The Works of the Reverend and Learned Isaac Watts, D. D. Containing, besides his Sermons, and Essays on miscellaneous subjects, several additional pieces, Selected from his Manuscripts by the Rev. Dr. Jennings, and the Rev. Dr. Doddridge, in 1753: to which are prefixed, memoirs of the life of the author, compiled by the Rev. George Burder. In six volumes |
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LXXV.—THE REWARDS OF POESY. |
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 | The Works of the Reverend and Learned Isaac Watts, D. D. |  |
LXXV.—THE REWARDS OF POESY.
Damon, Thalia, Urania.DAMON.
Muse, 'tis enough that in the fairy bow'rs
My youth has lost a thousand sprightly hours,
Attending thy vagaries, in pursuit
Of painted blossoms or inchanted fruit.
Forbear to teize my riper age: 'Tis hard
To be a slave so long, and find so small reward.
THALIA.
Man, 'tis enough that in the books of fame
On brazen leaves the muse shall write thy name,
Illustrious as her own, and make thy years the same.
Fame with her silver trump shall spread the sound
Of Damon's verse, wide as the distant bound
Of British empire, or the world's vast round.
I see, I see from far the falling oars,
And flying sails that bear to western shores
Thy shining name; it shoots from sea to sea;
Envy pursues, but faints amidst the way.
In vision my prophetic tube descries
Behind five hundred years new ages rise,
Who read thy works with rapture in their eyes.
Cities unbuilt shall bless the lyric bard.
O glorious memory! O immense reward!
DAMON.
Ah flatt'ring muse! How fruitless and how fair
These visionary scenes and sounding air?
Fruitless and vain to me! Can noisy breath
Or fame's loud trumpet reach the courts of death?
I shall be stretch'd upon my earthy bed,
Unthinking dust, nor know the honours paid
To my surviving song. Thalia, say,
Have I no more to hope? Hast thou no more to pay?
THALIA.
Say, what had Horace, what had Homer more,
My favourite sons, whom men almost adore;
And youth in learned ranks for ever sings,
While perish'd heroes and forgotten kings
Have lost their names? 'Tis sov'reign wit has bought
This deathless glory: This the wise have thought
Prodigious recompence—
DAMON.
—Prodigious fools,
To think the hum and buz of paltry schools,
And awkward tones of boys are prizes meet
For Roman harmony and Grecian wit!
Rise from thy long repose, old Homer's ghost!
Horace arise! Are these the palms you boast
For your victorious verse? Great poets, tell,
Can echos of a name reward you well,
For labours so sublime? Or have you found
Praise make your slumbers sweeter in the ground?
THALIA.
Yes, their sweet slumbers, guarded by my wing,
Are lull'd and soften'd by th'eternal spring
Of bubbling praises from th'Aonian hill,
Whose branching streams divide a silver rill
To every kindred urn: And thine shall share
These purling blessings under hallow'd air:
The poets' dreams in death are still the muse's care.
DAMON.
Once, thou fair tempter of my heedless youth,
Once and by chance thy tropes have hit the truth;
Praise is but empty air, a purling stream,
Poets are paid with bubbles in a dream.
Hast thou no songs to entertain thy dead?
No phantom-lights to glimmer round my shade?
THALIA.
Believe me, mortal, where thy relics sleep,
My nightingales shall tuneful vigils keep,
And cheer thy silent tomb: The glow-worm shine
With evening lamp, to mark which earth is thine:
While midnight fairies tripping round thy bed,
Collect a moon-beam glory for thy head.
Fair hyacinths thy hilloc shall adorn,
And living ivy creep about thy urn:
625
Their leafy shade o'er the green turf below,
And borrow life from thee to crown some poet's brow.
DAMON.
Muse, thy last blessings sink below the first;
Ah wretched trifler! To array my dust
In thy green flow'ry forms, and think the payment just!
Poor is my gain should nations join to praise;
And now must chirping birds reward my lays?
What! shall the travels of my soul be paid
With glow-worm light, and with a leafy shade,
Violets and creeping ivies? Is this all
The muse can promise, or the poet call
His glorious hope and joy?—
Are these the honours of thy favourite sons,
To have their flesh, their limbs, their mould'ring bones
Fatten the glebe to make a laurel grow,
Which the foul carcase of a dog might do,
Or any vile manure? Away, be gone;
Tempt me no more: I now renounce thy throne:
My indignation swells. Here, fetch me fire,
Bring me my odes, the labours of the lyre;
I doom them all to ashes.—
URANIA.
Rash man, restrain thy wrath, these odes are mine;
Small is thy right in gifts so much divine.
Was it thy skill that to a Saviour's name
Strung David's harp, and drew th'illustrious theme
From smoking altars and a bleeding Lamb?
Who form'd thy sounding shell? Who fix'd the strings,
Or taught thy hand to play eternal things?
Was't not my aid that rais'd thy notes so high?
And they must live till time and nature die.
Here heav'n and virtue reign: Here joy and love
Tune the retir'd devotion of the grove,
And train up mortals for the thrones above.
Sinners shall start, and, struck with dread divine,
Shrink from the vengeance of some flaming line,
Shall melt in trickling woes for follies past;
Yet all amidst their piercing sorrows taste
The sweets of pious hope: Emanuel's blood
Flows in the verse, and seals the pardon good.
Salvation triumphs here, and heals the smart
Of wounded conscience and a breaking heart.
Youth shall learn temp'rance from these hallow'd strains,
Shall bind their passions in harmonious chains;
And virgins learn to love with cautious fear,
Nor virtue needs her guard of blushes here.
Matrons, grown reverend in their silver hairs,
Sooth the sad memory of their ancient cares
With these soft hymns; while on their trembling knee
Sits their young offspring of the fourth degree
With list'ning wonder, till their infant tongue
Stammers and lisps, and learns th'immortal song,
And lays up the fair lesson to repeat
To the fourth distant age, when sitting round their feet.
Small is thy right in gifts so much divine.
Was it thy skill that to a Saviour's name
Strung David's harp, and drew th'illustrious theme
From smoking altars and a bleeding Lamb?
Who form'd thy sounding shell? Who fix'd the strings,
Or taught thy hand to play eternal things?
Was't not my aid that rais'd thy notes so high?
And they must live till time and nature die.
Here heav'n and virtue reign: Here joy and love
Tune the retir'd devotion of the grove,
And train up mortals for the thrones above.
Sinners shall start, and, struck with dread divine,
Shrink from the vengeance of some flaming line,
Shall melt in trickling woes for follies past;
Yet all amidst their piercing sorrows taste
The sweets of pious hope: Emanuel's blood
Flows in the verse, and seals the pardon good.
Salvation triumphs here, and heals the smart
Of wounded conscience and a breaking heart.
Youth shall learn temp'rance from these hallow'd strains,
Shall bind their passions in harmonious chains;
And virgins learn to love with cautious fear,
Nor virtue needs her guard of blushes here.
Matrons, grown reverend in their silver hairs,
Sooth the sad memory of their ancient cares
With these soft hymns; while on their trembling knee
Sits their young offspring of the fourth degree
With list'ning wonder, till their infant tongue
Stammers and lisps, and learns th'immortal song,
And lays up the fair lesson to repeat
To the fourth distant age, when sitting round their feet.
Each heav'n-born heart shall choose a favourite ode
To bear their morning homage to their God,
And pay their nightly vows. These sacred themes
Inspire the pillow with ethereal dreams:
And oft amidst the burdens of the day
Some devout couplet wings the soul away,
Forgetful of this globe: Adieu, the cares
Of mortal life! Adieu, the sins, the snares!
She talks with angels, and walks o'er the stars.
Amidst th'exalted raptures of the lyre
O'erwhelm'd with bliss, shall aged saints expire,
And mix their notes at once with some celestial choir.
To bear their morning homage to their God,
And pay their nightly vows. These sacred themes
Inspire the pillow with ethereal dreams:
And oft amidst the burdens of the day
Some devout couplet wings the soul away,
Forgetful of this globe: Adieu, the cares
Of mortal life! Adieu, the sins, the snares!
She talks with angels, and walks o'er the stars.
Amidst th'exalted raptures of the lyre
O'erwhelm'd with bliss, shall aged saints expire,
And mix their notes at once with some celestial choir.
DAMON.
What holy sounds are these? What strains divine?
Is it thy voice, O blest Urania, thine?
Enough: I claim no more. My toils are paid,
My midnight-lamp, and my o'er-labour'd head,
My early sighs for thy propitious pow'r,
And my wing'd zeal to seize the lyric hour:
Thy words reward them all. And when I die,
May the great Ruler of the rolling sky
Give thy predictions birth, with blessings from his eye.
I lay my flesh to rest, with heart resign'd
And smiling hope. Arise, my deathless mind,
Ascend, where all the blissful passions flow
In sweeter numbers; and let mortals know,
Urania leaves these odes to cheer their toils below.
| The Works of the Reverend and Learned Isaac Watts, D. D. | |