 | Poems |  |
Mr. HOLMAN.
Possessing a clear and a capable head,
With the mien of a gentleman, gay and well-bred;
See Holman quit Science, who calls veni Domine,
To embrace, with young vigour, the charms of Melpomene.
From the fam'd banks of Isis this eleve has stray'd,
To pay his devoirs to the tragical maid;
To forego the dull page of the classical schools,
And enlist in the Drama, and bend to its rules;
Tho' sapient Philosophy thrice call'd his name,
He shut up his ears, and walk'd onward to Fame;
The deeds of romance fill'd a niche in his brain,
And Hesiod and Eschylus pleaded in vain:
Theology wept o'er his youthful endeavour,
As he left her ador'd Alma Mater for ever.
When Worth call'd him forth to the paths of Contrition,
He experienc'd the joys and the ills of Ambition;
The phantoms of Honour crept round to seduce him,
The offspring of Envy to crush and traduce him:
To the first all the fire of youth gave the rein,
To the last all the traits of the man spoke disdain.
With the mien of a gentleman, gay and well-bred;
See Holman quit Science, who calls veni Domine,
To embrace, with young vigour, the charms of Melpomene.
From the fam'd banks of Isis this eleve has stray'd,
To pay his devoirs to the tragical maid;
To forego the dull page of the classical schools,
And enlist in the Drama, and bend to its rules;
Tho' sapient Philosophy thrice call'd his name,
He shut up his ears, and walk'd onward to Fame;
132
And Hesiod and Eschylus pleaded in vain:
Theology wept o'er his youthful endeavour,
As he left her ador'd Alma Mater for ever.
When Worth call'd him forth to the paths of Contrition,
He experienc'd the joys and the ills of Ambition;
The phantoms of Honour crept round to seduce him,
The offspring of Envy to crush and traduce him:
To the first all the fire of youth gave the rein,
To the last all the traits of the man spoke disdain.
Would he seek for the avenues leading to glory,
That his name might irradiate a theatric story;
He should walk in the path of judicious gradation,
Arranging his passion in subordination:
But the toil will be great, as his genius is such,
Which impels him to give, or too little, or much;
'Tis shackled by obstacles, monstrous, tho' bold,
Intolerant heat, and unnatural cold;
For there are who possess contradictory souls,
High-fraught with the temper of opposite poles.
Bid him seek gentle Nature, unravel her schemes,
For the path of Propriety severs extremes:
She is young, gay, and beautiful, constant, and kind:
Bid him list to her lays, and illumine his mind:
No schismatic dogmas will fall from her tongue,
Impotently grave, or vindictively wrong.
The eloquent lessons that Nature will sing,
Refresh like the Zephyrs, and glad like the Spring.—
When Roscius first honour'd old Albion's stage,
To dignify mirth, and give reason to rage;
He sought for the nymph, in her sacred cell,
To marshall his thought, and be bound by her spell:
And the canons she taught for the progress of art,
He wrote on the tablets that liv'd in his heart.
She holds up the Stagyrite, Terence, and Plautus,
To regulate errors that Custom had brought us.
There he stole like young Troilus every night,
And ravag'd her treasures, and fed on delight;
He utter'd his plaints at her roseate throne,
'Till he melted the nymph, and his woes were her own.
That his name might irradiate a theatric story;
He should walk in the path of judicious gradation,
Arranging his passion in subordination:
But the toil will be great, as his genius is such,
Which impels him to give, or too little, or much;
'Tis shackled by obstacles, monstrous, tho' bold,
Intolerant heat, and unnatural cold;
For there are who possess contradictory souls,
High-fraught with the temper of opposite poles.
Bid him seek gentle Nature, unravel her schemes,
For the path of Propriety severs extremes:
She is young, gay, and beautiful, constant, and kind:
Bid him list to her lays, and illumine his mind:
No schismatic dogmas will fall from her tongue,
Impotently grave, or vindictively wrong.
The eloquent lessons that Nature will sing,
Refresh like the Zephyrs, and glad like the Spring.—
133
To dignify mirth, and give reason to rage;
He sought for the nymph, in her sacred cell,
To marshall his thought, and be bound by her spell:
And the canons she taught for the progress of art,
He wrote on the tablets that liv'd in his heart.
She holds up the Stagyrite, Terence, and Plautus,
To regulate errors that Custom had brought us.
There he stole like young Troilus every night,
And ravag'd her treasures, and fed on delight;
He utter'd his plaints at her roseate throne,
'Till he melted the nymph, and his woes were her own.
His words flow too quick to administer pleasure;
In adagio time, and precipitate measure:
Like a torrent that rushes adown a steep hill,
'Till the breath is no longer obedient to skill;
Now it thunders, then roars, as it dashes the stones,
Then recedes from the ear, and we lose half its tones
By degrees; 'till the springs of its violence fail,
And its murmurs decay, and it dies in the vale.
In adagio time, and precipitate measure:
Like a torrent that rushes adown a steep hill,
'Till the breath is no longer obedient to skill;
Now it thunders, then roars, as it dashes the stones,
Then recedes from the ear, and we lose half its tones
By degrees; 'till the springs of its violence fail,
And its murmurs decay, and it dies in the vale.
The good-natur'd critic, with pain, takes offence,
When his natural warmth mars his natural sense;
But the sword eats the scabbard—'tis fairly presum'd,
That the seeds of his judgment by heat are consum'd;
But Time an amendment will work by his rigour,
And temper the force of this overstrain'd vigour;
But the fault is a good one, though yet 'tis a fault,
That leads him on Reason to make an assault.
For a juvenile actor, whose method's too tame,
Will scarce ever mount to the regions of Fame;
In the humaniz'd system e'en casuists confess,
That a fire is harder to raise than suppress:
This want of due force sicklies Middleton's deeds;
Whom Genius approves, and whom Modesty leads.
When his natural warmth mars his natural sense;
But the sword eats the scabbard—'tis fairly presum'd,
That the seeds of his judgment by heat are consum'd;
But Time an amendment will work by his rigour,
And temper the force of this overstrain'd vigour;
134
That leads him on Reason to make an assault.
For a juvenile actor, whose method's too tame,
Will scarce ever mount to the regions of Fame;
In the humaniz'd system e'en casuists confess,
That a fire is harder to raise than suppress:
This want of due force sicklies Middleton's deeds;
Whom Genius approves, and whom Modesty leads.
It pains me to hear a vile animal quote,
Some poignant expressions that Shakespeare has wrote;
And deliver the text with as formal an air,
As the dull, drawling tone of a methodist prayer:
While Folly attends to the vapid oration,
And Madness mistakes for an apt inspiration.—
There are who Thalia's best heroes engage,
Whose villanous efforts but sully the stage;
With arrogant minds, in presumption o'er-weening,
Rant, laugh, dance, and sing, without—merit or meaning:
Such parrots deny human wit as a master,
For their merit consists in who chatters the faster.
Some poignant expressions that Shakespeare has wrote;
And deliver the text with as formal an air,
As the dull, drawling tone of a methodist prayer:
135
And Madness mistakes for an apt inspiration.—
There are who Thalia's best heroes engage,
Whose villanous efforts but sully the stage;
With arrogant minds, in presumption o'er-weening,
Rant, laugh, dance, and sing, without—merit or meaning:
Such parrots deny human wit as a master,
For their merit consists in who chatters the faster.
This youth should set bounds to his tragic descanting,
Which sometimes approaches the precincts of ranting:
In gentleman juniors, adjust his proud walk;
And abandon the stare, and Titanian stalk.
That action which Nature involves in her plan,
When dignified Leon's assuming the man,
Would be awkward and stiff in Lothario the rover,
Or volatile Belmont, or Romeo the lover.
A part over-strain'd, damns the aims of Expression,
And gives much offence to Delight and Discretion:
Erecting the body, and bridling the head
In all situations, is vile and ill-bred;
Tis torturing the vertebræ bone of his back,
Till the joints creak with pain, and integuments crack.
But bid him be cautious of too much repentance,
Nor do aught beyond what's prescrib'd by this sentence;
Nor sink in the strife to do right with avidity,
From the heights of young rage—to the vale of torpidity;
Like Kemble with classical trifles affected,
Who fine-draws a point 'till the sense is bisected.
Which sometimes approaches the precincts of ranting:
In gentleman juniors, adjust his proud walk;
And abandon the stare, and Titanian stalk.
That action which Nature involves in her plan,
When dignified Leon's assuming the man,
Would be awkward and stiff in Lothario the rover,
Or volatile Belmont, or Romeo the lover.
A part over-strain'd, damns the aims of Expression,
And gives much offence to Delight and Discretion:
Erecting the body, and bridling the head
In all situations, is vile and ill-bred;
Tis torturing the vertebræ bone of his back,
Till the joints creak with pain, and integuments crack.
But bid him be cautious of too much repentance,
Nor do aught beyond what's prescrib'd by this sentence;
Nor sink in the strife to do right with avidity,
From the heights of young rage—to the vale of torpidity;
Like Kemble with classical trifles affected,
Who fine-draws a point 'till the sense is bisected.
136
I would guide him to Truth, but the maid is destroy'd,
And but few mourn her fate, who so many annoy'd:
The meek abject nymph was by myriads assail'd,
And, wounded, she droop'd, undeplor'd and unwail'd;
Resign'd to high Heaven, she gave up her breath,
And fell, like Rome's Cæsar—illustrious in death.
And but few mourn her fate, who so many annoy'd:
The meek abject nymph was by myriads assail'd,
And, wounded, she droop'd, undeplor'd and unwail'd;
Resign'd to high Heaven, she gave up her breath,
And fell, like Rome's Cæsar—illustrious in death.
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