, who breasting every wind,
Lives on the common mercy of his kind,
Who roams the world to tell his piteous case,
And dies as last amidst the human race.
MAN dragg'd the splendid stranger first to view,
And, like a meteor, round the world it flew,
A ready welcome from the world it found,
And Phœbus hail'd the Phœnix from the ground.
Immediate wonder seiz'd the circling crowd,
But chief Europa to her idol bow'd,
Her bark, her car, with emblems gilded o'er
The homage spread from ocean to the shore;
Attractive Gold obsequious votaries drew,
Till useful fondness into dotage grew.
Yet still be just. In shape of fraud or force,
Ere Gold appear'd the Passions took their course;
Like whirldwinds swept the flowers of life along,
And crush'd the weak, and undermin'd the strong;
Lord as thou wert, Tibullus, of the strains
That sweetest paint an hapless lover's pains,
Long, long ere execrated Gold from earth
Arose to give each tender trespass birth,
Full many a mistress knew, like thine, the art,
To sport with vows, and practise on the heart.
Let sage Tradition's reverend records tell,
Unbrib'd by gold, what hosts in battle fell,
Unbrib'd by gold,—when acorns were the food,
And man with beast roam'd naked thro' the wood,
Ev'n in those times which raptur'd bards have sung,
When nature triumph'd, and the world was young,
Blest days! whose charms so many lays rehearse,
Blest days, alas! which only bloom in verse—
Ev'n then let Hist'ry tell what follies sped,
Assail'd the hut, and thro' the forest spread;
How daring guilt in proud obtrusion stood,
And dy'd his dreadful robe in brothers blood;
How son and sire, with unrelenting strife,
Ensanguin'd sought each other's kindred life;
How matrons stopt the new-born infants breath,
And bold self-slaughter rush'd on impious death;
How darkling error stain'd the blushing morn,
And life's first roses bore the pointed thorn;
How ages past exhibit all the crimes
That random satire aims at modern times;
How varying modes alone divide the plan
Betwixt the savage and the social man;
How ruder vices now refin'd appear,
Adopting still the fashion of the year;
Conclude we then the vices are the same,
Conclude that Man, not Gold, is still to blame,
Rail then no more at gold, for plain to view
Behold an antidote and poison too:
Oh save the shining metal from abuse,
And the heart turns it to a social use!
The widow, orphan, and ten thousand more,
Prove that no dross need hang about the ore;
Prove, that this glittering treasure may dispense
The sterling joys of pure benevolence,
While from the golden reservoir may flow
The richest streams of sympathy below.
In soft alliance with the tender heart,
The senses too, their sympathy impart:
No longer blessings than as all conspire
With kindred zeal to fan the social fire.
Of sight, or smell, say what the mighty power,
If but to see the sun, or scent the flower?
Of touch, taste, hearing, what the wond'rous boast,
If narrow'd all to self, they all are lost?
But ye of finer souls, who truly know
The rich division of a joy and woe,
Oh tell the rapture when a friend is nigh
To charm the ear, or to delight the eye,
To draw amusement from the pictur'd air,
As fancy shapes her thousand visions there,
Now paints her monsters, now her armies strong,
When slow she drives her twilight car along:
Oh tell the rapture that each pleasure wears,
When the soul's friend each passing pleasure shares,
When with twin'd arms ye watch the opening rose,
Or trace the devious streamlet as it flows,
Together mark fair summer's radiant store,
Together nature's vernal haunts explore;
And fondly jealous of each object new,
Contend who first shall point it to the view;
Then part awhile, o'er hill and valley stray,
And anxious court the fortune of the day.
But if long absent, hail'd be every power
That blots the sunbeam and destroys the bower,
That wraps th' affrighted atmosphere in storms,
And each gay vision of the sky deforms,
The social senses then partake the grief,
And seek some kindred object of relief.
Oh hark, my soul, to yonder Stockdove's note,
Sweet as the woe from Philomela's throat;
Soft let me steal along the copse to hear
The mournful murmur break upon my ear;
Ah, gentle bird! indulge thy tender pains,
While the Muse greets thee with congenial strains,
Nor quit thy sombrous seat, nor, needless fly
The still, small breathings of a social sigh:
That ruffled plumage, that disorder'd wing,
More soothing now than softest blooms of spring,
And that deep sob, to every sense more dear
Than all the music of the vocal year.
Blest be the hand that lends the power to feel,
And frames us subject to the wounds we heal,
That urges all to minister relief,
And instant fly with open arms to grief;
That veils the soft attraction in a tear,
Each bliss makes poignant, and each sorrow dear;
Eternal incense from the soul ascend
To him who made each being want a friend,
Who plac'd us in a world 'twixt sun and shade,
That those which bloom might succour those that fade;
And doubly bless'd the providence, whose skill
In life's thin loom has woven many an ill;
Tho' weak the texture, from that weakness springs
The strength and beauty of all human things;
For still as fate or nature deals the blow,
The balms we now solicit, now bestow,
And all our miseries but clearly prove
The social powers of pity and of love.
Ask the pale mother why 'tis joy to weep
When o'er her stricken babe faint slumbers creep?
Ask why the child at midnight's thickest gloom
Still fondly lingers at a parent's tomb?
Or why the wife, in times of raging death,
Yet leans to catch her lord's polluted breath?
Go, warn them straight of pestilential air,
Point to the weakness here, the danger there,
Let mirth and music all their powers employ,
To spread for every sense its favourite joy,
Then, arm'd with all the world's seductions try
To wean the mourners from so dark a sky,
Oh! they will spurn the offer'd gales of health,
The lures of pleasure and the snares of wealth,
Prefer the dark recesses of disease,
The sickly pillow and the tainted breeze,
And call it conscience, nature, bliss, to know
The last extremities of social woe.
Hence the great principle to all expands,
Thaws Lapland's ice, and glows on India's sands;
Above, below, its genial splendours play,
Where'er an human footstep marks the way.
“Oh! for one track of man upon the snow,
“The trace of sweet society to show;
“Oh! for one print on swarthy Afric's shore!”
Thus prays the wanderer 'scap'd from Ocean's roar;
In every clime is felt the thorb divine,
By land, by water, here, and at the Line.
Nor climates only, but each age imparts
The kindly bias to our social hearts.
See the swath'd infant cling to the embrace,
Th' instinctive fondness dawning in its face,
See it, ascending, strengthen as it grows,
Till ripe and riper the affection glows,
Then view the child, its toys and trinkets share,
With some lov'd partner of its little care:
Behold the man a firmer bond requires,
For him the passion kindles all its fires;
Next, see his numerous offspring twining near,
Now move the smile, and now excite the tear;
Terror and transport in his bosom reign,
Succession sweet of pleasure and and of pain,
As age advances, some sensations cease,
Some, lingering, leave the heart, while some increase:
Thus, when life's vigorous passions are no more,
Self-love creeps closest to the social power;
The stooping vet'ran with time-silver'd hair,
Crawls to the blazing hearth and wicker chair;
There huddled close, he fondly hopes to spy
His goodly sons and daughters standing by;
To the lisp'd tale he bends the greedy ear,
And o'er his children's children drops a tear;
Or, every friend surviv'd, himself half dead,
Frail nature still demands her board, her bed;
And these some kindred spirit shall bestow,
His wants supply, or mitigate his woe;
Still Sympathy shall watch his fleeting breath,
And gently lead him to the gates of death.
Yet more; e'en war, the scourge of human kind,
But serves more close the social links to bind;
Confed'rate courage forms th' embattled line,
Firm on each side connecting passions join;
'Tis social danger either troop inspires,
'Tis social honour either army fires,
'Tis social glory burnishes the van,
'Tis social faith spreads on from man to man;
As front to front the warring parties meet,
For social ends they dare the martial feat;
As breast to breast, and eye to eye they fix,
For social ends they seperate or mix.
King, country, parents, children, prompt the fight,
For these alone they bleed, resist, unite;
And, hap'ly, first hostilities arose
From nice distinctions made of friends and foes;
Some scornful slight where nature most can smart,
Some stinging insult forest to the heart,
Some wrong detected, forfeited some trust,
A treaty broken, or a barrier burst,
Bade Sympathy call Vengeance to her aid,
Till where the laws avail'd not wars were made;
Affection sought from arms the wish'd relief,
And bore them 'gainst the assassin and the thief;
Eager o'er those who faith's fair league invade
With social zeal to lift th' avenging blade;
Or from the spoiler's hand to fence the flowers
That sweetly blossom round life's private bowers:
'Tis thus, the steady eye of Reason finds
What seems to snap the chain, more closely binds;
And thus each peril like each pleasure try'd,
Unites the rosy bonds on either side.
But less do arms than arts assist the plan,
Those may defend, but these embellish man;
These softly draw him nearer to his kind,
And mark distinct his seraph form of mind.
Lo, in firm compact, hand, and head, and heart,
To aid the system take an helping part,
Their various powers by various modes they lend,
And serve in union as one common friend;
Hence, by consent, men clear the unthrifty wood,
New model earth, and navigate the flood;
Hence hamlets grow into the city's pride,
While the soul opens, like the talents, wide.
By social pleasure, social profit sway'd,
Some soar to learning, and some stoop to trade.
Studious to gain the love of human kind,
The social sage at midnight stores his mind,
Robs weary nature of her just repose,
Nor drinks the dew that bathes the morning rose,
Nor when the sun to Cynthia gives the night,
Eyes the soft blessing of her tender light,
But o'er the taper leans his pensive head,
And for the living communes with the dead.
The dusky artizan, his effort made;
Asserts his rights, and leaves the sickly shade;
At eve he quits the spot where glooms annoy,
And seeks the bosom of domestic joy;
The social faggot, and the light repast,
Await to cheer him when his toils are past.
And hence each class of Elegant and Great,
Art decks the dome, and commerce crounds the street;
The heav'n-born Muse impetuous wings her way,
When her lov'd Seward seeks the realms of day;
Queen of the comic power, hence Cowley wooes
Fair visitations of the gayer Muse;
The painter hence his magic pencil plies,
And Reynolds bids a new creation rise;
Hence Kauffman sketches life's lov'd forms anew,
And holds the mirror of past times to view,
Restores each grace that mark'd the Grecian age,
And draws her lovely comment on the page;
And still to chear the solitary hour,
For this has Beach display'd his happiest power;
I see my friend upon the canvas glow,
And feel the smile that lightens every woe.
All, Sympathy, is thine; th' Immortal strung,
For thee that more than golden harp the tongue:
The sphere's best music taught it to impart,
And bade each soft vibration strike the heart.
Thine too, the varied fruitage of the fields,
The clustering crops which yonder valley yields
That thymy down where feeds a thousand sheep,
This bower umbrageous, and yon cultur'd steep;
The still smooth joys that bloom o'er life's serene,
And all the bustle of its public scene.
Nor think the dull cold reasoners, can disprove
These varied powers of Sympathetic love;
Nor hope, ye cynics, all your skill can find
From partial spots a flaw in human kind;
As well the panther might ye charge with sin,
And call each streak a blemish on his skin;
Allow to self the broadest scope ye can,
Still breathe the social principle in man.
Oft when pride whispers that he stands alone,
His strength proceeds from other than his own;
Oft when he seems to walk the world apart,
Another's interest twines about his heart;
And call his project rash, his effort vain,
The end is social which he sighs to gain;
Or say, this builds for pomp, that digs for bread,
This shews you pictures, that a pompous bed,
This toils a niggard at his lonely trade,
That rears the bower but asks not to its shade;
That this for vanity his wealth displays,
As that for pride unravels learning's maze;
Trace but their purpose to one general end,
You see it work the good of wife, or friend,
Parent or child their privilege still claim,
And social comfort springs from what we blame,
Frailty itself our sympathy may spare,
A graceful weakness when no vice is there.
Who hopes perfection breaks down nature's fence,
And spurns the modest bounds of sober sense.
When straw-like errors lean to virtue's side.
Ah! check, ye bigots, check your furious pride.
Some venial faults, like clouds at dawn of day,
Blush as they pass, and but a moment stay;
Those venial faults from sordid natures start,
And spring up only in the generous heart,
As florid weeds elude the labourer's toil,
From too much warmth or richness of the soil;
While meaner souls, like Zembla's hills of snow,
Too barren prove for weeds or flowers to grow.
This then is clear, while human kind exist,
The social principle must still subsist,
In strict dependency of one on all,
As run the binding links from great to small.
Man born for man some friendly aid requires,
The contract strengthening till the soul retires;
Nor then, ev'n then it breaks, for still we pay
A brother's homage to the breathless clay;
Jealous of destiny the heart would save
Its favour'd object from the closing grave,
Its favour'd object chosen from the rest,
In grief, in joy, the monarch of the breast;
To earth we trust what fondness would retain,
And leave the corpse to visit it again;
Nay, unconfin'd by partial ties of blood,
We brave e'en peril for a stranger's good.
Once, and not far from where those seats are seen,
Just where yon white huts peep the copse between,
A damsel languish'd, all her kin were gone,
For God who lent, resum'd them one by one;
Disease and penury in cruel strife,
Had ravish'd all the decent means of life,
E'en the mark'd crown, her lover's gift, she gave,
In filial duty for a father's grave,
That so the honour'd clay which caus'd her birth
Might slumber peaceful in the sacred earth,
Chim'd to its grass-green home with pious peal,
While hallow'd dirges hymn the last farewel;
At length these piercing woes her sense invade,
And lone and long the hapless wanderer stray'd,
O'er the black heath, around th' unmeasur'd wood,
Up the huge precipiece, or near the flood;
She mounts the rock at midnight's awful hour,
Enjoys the gloom, and idly mocks the shower;
Now scorns her fate, then patient bends the knee,
And courts each pitying star to set her free,
Then starting wilder, thinks those stars her foes,
Smites her sad breast, and laughs amidst her woes;
Oft would she chace the bee, or braid the grass,
Or crop the hedge-flower, or disorder'd pass;
Else, restless loiter in the pathless mead,
Sing to the birds at roost, the lambs at feed;
Or if a nest she found the brakes among,
No hand of hers destroy'd the promis'd young;
And when kind nature brought the balmy sleep,
Too soon she woke to wander and to weep;
Across her breast the tangled tresses flew,
And frenzied glances all around shew threw;
Th' unsettled soul those frenzied glances speak,
And tears of terror hurry down her cheek;
Yet still that eye was bright, that cheek was fair,
Though pale the rose, the lilly blossom'd there.
A wandering swain the beauteous Maniac found,
Her woes wild warbling to the rocks around;
A river roll'd beside, aghast she ran,
Her vain fears startling at the sight of man;
And, save me, God! my father's ghost! she cry'd,
Then headlong plung'd into the flashing tide.
The youth pursues—but wild the waters rose,
And o'er their heads in circling surges close,
Not heav'n-born Sympathy itself could save;
Both, both alas! were whelm'd beneath the wave.
And lives the man, who senseless could have stood
To see the victim buffet with the flood?
Whose coward cheek no tinge of honour feels,
Flush'd with no pride at which the Muse reveals?
If such a man, if such a wretch there be,
Thanks to this aching heart, I am not he.
Hail, lovely griefs, in tender mercy giv'n,
And hail, ye tears, like dew-drops fresh from heav'n;
Hail, balmy breath of unaffected sighs,
More sweet than airs that breathe from eastern skies;
Hail, sacred source of sympathy divine,
Each social pulse, each social fibre thine;
Hail, symbols of the God, to whom we owe
The nerves that vibrate, and the hearts that glow;
Love's tender tumult, friendship's holy fires,
And all which beauty, all which worth inspires,
The joy that lights the hope illumin'd eye,
The bliss supreme that melts in pity's sigh,
Affection's bloom quick rushing to the face,
The choice acknowledg'd and the warm embrace:
Oh power of powers, whose magic thus can draw,
Earth, air, and ocean, by one central law;
Join bird to bird, to insect insect link,
From those which grovel up to those which think;
Oh, ever blest! whose bounties opening wide
Fill the vast globe, for mortals to divide,
Thy heav'nly favours stretch from pole to pole,
Encircle earth, and rivet soul to soul!
Cease then to wonder these lov'd scenes impart
No more the usual transport to my heart;
Tho' modest Twilight visit Eve again,
At whose soft summons homeward steps the swain;
Though from the breath of oxen in the vale,
I catch the spirit of the balmy gale,
And from the brakes the answering thrushes sing,
While the grey owl sails by on solemn wing;
Nor wonder, if when morning blooms again,
In discontent I quit the flowery plain.
Thus the poor mariner, his traffic o'er,
Crouds ev'ry sail to reach his native shore,
With smiles he marks the pennons stream to port,
And climbs the top-mast mast to eye the fort;
Dim through the mist the distant lands appears,
And far he slopes to hail it with his tears;
From foreign regions, foreign faces come,
Anxious he seeks his much-lov'd friends at home,
Warm, and more warm, the social passions glows,
As near and nearer to the place he goes;
Quick beats his heart as pressing on he sees
His own fair cottage canopy'd with trees;
For there, in blessed health, he hopes to find
His wife and cradled infant left behind;
Panting, he plucks the latch that guards the door,
But finds his wife, his cradled babe no more!
Like some sad ghost he wanders o'er the green,
Droops on the blossom'd waste, and loaths the scene
Yet haply you, by Sympathy, may know
That here a-while I paus'd to paint my woe,
For sure if ever Silph or Silphid bore
One true friend's message to a distant shore;
If ever spirit whisper'd gentle deed,
In such an absence most its aid we need.—
Perhaps, for now let Fancy take her flight,
My friend, like me, may wander thro' the night,
Amidst a different scenery may roam,
And many gentle sigh address at home;
Ev'n now, where moon-beams tremble on the wave,
And circling seagulls their long pinions lave,
Where anchor'd vessels in the harbour ride,
To wait the flux of the returning tide,
Where the salt billow beats against the strand,
My friend may take his solitary stand;
Or to the rock projecting to the main,
May sit him down to mark the social strain,
Along the frothing beach may bend his way,
And suit, like me, his sorrows to his lay.
Farewel! my hour approaches with the dawn,
And up I spring to leave the flowery lawn;
The pain increases as I stay to trace
Another sunshine rising o'er the place:
Adieu then, balmy shrubs and shades, adieu,
This passing incense o'er your leaves I strew;
Adieu, thou dear and hill-screen'd cottage fair;
Adieu, thou decent dome of Sunday prayer;
To each, to all, adieu! your lonely guest
Retire. The social passions speaks the rest.