The works of John Dryden Illustrated with notes, historical, critical, and explanatory, and a life of the author, by Sir Walter Scott |
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| III. | EPISTLE THE THIRD. TO MY HONOURED FRIEND DR. CHARLETON, ON HIS LEARNED AND USEFUL WORKS,
BUT MORE PARTICULARLY HIS TREATISE OF STONEHENGE, BY HIM RESTORED TO THE TRUE FOUNDER. |
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 | The works of John Dryden |  |
12
EPISTLE THE THIRD. TO MY HONOURED FRIEND DR. CHARLETON, ON HIS LEARNED AND USEFUL WORKS, BUT MORE PARTICULARLY HIS TREATISE OF STONEHENGE, BY HIM RESTORED TO THE TRUE FOUNDER.
14
The longest tyranny that ever swayed,
Was that wherein our ancestors betrayed
Their free-born reason to the Stagyrite,
And made his torch their universal light.
So truth, while only one supplied the state,
Grew scarce, and dear, and yet sophisticate.
Still it was bought, like emp'ric wares, or charms,
Hard words sealed up with Aristotle's arms.
Columbus was the first that shook his throne,
And found a temperate in a torrid zone:
The feverish air, fanned by a cooling breeze;
The fruitful vales, set round with shady trees;
And guiltless men, who danced away their time,
Fresh as their groves, and happy as their clime.
Had we still paid that homage to a name,
Which only God and nature justly claim,
The western seas had been our utmost bound,
Where poets still might dream the sun was drowned;
And all the stars, that shine in southern skies,
Had been admired by none but savage eyes.
Was that wherein our ancestors betrayed
Their free-born reason to the Stagyrite,
And made his torch their universal light.
So truth, while only one supplied the state,
Grew scarce, and dear, and yet sophisticate.
Still it was bought, like emp'ric wares, or charms,
Hard words sealed up with Aristotle's arms.
Columbus was the first that shook his throne,
And found a temperate in a torrid zone:
The feverish air, fanned by a cooling breeze;
The fruitful vales, set round with shady trees;
And guiltless men, who danced away their time,
Fresh as their groves, and happy as their clime.
Had we still paid that homage to a name,
Which only God and nature justly claim,
The western seas had been our utmost bound,
Where poets still might dream the sun was drowned;
And all the stars, that shine in southern skies,
Had been admired by none but savage eyes.
15
Among the assertors of free reason's claim,
Our nation's not the least in worth or fame.
The world to Bacon does not only owe
Its present knowledge, but its future too.
Gilbert shall live, till loadstones cease to draw,
Or British fleets the boundless ocean awe.
And noble Boyle, not less in nature seen,
Than his great brother, read in states and men.
The circling streams, once thought but pools, of blood,
(Whether life's fuel, or the body's food,)
From dark oblivion Harvey's name shall save;
While Ent keeps all the honour that he gave.
Nor are you, learned friend, the least renowned;
Whose fame, not circumscribed with English ground,
Flies like the nimble journeys of the light,
And is, like that, unspent too in its flight.
Whatever truths have been, by art or chance,
Redeemed from error, or from ignorance,
Thin in their authors, like rich veins of ore,
Your works unite, and still discover more.
Such is the healing virtue of your pen,
To perfect cures on books, as well as men.
Nor is this work the least; you well may give
To men new vigour, who make stones to live.
Through you, the Danes, their short dominion lost,
A longer conquest than the Saxons boast.
Stonehenge, once thought a temple, you have found
A throne, where kings, our earthly gods, were crowned;
Where by their wondering subjects they were seen,
Joyed with their stature, and their princely mien.
Our sovereign here above the rest might stand,
And here be chose again to rule the land.
Our nation's not the least in worth or fame.
The world to Bacon does not only owe
Its present knowledge, but its future too.
Gilbert shall live, till loadstones cease to draw,
Or British fleets the boundless ocean awe.
And noble Boyle, not less in nature seen,
Than his great brother, read in states and men.
The circling streams, once thought but pools, of blood,
(Whether life's fuel, or the body's food,)
From dark oblivion Harvey's name shall save;
While Ent keeps all the honour that he gave.
16
Whose fame, not circumscribed with English ground,
Flies like the nimble journeys of the light,
And is, like that, unspent too in its flight.
Whatever truths have been, by art or chance,
Redeemed from error, or from ignorance,
Thin in their authors, like rich veins of ore,
Your works unite, and still discover more.
Such is the healing virtue of your pen,
To perfect cures on books, as well as men.
Nor is this work the least; you well may give
To men new vigour, who make stones to live.
Through you, the Danes, their short dominion lost,
A longer conquest than the Saxons boast.
Stonehenge, once thought a temple, you have found
A throne, where kings, our earthly gods, were crowned;
Where by their wondering subjects they were seen,
Joyed with their stature, and their princely mien.
17
And here be chose again to rule the land.
These ruins sheltered once his sacred head,
When he from Wor'ster's fatal battle fled;
Watched by the genius of this royal place,
And mighty visions of the Danish race.
His refuge then was for a temple shown;
But, he restored, 'tis now become a throne.
When he from Wor'ster's fatal battle fled;
Watched by the genius of this royal place,
And mighty visions of the Danish race.
His refuge then was for a temple shown;
But, he restored, 'tis now become a throne.
| The works of John Dryden | |