 | My Mind and its Thoughts, in Sketches, Fragments, and Essays |  |
ODE TO MERCY.
Whose melting eye,
And accent bland;
Whose gentle sigh,
And open hand,
Were to the best beloved of mortals given;—
Whither, ah whither, hast thou fled,
On what soft bosom rests thine angel head;
Or to what distant wilds are thy mild graces driven?
Which silken Gratio wears,
Whose softness flatters to beguile,
Whose kindness but in voice is known,
Round whose dark mind's degraded throne,
Falsehood her doubly forked sting with serpent venom bears.
Of rich Lorenzo's pride;
He who in trilling arts excels—
Critic in flies, in flowers, in shells;
Which o'er his hollow heart preside;—
And shut his marble breast to sorrow's moving strain.
Which in misconduct's tortured ear,
Proclaims each pity-giving tear,
Which virtue's sorrowing heart bestows,
When folly leads her train of woes,
And scorpions lash the voluntary wrong.
Oh shade of Howard! still to thee,
The living muses wake their grateful strain—
Howard, to sorrow self-resigned,
Whose firm, undaunted, sleepless mind,
Embraced the extended family of pain;
For that to heaven he raised the expiring eye,
With that he deigned to live,—for that he dared to die.
Where pity's weeping floweret blows,
Pouring her balm of blessedness around,
Scenes where the sick in heart, and lost of hope are found?
Not for thy rank, nor wealth, thy deeds alone!
Deeds which the powerful heart of misery feels,
Deeds of thy secret soul she calls her own;
Deeds at whose touch the prison'd debtor smiles,
His dim eye lighted by his fervid prayer;
The blessing, which his agony beguiles,
Is poured on heaven FOR HIM whose great reward is there.
While scattered bounty through their pathway blooms,
More grateful are the breathings of thy love,
Than all the generous summer's rich perfumes,
These to the sense luxurious sweets impart;
Those come like incense to the fainting heart.
May rest her fang of misery here,
To me thy tearful smile will seem,
Like the young morning's dewy beam
Cheering the gloom with promise mild,
A foliage mid the desert wild,
A bark the desperate wretch to save,
Who struggles with the stronger wave;
A light like that the apostle knew,
When back his prison's portals flew,
And the soft touch of angels lay
On chains, that touch dissolved away.
A blessing sought, and sent and shed
On earth—when earthly hope is dead.
To charm and change the deeply venomed heart,
Give the fix'd bosom, cold as hardest steel,
To move, to warm, to soften, and to feel.
Rewarding each awaken'd sense
With the rich blessing of thy own Benevolence.
That this true philanthropist was among the most humble and self accusing of mankind, is evinced in his letter, written in positive rejection of the statue, that had been ordered for the purpose of commemorating his inestimamable services; in which letter, disclaiming all merit, he deprecates every tribute.
Howard was a man of sorrows, and thence devoted and sacrificed his life to the children of suffering.
Howard died of a fever, the infection of which was communicated by a dying individual, who requested to see him, and in complying with that request his own life was sacrificed.
William Phillips, Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts, at once modest and munificent, pre-eminent among the first in every deed of mercy. This true Samaritan some time since released all the debtors under close confinement within the walls of the County prison, by paying the amount of demands brought individually against them, by merciless or necessitous creditors.
| My Mind and its Thoughts, in Sketches, Fragments, and Essays | |