The Poetical Works of Thomas Moore :: :: University of Virginia Library

Grand, from the Truth that reigns o'er all;
The unshrinking Truth, that lets her light
Through Life's low, dark, interior fall,
Opening the whole, severely bright:

Yet softening, as she frowns along,
O'er scenes which angels weep to see—
Where Truth herself half veils the Wrong,
In pity of the Misery.

True bard!—and simple, as the race
Of true-born poets ever are,
When, stooping from their starry place,
They're children, near, though gods, afar.

383

How freshly doth my mind recall,
'Mong the few days I've known with thee,
One that, most buoyantly of all,
Floats in the wake of memory ;

When he, the poet, doubly graced,
In life, as in his perfect strain,
With that pure, mellowing power of Taste,
Without which Fancy shines in vain;

Who in his page will leave behind,
Pregnant with genius though it be,
But half the treasures of a mind,
Where Sense o'er all holds mastery:—

Friend of long years! of friendship tried
Through many a bright and dark event;
In doubts, my judge—in taste, my guide—
In all, my stay and ornament!

384

He, too, was of our feast that day,
And all were guests of one, whose hand
Hath shed a new and deathless ray
Around the lyre of this great land;

In whose sea-odes—as in those shells
Where Ocean's voice of majesty
Seems still to sound—immortal dwells
Old Albion's Spirit of the Sea.

Such was our host; and though, since then,
Slight clouds have ris'n twixt him and me,
Who would not grasp such hand again,
Stretch'd forth again in amity?

Who can, in this short life, afford
To let such mists a moment stay,
When thus one frank, atoning word,
Like sunshine, melts them all away?

Bright was our board that day—though one
Unworthy brother there had place;
As 'mong the horses of the Sun,
One was, they say, of earthly race.

385

Yet, next to Genius is the power
Of feeling where true Genius lies;
And there was light around that hour
Such as, in memory, never dies;

Light which comes o'er me, as I gaze,
Thou Relic of the Dead, on thee,
Like all such dreams of vanish'd days,
Brightly, indeed—but mournfully!

Soon after Mr. Crabbe's death, the sons of that gentleman did me the honour of presenting to me the inkstand, pencil, &c. which their distinguished father had long been in the habit of using.

The lines that follow allude to a day passed in company with Mr. Crabbe, many years since, when a party, consisting only of Mr. Rogers, Mr. Crabbe, and the author of these verses, had the pleasure of dining with Mr. Thomas Campbell, at his house at Sydenham.