 | The poetical works |  |
BOOK I.
ODE I. PREFACE.
I
On yonder verdant hillock laid,Where oaks and elms, a friendly shade,
O'erlook the falling stream,
O master of the Latin lyre,
Awhile with thee will I retire
From summer's noontide beam.
II
And lo, within my lonely bower,The industrious bee from many a flower
Collects her balmy dews:
“For me,” she sings, “the gems are born,
For me their silken robe adorn,
Their fragrant breath diffuse.”
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III
Sweet murmurer! may no rude stormThis hospitable scene deform,
Nor check thy gladsome toils;
Still may the buds unsullied spring,
Still showers and sunshine court thy wing
To these ambrosial spoils.
IV
Nor shall my Muse hereafter failHer fellow labourer thee to hail;
And lucky be the strains!
For long ago did Nature frame
Your seasons and your arts the same,
Your pleasures and your pains.
V
Like thee, in lowly, sylvan scenes,On river banks and flowery greens
My Muse delighted plays;
Nor through the desert of the air,
Though swans or eagles triumph there,
With fond ambition strays.
VI
Nor where the boding raven chaunts,Nor near the owl's unhallow'd haunts
Will she her cares employ;
But flies from ruins and from tombs,
From Superstition's horrid glooms,
To day-light and to joy.
VII
Nor will she tempt the barren waste;Nor deigns the lurking strength to taste
Of any noxious thing;
But leaves with scorn to Envy's use
The insipid nightshade's baneful juice,
The nettle's sordid sting.
VIII
From all which Nature fairest knows,The vernal blooms, the summer rose,
She draws her blameless wealth:
And, when the generous task is done,
She consecrates a double boon,
To Pleasure and to Health.
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ODE XVI. TO CALEB HARDINGE, M.D.
I
With sordid floods the wintry UrnHath stain'd fair Richmond's level green:
Her naked hill the Dryads mourn,
No longer a poetic scene.
No longer there thy raptur'd eye
The beauteous forms of earth or sky
Surveys, as in their Author's mind:
And London shelters from the year
Those whom thy social hours to share
The Attic Muse design'd.
II
From Hampstead's airy summit meHer guest the city shall behold,
What day the people's stern decree
To unbelieving kings is told,
When common men (the dread of fame)
Adjudg'd as one of evil name,
Before the sun, the anointed head.
Then seek thou too the pious town,
With no unworthy cares to crown
That evening's awful shade.
III
Deem not I call thee to deploreThe sacred martyr of the day,
By fast and penitential lore
To purge our ancient guilt away.
For this, on humble faith I rest
That still our advocate, the priest,
From heavenly wrath will save the land:
Nor ask what rites our pardon gain,
Nor how his potent sounds restrain
The thunderer's lifted hand.
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IV
No, Hardinge: peace to church and state!That evening, let the Muse give law:
While I anew the theme relate
Which my first youth enamour'd saw.
Then will I oft explore thy thought,
What to reject which Locke hath taught,
What to pursue in Virgil's lay:
Till hope ascends to loftiest things,
Nor envies demagogues or kings
Their frail and vulgar sway.
V
O vers'd in all the human frame,Lead thou where'er my labour lies,
And English fancy's eager flame
To Grecian purity chastise:
While hand in hand, at Wisdom's shrine,
Beauty with truth I strive to join,
And grave assent with glad applause;
To paint the story of the soul,
And Plato's visions to control
By Verulamian laws.
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