QUOTATIONS
CHAUCER TO TENNYSON.
WITH COPIOUS INDEXES:
50; STT EJECTS, 435;
, 13,6OO.
BY
S. AUSTIN ALLIBONE,
AUTHOR OF "A CRITICAL DICTIONARY OF ENGLISH I4TERATUKB AND BRITSSK AND AMERICAN AUTHORS.'
"Back'd his opinion with quotations." PRIOR.
PHILADELPHIA:
J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY.
1891.
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1873, by
J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO.,
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.
TO
THE VENERABLE
HORACE BINNEY, LL.D.,
THE HEAD OF THE BAR IN THE UNITED STATES,*
STILL IN THE FULL POSSESSION OF HIS VIGOROUS AND WELL-CULTIVATED
INTELLECT,
IN HIS NINETY-FOURTH YEAR,
I DEDICATE THIS VOLUME,
IN LASTING REMEMBRANCE OF THE INTEREST WHICH HE HAS LONG TAKEN
IN THE LITERARY LABORS OF HIS FRIEND,
S. AUSTIN ALLIBONE. .
PHILADELPHIA, Feb. 8, 1873.
* By the verdict of Hon. CHARLES SUMNER, LL.D., of the Boston Bar, and Hon. WILLIAM M. EVARTS, LL.T''
of the New York Bar, verbally expressed to the writer.
PREFACE.
SHORTLY after the inception of my project of a DICTIONARY OF AUTHORS,
I determined, if life and health were continued, to supplement that work by a
copious selection of QUOTATIONS from some of the works of the authors re-
corded in that register. The POETICAL QUOTATIONS are now offered to the
public ; and are to be followed by PROSE QUOTATIONS : the three DICTIONARIES
AUTHORS, POETRY, PROSE representing and partly constituting a literature
marvellous for its extent, variety, and value. The advantages of well-arranged
and easily-consulted extracts from the best writings of the best authors are
too obvious to need rehearsal ; and the alphabetical distribution of the names
of authors, and copious Indexes of Authors, Subjects, and First Lines, carry
with them their own recommendation. A few words may be devoted to severa
of the most prominent subjects :
I. "AUTHORS." Opinions and criticisms upon 116 writers, by 56 authors,
are quoted. The writers commented upon are: Addison, Ariosto, Aristotle,
Bacon, Berkeley, Boileau, Boyle, Broome, Budgell, Burgess, Burnet, Burns,.
Cartesius, Cato, Cervantes, Chatterton, Chaucer, Gibber, Cicero, Coleridge,
Condorcet, Congreve, Corneille, Cowley, Crabbe, Craggs, Crashaw, Dante
Defoe, Denham, Dennis, Dionysius, Dryden, Duck, D'Urfey, Epictetus,
Erasmus, Etherege, Eusden, Evans, Flecknoe, Fletcher, Franklin, Galileo.
Gay, Granville, Harvey, Heylin, Hoadly, Hobbes, Homer, Horace, Jonson,
Knags, Lamb, Lee, Locke, Longinus, Lopez, Lucan, Maevius, Martial, Martyn,
Milbourn, Milton, Moliere, Moore, More, Newcastle, Newton, Ogilby, Ovid,
Paine, Parnell, Petrarch, Pindar, Plato, Plutarch, Pope, Quarles, Rabelais,
Racine, Raleigh, Ralph, Rochefoucauld, Roscommon, Rousseau, Rowe, Saint-
Andre, Sappho, Scarlatti, Scott, Settle, Shadwell, Shakspeare, Sheridan, Short,
Sidney, Skelton, Sloane, Socrates, Solon, Spenser, Swift, Theobald, Theo-
critus, Thomson, Vida, Virgil, Voiture, Waller, Walton, Withers, Wycherly,
Young, and Zoilus. The commentators are: Addison, Akenside, Basse,
Blackmore, Browning, Brydges, Bulwer, Byron, Campbell, Canning, Coleridge
Collins, Cowley, Cowper, Creech, Denham, Dryden, Elliott, Fenton, Gay,
Granville, Hall, Harte, Henley, Hill, Holmes, Horace, Johnson, Jonson, Lamb^
Lyttelton, Milton, Moore, Parnell, Philips, Pope, Prior, Raleigh, Roscommon,
Sandys, Savage, Shakspeare, Sheffield, Shelley, Shenstone, Sydney Smith,
Southey, Spenser, Swift, Thomson, Tickell, Waller, Wolcott, Wordsworth, and
Young.
(xiii)
xiv PREFACE.
These annotations are fitly supplemented by the articles "AUTHORSHIP" and
"CRITICISM" (under which last will be found 170 quotations).
II. "MORNING." One of the finest compositions in the writings of the late
Daniel Webster is a letter on the morning, written to Mrs. J. W. Paige, and
dated at Richmond, April 29, five o'clock A.M., 1847. (See Private Corre-
spondence of Daniel Webster, 1857, ii. 240.) "Beautiful descriptions of the
'morning' abound in all languages. . . . Milton has fine descriptions of morning,
but not so many as Shakespeare, from whose writings pages of the most beautiful
images, all founded on the glory of the morning, might be filled," etc. Under
this title 152 extracts, from 38 authors, will be found.
III. " RIVERS." In his very interesting Recollections of Past Life (1872,
chapter ii.), Sir Henry Holland remarks, " Much more I could say of rivers,
as giving to travel the greatest charm of landscape, while affording lessons in
geology and physical geography invaluable to science. Even the simple brook,
followed step by step to its course, illustrates, in the windings of its channel,
its depths and deposits, and the sections which its banks disclose, many of the
grandest phenomena and conclusions of geology. In the poetry of every age
the flow of river-waters has been a favourite theme, one symbol of the life and
destinies of man." The reader will find 94 quotations under this head.
"BIRDS" are celebrated in 260 passages by 45 authors; "LAW" contains
194, "LOVE" 565, "POLITICS" 157, "SLEEP" 242, "WOMAN" 291, and
"YOUTH" 227 quotations. In the whole (as stated on the title-page) 435
subjects are illustrated, by 550 authors, in 13,600 quotations, which may be
read in course, or consulted separately, as occasion serves.
S. AUSTIN ALLIBONE.
, February 8, 1873.
DICTIONARY
OF
POETICAL QUOTATION5
ABSENCE.
Since she must go, and I must mourn, come
night,
Environ me with darkness wi:ilst I \v
Don
Winds murmur'd through the ar short
delay
And fountains o'er their pebbles chid your
stay:
hey cease to
n at your return.
DRYDEN.
uirn with vain devotion
DRYDEN.
ce, and condemn'd to
1 unthank'd reprieve.
DRYDEN.
hour- for months, and days for
e is an age.
DRYDEN: Amphytrion.
iends behold. : n d pity'd him in vain,
nat advice can ease a lover's pain?
dient they could find,
>ave the fortu^, if not cure the mind.
DRYDEN: Fables.
ence from h mother oft he'll mourn,
v ith his eyes.loofc w ishes to return.
I>R>-DEN: Juvenal, Sat. II.
Where'er I roam, whatever realms to see,
My heart, unrravell'd, fondly turns to the
Still to my brother turns, with ceaseless ]
And drags at each remove a lengthening
GOLDSMITH : Travt
Short absence hurt him m
ide his wound far greater than be
Absence not long enough to root out quite
All love, increases love at second sight.
THOMAS MAY : Henry If.
Short retirement urges sweet return.
MlLT(
Oh ! couldst thou but know
With what a deep devotedness of woe
I wept thy absence, o'er and o'er again
Thinking of thee, still thee, till though'
pain,
And memory, like a drop that night and d
Falls cold and ceaseless, wore my heart :,
MOORE: Lalla Roo,
Ye flowers that droop, forsaken by the spr
Ye birds that, left by summer, cease to sinj,,
Ye trees that fade, when autumn heats ren
Say, is not absence death to those who lov
Poi
As some sad turtle his lost love deplores,
Thus far from Delia to the winds I mourn.
Alike unheard, unpitied, and forlorn.
Fate some future bard shall join
In sad similitude of griefs to mine ;
Condemn'd whole years in absence to depl* . ,
And image charms he must behold no more.
POPE: Elois,.
07)
i8
ABSENCE. A C TORS. AD VERSITY.
In spring the fields, in autumn hills I love;
At morn the plains, at noon the shady grove;
But Delia always; absent from her sight,
Nor plains at morn, nor groves at noon delight.
POPE: Pastorals.
In vain you tell your parting lover
You wish fair winds may waft him over:
Alas ! what winds can happy prove,
That bear me far from what I love ?
PRIOR.
I charge thee loiter not, but haste to bless me :
Think with what eager hopes, what rage, I burn,
For every tedious moment how I mourn :
Think how I call thee cruel for thy stay,
And break my heart with grief for thy delay.
ROWE.
What! keep a week away? seven days and
nights ?
Eightscore eight hours? and lovers' absent
hours,
More tedious than the dial eightscore times?
Oh, weary reckoning!
SHAKSPEARE.
O thou that dost inhabit in my breast,
i so long tenantless;
-owing ruinous, the building fall,
10 memory of what it was!
me with thy presence, Sylvia;
' ntle nymph, cherish thy forlorn swain.
SHAKSPEARE.
;m forced thus to absent myself
il I love, I shall contrive some means,
friendly intervals, to visit thee.
SOUTHERN: Spartan Dame.
ing my love, I go from place to place,
a young fawn that late hath lost the
hind ;
ek each where, where last I saw her face,
iose image yet I carry fresh in mind.
SPENSER.
I did leave the presence of my love,
iy long weary days I have out-worn,
\ny nights that slowly seem'd to move
Their sad protract from evening until morn.
SPENSKR.
For since mine eye your joyous sight did miss,
My cheerful day is turn'd to cheerless night.
SPENSER,
ACTORS.
One tragic sentence if I dare deride,
Which Betterton's grave action dignified;
Or well-mouth'd Booth with emphasis pro-
claims,
Though but perhaps a muster-roll of names.
POPE.
Is it not monstrous that this player here,
But in a fiction, in a dream of passion,
Could force his soul so to his own conceit,
That, from her working, all his visage wann'd.'
SHAKSPEARF.
ADVERSITY.
The gods in bounty work up storms about us,
That give mankind occasion to exert
Their hidden strength, and throw out into prac-
tice
Virtues which shun the day.
ADDISON.
The rugged metal of the mine
Must burn before its surface shine;
But plunged within the furnace flame,
It bends and melts though still the same.
BYRON: Giaour.
By adversity are wrought
The greatest works of admiration,
And all the fair examples of renown
Out of distress and misery are gr
DANIEL: On the Earl c. :>n.
Some souls wi
Grow hard and stiffen with adversitv
DAT
Aromatic plants bestow
No spicy fragrance while they grow;
But, crush'd or trodden to tli
Diffuse their balmy sheets around.
By how much from tin
Strongest of mortnl men.
To lowest pitch of abject fort
The scene of beauty and del:
No roses bloom upon my fading < '
No laughing graces want" 1 '
But haggard Grief, lean
And pining Discontent, a ri "
Dwell on my brow, all ) '
AD VICE. AFFE CTA TION. AFFLICTION.
Some, the prevailing malice of the great
(Unhappy men!) or adverse fate
Sunk deep into the gulfs of an afflicted state.
ROSCOMMON.
Cold news for me :
Thus are my blossoms blasted in the bud,
And caterpillars eat my leaves away.
SHAKSPEARE.
Sweet are the uses of adversity;
Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head :
And this our life, exempt from public haunt,
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running
brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in everything.
SHAKSPEARE.
Let me embrace these sour adversities;
For wise men say it is the wisest course.
SHAKSPEARE.
His overthrow heap'd happiness upon him ;
For then, and not till then, he felt himself,
And found the blessedness of being little.
SHAKSPEARE.
ADVICE.
Thou, heedful of advice, secure proceed ;
My praise the precept is, be thine the deed.
POPE.
Where's the man who counsel can bestow,
Unbiass'd or by favour or by spite ;
Not dully prepossess'd, nor blindly right ?
POPE.
Fear not the anger of the wise to raise ;
Those best can bear reproof who merit praise.
POPE.
In vain Thalestris with reproach assails ;
For who can move, when fair Belinda fails ?
POPE.
I find, quoth Mat, reproof is vain !
Who first offend will first complain.
PRIOR.
A wretched soul, bruised with adversity,
We bid be quiet, when we hear it cry ;
But were we burden'd with like weight of pain,
As much, or more, we should ourselves com-
plain.
SHAKSPEARE.
Men
Can counsel, and give comfort to that L;
Which they themselves not feel; but ta c -'ing it,
Their counsel turns to passion, which bt
Would give preceptial medicine to rage :
Fetter strong madness in a silken thread,
Charm ache with air, and agony with w
SHAKSPEARE.
Direct not him whose way himself will choose ;
'Tis breath thou lack'st, and that breath wilt
thou lose.
SHAKSPEA
Mishaps are master'd by advice discreet,
And counsel mitigates the greatest smart.
SPENSER.
AFFECTATION.
There affectation, with a sickly mien,
Shows in her cheeks the roses of eighteen ,
Practised to lisp and hang the head aside,
Faints into airs, and languishes with pride.
AFFLICTION.
In this wild world the fondest and the be.
Are the most tried, most troubled, and distr
CRAI
We bear it calmly, though a ponderous \v< .
And still adore the hand that gives the blo\v.
POMI
Heaven is not always angry when He stril
But most chastises those whom most He 1'
POMFRM.
The good are better made by ill,
As odours crushed are sweeter still.
ROGERS : Jacqu
Affliction is enamour'd of thy parts,
And thou art wedded to calamity.
SHAKSPEAR .
Henceforth I'll bear *
Affliction till it do cry out itself,
Enough, enough, and die.
SHAKSPEA i
Affliction is the good man's shining scene ;
Prosperity conceals his brightest ray ;
As night to stars, woe lustre gives to man.
YOUNGS Night TJicnghts.
20
AGE.
AGE.
Why shouldst them try to hide thyself in youth ?
Impartial Proserpine beholds the truth ;
And laughing at so vain and fond a task,
Will strip thy hoary noddle of its mask.
ADDISON.
We'll mutually forget
The warmth of youth and frowardness of age.
ADDISON.
Young men soon give, and soon forget affronts ;
Old age is slow in both.
ADDISON: Cato.
Now wasting years my former strength confound,
And added woes have bow'd me to the ground :
Yet by the stubble you may guess the grain,
And mark the ruins of no common man.
BROOME.
What is the worst of woes that wait on age ?
What stamps the wrinkle deeper on the brow ?
To view each loved one blotted from life's page,
Atri b e a lone on earth as I am now.
ore the Chastener humbly let me bow
r hearts divided, and o'er hopes destroy'd.
BYRON : Childe Harold.
'Tis the sunset of life gives me mystical lore,
And coming events cast their shadows before.
CAMPBELL: Lochiers Warning.
can the snow that age does shed
i thy rev'rend head,
ich or allay the noble fire within ;
.11 that youth can be thou art.
,. CO\VLEY.
hen the ills of age, its pains, its care,
i..- Drooping spirit for its fate prepare;
And each affection failing, leaves the heart
Loosed from life's charm, and willing to depart.
CRABBE.
Our nature here is not unlike our wine ;
Some sorts, when old, continue brisk and fine :
So age's gravity may seem severe,
But nothing harsh or bitter ought t' appear.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Those trifles wherein children take delight
Grow nauseous to the young man's appetite,
And from those gaieties our youth requires
To exercise their minds, our age. retires.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Age's chief arts, and arms, are to grow wise ;
Virtue to know, and known, to exercise.
SIR J. DENHAM.
The spring, like youth, fresh blossoms doth pro-
duce,
But autumn makes them ripe, and fit for use :
So age a mature mellowness doth set
On the green promises of youthful heat.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Age, like ripe apples, on earth's bosom drops ;
While force our youth, like fruits, untimely
crops.
SIR J. DENHAM.
To elder years to be discreet and grave,
Then to old age maturity she gave.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Who this observes, may in his body find
Decrepit age, but never in his mind.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Of Age's avarice I cannot see
What colour, ground, or reason there can be ;
Is it not folly, when the way we ride
Is short, for a long journey to provide ?
SIR J. DENHAM.
Not from grey hairs authority doth flow,
Nor from bald heads, nor from a wrinkled brow ;
But our past life, when virtuously spent,
Must to our age those happy fruits present.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Age is froward, uneasy, scrutinous,
Hard to be pleased, and parsimonious.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Authority kept up, old age secures,
Whose dignity as long as life endures.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Old husbandmen I at Sabinum know,
Who for another year dig, plough, and sow ;
For never any man was yet so old,
But hoped his life one winter more would hold.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Age by degrees invisibly doth creep,
Nor do we seem to die, but fall asleep.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Old age, with silent pace, comes creeping on,
Nauseates the praise which in her youth she won.
And hates the muse by which she was undone,
DRYDEN.
Thus daily changing, by degrees I'd waste,
Still quitting ground by unperceived decay,
And steal myself from life, and melt away.
DRYDEN
AGE.
21
Prudence, thou vainly in our youth art sought,
And with age purchased, art too dearly bought :
We're past the use of wit for which we toil :
Late fruit, and planted in too cold a soil.
DRYDEN.
Our green youth copies what grey sinners act,
When age commends the fact.
DRYDEN.
His youth and age
All of a piece throughout, and all divine.
DRYDEN.
Yet unimpair'd with labours, or with time,
Your age but seems to a new youth to climb.
DRYDEN.
He look'd in years, yet in his years were seen
A youthful vigor, and autumnal green.
DRYDEN.
You season still with sports your serious hours,
For age but tastes of pleasures, youth devours.
DRYDEN.
This advantage youth from age hath won,
As not to be outridden though outrun.
DRYDEN.
When the hoary head is hid in snow,
The life is in the leaf, and still between
The fits of falling snows appears the streaky
green.
DRYDEN.
What, start at this! when sixty years have
spread
Their grey experience o'er thy hoary head ?
Is this the all observing age could gain ?
OF hast thou known the world so long in vain ?
DRYDEN.
So noiseless would I live, such death to find :
Like timely fruit, not shaken by the wind,
But ripely dropping from the sapless bough.
DRYDEN.
Time has made you dote, and vainly tell
Of arms imagined in your lonely cell :
Go ! be the temple and the gods your care ;
Permit to men the thought of peace and war.
DRYDEN.
Time seems not now beneath his years to stoop,
Nor do his wings with sickly feathers droop.
DRYDEN.
And sin's black dye seems blanch'd by age to
virtue,
DRYDEN.
Age has not yet
So shrunk my sinews, or so chill'd my veins,
But conscious virtue in my breast remains.
DRYDEN.
Were I no queen, did you my beauty weigh,
My youth in bloom, your age in its decay.
DRYDEN.
Now leave these joys, unsuiting to thy age,
To a fresh comer, and resign the stage.
DRYDEN.
Just in the gate
Dwelt pale diseases and repining age.
DRYDEN.
Beroe but now I left; whom, pined with pain,
Her age and anguish from these rites detain.
DRYDEN.
O'er whom Time gently shakes his wings of
down,
Till with his silent sickle they are mown.
DRYDEN.
Jove, grant me length of life, and years good
store
Heap on my bended back.
DRYDEN.
The feeble old, indulgent of their ease.
DRYDEN.
Thus then my loved Euryalus appears;
He looks the prop of my declining years.
DRYDEN.
Of no distemper, of no blast he died,
But fell like autumn fruit that mellow'd long;
Even wonder'd at, because he dropt no sooner.
Fate seem'd to wind him up for fourscore years;
Yet freshly ran he on ten winters more :
Till like a clock worn out with eating time,
The wheels of weary life at last stood still.
DRYDEN: QLdipu*.
These I wielded while my bloom was warm,
Ere age unstrung my nerves, or time o'er-
snow'd my head.
DRYDEN.
A look so pale no quartane ever gave ;
My dwindled legs seem crawling to a grave.
DRYDEN: JuvenaL
These are the effects of doting age,
Vain doubts, and idle cares, and over caution.
DRYDEN: Sebastian.
22
AGE.
Ripe age bade him surrender late
His life and long good fortune unto final fate.
FAIRFAX.
How blest is he who crowns, in shades like
these,
A youth of labour with an age of ease !
GOLDSMITH : Deserted Village.
Alike all ages. Dames of ancient days
Have led their children through the mirthful
maze;
And the gay grandsire, skill'd in gestic lore,
Has frisk'd beneath the burden of threescore.
GOLDSMITH: Traveller.
An age that melts in unperceived decay,
And glides in modest innocence away.
DR. S.JOHNSON: Vanity of Human Wishes.
In life's last scene what prodigies surprise,
Fears of the brave, and follies of the wise !
From Marlb'rough's eyes the streams of dotage
flow,
And Swift expires a driv'ler and a show.
DR. S. JOHNSON : Vanity of Human Wishes.
Superfluous lags the veteran on the stage.
DR. S. JOHNSON : Vanity of Human Wishes.
The still returning tale, and lingering jest,
Perplex the fawning niece, and pamper'd guest,
While growing hopes scarce awe the gath'ring
sneer,
And scarce a legacy can bribe to hear.
DR. S.JOHNSON: Vanity of Human Wishes.
Thou must outlive
Thy youth, thy strength, thy beauty, which will
change
To wither'd, weak, and grey.
v MILTON.
Better at home lie bed-rid, idle,
Inglorious, unemploy'd, with age outworn.
MILTON.
Till length of years,
And sedentary numbness, craze my limbs
To a contemptible old age obscure.
MILTON.
To what can I be useful, wherein serve,
But to sit idle on the household hearth,
A burd'nous drone, to visitants a gaze?
MILTON.
My hasting days fly on with full career,
But my late spring no bud nor blossom shewcth.
MILTON.
So mayst thou live, till, like ripe fruit, thou drop
Into thy mother's lap; or be with ease
Gather'd, not harshly pluck'd.
MILTON.
And may at last my weary age
Find out the peaceful hermitage,
The hairy gown and mossy cell,
Where I may sit and rightly spell
Of every star that heaven doth shew
And every herb that sips the dew ;
Till old experience do attain
To something like prophetic strain.
M I LTON : // Penseroso.
Such drowsy sedentary souls have they
Who would to patriarchal years live on,
Fix'd to hereditary clay,
And know no climate but their own.
NORRIS.
Learn to live well, or fairly make your will;
You've play'd, and loved, and ate, and drank
your fill :
Walk sober off before a sprightlier age
Comes tittering on, and shoves you from the
stage :
Leave such to trifle with more grace and ease,
Whom folly pleases, and whose follies please.
POPE.
So peaceful shalt thou end thy blissful days,
And steal thyself from life by slow decays.
POPE.
Wasting years that wither human race,
Exhaust thy spirits, and thy arms unbrace.
POPE.
He now, observant of the parting ray,
Eyes the calm sunset of thy various day.
POPE.
Has life no sourness, drawn so near its end?
POPE.
\Vhy will you break the sabbath of my days,
Now sick alike of envy and of praise ?
POPE.
In years he seem'd, but not impair'd by years.
fan.
The poor, the rich, the valiant, and the sage.
And boasting youth, and narrative old agf.
POPE.
But if you'll prosper, mark what I advise,
Whom age and long experience render wise.
POPE.
AGE.
Oh ! if to dance all night, and dress all day,
Charm'd the small-pox, or chased old age away,
Who would not scorn what housewife's cares
produce ?
Or who would learn one earthly thing of use ?
POPE.
Propp'd on his staff, and stooping as he goes,
A painted mitre shades his furrow'd brows;
The god, in this decrepit form array'd,
The gardens enter'd, and the fruits survey'd.
POPE.
She still renews the ancient scene ;
Forgets the forty years between;
Awkwardly gay and oddly merry ;
Her scarf pale pink, her head-knot cherry.
PRIOR.
And on this forehead (where your verse has said
The loves delighted, and the graces play'd)
Insulting age will trace his cruel way,
And leave sad marks of his destructive sway.
PRIOR.
So shall I court thy dearest truth
When beauty ceases to engage :
So thinking on thy charming youth,
I'll love it o'er again in age.
PRIOR.
Kindness itself too weak a charm will prove
To raise the feeble fires of aged love.
PRIOR.
By one countless sum of woes opprest,
Hoary with cares, and ignorant of rest,
We find the vital springs relax'd and worn :
Thus, through the round of age, to childhood
we return.
PRIOR.
By weak'ning toil and hoary age o'ercome,
See thy decrease, and hasten to thy tomb.
PRIOR.
Then, in full age, and hoary holiness,
Retire, great teacher, to thy promised bliss :
Untouch'd thy tomb, uninjured be thy dust,
As thy own fame among the future just !
PRIOR.
The remnant of his days he safely past,
Nor found they lagg'd too slow, nor flew too fast;
He made his wish with his estate comply,
Joyful to live, yet not afraid to die.
PRIOR.
Till future infancy, baptized by thee,
Grow ripe in years, and old in piety.
PRIOR.
Then old age and experience, hand in hand,
Lead him to death and make him understand,
After a search so painful and so long,
That all his life he had beeji in the wrong.
ROCHESTER.
Boys must not have th' ambitious care of men ;
Nor men the weak anxieties of age.
ROSCOMMON.
Age sits with decent grace upon his visage,
And worthily becomes his silver locks;
He wears the marks of many years well spent,
Of virtue, truth well tried, and wise experience.
ROWE: Jane Shore.
Thou, full of days, like weighty shocks of corn,
In season reap'd, shalt to thy grave be borne.
GEORGE SANDYS.
Nor should their age by years be told,
Whose souls more swift than motion climb,
And check the tardy flight of time.
GEORGE SANDYS.
On his bold visage middle age
Had slightly press'd its signet sage.
SIR W. SCOTT: Lady of the Lake.
Hard toil can roughen form and face,
And want can quench the eye's bright grace ;
Nor does old age a wrinkle trace
More deeply than despair.
SIR W. SCOTT : Marmion.
Thus pleasures fade away ;
Youth, talents, beauty thus decay,
And leave us dark, forlorn, and gray.
SIR W. SCOTT : Marmion.
Thou hast not youth or age ;
But as it were an after-dinner sleep,
Dreaming on both ; for all thy blessed youth
Becomes as aged, and doth beg the alms
Of palsy'd eld : and when thou'rt old and rich,
Thou'st neither heat, affection, limb, nor beauty,
To make thy riches pleasant.
SHAKSPEARE.
You are old :
Nature in you stands on the very verge
Of her confine.
SHAKSPEARE.
AGE.
Though now this grained face of mine be hid
In sap-consuming winter's drizzled snow,
And all the conduits of my blood froze up,
Yet hath my night of life some memory.
SHAKSPEARE.
Nature, as it grows again tow'rds earth,
Is fashion'd for the journey, dull and heavy.
SHAKSPEARE.
'Tis our first intent
To shake all cares and business from our age,
While we unburthen'd crawl tow'rd death.
SHAKSPEARE.
What should we speak of
When we are old as you ? When we shall hear
The rain and wind beat dark December.
SHAKSPEARE.
Youth no less becomes
The light and careless livery that it wears,
Than settled age his sables and his weeds,
Importing health and graveness.
SHAKSPEARE.
How ill white hairs become a fool and jester !
I have long dream'd of such a kind of man,
So surfeit-swell'd, so old, and so profane.
SHAKSPEARE.
Would some part of my young years
Might but redeem the passage of your age !
SHAKSPEARE.
Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale
Her infinite variety.
SHAKSPEARE.
Eighty odd years of sorrow have I seen,
And each hour's joy wreck'd with a week of
teen.
SHAKSPEARE.
At your age
The heyday in the blood is tame, it's humble,
And waits upon the judgment.
SHAKSPEARE.
Let's take the instant by the forward top :
For we are old, and on our quick'st decrees
Th' inaudible and noiseless foot of time
Steals, ere we can effect them.
SHAKSPEARE.
An old man, broken with the storms of state,
Is come to lay his weary bones among ye :
(iive him a little earth for charity.
SHAKSPEARE.
I have lived long enough : my way of life
Is fall'n into the sear, the yellow leaf:
And that which should accompany old age,
As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends,
I must not look to have.
SHAKSPEARE.
You see me here, you gods, a poor old man,
As full of grief as age ; wretched in both.
SHAKSPEARE.
Let him keep
A hundred knights; yes, that on ev'ry dream,
Each buz, each fancy, each complaint, dislike,
He may enguard his dotage.
SHAKSPEARE.
Come, my lord ;
We will bestow you in some better place,
Fitter for sickness and for crazy age.
SHAKSPEARE.
O heavens !
If you do love old men, if your sweet sway
Allow obedience, if yourselves are old,
Make it your cause.
SHAKSPEARE.
I thought the remnant of mine age
Should have been cherished by her childlike
duty.
SHAKSPEARE.
The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slipper'd pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose, and pouch on side ;
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shanks.
SHAKSPEARE.
Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion ;
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.
SHAKSPEARE.
Let not old age disgrace my high desire,
O heavenly soul, in human shape contain'd !
Old wood inflamed doth yield the bravest fire,
When younger doth in smoke his virtue spend.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
From pert to stupid sinks supinely down,
In youth a coxcomb, and in age a clown.
SPECTATOR.
Dotard, said he, let be thy deep advise,
Seems that through many years thy wits thee
fail,
And that weak eld hath left thee nothing wise,
Else never should thy judgment be so frail.
SPENSER: Faerie Queene.
A GE.A G ONY.A GRICUL TURE.
SWIFT.
SWIFT.
SWIFT.
We now can form no more
Long schemes of life as heretofore.
Deaf, giddy, helpless, left alone,
To all my friends a burden grown.
Wrinkles undistinguish'd pass,
For I'm ashamed to use a glass.
This day then let us not be told
That you are sick, and I grown old ;
Nor think on our approaching ills,
And talk of spectacles and pills.
SWIFT.
Though you, and all your senseless tribe,
Could art, or time, or nature bribe
To make you look like beauty's queen,
And hold forever at fifteen,
No bloom of youth can ever blind
The cracks and wrinkles of your mind :
All men of sense will pass your door,
And crowd to Stella's at fourscore.
SWIFT.
Age too shines out, and, garrulous, recounts
The feats of youth.
THOMSON : Seasons.
The tree of deepest root is found
Least willing still to quit the ground ;
'Twas therefore said by ancient sages
That love of life increased with years,
So much that in our latter stages,
When pains grow sharp, and sickness rages,
The greatest love of life appears.
MRS. THRALE : Three Warnings.
The soul's dark cottage, batter'd and decay'd,
Lets in new light through chinks that time has
made ;
Stronger by weakness, wiser men become
As they draw near to their eternal home.
WALLER.
But an old age serene and bright
And lovely as a Lapland night
Shall lead thee to thy grave.
WORDSWORTH.
'Tis greatly wise to know before we're told,
The melancholy news that we grow old.
YOUNG.
Like our shadows,
Our wishes lengthen as our sun declines.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
2*
Virtue, not rolling suns, the mind matures ;
That life is long which answers life's great end :
The time that bears no fruit deserves no name ;
The man of wisdom is the man of years.
YOUNG : Night Thoughts.
When once men reach their autumn, sickly joys
Fall off apace, as yellow leaves from trees,
At every little breath misfortune blows,
Till, left quite naked of their happiness,
In the chill blasts of winter they expire.
YOUNG.
AGONY.
Thee I have miss'd, and thought it long, deprived
Thy presence ; agony of love ! till now
Not felt, nor shall be twice.
MILTON.
Or touch, if tremblingly alive all o'er,
To smart and agonize at every pore.
POPE.
Dost thou behold my poor distracted heart
Thus rent with agonizing love and rage,
And ask me, what it means ? Art thou not false ?
ROWE : Jane Shore.
Betwixt them both they have done me to dy
Through wounds, and strokes, and stubborn
handeling,
That death were better than such agony
As grief and fury unto me did bring.
SPENSER : Faerie Queene.
AGRICULTURE.
Retreat betimes
To thy paternal seat, the Sabine field,
W'here the great Cato toil'd with his own hands.
ADDISON.
The glebe untill'd might plenteous crops have
borne ;
Rich fruits and flow'rs, without the gardener's
pains,
Might ev'ry hill have crown'd, have honour'd all
the plains.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Through all the soil a genial ferment spreads,
Regenerates the plants, and new adorns the
meads.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
A race
Of proud-lined loiterers, that never sow,
Nor put a plant in earth, nor use a plough.
CHAPMAN.
AGRICULTURE.
Ask'd if in husbandry he ought did know,
To plough, to plant, to reap, to sow.
CHAUCER.
As Hesiod sings, spread waters o'er thy field,
And a most just and glad increase 'twill yield.
SIR J. DENHAM.
A swelling knot is raised,
Whence, in short space, itself the cluster shows,
And from earth's moisture, mixt with sunbeams,
grows.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Who hath a ploughland casts all his seed corn
there,
And yet allows his ground more corn to bear.
JOHN DONNE.
No fences parted fields, nor marks nor bounds
Distinguish'd acres of litigious grounds.
DRYDEN.
Apulian farms, for the rich soil admired,
And thy large fields, where falcons may be tired.
DRYDEN.
Much labour is required in trees ;
Well must the ground be digg'd, and better
dress'd,
New soil to make, and meliorate the rest.
DRYDEN.
Of the same soil their nursery prepare
With that of their plantation, lest the tree
Translated should not with the soil agree.
DRYDEN.
Better gleanings their worn soil can boast
Than the crab vintage of the neighb'ring coast.
DRYDEN.
When the Nile from Pharian fields is fled,
The fat manure with heav'nly fire is warm'd.
DRYDEN.
That the spent earth may gather heart again,
And, better'd by cessation, bear the grain.
DRYDEN.
Next, fenced with hedges and deep ditches round,
Exclude th' encroaching cattle from the ground.
DRYDEN.
The crooked plough, the share, the tow'ring
height
Of wagons, and the cart's unwieldy weight ;
These all must be prepared.
DRYDEN.
'Tis good for arable ; a glebe that asks
Tough teams of oxen ; and laborious tasks.
DRYDEN.
When the fiery suns too fiercely play,
And shrivell'd herbs on with'ring stems decay,
The wary ploughman, on the mountain's brow,
Undams his wat'ry stores ; huge torrents flow ;
Temp' ring the thirsty fever of the field.
DRYDEN.
Pales no longer swell'd the teeming grain,
Nor Phoebus fed his oxen on the plain.
DRYDEN.
Quintius here was born,
Whose shining ploughshare was in furrows worn,
Met by his trembling wife, returning home,
And rustically joy'd, as chief of Rome.
DRYDEN.
From ploughs and harrows sent to seek renown,
They fight in fields, and storm the shaken town.
DRYDEN.
The royal husbandman appear'd,
And plough'd, and sow'd, and till'd ;
The thorns he rooted out, the rubbish clear'd,
And blest th' obedient field.
DRYDEN.
Men plough with oxen of their own
Their small paternal field of corn.
DRYDEN.
The field is spacious I design to sow,
With oxen far unfit to draw the plough.
DRYDEN.
No plough shall hurt the glebe, no pruning-
hook the vine.
DRYDEN.
The teeming earth, yet guileless of the plough,
And unprovoked, did fruitful stores allow.
DRYDEN.
The sweating steers unharness'd from the yoke
Bring back the crooked plough.
DRYDEN.
An ox that waits the coming blow,
Old and unprofitable to the plough.
DRYDEN.
Who can cease to admire
The ploughman consul in his coarse attire ?
DRYDEN.
The lab'ring swain
Scratch'd with a rake a furrow for his grain,
And cover'd with his hand the shallow seed again.
DRYDEN.
His corn and cattle were his only care,
And his supreme delight a country fair.
DRYDEN.
AGRICULTURE.
27
He burns the leaves, the scorching blast invades
The tender corn, and shrivels up the blades.
DRYDEN.
Thou king of horned floods, whose plenteous urn
Suffices fatness to the fruitful corn,
Shalt share my morning song and evening vows.
DRYDEN.
No fruitful crop the sickly fields return ;
But oats and darnel choke the rising corn.
DRYDEN.
Tough thistles choked the fields, and kill'd the
corn,
And an unthrifty crop of weeds was born.
DRYDEN.
The bearded corn ensued
From earth unask'd ; nor was that earth renew'd.
DRYDEN.
Your hay it is mow'd, and your corn it is reap'd ;
Your barns will be full, and your hovels heap'd ;
Come, my boys, come,
Come, my boys, come,
And merrily roar out harvest-home.
DRYDEN.
Moist earth produces corn and grass, but both
Too rank and too luxuriant in their growth.
Let not my land so large a promise boast,
Lest the lank ears in length of stem be lost.
DRYDEN.
Delve of convenient depth your threshing floor ;
With temper'd clay then fill and face it o'er.
DRYDEN.
In vain the hinds the threshing floor prepare,
And exercise their flails in empty air.
DRYDEN.
If a wood of leaves o'ershade the tree,
In vain the hind shall vex the threshing floor,
For empty chaff and straw will be thy store.
DRYDEN.
On a short pruning-hook his head reclines,
And studiously surveys his gen'rous vines.
DRYDEN.
She in pens his flocks will fold.
DRYDEN.
In shallow furrows vines securely grow.
DRYDEN.
The vineyard must employ thy sturdy steer
To turn the glebe ; besides thy daily pain
To break the clods, and make the surface plain.
DRYDEN.
Some steep their seeds, and some in cauldrons
boil
O'er gentle fires; the exuberant juice to drain,
And swell the flatt' ring husks with fruitful grain.
DRYDEN.
Mark well the flow'ring almonds in the wood :
If od'rous blooms the bearing branches load,
The glebe will answer to the sylvan reign :
Great heats will follow, and large crops of grain.
DRYDEN.
The low'ring spring, with lavish rain,
Beats down the slender stem and bearded grain.
DRYDEN.
Oft the drudging ass is driven with toil ;
Returning late and loaden home with gain
Of barter'd pitch, and handmills for the grain.
DRYDEN.
In the sun your golden grain display,
And thrash it out and winnow it by day.
DRYDEN.
We may know
And when to reap the grain and when to sow,
Or when to fell the furzes.
DRYDEN : Virgil.
You who supply the ground with seeds of grain,
And you who swell those seeds with kindly rain.
DRYDEN.
When continued rain
The lab'ring husband in his house restrain,
Let him forecast his work with timely care,
Which else is huddled when the skies are fair.
DRYDEN.
And oft whole sheets descend of sluicy rain,
Suck'd by the spungy clouds from off the main:
The lofty skies at once come pouring down,
The promised crop and golden labours drown.
DRYDEN.
She took the coleworts which her husband got
From his own ground (a small well-water'd
spot) ;
She stripp'd the stalks of all their leaves ; the best
She cull'd, and then with handy care she dress'd.
DRYDEN.
But when the western winds with vital pow'r
Call forth the tender grass and budding flow'r,
Men, at the last, produce in open air
Both flocks, and send them to their summer's
fare.
DRYDEN.
AGRICULTURE.
Begin when the slow waggoner descends,
Nor cease your sowing till midwinter ends.
DRYDEN.
For sundry foes the rural realm surround;
The field-mouse builds her garner under ground :
For gather'd grain the blind laborious mole,
In winding mazes, works her hidden hole.
DRYDEN.
Where the vales with violets once were crown'd,
Now knotty burs and thorns disgrace the
ground.
DRYDEN.
Most have found
A husky harvest from the grudging ground.
DRYDEN.
For flax and oats will burn the tender field,
And sleepy poppies harmful harvests yield.
DRYDEN.
But various are the ways to change the state,
To plant, to bud, to graft, to inoculate.
DRYDEN.
The peasant, innocent of all these ills,
With crooked ploughs the fertile fallow tills,
And the round year with daily labour fills.
DRYDEN.
To his county farm the fool confined ;
Rude work well suited with a rustic mind.
DRYDEN.
Thou hop'st with sacrifice of oxen slain
To compass wealth, and bribe the god of gain
To give thee flocks and herds, with large in-
crease ;
Fool ! to expect them from a bullock's grease.
DRYDEN.
Apollo check'd my pride, and bade me feed
My fatt'ning flocks, nor dare beyond the reed.
DRYDEN.
I^et Araby extol her happy coast,
Her fragrant flow'rs, her trees with precious
tears,
Her second harvests.
DRYDEN.
Suffering not the yellow beards to rear,
He tramples down the spikes, and intercepts
the ear.
DRYDEN.
Kv'n when they sing at ease in full content,
Insulting o'er the toil they underwent,
Yet still they find a future task remain,
To turn the soil.
DRYDEN.
To dress the vines new labour is required,
Nor must the painful husbandman be tired.
DRYDEN.
Give me, ye gods, the product of one field,
That so I neither may be rich nor poor;
And having just enough, not covet more.
DRYDEN.
All was common, and the fruitful earth
Was free to give her unexacted birth.
DRYDEN.
Their morning milk the peasants press at night ;
Their evening milk before the rising light.
DRYDEN.
The peaceful peasant to the wars is prest,
The fields lie fallow in inglorious rest.
DRYDEN.
\Vhere the tender rinds of trees disclose
Their shooting germs, a swelling knot there
grows ;
Just in that place a narrow slit we make,
Then other buds from bearing trees we take;
Inserted thus, the wounded rind we close.
DRYDEN.
Your farm requites your pains,
Though rushes overspread the neighb'ring
plains.
DRYDEN.
Rocks lie cover'd with eternal snow;
Thin herbage in the plains, and fruitless fields.
DRYDEN.
Uneasy still within these narrow bounds,
Thy next design is on thy neighbour's grounds:
His crop invites, to full perfection grown ;
Thy own seems thin, because it is thy own.
DRYDEN.
T' unload the branches, or the leaves to thin
That suck the vital moisture of the vine.
DRYDEN.
Yet then this little spot of earth well till'd,
A num'rous family with plenty fill'd,
The good old man and thrifty housewife spent
Their days in peace and fatten'd with content;
Enjoy'd the dregs of life, and lived to see
A long descending healthful progeny.
DRYDEN.
The soil, with fatt'ning moisture fill'd,
Is clothed with grass, and fruitful to be till'd;
Such as in fruitful vales we view from high,
Which dripping rocks, not rowling streams
supply.
DRYDEN.
AGRICULTURE.
First, with assiduous care from winter keep,
Well fother'd in the stalls, thy tender sheep;
Then spread with straw the bedding of thy fold,
With fern beneath, to fend the bitter cold.
DRYDEN.
In vain the barns expect their promised load;
Nor barns at home, nor ricks are heap'd abroad.
DRYDEN.
At harvest-home, and on the shearing day,
When he should thanks to Pan and Pales pay.
DRYDEN.
Ah that your business had been mine,
To pen the sheep.
DRYDEN.
Root up wild olives from thy labour'd lands.
DRYDEN.
Nor is the profit small the peasant makes,
Who 'smooths with harrow, or who pounds
with rakes,
The crumbling clods.
DRYDEN.
Be mindful
With iron teeth of rakes and prongs to move
The crusted earth.
DRYDEN.
Let thy hand supply the pruning-knife,
And crop luxuriant stragglers.
DRYDEN.
Bid the laborious hind,
Whose harden'd hands did long in tillage toil,
Neglect the promised harvest of the soil.
DRYDEN.
The wiser madman did for virtue toil
A thorny, or at least a barren, soil.
DRYDEN.
Here the marshy grounds approach your fields,
And there the soil a stony harvest yields.
DRYDEN.
While the reaper fills his greedy hands,
And binds the golden sheaves in brittle bands.
DRYDEN.
Did we for these barbarians plant and sow,
On these, on these our happy fields bestow?
DRYDEN.
If your care to wheat alone extend,
Let Maia with her sisters first descend,
Before you trust in earth your future hope,
Or else expect a listless, lazy crop.
DRYDEN.
Sleeping vegetables lie,
Till the glad summons of a genial ray
Unbinds the glebe, and calls them out to-day.
GARTH.
By devastation the rough warrior gains,
And farmers fatten most when famine reigns.
GARTH.
If on Swithin's feast the welkin lowers,
And every penthouse streams with hasty
show'rs,
Twice twenty days shall clouds their fleeces
drain.
GAY.
Here I peruse the Mantuan's georgic strains,
And learn the labours of Italian swains.
GAY.
The bending scythe
Shaves all the surface of the waving green.
GAY.
The ploughman leaves the task of day,
And trudging homeward whistles on the way.
GAY.
How turnips hide their swelling heads below,
And how the closing coleworts upwards grow.
GAY.
Cheerful at morn, he wakes from short repose,
Breathes the keen air, and carols as he goes.
GOLDSMITH : Traveller.
Ill fares the land, to hast'ning ills a prey,
Where wealth accumulates and men decay;
Princes and lords may flourish, or may fade ;
A breath can make them, as a breath has made:
But a bold peasantry, their country's pride,
When once destroy'd can never be supplied.
GOLDSMITH: Deserted Village.
Nor is't unwholesome to subdue the land
By often exercise ; and where before
You broke the earth, again to plow.
MAY.
The ground one year at rest, forget not then
With richest dung to hearten it again.
MAY.
Their bulls they send to pastures far
On hills, or feed them at full racks within.
MAY.
Bring them for food sweet boughs and osiers cut
Nor all the winter long thy hay-rick shut.
MAY.
AGRICULTURE.
I oft have seen, when corn was ripe to mow,
And now in dry and brittle straw did grow,
Winds from all quarters oppositely blow.
MAY.
Nor are the ways alike in all
How to ingraff, how to inoculate.
MAY.
Fires oft are good on barren earshes made,
With crackling flames to burn the stubble blade.
MAY.
Thy corn thou there may'st safely sow,
Where in full cods last year rich pease did grow.
MAY.
Let the plowmen's prayer
Be for moist solstices, and winters fair.
MAY.
His eyes he open'd, and beheld a field
Part arable and tilth ; whereon were sheaves
New reap'd; the other part, sheep-walks and
folds.
MILTON.
The cattle in the fields and meadows green,
Those rare and solitary, these in flocks
Pasturing, at once and in broad herds upsprung.
MILTON.
The field
To labour calls us, now with sweat imposed.
MILTON.
They mock our scant manuring, and require '
More hands than ours to lop their wanton growth.
MILTON.
Seedtime and harvest, heat and hoary frost,
Shall hold their course.
MILTON.
While the ploughman near at hand
Whistles o'er the furrow'd land.
MILTON.
The careful ploughman doubting stands,
Lest on the threshing floor his sheaves prove
chaff.
MILTON.
A sweaty reaper from his tillage brought
First fruits, the green ear, and the yellow sheaf,
Uncull'd as came to hand.
MILTON.
Tells how the drudging goblin swet,
To earn his cream-bowl duly set,
When in one night, ere glimpse of morn,
Mis shadowy flail hath thresh'd the corn
That ten day-labourers could not end.
MILTON.
The labour'd ox
In his loose traces from the furrow came,
And the swink'd hedger at his supper sat.
MILTON.
MILTON.
Or if the earlier season lead
To the tann'd haycock in the mead.
While the milkmaid singeth blithe,
And the mower whets his scythe.
MILTON.
There are who, fondly studious of increase,
Rich foreign mould in their ill-natured land
Induce.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Wilt thou repine
To labour for thyself? and rather chuse
To lie supinely, hoping heaven will bless
Thy slighted fruits, and give thee bread un-
earned ?
JOHN PHILIPS.
Let sage experience teach thee all the arts
Of grafting and ineyeing.
JOHN PHILIPS.
The unfallow'd glebe
Yearly o'ercomes the granaries with stores
Of golden wheat.
JOHN PHILIPS.
The nursling grove
Seems fair awhile, cherish'd with foster earth ;
But when the alien compost is exhaust,
Its native poverty again prevails.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Rough unwieldy earth, nor to the plough
Nor to the cattle kind, with sandy stones
And gravel o'er-abounding.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Nothing profits more
Than frequent snows : oh, may'st thou often see
Thy furrows whiten'd by the woolly rain,
Nutritious !
JOHN PHILIPS.
The orchard loves to wave
With winter winds : the loosen'd roots then
drink
Large increment, earnest of happy years.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Autumn vigour gives,
Equal, intenerating, milky grain.
JOHN PHILIPS,,
AGRICULTURE.
Twelve mules, a strong laborious race,
New to the plough, unpracticed in the trace.
POPE.
While lab'ring oxen, spent with toil and heat,
In their loose traces from the field retreat.
POPE.
Safe on my shore each unmolested swain
Shall tend the flocks, or reap the bearded grain
POPE.
Or great Osiris, who first taught the swain
In Pharian fields to sow the golden grain.
POPE.
In vain kind seasons swell'd the teeming grain ;
Soft showers distill'd, and suns grew warm in
vain.
POPE.
Go first the master of thy herds to find,
True to his charge, a loyal swain and kind.
POPE.
To build, to plant, whatever you intend,
To rear the column, or the arch to bend.
POPE.
O'er sandy wilds were yellow harvests spread.
POPE.
His cheerful tenants bless their yearly toil,
Yet to their lord owe more than to the soil.
POPE.
From fresh pastures, and the dewy field,
The lowing herds return, and round them throng,
With leaps and bounds, the late imprison' d
young.
POPE.
The worm that gnaws the ripening fruit, sad
guest !
Canker, or locust hurtful to infest
The blade ; while husks elude the tiller's care,
And eminence of want distinguishes the year.
PRIOR.
Let her glad valleys smile with wavy corn;
Let fleecy flocks her rising hills adorn.
PRIOR.
After the declining sun-
Had changed the shadows, and their task was
done,
Home with their weary team they took their way.
ROSCOMMON.
Their sickles reap the corn another sows.
SANDYS.
The higher Nilus swells,
The more it promises : as it ebbs, the seedsman
Upon the slime and ooze scatters his grain,
And shortly comes to harvest.
SHAKSPEARE.
You sunburnt sickle men. of August weary,
Come hither from the furrow, and be merry.
SHAKSPEARE.
The sun shines hot; and if we use delay,
Cold biting winter mars our hoped-for hay.
SHAKSPEARE.
The strawy Greeks, ripe for his edge,
Fall down before him like the mower's swath.
SHAKSPEARE.
What valiant foemen, like to autumn's corn,
Have now we mowed down in top of all their
pride ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Let me be no assistant for a state,
But keep a farm, and carters.
SHAKSPEARE.
When shepherds pipe on oaten straws,
And merry larks are ploughmen's clocks.
SHAKSPEARE.
The folds stand empty in the drowned field,
And crows are fatted with the murrain flock;
The nine men's morris is filled up with mud.
SHAKSPEARE.
Her fallow leas
The darnel, hemlock, and rank fumitory
Doth root upon ; while that the culter rusts
That should deracinate such savagery.
SHAKSPEARE.
Nothing teems
But hateful docks, rough thistles, kecksies, burs,
Losing both beauty and utility.
SHAKSPEARE.
The ear that budded fair is burnt and blasted,
And all my hoped gain is turn'd to scath.
SPENSER.
Thee a ploughman all unweeting found,
As he his toilsome team that way did guide,
And brought thee up in ploughman's state to
bide.
SPENSER.
3 2
AGRICULTURE.
Her flood of tears
Seem like the lofty barn of some rich swain,
Which from the thatch drips fast a shower of rain.
SWIFT.
In ancient times, the sacred plough employ'd
The kings, and awful fathers of mankind;
And some, with whom compared your insect
tribes
Are but the beings of a summer's day,
Have held the scale of empire, ruled the storm
Of mighty war, then, with unwearied hand,
Disdaining little delicacies, seized
The plough, and greatly independent lived.
THOMSON.
To the harness'd yoke
They lend their shoulder, and begin their toil.
THOMSON.
With superior boon may your rich soil
Exuberant nature's better blessings pour
O'er every land, the naked nations clothe,
And be th' exhaustless granary of a world.
THOMSON.
They rose as vigorous as the sun ;
Then to the culture of the willing glebe.
THOMSON.
In rueful gaze
The cattle stand, and on the scowling heavens
Cast a deploring eye.
THOMSON.
As they rake the green-appearing ground,
The russet haycock rises.
THOMSON.
Behind the master walks, builds up the shocks,
Feels his heart heave with joy.
THOMSON.
The gleaners,
Spike after spike, their sparing harvest pick.
THOMSON.
Huswives are teached, instead of a clocke,
How winter night passeth, by crowing of cocke.
TUSSER.
If snowe do continue, sheepe hardly that fare
Crave mistle and ivie for them to spare.
TUSSKR.
In March is good graffing, the skilful do know,
So long as the wind in the east do not blow :
From moon being changed, till past be the
prime,
For graffing and cropping is very good time.
TUSSER.
In May get a weed-hook, a crotch, and a glove,
And weed out such weeds as the corn doth not
love.
TUSSER.
Plough-Monday next after that the twelftide is
past,
Bids out with the plough, the worst husband is
last.
TUSSER.
At Midsummer down with the brambles and
brakes,
And after abroad with thy forks and thy rakes.
TUSSER.
Such land as ye break up for barley to sow,
Two earths, at the least, ere ye sow it, bestow.
TUSSER.
Sowe peason and beans in the wane of the moon :
Who soweth them sooner he soweth too soone.
TUSSER.
Friend, harrow in time, by some manner of
means,
Not only thy peason, but also thy beans.
TUSSER.
Plant ye with alders or willowes a plot,
Where yeerely, as needeth, mo poles may be got.
TUSSER.
The north is a noiance to grass of all suits,
The east a destroyer to herbs and all fruits.
TUSSER.
The west as a father all goodness doth bring,
The east a forbearer no manner of thing.
TUSSER.
Let servant be ready with mattock in hand
To stub out the bushes that noieth the land.
TUSSER.
In lopping and felling save elder and stake,
Thine hedges, as needeth, to mend or to make.
TUSSER.
One seed for another to make an exchange
With fellowly neighbourhood seemeth not
strange.
TUSSER.
Land arable, driven, or worn to the proof,
With oats you may sow it, the sooner to grass,
More soon to be pasture, to bring it to pass.
TUSSER.
And he that can rear up a pig in his house,
Hath cheaper his bacon, and sweeter his souse.
TUSSER.
AL CHE MY. AMBITION.
33
Of barley the finest and greenest ye find,
Leave standing in dallops till time ye do bind.
TUSSER.
From wheat go and rake out the titters or tine,
If care be not forth, it will rise again fine.
TUSSER.
Through cunning, with dibble, rake, mattock,
and spade,
By line and by level trim garden is made.
TUSSER.
Now down with the grass upon headlands about,
That groweth in shadow so rank and so stout.
TUSSER.
Some commons are barren, the nature is such,
And some overlayeth the commons too much.
TUSSER.
Grant harvest-lord more by a penny or two,
To call on his fellows the better to do.
TUSSER.
Things thus set in order, in quiet and rest,
Shall further thy harvest, and pleasure thee best.
TUSSER.
Reap well, scatter not, gather clean that is shorn,
Bind fast, shock apace, have an eye to thy corn.
TUSSER.
So likewise a hovel will serve for a room
To stack on the peas, when harvest shall come.
TUSSER.
Who abuseth his cattle and starves them for meat,
By carting or ploughing his gain is not great ;
Where he that with labour can use them aright,
Hath gain to his comfort, and cattle in plight.
TUSSER.
So corn in fields, and in the garden flowers
Revive, and raise themselves with mod'rate
showers ;
But overcharged with never-ceasing rain,
Become too moist.
WALLER.
Your reign no less assures the ploughman's
peace,
Than the warm sun advances his increase.
WALLER.
Such is the mould that the blest tenant feeds
On precious fruits, and pays his rent in weeds.
WALLER.
3
ALCHEMY.
By fire
Of sooty coal th' empiric alchemist
Can turn, or holds it possible to turn,
Metals of drossiest ore to perfect gold.
MILTON.
The starving chymist in his golden views
Supremely blest, the poet in his muse.
POPE.
AMBITION.
Love is not to be reason'd down, or lost
In high ambition.
ADDISON.
Where ambition of place goes before fitness
Of birth, contempt and disgrace follow.
GEORGE CHAPMAN.
Blinded greatness, ever in turmoil,
Still seeking happy life, makes life a toil.
DANIEL.
Be not with honour's gilded baits beguiled,
Nor think ambition wise, because 'tis brave;
For though we like it, as a forward child,
'Tis so unsound her cradle is her grave.
SIR W. DAVENANT : Gondibert.
Ambition, the disease of virtue, bred
Like surfeits from an undigested fulness,'
Meets death in that which is the means of life.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Nature and duty bind him to obedience :
But these being placed in a lower sphere,
His fierce ambition, like the highest mover,
Has hurried with a strong impulsive motion
Against their proper course.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Some through ambition, or through thirst of gold,
Have slain their brothers, and their country sold.
DRYDEN.
Those who to empire by dark paths aspire,
Still plead a call to what they most desire.
DRYDEN.
One world sufficed not Alexander's mind ;
Coop'd up he seem'd, in earth and seas confined.
DRYDEN.
Too truly Tamerlane's successors they ;
Each thinks a world too little for his sway.
DRYDEN.
O diadem, thou centre of ambition,
Where all its different lines are reconciled ;
As if thou wert the burning glass of glory.
DRYDEN.
34
AMBITION.
No toil, no hardship can restrain
Ambitious man inured to pain ;
The more confined, the more he tries,
And at forbidden quarry flies.
DRYDEN.
With joy th' ambitious youth his mother heard,
And, eager, for the journey soon prepared;
He longs the world beneath him to survey,
To guide the chariot, and to give the day.
DRYDEN.
Why does Antony dream out his hours,
And tempts not fortune for a noble day ?
DRYDEN.
To cure their mad ambition, they were sent
To rule a distant province, each alone :
What could a careful father more have done ?
DRYDEN.
Leave to fathom such high points as these,
Nor be ambitious, ere the time, to please ;
Unseasonably wise, till age and cares
Have form'd thy soul to manage great affairs.
DRYDEN.
Dare to be great without a guilty crown ;
View it, and lay the bright temptation down :
'Tis base to seize on all.
DRYDEN.
Both ways deceitful is the wine of power ;
When new 'tis heady, and when old 'tis sour.
WALTER HARTE.
In me, as yet, ambition had no part ;
Pride had not sour'd, nor wrath debased, my
heart.
WALTER HARTE.
This sov'reign passion, scornful of restraint,
Even from the birth effects supreme command,
Swells in the breast, and with resistless force
O'erbears each gentler motion of the mind.
DR. JOHNSON : Irene.
They ween'd
To win the mount of God, and on his throne
To set the envier of his state, the proud
Aspirer ; but their thoughts proved fond and vain.
MILTON.
One shall rise
Of proud ambitious heart, who, not content
With fair equality, fraternal state,
Will arrogate dominion undeserved
Over his brethren, and quite dispossess
Concord and law of nature from the earth.
MILTON.
Here may we reign secure; and, in my choice,
To reign is worth ambition, though in hell.
MILTON.
Bad men boast
Their specious deeds on earth, which glory ex-
cites,
Or close ambition varnish'd o'er with zeal.
MILTON.
Ambition sigh'd: she found it vain to trust
The faithless column, and the crumbling bust.
POPE.
But see, how oft ambitious aims are crost ;
And chiefs contend till all the prize is lost.
POPE.
Aspiring to be gods, if angels fell,
Aspiring to be angels, men rebel.
POPE.
The fiery soul abhorr'd in Catiline,
In Decius charms, in Curtius is divine :
The same ambition can destroy or save,
And make a patriot, as it makes a knave.
POPE.
She points the arduous height where glory lies,
And teaches mad ambition to be wise.
POPE.
In vain for life he to the altar fled ;
Ambition and revenge have certain speed.
PRIOR.
Thy cruel and unnatural lust of power
Has sunk thy father more than all his years,
And made him wither in a green old age.
ROWE.
O momentary grace of mortal men !
Which we more hunt for than the grace of God ;
Who builds his hope in air of your fair looks,
Lives like a drunken sailor on a mast,
Ready with ev'ry nod to tumble down.
SHAKSPEARE.
'Tis a common proof,
That lowliness is young ambition's ladder,
Whereto the climber upward turns his face :
But when he once attains the upmost round,
He then unto the ladder turns his back,
Looks in the clouds, scorning the base degrees
By which he did ascend.
SHAKSPEARE.
They that stand high have many blasts to shake
them,
And if they fall, they dash themselves to pieces.
SlIAKSI'KARE.
AMBITION. ANCESTR Y.
They hail'd him father to a line of kings ;
Upon my head they placed a fruitless crown,
And put a barren sceptre in my gripe,
No son of mine succeeding.
SHAKSPEARE.
Here lies the dusky torch of Mortimer,
Choked with ambition of the meaner sort.
SHAKSPEARE.
There is betwixt that smile we would aspire to,
That sweet aspect of princes, and our ruin,
More pangs and fears than war or women have.
SHAKSPEARE.
I do contest
As hotly and as nobly with thy love,
As ever in ambitious strength I did
Contend against thy valour.
SHAKSPEARE.
These signs have mark'd me extraordinary,
And all the courses of my life do show
I am not in the roll of common men.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thriftless ambition ! that will raven up
Thine own life's means.
SHAKSPEARE.
Such men as he be never at heart's ease,
Whilst they behold a greater than themselves.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thou wouldst be great,
Art not without ambition ; but without
The illness should attend it.
SHAKSPEARE.
Ill-weaved ambition, how much art thou shrunk !
When that this body did contain a spirit,
A kingdom for it was too small a bound :
But now two paces of the vilest earth
Is room enough.
SHAKSPEARE.
No blown ambition doth our arms incite,
But love, dear love, and our aged father's right.
SHAKSPEARE.
O vain to seek delight in earthly thing!
But most in courts where proud ambition towers.
SHENSTONE.
Drawn into arms, and proof of mortal fight,
Through proud ambition and heart-swelling
hate.
SPENSER.
Of all the passions which possess the soul,
None so disturb vain mortals' minds
As vain ambition, which so blinds
The light of them, that nothing can control
Nor curb their thoughts who will aspire.
EARL OF STIRLING : Darius.
Well I deserved Evadne's scorn to prove,
That to ambition sacrificed my love.
WALLER.
Alas ! ambition makes my little less,
Embitt'ring the possess'd: why wish for more?
Wishing of all employments is the worst;
Philosophy's reverse, and health's decay !
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
ANCESTRY.
Heralds stickle, who got who
So many hundred years ago.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
He that to ancient wreaths can bring no more
From his own worth, dies bankrupt on the score.
JOHN CLEAVELAND.
'Twas no false heraldry when madness drew
Her pedigree from those who too much knew.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Were virtue by descent, a noble name
Could never villanize his father's fame;
But, as the first, the last of all the line
Would, like the sun, ev'n in descending, shine.
DRYDEN.
Vain are their hopes who fancy to inherit,
By trees of pedigree, or fame or merit ;
Though plodding heralds through each branch
may trace
Old captains and dictators of their race.
DRYDEN.
Long galleries of ancestors
Challenge nor wonder or esteem from me :
"Virtue alone is true nobility."
DRYDEN.
Do then as your progenitors have done,
And by their virtues prove yourself their son.
DRYDEN.
Thus, born alike, from virtue first began
The difPrence that distinguish'd man from man:
He claim'd no title from descent of blood ;
But that which made him noble, made him good.
DRYDEN.
ANCESTRY.
What have I lost by my forefathers' fault !
Why was I not the twentieth by descent
From a long restive race of droning kings ?
DRYDEN.
Please thy pride, and search the herald's roll,
Where thou shall find thy famous pedigree,
Drawn from the root of some old Tuscan tree,
And thou, a thousand off, a fool of long degree.
DRYDEN.
For if the sire be faint, or out of case,
He will be copied in his famish'd race.
DRYDEN.
So bright a splendour, so divine a grace,
The glorious Daphnis casts on his illustrious
race.
DRYDEN.
Auspicious chief! thy race, in times to come,
Shall spread the conquests of imperial Rome.
DRYDEN.
From a mean stock the pious Decii came ;
Yet such their virtues, that their loss alone
For Rome and all our regions did atone.
DRYDEN.
Obscure ! why prythee what am I ? I know
My father, grandsire, and great grandsire too :
If farther I derive my pedigree,
I can but guess beyond the fourth degree.
The rest of my forgotten ancestors
Were sons of earth.
DRYDEN.
Nor stand so much on your gentiKty,
Which is an airy and mere borrow'd thing,
From dead men's dust and bones; and none
of yours,
Except you make or hold it.
BEN JONSON.
But by your fathers' work if yours you rate,
Count me those only that were good and great.
Go ! if your ancient but ignoble blood
Has crept through scoundrels ever since the
flood,
Go! and pretend your family is young;
Nor own your fathers have been fools so long.
What can ennoble sots, or slaves, or cowards?
Alas ! not all the blood of all the Howards.
POPE.
Say from what sceptred ancestry ye claim,
Recorded eminent in deathless fame ?
POPE.
From the same lineage stern ^Eetes came,
The far-famed brother of th' enchantress dame.
POPE.
Vulgar parents cannot stamp their race
With signatures of such majestic grace.
POPE.
He lives to build, not boast, a generous race ;
No tenth transmitter of a foolish face.
SAVAGE.
As many and as well-born bloods as those
Stand in his face, to contradict his claim.
SHAKSPEARE.
Being not propt by ancestry, whose grace
Chalks successors their way.
SHAKSPEARE.
The honours of a name 'tis just to guard ;
They are a trust but lent us, which we take,
And should, in reverence to the donor's fame,
With care transmit them down to other hands.
SHIRLEY.
How vain are all hereditary honours,
Those poor possessions from another's deeds,
Unless our own just virtues form our title
And give a sanction to our fond assumption !
SHIRLEY.
Nor can the skilful herald trace
The founder of thy ancient race.
SWIFT.
One whose extraction from an ancient line
Gives hope again that well-born men may shine.
WALLER.
They that on glorious ancestors enlarge,
Produce their debt, instead of their discharge.
YOUNG.
He stands for fame on his forefathers' feet,
By heraldry proved valiant or discreet !
Yorv;.
Let high birth triumph! what can be more
great?
Nothing but merit in a low estate.
YOUNG.
Men should press forward in fame's glorious
chase ;
Nobles look backward, and so lose the race.
YOUNG-
ANGELS.
37
ANGELS.
The good he scorn'd
Stalk' d off reluctant, like an ill-used ghost,
Not to return ; or, if it did, in visits
Like those of angels, short and far between.
ROBERT BLAIR : The Grave.
If a man would be invariable,
He must be like a rock, or stone, or tree;
For ev'n the perfect angels were not stable,
But had a fall more desperate than we.
SIR J. DAVIES.
Then unbeguile thyself, and know with me,
That angels, though on earth employ'd they be,
Are still in heaven.
JOHN DONNE.
When we behold an angel, not to fear,
Is to be impudent.
DRYDEN.
That we may angels seem, we paint them elves,
And are but satires to set up ourselves.
DRYDEN.
i saw th' angelic guards from earth ascend,
Grieved they must now no longer man attend ;
The beams about their temples dimly shone ;
One would have thought the crime had been
their own.
DRYDEN.
Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth-
Unseen, both when we wake and when we sleep.
MILTON.
Speak, ye who best can tell, ye sons of light,
Angels ! for ye behold him, and with songs
And choral symphonies, day without night,
Circle his throne rejoicing.
MILTON.
How often from the steep
Of echoing hill, or thicket, have we heard
Celestial voices, to the midnight air,
Sole, or responsive, each to other's note
Singing their great Creator !
MILTON.
Oft in bands,
While they keep watch, or nightly rounding walk,
With heavenly touch of instrumental sounds
In full harmonious number join'd, their songs
Divide the night, and lift our thoughts to heaven.
MILTON.
Angels, by imperial summons call'd,
Forthwith from all the ends of heav'n appear'd,
Under their hierarchs in orders bright.
MILTON.
The apostate angel, though in pain,
Vaunting aloud, but rack'd with deep despair.
MILTON.
His form had yet not lost
All her original brightness, nor appear'd
Less than archangel ruin'd, and th' excess
Of glory obscured.
MILTON.
Him long of old
Thou didst debel, and down from heaven cast,
With all his army.
MILTON.
Gladly then he mix'd
Among those friendly pow'rs, who him received
With joy and acclamations loud, that one,
That (of so many myriads fall'n) yet one
Return' d, not lost.
MILTON.
For the greater part have kept
Their station ; heav'n, yet populous, retains
Number sufficient to possess her realms.
MILTON.
I might relate of thousands, and their names
Eternize here on earth ; but those .elect
Angels, contented with their fame in heav'n,
Seek not the praise of men.
MILTON*
Others, more mild,
Retreated in a silent valley, sing
With notes angelical to many a harp
Their own heroic deeds, and hapless fall
By doom of battle.
MILTON.
Hear, all ye angels, progeny of light,
Thrones, dominations, princedoms, virtues,
pow'rs !
MILTON.
The angel ended, and in Adam's ear
So charming left his voice.
MILTON.
How fading are the joys we dote upon !
Like apparitions seen and gone ;
But those which soonest take their flight
Are the most exquisite and strong ;
Like angels' visits, short and bright,
Mortality's too weak to bear them long.
JOHN NORRIS : The Parting.
Thy beauty appears,
In its graces and airs,
All bright as an angel new dropp'd from the sky.
PARNELL.
ANGELS. ANGER.
In trance ecstatic may thy pangs be drovvn'd ;
Bright clouds descend, and angels watch thee
round.
POPE.
My fancy form'd thee of angelic kind,
Some emanation of th' all-beauteous Mind.
POPE.
Virgins visited by angel pow'rs.
POPE.
Ye careful angels whom eternal fate
Ordains on earth and human acts to wait,
Who turn with secret pow'r this restless ball,
And bid predestined empires rise and fall.
PRIOR.
Busy angels spread
The lasting roll, recording what we said.
PRIOR.
Why, whilst we struggle in this vale beneath,
With want and sorrow, with disease and death,
Do they, more bless'd, perpetual life employ
In songs of pleasure and in scenes of joy ?
PRIOR.
Angels are bright still, though the brightest fell.
SHAKSPEARE.
She loves him with that excellence
That angels love good men with.
SHAKSPEARE.
Long, long may you on earth our empress reign,
Ere you in heaven a glorious angel stand.
SHAKSPEARE.
However, 'twas civil, an angel or elf;
For he ne'er could have fill'd it so well of him-
self.
SWIFT.
They now assist the choir
Of angels, who their songs admire.
WALLER.
ANGER.
You, too weak the slightest loss to bear,
Are on the fret of passion, boil and rage.
CREECH.
Of all bad things by which mankind are cursed,
Their own bad tempers surely are the worst.
RICHARD CUMBERLAND : Menander.
Whatsoever
Is worthy of their love is worth their anger.
SIR J. DENHAM.
When he knew his rival freed and gone,
He swells with wrath ; he makes outrageous
moan :
He frets, he fumes, he stares, he stamps the
ground,
The hollow tow'r with clamours rings around.
DRYDEN.
I beg the grace
You would lay by those terrors of your face ;
Till calmness to your eyes you first restore,
I am afraid, and I can beg no more.
DRYDEN.
If on your head my fury does not turn,
Thank that fond dotage which so much you
scorn.
DRYDEN.
Thou with scorn
And anger would resent the offer' d wrong.
MILTON.
What sullen fury clouds his scornful brow ?
POPE.
Harsh words, that once elanced, must ever fly
Irrevocable.
PRIOR.
When anger rushes, unrestrain'd, to action,
Like a hot steed, it stumbles in its way :
The man of thought strikes deepest, and strikes
safest.
SAVAGE : Sir Thomas Overbury.
Anger is like
A full hot horse, who being allow'd his way,
Self-mettle tires him.
SHAKSPEARE.
Being once chafed, he cannot
Be rein'd again to temperance ; then he speaks
What's in his heart.
SHAKSPEARE.
Put him to choler straight : he hath been used
Ever to conquer, and to have his word
Of contradiction.
SHAKSPEARE.
Unknit that threat'ning unkind brow ;
It blots thy beauty, as frost bites the meads,
Confounds thy fame.
SHAKSPEARE.
Have you not love enough to bear with me,
When that rash humour which my mother gave
me
Makes me forgetful ?
SHAKSPEARE.
ANGER. ANGLING.
39
With such sober and unnoted passion
He did behave his anger ere 'twas spent,
As if he had proved an argument.
SHAKSPEARE.
In thy face
I see thy fury ; if I longer stay,
We shall begin our ancient bickerings.
SHAKSPEARE.
A countenance more in sorrow than in anger.
SHAKSPEARE.
Scarce can I speak, my choler is so great :
Oh ! I could hew up rocks, and fight with flint.
SHAKSPEARE.
It engenders choler ; planteth anger ;
And better 'twere that both of us did fast,
Since, of ourselves, ourselves are choleric,
Than feed it with such over-roasted flesh.
SHAKSPEARE.
Full many mischiefs follow cruel wrath,
Abhorred bloodshed, and tumultuous strife,
Unmanly murder, and unthrifty scath.
SPENSER: Faerie Queene.
ANGLING.
Let others freeze with angling reeds,
Or treacherously poor fish beset
With straggling snare or winding net.
JOHN DONNE.
Sometimes we'll angle at the brook,
The freckled trout to take
With silken worms.
DRAYTON.
He, like a patient angler, ere he strook,
Would let them play awhile upon the hook.
DRYDEN.
Casting nets were spread in shallow brooks,
Drags in the deep, and baits were hung on hooks.
DRYDEN.
Nor drain I ponds the golden carp to take,
Nor troll for pikes, dispeoplers of the lake.
GAY.
In genial spring, beneath the quiv'ring shade,
Where cooling vapours breathe along the mead,
The patient fisher takes his silent stand,
Intent, his angle trembling in his hand :
With looks unmoved, he hopes the scaly breed,
And eyes the dancing cork and bending reed.
POPE : Windsor Forest.
Our plenteous streams a various race supply :
The silver eel, in shining volumes roll'd;
The yellow carp, in scales bedropp'd with gold.
POPE.
With hairy springes we the birds betray;
Slight lines of hair surprise the finny prey.
POPE.
My absent mates
Bait the barb'd steel, and from the fishy flood
Appease th' afflictive fierce desire of food.
POPE.
A soldier now, he with his coat appears;
A fisher now, his trembling angle bears.
POPE.
Give me thine angle; we'll to the river; there,
My music playing far off, I will betray
Tawny-finn'd fish ; my bending hook shall pierce
Their slimy jaws.
SHAKSPEARE.
The pleasant'st angling is to see the fish
Cut with her golden oars the silver stream
And greedily devour the treacherous bait;
So angle we for Beatrice.
SHAKSPEARE.
Your diver
Did hang a salt fish on his hook, which he
With fervency drew up.
SHAKSPEARE.
Like unto golden hooks
That from the foolish fish their baits do hide.
SPENSER.
Nymphs of Mulla, which, with careful heed,
The silver scaly trouts did tend full well.
SPENSER.
Should you lure
From his dark haunt beneath the tangled roots
Of pendent trees the monarch of the brook,
Behoves you then to ply your finest art.
THOMSON.
The ladies angling in the crystal lake,
Feast on the waters with the prey they take.
WALLER.
Let me live harmlessly, and near the brink
Of Trent or Avon have a dwelling place ;
\Vhere I may see my quill or cork down sink
With eager bite of pearch, or bleak, or dace.
IZAAK WALTON.
ANG UISH. ANTIQ UITIES.
I in these flowery meads would be ;
These crystal streams should solace me;
To whose harmonious, bubbling noise
I with my angle would rejoice.
IZAAK WALTON.
ANGUISH.
Perpetual anguish fills his anxious breast,
Not stopt by business, nor composed by rest ;
No music cheers him, nor no feast can please.
DRYDEN.
There doth my soul in holy vision sit,
In pensive trance, and anguish, and ecstatic fit.
MILTON.
Not all so cheerful seemed she of sight
As was her sister; whether dread did dwell,
Or anguish, in her heart, is hard to tell.
SPENSER: Faerie Queene.
ANTIQUITIES.
Immortal glories in my mind revive,
When Rome's exalted beauty I descry
Magnificent in piles of ruin lie.
ADDISON.
There is a temple in ruin stands,
Fashion'd by long-forgotten hands;
Two or three columns, and many a stone,
Marble and granite, with grass o'ergrown !
BYRON : Siege of Corinth,
There is a power
And magic in the ruin'd battlement,
For which the palace of the present hour
Must yield its pomp, and wait till ages
Are its dower.
BYRON : Childe Harold.
Ye glorious Gothic scenes ! how much ye strike
All phantasies, not even excepting mine !
A gray wall, a green ruin, rusty pike,
Make my soul pass the equinoctial line
Between the present and past worlds, and hover
Upon their airy confine, half -seas over.
BYRON.
Some on antiquated authors pore;
Rummage for sense.
DRYDEN.
Then thus a senior of the place replies,
Well read, and curious of antiquities.
DRYDEN.
Poor Vadius, long with learned spleen devour' d,
Can taste no pleasure since his shield was scour' d.
POPE.
Foes to all living work, except your own;
And advocates for folly dead and gone.
POPE.
Of ancient writ unlocks the learned store, .
Consults the dead, and lives past ages o'er.
POPE.
O goddess, say, shall I deduce my rhymes
From the dire nation in its early times ?
POPE.
With sharpen'd sight pale antiquaries pore,
Th' inscription value, but the rust adore ;
This the blue varnish, that the green, endears:
The sacred rust of twice ten hundred years.
POPE.
What toil did honest Curio take,
To get one medal wanting yet,
And perfect all his Roman set.
PRIOR: Alma.
My copper medals by the pound
May be with learned justice weigh'd:
To turn the balance, Otho's head
May be thrown in ; and for the mettle
The coin may mend a tinker's kettle.
PRIOR: Alma.
My copper lamps, at any rate,
For being true antique I bought ;
Yet wisely melted down my plate
On modern models to be wrought;
And trifles I alike pursue
Because they're old, because they're new.
PRIOR: Alr:a.
His chamber all was hang'd about with rolls,
And old records from antient times derived ;
Some made in books, some in long parchment
scrolls,
That were all worm-eaten, and full of canker
holes.
SPENSER.
Rare are the buttons of a Roman's breeches,
In antiquarian eyes surpassing riches;
Rare is each crack'd, black, rotten, earthen dish,
That held of ancient Rome the flesh and fish.
DR. WoLCon.
How his eyes languish ! how his thoughts adore
That painted coat which Joseph never wore !
He shows, on holidays, a sacred pin
That touch'd the ruff that touch'd Queen Bess's
chin.
YOUNG : Love of Fame.
A NX IE TY. A PPL A USE. AR CHITE CTURE.
ANXIETY.
What avails it that indulgent heaven
From mortal eyes has wrapt the woes to come,
If we, ingenious to torment ourselves,
Grow pale at hideous fictions of our own ?
DR. J. ARMSTRONG : ArtofPreservingHealth.
His pensive cheek upon his hand reclined,
And anxious thoughts revolving in his mind.
DRYDEN.
Let this and every other anxious thought
At th' entrance of my threshold be forgot.
DRYDEN.
Be not over-exquisite
To cast the fashion of uncertain evils :
For grant they be so, while they rest unknown,
What need a man forestall his date of grief,
And run to meet what he would most avoid ?
MILTON : Comus.
APPLAUSE.
Scylla wept,
And chid her barking waves into attention ;
And fell Charybdis murmur' d soft applause.
MILTON.
Nations unborn your mighty names shall sound,
And worlds applaud that must not yet be found !
POPE.
I would applaud thee to the very echo,
That should applaud again.
SHAKSPEARE.
ARCHITECTURE.
Our fathers next, in architecture skill'd,
Cities for use, and forts for safety build :
Then palaces and lofty domes arose;
These for devotion, and for pleasure those.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Windows and doors in nameless sculpture drest,
With order, symmetry, or taste unblest ;
Forms like some bedlam statuary's dream,
The crazed creation of misguided whim.
BURNS.
How rev'rend is the face of this tall pile,
Whose ancient pillars rear their marble heads
To bear aloft its arch'd and pond'rous roof!
By its own weight made steadfast and immovable ;
Looking tranquillity ! It strikes an awe
And terror to my aching sight ! The tombs
And monumental caves of death look cold,
And shoot a dullness to my trembling heart.
CONGREVE : Mourning Bride.
3*
Silently as a dream the fabric rose,
No sound of hammer or of saw was there.
COWPER : Task.
Firm Doric pillars found the solid base,
The fair Corinthian crown the higher space,
And all below is strength, and all above is grace.
DRYDEN.
His son builds on, and never is content
Till the last farthing is in structure spent.
DRYDEN.
No hammers fell, no ponderous axes rung ;
Like some tall palm the mystic fabric sprung;
Majestic silence !
HEBER : Palestine.
Let my due feet never fail
To walk the studious cloisters pale,
And love the high embowed roof,
With antique pillars massy proof;
And storied windows richly dight,
Casting a dim religious light.
MILTON.
The hasty multitude
Admiring enter' d ; and the work some praise,
And some the architect : his hand was known
In heav'n by many a tower'd structure high ;
Where sceptred angels held their residence,
And sat as princes.
MILTON.
Ecbatana her structure vast there shows,
And Hecatompylos her hundred gates.
MILTON.
Whene'er we view some well-proportion'd dome.
No single parts unequally surprise ;
All comes united to th' admiring eyes.
POPE.
Westward a pompous frontispiece appear' d,
On Doric pillars of white marble rear'd,
Crown'd with an architrave of antique mould,
And sculpture rising on the roughen'd gold.
POPE.
There stands a structure of majestic frame.
POPE.
W 7 ith her the temple ev'ry moment grew,
Upward the columns shoot, the roofs ascend,
And arches widen, and long aisles ascend.
POPE.
The growing tow'rs like exhalations rise,
And the huge columns heave into the skies.
POPE.
AR CHITE CTURE.AR G UING.
While fancy brings the vanish'd piles to view,
And builds imaginary Rome anew.
POPE.
You show us Rome was glorious, not profuse;
And pompous buildings once were things of use.
TOPE.
You too proceed ! make falling arts your care,
Erect new wonders, and the old repair;
Jones and Palladio to themselves restore,
And be \vhate : er Vitruvius was before.
POPE : To the Earl of Burlington.
In the well-framed models,
With emblematic skill and mystic order,
Thou show'dst where tow'rs on battlements
should rise ;
Where gates should open, or where walls should
compass.
PRIOR.
View not this spire by measures giv'n
To buildings raised by common hands.
PRIOR.
ARGUING.
When men argue, th' greatest part
O' the contest falls on terms of art,
Until the fustian stuff be spent,
And then they fall to th' argument.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
He could on either side dispute,
Confute, change hands, and still confute.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
Quoth Hudibras, It is in vain,
I see, to argue 'gainst the grain.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
Why do disputes in wrangling spend the day,
Whilst one says only " Yes," and t'other " Nay" ?
SIR J. DENIIAM.
Be calm in arguing; for fierceness makes
Error a fault, and truth discourtesy.
GEORGE HERBERT.
Let argument bear no unmusical sound,
Nor jars interpose, sacred friendship to grieve.
BEN JONSON.
His tongue
Dropp'd manna, and could make the worse ap-
pear
The better reason, to perplex and dash
Maturest counsels.
MILTON.
With studied argument, and much persuasion
sought,
Lenient of grief and anxious thought.
MILTON.
In argument with men a woman ever
Goes by the worse, whatever be her cause.
MILTON.
Let subtle schoolmen teach these friends to fight,
More studious to divide than to unite.
POPE.
Like doctors thus, when much dispute has past,
We find our tenets just the same at last.
POPE : Moral Essays.
Who shall decide when doctors disagree,
And soundest casuists doubt, like you and me?
POPE : Moral Essays.
Blunt the sense, and fit it for a skull
Of solid proofs, impenetrably dull.
POPE.
They reason and conclude by precedent,
And own stale nonsense which they ne'er invent
POPE.
Can syllogism set things right ?
No, majors soon with minors fight ;
Or, both in friendly consort join'd,
The consequence limps false behind.
PRIOR.
We sometimes wrangle, when we should debate;
A consequential ill which freedom draws;
A bad effect, but from a noble cause.
PRIOR.
In argument,
Similes are like songs in love :
They much describe, they nothing prove.
PRIOR.
In the dispute whate'er I said,
My heart was by my tongue belied ;
And in my looks you might have read
How much I argued on your side.
PRIOR.
High flights she had, and wit at will,
And so her tongue lay seldom still;
For in all visits who but she
To argue or to repartee ?
PRIOR.
The fool hath planted in his memory
An army of good words; and I do know
A many fools that stand in better place,
Garnish'd like him, that for a tricksy word
Defy the matter.
SHAKSPEARE.
A R IS TO CRA CY. ARMS. AR T.
43
ARISTOCRACY.
Grant her, besides, of noble blood that ran
In ancient veins, ere heraldry began.
DRYDEN.
May none whose scatter'd names honour my
book,
For strict degrees of rank or title look ;
'Tis 'gainst the manner of an epigram,
And I a poet here, no herald, am.
BEN JONSON.
Their choice nobility and flower
Met from all parts to solemnize this feast.
MILTON.
He, then, that is not furnish'd in this sort
Doth but usurp the sacred name of knight,
And should, if I were worthy to be judge,
Be quite degraded, like a hedge-born swain,
That doth presume to boast of gentle blood.
SHAKSPEARE.
Howe'er it be, it seems to me
'Tis only noble to be good :
Kind hearts are more than coronets,
And simple faith than Norman blood.
TENNYSON.
Fairest piece of well-form'd earth,
Urge not thus your haughty birth.
WALLER.
One whose extraction from an ancient line
Gives hope again that well-born men may shine ;
The meanest in your nature mild and good,
The noble rest secured in your blood.
WALLER.
ARMS.
The whole division that to Mars pertains,
All trades of death that deal in steel for gains,
Were there; the butcher, armorer, and smith,
Who forges sharpen'd fauchions, or the scythe.
DRYDEN.
The weighty mallet deals resounding blows,
Till the proud battlements her tow'rs inclose.
GAY.
The sword
Of Michael from the armory of God
Was giv'n him; temper'd so, that neither keen
Nor solid might resist that edge.
MILTON.
With plain heroic magnitude of mind,
And celestial vigour arm'd,
Their armories and magazines contemns.
MILTON.
Nigh at hand,
Celestial armory, shields, helms, and spears,
Hung high, with diamonds flaming and with
gold.
MILTON.
The arm'rers temper in the ford
The keen-edged pole-ax, or the shining sword;
The red-hot metal hisses in the lake.
POPE.
The armorers accomplishing the knights,
With busy hammers closing rivets up,
Give dreadful note of preparation.
SHAKSPEARE.
His warlike shield
Was all of diamond, perfect, pure, and clean;
For so exceeding shone his glistering ray,
That Phoebus' golden face it did attaint,
As when a cloud his beams doth overlay.
SPENSER: Faerie Queene.
ART.
The whole world, without art and dress,
Would be but one great wilderness,
And mankind but a savage herd,
For all that nature has conferr'd :
This does but roughen and design,
Leaves art to polish and refine.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
Their wildness lose, and, quitting nature's part,
Obey the rules and discipline of(art.
DRYDEN.
Such tools as art yet rude had form'd.
MILTON.
Art from that fund each just supply provides,
Works without show, and without pomp presides.
POPE.
From vulgar bounds with brave disorder part,
And snatch a grace beyond the reach of art.
POPE : Essay on Criticism.
To wake the soul by tender strokes of art,
To raise the genius, and to mend the heart.
POPE: Prologs to "Cato."
We oft our slowly growing works impart,
While images reflect from art to art.
POPE.
Semblant art shall carve the fair effect
And full achievement of thy great designs.
PRIOR.
44
AR TIFICE. AR TS.
Good Howard, emulous of the Grecian art.
PRIOR.
In framing artists, art hath thus decreed :
To make some good, but others to exceed.
SHAKSPEARE.
Famous Greece,
That source of art and cultivated thought,
Which they to Rome, and Romans hither brought.
WALLER.
ARTIFICE.
Others by guilty artifice and arts
Of promised kindness practise on our hearts ;
With expectation blow the passion up ;
She fans the fire without one gale of hope.
GRANVILLE.
A man of sense can artifice disdain,
As men of wealth may venture to go plain.
YOUNG.
ARTS.
Behold those arts with a propitious eye
That suppliant to their great protectress fly.
ADDISON.
Cultivate the wild licentious savage
With wisdom, discipline, and liberal arts,
The embellishments of life.
ADDISON.
Wheresoe'er her conquering eagles fled,
Arts, learning, and civility were spread.
SIR J. DENHAM.
From Egypt arts their progress made to Greece,
Wrapt in the fable of the golden fleece.
SIR J. DENHAM.
The soldier then in Grecian arts tinskill'd,
Returning rich with plunder from the field,
If cups of silver or of gold he brought
With jewels set, and exquisitely wrought,
To glorious trappings strait the plate he turn'd,
And with the glitt'ring spoil his horse adorn'd.
DRYDEN.
What wonder if the kindly beams he shed,
Revived the drooping arts again ;
If science raised her head,
And soft humanity, that from rebellion fled.
DRYDEN.
All arts and artists Theseus could command,
Who sold for hire, or wrought for better fame.
DRYDEN.
He, full of fraudful arts,
This well-invented tale for truth imparts.
DRYDEN.
Live then, thou great encourager of arts !
Live ever in our thankful hearts.
DRYDEN.
Studious they appear
Of arts that polish life ; inventors rare,
Unmindful of their maker.
MILTON.
For when he dies, farewell all honour, bounty,
All generous encouragement of arts.
OTWAY.
Expunge the whole, or lop th' excrescent parts
Of all, our vices have created arts :
Then see how little the remaining sum,
Which served the past, and must the times to
come.
POPE.
Artist divine, whose skilful hands infold
The victinvs horn with circumfusile gold.
POPE.
Smit with the love of English arts we came,
And met congenial, mingling flame with flame.
POPE.
Arts still follow'd where Rome's eagles flew.
POPE.
We conquer'd France, but felt our captive's
charm :
Their arts victorious triumph'd o'er our arms.
POPE.
Artists and plans relieved my solemn hours ;
I founded palaces, and planted bow'rs.
PRIOR.
Ere the progressive course of restless age
Performs three thousand times its annual stage,
May not our pow'r and learning be suppress'd,
And arts and learning learn to travel west ?
PRIOR.
Our court shall be a little academy,
Still and contemplative in living arts.
SHAKSPEARE.
None in more languages can show
Those arts, which you so early know.
WALLER.
ASTROLOGY.
45
ASTROLOGY.
If he chance to find
A new repast, or an untasted spring,
Blesses his stars and thinks it luxury.
ADDISON.
Thanks to my stars, I have not ranged about
The wilds of life ere I could find a friend.
ADDISON.
Man is his own star, and the soul that can
Render an honest and a perfect man,
Commands all light, all influence, all fate
Nothing to him falls early or too late.
Our acts our angels are, or good or ill,
Our fatal shadows, that walk by us still.
BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER.
Though cheats, yet more intelligible
Than those that with the stars do fribble.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
But with more lucky hit than those
That use to make the stars depose.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
I only deal by rules of art,
Such as are lawful, and judge by
Conclusions of astrology.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
Cardan believed great states depend
Upon the tip o' th' bear's tail's end ;
That as she whisk'd it t'wards the sun,
Strow'd mighty empires up and down.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
They'll find i' the physiognomies
O' th' planets all men's destinies.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
Quoth Hudibras, The stars determine
You are my prisoners, base vermin !
Could they not tell you so, as well
As what I came to know foretell ?
BUTLER: Hudibras.
Many rare pithy saws concerning
The worth of astrologic learning.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
Cry out upon the stars for doing
111 offices, to cross their wooing.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
The astrologer, who spells the stars,
Mistakes his globes, and in her brighter eye
Interprets heaven's physiognomies.
JOHN CLEAVELAND.
Howe'er love's native hours are set,
Whatever starry synod met,
'Tis in the mercy of her eye,
If poor love shall live or die.
CRASHAW.
Large foundations may be safely laid,
Or houses roof 'd, if friendly planets aid.
CREECH.
The Greek names this the horoscope,
This governs life, and this marks out our parts ;
Our humours, manners, qualities, and arts.
CREECH.
We must trust to virtue, not to fate ;
That may protect, whom cruel stars will hate.
SIR W. DAVENANT : Distresses.
Unskill'd in schemes by planets to foreshow,
I neither will nor can prognosticate
To the young gaping heir his father's fate.
DRYDEN.
The spiteful stars have shed their venom down,
And now the peaceful planets take their turn.
DRYDEN.
Such sullen planets at my birth did shine,
They threaten every fortune mixt with mine.
DRYDEN.
Sorceries to raise th' infernal pow'rs,
And sigils framed in planetary hours.
DRYDEN.
Would I had been disposer of thy stars,
Thou shouldst have had thy wish, and died in
wars.
DRYDEN.
If but a mile she travel out of town,
The planetary hour must first be known,
And lucky moment, if her eye but akes,
Or itches, its decumbiture she takes.
DRYDEN.
Lady, throw back thy raven hair,
Lay thy white brow in the moonlight bare ;
I will look on the stars and look on thee,
And read the page of thy destiny.
L. E. LANDON.
For if those stars, cross to me in my birth,
Had not denied their prosperous influence to it,
I might have ceased to be, and not as now
To curse my being.
MASSINGER.
Their planetary motions and aspects
Of noxious efficacy, and when to join
In synod unbenign.
MILTON.
ASTROLOGY. A UCTION. A UTHORS.
Two planets rushing from aspect malign
Of fiercest opposition in mid sky,
Should combat, and their jarring spheres con-
found.
MILTON.
No date prefix' d
Directs me in the starry rubric set.
MILTON.
If I read aught in heav'n,
Or heav'n write aught of fate, by what the stars,
Voluminous, or single characters,
In their conjunction met, give me to spell,
Sorrows and labours, opposition, hate,
Attend thee.
MILTON.
fact unparallel'd ! Charles ! best of kings !
What stars their black, disastrous influence shed
On thy nativity ?
JOHN PHILIPS.
Astrologers that future fates foreshew,
Projectors, quacks, and lawyers not a few.
POPE.
Of talismans and sigils knew the power,
And careful watch'd the planetary hour.
POPE.
f A blockhead rubs his thoughtless skull,
i And thanks his stars he was not born a fool.
POPE.
There's some ill planet reigns :
1 must be patient, till the heavens look
With an aspect more favourable.
SHAKSPEARE.
Be opposite all planets of good luck
To my proceeding, if, with pure heart's love,
Immaculate devotion, holy thoughts,
I tender not thy beauteous princely daughter !
SHAKSPEARE.
I find my zenith doth depend upon
A most auspicious star ; whose influence
If now I court not, but omit, my fortunes
Will ever after droop.
SHAKSPEARE.
Let me lament
That our stars, unreconcilable, should have
divided
Our equalness to this.
SHAKSPEARE.
Our jovial star reign'd at his birth.
SHAKSl'EARE.
Men at some time are masters of their fates ;
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves, that we are underlings.
SHAKSPEARE.
They have, as who have not, whom their great
stars
Throned and set high ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Shall I so much dishonour my fair stars,
On equal terms to give him chastisement ?
SHAKSPEARE.
My good stars, that were my former guides,
Have empty left their orbs, and shot their fires
Into the abysm of hell.
SHAKSPEARE.
Strange an astrologer should die
Without one wonder in the sky !
Not one of all his crony stars
To pay their duty at his hearse.
SWIFT.
AUCTION.
And much more honest to be hired, and stand
With auctionary hammer in thy hand ;
Provoking to give more, and knocking thrice
For the old household stuff, or picture's price.
DRYDEN : Juvenal.
Ask you why Phryne the whole auction buys?
Phryne foresees a general excise.
POPE.
AUTHORS.
Our homespun authors must forsake the field,
And Shakspeare to the soft Scarlatti yield.
ADDISON.
Great Milton next, with high and haughty stalks,
Unfetter'd in majestic numbers walks.
ADDISON.
Than Timoleon's arms require,
And Tully's curule chair, and Milton's golden
lyre.
AKENSIDE : Ode.
Renowned Spenser, lie a thought more nigh
To learned Chaucer, and, rare Beaumont, lie
A little nearer Spenser, to make room
For Shakspeare in your threefold, fourfold tomb.
WILLIAM BASSE : On Shakspeare.
How does Cartesius all his sinews strain
The earth's attractive vigour to explain !
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
AUTHORS.
47
There Shakspeare ! on whose forehead climb
The crowns o' the world ! O eyes sublime
With tears and laughter for all time !
MRS. E. B. BROWNING.
The glory dies not, and the grief is past.
SIR S. E. BRYDGES : Death of Sir Walter Scott.
Where sense with sound and ease with weight
combine
In the pure silver of Pope's ringing line ;
Or where the pulse of man beats loud and strong
In the frank flow of Dryden's lusty song.
BULWER : New Timon.
When Bishop Berkeley said, " There was no
matter,"
And proved it 'twas no matter what he said.
BYRON.
Evergreen forest ! which Boccaccio's lore
And Dryden's lay made haunted ground to me,
How have I loved the twilight hour and thee !
BYRON.
Cervantes smiled Spain's chivalry away.
BYRON.
Yet truth will sometimes lend her noblest fires,
And decorate the verse herself inspires:
This fact, in Virtue's name, let Crabbe attest :
Though Nature's sternest painter, yet the best.
BYRON : English Bards and Scotch Reviewers.
And stoic Franklin's energetic shade,
Robed in the lightning which his hand allay'd.
BYRON : Age of Bronze.
The starry Galileo with his woes.
BYRON : Childe Harold.
The blind old man of Scio's rocky isle.
BYRON : Bride of Abydos.
Think you, if Laura had been Petrarch's wife,
He would have written sonnets all his life ?
BYRON.
The self-torturing sophist, wild Rousseau,
The apostate of affection he who threw
Enchantment over passion, and from woe
Wrung overwhelming eloquence.
BYRON: Childe Harold.
The isles of Greece ! the isles of Greece !
Where burning Sappho loved and sung.
BYRON.
The Ariosto of the North.
BYRON : Childe Harold.
Sighing that nature form'd but one such man,
And broke the die in moulding Sheridan.
BYRON.
And aye that volume on her lap is thrown,
Which every heart of human mould endears;
With Shakspeare's self she speaks and smiles
alone,
And no intruding visitation fears
To shame the unconscious laugh or stop her
sweetest tears.
CAMPBELL: Gertrude of Wyoming.
And rival all but Shakspeare's name below.
CAMPBELL: Pleasures of Hope.
Condorcet filter'd through the dregs of Paine.
CANNING: Anti- Jacobin.
Be that blind bard, who on the Chian strand
By those deep sounds possess' d with inwar^
light,
Beheld the Iliad and the Odyssee
Rise to the swelling of the voiceful sea.
COLERIDGE: Fancy in Nubibus.
Too nicely Jonson knew the critic's part;
Nature in him was almost lost in Art.
COLLINS.
The fair example of the heav'nly lark,
Thy fellow-poet, Cowley, mark ;
Above the stars let thy bold music sound,
Thy humble nest build on the ground.
COWLEY.
His faith, perhaps, in some nice tenets might
Be wrong; his life, I'm sure, was in the right.
COWLEY : On the Death of Crashaw.
Pindar's unnavigable song
Like a swift stream from mountains pours along.
COWLEY.
All the wide extended sky,
And all the harmonious worlds on high.
And Virgil's sacred work shall die.
COWLEY.
Sidney, warbler of poetic prose.
COWPER: Task.
I hasten to our own ; nor will relate
Great Mithridates' and rich Croesus' fate;
Whom Solon wisely counsell'd to attend
The name of happy, till he knew his end.
CREECH.
Time, which made them their fame outlive,
To Cowley scarce did ripeness give.
SIR J. DENHAM.
AUTHORS.
Horace's wit and Virgil's state
He did not steal, but emulate;
And when he would like them appear,
Their garb, but not their clothes, did wear.
SIR J. DENHAM.
What from Jonson's oil and sweat did flow,
Or what more easy nature did bestow
On Shakspeare's gentler muse, in thee full-grown
Their graces did appear.
SIR J. DENHAM.
So the twins' humours in our Terence are
Unlike; this harsh and rude, that smooth and
fair.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Noble Boyle, not less in nature seen
Than his great brother read in states and men.
DRYDEN.
Great Fletcher never treads in buskins here,
Nor greater Jonson dares in socks appear.
DRYDEN.
In easy dialogues is Fletcher's praise :
He moved the mind, but had not pow'r to raise.
DRYDEN.
When did his muse from Fletcher scenes purloin,
As thou whose Eth'ridge dost transfuse to thine ?
But so transfused as oil and waters flow :
His always floats above, thine sinks below.
DRYDEN.
Ganfride, who couldst so well in rhyme com-
plain
The death of Richard, with an arrow slain.
DRYDEN.
Homer, whose name shall live in epic song,
While music numbers, or while verse has feet.
DRYDEN.
Three poets, in three distant ages born,
Greece, Italy, and England did adorn :
The first in majesty of thought surpass'd,
The next in gracefulness ; in both the last.
The force of nature could no further go :
To make a third she join'd the other two.
DRYDEN : On Milton.
Horace, with sly insinuating grace,
Laugh'd at his friend, and look'd him in the
face;
Would raise a blush where secret vice he found,
And tickle while he gently probed the wound;
With seeming innocence the crowd beguiled,
But made the desperate passes when he smiled.
DRYDEN.
Nor let false friends seduce thy mind to fame
By arrogating Jonson's hostile name ;
Let father Flecknoe fire thy mind with praise,
And uncle Ogleby thy envy raise.
DRYDEN.
Your Ben and Fletcher, in their first young
flight,
Did no Volpone, nor no Arbaces write ;
But hopp'd about, and short excursions made
From bough to bough, as if they were afraid.
DRYDEN.
Lucan, content with praise, may lie at ease
In costly grots and marble palaces;
But to poor Bassus what avails a name,
To starve on compliments and empty fame?
DRYDEN.
Orestes' bulky rage,
Unsatisfied with margins closely writ,
Foams o'er the covers, and not finish'd yet.
DRYDEN.
Next Petrarch follow'd, and in him we see
What rhyme, improved in all its height, can be;
At best a pleasing sound, and sweet barbarity.
DRYDEN.
Saint Andre's feet ne'er kept more equal time,
Not ev'n the feet of thy own Psyche's rhyme ;
Though they in numbers as in sense excel,
So just, so like tautology, they fell.
DRYDEN.
Shadwell alone of all my sons is he
Who stands confirm'd in full stupidity.
DRYDEN.
The rest to some faint meaning make pretence,
But Shadwell never deviates into sense.
DRYDEN.
Some beams of wit on other souls may fall,
Strike through, and make a lucid interval;
But Shadwell's genuine night admits no ray,
His rising fogs prevail upon the day.
DRYDEN.
Anger would indite
Such woful stuff as I or Shadwell write.
DRYDEN.
Shadwell till death true dulness would main-
tain;
And, in his father's right and realm's defence,
Ne'er would have peace with wit, nor truce with
sense.
DRYDEN.
AUTHORS.
49
But Shakspeare's magic could not copied be ;
Within that circle none durst walk but he.
DRYDEN : Prologue to the Tempest.
The vain endurances of life,
And they who most perform'd, and promised
less,
Ev'n Short and Hobbes, forsook th' unequal
strife.
DRYDEN.
Whoe'er thou art, whose forward ears are bent
On state affairs, to guide the government;
Hear first what Socrates of old has said
To the loved youth whom he at Athens bred.
DRYDEN.
Exalted Socrates ! divinely brave !
Injured he fell, and dying he forgave;
Too noble for revenge.
DRYDEN.
That good man, who drank the pois'nous
draught
With mind serene, and could not wish to see
His vile accuser drink as deep as he.
DRYDEN.
Burns o'er the plough sung sweet his wood-
notes wild,
And richest Shakspeare was a poor man's child.
E. ELLIOTT.
O ye muses ! deign your bless'd retreat,
Where Horace wantons at your spring,
And Pindar sweeps a bolder string.
FENTON.
Morals snatch from Plutarch's tatter'd page,
A mildew'd Bacon, or Stagyra's sage.
GAY.
Thus flourish'd love, and beauty reign'd in state,
Till the proud Spaniard gave this glory's date :
Past is the gallantry; the fame remains,
Transmitted safe in Dryden's lofty scenes.
GRANVILLE.
Dryden himself, to cure a frantic age,
Was forced to let his judgment stoop to rage;
To a wild audience he conform'd his voice,
Complied to custom, but not err'd through
choice :
Deem then the people's, not the writer's sin,
Almansor's rage, and rants of Maximin.
GRANVILLE.
Homer shall last, like Alexander, long;
As much recorded, and as often sung.
GRANVJLLE.
Angry Skelton's breathless rhymes.
BISHOP HALL.
O thou, too great to rival or to praise,
Forgive, lamented shade, these duteous lays.
Lee had thy fire, and Congreve had thy wit;
And copyists, here and there, some likeness
hit;
But none possess'd thy graces and thy ease,
For thee alone 'twas natural to please.
WALTER HARTE,
Pope came off clean with Homer ; but they
say,
Broome went before, and kindly swept the
way.
ANTHONY HENLEY.
O'er nature's laws God cast the veil of night :
Out blazed a Newton's soul and all was light.
AARON HILL.
Their discords sting through Burns and Moore,
Like hedgehogs dress'd in lace.
O. W. HOLMES: Music Grinders.
Good Homer sometimes nods.
HORACE.
Each change of many-colour'd life he drew,
Exhausted worlds, and then imagined new:
Existence saw him spurn her bounded reign,
And panting Time toil'd after him in vain.
DR. S. JOHNSON.
From Marlborough's eyes the streams of dotage
flow,
And Swift expires a driveller and a show.
DR. S. JOHNSON : Vanity of Human Wishes.
Martial, thou gav'st far nobler epigrams"
To thy Domitian than I can my James;
But in my royal subject I pass thee,
Thou flattered'st thine, mine cannot flatter'd be.
BEN JONSON.
Soule of the Age !
The applause ! delight ! the wonder of our
Stage !
My Shakespeare, rise ; I will not lodge thee by
Chaucer, or Spenser, or bid Beaumont lye
A little further, to make thee a roome :
Thou art a Monument, without a tombe,
And art aliue still, while thy Booke doth Hue,
And we haue wits to read, and praise to giue.
BEN JONSON: Preface to First Folio, 1622.
And half had stagger'd that stout Stagirite.
LAMB.
AUTHORS.
Love warms our fancy with enliv'ning fires,
Refines our genius, and our verse inspires;
From him Theocritus, on Enna's plains,
Learnt the wild sweetness of his Doric strains;
Virgil by him was taught the moving art,
That charm'd each ear and soften'd every heart.
LORD LYTTELTON.
For his chaste Muse employ'd her heaven-
taught lyre
None but the noblest passions to inspire ;
Not one immoral, one corrupted thought,
One line which, dying, he could wish to blot.
LORD LYTTELTON : Prologue to Thomson's
Coriolanus.
What neede my Shakespeare for his honour'd
bones,
The labour of an Age in piled stones,
Or that his hallow'd Reliques should be hid
Under a star-ypointing pyramid ?
Dear Sonne of Memory, great Heire of Fame,
What need'st thou such weak witness of thy
Name?
Thou in our wonder and astonishment
Hast built thyselfe a lasting Monument :
For whilst, to th' shame of slow-endevouring Art,
Thy easie numbers flow, and that each part
[heart]
Hath from the leaves of thy unvalued Booke,
Those Delphicke Lines with deep Impression
tooke ;
Then thou, our fancy of herself bereaving,
Dost make us Marble with too much conceiving,
And so Sepulcher'd, in such pompe does lie,
That Kings for such a Tombe would wish to die.
MILTON.
Or sweetest Shakspeare, fancy's child,
Warble his native wood-notes wild.
MILTON.
The plain good man, whose actions teach
More virtue than a sect can preach,
Pursues his course unsagely blest,
His tutor whisp'ring in his breast :
Nor could he act a purer part
Though he had Tully all by heart;
And when he drops the tear on woe,
He little knows, or cares to know,
That Epictetus blamed that tear,
By Heav'n approved, to virtue dear.
MOORE.
Oh ! who that has ever had rapture complete
Would ask how we feel it, or why it is sweet;
How rays are confused, or how particles fly
Through the medium refined of a glance or a
sigh?
Is there one who but once would not rather
have known it
Than written, with Harvey, whole volumes
upon it?
MOORE.
In English lays, and all sublimely great,
Thy Homer charms with all his ancient heat.
PARNELL.
Thus tender Spenser lived, with mean repast
Content, depress'd with penury, and pined
In foreign realm : yet not debased his verse.
JOHN PHILIPS.
How did they fume, and stamp, and roar, and
chafe,
And swear ! not Addison himself was safe.
POPE.
Who but must laugh, if such a man there be?
Who would not weep, if Atticus were he ?
POPE.
If parts allure thee, think how Bacon shined,
The wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind ;
Or, ravish'd with the whistling of a name,
See Cromwell clamn'd to everlasting fame.
POPE.
Words that wise Bacon or brave Raleigh spoke.
POPE.
Her gray-hair'd synods damning books unread,
And Bacon trembling for his brazen head.
POPE.
The hero William, and the martyr Charles,
One knighted Blackmore, and one pension'd
Quarles.
POPE.
Could pension'd Boileau lash in honest strain
Flatt'rers and bigots, even in Louis' reign ;
And I not strip the gilding off a knave,
Unplaced, unpension'd, no man's heir or slave ?
POPE.
Sat full-blown Bufo, pufTd by ev'ry quill,
Fed by soft dedication allday long,
Horace and he went hand in hand in song.
1'OPE.
Chaucer's worst ribaldry is learn'd by rote,
And beastly Skelton Heads of Houses quote.
POPE.
AUTHORS.
No longer now that golden age appears,
When patriarch-wits survived a thousand years;
Now length of fame, our second life, is lost,
And bare threescore is all ev'n that can boast;
Our sons their fathers' failing language see,
And such as Chaucer is, shall Dryden be.
POPE.
Less reading than makes felon 'scape,
Less human genius than God gives an ape,
Can make a Gibber.
POPE.
With equal rays immortal Tully shone :
Behind, Rome's genius waits with civic crowns,
And the great father of his country owns.
POPE.
Begone, ye critics, and restrain your spite ;
Codrus writes on, and will forever write.
POPE
Who now reads Cowley? If he pleases yet,
His moral pleases, not his pointed wit.
POPE.
Yet time ennobles or degrades each line ;
It brighten'd Craggs's, and may darken thine.
POPE.
Earless on high stood unabash'd Defoe,
And Tutchin, flagrant from the scourge, below.
POPE.
Leave such to tune their own dull rhymes, and
know
What's roundly smooth, or languishingly slow;
And praise the easy vigour of a line
Where Denham's strength and Waller's sweet-
ness join.
POPE.
Dennis and dissonance and captious art,
And snip-snap short, and interruption smart.
POPE.
Unhappy Dryden ! in all Charles's days
Roscommon only boasts unspotted lays;
And in our own, excuse some courtly stains,
No whiter page than Addison's remains.
POPE.
Ev'n copious Dryden wanted, or forgot,
The last and greatest art, the art to blot.
POPE.
All books he reads, and all he reads assails,
From Dryden's Fables down to D y's Tales.
POPE.
Might Dryden bless once more our eyes,
New Blackmores and new Milbourns must arise;
Nay, should great Homer lift his awful head,
Zoilus again would start up from the dead.
POPE.
At length Erasmus, that great injured name,
Stemm'd the wild torrent of a barb'rous age,
And drove those holy Vandals off the stage.
POPE.
Eusden ekes out Blackmore's endless line.
POPE.
Songs, sonnets, epigrams, the winds uplift,
And whisk them back to Evans, Young, and
Swift.
POPE.
Most authors steal their works, or buy ;
Garth did not write his own Dispensary.
POPE.
The thoughts of gods let Granville's verse recite,
And bring the scenes of op'ning fate to light.
POPE.
The lines are weak, another's pleased to say :
Lord Fanny spins a thousand such a day.
POPE.
Be Homer's works your study ;
Thence form your judgment, thence your notions
bring,
And trace the muses upwards to their spring.
POPE.
See Dionysius Homer's thoughts refine,
And call new beauties forth from ev'ry line.
POPE.
Those oft are stratagems which errors seem ;
Nor is it Homer nods, but we who dream.
POPE.
Horace still charms with graceful negligence,
And without method talks us into sense;
Will, like a friend, familiarly convey
The truest notions in the easiest way.
POPE.
There are, who to my person pay their court ;
I cough like Horace, and, though lean, am short.
Amnon's great son one shoulder had too high ;
Such Ovid's nose, and, sir ! you have an eye !
POPE.
Whether the darken'd room to muse invite,
Or whiten'd wall provoke the skewer to write;
In durance, exile, Bedlam, or the Mint,
Like Lee or Budgell, I will rhyme and print.
POPE.
AUTHORS.
Each staunch polemic, stubborn as a rock,
Each fierce logician still expelling Locke,
Came whip and spur.
POPE.
Thee, bold Longinus, all the Nine inspire,
And bless their critic with a poet's fire.
POPE.
If Maevius scribble in Apollo's spite,
There are who judge still worse than he can
write.
POPE.
Milton's strong pinion now no heaven can
bound,
Now, serpent-like, in prose he sweeps the ground.
POPE.
Now times are changed, and one poetic itch
Has seized the court and city, poor and rich :
Sons, sires, and grandsires, all will wear the
bays,
Our wives read Milton, and our daughters plays ;
To theatres and to rehearsals throng,
And all our grace at table is a song.
POPE.
Superior beings, when of late they saw
A mortal man unfold all nature's law,
Admired such wisdom in a mortal shape,
And show'd a Newton as we show an ape.
POPE.
Nature and nature's laws lay hid in night
God said, " Let Newton be !" and all was light.
POPE.
Here swells the shelf with Ogilby the great;
There, stamp' d with arms, Newcastle shines
complete.
POPE.
Otway fail'd to polish or refine,
And fluent Shakspeare scarce effaced a line.
POPE.
Recall those nights that closed thy toilsome days;
Still hear thy Parnell in his living lays.
POPE.
Then future ages with delight shall see
How Plato's, Bacon's, Newton's, looks agree ;
Or in fair series laurell'd bards be shown,
A Virgil there, and here an Addison.
POPE.
Go soar with Plato to th' empyreal sphere,
To the first good, first perfect, and first fair.
POPE.
Plutarch, that writes his life,
Tells us that Cato dearly loved his wife.
POPE.
Why did I write ? what sin to me unknown
Dipp'd me in ink? my parents' or my own ?
As yet a child, nor yet a fool to fame,
I lisp'd in numbers, for the numbers came.
POPE.
Exact Racine and Corneille's noble fire
Taught us that France had something to admire.
POPE.
Silence, ye wolves, while Ralph to Cynthia howls,
And makes night hideous ; answer him, ye owls.
POPE.
Roscommon not more learn'd than good,
With manners gen'rous as his noble blood ;
To him the wit of Greece and Rome was known,
And ev'ry author's merit bui his own.
POPE.
Thy relicks, Rowe, to this fair shrine we trust,
And sacred place by Dryden's awful dust;
Beneath a rude and nameless stone he lies,
To which thy tomb shall guide inquiring eyes.
POPE.
Against your worship when had S k writ ?
Or P ge pour'd forth the torrent of his wit?
POPE.
Now night descending, the proud scene was o'er,
But lived in Settle's numbers one day more.
POPE.
Shakspeare, whom you and ev'ry playhouse bill
Style the divine, the matchless, what you will,
For gain, not glory, wing'd his roving flight,
And grew immortal in his own despite.
POPE.
The mighty Stagyrite first left the shore,
Spread all his sails, and durst the deepsexplore;
He steer'd securely, and discover'd far,
Led by the light of the Mrconian star.
POPE.
Spenser himself affects the obsolete,
And Sidney's verse halts ill on Roman feet.
POPE.
O thou ! whatever title please thine ear,
Dean, Drapier, Bickerstaff, or Gulliver !
Whether thou choose Cervantes' serious air,
Or laugh and shake in Rabelais' easy chair,
Or praise the court, or magnify mankind,
Or thy grieved country's copper chains unbind.
POPE.
AUTHORS.
53
Swift for closer style,
But Hoadly for a period of a mile.
POPE.
For Swift and him despised the farce of state,
The sober follies of the wise and great.
POPE.
Next o'er his books his eyes began to roll,
In pleasing memory of all he stole ;
Now here he sipp'd, now there he plunder'd
snug,
And suck'd o'er all, like an industrious bug.
POPE : on Theobald.
Immortal Vida ! on whose honour'd brow
The poet's bays and critic's ivy grow,
Cremona now shall ever boast thy name,
As next in place to Mantua, next to fame.
POPE.
To Cato, Virgil paid one honest line :
O let my country's friends illumine mine.
POPE.
When first young Maro sung of kings and wars,
Ere warning Phoebus touch'd his trembling ears,
Perhaps he seem'd above the critic's law,
And but from nature's fountains scorn'd to draw.
POPE.
Even rival wits did Voiture's fate deplore,
And the gay mourn'd, who never mourn'd
before.
POPE.
The truest hearts for Voiture heaved with sighs;
Voiture was wept by all the brightest eyes.
POPE.
A monarch's sword when mad vain glory draws,
Not Waller's wreath can hide the nation's scars.
POPE.
Waller was smooth, but Dryden taught to join
The varying verse, the full resounding line,
The long majestic march, and energy divine !
POPE.
Withers, adieu ! yet not with thee remove
Thy martial spirit or thy social love.
POPE.
When once the poet's honour ceases,
From reason far his transports rove;
And Boileau for eight hundred pieces
Makes Louis take the wall of Jove.
PRIOR.
The youngster, who at nine and three
Drinks with his sisters milk and tea,
From breakfast reads, till twelve o'clock,
Burnet and Heylin, Hobbes and Locke.
PRIOR.
Homer, great bard! so fate ordain'd, arose;
And, bold as were his countrymen in fight,
Snatch'd their fair actions from degrading piose,
And set their battles in eternal light.
PRIOR.
Beneath a verdant laurel's shade,
Horace, immortal bard! supinely laid.
PRIOR.
Me all too mean for such a task I weet;
Yet if the sovereign lady deigns to smile,
I'll follow Horace with impetuous heat,
And clothe the verse in Spenser's native style,
PRIOR.
Dan Pope, for thy misfortune grieved,
With kind concern and skill has weaved
A silken web, and ne'er shall fade
Its colours; gently has he laid
The mantle o'er thy sad distress,
And Venus shall the texture bless.
PRIOR.
Shadwell from the town retires
To bless the wood with peaceful lyric;
Then hey for praise and panegyric.
PRIOR.
Writing is but just like dice,
And lucky mains make people wise;
That jumbled words, if fortune throw 'em,
Shall well as Dryden form a poem.
PRIOR.
If to be sad is to be wise,
I do most heartily despise
Whatever Socrates has said,
Or Tully writ, or Wanley read.
PRIOR.
Though its error may be such
As Knags and Burgess cannot hit,
It may feel the nicer touch
Of Wycherley's or Congreve's wit.
PRIOR.
Methought I saw the grave where Laura lay.
SIR W. RALEIGH : Verses to Spenser.
Horace will our superfluous branches prune,
Give us new rules, and set our harps in tune.
ROSCOMMON.
54
AUTHORS.
Serene and clear harmonious Horace flows,
With sweetness not to be exprest in prose.
ROSCOMMON.
Horace did ne'er aspire to epic bays;
Nor lofty Maro stoop to lyric lays.
ROSCOMMON.
We know that town is but with fishers fraught,
Where Theseus govern'd and where Plato
taught.
SANDYS.
Though gay as mirth, as curious thought sedate,
As elegance polite, as power elate.
SAVAGE: On Pope.
While we do admire
This virtue and this moral discipline,
Let's be no stoics, nor no stocks, I pray;
Or so devote to Aristotle's checks,
As Ovid be an outcast quite abjured.
SHAKSPEARE.
Read Homer once, and you can read no more,
For all books else appear so mean, so poor,
Verse will seem prose ; but still persist to read,
And Homer will be all the books you need.
SHEFFIELD : Essay on Poetry.
How many a rustic Milton has pass'd by, .
Stifling the speechless longings of his heart
In unremitting drudgery and care.
How many a vulgar Cato has compell'd
His energies, no longer tameless then,
To mould a pin, or fabricate a nail.
SHELLEY: Queen Mab.
A little bench of heedless bishops here,
And there a chancellor in embryo,
Or bard sublime, if bard may e'er be so,
As Milton, Shakspeare, names that ne'er shall
die.
SHENSTONE: School- Mistress.
Witty as Horatius Flaccus,
As great a Jacobin as Gracchus,
Short, though not as fat, as Bacchus,
Riding on a little jackass.
SYDNEY SMITH : Impromptu on Jeffrey.
Wild dreams ! but such
As Plato loved ; such as with holy zeal
Our Milton worshipp'd.
SOUTHEY: Inscription on Henry Martyn.
Dan Chaucer, well of English undefiled.
SPENSER: Faerie Queene.
Thrice-happy Duck, employ'd in threshing
stubble,
Thy toil is lessen'd, and thy profits double.
SWIFT.
Gay paid his courtship with the crowd,
As far as modest pride allow'd;
Rejects a servile usher's place,
And leaves St. James's in disgrace.
SWIFT.
Dame Nature, as the learned show,
Provides each animal its foe.
Hounds hunt the hare; the wily fox
Devours your geese, the wolf your flocks:
Thus envy pleads a natural claim
To persecute the muse's fame :
On poets, in all times, abusive;
From Homer down to Pope, inclusive.
SWIFT.
Wit, like wine, from happier climates brought,
Dash'd by these rogues, turns English common
draught.
They pall Moliere's and Lopez's sprightly strain.
SWIFT.
In Pope I cannot read a line,
But with a sigh I wish it mine;
When he can in one couplet fix
More sense than I can do in six.
Pope's filial piety excels
Whatever Grecian story tells.
Send those to paper-sparing Pope;
And, when he sits to write,
No letter with an envelope
Could give him more delight.
As Rochefoucault his maxims drew
From nature, I believe them true;
They argue no corrupted mind
In him : the fault is in mankind.
SWIFT.
SWIFT.
SWIFT.
SWIFT.
Now Curll his shop from rubbish drains:
Three genuine tomes of Swift's remains;
And then, to make them pass the glibber,
Revised by Tibbald, More, and Cibber.
SWIFT.
He'll use me as he does my betters,
Publish my life, my will, my letters,
Revive the libels born to die,
Which Pope must bear as well as I.
SWIFT.
A UTHORS.A UTHORSHIP.
55
In Raleigh mark their ev'ry glory mix'd;
Raleigh, the scourge of Spain, whose breast
with all
The sage, the patriot, and the hero burn'd.
THOMSON.
The patient show'd us the wise course to steer,
A candid censor and a friend sincere;
He taught us how to live; and (oh! too high
The price of knowledge !) taught us how to die.
TlCKELL: on the Death of Addison.
Though slaves, like birds that sing not in a cage,
They lost their genius, and poetic rage ;
Homers again and Pindars may be found,
And his great actions with their numbers
crown'd.
WALLER.
A great deal, my dear liege, depends
On having clever bards for friends.
What had Achilles been without his Homer,
A tailor, woollen-draper, or a comber?
DR. WOLCOTT.
I thought of Chatterton, the marvellous boy,
The sleepless soul that perish'd in his pride ;
Of him who walk'd in glory and in joy,
Following his plough, along the mountain side.
WORDSWORTH.
Since every mortal power of Coleridge
Was frozen at its marvellous source,
The rapt one, of the godlike forehead,
The heaven-eyed creature sleeps in earth ;
And Lamb, the frolic and the gentle,
Has vanish'd from his lonely hearth.
WORDSWORTH.
That mighty orb of song,
The divine Milton.
WORDSWORTH.
And when a damp
Fell round the path of Milton, in his hand
The thing became a trumpet, whence he blew
Soul-animating strains, alas ! too few.
WORDSWORTH.
The sightless Milton, with his hair
Around his placid temples curl'd;
And Shakspeare at his side, a freight,
If clay could think and mind were weight,
For him who bore the world.
WORDSWORTH.
For Plato's lore sublime,
And all the wisdom of the Stagyrite,
Enrich'd and beautified his studious mind.
WORDSWORTH : from the Italian.
We must be free or die, who speak the tongue
That Shakspeare spake, the faith and morals
hold
Which Milton held.
WORDSWORTH.
Meek Walton's heavenly memory.
WORDSWORTH : Walton's Book of Lives.
The feather whence the pen
Was shaped that traced the lives of these good
men,
Dropp'd from an angel's wing.
WORDSWORTH : Walton's Book of Lives.
As thou these ashes, little brook ! wilt bear
Into the Avon, Avon to the tide
Of Severn, Severn to the narrow seas,
Into main ocean they, this deed accursed
An emblem yields to friends and enemies,
How the bold Teacher's doctrine, sanctified
By truth, shall spread, throughout the world dis-
persed.
WORDSWORTH : to Wickliffe.
Why slumbers Pope, who leads the tuneful train,
Nor hears that virtue which he loves complain ?
YOUNG.
But what in oddness can be more sublime
Than S [loane] the foremost toyman of his time ?
YOUNG.
AUTHORSHIP.
Each wit may praise it for his own dear sake,
And hint he writ it, if the thing should take.
ADDISON.
Much thou hast said which I know when
And where thou stol'st from other men ;
Whereby 'tis plain thy light and gifts
Are all but plagiary shifts.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
'Tis pleasant sure to see one's name in print ;
A book's a book although there's nothing in't.
BYRON.
One hates an author that's all author, fellows
In foolscap uniforms turn'd up with ink,
So very anxious, clever, fine, and jealous,
One don't know what to say to them, or think,
Unless to puff them with a pair of bellows ;
Of coxcombry's worst coxcombs, e'en the pink
Are preferable to these shreds of paper,
These unquench'd snuffings of the midnight
taper.
BYRON.
AUTHORSHIP.
None but an author knows an author's cares,
Or fancy's fondness for the child she bears.
COWPER.
For he writes not for money, nor for praise,
Nor to be call'd a wit, nor to wear bays.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Who have before, or shall write after thee,
Their works, though toughly laboured, will be
Like infancy or age to man's firm stay.
JOHN DONNE.
All authors to their own defects are blind ;
Hadst thou but, Janus-like, a face behind,
To see the people, what splay mouths they make,
To mark their fingers pointed at thy back.
DRYDEN.
The unhappy man who once has trail' d a pen
Lives not to please himself, but other men ;
Is always drudging with his life and blood,
Yet only eats and drinks what you think good.
DRYDEN : Prol. to Lees Ccesar Borgia.
Such is the poet's lot : what happier fate
Does on the works of grave historians wait!
More time they spend, in greater toils engage :
Their volumes swell beyond the thousandth page.
DRYDEN.
If I by chance succeed
In what I write, and that's a chance indeed,
Know I am not so stupid, or so hard,
Not to feel praise, or fame's deserved reward.
DRYDEN.
You exclaim as loud as those that praise,
For scraps and coach-hire, a young noble's plays.
DRYDEN.
Is it for this they study ? to grow pale,
And miss the pleasures of a glorious meal ?
For this, in rags accoutred are they seen,
And made the May -game of the public spleen ?
DRYDEN.
The bard that first adorn'd our native tongue
Tuned to his British lyre this ancient song.
DRYDEN.
Th' illiterate writer, empiric-like, applies
To minds diseased unsafe chance remedies :
The learn'd in schools, where knowledge first
began,
Studies with care th' anatomy of man ;
Sees virtue, vice, and passions in their cause,
And fame from science, not from fortune, draws.
DRYDEN.
He was too warm on picking work to dwell,
But faggoted his notions as they fell ;
And if they rhymed and rattled, all was well.
DRYDEN.
The hand and head were never lost of those
Who dealt in dogg'rel,or who punn'd in prose.
DRYDEN.
No more accuse thy pen, but charge the crime
On native sloth, and negligence of time.
DRYDEN.
His knowledge in the noblest useful arts
Was such dead authors could not give,
But habitudes with those who live.
DRYDEN.
Whatever truths
Redeem'd from error, or from ignorance,
Thin in their authors, like rich veins of ore,
Your works unite, and still discover more.
DRYDEN.
I must disclaim whate'er he can express ;
His grovelling sense will show my passion lesi.
DRYDEN.
Gentle or sharp, according to thy choice,
To laugh at follies, or to lash at vice.
DRYDEN.
'Tis not indeed my talent to engage
In lofty trifles, or to swell my page
With wind and noise.
DRYDEN.
Yet still thy fools shall stand in thy defence,
And justify their author's want of sense.
DRYDEN.
Thy name, to Phoebus and the muses known,
Shall in the front of ev'ry page be shown.
DRYDEN.
Every scribbling man
Grows a fop as fast as e'er he can,
Prunes up, and asks his oracle the glass
If pink or purple best become his face ?
DRYDEN.
Envy's a sharper spur than pay,
And, unprovoked, 'twill court the fray;
No author ever spared a brother :
Wits are gamecocks to one another.
GAY: Fables.
The scribbler, pinch'd with hunger, writes to
dine,
And to your genius must conform his line.
GRANVILLE.
AUTHORSHIP.
57
From yon bright heaven our author fetch'd
his fire,
And paints the passions that your eyes inspire;
Full of that flame, his tender scenes he warms,
And frames his goddess by your matchless
charms.
GRANVILLE.
His works become the frippery of wit.
BEN JONSON.
Authors are judged by strange capricious rules,
The great ones are thought mad, the small ones
fools ;
Yet sure the best are most severely fated,
For fools are only laughed at, wits are hated.
Blockheads with reason men of sense abhor;
But fool 'gainst fool is barb'rous civil war.
Why on all authors then should critics fall ?
Since some have writ, and shown no wit at all.
POPE.
I sought no homage from the race that write ;
I kept, like Asian monarchs, from their sight :
Poems I heeded, now berhymed so long,
No more than thou, great George ! a birthday
song.
POPE.
For thee I dim these eyes and stuff this head
With all such reading as was never read.
POPE.
A dire dilemma, either way I'm sped;
If foes they write, if friends they read, me dead.
POPE.
The dog-star rages; nay, 'tis past a doubt
All Bedlam or Parnassus is let out;
Fire in each eye, and papers in each hand,
They rave, recite, and madden round the land.
POPE.
Glad of a quarrel, straight I clap the door:
" Sir, let me see your works and you no more !"
POPE.
Who shames a scribbler? break one cobweb
through,
He spins the slight self-pleasing thread anew.
POPE.
He plunged for sense, but found no bottom there;
Then writ and flounder' d on in mere despair!
POPE.
Shall I in London act this idle part?
Composing songs for fools to get by heart.
POPE.
They who reach Parnassus' lofty crown
Employ their pains to spurn some others down ;
And, while self-love each jealous writer rules,
Contending wits become the sport of fools.
POPE.
Leave flattery to fulsome dedicators,
Whom, when they praise, the world believes
no more
Than when they promise to give scribbling o'er.
POPE.
Authors alone, with more than savage rage,
Unnat'ral war with brother authors wage.
POPE.
No rag, no scrap, of all the beau or wit,
That once so flutter'd, and that once so writ.
POPE.
Oft leaving what is natural and fit,
The current folly proves our ready wit;
And authors think their reputation safe,
Which lives as long as fools are pleased to laugh.
POPE.
With authors, stationers obey'd the call;
Glory and pain th' industrious tribe provoke,
And gentle Dulness ever loves a joke.
POPE.
Matchless his pen, victorious was his lance;
Bold in the lists, and graceful in the dance.
POPE.
There he stopp'd short, nor since has writ a tittle,
But has the wit to make the most of little,
Like stunted hide-bound trees, that just have got
Sufficient sap at once to bear and rot.
POPE.
Some the French writers, some our own despise;
The ancients only or the moderns prize.
POPE.
The bard whom pilfer'd pastorals renown,
Who turns a Persian tale for half a crown,
Just writes to make his barrenness appear,
And strains from hard-bound brains eight lines
a year.
POPE.
'Tis hard to say, if greater want of skill
Appear in writing or in judging ill ;
But of the two less dang'rous is th' offence
To tire our patience, than mislead our sense.
POPE.
For fame with toil we gain, but lose with ease,
Sure some to vex, but never all to please.
POPE.
AUTHORSHIP.
To write what may securely stand the test
Of being well read over thrice at least,
Compare each phrase, examine ev'ry line,
Weigh ev'ry word, and ev'ry thought refine.
POPE.
Is there who, lock'd from ink and paper, scrawls
With desp'rate charcoal round his darken'd
walls ?
POPE.
Authors are partial to their wit, 'tis true ;
But are not critics to their judgments too?
POPE.
A clerk foredoom'd his father's soul to cross,
Who pens a stanza when he should engross.
POPE.
What could thus high thy rash ambition raise?
Art thou, fond youth, a candidate for praise ?
POPE.
Yet this false comfort never gives him o'er,
That, whilst he creeps, his vig'rous thought can
soar.
POPE.
Some to conceit alone their works confine,
And glitt'ring thoughts struck out at ev'ry line.
POPE.
But is it thus you English bards compose?
With Runic lays thus tag insipid prose?
And when you should your heroes' deeds
rehearse,
Give us a commissary's list in verse ?
PRIOR.
Choose an author as you choose a friend.
PRIOR.
The privilege that ancient poets claim,
Now turn'd to license by too just a name.
ROSCOMMON.
None have been with admiration read,
But who, besides their learning, were well bred.
ROSCOMMON.
Make the proper use of each extreme,
And write with fury, but correct with phlegm.
ROSCOMMON.
Every busy little scribbler now
Swells with the praises which he gives himself,
And, taking sanctuary in the crowd,
Brags of his impudence, and scorns to mend.
ROSCOMMON.
Your author always will the best advise :
Fall when he falls, and when he rises, rise.
ROSCOMMON.
Sound judgment is the ground of writing well.
ROSCOMMON.
Who did ever, in French authors, see
The comprehensive English energy?
ROSCOMMON.
Worthy of great Phcebus rote,
The triumphs of Phlegrean Jove he wrote,
That all the gods admired his lofty note.
SPENSER.
Our chilling climate hardly bears
A sprig of bay in fifty years ;
While every fool his claim alleges,
As if it grew in common hedges.
SWIFT.
An author thus who pants for fame
Begins the world with fear and shame ;
When first in print you see him dread
Each pop-gun levell'd at his head.
SWIFT.
His works were hawk'd in every street,
But seldom rose above a sheet.
SWIFT.
Chaste moral writing we may learn from hence,
Neglect of which no wit can recompense ;
The fountain which from Helicon proceeds,
That sacred stream, should never water weeds.
WALLER.
Not content to see
That others write as carelessly as he.
WALLER.
So must the writer whose productions should
Take with the vulgar, be of vulgar mould.
WALLER.
\Vho but thyself the mind and ear can please,
With strength and softness, energy and ease ?
WALLER.
An author! 'Tis a venerable name!
How few deserve it, and what numbers claim !
Unblest with sense above their peers refined,
Who shall stand up, dictators to mankind ?
Nay, who dare shine, if not in virtue's cause,
That sole proprietor of just applause ?
YOUNG.
At that tribunal stands the writing tribe,
Which nothing can intimidate or bribe :
Time is the judge.
YOUNG.
Authors now find, as once Achilles found,
The whole is mortal if a part's unsound.
YOUNG.
A UTUMN.A VARICE.
59
Hot, envious, proud, the scribbling fry
Burn, hiss, and bounce, waste paper, ink, and die.
YOUNG.
AUTUMN.
No spring or summer's beauty hath such grace
As I have seen in one autumnal face.
JOHN DONNE.
When bounteous Autumn rears his head,
He joys to pull the ripen'd pear.
DRYDEN.
Autumnal heat declines,
Ere heat is quite decay'd, or cold begun.
DRYDEN.
Autumn succeeds, a sober, tepid age,
Nor froze with fear, nor boiling into rage ;
Last, Winter creeps along with tardy pace,
Sour is his front, and furrow'd is his face.
DRYDEN.
But see the fading many-colour'd woods,
Shade deep'ning over shade, the country round
Imbrown ; crowded umbrage, dusk and dun,
Of every hue, from wan declining green
To sooty dark.
THOMSON: Seasons.
The pale descending year, yet pleasing still,
A gentler mood inspires ; for now the leaf
Incessant rustles from the mournful grove,
Oft starting such as, studious, walk below,
And slowly circles through the waving air.
THOMSON : Seasons.
AVARICE.
O cursed love of gold ; when for thy sake
The fool throws up his interest in both worlds,
First starved in this, then damn'd in that to
come !
BLAIR: Grave.
The more we have, the meaner is our store ;
The unenjoying craving wretch is poor.
CREECH.
Up, up, says Avarice ! thou snor'st again,
Stretches! thy limbs, and yawn's^, but all in vain :
The tyrant Lucre no denial takes;
At his command th' unwilling sluggard wakes.
DRYDEN.
Her soul abhorring avarice,
Bounteous; but almost bounteous to a vice.
DRYDEN.
But more have been by avarice opprest,
And heaps of money crowded in the chest.
DRYDEN.
Young men to imitate all ills are prone,
But are compell'd to avarice alone ;
For then in virtue's shape they follow vice.
DRYDEN.
Nor love his peace of mind destroys,
Nor wicked avarice of wealth.
DRYDEN.
Go, miser ! go : for lucre sell thy soul ;
Truck wares for wares, and trudge from pole to
pole,
That men may say, when thou art dead and gone,
See what a vast estate he left his son !
DRYDEN.
For he who covets gain in such excess
Does by dumb signs himself as much express
As if in words at length he show'd his mind.
DRYDEN.
The base wretch who hoards up all he can
Is praised and call'd a careful thrifty man.
DRYDEN.
For should you to extortion be inclined,
Your cruel guilt will little booty find.
DRYDEN.
Like a miser 'midst his store,
Who grasps and grasps till he can hold no more.
DRYDEN.
As thy strutting bags with money rise,
The love of gain is of an equal size.
DRYDEN.
From hence the greatest part of ills descend,
When lust of getting more will have no end.
DRYDEN.
But the base miser starves amidst his store,
Broods o'er his gold, and, griping still at more,
Sits sadly pining, and believes he's poor.
DRYDEN.
Why lose we life in anxious cares
To lay in hoards for future years ?
Can these, when tortured by disease,
Cheer our sick hearts, or purchase ease?
Can these prolong one gasp of breath,
Or calm the troubled hour of death ?
GAY.
6o
A VARICE.
Be thrifty, but not covetous; therefore give
Thy need, thine honour, and thy friend, his due :
Never was scraper brave man. Get to live;
Then live, and use it; else it is not true
That thou hast gotten : surely, use alone
Makes money not a contemptible stone.
GEORGE HERBERT.
He turns with anxious heart and crippled hands
His bonds of debt and mortgages of lands;
Or views his coffers with suspicious eyes,
Unlocks his gold, and counts it till he dies.
DR. JOHNSON.
The love of gold, that meanest rage
And latest folly of man's sinking age,
Which, rarely venturing in the van of life,
While nobler passions wage their heated strife,
Comes skulking last, with selfishness and fear,
And dies collecting lumber in the rear.
MOORE.
Thoughtful of gain, I all the live-long day
Consume in meditation deep.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Is yellow dirt the passion of thy life?
Look but on Gripus, or on Gripus' wife.
POPE.
'Tis strange the miser should his cares employ
To gain those riches he can ne'er enjoy;
Is it less strange the prodigal should waste
His wealth to purchase what he ne'er can taste?
POPE.
Who sees pale Mammon pine amidst his store,
Sees but a backward steward for the poor;
This year a reservoir, to keep and spare ;
The next, a fountain spouting through his heir.
POPE.
Benighted wanderers the forest o'er,
Curse the saved candle and unopening door;
While the gaunt mastiff, growling at the gate,
Affrights the beggar whom he longs to eat.
POPE.
When Hopkins dies, a thousand lights attend
The wretch who living saved a candle's end;
Should'ring God's altar a vile image stands,
Belies his features, nay, extends his hands.
POPE.
They meanly pilfer, as they bravely fought,
Now save a nation, and now save a groat.
POPE.
Then, in plain prose, were made two sorts of
men;
To squander some, and some to hide agen.
POPE.
Corruption, like a general flood,
Shall deluge all ; and av'rice creeping on
Spread like a low-born mist, and blot the sun.
POPE.
Be niggards of advice on no pretence ;
For the worst avarice is that of sense.
POPE.
This avarice
Strikes deeper, grows with more pernicious root.
SHAKSPEARE.
There grows
In my most ill-composed affection, such
A stanchless avarice, that were I king,
I should cut off the nobles for their lands.
SHAKSPEARE.
He shall spend mine honour with his shame ;
As thriftless sons their scraping fathers' gold.
SHAKSPEARE.
See, sons, what things you are ! how quickly
nature
Falls to revolt, when gold becomes her object !
For this the foolish over-careful fathers
Have broke their sleeps with thought, their
brains with care.
SHAKSPEARE.
Then avarice 'gan through his veins to inspire
His greedy flames, and kindle life-devouring
fire.
SPENSER.
Regard of worldly muck doth foully blend
And low abase the high heroic spirit.
SPENSER.
Whether thy counter shine with sums untold,
And thy wide-grasping hand grows black with
gold.
SWIFT.
Who, lord of millions, trembles for his store,
And fears to give a farthing to the poor ;
Proclaims that penury will be his fate,
And, scowling, looks on charity with hate.
DR. WOLCOTT.
Some, o'er-enamour'd of their bags, run mad,
Groan under gold, yet weep for want of bread.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
BATTLE.
BATTLE.
Marcia, let me hope thy kind concerns,
And gentle wishes, follow me to battle.
ADDISON : Cato.
If he that is in battle slain
Be in the bed of honour lain,
He that is beaten may be said
To lie in honour's truckle-bed.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
What perils do environ
The man that meddles with cold iron !
What plaguy mischiefs and mishaps
Do dog him still with after-claps !
BUTLER : Hudibras.
And now the field of death, the lists,
Were enter'd by antagonists,
And blood was ready to be broach'd,
When Hudibras in haste approach'd.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
A gen'ral sets his army in array
In vain, unless he fight and win the day.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Our swords so wholly did the fates employ,
That they, at length, grew weary to destroy ;
Refused the work we brought, and out of breath,
Made sorrow and despair attend for death.
DRYDEN.
1 fought and fell like one, but death deceived
me :
I wanted weight of feeble Moors upon me,
To crush my soul out.
DRYDEN.
Here Pallas urges on, and Lausus there ;
Their congress in the field great Jove with-
stands :
Both doom'd to fall, but fall by greater hands.
DRYDEN.
Why asks he what avails him not in fight,
And would but cumber and retard his flight,
In which his only excellence is placed ?
You give him death that interrupt his haste.
DRYDEN.
They follow their undaunted king;
Crowd through their gates ; and, in the fields of
light,
The shocking squadrons meet in mortal fight.
, DRYDEN.
Two battles your auspicious cause has won ;
Thy sword can perfect what it has begun.
DRYDEN.
A cloud of smoke envelops either host,
And all at once the combatants are lost :
Darkling they join adverse, and shock unseen,
Coursers with coursers justing, men with men.
DRYDEN.
Amidst whole heaps of spices lights a ball,
And now their odours arm'd against them
fly:
Some preciously by shatter'd porcelain fall,
And some by aromatic splinters die.
DRYDEN.
Their standard, planted on the battlement,
Despair and death among the soldiers sent.
DRYDEN.
He to the town return'd,
Attended by the chiefs who fought the field,
Now friendly mix'd, and in one troop compell'd.
DRYDEN.
Thus fights Ulysses, thus his fame extends ;
A formidable man, but to his friends.
DRYDEN.
The Grecians rally, and their powers unite;
With fury charge us, and renew the fight.
DRYDEN.
Would you the advantage of the fight delay
If, striking first, you were to win the day?
DRYDEN.
He with his sword unsheathed, on pain of life,
Commands both combatants to cease their strife.
DRYDEN.
Who, single combatant,
Duel'd their armies rank'd in proud array;
Himself an army.
MILTON.
Them, with fire and hostile arms,
Fearless assault ; and to the brow of heav'n
Pursuing, drive them out from God and bliss.
MILTON.
So frown'd the mighty combatants, that hell
Grew darker at their frown.
MILTON.
The pierced battalions disunited fall
In heaps on heaps: one fate o'erwhelms them
all.
POPE.
'Tis ours by craft and by surprise to gain;
'Tis yours to meet in arms, and battle in the plaia
PRIOR.
BA TTLE.BEA UTY.
Our battle is more full of names than yours,
Our men more perfect in the use of arms,
Our armour all as strong, our cause the best;
Then reason wills our hearts should be as good.
SHAKSPEARE.
He which hath no stomach to this fight,
Let him depart; his passport shall be made.
SHAKSPEARE.
noble English ! that could entertain,
With half their forces, the full pride of France,
And let another half stand laughing by,
All out of work, and cold for action.
SHAKSPEARE.
To-morrow in the battle think on me,
And fall thy edgeless sword; despair, and die.
SHAKSPEARE.
In that day's feats
He proved the best man i' th' field; and for his
meed
Was brow-bound with the oak.
SHAKSPEARE.
Mine emulation
Hath not that honour in't it had; for
1 thought to crush him in an equal force,
True sword to sword.
SHAKSPEARE.
The interruption of their churlish drums
Cuts off more circumstance; they are at hand
To parley, or to fight.
SHAKSPEARE.
In this kind to come, in braving arms,
Be his own carver, and cut out his way,
To find out right with wrong, it may not be.
SHAKSPEARE.
Against whose fury, and th' unmatched force,
The aweless lion could not wage the fight.
SHAKSPEARE.
Let fall thy blade on vulnerable crests ;
I bear a charmed life, which must not yield
To one of woman born.
SHAKSPEARE.
Put in their hands thy bruising irons of wrath,
That they may crush down, with a heavy fall,
Th' usurping helmets of our adversaries !
SHAKSPEARE.
Themselves at discord fell,
And cruel combat join'd in middle space,
With horrible assault and fury fell.
SPENSER.
True be thy words, and worthy of thy praise,
That warlike feats dost highly glorify ;
Therein have I spent all my youthly days,
And many battles fought, and many frays.
SPENSER.
From vaster hopes than this he seem'd to fall,
That durst attempt the British admiral :
From her broadsides a ruder flame is thrown
Than from the fiery chariot of the sun.
WALLER.
BEAUTY.
Loveliest of women ! heaven is in thy soul ;
Beauty and virtue shine forever round thee,
Bright'ning each other! thou art all divine.
ADDISON.
She moves ! life wanders up and down
/Through all her face, and lights up every charm.
ADDISON.
In praising Chloris, moon, and stars, and skies,
Are quickly made to match her face and eyes;
And gold and rubies, with as little care,
To fit the colours of her lips and hair;
And mixing suns, and flowers, and pearls, and
stones,
Make them seem all complexions at once.
BUTLER.
'The light of love, the purity of grace,
The mind, the music breathing from her face,
The heart whose softness harmonized the whole,
And oh ! that eye was in itself a soul.
BYRON: Bride of Abydos,
She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes :
Thus mellow'd to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.
BYRON : Hebrew Melodies.
She was a form of life and light,
That, seen, became a part of sight;
And rose, where'er I turn'd my eye,
The morning star of memory.
BYRON: Giaour.
Like pensive beauty smiling in her tears.
CAMPBELL.
It is not beauty I demand,
A crystal brow, the moon's despair,
Nor the snow's daughter, a white hand,
Nor mermaid's yellow pride of hair.
CAREW.
BEAUTY.
CAREW.
Think not, 'cause men flatt'ring say,
Y' are fresh as April, sweet as May,
Bright as the morning star,
That you are so.
If ev'ry sweet, and ev'ry grace,
Must fly from that forsaken face.
CAREW.
Harmony, with ev'ry grace,
Plays in the fair proportions of her face.
ELIZABETH CARTER.
Metals may blazon common beauties ; she
Makes pearls and planets humble heraldry.
JOHN CLEAVELAND.
Where such radiant lights have shone,
No wonder if her cheeks be grown
Sunburnt with lustre of her own.
JOHN CLEAVELAND.
Where lilies, in a lovely brown,
Inoculate carnation.
JOHN CLEAVELAND.
Beauty or wit is all I find.
COWLEY.
Beauty ! thou wild fantastic ape,
Who dost in ev'ry country change thy shape :
Here black; there brown; here tawny; and
there white!
Thou flatt'rer, who comply'st with ev'ry sight!
Who hast no certain what, nor where.
COWLEY.
Beauty, sweet love! is like the morning dew,
Whose short refresh upon the tender green
Cheers for a time, but till the sun doth shew,
And straight is gone as it had never been.
DANIEL.
All the beauties of the court besides
Are mad in love, and dote upon your person.
SIR J. DENHAM.
She by whose lines proportion should be
Examined, measure of all symmetry;
Whom had that ancient seen, who thought souls
made
Of harmony, he would at next have said
That harmony was she.
DONNE.
Love built on beauty, soon as beauty, dies ;
Choose this face, changed by no deformities.
DONNE.
Such were the features of her heav'nly face;
Her limbs were form'd with such harmonious
grace;
So faultless was the frame, as if the whole
Had been an emanation of the soul.
DRYDEN.
Her eyes, her lips, her cheeks, her shapes, her
features,
Seem to be drawn by Love's own hand; by Love
Himself in love.
DRYDEN.
Vouchsafe, illustrious Ormond, to behold
What pow'r the charms of beauty had of old.
DRYDEN.
Beauty, like ice, our footing does betray;
Who can tread sure on the smooth slipp'ry way?
Pleased with the passage, we glide swiftly on,
And see the dangers which we cannot shun.
DRYDEN.
When factious rage to cruel exile drove
The queen of beauty and the court of love,
The muses droop'd with their forsaken arts.
DRYDEN.
And she that was not only passing fair,
But was withal discreet and debonair,
Resolved the passive doctrine to fulfil.
DRYDEN.
But none, ah ! none can animate the lyre,
And the mute strings with vocal souls inspire:
Whether the learn'd Minerva be her theme,
Or chaste Diana bathing in the stream;
None can record their heav'nly praise so well
As Helen, in whose eyes ten thousand cupids
dwell.
DRYDEN.
Old as I am, for ladies' love unfit,
The pow'r of beauty I remember yet.
DRYDEN.
Few admired the native red and white
Till poets dress'd them up to charm the sight.
DRYDEN.
Her who fairest does appear,
Crown her queen of all the year.
DRYDEN.
No mortal tongue can half the beauty tell;
For none but hands divine could work so well.
DRYDEN.
Beauty, and youth,
And sprightly hope, and short -enduring joy.
DRYDEN.
BEAUTY.
His neck, his hands, his shoulders, and his
breast,
Did next in gracefulness and beauty stand
To breathing figures.
DRYDEN.
On sev'ral parts a sev'ral praise bestow:
The ruby lips, and well-proportion'd nose,
The snowy brow, the raven glossy hair,
The dimpled chin.
DRYDEN.
He through a little window cast his sight,
Through thick of bars that gave a scanty light;
But ev'n that glimm'ring served him to descry
Th' inevitable charms of Emily.
DRYDEN.
The young Emilia, fairer to be seen
Than the fair lily on the flow'ry green.
DRYDEN.
The bloom of beauty other years demands,
Nor will be gather'd by such wither'd hands.
DRYDEN.
I take this garland, not as given by you,
But as my merit and my beauty's due.
DRYDEN.
Down fell the beauteous youth; the yawning
wound
Gush'd out in purple stream, and stain'd the
ground.
DRYDEN.
Our phoenix queen was there pourtray'd too
bright;
Beauty alone could beauty take so right.
DRYDEN.
Beauty a monarch is,
Which kingly power magnificently proves
By crowds of slaves, and peopled empire loves.
DRYDEN.
O race divine !
For beauty still is fatal to the line.
DRYDEN.
The beauties of this place should mourn ;
The immortal fruits and flow'rs at my return
Should hang their wither'd head.
DRYDEN.
As Thessalian steeds the race adorn,
So rosy-colour'd Helen is the pride
Of Lacedemon and of Greece beside.
DRYDEN.
So sleek her skin, so faultless was her make,
Ev'n Juno did unwilling pleasure take
To see so fair a rival.
DRYDEN.
Her heav'nly form too haughtily she prized;
His person hated, and his gifts despised.
DRYDEN.
Her dress, her shape, her matchless grace,
Were all observed, as well as heav'nly face;
With such a peerless majesty she stands,
As in that day she took the crown.
DRYDEN.
These look like the workmanship of heav'n :
This is the porcelain clay of human kind,
And therefore cast into these noble moulds.
DRYDEN.
I pass their form and every charming grace.
DRYDEN.
The charming Lausus, full of youthful fire,
To Turnus only second in the grace
Of manly mien, and features of the face.
DRYDEN.
Since my Orazia's death I have not seen
A beauty so deserving to be queen.
DRYDEN.
The beauty I beheld has struck me dead;
Unknowingly she strikes, and kills by chance ;
Poison is in her eyes, and death in ev'ry glance.
DRYDEN.
What further fear of danger can there be ?
Beauty, which captives all things, sets me free.
DRYDEN.
Daughter of the rose, whose cheeks unite
The diff ring titles of the red and white ;
Who heav'n's alternate beauty well display,
The blush of morning and the milky way.
DRYDEN.
Blood, rapine, massacres were cheaply bought,
So mighty recompense your beauty brought.
DRYDEN.
Beauteous Helen shines among the rest ;
Tall, slender, straight, with all the graces blest.
DRYDEN.
The well-proportion'd shape, and beauteous face,
Shall never more be seen by mortal eyes.
DRYDEN.
Yet all combined,
Your beauty and my impotence of mind.
DRYDEN.
BEAUTY.
Ruddy his lips, and fresh and fair his hue ;
Some sprinkled freckles on his face were seen,
Whose dusk set off the whiteness of the skin.
DRYDEN.
Some angel copied, while I slept, each grace,
And moulded ev'ry feature from my face ;
Such majesty does from her forehead rise,
Her cheeks such blushes cast, such rays her eyes.
DRYDEN.
Sure I am, unless I win in arms,
To stand excluded from Emilia's charms.
DRYDEN.
Trust not too much to that enchanting face ;
Beauty's a charm, but soon the charm will pass.
DRYDEN.
For my own share one beauty I design ;
Engage your honours that she shall be mine.
DRYDEN.
When I view the beauties of thy face,
I fear not death, nor dangers, nor disgrace.
DRYDEN.
A vaile obscured the sunshine of her eyes,
The rose within herself her sweetness closed;
Each ornament about her seemly lies,
By curious chance, or careless art, composed.
FAIRFAX.
The same that left thee by the cooling stream,
Safe from sun's heat, but scorch'd with beauty's
beam.
FAIRFAX.
Fairest blossoms drop with every blast ;
But the brown beauty will like hollies last,
GAY.
Narcissus' change to the vain virgin shows,
Who trusts to beauty, trusts the fading rose.
GAY.
Sylvia's like autumn ripe, yet mild as May,
More bright than noon, yet fresh as early day.
GAY.
The toilet, nursery of charms,
Completely furnish'd with bright beauty's arms,
The patch, the powder-box, pulvil, perfumes.
GAY.
Of beauty sing :
Let others govern or defend the state,
Plead at the bar, or manage a debate.
GRANVILLE.
Of beauty sing, her shining progress view,
From clime to clime the dazzling light pursue.
GRANVILLE.
Her cheeks their freshness lose and wonted grace,
And an unusual paleness spreads her face.
GRANVILLE.
Wyndham like a tyrant throws the dart,
And takes a cruel pleasure in the smart ;
Proud of the ravage that her beauties make,
Delights in wounds, and kills for killing's sake.
GRANVILLE.
A lovelier nymph the pencil never drew;
For the fond Graces form'd her easy mien,
And heaven's soft azure in her eye was seen.
HAYLEY.
As lamps burn silent with unconscious light,
So modest ease in beauty shines most bright;
Unaiming charms with edge resistless fall,
And she who means no mischief does it all.
AARON HILL.
W T ho sees a soul in such a body set,
Might love the treasure for the cabinet.
BEN JONSON.
A thing of beauty is a joy forever;
Its loveliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness.
KEATS.
Where none admire, 'tis useless to excel ;
Where none are beaux, 'tis vain to be a belle.
LORD LYTTELTON : Soliloquy on a Beauty in
the Country.
Oh, she is fairer than the evening air,
Clad in the beauty of a thousand stars.
MARLOWE: Faustus.
While in the dark on thy soft hand I hung,
And heard the tempting siren in thy tongue,
What flames, what darts, what anguish I
endured !
But when the candle enter'd, I was cured.
MARTIAL.
They said her cheek of youth was beautiful,
Till with'ring sorrow blanch'd the white rose
there.
MATURIN.
Beauteous as vision seen in dreamy sleep
By holy maid on Delphi's haunted steep,
Mid the dim twilight of the laurel grove :
Too fair to worship, too divine to love !
MlLMAN.
66
BE A UTY,
Her grace of motion, and of look, the smooth
And swimming majesty of step and tread,
The symmetry of form and feature, set
The soul afloat, even like delicious airs
Of flute and harp.
MlLMAN.
Beauty is nature's coin, must not be hoarded,
But must be current, and the good thereof
Consists in mutual and partaken bliss,
Unsavoury in th' enjoyment of itself:
If you let slip time, like a neglected rose
It withers on the stalk with languish' d head.
MILTON.
Beauty is nature's brag, and must be shown
In courts, at feasts, and high solemnities,
Where most may wonder.
MILTON.
Beauty is excell'd by manly grace,
And wisdom, which alone is truly fair.
MILTON.
Yet beauty, though injurious, hath strange
power,
After often ce returning, to regain
Love once possest.
MILTON.
Beauty stands
In the admiration only of weak minds
Led captive ; cease to admire, and all her plumes
Fall flat and shrink into a trivial toy ;
At every sudden slighting quite abash'd.
MILTON.
Here only weak,
Against the charm of beauty's powerful glance.
MILTON.
How many have with a smile made small
account
Of beauty, and her lures; easily scorn'd
All her assaults, on worthier things intent !
MILTON.
Or should she, confident
As sitting queen adorn'd on beauty's throne,
Descend, with all her winning charms begirt,
T' enamour.
MILTON.
What admir'st thou, what transports thee so?
An outside ? fair, no doubt, and worthy well
Thy cherishing and thy love.
MILTON.
Can any mortal mixture of earth's mould
Breathe such divine enchanting ravishment!
MILTON.
His grave rebuke,
Severe in youthful beauty, added grace.
MILTON.
His fair,large front and eye sublime declared
Absolute rule.
MILTON.
So lovely fair!
That what seem'd fair in all the world, seem'd
now
Mean, or in her summ'd up, in her contain'd.
MILTON.
What need a vermeil-tinctured lip for that,
Love-darting eyes, or tresses like the morn ?
MILTON.
All beaming with light as those young features
are,
There's a light round thy heart that is lovelier
far;
It is not thy cheek 'tis the soul dawning clear
Though its innocent blush makes thy beauty so
dear:
As the sky we look up to, though glorious and
fair,
Is look'd up to more because heaven is there !
MOORE.
'Tis not a lip, or eye, we beauty call,
But the joint force and full result of all.
POPE.
Love raised on beauty will like that decay;
Our hearts may bear its slender chain a day :
As flow'ry bands in wantonness are worn,
A morning's pleasure, and at evening torn.
POPE.
Happy, and happy still she might have proved,
Were she less beautiful, or less beloved.
POPE.
The nymph surveys him, and beholds the grace
Of charming features, and a youthful face.
POPE.
Besides, he's lovely far above the rest,
With you immortal, and with beauty blest.
POPE.
A scene where, if a god should cast his sight,
A god might gaze and wonder with delight !
Joy touch'd the messenger of heav'n ; he stay'd
Entranced, and all the blissful haunts survey'd.
POPE.
But beauty's triumph is well-timed retreat,
As hard a science to the fair as great.
POPE.
BEAUTY.
Some nymphs there are too conscious of their
face;
These swell their prospects, and exalt their pride,
When offers are disdain'd, and love denied.
POPE.
The fair
Repairs her smiles, awakens ev'ry grace,
And calls forth all the wonders of her face.
POPE.
Trust not too much your now resistless charms ;
Those age or sickness soon or late disarms.
POPE.
Yet graceful ease, and sweetness void of pride,
Might hide her faults, if belles had faults to hide ;
If to her share some female errors fall,
Look on her face, and you'll forget them all.
POPE.
Some figures monstrous and misshaped appear,
Consider'd singly, or beheld too near;
Which but proportion'd to their light or place,
Due distance reconciles to form and grace.
POPE.
What winning graces, what majestic mien !
She moves a goddess, and she looks a queen.
POPE.
Beauties, like tyrants, old and friendless grown,
Yet hate repose, and dread to be alone;
Worn out in public, weary ev'ry eye,
Nor leave one sigh behind them when they die.
POPE.
Beauties in vain their pretty eyes may roll;
Charms strike the sight, but merit wins the soul.
POPE.
Say, why are beauties praised and honour' d most,
The wise man's passion and the vain man's toast?
Why deck'd with all that land and sea afford ?
Why angels call'd, and angel-like adored ?
POPE.
You still, fair mother, in your offspring trace
The stock of beauty destined for the race;
Kind Nature, forming them, the pattern took
From heav'n's first work, and Eve's original
look.
PRIOR.
That air and harmony of shape express,
Fine by degrees and beautifully less.
PRIOR.
Bracelets of pearl gave roundness to her arm,
And ev'ry gem augmented ev'ry charm.
PRIOR.
Mature the virgin was, of Egypt's race;
Grace shaped her limbs, and beauty deck'd her
face.
PRIOR.
This forehead, where your verse has said
The Loves delighted and the Graces play'd.
PRIOR.
Take heed, my dear, youth flies apace ;
As well as Cupid, Time is blind ;
Soon must those glories of thy face
The fate of vulgar beauty find.
The thousand loves, that arm thy potent eye,
Must drop their quivers, flag their wings, and die.
PRIOR.
Another nymph with fatal pow'r may rise,
To damp the sinking beams of Caelia's eyes;
With haughty pride may hear her charms confest,
And scorn the ardent vows that I have blest.
PRIOR.
Venus ! take my votive glass :
Since I am not what I was,
What from this day I shall be,
Venus ! let me never see.
PRIOR.
Is she not more than painting can express,
Or youthful poets fancy when they love ?
ROWE: Fair Penitent.
The bloom of opening flowers' unsullied beauty,
Softness, and sweetest innocence she wears,
And looks like nature in the world's first spring.
ROWE.
Beauty is but a vain and doubtful good,
A shining gloss that fadeth suddenly,
A flower that dies when first it 'gins to bud,
A brittle glass that's broken presently ;
A doubtful good, a gloss, a glass, a flower,
Lost, faded, broken, dead within an hour.
SHAKSPEARE.
Beauty, wit, high birth, desert in service,
Love, friendship, charity, are subject all
To envious and calumniating time.
SHAKSPEARE.
Beauty does varnish age as if new born,
And gives the crutch the cradle's infancy.
SHAKSPEARE.
Since she did neglect her looking-glass,
And threw her sun-expelling mask away,
The air hath starved the roses in her cheek,
And pitch'd the lily tincture of her face.
SHAKSPEARE.
68
BEAUTY.
She means to tangle mine eyes too :
'Tis not your inky brows, your black silk hair,
Your bugle eyeballs, nor your cheek of cream,
That can entame my spirits to your worship.
SHAKSPEARE.
These black masks
Proclaim an enshield beauty, ten times louder
Than beauty could display.
SHAKSPEARE.
Tell me,
Hast thou beheld a fresher gentlewoman,
Such war of white and red within her cheeks ?
SHAKSPEARE.
'Tis beauty truly blent, whose red and white
Nature's own sweet and cunning hand laid on.
SHAKSPEARE.
The lover, frantic,
Sees Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt.
SHAKSPEARE.
Her eyes, her hair, her cheek, her gait, her voice,
Thou handiest in thy discourse.
SHAKSPEARE.
Kate, like the hazel twig,
Is straight and slender, and as brown in hue
As hazel-nuts, and sweeter than the kernels.
SHAKSPEARE.
Black brows
Become some women best, so they be in a semi-
circle
Or a half-moon, made with a pen.
SHAKSPEARE.
With untainted eye
Compare her face with some that I shall show,
And I will make thee think thy swan a crow.
SHAKSPEARE.
I've perused her well ;
Beauty and honour in her are so mingled
That they have caught the king.
SHAKSPEARE.
I have mark'd
A thousand blushing pparitions
Start into her face ; a thousand innocent shames
In angel whiteness bear away those blushes.
SHAKSPEARE.
Oh, how much more doth beauty beauteous seem
By that sweet ornament which truth doth give !
The rose looks fair, but fairer we it deem
For that sweet odour which doth in it live.
SHAKSPEARE.
Young budding virgin, fair and fresh and sweet,
Whither away ? or where is thy abode ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Beauty is a witch,
Against whose charms faith melteth into blood.
SHAKSPEARE.
As the snake, roll'd in the flow'ry bank,
With shining checker'd slough, doth sting a
child,
That for the beauty thinks it excellent.
SHAKSPEARE.
O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright !
It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear;
Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear !
SHAKSPEARE.
'Twas pretty, though a plague,
To see him ev'ry hour : to sit and draw
His arched brows, his hawking eye, his curls,
In our heart's table.
SHAKSPEARE.
A combination and a form indeed
Where every god did seem to set his seal,
To give the world assurance of a man.
SHAKSPEARE.
See what a grace was seated on his brow :
Hyperion's curls; the front of Jove himself;
An eye like Mars, to threaten and command.
SHAKSPEARE.
Read o'er the volume of his lovely face,
And find delight writ there with beauty's pen;
Examine every several lineament,
And what obscure in this fair volume lies
Find written in the margin of his eyes.
SHAKSPEARE.
A night of fretful passion may consume
All that thou hast of beauty's gentle bloom ;
And one distemper'd hour of sordid fear
Print on thy brow the wrinkles of a year.
SHERIDAN: on Female Gamesters.
This doth lead me to her hand,
Of my first love the fatal band,
Where whiteness doth forever sit;
Nature herself enamell'd it.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
Disdain not me, although I be not fair :
Doth beauty keep which never sun can burn,
Nor storms do turn ?
SIR P. SIDNEY,
BEAUTY.
69
Lips never part but that they show
Of precious pearls the double row.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
Doth even beauty beautify,
And most bewitch the wretched eye ?
SIR P. SIDNEY.
In her cheeks the vermil red did shew,
Like roses in a bed of lilies shed ;
The which ambrosial odours from them threw,
And gazer's sense with double pleasure fed.
SPENSER.
The blazing brightness of her beauty's beam,
And glorious light of her sun-shining face,
To tell, were as to strive against the stream.
SPENSER.
The brightness of her beauty clear,
The ravish'd hearts of gazeful men might rear
To admiration of that heavenly light.
SPENSER.
Upon her eyelids many graces sat,
Under the shadow of her even brows,
Working bellgards and amorous retraite ;
And every one her with a grace endows.
SPENSER.
Her face so fair, as flesh it seemed not,
But heavenly portrait of bright angel's hue,
Clear as the sky, withouten blame or blot,
Through goodly mixture of complexion's dew.
SPENSER.
How red the roses flush up in her cheeks,
And the pure snow with goodly vermil stain,
Like crimson dyed in grain.
SPENSER.
Take heed, mine eyes, how ye do stare
Henceforth too rashly on that guileful net;
In which, if ever eyes entrapped are,
Out of her bands ye by no means shall get.
SPENSER.
Her face right wondrous fair did seem to be,
That her broad beauty's beam great brightness
threw
Through the dim shade, that all men might it see.
SPENSER.
Fair is my love
When the rose in her cheek appears,
Or in her eyes the fire of love doth spark.
SPENSER.
Her cheeks like apples which the sun had
rudded.
SPENSER.
What great despite doth fortune to thee bear,
Thus lowly to abase thy beauty bright,
That it should not deface all other lesser light?
SPENSER.
So long as Guyon with her communed,
Unto the ground she cast her modest eye;
And ever and anon, with rosy red,
The bashful blood her snowy cheeks did dye.
SPENSER.
She doth display
The gate with pearls and rubies richly dight,
Through which her words so wise do make
their way.
SPENSER.
Fairer than fairest, in his faining eye,
Whose sole aspect he counts felicity.
SPENSER.
There a noble crew
Of lords and ladies stood on every side,
Which with their presence fair the place much
beautified.
SPENSER.
Beauty's empires, like to greater states,
Have certain periods set, and hidden fates,
SIR J. SUCKLING.
Dost see how unregarded now
That piece of beauty passes ?
There was a time when I did vow
To that alone :
But mark the fate of faces.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
Wonder not much if thus amazed I look ;
Since I saw you I have been planet-struck;
A beauty, and so rare, I did descry.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
There's no such thing as that we beauty call,
It is mere cosenage all :
For though some long ago
Liked certain colours mingle so and so,
That doth not tie me now from chusing new.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
Oh! it would 'please the gods to split
Thy beauty, size, and years, and wit:
No age could furnish out a pair
Of nymphs so graceful, wise, and fair;
With half the lustre of your eyes,
With half your wit, your years, and size.
SWIFT.
You'll be no more your former you;
But for a blooming nymph will pass,
Just fifteen coming summer's grasp.
SWIFT.
BEA UTY. BE A UX. BIRDS.
Nor should my praises owe their truth
To beauty, dress, or paint, or youth ;
'Twere grafting on an annual stock,
That must our expectations mock,
And, making one luxuriant shoot,
Die the next year for want of root.
SWIFT.
A native grace
Sat fair proportion'd on her polish'd limbs,
Veil'd in a simple robe, their best attire,
Beyond the pomp of dress ; for loveliness
Needs not the foreign aid of ornament,
But is, when unadorn'd, adorn'd the most.
THOMSON.
The sun's oppressive ray, the roseate bloom
Of beauty blasting, gives the glossy hue
And feature gross.
THOMSON.
Such madd'ning draughts of beauty
As for a while o'erwhelm'd his raptured thought.
THOMSON.
In Britain's lovely isle a shining throng
War in his cause, a thousand beauties strong.
TlCKELL.
Fame of thy beauty and thy youth
Among the rest me hither brought ;
Finding this fame fall short of truth
Made me stay longer than I thought.
WALLER.
You can with single look inflame
The coldest breast, the rudest tame.
WALLER.
And in the symmetry of her parts is found
A pow'r like that of harmony and sound.
WALLER.
This royal fair
Shall, when the blossom of her beauty's blown,
See her great brother on the British throne.
WALLER.
War brings ruin where it should amend ;
But beauty, with a bloodless conquest, finds
A welcome sov'reignty in rudest minds.
WALLER.
Delia, the queen of love, let all deplore !
Delia, the queen of beauty, is no more.
WALSH.
The face that in the morning sun
We thought so wondrous fair,
Hath faded ere its course was run
Beneath its golden hair.
PROFESSOR JOHN WILSON.
The stars of midnight shall be dear
To her; and she shall lean her ear
In many a secret place
Where rivulets dance their wayward round,
And beauty born of murmuring sound
Shall pass into her face.
WORDSWORTH.
What's true beauty but fair virtue's face,
Virtue made visible in outward grace?
YOUNG.
What's female beauty, but an air divine,
Through which the mind's all gentle graces
shine ?
They, like the sun, irradiate all between;
The body charms, because the soul is seen.
Hence men are often captives of a face,
They know not why, of no peculiar grace :
Some forms, though bright, no mortal man can
bear,
Some, none resist, though not exceeding fair.
YOUNG.
BEAUX.
Why round our coaches crowd the white-
gloved beaux?
Why bows the side box from its inmost rows ?
POPE.
There heroes' wits are kept in pond'rous vases,
And beaux' in snuff-boxes and tweezer cases.
POPE.
Visits, plays, and powdered beaux.
His genius was below
The skill of ev'ry common beau;
Who, though he cannot spell, is wise
Enough to read a lady's eyes,
And will each accidental glance
Interpret for a kind advance.
SWIFT.
SWIFT.
BIRDS.
The raven, used by such impertinence,
Grew passionate, it seems, and took offence.
ADDISON.
Each bird gives o'er its note, the thrush alone
Fills the cool grove when nil the rest are gone.
Harmonious bird! daring till night to stay,
And glean the last remainder of the day.
EDMUND BURKE, at. 16.
BIRDS.
Teach me, O lark ! with thee to greatly rise,
T exalt my soul and lift it to the skies;
To make each worldly joy as mean appear,
Unworthy care, when heavenly joys are near.
EDMUND BURKE, at. 16.
The nightingale, their only vesper-bell,
Sung sweetly to the rose the day's farewell.
BYRON.
I saw the expectant raven fly,
Who scarce could wait till both should die,
Ere his repast began.
BYRON.
Ah ! nut-brown partridges ! ah, brilliant pheas-
ants!
And ah, ye poachers ! 'Tis no sport for peasants.
BYRON.
So the struck eagle stretch' d upon the plain,
No more through rolling clouds to soar again,
View'd his own feather on the fatal dart,
And wing'd the shaft that quiver'd in his heart.
BYRON.
The winglets of the fairy humming-bird,
Like atoms of the rainbow flitting round.
CAMPBELL.
Two eagles,
That mounted on the wings, together still
Their strokes extended.
CHAPMAN.
'Tis the merry nightingale
That crowds, and hurries, and precipitates,
With fast, thick warble, his delicious notes,
As he were fearful that an April night
Would be too short for him to utter forth
His love-chant, and disburden his full soul
Of all its music !
COLERIDGE.
A bird that flies about,
And beats itself against the cage,
Finding at last no passage out,
It sits and sings.
COWLEY.
Nay, the birds' rural music too
Is as melodious and as free
As if they sung to pleasure you.
Foolish swallow, what dost thou
So often at my window do,
With thy tuneless serenade ?
COWLEY.
COWLEY.
Ten thousand warblers cheer the day, and one
The live-long night : nor these alone whose notes
Nice-finger'd art must emulate in vain,
But cawing rooks, and kites that swim sublime
In still repeated circles, screaming loud ;
The jay, the pie, and e'en the boding owl
That hails the rising moon, have charms for me.
COWPER: Task.
Whom call we gay ? that honour has been long
The boast of mere pretenders to the name :
The innocent are gay, the lark is gay
That dries his feathers saturate with dew
Beneath the rosy cloud, while yet the beams
Of day-spring overshoot his humble nest.
COWPER.
The morning muses perch like birds, and sing
Among his branches.
CRASHAW.
9
Dost thou use me as fond children do
Their birds, show me my freedom in a string,
And when thou'st play'd with me a while, then
pull
Me back again, to languish in my cage ?
SIR W. DAVENANT.
Thou marry'st every year
The lyric lark and the grave whispering dove,
The sparrow that neglects his life for love,
The household bird with the red stomacher.
DONNE.
He rounds the air, and breaks the hymnic notes
In birds, heav'n's choristers, organic throats ;
W'hich, if they did not die, might seem to be
A tenth rank in the heav'nly hierarchy.
DONNE.
Tongued like the night-crow.
DONNE.
The winds were hush'd, no leaf so small
At all was seen to stir;
Whilst tuning to the water's fall
The small birds sang to her.
DRAYTON.
With her nimble quills his soul did seem to hover,
And eye the very pitch that lusty bird did cover.
DRAYTON.
And here th' access a gloomy grove defends ;
And here th' unnavigable lake extends ;
O'er whose unhappy waters, void of light,
No bird presumes to steer his airy flight.
DRYDEN.
Hence men and beasts the breath of life obtain,
And birds of air, and monsters of the main.
DRYDEX.
J3IRDS.
As callow birds,
Whose mother 's kill'd in seeking of the prey,
Cry in their nest, and think her long away,
And at each leaf that flies, each blast of wind,
Gape for the food which they must never find.
DRYDEN.
Fowls, by winter forced, forsake the floods,
And wing their hasty flight to happier lands.
DRYDEN.
All hail, he cry'd, thy country's grace and love ;
Once first of men below, now first of birds above.
DRYDEN.
The painted birds, companions of the spring,
Hopping from spray to spray were heard.
DRYDEN.
He therefore makes all birds of every sect
Free of his farm, with promise to respect
Their several kinds alike, and equally protect.
DRYDEN.
His gracious edict the same franchise yields
To all the wild increase of woods and fields.
DRYDEN.
The painted lizard and the birds of prey,
Foes of the frugal kind, be far away.
DRYDEN.
From each tree
The feather'd people look down to peep on me.
DRYDEN.
A bird new made, about the banks she plies,
Not far from shore, and short excursions tries.
DRYDEN.
Her leafy arms with such extent were spread,
That hosts of birds, that wing the liquid air,
Perch'd in the boughs, had nightly lodging there.
DRYDEN.
At first she flutters, but at length she springs
To smoother flight, and shoots upon her wings.
DRYDEN.
The broken air loud whistling as she flies,
She stops and listens, and shoots forth again,
And guides her pinions by her young ones' cries.
DRYDEN.
New herds of beasts he sends the plains to share ;
New colonies of birds to people air ;
And to the oozy beds the finny fish repair.
DRYDEN.
The gods their shapes to winter birds translate;
But both obnoxious to their former fate.
DRYDEN.
For still methought she sung not far away;
At last I found her on a laurel spray :
Close by my side she sat, and fair in sight,
Full in a line against her opposite.
DRYDEN.
The pris'ner with a spring from prison broke,
Then stretch'd his feather'd fans with all his
might,
And to the neighb'ring maple wing'd his flight.
DRYDEN.
Either songster holding out their throats,
And folding up their wings, renew' d their notes,
As if all day, preluding to the sight,
They only had rehearsed, to sing by night.
DRYDEN.
I rave,
And, like a giddy bird in dead of night,
Fly round the fire that scorches me to death.
DRYDEN.
I waked, and, looking round the bow'r,
Search'd ev'ry tree, and prey'd on ev'ry flow'r,
If anywhere by chance I might espy
The rural poet of the melody.
DRYDEN.
A peal of loud applause rang out,
And thinn'd the air, till ev'n the birds fell down
Upon the shouters' heads.
DRYDEN.
Earth smiles with flow'rs renewing, laughs the
sky,
And birds to lays of love their tuneful notes
apply.
DRYDEN.
The crested bird shall by experience know
Jove made not him his master-piece below.
DRYDEN.
The buzzard
Invites the feather'd Nimrods of his race
To hide the thinness of their flock from sight
And all together make a seeming goodly flight.
DRYDEN.
Within this homestead lived without a peer,
For crowing loud, the noble chanticleer.
DRYDEN.
Sooner than the matin-bell was rung
He clapp'd his wings upon his roost, and sung.
DRYDEN.
To crows he like impartial grace affords,
And choughs, and daws, and such republic birds.
DRYDEN.
BIRbS.
73
The dastard crow, that to the wood made wing,
With her loud caws her craven kind does bring,
Who, safe in numbers, cuff the noble bird.
DRYDEN.
The new dissembled eagle, now endued
With beak and pounces, Hercules pursued.
DRYDEN.
Then as an eagle who with pious care
Was beating widely on the wing for prey,
To her now silent eyrie does repair,
And finds her callow infants forced away.
DRYDEN.
Spread upon a lake, with upward eye,
A plump of fowl behold their foe on. high,
They close their trembling troop, and all attend
On whom the soaring eagle will descend.
DRYDEN.
A goldfinch there I saw, with gaudy pride
Of painted plumes that hopp'd from side to side.
DRYDEN.
Some haggard hawk, who had her eyrie nigh,
Well pounced to fasten, and well wing'd to fly.
DRYDEN.
When watchful herons leave their watery stand,
And, mounting upward with erected flight,
Gain on the skies, and soar above ths sight.
DRYDEN.
And how in fields the lapwing Tereus reigns,
The warbling nightingale in woods complains.
DRYDEN.
The lark, the messenger of day,
Saluted in her song the morning gray.
DRYDEN.
Mark how the lark and linnet sing;
With rival notes
They strain their warbling throats
To welcome in the spring.
DRYDEN.
As in a drought the thirsty creatures cry,
And gape upon the gather'd clouds for rain,
Then first the martlet meets it in the sky,
And with wet wings joys all the feather'd train.
DRYDEN.
Nor need they fear the dampness of the sky
Should flag their wings, and hinder them to fly;
'Twas only water thrown on sails too dry.
- DRYDEN.
Owls, that mark the setting sun, declare
A starlight evening and a morning fair.
DRYDEN.
The musket and the coyshet were too weak,
Too fierce the falcon ; but above the rest
The noble buzzard ever pleased me best.
DRYDEN.
The mother nightingale laments alone;
Whose nest some prying churl had found, and
thence,
By stealth, convey'd th' unfeather'd innocence.
DRYDEN.
On his left hand twelve rev'rend owls did fly:
So Romulus, 'tis sung, by Tiber's brook,
Presage of sway from twice six vultures took.
DRYDEN.
And parrots, imitating human tongue,
And singing birds, in silver cages hung;
And ev'ry fragrant flow'r, and od'rous green,
Were sorted well, with lumps of amber laid
between.
DRYDEN.
Who taught the parrot human notes to try,
Or with a voice endued the chattering pie ?
'Twas witty want.
DRYDEN.
So when the new-born phoenix first is seen,
Her feather'd subjects all adore their queen.
DRYDEN.
All these received their birth from other things,
But from himself the phoenix only springs*
Self-born, begotten by the parent flame
In which he burn'd, another and the same.
DRYDEN.
Constrain'd him in a bird, and made him fly,
With party-colour'd plumes, a chattering pie.
DRYDEN.
Huge flocks of rising rooks forsake their food,
And crying seek the shelter of the wood.
DRYDEN.
Stockdoves and turtles tell their am'rous pain,
And from the lofty elms of love complain.
DRYDEN.
The swallow skims the river's wat'ry face,
The frogs renew the croaks of their loquacious
race.
DRYDEN.
Thus on some silver swan or tim'rous hare
Jove's bird comes sousing down from upper air;
Her crooked talons truss the fearful prey,
Then out of sight she soars.
DRYDEN.
74
BIRDS.
Twelve swans behold in beauteous order move,
And stoop with closing pinions from above.
DRYDEN.
Like a long team of snowy swans on high,
"Which clap their wings, and cleave the liquid
sky,
While homeward from their wat'ry pastures
borne,
They sing, and Asia's lakes their notes return.
DRYDEN.
Your words are like the notes of dying swans ;
Too sweet to last.
DRYDEN.
The titmouse and the peckers' hungry brood,
And Progne with her bosom stain'd in blood.
DRYDEN.
A rav'nous vulture in his open'd side
Her crooked beak and cruel talons tried.
DRYDEN.
Such dread his awful visage on them cast;
So seem poor doves at goshawk's sight aghast.
FAIRFAX.
They long'd to see the day, to hear the lark
Record her hymns, and chant her carols blest.
FAIRFAX.
Thus boys hatch game-eggs under birds of prey,
To make the fowl more furious for the fray.
GARTH.
The widow'd turtle hangs her moulting wings,
And to the woods in mournful murmur sings.
GARTH.
Thy younglings, Cuddy, are but just awake,
No thrustles shrill the bramble bush forsake,
No chirping lark the welkin sheen invokes.
GAY.
See yon gay goldfinch hop from spray to spray,
Who sings a farewell to the parting day.
GAY.
Such strains ne'er warble in the linnet's throat.
GAY.
The peacock's plumes thy tackle must not fail,
Nor the dear purchase of the sable's tail.
GAY.
He told us that the welkin would be clear
When swallows fleet soar high and sport in air.
GAY.
Soon as in doubtful day the woodcock flies,
Her cleanly pail the pretty housewife bears.
GAY.
The noisy geese that gabbled in the pool.
GOLDSMITH.
Want sharpens poetry, and grief adorns :
The spink chants sweetest in a hedge of thorns.
WALTER HARTE.
Brightly, sweet summer, brightly
Thine hours have floated by,
To the joyous birds of the woodland boughs,
To the rangers of the sky.
MRS. HEMANS.
Thou wast not born for death, immortal bird !
No hungry generations tread thee down ;
The voice I hear this passing night was heard
In ancient days by emperor and clown.
KEATS.
None but the lark so shrill and clear !
Now at heaven's gate she claps her wings,
The morn not waking till she sings.
JOHN LILY.
There will we sit upon the rocks,
And see the shepherds feed their flocks
By shallow rivers, to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.
MARLOWE.
If chance the radiant sun, with farewell sweet,
Extend his ev'ning beam, the fields revive,
The birds their notes renew, and bleating herds
Attest their joy, that hill and valley ring.
MILTON.
The birds,
After a night of storm so ruinous,
Clear'd up their choicest notes in bush and spray,
To gratulate the sweet return of morn.
MILTON.
From branch to branch the smaller birds with
song
Solaced the woods, and spread their painted
wings
Till ev'n.
MILTON.
I saw a pleasant grove,
With chant of tuneful birds resounding love.
MILTON.
Sweet is the breath of Morn, her rising sweet,
With charm of earliest birds.
MILTON.
Creatures that lived, and moved, and walked,
or flew ;
Birds on the branches warbling; all things smiled.
MILTON.
BIRDS.
75
These delicacies
I mean of taste, sight, smell, herbs, fruits, and
flow'rs,
Walks, and the melody of birds.
MILTON.
Wings he wore of many a coloured plume.
MILTON.
Cow'ring low
With blandishment, each bird stoop' d on his
wing.
, MILTON.
Now shaves with level wing the deep, then soars.
MILTON.
Join voices, all ye living souls ! ye birds,
That singing up to heaven gate ascend,
Bear on your wings, and in your notes, his
praise.
MILTON.
While the cock with lively din
Scatters the rear of darkness thin,
And to the stack or the barn door
Proudly struts his dames before.
MILTON.
The eagle and the stork
On cliffs and cedar-tops their eyries build.
MILTON.
The bird of Jove, stoop'd from his airy tour,
Two birds of gayest plume before him drove.
MILTON.
To hear the lark begin its flight,
And singing / startle the dull night,
From his watchtower in the skies,
Till the dapple dawn doth rise ;
Then to come, in spite of sorrow,
And at my window bid " Good morrow."
MILTON.
Sweet bird, that shunn'st the noise of folly,
Most musical, most melancholy!
Thee, chantress, oft, the woods among,
I woo, to hear thy even-song.
MILTON.
O nightingale, that on yon bloomy spray
Warblest at eve, when all the woods are still ;
Thou with fresh hope the lover's heart dost fill
While the jolly Hours lead on propitious May.
MILTON.
The love-lorn nightingale
Nightly to thee her sad song mourneth well.
MILTON.
Nor then the solemn nightingale
Ceased warbling, but all night tuned her soft lays.
MILTON.
The wakeful bird
Sings darkling, and, in shadiest covert hid,
Tunes her nocturnal note.
MILTON.
Th' other, whose gay train
Adorns him, colour'd with the florid hue
Of rainbows and starry eyes.
MILTON.
The swan with arched neck,
Between her white wings mantling proudly, rows
Her state with oary feet.
MILTON.
Those lazy owls, who, perch'd near fortune's tip,
Sit only watchful with their heavy wings
To cuff down new-fledged virtues, that would rise
To nobler heights, and make the grove harmo-
nious.
OTWAY.
The fowler, warn'd
By those good omens, with swift early steps
Treads the crimp earth, ranging through fields
and glades,
Offensive to the birds.
JOHN PHILIPS.
From retentive cage
When sullen Philomel escapes, her notes
She varies, and of past imprisonment
Sweetly complains.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Philomela's liberty retrieved,
Cheers her sad soul.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Hear how the birds, on ev'ry blooming spray,
With joyous music wake the dawning day!
Why sit we mute when early linnets sing,
When warbling Philomel salutes the spring?
Why sit we sad when Phosphor shines so clear,
And lavish Nature paints the purple year?
POPE.
Fear the just gods, and think of Sylla's fate!
Changed to a bird, and sent to flit in air.
POPE.
Ah ! what avail his glossy varying dyes ;
The vivid green his shining plumes unfold;
His painted wings, and breast that flames with
gold?
POPE.
7 6
BIRDS.
Unnumber'd birds glide through th' aerial way,
Vagrants of air, and unforeboding stray.
POPE.
With hairy springes we the birds betray ;
Slight lines of hair surprise the finny prey.
POPE.
With slaught'ring guns th' unwearied fowler
roves,
When frosts have whiten'd all the naked groves.
POPE.
Oh, were I made, by some transforming pow'r,
The captive bird that sings within thy bow'r,
Then might my voice thy list'ning ears employ,
And I those kisses he receives enjoy.
POPE.
The chough, the sea-mew, the loquacious crow,
Scream aloft.
POPE.
Not half so swift the trembling doves can fly,
When the fierce eagle cleaves the liquid sky;
Not half so swiftly the fierce eagle moves,
When through the skies he drives the trembling
doves.
POPE.
Where doves in flocks the leafless trees o'er-
shade,
And lonely woodcocks haunt the wat'ry glade.
POPE.
Draw forth the monsters of th' abyss profound,
Or fetch th' aerial eagle to the ground.
POPE.
Abrupt, with eagle-speed she cut the sky,
Instant invisible to mortal eye :
Then first he recognized th' ethereal guest.
POPE.
Will the falcon, stooping from above,
Smit with her varying plumage, spare the dove?
Admires the jay the insect's gilded wings?
Or hears the hawk when Philomela sings?
POPE.
The dullest brain, if gently stirr'd,
Perhaps may waken to a humming-bird;
The most recluse, discreetly open'd, find
Congenial object in the cockle kind.
POPE.
Oft, as in airy rings they skim the heath,
The clam'rous lapwings feel the leaden death.
POPE.
No more the mounting larks, while Daphne
sings,
Shall, lifting in mid air, suspend their wings.
POPE.
Is it for thee the linnet pours his throat ?
Loves of his own and raptures swell the note.
POPE.
See! from the brake the whirring pheasant
springs,
And mounts exulting on triumphant wings :
Short is his joy, he feels the fiery wound,
Flutters in blood, and panting beats the ground.
POPE.
Night shades the groves, and all in silence lie;
All but the mournful Philomel and I.
POPE.
How all things listen while thy muse complains !
Such silence waits on Philomela's strains
In some still ev'ning, when the whisp'ring breeze
Pants on the leaves, and dies upon the trees.
POPE.
The robin-redbreast till of late had rest,
And children sacred held a martin's nest.
POPE.
Not less their number than the milk-white
swans
That o'er the winding of Cyaster's springs
Stretch their long necks, and clap their rustling
wings.
POPE.
Upward the noble bird directs his wing,
And, tow'ring round his master's earth-born foes,
Swift he collects his fatal stock of ire,
Lifts his fierce talon high, and darts the forked
fire.
PRIOR.
How in small flights they know to try their
young,
And teach the callow child her parent's song.
PRIOR.
Poor, little, pretty, flutt'ring thing,
Must we no longer live together?
And dost thou prune thy trembling wing
To take thy flight thou know'st not whither?
PRIOR.
The cheerful birds no longer sing;
Each drops his head, and hangs his wing.
PRIOR.
BIRDS.
77
A falc'ner Henry is, when Emma hawks :
With her of tarsels and of lures he talks.
PRIOR.
The birds, great Nature's happy commoners,
That haunt in woods, in meads, and flowery
gardens,
Rifle the sweets, and taste the choicest fruits.
ROWE.
Ask thou the citizens of pathless woods ;
What cut the air with wings, what swim in
floods ?
SANDYS.
The peacock not at thy command assumes
His glorious train, nor ostrich her rare plumes.
SANDYS.
The birds chant melody on every bush,
The green leaves quiver with the cooling wind.
SHAKSPEARE.
Our cage
We make a choir, as doth the prison bird,
And sing our- bondage freely.
SHAKSPEARE.
Myself have limed a bush for her,
And placed a quire of such enticing birds,
That she will 'light to listen to their lays.
SHAKSPEARE.
I would have thee gone,
And yet no farther than a wanton's bird,
That lets it hop a little from her hand,
And with a silk thread plucks it back again.
SHAKSPEARE.
Ere the bat hath flown
His cloister'd flight.
SHAKSPEARE.
Often to our comfort shall we find
The sharded beetle in a safer hold
Than is the full-wing'd eagle.
SHAKSPEARE.
Russet-pated choughs, many in sort,
Rising and cawing at the gun's report.
SHAKSPEARE.
The cock, that is the trumpet to the morn,
Doth with his lofty and shrill-sounding throat
Awake the god of day.
SHAKSPEARE.
The morning cock crew loud,
And at the sound it shrunk in haste away,
And vanish' d from our sight.
SHAKSPEARE.
The early village cock
Hath twice done salutation to the morn.
SHAKSPEARE.
Light thickens, and the crow
Makes wing to the rocky wood.
SHAKSPEARE.
The crows and choughs that wing the midway
air
Show scarce so gross as beetles.
SHAKSPEARE.
To be furious
Is to be frighted out of fear ; and in that mood
The dove will peck the estridge.
SHAKSPEARE-
So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows,
As yonder lady o'er her fellows shows.
SHAKSPEARE.
I saw Jove's bird, the Roman eagle, wing'd
From the spungy south to this part of the west,
There vanish'd in the sunbeams.
SHAKSPEARE.
His royal bird
Prunes the immortal wing, and cloys his beak,
As when his god is pleased.
SHAKSPEARE.
The gallant monarch is in arms j
And like an eagle o'er his eyrie tow'rs,
To souse annoyance that comes near his nest.
SHAKSPEARE.
She that her eyrie buildeth in the cedar-top,
And dallies with the wind, and scorns the sun.
SHAKSPEARE.
All plumed like estridges, that with the wind
Baited like eagles having lately bathed ;
Glittering in golden coats like images.
SHAKSPEARE.
A falcon, tow'ring in her pride of place,
Was by a mousing owl hawk'd at and kill'd.
SHAKSPEARE.
\Vhat a point your falcon made !
And what a pitch she flew above the rest !
SHAKSPEARE.
My falcon now is sharp and passing empty,
And till she stoop, she must not be full-gorged;
For then she never looks upon her lure.
SHAKSPEARE.
7 8
BIRDS.
Another way I have to man my haggard,
To make her come, and know her keeper's call ;
That is, to watch her as we watch those kites
That bait and beat, and will not be obedient.
SHAKSPEARE.
Between two hawks which flies the higher pitch,
I have, perhaps, some shallow judgment.
SHAKSPEARE.
What! is the jay more precious than the lark,
Because his feathers are more beautiful ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Lo ! here the gentle lark, weary of rest,
From his moist cabinet mounts up on high,
And wakes the morning, from whose silver breast
The sun ariseth in his majesty.
SHAKSPEARE.
Nor that is not the lark, whose notes do beat
The vaulty heav'n so high above our heads.
SHAKSPEARE.
It is the lark that sings so out of tune,
Straining harsh discords and unpleasing sharps.
SHAKSPEARE.
It was the lark, the herald of the morn.
SHAKSPEARE.
Look up a height, the shrill-gorged lark so far
Cannot be seen or heard.
SHAKSPEARE.
When shepherds pipe on oaten straws,
And merry larks are ploughmen's clocks.
SHAKSPEARE.
Augurs, that understood relations, have
By magpies, and by choughs, and rooks, brought
forth
The secret'st man of blood.
SHAKSPEARE.
This guest of summer,
The temple-haunting martlet, does approve,
By his loved mansionry, that heaven's breath
Smells wooingly here. No jutty, frieze,
Buttress, nor coigne of vantage, but this bird
Hath made his pendent bed and procreant cradle :
Where they most breed and haunt, I have ob-
served
The air is delicate.
SHAKSPEARE,
It was the nightingale, and not the lark,
That pierced the fearful hollow of thine ear;
Nightly she sings on yon pomegranate tree.
SHAKSPEARE.
The nightingale, if she should sing by day,
When every goose is cackling, would be thought
No better a musician than the wren.
How many things by season season'd are
To their right praise and true perfection !
SHAKSPEARE.
Except I be by Sylvia in the night,
There is no music in the nightingale.
SHAKSPEARE.
Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes
Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated,
The bird of dawning singeth all night long.
SHAKSPEARE.
The ousel cock so black of hue,
With orange tawny bill.
SHAKSPEARE.
It was the owl that shriek'd ; the fatal bellman
Which gives the stern'st good-night.
SHAKSPEARE.
The obscure bird clamour' d the livelong night.
SHAKSPEARE.
The owl shriek'd at thy birth ; an evil sign ;
The night-crow cry'd ; a boding luckless time.
SHAKSPEARE.
The clamorous owl, that nightly hoots and
wonders
At our quaint spirits.
SHAKSPEARE.
Who finds the partridge in the puttock's nest,
But may imagine how the bird was dead,
Although the kite soar with unbloodied beak?
SHAKSPEARE.
Let frantic Talbot triumph for a while,
And, like a peacock, sweep along his tail.
SHAKSPEARE.
Did ever raven sing so like a lark,
That gives sweet tidings of the sun's uprise?
SHAKSPEARE.
The raven himself is hoarse
That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan
Under my battlements.
SHAKSPEARE.
The raven croak'd hoarse on the chimney's top,
And chattering pies in dismal discord sung.
SHAKSPEARE.
The hedge-sparrow fed the cuckoo so long
That it had its head bit off by its young.
SHAKSPEARE.
BIRDS.
79
The swan's down feather,
That stands upon the swell at full of tide,
And neither way inclines.
SHAKSPEARE.
The throstle with his note so true,
The wren with little quill.
SHAKSPEARE.
We'll teach him to know turtles from jays.
SHAKSPEARE.
As a woodcock to my own springe, Osrick,
I'm justly kill'd with mine own treachery.
SHAKSPEARE.
The poor wren,
The most diminutive of birds, will fight,
Her young ones in her nest, against the owl.
SHAKSPEARE.
The world is grown so bad
That wrens make prey where eagles dare not
perch.
SHAKSPEARE.
As the day begins,
With twenty gins we will the small birds take,
And pastime make.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
Thus children do the silly birds they find
With stroking hurt, and too much cramming kill.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
As Venus' bird, the white, swift, lovely dove,
O ! happy dove that art compared to her,
Doth on her wings her utmost swiftness prove,
Finding the gripe of falcon fierce not far.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
The phoenix' wings are not so rare
For faultless length and stainless hue.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
A maid thitherward did run
To catch her sparrow, which from her did
swerve.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
The heron,
Upon the bank of some small, purling brook,
Observant stands, to take his scaly prey.
SOMERVILE.
The melancholy Philomel,
Thus perch'd all night alone in -shady groves,
Tunes her soft voice to sad complaint of love,
Making her life one great harmonious woe.
SOUTHERN.
The merry birds of ev'ry sort
Chaunted about their cheerful harmony,
And made amongst themselves a sweet consort,
That quick'ned the dull sp'rit with musical
comfort.
SPENSER.
No bird but did her shrill notes sweetly sing;
No song but did contain a lovely dit.
SPENSER.
The trees did bud, and early blossom bore,
And all the quire of birds did sweetly sing,
And told that garden's pleasures in their carol-
ling.
SPENSER.
Leaves of flowers -
That freshly budded, and new blossoms did bear,
In which a thousand birds had built their bowers.
SPENSER.
The birds
Frame to thy song their cheerful cheruping,
Or hold their peace for shame of thy sweet lays.
SPENSER.
The cheerful birds of sundry kind
Do chant sweet music to delight his mind.
SPENSER.
He percheth on some branch thereby,
To weather him, and his moist wings to dry.
SPENSER.
She, more sweet than any bird on bough,
Would oftentimes among them bear a part,
And strive to pass, as she could well enow,
Their native music by her skilful art.
SPENSER.
Hark! how the cheerful birds do chant their
lays,
And carol of Love's praise.
The merry lark her matins sings aloft ;
The thrush replies ; the mavis descant plays ;
The ousel shrills ; the redbreast warbles soft :
So goodly all agree, with sweet consent,
To this day's merriment.
SPENSER.
The merry cuckoo, messenger of spring,
His trumpet shrill hath thrice already sounded.
SPENSER.
Like as the culver on the bared bough
Sits mourning for the absence of her mate.
SPENSER.
8o
BIRDS.
I do but sing because I must,
And pipe but as the linnets sing.
TENNYSON.
Every copse
Deep tangled, tree irregular, and bush
Bending with dewy moisture, o'er the heads
Of the coy quiristers that lodge within,
Are prodigal of harmony.
THOMSON.
The cleft tree
Offers its kind concealment to a few ;
Their food its insects, and its moss their nests.
THOMSON.
Through the soft silence of the listening night
The sober-suited songstress trills her lay.
THOMSON.
Their tribes adjusted, clean'd their vig'rous
wings,
And many a circle, many a short essay
Wheel'd round and round.
THOMSON.
Innumerous songsters in the fresh'ning shade
Of new spring leaves their modulations mix.
THOMSON.
The jay, the rook, the daw
Aid the full concert.
THOMSON.
Up springs the lark, shrill-voiced and loud.
THOMSON.
A fresher gale
Sweeping with shadowy gust the field of corn,
While the quail clamours for his running mate.
THOMSON.
The redbreast, sacred to the household gods,
Pays to trusted man his annual visit.
THOMSON.
The rook, who high amid the boughs
In early spring his airy city builds,
And ceaseless caws.
THOMSON.
The swallow sweeps
The slimy pool to build his hanging house.
THOMSON.
The stately-sailing swan
Gives out his snowy plumage to the gale ;
And, arching proud his neck, with oary feet
Bears forward fierce, and guards his osier isle,
Protective of his young.
THOMSON.
As an eagle seeing prey appear
His airy plumes doth rouse full rudely dight,
So shaked he, that horror was to hear.
SPENSER.
The kingly bird that bears Jove's thunderclap
One day did scorn the simple scarabee,
Proud of his highest service, and good hap,
That made all other fowls his thralls to be.
SPENSER.
Lifted aloft, he 'gan to mount up higher,
And, like fresh eagle, made his hardy flight
Thro' all that great wide waste, yet wanting light.
SPENSER.
An haggard hawk, presuming to contend
With hardy fowl above his able might,
His weary pounces all in vain doth spend,
To truss the prey too heavy for his flight.
SPENSER.
The nightingale is sovereign of song,
Before him sits the titmouse silent by,
And I, unfit to thrust in skilful throng,
Should Colin make judge of my foolerie.
SPENSER.
The ill-faced owl, death's dreadful messenger,
The hoarse night-raven, trump of doleful drere,
The leather-winged bat, day's enemy,
The rueful strick, still waiting on the bier.
SPENSER.
Where dwelt the ghostly owl,
Shrieking his baleful note, which ever drave
Far from their haunt all other cheerful fowl.
SPENSER.
Often have I scaled the craggy oak,
All to dislodge the raven of her nest.
SPENSER.
Nor the night raven, that still deadly yells,
Nor griesly vultures, make us once affear'd.
SPENSER.
The swallow peeps out of her nest,
And cloudy welkin cleareth.
SPENSER.
Up a grove did spring, green as in May
When April had been moist ; upon whose bushes
The pretty robins, nightingales, and thrushes
Warbled their notes.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
The boding owl
Steals from her private cell by night,
And flies about the candlelight.
SWIFT.
BLANDISHMENTS. BLESSINGS. BLINDNESS.
81
Congregated thrushes, linnets, sit
On the dead tree, a dull despondent flock.
THOMSON.
Hark ! on every bough
In lulling strains the feather'd warblers woo.
TlCKELL.
In these soft shades, unpress'd by human feet,
Thy happy Phoenix keeps his balmy seat.
TlCKELL.
Those which only warble long,
And gargle in their throats a song.
WALLER.
The birds know how to chuse their fare ;
To peck this fruit they all forbear :
Those cheerful singers know not why
They should make any haste to die.
WALLER.
The eagle's fate and mine are one,
Which on the shaft that made him die
Espied a feather of his own,
Wherewith he wont to soar on high.
WALLER.
The lark still shuns on lofty boughs to build;
Her humble nest lies silent in the field.
WALLER.
Thus the wise nightingale that leaves her home,
Pursuing constantly the cheerful spring,
To foreign groves does her old music bring.
WALLER.
And hark how blithe the throstle sings !
He, too, is no mean preacher.
WORDSWORTH : Table Turned.
Now all nature seem'd in love,
And birds had drawn their valentines.
WOTTON.
You curious chanters of the wood,
That warble forth Dame Nature's laySr
WOTTON.
BLANDISHMENTS.
Him Dido now with blandishment detains ;
But I suspect the town where Juno reigns.
DRYDEN.
Each bird and beast behold
Approaching two and two ; these cow'ring low
With blandishment.
MILTON.
6
Must' ring all her wiles,
With blandish'd parleys, feminine assaults,
Tongue-batteries, she surceased not day not
night
To storm me, over-watch'd and weary'd out.
MILTON.
The little babe up in his arms he bent,
Who, with sweet pleasure and bold blandish-
ment,
'Gan smile.
SPENSER.
BLESSINGS.
In vain with folding arms the youth assay'd
To stop her flight, and strain the flying shade ;
But she return'd no more to bless his longing
eyes.
DRYDEN.
There's not a blessing individuals find
But some way leans and hearkens to the kind.
POPE.
Bring then these blessings to a strict account,
Make fair deductions, see to what they mount.
POPE.
The blest to-day is as completely so
As who began a thousand years ago.
POPE.
From the blessings they bestow
Our times are dated, and our eras move :
They govern and enlighten all below,
As thou dost all above.
PRIOR.
For so it falls out,
That what we have we prize not to the worth
Whiles we enjoy it, but being lack'd and lost,
Why, then we rack the value; then we find
The virtue, that possession would not show us
Whiles it was ours.
SHAKSPEARE.
How blessings brighten as they take their flight!
YOUNG.
BLINDNESS.
He blinds the wise, gives eyesight to the blind,
And moulds and stamps anew the lover's mind.
DRYDEN.
This three years day, these eyes, though clear
To outward view of blemish or of spot,
Bereft of sight, their seeing have forgot.
MILTON.
82
BLINDNESS. BLISS.
These eyes that roll in vain
To find thy piercing ray, and find no dawn.
MILTON.
Thus with the year
Seasons return, but not to me returns
Day, or the sweet approach of even or morn,
Or sight of vernal bloom, or summer's rose,
Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine.
MILTON.
Though sight be lost,
Life yet hath many solaces, enjoy'd,
Where other senses want not their delights,
At home, in leisure and domestic ease,
Exempt from many a care and chance, to which
Eyesight exposes daily men abroad.
MILTON.
Sight bereaved
May chance to number thee with those
Whom patience finally must crown.
MILTON.
He that is stricken blind cannot forget
The precious treasure of his eyesight lost.
SHAKSPEARE.
BLISS.
To bliss unknown my lofty soul aspires;
My lot unequal to my vast desires.
ARBUTHNOT.
Though duller thoughts succeed,
The bliss e'en of a moment still is bliss.
Thou would'st not of her dew-drops spoil the
thorn
Because her glory will not last till noon.
JOANNA BAILLIE: Beacon.
Blessed, thrice blessed days ! but ah ! how short !
Bless'd as the pleasing charms of holy men,
But fugitive like those, and quickly gone.
ROBERT BLAIR : The Grave.
Alas! the breast that inly bleeds
Hath nought to dread from outward blow :
Who falls from all he knows of bliss,
Cares little into what abyss.
BYRON: Giaour.
She contains all bliss,
And makes the world but her periphrasis.
JOHN CLEAVELAND.
The quick'ning power would be, and so would
rest;
The sense would not be only, but be well :
But wit's ambition longeth to the best,
For it desires in endless bliss to dwell.
SIR J. DAVIES.
Poor human kind, all dazed in open day,
Err after bliss, and blindly miss their way.
DRYDEN.
Two magnets, heav'n and earth, allure to bliss,
The larger loadstone that, the nearer this.
DRYDEN.
Kindness for man, and pity for his fate,
May mix with bliss, and yet not violate.
DRYDEN.
May Heav'n, great monarch, still augment your
bliss
With length of days, and every day like this.
DRYDEN.
Vain, very vain, my weary search to find
That bliss which only centres in the mind.
GOLDSMITH.
Bliss, as thou hast part, to me is bliss;
Tedious, unshared with thee, and odious soon.
MILTON.
Condition, circumstance, is not the thing :
Bliss is the same in subject or in king;
In who obtain defence, or who defend,
In him who is, or him who finds, a friend.
POPE.
Some place the bliss in action, some in ease;
Those call it pleasure, and contentment these.
POPE.
See ! the sole bliss heav'n could on all bestow,
Which who but feels can taste, but thinks can
know.
POPE.
I see thee, lord and end of my desire,
Loaded and blest with all the affluent store
Which human vows and smoking shrines im-
plore.
PRIOR.
Then pour out plaint, and in one word say this :
Helpless his plaint who spoils himself of bliss.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
Yet, swimming in that sea of blissful joy,
He nought forgot.
SPENSER.
This day's ensample hath this lesson dear
Deep written in my heart with iron pen,
That bliss may not abide in state of mortal men.
SPENSER.
BL USHES. B CASTING. B O OKS.
Oft when blind mortals think themselves secure,
In height of bliss, they touch the brink of ruin.
THOMSON.
While the fond soul,
Wrapt in gay visions of unreal bliss,
Still paints th' illusive form.
THOMSON.
The spider's most attenuated thread
Is cord is cable to man's tender tie
On earthly bliss ; it breaks at every breeze.
YOUNG.
BLUSHES.
The eloquent blood
Spoke in her cheeks, and so distinctly wrought
You might have almost said her body thought.
DONNE.
Will you not speak to save a lady's blush ?
DRYDEN.
call not to this aged cheek
The little blood which should keep warm my
heart.
DRYDEN.
Playful blushes that seem'd nought
But luminous escapes of thought. -
MOORE.
Let me forever gaze
And bless the new-born glories that adorn thee ;
From every blush that kindles in thy cheeks
Ten thousand little loves and graces spring.
ROWE.
I will go wash :
And when my face is fair, you shall perceive
Whether I blush or no.
SHAKSPEARE.
1 have mark'd
A thousand blushing apparitions
To start into her face; a thousand innocent
shames,
In angel whiteness, bear away those blushes.
SHAKSPEARE.
To-day he puts forth
The tender leaves of hope ; to-morrow blossoms,
And bears his blushing honours thick upon him.
SHAKSPEARE.
Her lips blush deeper sweets.
THOMSON.
Along those blushing borders, bright with dew.
THOMSON.
The man that blushes is not quite a brute.
YOUNG.
BOASTING.
That brawny fool who did his vigour boast,
In that presuming confidence was lost.
DRYDEN.
No more delays, vain boaster ! but begin ;
I prophesy beforehand I shall win :
I'll teach you how to brag another time.
DRYDEN.
He the proud boasters sent, with stern assault,
Down to the realms of night.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Boastful and rough, your first son is a 'squire,
The next a tradesman, meek, and much a liar.
POPE.
If it be so, yet bragless let it be :
Great Hector was as good a man as he.
SHAKSPEARE.
Who knows himself a braggart,
Let him fear this ; for it will come to pass,
That every braggart shall be found an ass.
SHAKSPEARE
BOOKS.
Its no' in books, its no' in lear,
To make us truly blest,
If happiness has not her seat
And centre in the breast.
BURNS : Epistle to Davie.
Old wood to burn ! old wine to drink !
Old friends to trust ! old books to read !
ALONZO OF ARAGON.
'Tis in books the chief
Of all perfections to be plain and brief.
BUTLER.
They cannot read, and so don't lisp in criticism;
Nor write, and so they don't affect the muse;
Were never caught in epigram or witticism ;
Have no romances, sermons, plays, reviews.
BYRON.
'Twere well with most, if books, that could
engage
Their childhood, pleased them at a riper age,
The man, approving what had charm'd the boy,
Would die at last in comfort, peace, and joy;
And not with curses on his art who stole
The gem of truth from his unguarded soul.
COWPER.
Books are not seldom talismans and spells.
COWPER.
BOOKS.
Books cannot always please, however good;
Minds are not ever craving for their food.
CRABBE.
Books should to one of these four ends conduce :
For wisdom, piety, delight, or use.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Fixt and contemplative their looks,
Still turning over nature's books.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Yet vainly most their age in study spend :
No end of writing books, and to no end.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Let moths through pages eat their way,
Your wars, your loves, your praises be forgot,
And make of all an universal blot.
DRYDEN.
Whate'er these booklearn'd blockheads say,
Solon's the veriest fool in all the play.
DRYDEN.
How pure the joy when first my hands unfold
The small, rare volume, black with tarnish'd
gold.
FERRIAR : Bibliomania.
The princeps copy, clad in blue and gold.
FERRIAR : Bibliomania.
Now cheaply bought for thrice their weight in
gold.
FERRIAR : Bibliomania.
That place that does
Contain my books, the best companions, is
To me a glorious court, where hourly I
Converse with the old sages and philosophers.
FLETCHER.
Whence is thy learning? Hath thy toil
O'er books consumed the midnight oil?
GAY.
Volumes on shelter'd stalls expanded lie,
And various science lures the learned eye.
GAY.
Uncertain and unsettled he remains,
Deep versed in books, and shallow in himself.
MILTON.
My only books
Were woman's looks,
And folly's all they taught me.
MOORE.
Books are part of man's prerogative ;
In formal ink they thought and voices hold,
That we to them our solitude may give,
And make time present travel that of old.
Our life, fame pieceth longer at the end,
And books it farther backward doth extend.
SIR THOMAS OVERBURY.
Studious he sate, with all his books around,
Sinking from thought to thought, a vast pro-
found ;
Plunged for his sense, but found no bottom there ;
Then wrote, and flounder'd on in mere despair.
POPE.
Next o'er his books his eyes began to roll
In pleasing memory of all he stole.
POPE.
The fate of all extremes is such,
Men may be read, as well as books, too much.
POPE.
Yes, you despise the man to books confined,
Who from his study rails at human kind ;
Though what he learns he speaks.
POPE.
Blest with a 'taste exact, yet unconfined;
A knowledge both of books and human kind.
POPE.
Still with esteem no less conversed than read ;
With wit well-natured, and with books well-bred.
POPE.
To all their dated backs he turns you round :
These Aldus printed, those Du Sueil has bound.
POPE.
Quartos, octavos, shape the lessening pyre,
And last a little Ajax tips the spire.
POPE.
There Caxton slept, with Wynken at his side;
One clasp'd in wood, and one in strong cowhide.
POPE.
To love an altar built
Of twelve vast French romances neatly gilt.
POPE.
The bookful blockhead, ignorantly read,
With loads of learned lumber in his head,
With his own tongue still edifies his ears,
And always list'ning to himself appears.
POPE.
I, fond of my well-chosen seat,
My pictures, medals, books complete.
PRIOR.
My favourite books and pictures sell ;
Kindly throw in a little figure,
And set the price upon the bigger.
PRIOR.
BOOKS.
Those who could never read the grammar,
When my dear volumes touch the hammer,
May think books best, as richly bound.
PRIOR.
O Rosalind, these trees shall be my books,
And in their barks my thoughts I'll character;
That every eye which in this forest looks
Shall see thy virtue witness'd everywhere.
Run, run, Orlando, carve on every tree
The fair, the chaste, the unexpressive she.
SHAKSPEARE.
A book ! oh, rare one !
Be not, as in this fangled world, a garment
Nobler than it covers.
SHAKSPEARE.
Me, poor man, my library
Was dukedom large enough.
SHAKSPEARE.
We turn'd o'er many books together.
SHAKSPEARE.
This man's brow, like to a title leaf,
Foretells the nature of a tragic volume.
SHAKSPEARE.
Was ever book, containing such vile matter,
So fairly bound ?
SHAKSPEARE.
This Armado is a Spaniard that keeps here in
court,
A phantasm, a monarch, one that makes sport
To the prince and his bookmates.
SHAKSPEARE.
This civil war of wits were much better used
On Navarre and his bookmen; for here 'tis
abused.
SHAKSPEARE.
I'll make him yield the crown,
Whose bookish rule hath pull'd fair England
down.
SHAKSPEARE.
So have I seen trim books in velvet dight,
With golden leaves and painted babery
Of seely boys, please unacquainted sight.
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY.
My days among the dead are pass'd;
Around me I behold,
Where'er these casual eyes are cast,
The mighty minds of old;
My never-failing friends are they,
With whom I converse night and day.
SOUTHEY.
The printed part, though far too large, is less
Than that which, yet unprinted, waits the press.
SPANISH COUPLET.
Then as they 'gan his library to view,
And antique registers for to avise,
There chanced to the prince's hand to rise
An ancient book, hight Britain's Monuments.
SPENSER.
After so long a race as I have run
Through fairy land, which those six books com-
pile,
Give leave to rest me.
SPENSER.
How enviously the ladies look
When they surprise me at my book,
And sure as they're alive at night,
As soon as gone will show their spite.
SWIFT.
SWIFT.
SWIFT.
Harley, the nation's great support,
Returning home one day from court,
Observed a parson near Whitehall
Cheap'ning old authors on a stall.
To statesmen would you give a wipe,
You print it in Italic type :
When letters are in vulgar shapes,
'Tis ten to one the wit escapes;
But when in capitals exprest,
The dullest reader smokes the jest.
If one short volume could comprise
All that was witty, learn'd, and wise,
How would it be esteem'd and read !
SWIFT.
You modern wits should each man bring his
claim,
Have desperate debentures on your fame ;
And little would be left you, I'm afraid,
If all your debts to Greece and Rome were paid.
SWIFT.
Books are yours,
Within whose silent chambers treasure lies
Preserved from age to age ; more precious far
Than that accumulated store of gold
And orient gems which, for a day of need,
The Sultan hides deep in ancestral tombs.
These hoards of truth you can unlock at will.
WORDSWORTH.
Dreams, books, are each a world; and books,
we know,
Are a substantial world, both pure and good :
86
B ORES. B O UNTY. BRA VER Y.
Round these, with tendrils strong as flesh and
blood,
Our pastime and our happiness will grow.
WORDSWORTH : Personal Talk.
Others with wistful eyes on glory look
When they have got their picture towards a book;
Or pompous title, like a gaudy sign
Meant to betray dull sots to wretched wine.
YOUNG.
Some future strain, in which the muse shall tell
How science dwindles, and how volumes swell.
YOUNG.
Letters admit not of a half renown ;
They give you nothing, or they give a crown :
No work e'er gain'd true fame, or ever can,
But what did honour to the name of man.
YOUNG.
BORES.
What though no bees around your cradle flew,
Nor on their lips distill'd their golden dew,
Yet have we oft discover'd, in their stead,
A swarm of drones that buzz'd about your head.
POPE.
BOUNTY.
For thy vast bounties are so numberless,
That them or to conceal, or else to tell,
Is equally impossible.
COWLEY.
Such moderation with thy bounty join
That thou may'st nothing give that is not thine;
That liberality is but cast away
WTiich makes us borrow what we cannot pay.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Those godlike men, to wanting virtue kind,
Bounty well placed, preferr'd,and well design'd,
To all their titles.
DRYDEN.
Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere ;
Heaven did a recompense as largely send ;
He gave to misery all he had a tear ;
He gain'd from heaven 'twas all he wish'd
a friend !
GRAY.
Which of you, shall we say, doth love us most ?
That we our largest bounty may extend
Where nature doth with merit challenge.
SHAKSPEARE.
If you knew to whom you show this honour,
I know you would be prouder of the work
Than customary bounty can enforce you.
SHAKSPEARE.
That churchman bears a bounteous mind, in-
deed;
A hand as fruitful as the land that feeds us;
His dew falls ev'rywhere.
SHAKSPEARE.
A losel wandering by the way,
One that to bounty never cast his mind ;
Ne thought of heaven ever did assay
His baser breast.
SPENSER.
BRAVERY.
The truly brave are soft of hearts and eyes,
And feel for what their duty bids them do.
BYRON.
But whosoe'er it was, nature design'd
First a brave place, and then as brave a mind.
SIR J. DENHAM.
No fire, nor foe, nor fate, nor night,
The Trojan hero did affright,
Who bravely twice renew'd the fight.
SIR J. DENHAM.
No, there is a necessity in fate
Why still the brave bold man is fortunate ;
He keeps his object ever full in sight,
And that assurance holds him firm and right :
True, 'tis a narrow path that leads to bliss,
But right before there is no precipice ;
Fear makes men look aside, and so their footing
miss.
DRYDEN.
The brave man seeks not popular applause,
Nor, overpower'd with arms, deserts his cause :
Unshamed, though foil'd, he does the best he
can ;
Force is of brutes, but honour is of man.
DRYDEN.
Impute your danger to our ignorance ;
The bravest men are subject most to chance.
DRYDKN.
Hot braves, like thee, may fight, but know not
well
To manage this, the last great stake.
DRYDEN.
BRA VER Y. BRIDE.
A braver choice of dauntless spirits
Did never float upon the swelling tide.
SHAKSPEARE.
I do not think a braver gentleman,
More daring, or more bold, is now alive,
To grace this latter age with noble deeds.
SHAKSPEARE.
Fight valiantly to-day ;
And yet I do thee wrong to mind thee of it ;
For thou art framed of the firm truth of valour.
SHAKSPEARE.
I'll prove the prettier fellow of the two,
And wear my dagger with a braver grace.
SHAKSPEARE.
But while hope lives
Let not the generous die. 'Tis late before
The brave despair.
THOMSON.
From armed foes to bring a royal prize,
Shows your brave heart victorious as your eyes.
WALLER.
BRIDE.
As when a piece of wanton lawn,
A thin aerial veil is drawn
O'er beauty's face, seeming to hide,
More sweetly shows the blushing bride :
A soul whose intellectual beams
No mists do mask, no lazy streams.
CRASHAW.
Up, up, fair bride ! and call
Thy stars from out their several boxes; take
Thy rubies, pearls, and diamonds forth, and
make
Thyself a constellation of them all.
JOHN DONNE.
The bride,
Lovely herself, and lovely by her side
A bevy of bright nymphs, with sober grace,
Came glitt'ring like a star, and took her place:
Her heav'nly form beheld, all wish'd her joy;
And little wanted, but in vain, their wishes all
employ.
DRYDEN.
O happy youth !
For whom thy fates reserve so fair a bride :
He sigh'd, and had no leisure more to say;
His honour call'd his eyes another way.
DRYDEN.
The day approach'd when fortune should decide
Th' important enterprise, and give the bride.
DRYDEN.
Heaven's unchanged decrees attentive hear:
More pow'rful gods have torn thee from my side,
Unwilling to resign, and doom'd a bride.
DRYDEN.
The lovely Thais by his side
Sat, like a blooming Eastern bride,
In flow'r of youth, and beauty's pride.
DRYDEN.
By this the brides are waked, their grooms are
dress'd ;
All Rhodes is summon'd to the nuptial feast.
DRYDEN.
Love yields at last, thus combated by pride,
And she submits to be the Roman's bride.
GRANVILLE.
She smiled, array'd
With all the charms of sunshine, stream, and
glade,
New drest and blooming as a bridal maid.
WALTER HARTE.
She turn'd and her mother's gaze brought back
Each hue of her childhood's faded track :
Oh, hush the song, and let her tears
Flow to the dream of her early years !
Holy and pure are the drops that fall
When the young bride goes from her father's
hall;
She goes unto love yet untried and new :
She parts from love which hath still been true.
MRS. HEMANS.
Sweet day, so cool, so calm, so bright,
The bridal of the earth and sky,
Sweet dews shall weep thy fall to-night:
For thou must die !
GEORGE HERBERT.
The amorous bird of night
Sung spousal, and bid haste the ev'ning star
On his hill-top to light the bridal lamp.
MILTON.
Your ill-meaning politician lords,
Under pretence of bridal friends and guests,
Appointed to await me thirty spies.
MILTON.
Yet here and there we grant a gentle bride,
Whose temper betters by the father's side;
Unlike the rest that double human care,
Fond to relieve, or resolute to share.
PARNELL.
/
BRIDE. CAL UMNY. CAND OUR. CARE.
"or her the spouse prepares the bridal ring,
For her white virgins hymeneals sing.
POPE.
Sleep' st thou careless of the nuptial day ?
Thy spousal ornament neglected lies;
Arise, prepare the bridal train, arise !
POPE.
Elusive of the bridal day, she gives
Fond hopes to all, and all with hopes deceives.
POPE.
They, vain expectants of the bridal hour,
My stores in riotous expense devour.
POPE.
Nay, we must think men are not gods ;
Nor of them look for such observance always
As fits the bridal.
SHAKSPEARE.
Our wedding cheer to a sad fun'ral feast,
Our solemn hymns to sullen dirges change,
Our bridal flowers serve for a buried corse.
SHAKSPEARE.
Now hats fly off, and youths carouse,
Healths first go round, and then the house,
The brides come thick and thick.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
Next morn, betimes, the bride was missing:
The mother scream'd, the father chid,
Where can this idle wench be hid !
SWIFT.
No news of Phyl ? the bridegroom came ;
And thought his bride had skulk'd for shame;
Because her father used to say
The girl had such a bashful way.
SWIFT.
CALUMNY.
With calumnious art
Of counterfeited truth, thus held their ears.
MILTON.
Virtue itself 'scapes not calumnious strokes.
SHAKSPEARE.
Be thou as chaste as ice, as pure as snow,
Thou shall not escape calumny.
SHAKSPEARE.
CANDOUR.
Up into the watch-tower get,
And see all things despoil'd of fallacies :
Thou shall not peep through lattices of eyes
Nor hear through labyrinths of ears, nor learn
By circuit or collections to discern.
DONNE.
As thought was visible that roll'd within,
As through a crystal case the figured hours are
seen.
DRYDEN.
Some positive persisting fops we know,
That if once wrong, will needs be always so :
But you with pleasure own your errors past,
And make each day a critic on the last.
POPE.
CARE.
I have observed of late thy looks are fallen,
O'ercast with gloomy cares and discontent.
ADDISON.
The people, free from cares, serene and gay,
Pass all their mild untroubled hours away.
ADDISON.
Vain man, forbear; of cares unload thy mind ;
Forget thy hopes, and give thy fears to wind.
CREECH.
Let early care thy main concerns secure :
Things of less moment may delays endure.
SIR J. DENHAM.
No sullen discontent, nor anxious care,
E'en though brought thither, could inhabit there.
DRYDEN.
Or, if I would take care, that care should be
For wit that scorn'd the world, and lived like me.
DRYDEN.
Well, on my terms thou wilt not be my heir;
If thou car'st little, less shall be my care.
DRYDEN.
Flush'd were his cheeks, and glowing were his
eyes.
Is she thy care ? is she thy care ? he cries.
DRYDEN.
CARE. CAROL. CAROUSING.
8g
Restless anxiety, forlorn despair,
And all the faded family of care.
GARTH.
Care that is enter'd once into the breast
Will have the whole possession ere it rest.
BEN JONSON.
What bliss, what wealth, did e'er the world bestow
On man, but cares and fears attended it ?
THOMAS MAY.
Mild heav'n
Disapproves that care, though wise in show,
That with superfluous burden loads the day.
MILTON.
God hath bid dwell far off all anxious cares,
And not molest us ; unless we ourselves
Seek them with wandering thoughts and notions
vain.
MILTON.
I who at some times spend, at others spare;
Divided between carelessness and care.
POPE.
To gloomy cares my thoughts alone are free :
111 the gay sports with troubled thoughts agree.
POPE.
To pass the riper period of his age,
Acting his part upon a crowded stage,
To lasting toils exposed, and endless cares,
To open dangers and to secret snares.
PRIOR.
Things done well,
And with a care, exempt themselves from fear :
Things done without example, in their issue
Are to be fear'd.
SHAKSPEARE.
Care is no cure, but rather a corrosive,
For things that are not to be remedied.
SHAKSPEARE.
The incessant care and labour of his mind
Hath wrought the mure that should confine it in,
So thin, that life looks through and will break
out.
SHAKSPEARE.
And this of all my harvest -hope I have
Nought reaped but a weedy crop of care.
. SPENSER.
Stiff opposition, and perplex'd debate.
And thorny care, and rank and stinging hate.
YOUNG.
Life's cares are comforts ; such by heav'n de-
sign'd;
He that has none, must make them, or be
wretched.
Cares are employments ; and without employ
The soul is on the rack ; the rack of rest,
To souls most adverse: action all their joy.
YOUNG.
CAROL.
For which the shepherds at their festivals
Carol her goodness loud in rustic lays.
MILTON.
They gladly thither haste ; and by a choir
Of squadron'd angels hear his carol sung.
MILTON.
No night is now with hymn or carol blest.
SHAKSPEARE.
CAROUSING.
Our cheerful guests carouse the sparkling tears
Of the rich grape, whilst music charms their ears.
SIR JOHN DENHAM.
Waste in wild riot what your land allows,
Then ply the early feast and late carouse.
POPE.
Learn with how little life may be preserved :
In gold and myrrh they need not to carouse.
SIR W. RALEIGH.
Now my sick fool, Roderigo,
Whom love hath turn'd almost the wrong side
out,
To Desdemona hath to-night caroused
Potations pottle deep.
SHAKSPEARE.
He calls for wine : A health, quoth he, as if
He'd been aboard carousing to his mates.
SHAKSPEARE.
Please you, we may contrive this afternoon,
And quaff carouses to our mistress' health.
SHAKSPEARE.
Under the shadow of friendly boughs
They sit carousing, where their liquor grows.
WALLER.
CA TAR A CTS.CA UTION. CENSURE. CEREMONY.
CATARACTS.
Torrents and loud impetuous cataracts,
Through roads abrupt, and rude unfashion'd
tracts,
Run down the lofty mountain's channel'd sides,
And to the vale convey their foaming tides.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
What if all
Her stores were open'd, and the firmament
Of hell should spout her cataracts of fire ?
Impendent horrors !
MILTON.
Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks ; rage, blow !
You cataracts and hurricanes, spout
Till you have drench'd our steeples.
SHAKSPEARE.
CAUTION.
Like a rich vessel beat by storms to shore,
'Twere madness should I venture out once more.
DRYDEN.
Fields are full of eyes, and woods have ears ;
For this the wise are ever on their guard :
For, unforeseen, they say, is unprepared.
DRYDEN.
CENSURE.
To his green years your censure you would suit ;
Not blast the blossom, but expect the fruit.
DRYDEN.
Some did all folly with just sharpness blame,
While others laugh'd and scorn'd them into
shame ;
But, of these two, the last succeeded best,
As men aim rightest when they shoot in jest.
DRYDEN.
As if to every fop it might belong,
Like senators, to censure, right or wrong.
GRANVILLE.
Let us no more contend, nor blame
Each other, blamed enough elsewhere.
MILTON.
Enough for half the greatest of these days
To 'scape my censure, not expect my praise.
POPE.
But if in noble minds some dregs remain,
Not yet purged off, of spleen and sour disdain,
Discharge that rage on more provoking crimes,
Nor fear a dearth in these flagitious times.
POPE.
Let ev'ry tongue its various censures chuse,
Absolve with coldness, or with spite accuse.
PRIOR.
O let thy presence make my travels light!
And potent Venus shall exalt my name
Above the rumours of censorious fame.
PRIOR.
We must not stint
Our necessary actions, in the fear
To cope malicious censurers.
SHAKSPEARE.
Madam, you and my sister, will you go
To give your censures in this weighty business?
SHAKSPEARE.
If I can do it,
By aught that I can speak in his dispraise,
She shall not long continue love to him.
SHAKSPEARE.
Look how we can, or sad or merrily,
Interpretation will misquote our looks.
SHAKSPEARE.
CEREMONY.
A coarser place,
Where pomp and ceremonies enter'd not,
Where greatness was shut out, and highness
well forgot.
DRYDEN: Fables.
What art thou, thou idle ceremony?
What kind of god art thou, that suffer'st more
Of mortal grief than do thy worshippers ?
Art thou aught else but place, degree, and form ?
SHAKSPEARE.
What are thy rents? what are thy comings-in?
O ceremony, show me but thy worth !
What is thy toll, O adoration?
SHAKSPEARE.
The sauce to meat is ceremony;
Meeting were bare without it.
SHAKSPEARE.
You are too senseless obstinate, my lord,
Too ceremonious and traditional.
SHAKSPEARE.
He is superstitious grown of late,
Quite from the main opinion he held once
Of fantasy, of dreams, and ceremonies.
SHAKSPEARE.
CHANCE. CHANGE. CHANGELINGS. CHAPLE TS.
CHANCE.
If casual concourse did the world compose,
And things and acts fortuitous arose,
Then any thing might come from any thing;
For how from chance can constant order spring?
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Thanks to giddy chance, which never bears
That mortal bliss should last for length of years :
She cast us headlong from our high estate,
And here in hope of thy return we wait.
DRYDEN.
All nature is but art, unknown to thee ;
All chance direction which thou canst not see.
POPE.
Esteem we these, my friends ! event and chance,
Produced by atoms from their flutt'ring dance?
PRIOR.
Determine on some course,
More than a wild exposure to each chance
That starts i' th' way before thee.
SHAKSPEARE.
As th' untaught accident is guilty
Of what we wildly do, so we profess
Ourselves to be the slaves of chance, and flies
Of every wind that blows.
SHAKSPEARE.
CHANGE.
Our fathers did, for change, to France repair;
And they, for change, will try our English air.
DRYDEN.
The French and we still change; but here's the
curse,
They change for better, and we change for worse.
DRYDEN.
O wondrous changes of a fatal scene,
Still varying to the last !
DRYDEN.
Each may feel increases and decays,
And see now clearer and now darker days.
POPE.
Since I saw you last,
There is a change upon you.
SHAKSPEARE.
I shall 'fall
Like a bright exhalation in the evening,
And no man see me more.
SHAKSPEARE.
I am the very man
That from your first of difference and decay
Have follow' d your sad steps.
SHAKSPEARE.
The fleece that has been by the dyer stain'd
Never again its native whiteness gain'd.
WALLER.
CHANGELINGS.
'Twas not long
Before from world to world they swung;
As they had turn'd from side to side,
And as they changelings lived they died.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
Changelings and fools of heav'n, and thence
shut out,
Wildly we roam in discontent about.
DRYDEN.
She, as her attendant, hath
A lovely boy stol'n from an Indian king;
She never had so sweet a changeling.
SHAKSPEARE.
Of fickle changelings and poor discontents,
That gape and rub the elbow at the news
Of hurly-burly innovation.
SHAKSPEARE.
And her base elfin breed there for thee left :
Such men do changelings call, so changed by
fairies' theft.
SPENSER.
CHAPLETS.
The winding ivy chaplet to invade,
And folded fern, that your fair forehead shade.
DRYDEN.
All the quire was graced
With chaplets green, upon their foreheads placed.
DRYDEN.
I strangely long to know
Whether they nobler chaplets wear,
Those that their mistress' scorn did bear,
Or those that were used kindly.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
CHARACTER.
Each drew fair characters, yet none
Of those they feign'd excels their own.
SIR J. DENHAM.
CHAR A CTER. CHARITY.
'Tis from high life high characters are drawn :
A saint in crape is twice a saint in lawn ;
A judge is just, a chanc'llor juster still ;
A gown-man, learn'd ; a bishop, what you will ;
Wise, if a minister; but if a king,
More wise, more learn'd, more just, more ev'ry
thing.
POPE.
These plain characters we rarely find ;
Though strong the bent, yet quick the turns of
mind ;
Or puzzling contraries confound the whole,
Or affectations quite reverse the soul.
POPE.
But grant that actions best discover man,
Take the most strong, and sort them as you can :
The few that glare each character must mark :
You balance not the many in the dark.
POPE.
Virtuous and vicious ev'ry man must be,
Few in th' extreme, but all in the degree ;
The rogue and fool by fits is fair and wise,
And ev'n the best, by fits, what they despise.
POPE.
Yet Chloe sure was form'd without a spot :
'Tis true; but something in her was forgot.
POPE.
There's no art
To show the mind's construction in the face.
SHAKSPEARE.
The purest treasure mortal times afford
Is spotless reputation ; that away,
Men are but gilded loam, or painted clay.
SHAKSPEARE.
Poets make characters, as salesmen clothes ;
We take no measure of your fops and beaux.
SWIFT.
Not warp'd by passion, awed by rumour,
Nor grave through pride, nor gay through
folly,
An equal mixture of good humour
And sensible soft melancholy.
SWOT.
CHARITY.
Such moderation with thy bounty join
That thou may'st nothing give that is not thine ;
That liberality is but cast away
Which makes us borrow what we cannot pay.
SIR J. DKNIIAM.
Wise Plato said the world with men was stored
That succour each to other might afford.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Godlike his unwearied bounty flows ;
First loves to do, then loves the good he does.
SIR J. DENHAM.
From thy new hope, and from thy growing store,
Now lend assistance, and relieve the poor.
DRYDEN.
Yet was she not profuse, but fear'd to waste,
And wisely managed that the stock might last ;
That all might be supplied, and she not grieve,
When crowds appear'd, she had not to relieve ;
Which to prevent, she still increased her store;
Laid up, and spared, that she might give the
more.
DRYDEN.
In such charities she pass'd the day
'Twas wondrous how she found an hour to pray.
DRYDEN.
The wanting orphans saw with wat'ry eyes
Their founder's charity in the dust laid low.
DRYDEN.
A parish priest was of the pilgrim train,
An awful, reverend, and religious man;
His eyes diffused a venerable grace,
And charity itself was in his face.
DRYDEN.
Who, should they steal for want of his relief,
He judged himself accomplice with the thief.
DRYDEN.
I never had the confidence to beg a charity.
DRYDEN.
Heaven-born charity ! thy blessings shed ;
Bid meagre want uprear her sickly head
GAY.
His house was known to all the vagrant train ;
He chid their wand'rings, but relieved their pain;
The long-remember'd beggar was his guest,
Whose beard descending swept his aged breast.
GOLDSMITH.
The liberal are secure alone ;
For what we frankly give, forever is our own.
GRANVILLE.
Half his earn'd pittance to poor neighbours went :
They had his alms, and he had his content.
WALTER HARTE.
CHARITY.
93
Still from his little he could something spare
To feed the hungry, and to clothe the bare.
WALTER HARTE.
Only add
Deeds to thy knowledge answerable ; add faith,
Add virtue, patience, temperance ; add love,
By name to come call'd charity, the soul
Of all the rest.
MILTON.
By thee,
Founded in reason, loyal, just, and pure,
Relations dear, and all the charities
Of father, son, and brother, first were known.
MILTON.
In faith and hope the world will disagree,
But all mankind's concern is charity :
All must be false that thwart this one great end ;
And all of God, that bless mankind or mend.
POPE.
Constant at church and 'change; his gains were
sure;
His givings rare, save farthings to the poor.
POPE.
Who feeds that alms-house neat, but void of
state,
Where age and want sit smiling at the gate ?
Who taught that heav'n-directed spire to rise?
"The man of Ross!" each lisping babe replies.
POPE.
Behold the market-place with poor o'erspread;
The man of Ross divides the weekly bread !
POPE.
Him portion'd maids, apprenticed orphans blest,
The young who labour, and the old who rest.
POPE.
Let humble Allen, with an awkward shame,
Do good by stealth, and blush to find it fame.
POPE.
Like the sun, let bounty spread her ray,
And shine that superfluity away.
POPE.
Health to himself, and to his infants bread,
The lab'rer bears : what his hard heart denies,
His charitable vanity supplies.
POPE.
But lasting charity's more ample sway,
Nor bound by time, nor subject to decay,
In happy triumph shall forever live.
PRIOR.
Faith and hope themselves shall die,
While deathless charity remains.
PRIOR.
Yet, gracious charity ! indulgent guest !
Were not thy pow'r exerted in my breast,
My speeches would send up unheeded pray'r:
The scorn of life would be but wild despair :
A tymbal's sound were better than my voice,
My faith were form, my eloquence were noise.
PRIOR.
How few, like thee, inquire the wretched out,
And court the offices of soft humanity !
Like thee, reserve their raiment for the naked,
Reach out their bread to feed the crying orphan,
Or mix the pitying tears with those that weep !
ROWE.
Think not the good,
The gentle deeds of mercy thou hast done,
Shall die forgotten all: the poor, the pris'ner,
The fatherless, the friendless, and the widow,
Who daily own the bounty of thy hand,
Shall cry to heav'n, and pull a blessing on thee.
ROWE.
He hath a tear for pity, and a hand
Open as day for melting charity :
Yet notwithstanding, being incensed, he's flint;
As humorous as winter.
SHAKSPEARE.
My very enemy's dog,
Though he had bit me, should have stood that
night
Against my fire. SHAKSPEARE.
O father abbot !
An old man, broken with the storms of state,
Is come to lay his weary bones among ye;
Give him a little earth for charity.
SHAKSPEARE.
What black magician conjures up this fiend,
To stop devoted charitable deeds?
SHAKSPEARE. .
The gen'rous band redressive search'd
Into the horrors of the gloomy jail,
Unpity'd and unheard where misery moans.
THOMSON.
From a confined well-managed store,
You both employ and feed the poor.
WALLER.
The primal duties shine aloft, like stars;
The charities that soothe, and heal, and bless,
Are scatter'd at the feet of man, like flowers.
WORDSWORTH.
CHARMS. CHASTISEMENT. CHEERFULNESS.
CHARMS.
Oh, he was all made up of love and charms !
Delight of every eye ! when he appear'd,
A secret pleasure gladden'd all that saw him.
ADDISON.
Alcyone he names amidst his pray'rs,
Names as a charm against the waves and wind,
Most in his mouth, and ever in his mind.
DRYDEN.
The passion you pretended
Was only to obtain;
But when the charm is ended,
The charmer you disdain.
We implore thy powerful hand
To undo the charmed band
Of true virgin here distress'd.
DRYDEN.
MILTON.
Charm by accepting, by submitting sway.
POPE.
Chloe thus the soul alarm'd,
Awed without sense, and without beauty
charm'd.
POPE.
Nor ever hope the queen of love
Will e'er thy fav'rite's charms improve.
PRIOR.
That handkerchief
Did an Egyptian to my mother give ;
She was a charmer, and could almost read
The thoughts of people.
SHAKSPEARE.
Anteeus could, by magic charms,
Recover strength whene'er he fell.
SWIFT.
You caution'd me against their charms,
But never gave me equal arms.
SWIFT.
Amoret! my lovely foe,
Tell me where thy strength doth lie :
Where the pow'r that charms us so,
In thy soul, or in thy eye ?
WALLER.
CHASTISEMENT.
I follow thee, safe guide ! the path
Thou lead'st me; and to the hand of heav'n
submit,
However chast'ning.
MILTON.
Like you, commission'd to chastise and bless,
He must avenge the world, and give it peace !
PRIOR.
Some feel the rod,
And own, like us, the father's chast'ning hand.
ROWE.
Hie thee hither,
That I may pour my spirit in thine ear,
And chastise with the valour of my tongue
All that impedes thee.
SHAKSPEARE.
Know, sir, that I
Will not wait pinion'd at your master's court,
Nor once be chastised with the sober eye
Of dull Octavia.
SHAKSPEARE.
CHEERFULNESS.
Let cheerfulness on happy fortune wait,
And give not thus the counter-time to fate.
DRYDEN.
Be not dishearten'd then, nor cloud those looks,
That wont to be more cheerful and serene.
MILTON.
At sight of thee my gloomy soul cheers up,
My hopes revive, and gladness dawns within me.
AMBROSE PHILIPS.
I have not that alacrity of spirit,
Nor cheer of mind, that I was wont to have.
SHAKSPEARE.
You promised
To lay aside self-harming heaviness,
And entertain a cheerful disposition.
SHAKSPEARE.
Pluck up thy spirits, look cheerfully upon me.
SHAKSPEARE.
His grace looks cheerfully and smooth this
morning:
There's some conceit or other, likes him well,
When that he bids Good-morrow with such spirit.
SHAKSPEARE.
We beseech you, bend you to remain
Here in the cheer and comfort of our eye,
Our chiefest courtier, cousin, and our son.
SHAKSPEARE.
I died, ere I could lend thee aid ;
But cheer thy heart, and be thou not dismay'd.
SHAKSPEARE.
CHESS. CHIDING. CHILDREN.
95
So my storm-beaten heart likewise is cheer'd
With that sunshine, when cloudy looks are
clear'd.
SPENSER.
CHESS.
This game the Persian magi did invent,
The force of Eastern wisdom to express :
From thence to busy Europeans sent,
And styled by modern Lombards pensive chess.
SIR J. DENHAM.
So have I seen a king on chess,
(His rooks and knights withdrawn,
His queen and bishops in distress,)
Shifting about, grow less and less,
With here and there a pawn.
DRYDEN.
And cards are dealt, and chess-boards brought,
To ease the pain of coward thought.
PRIOR.
CHIDING.
Winds murmur'd through the leaves your long
delay,
And fountains, o'er the pebbles, chid your stay.
DRYDEN.
I chid the folly of my thoughtless haste ;
For, the work perfected, the joy was past.
PRIOR.
Chide him for faults, and do it reverently,
When you perceive his blood inclined to mirth.
SHAKSPEARE.
Those that do teach your babes
Do it with gentle means and easy tasks ;
He might have chid me so : for, in good faith,
I am a child to chiding.
SHAKSPEARE.
Not her that chides, sir, at thy hand I pray
I love no chiders, sir.
SHAKSPEARE.
CHILDREN.
Crying they creep among us like young cats :
Cares and continual crosses keeping with them,
They make time old to tend them, and experi-
ence
An ass, they alter so.
BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER.
Do ye hear the children weeping, O my brothers,
Ere the sorrow comes with years ?
They are leaning their young heads against their
mothers,
And that cannot stop their tears.
E. B. BROWNING.
At length his lonely cot appears in view,
Beneath the shelter of an aged tree ;
Th' expectant wee things todlin stacher through
To meet their dad, wi' flichtering noise and
glee.
BURNS. '
Thy little brethren, which, like fairy sprights,
Oft skip into our chamber those sweet nights,
And kiss'd and dandled on thy father's knee,
Were bribed next day to tell what they did see.
DONNE.
The little children when they learn to go
By painful mothers daded to and fro.
DRAYTON.
He struggles first for breath, and cries for aid ;
Then helpless in his mother's lap is laid :
He creeps, he walks, and, issuing into man,
Grudges their life from whence his own began;
Retchless of laws, affects to rule alone.
DRYDEN.
He next essays to walk, but, downward press'd,
On four feet imitates his brother beast ;
By slow degrees he gathers from the ground
His legs, and to the rolling chair is bound.
DRYDEN.
The babe had all that infant care beguiles,
And early knew his mother in her smiles ;
At his first aptness the maternal love
Those rudiments of reason did improve.
DRYDEN.
Begin, auspicious boy, to cast about
Thy infant eyes, and with a smile thy mother
single out.
DRYDEN.
In their tender nonage, while they spread
Their springing leaves, and lift their infant head,
Indulge their childhood, and the nursling spare.
DRYDEN.
His cares are eased with intervals of bliss :
His little children, climbing for a kiss,
Welcome their father's late return at night.
DRYDEN.
He grieved, he wept; the sight an image brought
Of his own filial love, a sadly pleasing thought.
DRYDEN.
9 6
CHILDREN.
When the father is too fondly kind,
Such seed he sows, such harvest shall he find.
DRYDEN.
Children to serve their parents' int'rests live :
Take heed what doom against yourself you
give.
DRYDEN.
Their love in early infancy began,
And rose as childhood ripen'd into man.
DRYDEN.
The nurse's legends are for truth received,
And the man dreams but what the boy believed.
DRYDEN.
Your warrior offspring that upheld the crown,
The scarlet honour of your peaceful gown,
Are the most pleasing objects I can find;
Charms to my sight, and cordials to my mind.
DRYDEN.
In Spain, our springs like old men's children be,
Decay'd and wither'd from their infancy ;
No kindly showers fall on our barren earth,
To hatch the seasons in a timely birth.
DRYDEN.
happy unown'd youths ! your limbs can bear
The scorching dog-star and the winter's air;
While the rich infant, nursed with care and
pain,
Thirsts with each heat, and coughs with ev'ry
rain.
GAY.
By sports like these are all their cares beguiled :
The sports of children satisfy the child.
GOLDSMITH.
This is folly, childhood's guide,
This is childhood at her side.
HAWKESWORTH.
Oh ! I will hearken like a doting mother
To hear her children praised by flatt'ring tongues.
SIR ROBERT HOWARD.
1 know he's coming by this sign,
That baby's almost wild !
See how he laughs and crows and starts,
Heaven bless the merry child !
He's father's self in face and limb,
And father's heart is strong in him.
Shout, baby, shout ! and clap thy hands,
For father on the threshold stands.
MARY HOWITT.
On parent knees, a naked new-born child,
Weeping thou sat'st, while all around thee
smiled ;
So live, that, sinking in thy last long sleep,
Calm thou may'st smile, while all around thee
weep.
SIR W. JONES : from the Persian.
Seldom have I ceased to eye
Thy infancy, thy childhood, and thy youth.
MILTON.
On thy foot thou stood'st at last,
Though comfortless as when a father mourns
His children, all in view destroy'd at once.
MILTON.
When I was yet a child, no childish play
To me was pleasing; all my mind was set
Serious to learn and know.
MILTON.
Of all the joys that brighten suffering earth,
What joy is welcomed like a new-born child ?
MRS. NORTON.
Children blessings seem, but torments are :
When young, our folly, and when old, our fear.
OTWAY: Don Carlos.
Britain, changeful as a child at play,
Now calls in princes, and now turns away.
POPE.
My sons their old unhappy sire despise,
Spoil' d of his kingdom, and deprived of eyes.
POPE.
From the age
That children tread this worldly stage,
Broomstaff or poker they bestride,
And round the parlour love to ride.
PRIOR.
Condemn'd to sacrifice his childish years
To babbling ign'rance and to empty fears.
PRIOR.
Leave to thy children tumult, strife, and war,
Portions of toil, and legacies of care.
PRIOR.
One that has newly learn'd to speak and go
Loves childish plays.
ROSCOMMON.
The tear down childhood's cheek that flows
Is like the dew-drop on the rose;
When next the summer breeze comes by,
And waves the bush, the flower is dry.
SCOTT.
CHILDREN. CHIVALR Y.
97
Your children were vexation to your youth :
But mine shall be a comfort to your age.
SHAKSPEARE.
Fathers that wear rags
Do make their children blind :
But fathers that bear bags
Shall see their children kind.
SHAKSPEARE.
Those that do teach your babes
Do it with gentle means and easy tasks;
He might have chid me so : for, in good faith,
I am a child to chiding.
SHAKSPEARE.
Why grow the branches, when the root is gone ?
Why wither not the leaves that want their sap?
SHAKSPEARE.
Grief fills the room up of my absent child ;
Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me;
Puts on his pretty looks, repeats his words,
Remembers me of all his gracious parts,
Stuffs out his vacant garments with his form :
Thus have I reason to be fond of grief.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thy due from me is tears,
Which nature, love, and filial tenderness
Shall, O dear father, pay thee plenteously.
SHAKSPEARE.
His life I gave him, and did thereto add
My love without retention or restraint.
SHAKSPEARE.
We have no such daughter, nor shall ever see
That face of hers again ; therefore begone,
Without our grace, our love, our benison.
SHAKSPEARE.
We'll no more meet, no more see one another :
But yet thou art my flesh, my blood, my
daughter.
SHAKSPEARE.
The heav'ns have blest you with a godly son,
To be a comforter when he is gone.
SHAKSPEARE.
How have I stain'd the childhood of our joy
With blood removed but little from our own.
SHAKSPEARE.
How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is,
To have a thankless child !
SHAKSPEARE.
I shall see
The winged vengeance overtake such children.
SHAKSPEARE.
7
Oh, when a mother meets on high
The babe she lost in infancy,
Hath she not then, for pains and fears,
The day of woe, the watchful night,
For all her sorrow, all her tears,
An over-payment of delight?
SOUTHEY.
Them before the fry of children young,
Their wanton sports and childish mirth did play,
And to the maidens sounding timbrels sung.
SPENSER.
The lion's whelps she saw how he did bear
And lull in rugged arms withouten childish fear.
SPENSER.
The bearing and the training of a child
Is woman's wisdom.
TENNYSON.
Meantime a smiling offspring rises round,
And mingles both their graces. By degrees,
The human blossom blows; and every day,
Soft as it rolls along, shows some new charm;
The father's lustre, and the mother's bloom.
THOMSON.
The little strong embrace
Of prattling children, twined around his neck,
And emulous to please him, calling forth
The fond paternal soul.
THOMSON.
In vain his little children, peeping out
Into the mingling storm, demand their sire.
THOMSON.
Trailing clouds of glory, do we come
From God, who is our home :
Heaven lies about us in our infancy.
WORDSWORTH.
CHIVALRY.
Solemnly he swore,
That by the faith which knights to knighthood
bore,
And whate'er else to chivalry belongs,
He would not cease till he revenged their
wrongs.
DRYDEN.
The champions, all of high degree,
Who knighthood loved, and deeds of chivalry,
Throng'd to the lists, and envy'd to behold
The names of others, not their own, enroll'd.
DRYDEN.
9 8
CHUR CH. COLD. COMMENTS. COMMER CE.
How does your pride presume against my laws;
As in a listed field to fight your cause :
Unask'd the royal grant, no marshal by,
As knightly rites require, nor judge to try.
DRYDEN.
Thou hast slain
The flow'r of Europe for his chivalry.
SHAKSPEARE.
And by his light
Did all the chivalry of England move
To do brave acts.
SHAKSPEARE.
I may speak it to my shame,
I have a truant been to chivalry.
SHAKSPEARE.
CHURCH.
God never had a house of prayer
But Satan had a chapel there.
DE FOE.
A place where misdevotion frames
A thousand prayers to saints, whose very names
The church knew not, heav'n knows not yet.
DONNE.
They would assume, with wondrous art,
Themselves to be the whole who are but part
Of that vast frame the church; yet grant they
were
The banders down, can they from thence infer
A right t' interpret ? Or would they alone,
Who brought the present, claim it for their own ?
DRYDEN.
Who builds a church to God, and not to fame,
Will never mark the marble with his name ;
Go search it there, where to be born and die,
Of rich and poor makes all the history.
POPE.
Seldom at church, 'twas such a busy life ;
But duly sent his family and wife.
POPE.
No silver saints by dying misers giv'n
Here bribed the rage of ill-requited Heav'n;
But such plain roofs as piety could raise,
And only vocal with the Maker's praise.
POPE.
COLD.
When winter frosts constrain the field with cold,
The fainty root can take no steady hold.
DRYDEN.
Frosts that constrain the ground
Do seldom their usurping power withdraw,
But raging floods pursue their hasty hand.
DRYDEN.
The frame of burnish'd steel, that cast a glare
From far, and seem'd to thaw the freezing air.
DRYDEN.
Unless an age too late, or cold
Climate, or years, damp my intended wing
Depress' d.
MILTON.
Or call the winds through long arcades to roar,
Proud to catch cold at a Venetian door.
POPE.
What more miraculous thing may be told,
Than ice, which is congeal'd with senseless cold,
Should kindle fire by wonderful device ?
SPENSER.
No more
The expansive atmosphere is cramp'd with cold,
But full of life, and vivifying soul.
THOMSON.
COMMENTS.
Slily as any commentator goes by
Hard words or sense.
DONNE.
Such are thy secrets, which my life makes good,
And comments on thee ; for in ev'ry thing
Thy words do find me out, and parallels bring,
And in another make me understand.
GEORGE HERBERT.
[No commentator can more slily pass
O'er a learn'd unintelligible place.
POPE.
In such a time as this, it is not meet
That every nice offence should bear its com-
ment.
SHAKSPEARE.
Forgive the comment that my passion made
Upon thy feature; for my rage was blind.
SHAKSPEARE.
COMMERCE.
Instructed ships shall sail to quick commerce,
By which remotest regions are allied ;
Which makes one city of the universe,
Where some may gain, and all may be sup-
plied.
DRYDEN.
COMPASSION. COMPLIMENTS. CONSCIENCE.
99
How could communities,
Degrees in schools, and brotherhoods in cities,
Peaceful commerce from dividable shores,
But by degrees stand in authentic place ?
SHAKSPEARE.
COMPASSION.
Compassionate my pains ! she pities me t
To one that asks the warm return of love,
Compassion's cruelty, 'tis scorn, 'tis death.
ADDISON.
Then we must those who groan beneath the
weight
Of age, disease, or want, commiserate.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Distress'd myself, like you confined I live,
And therefore can compassion take and give.
DRYDEN.
Their angry hands
My brothers hold, and vengeance these exact;
This pleads compassion, and repents the fact.
DRYDEN.
O heavens! can you hear a good man groan,
And not relent, or not compassion him ?
SHAKSPEARE.
COMPLIMENTS.
What honour that,
But tedious waste of time, to sit and hear
So many hollow compliments and lies,
Outlandish flatteries?
MILTON.
Garnish'd and deck'd in modest compliment,
Not working with the ear, but with the eye.
SHAKSPEARE.
My servant, sir? 'Twas never merry world
Since lowly feigning was call'd compliment.
SHAKSPEARE.
One whom the music of his own vain tongue
Doth ravish, like enchanting harmony :
A man of compliments, whom right and wrong
Have chose as umpire of their meeting.
SHAKSPEARE.
A doleful case desires a doleful song,
Without vain art or curious compliments.
SPENSER.
CONSCIENCE.
No ear can hear, no tongue can tell,
The tortures of that inward hell !
BYRON: Giaour.
Yet still there whispers the small voice within,
Heard through Gain's silence, and o'er Glory's
din:
Whatever creed be taught or land be trod,
Man's conscience is the oracle of God !
BYRON: Island.
That savage spirit which would lull by wrath
Its desperate escapes from duty's path ;
For ne'er can man his conscience all assuage,
Unless he drain the wine of passion, rage.
BYRON: Island.
There is no future pang
Can deal that justice on the sjslf-condemn'd
He deals on his own soul.
BYRON: Manfred.
A clear conscience and heroic mind
In ills their business and their glory find.
COWLEY.
Oh conscience ! conscience ! Man's most faithful
friend,
How canst thou comfort, ease, relieve, defend!
But if he will thy friendly checks forego,
Thou art, oh, woe for me! his deadliest foe.
CRABBE.
But why must those be thought to 'scape, that feel
Those rods of scorpions and those whips of steel
Which conscience shakes ?
CREECH: Juvenal.
But of the clock which in our breasts we bear,
The subtile motions we forget the while.
SIR J. DAVIES.
What power was that, whereby Medea saw,
And well approved, and praised the better
course,
When her rebellious sense did so withdraw
Her feeble pow'rs, that she pursued the worse ?
SIR J. DAVIES.
Who fears not to do ill, yet fears the name,
And, free from conscience, is a slave to fame.
SIR J. DENHAM.
The sweetest cordial we receive at last
Is conscience of our virtuous actions past.
SIR J. DENHAM.
100
CONSCIENCE.
Immortal pow'rs the term of conscience know,
But interest is her name with men below.
DRYDEN.
His own impartial thought
Will damn, and conscience will record the fault.
DRYDEN.
Not sharp revenge, nor hell itself, can find
A fiercer torment than a guilty mind,
Which day and night doth dreadfully accuse,
Condemns the wretch, and still the charge
renews.
DRYDEN.
First guilty conscience doth the mirror bring,
Then sharp remorse shoots out her angry sting ;
And anxious thoughts, within themselves at
strife,
Upbraid the long misspent, luxurious life.
DRYDEN.
Here, here, it lies; a lump of lead by day;
And in my short, distracted, nightly slumbers,
The hag that rides my dreams.
DRYDEN.
I, my own judge, condemn'd myself before;
For pity, aggravate my crime no more.
DRYDEN.
Trust me, no tortures which the poets feign
Can match the fierce, the unutterable pain
He feels, who, night and day devoid of rest,
Carries his own accuser in his breast.
GIFFORD : Juvenal.
Doctrine and life, colours and light, in one
When they combine and mingle, bring
A strong regard and awe ; but speech alone
Doth vanish like a flaring thing,
And in the ear, not conscience, ring.
GEORGE HERBERT.
Not all the glory, all the praise,
That decks the prosperous hero's days,
The shout of men, the laurel crown,
The pealing echoes of renown,
May conscience' dreadful sentence drown.
MRS. HOLFORD.
Now guilt once harbour'd in the conscious breast
Intimidates the brave, degrades the great.
DR. JOHNSON : Irene.
'Tis ever thus
With noble minds, if chance they slide to folly;
Remorse stings deeper, and relentless conscience
Pours more of gall into the bitter cup
Of their severe repentance.
MASON: Elfrida.
Knowledge or wealth to few are given ;
But mark how just the ways of heaven :
True joy to all is free :
Nor wealth nor knowledge grant the boon,
'Tis thine, O Conscience ! thine alone:
It all belongs to thee.
MlCKLE.
Now conscience wakes despair
That slumber'd, wakes the bitter memory
Of what he was, what is, and what must be
Worse; if worse deeds, worse sufferings must
ensue.
MILTON.
conscience ! into what abyss of fears
And horrors hast thou driv'n me ! out of which
1 find no way; from deep to deeper plunged.
MILTON.
But his doom
Reserved him to more wrath; for now the
thought
Both of lost happiness and lasting pain
Torments him.
MILTON.
Let his tormentor, conscience, find him out.
MILTON.
The chains of darkness, and th' undying worm.
MILTON.
I will place within them as a guide
My umpire conscience, whom if they will hear,
Light after light well used they shall attain,
And to the end persisting safe arrive.
MILTON. ,
In such righteousness
To them by faith imputed, they may find
Justification towards God, and peace
Of conscience.
MILTON.
The virtuous mind, that ever walks attended
By a strong siding champion, conscience.
MILTON.
He that has light within his own clear breast
May sit i' the centre, and enjoy bright day ;
But he that hides a dark soul and foul thoughts,
Benighted walks under the mid-day sun :
Himself is his own dungeon.
MILTON.
Accountable to none
But to my conscience and my God alone.
OLDHAM.
CONSCIENCE.
101
How awful is that hour when conscience stings
The hoary wretch, who on his deathbed hears,
Deep in his soul, the thundering voice that rings,
In one dark, damning moment, crimes of years !
J. G. PERCIVAL.
Some scruple rose, but thus he eased his
thought :
I'll now give sixpence where I gave a groat ;
Where once I went to church, I'll now go twice,
And am so clear too of all other vice.
POPE.
He's arm'd without that's innocent within.
POPE.
Plays round the head, but comes not to the heart :
One self-approving hour whole years outweighs
Of stupid starers and of loud huzzas;
And more true joy Marcellus exiled feels
Than Csesar with a senate at his heels.
POPE.
Let joy or ease, let affluence or content,
And the glad~conscience of a life well spent,
Calm ev'ry thought, inspirit ev'ry grace,
Glow in thy heart, and smile upon thy face.
POPE.
My conscience hath a thousand sev'ral tongues,
And ev'ry tongue brings in a sev'ral tale,
And ev'ry tale condemns me for a villain.
SHAKSPEARE.
coward conscience, how dost thou afflict me !
The lights burn blue. Is it not dead midnight?
Cold fearful drops stand on my trembling flesh.
SHAKSPEARE.
~v
I know thou art religious,
And hast a thing within thee called conscience;
With twenty popish tricks and ceremonies,
Which I have seen thee careful to observe.
SHAKSPEARE.
1 will converse with iron-witted fools,
And unrespective boys : none are for me
That look into me with considerate eyes.
SHAKSPEARE.
Conscience is but a word that cowards use,
Devised at first to keep the strong in awe.
SHAKSPEARE.
Conscience is a blushing shame-faced spirit,
That mutinies in a man's bosom; it fills
One full of obstacles.
SHAKSPEARE.
I know myself now, and I feel within me
A peace above all earthly dignities;
A still and quiet conscience.
SHAKSPEARE.
Leave her to heav'n,
And to those thorns that in her bosom lodge,
To prick and sting her.
SHAKSPEARE.
The worm of conscience still begnaw thy soul.
SHAKSPEARE.
O Brackenbury, I have done these things
That now give evidence against my soul.
SHAKSPEARE.
Who then shall blame
His pester'd senses to recoil and start,
When all that is within him does condemn
Itself for being there ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Better be with the dead,
Whom we, to gain pur place, have sent to peace,
Than on the torture of the mind to lie
In restless ecstasy.
SHAKSPEARE.
Suspicion always haunts the guilty mind :
The thief doth fear each bush an officer.
SHAKSPEARE.
How smart a lash that speech doth give
My conscience !
SHAKSPEARE.
Which gifts the capacity
Of your soft cheveril conscience would receive,
If you might please to stretch it.
SHAKSPEARE.
'Tis your graces
That from my mutest conscience, to my tongue,
Charms this report out.
SHAKSPEARE.
My conscience bids me ask, wherefore you have
Commanded of me these most pois'nous com-
pounds.
SHAKSPEARE.
The colour of the king doth come and go
Between his purpose and his conscience.
SHAKSPEARE.
What stronger breastplate than aheart untainted ?
Thrice is he arm'd that hath his quarrel just;
And he but naked, though lock'd up in steel,
Whose conscience with injustice is corrupted.
SHAKSPEARE.
io2 CONSPIRA CY. CONTEMPLA TION. CONTENTMENT.
Thou may'st conceal thy sin by cunning art,
But conscience sits a witness in thy heart;
Which will disturb thy peace, thy rest undo,
For that is witness, judge, and prison too.
R. WATKYNS.
See, from behind her secret stand,
The sly informer minutes ev'ry fault,
And her dread diary with horror fills.
YOUNG.
CONSPIRACY.
But let the bold conspirator beware;
For heav'n makes princes its peculiar care.
DRYDEN.
When scarce he had escaped the blow
Of faction and conspiracy,
Death did his promised hopes destroy.
DRYDEN.
O conspiracy !
Shamest thou to show thy dang'rous brow by
night,
When evils are most free ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Take no care
Who chafes, who frets, and where conspirers are :
Macbeth shall never vanquish'd be.
SHAKSPEARE.
I had forgot that foul conspiracy
Of the beast Caliban and his confed'rates
Against my life.
SHAKSPEARE.
CONTEMPLATION.
No sense the precious joys conceives
Which in her private contemplations be;
For then the ravish'd spirit the senses leaves,
Hath her own powers and proper actions free.
SIR J. DAVIES.
Bear me, some god ! oh, quickly bear me hence
To wholesome solitude, the nurse of sense ;
Where Contemplation prunes her ruffled wings,
And the free soul looks down to pity kings.
POPE.
In these deep solitudes, and awful cells,
Where heavenly pensive Contemplation dwells.
POPE.
So many hours must I take my rest ;
So many hours must I contemplate.
SHAKSPEARE.
I have breathed a sacred vow
To live in prayer and contemplation,
Only attended by Nerissa here.
SHAKSPEARE.
His name was heav'nly contemplation ;
Of God and goodness was his meditation.
SPENSER.
Pure serenity apace
Produces thought and contemplation still.
THOMSON.
Free from th' impediments of light and noise,
Man, thus retired, his nobler thoughts employs.
WALLER.
CONTENTMENT.
Unfit for greatness, I her snares defy,
And look on riches with untainted eye :
To others let the glitt'ring baubles fall ;
Content shall place me far above them all.
CHURCHILL.
He that holds fast the golden mean,
And lives contentedly between
The little and the great,
Feels not the wants that pinch the poor,
Nor plagues that haunt the rich man's door,
Embittering all his state.
COWPER : Horace.
Oh ! happiness of sweet retired content !
To be at once secure and innocent.
SIR J. DENHAM.
One thought content the good to be enjoy'd;
This every little accident destroy'd.
DRYDEN.
Still all great souls still make their own content ;
We to ourselves may all our wishes grant;
For, nothing coveting, we nothing want.
DRYDEN.
Her poverty was glad ; her heart content ;
Nor knew she what the spleen or vapours meant.
DRYDEN.
Unvex'd with thoughts of want which may betide,
Or for to-morrow's dinner to provide.
DRYDEN.
What happiness the rural maid attends,
In cheerful labour while each day she spends !
She gratefully receives what Heaven has sent,
And, rich in poverty, enjoys content.
GAY.
CONTENTMENT. CON VERSA TION.
103
grant me, heav'n, a middle state,
Neither too humble nor too great;
More than enough for nature's ends,
With something left to treat my friends.
DAVID MALLET.
Whate'er the passion, knowledge, fame, or pelf,
No one will change his neighbour for himself:
The learn'd is happy nature to explore,
The fool is happy that he knows no more ;
The rich is happy in the plenty giv'n,
The poor contents him with the care of heav'n.
POPE.
No bandit fierce, no tyrant mad with pride,
No cavern'd hermit, rests self-satisfied.
POPE.
Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind,
Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd.
POPE.
But now no face divine contentment wears;
'Tis all blank sadness, or continual tears.
POPE.
Whose little store her well-taught mind does
please,
Nor pinch'd with want, nor cloy'd with wanton
ease.
ROSCOMMON.
My crown is in my heart, not on my head ;
Not deck'd with diamonds and Indian stones,
Nor to be seen : my crown is call'd content ;
A crown it is that seldom kings enjoy.
SHAKSPEARE.
1 seek not to wax great by others' waning ;
Sufficeth that I have maintains my state,
And sends the poor well pleased from my gate.
SHAKSPEARE.
Poor and content is rich, and rich enough;
But riches, fineless, is as poor as winter,
To him that ever fears he shall be poor.
SHAKSPEARE.
By him that raised me to this careful height,
From that contented hap which I enjoy'd.
SHAKSPEARE.
Nought's had, all's spent,
Where our desire is got without content.
SHAKSPEARE.
Best states, contentless,
Have a distracted and most wretched being,
Worse than the worst, content.
SHAKSPEARE.
Arrived there, the little house they fill,
Ne look for entertainment where none was;
Rest is their feast, and all things at their will :
The noblest mind the best contentment has.
SPENSER.
Guard, while 'tis thine, thy philosophic ease,
And ask no joy but that of virtuous peace,
That bids defiance to the storms of fate :
High bliss is only for a higher state.
THOMSON.
This man is freed from servile hands,
Of hope to rise, or fear to fall :
Lord of himself, though not of lands,
And, having nothing, yet hath all.
WOTTON.
CONVERSATION.
Oft the hours
From morn to eve have stolen unmark'd away,
While mute attention hung upon his lips.
AKENSIDE.
But, light and airy, stood on the alert,
And shone in the best part of dialogue :
By humouring always what they might assert,
And listening to the topics most in vogue ;
Now grave, now gay, but never dull or pert;
And smiling but in secret cunning rogue !
He ne'er presumed to make an error clearer:
In short, there never was a better hearer.
BYRON.
Our sensibilities are so acute,
The fear of being silent makes us mute.
COWPER.
Discourse may want an animated "No!"
To brush the surface, and to make it flow;
But still remember, if you mean to please,
To press your point with modesty and ease.
COWPER.
Words learn'd by rote a parrot may rehearse,
But talking is not always to converse;
Not more distinct from harmony divine
The constant creaking of a country sign.
COWPER.
First in the council-hall to steer the state,
And ever foremost in a tongue-debate.
DRYDEN.
The vanquished party with the victors join'd,
Nor wanted sweet discourse, the banquet of the
mind.
DRYDEN.
IO4
CON VERSA TION.
In thy discourse, if thou desire to please,
All such is courteous, useful, new, or witty;
Usefulness comes by labour, wit by ease,
Courtesy grows in court, news in the city.
GEORGE HERBERT.
And when you stick on conversation's burrs,
Don't strew your pathway with those dread-
ful urs.
O. W. HOLMES : Urania.
Now that the fields are dank, and ways are mire,
Where shall we sometimes meet, and by the fire
Help waste a sullen day ?
MILTON.
Or object new
Casual discourse draws on, which intermits
Our day's work.
MILTON.
If much converse
Thee satiate, to short absence I could yield.
MILTON.
I by conversing cannot these erect
From prone, nor in their ways complacence find.
MILTON.
My earthly, by his heav'nly overpower'd,
In that celestial colloquy sublime,
As with an object that excels the sense,
Dazzled and spent, sunk down.
MILTON.
Meantime he smokes, and laughs at merry tale,
Or pun ambiguous, or conundrum quaint.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Form'd by thy converse happily to steer
From grave to gay, from lively to severe.
POPE.
Gen'rous converse, a soul exempt from pride,
And love to praise with reason on his side.
POPE.
In various talk th' instructive hours they past;
Who gave the ball, or paid the visit last.
POPE.
Distrustful sense with modest caution speaks;
But rattling nonsense in full volleys breaks.
POPE.
The tongue moved gently first, and speech was
low,
Till wrangling science taught it noise and show,
And wicked wit arose, thy most abusive foe.
POPE.
Be silent always when you doubt your sense ;
And speak, though sure, with seeming diffidence.
POPE.
'Tis remarkable, that they
Talk most who have the least to say.
PRIOR.
Your fair discourse has been as sugar,
Making the hard way sweet and delectable.
SHAKSPEARE.
The tract of everything
Would by a good discourser lose some life,
Which action's self was tongue to.
SHAKSPEARE.
Leave nothing fitted for the purpose
Untouch'd or slightly handled in discourse.
SHAKSPEARE.
She hath prosperous art
When she will play with reason and discourse,
And well she can persuade.
SHAKSPEARE.
If voluble and sharp discourse be marr'd,
Unkindness blunts it more than marble hard.
SHAKSPEARE.
Her conversation
More glad to me than to a miser money is.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
Would you both please and be instructed too,
\Vatch well the rage of shining to subdue;
Hear every man upon his favourite theme,
And ever be more knowing than you seem.
The lowest genius will afford some light,
Or give a hint that had escaped your sight.
BENJAMIN STILLINGFLEET.
Thus you may still be young to me
While I can better hear than see :
Oh, ne'er may Fortune show her spite,
To make me deaf, and mend my sight.
SWIFT.
His converse is a system fit
Alone to fill up all her wit.
SWIFT.
The tender heart is peace,
And kindly pours its copious treasures forth
In various converse.
THOMSON.
Her speech is graced with sweeter sound
Than in another's song is found.
WALLER.
Xor did we fail to see within ourselves
What need there is to be reserved in speech
And temper all our thoughts with charity.
WORDSWORTH.
COQUETTES. COUNTRY LIFE.
Is there a tongue like Delia's o'er her cup,
That runs for ages without winding up?
YOUNG.
A dearth of words a woman need not fear,
But 'tis a task indeed to learn to hear :
In that the skill of conversation lies;
That shows or makes you both polite and wise.
YOUNG.
COQUETTES.
Flavia the least and slightest toy
Can with resistless art employ:
In other hands the fan would prove
An engine of small force in love ;
But she with such an air and mien,
Not to be told or safely seen,
Directs its wanton motion so
That it wounds more than Cupid's bow,
Gives coolness to the matchless dame,
To every other breast a flame.
ATTERBURY.
Coquet and coy at once her air,
Both studied, though both seem neglected ;
Careless she is with artful care,
Affecting to seem unaffected.
CONGREVE.
If she perceived by his outward cheer
That any would his love by talk bewray,
Sometimes she heard him, sometimes stopt her
ear,
And played fast and loose the livelong day.
FAIRFAX.
The vain coquette each suit disdains,
And glories in her lover's pains ;
With age she fades, each lover flies :
Contemn'd, forlorn, she pines and dies.
GAY: Fables.
There affectation, with a sickly mien,
Shows in her cheeks the roses of eighteen ;
Practised to lisp, and hang the head aside,
Faints into airs, and languishes with pride;
On the rich silk sinks with becoming woe,
Wrapt in a gown for sickness and for show.
POPE.
The light coquettes in sylphs aloft repair,
And sport and flutter in the fields of air.
POPE.
'Tis these that early taint the female soul,
Instruct the eyes of young coquettes to roll,
Teach infants' cheeks a bidden blush to know,
And little hearts to flutter at a beau.
POPE.
Phyllis, who but a month ago
Was married to the Tunbridge beau,
I saw coquetting t'other night,
In public, with that odious knight.
SWIFT.
In vain are all the practised wiles,
In vain those eyes would love impart;
Not all th' advances, all the smiles,
Can move one unrelenting heart.
WALSH.
COUNTRY LIFE.
Bear me, some god, to Baja's gentle seats,
Or cover me in Umbria's green retreats,
Where western gales eternally reside,
And all the seasons lavish all their pride.
ADDISON.
Oh! blest of heaven, whom not the languid
songs
Of luxury, the siren ! nor the bribes
Of sordid wealth, nor all the gaudy spoils
Of pageant honour, can seduce to leave
Those ever-blooming sweets, which from the
store
Of nature fair imagination culls
To charm the enliven'd soul !
AKENSIDE: Pleasures of Imagination.
O how canst thou renounce the boundless store
Of charms which Nature to her votary yields :
The warbling woodland, the resounding shore,
The pomp of groves, and garniture of fields;
All that the genial ray of morning gilds,
And all that echoes to the song of even,
All that the mountain's sheltering bosom shields,
And all the dread magnificence of heaven:
O how canst thou renounce, and hope to be
forgiven ?
BEATTIE: Minstrel.
Would I a house for happiness erect,
Nature alone should be the architect;
She'd build it more convenient than great,
And doubtless in the country choose her seat.
COWLEY.
O fields, O woods, oh when shall I be made
The happy tenant of your shade !
COWLEY.
io6
COUNTRY LIFE.
The statesman, lawyer, merchant, man of trade,
Pants for the refuge of some rural shade,
Where, all his long anxieties forgot,
Amidst the charms of a sequester'd spot,
Or recollected only to gild o'er
Ana add a smile to what was sweet before,
He may possess the joys he thinks he sees,
Lay his old age upon the lap of ease,
Improve the remnant of his wasted span,
And, having lived a trifler, die a man.
COWPER : Retirement.
The fall of waters, and the song of birds,
And hills that echo to the distant herds,
Are luxuries excelling all the glare
The world can boast, and her chief favourites
share.
COWPER : Retirement.
God made the country, and man made the town ;
What wonder then that health and virtue, gifts
That can alone make sweet the bitter draught
That life holds out to all, should most abound
And least be threaten'd in the fields and groves?
COWPER : Task.
Oh friendly to the best pursuits of man,
Friendly to thought, to virtue, and to peace,
Domestic life in rural leisure pass'd !
Few know thy value, and few taste thy sweets,
Though many boast thy favours, and affect
To understand and choose thee for their own.
COWPER : Task.
More true delight in that small ground
Than in possessing all the earth was found.
DANIEL.
But could you be content to bid adieu
To the dear playhouse, and the players too,
Sweet country seats are purchased ev'rywhere,
With lands and gardens, at less price than here
You hire a darksome dog-hole by the year.
DRYDEN.
All these a milk-white honeycomb surround,
Which in the midst a country banquet crown'd.
DRYDEN.
That pleasing shade they sought, a soft retreat
From sudden April showers, a shelter from the
heat.
DRYDEN.
How rich in humble poverty is he
Who leads a quiet country life ;
Discharged of business, void of strife !
DRYDEN.
You to your own Aquinuum shall repair,
To take a mouthful of sweet country air.
DRYDEN.
O leave the noisy town ! O come and see
Our country cots, and live content with me !
DRYDEN.
The dewy paths of meadows we will tread.
DRYDEN.
Lofty trees, with sacred shades,
And perspectives of pleasant glades,
Where nymphs of brightest form appear.
DRYDEN.
How happy in his low degree,
WTio leads a quiet country life,
And from the griping scrivener free !
DRYDEN.
Here nature spreads her fruitful sweetness round,
Breathes on the air, and broods upon the ground.
DRYDEN.
Beneath this shade a weary peasant lies,
Plucks the broad leaf, and bids the breezes rise.
GAY.
Now he goes on, and sings of fairs and shows ;
For still new fairs before his eyes arose :
How pedlars' stalls with glitt'ring toys are laid,
The various fairings of the country maid.
GAY.
O blest retirement ! friend to life's decline,
Retreats from care, that never must be mine :
How blest is he who crowns, in shades like these,
A youth of labour with an age of ease ;
Who quits a world where strong temptations try,
And, since 'tis hard to combat, learns to fly !
GOLDSMITH: Deserted Village.
In quiet shades, content with rural sports,
Give me a life remote from guilty courts.
GRANVILLE.
Thrice happy they, who thus in woods and groves,
From courts retired, possess their peaceful loves :
Of royal maids how wretched is the fate !
GRANVILLE.
Leave the mere country to mere country swains,
And dwell where life in all life's glory reigns.
WALTER HARTE.
Couldst thou resign the park and play, content,
For the fair banks of Severn or of Trent,
There mightst thou find some elegant retreat,
Some hireling senator's deserted seat ;
COUNTRY LIFE.
107
And stretch thy prospects o'er the smiling land,
For less than rent the dungeons of the Strand ;
There prune thy walks, support thy drooping
flow'rs,
Direct thy rivulets, and twine thy bow'rs;
And, while thy beds a cheap repast afford,
Despise the dainties of a venal lord :
There ev'ry bush with nature's music rings,
There ev'ry breeze bears health upon its wings ;
On all thy hours security shall smile,
And bless thy evening walk and morning toil.
DR. S. JOHNSON: London.
To one who has been long in city pent,
'Tis very sweet to look into the fair
And open face of heaven, to breathe a prayer
Full in the smile of the blue firmament.
KEATS : Sonnets.
Come live with me and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove
That valleys, groves, and hills, and fields,
Woods, or sleepy mountains, yield.
C. MARLOWE : Passionate Shepherd to his
Love.
Then let me, fameless, love the fields and woods,
The fruitful water'd vales, and running floods.
THOMAS MAY : Virgil.
As one who long in populous city pent,
Where houses thick and sewers annoy the air,
Forth issuing on a summer's morn, to breathe
Among the pleasant villages and farms
Adjoin'd, from each thing met conceives delight.
MILTON.
Cedar and pine, and fir and branching palm,
A sylvan scene ; and as the ranks ascend,
Shade above shade, a woody theatre
Of stateliest view.
MILTON.
There in close covert by some brook,
Where no profaner eye may look,
Hide me from day's garish eye.
MILTON.
Such as the jocund flute or gamesome pipe
Stirs up among the loose unletter'd hinds,
Who thank the gods amiss.
MILTON.
Straight mine eye hath caught new pleasures,
Whilst the landscape round it measures ;
Russet lawns and fallows gray,
Where the nibbling flocks do stray.
MILTON.
The smell of grain, or tedded grass, or kine,
Or dairy, each rural sight, each rural sound.
MILTON.
Round I saw
Hill, dale, and shady woods, and sunny plains,
And liquid lapse of murmuring streams.
MILTON.
The cattle in the fields and meadows green,
Those rare and solitary, these in flocks
Pasturing, at once and in broad herds upsprung.
MILTON.
With what delights could I have walk'd thee
round !
If I could joy in aught! sweet interchange
Of hill and valley, rivers, woods, and plains.
MILTON.
Sometimes walking not unseen
By hedge-row elms, on hillocks green.
MILTON.
This evening late, by then the chewing flocks
Had ta'en their supper on the savoury herb
Of knot-grass dew-besprent, and were in fold,
I sat me down to watch upon a bank
With ivy canopied, and interwove
With flaunting honeysuckle.
MILTON.
Come, we'll e'en to our country seat repair,
The native home of innocence and love.
JOHN NORRIS.
What are the falling rills, the pendent shades,
The morning bowers, the evening colonnades,
But soft recesses for the weary mind
To sigh unheard into the passing wind !
POPE.
To her the shady grove, the flow'ry field,
The streams and fountains, no delight could
yield.
POPE.
Oft in her glass the musing shepherd spies
The wat'ry landscape of the pendent woods,
And absent trees, that tremble in the floods.
POPE.
She went to plain work, and to purling brooks,
Old-fashion'd halls, dull aunts, and croaking
rooks.
POPE.
His court, with nettles and with cresses stored,
With soups unbought and salads blest his board.
POPE.
io8
COUNTRY LIFE.
Midst the desert fruitful fields arise,
That, crown'd with tufted trees and springing
corn,
Like verdant isles the sable waste adorn.
POPE.
Beneath our humble cottage let us haste,
And here, unenvied, rural dainties taste.
POPE.
Haste to yonder woodbine bow'rs;
The turf with rural dainties shall be crown'd,
While opening blooms diffuse their sweets
around.
POPE.
Behold Villario's ten years' toil complete,
His arbours darken, his espaliers meet.
POPE.
Ye sacred Nine ! that all my soul possess,
Whose raptures fire me, and whose visions bless,
Bear me, oh, bear me to sequester'd scenes
Of bow'ry mazes and surrounding greens.
POPE.
Interspersed in lawns and opening glades,
Thin trees arise that shun each other's shades.
POPE.
Can I retrench ? Yes, mighty well,
Shrink back to my paternal cell;
A little house, with trees a-row,
And, like its master, very low!
POPE.
A man first builds a country seat,
Then finds the walls not good to eat.
PRIOR.
I'll cull the farthest mead for thy repast;
The choicest herbs I to thy board will bring,
And draw thy water from the freshest spring.
PRIOR.
They spied a country farm,
Where all was snug, and clean, and warm;
For woods above, and hills behind,
Secured it both from rain and wind.
PRIOR.
Dear solitary groves, where peace does dwell !
Sweet harbours of pure love and innocence !
How willingly could I forever stay
Beneath the shade of your embracing greens,
List'ning to the harmony of warbling birds,
Tuned with the gentle murmur of the streams.
ROCHESTER : Valentinian.
Mine be a cot beside the hill;
A beehive's hum shall soothe my ear;
A willowy brook, that turns a mill,
With many a fall, shall linger near.
ROGERS: A Wish.
Here may I always on this downy grass,
Unknown, unseen, my easy minutes pass !
ROSCOMMON.
Within an ancient forest's ample verge,
There stands a lonely but a healthful dwelling,
But for convenience, and the use of life ;
Around it fallows, meads, and pastures fair,
A little garden, and a limpid brook,
By nature's own contrivance seem disposed.
ROWE : Jane Shore.
Of all these bounds, even from this line to this,
With shadowy forests, and with champaigns
rich'd
W T ith plenteous rivers, and wide-skirted meads,
We make thee lady.
SHAKSPEARE.
This our life, exempt from public haunt,
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running
brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in every thing.
SHAKSPEARE.
Go, signify as much, while here we march
Upon the grassy carpet of this plain.
SHAKSPEARE.
O happy if ye know your happy state,
Ye rangers of the fields ! whom nature's boon
Cheers with her smiles, and ev'ry element
Conspires to bless.
SOMERVILE: Chase.
A little lowly hermitage it was,
Down in a dale hard by a forest's side,
Far from resort of people that did pass
In travel to and fro.
SPENSER.
Oh, could I see my country-seat!
There, leaning near a gentle brook,
Sleep, or peruse some ancient book ;
And there in sweet oblivion drown
Those cares that haunt the court and town.
S \VIFT.
Jove sent and found, far in a country scene,
Truth, innocence, good-nature, look serene ;
From which ingredients, first the dext'rous boy
Pick'd the demure, the awkward, and the coy.
SWIFT.
COUNTRY LIFE. COURAGE.
109
I've often wish'd that I had clear,
For life, six hundred pounds a year,
A terrace-walk, and half a rood
Of land, set out to plant a wood.
SWIFT.
Long untravell'd heaths,
With desolation brown, he wanders waste.
THOMSON.
He, thrice happy, on the sunless side,
Beneath the whole collected shade reclines.
THOMSON.
Through the verdant maze
Of sweet-brier hedges I pursue my walk.
THOMSON.
Here too dwells simple truth; plain inno-
cence ;
Unsullied beauty ; sound unbroken youth,
Patient of labour, with a little pleased ;
Health ever blooming; unambitious toil;
Calm contemplation ; and poetic ease.
THOMSON.
O knew he but his happiness, of men
The happiest he ! who, far from public rage,
Deep in the vale, with a choice few retired,
Drinks the pure pleasures of the rural life.
THOMSON.
Can fierce passion vex his breast,
While every gale is peace, and every grove
Is melody ?
THOMSON.
I long my careless limbs to lay
Under the plantain's shade.
WALLER.
Your love in a cottage is hungry,
Your vine is a nest for flies;
Your milkmaid shocks the graces,
And simplicity talks of pies !
You lie down to your shady slumber,
And wake with a bug in your ear ;
And your damsel that walks in the morning
Is shod like a mountaineer.
N. P. WILLIS.
On every thorn delightful wisdom grows,
In ev'ry rill a sweet instruction flows ;
But some untaught o'erhear the whisp'ring
rill,
In spite of sacred leisure, blockheads still.
YOUNG.
COURAGE.
Wearied, forsaken, and pursued at last,
All safety in despair of safety placed,
Courage he thence resumes, resolved to bear
All their assaults, since 'tis in vain to fear.
SIR J. DENHAM.
He, when his country (threatened with alarm)
Requires his courage and his conq'ring arm,
Shall more than once the Punic bands affright.
DRYDEN.
Unconquer'd yet, in that forlorn estate,
His manly courage overcame his fate.
DRYDEN.
How fierce in fight, with courage undecay'd!
Judge if such warriors want immortal aid.
DRYDEN.
Hope arms their courage; from their tow'rs
they throw
Their darts with double force, and drive the foe.
DRYDEN.
Deaf with the noise, I took my hasty flight:
No mortal courage can support the fright.
DRYDEN.
Numerous sails the fearful only tell ;
Courage from hearts, and not from numbers,
grows.
DRYDEN.
No drum or trumpet needs
T' inspire the coward, or to warm the cold;
His voice, his sole appearance, makes them bold.
DRYDEN.
Courage uncertain dangers may abate;
But who can bear th' approach of certain fate?
DRYDEN.
The combat now by courage must be tried.
DRYDEN.
Can I want courage for so brave a deed ?
I've shook it off: my soul is free from fear.
DRYDEN.
Heav'n as its instrument my courage sends;
Heav'n ne'er sent those who fight for private
ends.
DRYDEN.
Well I knew
What perils youthful ardour would pursue,
Young as thou wert in dangers, raw to war.
DRYDEN.
no
COURA GE. COURTESY. COURTSHIP.
What courage tamely could to death consent,
And not by striking first the blow prevent ?
DRYDEN.
He was stout of courage, strong of hand,
Bold was his heart, and restless was his spright.
FAIRFAX.
Now if 'tis chiefly in the heart
That courage doth itself exert,
'Twill be prodigious hard to prove
That this is eke the throne of love.
PRIOR.
The thing of courage,
As roused with rage, with rage doth sympathize,
And with an accent tuned in self-same key,
Returns to chiding fortune.
SHAKSPEARE.
The native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought.
SHAKSPEARE.
No man so potent breathes upon the ground
But I will beard him.
SHAKSPEARE.
They're thinking, by his face,
To fasten in our thoughts that they have
courage ;
But 'tis not so. SHAKSPEARE.
His death
Being bruited once, took fire and heat away
From the best temper' d courage in his troops.
SHAKSPEARE.
Uncomely courage, unbeseeming skill.
THOMSON.
Errors not to be recall'd do find
Their best redress from presence of the mind ;
Courage our greatest failings does supply.
WALLER.
Godlike his courage seem'd; whom nor delight
Could soften, nor the face of death affright.
WALLER.
'Tis great, 'tis manly, to disdain disguise ;
It shows our spirit, or it proves our strength.
YOUNG.
COURTESY.
So gentle of condition was he known,
That through the court his courtesy was blown.
DRYDEN.
Shepherd,
I trust thy honest offer'd courtesy,
Which oft is sooner found in lowly sheds
With smoky rafters, than in tap'stry halls,
And courts of princes.
MILTON.
I am the very pink of courtesy.
SHAKSPEARE.
Repose you there, while I to the hard house
Return, and force their scanted courtesy.
SHAKSPEARE.
Me rather had, my heart might feel your love,
Than my unpleased eye see your courtesy.
SHAKSPEARE.
You spurn'd me such a day; another time
You call'd me dog; and for these courtesies
I'll lend you thus much monies.
SHAKSPEARE.
COURTSHIP.
They often have reveal'd their passion to me :
But tell me whose address thou favour' st most;
I long to know, and yet I dread to hear it.
ADDISON.
Feel darts and charms, attracts and flames,
And woo and contract in their names.
BUTLER : Htidibras,
In tedious courtship we declare our pain,
And ere we kindness find, first meet disdain.
DRYDEN.
Your boldness I with admiration see ;
What hope had you to gain a queen like me?
Because a hero forced me once away,
Am I thought fit to be a second prey ?
DRYDEN.
Ev'n now, when silent scorn is all they gain,
A thousand court you, though they court in vain,
POPE.
That man who hath a tongue is no man,
If with his tongue he cannot win a woman.
SHAKSPKARE.
Be merry, and employ your chiefest thoughts
To courtship, and such fair ostents of love
As shall conveniently become you there.
SHAKSPEARE.
To me (sad maid, or rather widow sad)
He was affianced, long time before ;
And sacred pledges he both gave and had,
False errant knight, infamous and forswore.
SPENSER: Faerie Queene.
CO WARD ICE. COXCOMB. CREA TION.
COWARDICE.
That all men would be cowards if they dare,
Some men have had the courage to declare.
CRABBE.
That he should dare to do me this disgrace !
Is fool or coward writ upon my face ?
DRYDEN.
Never did men more joyfully obey,
Or sooner understood the sign to fly :
With such alacrity they bore away,
As if, to praise them, all the States stood by.
DRYDEN.
When desperate ills demand a speedy cure,
Distrust is cowardice, and prudence folly.
DR. JOHNSON: Irene.
Fear is my vassal ; when I frown, he flies :
A hundred times in life a coward dies.
MARSTON : Insatiate Countess.
Cowards fear to die ; but courage stout,
Rather than live in snuff, will be put out.
SIR W. RALEIGH :
On the Snuff of a Candle.
Thou runaway ! thou coward ! art thou fled ?
Speak in some bush ; where dost thou hide thy
head?
SHAKSPEARE.
Cowards die many times before their deaths ;
The valiant never taste of death but once.
SHAKSPEARE.
Bootless speed,
When cowardice pursues, and valour flies.
SHAKSPEARE.
Have the power still
To banish your defenders, till at length
Your ignorance deliver you, as most
Abated captives, to some nation
That won you without blows.
SHAKSPEARE.
COXCOMBS.
Some are bewilder' d in the maze of schools,
And some made coxcombs, nature meant but
fools.
CREATION.
Jove was not more pleased
With infant nature, when his spacious hand
Had rounded this huge ball of earth and seas,
To give it the first push, and see it roll
Along the vast abyss.
ADDISON: Guardian, No. no.
Does it not all mechanic heads confound,
That troops of atoms from all parts around,
Of equal number and of equal force,
Should to this single point direct their course,
That so the counter-pressure ev'ry way,
Of equal vigour, might their motions stay,
And by a steady poise the whole in quiet lay ?
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Should we the long-depending scale ascend,
Of sons and fathers will it never end ?
If 'twill, then must we through the order run
To some one man whose being ne'er begun :
If that one man was sempiternal, why
Did he, once independent, ever die?
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Had not the Maker wrought the springy frame,
Such as it is, to fan the vital flame,
The blood, defrauded of its nitrous food,
Had cool'd and languish'd in th' arterial road;
While the tired heart had strove, with fruitless
pain,
To push the lazy tide along the vein.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Could atoms, which, with undirected flight,
Roam'd through the void, arid ranged the realms
of night,
In order march, and to their posts advance,
Led by no guide but undesigning chance ?
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Besides materials, which are brute and blind,
Did not this work require a knowing mind,
Who for the task should fit detachments choose
From all the atoms.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
How could this noble fabric be design'd,
And fashion'd by a maker brute and blind?
Could it of art such miracles invent ?
And raise a beauteous world of such extent ?
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Unconscious causes only still impart
Their utmost skill, their utmost power exert :
Those which can freely choose, discern, and
know,
Can more or less of art and care bestow.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Ye sons of art, one curious piece devise,
From whose construction motion shall arise.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Did chymic chance the furnaces prepare,
Raise all the labour-houses of the air,
And lay crude vapours in digestion there ?
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
CREATION.
When the world first out of chaos sprang,
So smiled the days, and so the tenor ran
Of their felicity; a spring was there,
An everlasting spring the jolly year
Led round in his great circle; no wind's breath,
As now, did smell of winter or of death.
CRASHAW.
Atheist, use thine eyes ;
And, having view'd the order of the skies,
Think (if thou canst) that matter, blindly hurl'd
Without a guide, should frame this wondrous
world.
CREECH.
For when God's hand had written in the hearts
Of our first parents all the rules of good,
So that their skill infused surpass'd all arts
That ever were before or since the flood.
SIR J. DAVIES.
Such was the discord, which did first disperse
Form, order, beauty, through the universe :
While dryness moisture, coldness heat resists,
All that we have, and that we are, subsists.
SIR J. DENHAM.
As subjects then the whole creation came,
And from their natures Adam them did name.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Before the sea, and this terrestrial ball,
One was the face of nature, if a face;
Rather a rude and indigested mass.
DRYDEN.
From such rude principles our form began,
And earth was metamorphosed into man.
DRYDEN.
Nor could the tender new creation bear
Th' excessive heats or coldness of the year.
DRYDEN.
Heav'n and earth's compacted frame,
And flowing waters, and the starry flame,
And both the radiant lights, one common soul
Inspires and feeds, and animates the whole.
DRYDEN.
Some few, whose lamp shone brighter, have
been led
From cause to cause to nature's secret head,
And found that one first principle mvist be.
DRYDEN.
Study thyself : what rank, or what degree,
Thy wise Creator has ordain'd for thee.
DRYDEN.
Betwixt the midst and these, the gods assign'd.
Two habitable seats for human kind;
And 'cross their limits cut a sloping way,
Which the twelve signs in beauteous order sway.
DRYDEN.
Whether with particles of heav'nly fire
The God of nature did his soul inspire ;
Or earth, but new divided from the sky,
And pliant still, retain' d th' ethereal energy.
DRYDEN.
What am I ? or from whence ? for that I am
I know, because I think; but whence I came,
Or how this frame of mine began to be,
What other being can disclose to me ?
DRYDEN.
Such was the saint, who shone with ev'ry grace,
Reflecting, Moses-like, his master's face :
God saw his image lively was express'd,
And his own work as his creation bless'd.
DRYDEN.
Open, ye heavens, your living doors; let in
The great Creator, from his work return'd
Magnificent ; his six days' work, a world.
MILTON.
What cause
Moved the Creator, in his holy rest
Through all eternity, so late to build
In chaos ; and the work begun, how soon
Absolved.
MILTON.
To recount almighty works,
What words of tongue or seraph can suffice,
Or heart of man suffice to comprehend ?
MILTON.
When I behold this goodly frame, this world,
Of heav'n and earth consisting ; and compute
Their magnitudes ; this earth a spot, a grain,
An atom, with the firmament compared.
MILTON.
He longer will delay, to hear thee tell
His generation, and the rising birth
Of nature from the unapparent deep.
MILTON.
By thy kind pow'r and influencing care,
The various creatures live, and move, and are.
MILTON.
In days of yore, no matter where or when,
Before the low creation swarm'd with men.
PARNELL.
CREA TION. CRITICISM.
See plastic nature, working to this end !
The single atoms each to other tend ;
Attract, attracted to, the next in place,
Form'd and impell'd its neighbour to embrace.
POPE.
Then various elements against thee join'd,
In one more various animal combined,
And framed the clam'rous race of busy human
kind.
POPE.
Who taught the nations of the field and wood
To shun their poison, and to choose their food?
Prescient, the tides or tempests to withstand,
Build on the wave, or arch beneath the sand ?
POPE.
And if each system in gradation roll,
Alike essential to the amazing whole,
The least confusion but in one, not all
That system only, but the whole must fall.
POPE.
Then from whate'er we can to sense produce,
Common and plain, or wondrous and abstruse,
From Nature's constant or eccentric laws,
The thoughtful soul this gen'ral inference draws,
That an effect must presuppose the cause.
PRIOR.
He, sole in power, at the beginning said,
Let sea and air, and earth, and heav'n be made;
And it was so: and when he shall ordain
In other sort, has but to speak again,
And they shall be no more.
PRIOR.
While she does her upward flight sustain,
Touching each link of the continued chain,
At length she is obliged and forced to see
A first, a source, a life, a deity.
PRIOR.
Heaven, sure, has kept this spot of earth
uncurst,
To show how all things were created first.
PRIOR.
A mind which through each part infused doth
pass,
Fashions and works, and wholly doth transpierce
All this great body of the universe.
SIR W. RALEIGH.
Thou hung'st the solid earth in fleeting air,
Vein'd with clear springs, which ambient seas
repair.
SANDYS.
8
All the world by thee at first was made,
And daily yet thou dost the same repair:
Nor aught on earth that merry is and glad,
Nor aught on earth that lovely is and fair,
But thou the same for pleasure didst prepare.
SPENSER.
Through knowledge we behold the world's
creation,
How in his cradle first he foster'd was;
And judge of nature's cunning operation,
How things she formed of a formless mass.
SPENSER.
But come, ye generous minds, in whose wide
thought,
Of all his works, creative beauty burns
With warmest beam.
THOMSON.
What but God !
Inspiring God ! who, boundless spirit all,
And unremitting energy pervades,
Adjusts, sustains, and agitates the whole.
THOMSON.
Who on this base the earth didst firmly found,
And mad'st the deep to circumvent it round.
WOTTON.
CRITICISM.
This writer's want of sense arraign,
Treat all his empty pages with disdain,
And think a grave reply misspent in vain.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
These, with the pride of dogmatizing schools,
Imposed on nature arbitrary rules;
Forced her their vain inventions to obey,
And move as learned frenzy traced the way.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Brimful of learning, see that pedant stride,
Bristling with horrid Greek, and puff'd with
pride !
A thousand authors he in vain has read,
And with their maxims stuff 'd his empty head;
And thinks that without Aristotle's rule
Reason is blind, and common sense a fool.
BOILEAU.
Those fierce inquisitors of wit,
The critics, spare no flesh that ever writ ;
But just as tooth-draw'rs find among the rout
Their own teeth work in pulling others out,
So they, decrying all of all that write,
Think to erect a trade of judging by 't.
BUTLER.
114
CRITICISM.
All this, without a gloss or comment,
He could unriddle in a moment.
BUTLER.
A man must serve his time to ev'ry trade
Save censure : critics all are ready made :
Take hackney'd jokes from Miller, got by rote,
With just enough of learning to misquote;
A mind well skill'd to find or forge a fault;
A turn for punning call it Attic salt.
BYRON.
A modern critic is a thing who runs
All ways, all risks, to evitate his duns :
Let but an author ask him home to dine,
And lend him money while he gave him wine ;
However dull the trash the man might write,
Its praise the grateful guest would still indite.
BYRON.
Hope constancy in wind, or corn in chaff,
Believe a woman, or an epitaph,
Or any other thing that's false, before
You trust in critics who themselves are sore.
BYRON.
John Keats, who was kill'd off by one critique,
Just as he really promised something great,
If not intelligible, without Greek
Contrived to talk about the gods of late,
Much as they might have been supposed to speak.
Poor fellow ! His was an untoward fate.
'Tis strange the mind, that very fiery particle,
Should let itself be snufPd out by an article.
BYRON.
Smit with the love of honour or of pence
O'errun with wit, and destitute of sense,
Should any novice in the rhyming trade
With lawless pen the realms of verse invade,
Forth from the court where sceptred sages sit,
Abused with praise, and flatter'd into wit,
Where in lethargic majesty they reign,
And what they win by dulness still maintain,
Legions of factious authors throng at once,
Fool beckons fool, and dunce awakens dunce.
CHURCHILL.
A servile race,
Who in mere want of fault all merit place;
Who blind obedience pay to ancient schools,
Bigots to Greece, and slaves to rusty rules.
CHURCHILL.
Who shall dispute what the Reviewers say?
Their word's sufficient; and to ask a reason,
In such a state as theirs, is downright treason.
CHURCHILL.
Through whim (our critics) or by envy led,
They damn those authors whom they never read.
CHURCHILL.
But, spite of all the criticising elves,
Those who would make us feel, must feel them-
selves.
CHURCHILL.
You scandal to the stock of verse ! a race
Able to bring the gibbet in disgrace.
JOHN CLEAVELAND.
Critics to plays for the same end resort
That surgeons wait on trials in a court :
For innocence condemn'd they've no respect,
Provided they've a body to dissect.
CONGREVE.
Then all bad poets we are sure are foes,
And how their number's swell'd the town well
knows :
In shoals I've mark'd 'em judging in the pit,
Tho' they're on no pretence for judgment fit,
But that they have been damn'd for want of wit.
Since when they, by their own offences taught,
Set up for spies on plays and finding fault.
CONGREVE.
Rich, racy verses, in which we
The soil from which they come taste, smell, and
see.
COWLEY.
Oh ! rather give me commentators plain,
Who with no deep researches vex the brain ;
Who from the dark and doubtful love to run,
And hold their glimm'ring tapers to the sun.
CRABBE: Parish Register.
Some vip'rous critic may bereave
Th' opinion of thy work for some defect.
DANIEL.
That servile path thou nobly dost decline
Of tracing word by word, and line by line.
SIR J. DEMIAM.
Your intention hold,
As fire these drossy rhymes to purify,
Or as elixir to change them into gold.
This wond'red error growth
At which our critics gird.
DONNE.
DRAYTON.
Critics in plume,
Who lolling on our foremost branches sit,
And still charge first, the true forlorn of wit.
DRYDKN.
CRITICISM.
Hourly we see some raw pin-feather'd thing
Attempt to mount, and fights and heroes sing,
Who for false quantities was whipp'd at school,
But t'other day, and breaking grammar-rule.
DRYDEN.
These wretched spies of wit must then confess
They take more pains to please themselves the
less.
DRYDEN.
The verse in fashion is, when numbers flow
So smooth and equal, that no sight can find
The rivet, where the polish'd piece was join'd.
DRYDEN.
When I spoke,
My honest, homely words were carp'd and cen-
sured,
For want of courtly style.
DRYDEN.
They damn themselves, nor will my muse de-
scend
To class with such who fools and knaves com-
mend.
DRYDEN.
For the great dons of wit,
Phoebus gives them full privilege alone
To damn all others, and cry up their own.
DRYDEN.
Two fools that crutch their feeble sense in verse;
Who by my rnuse to all succeeding times
Shall live, in spite of their own dogg'rel rhymes.
DRYDEN.
Your wit burlesque may one step higher climb,
And in his sphere may judge all dogg'rel rhyme.
DRYDEN.
But he whose noble genius is allow'd,
Who with stretch' d pinions soars above the
crowd ;
Who mighty thought can clothe with manly
dress :
He whom I fancy, but can ne'er express.
DRYDEN.
As I interpret fairly your design,
So look not with severer eyes on mine.
DRYDEN.
'Tis fustian all, 'tis execrably bad;
But if they will be fools, must you be mad ?
DRYDEN.
He that but conceives a crime in thought
Contracts the danger of an actual fault.
DRYDEN.
Teach them how manly passions ought to move;
For such as cannot think, can never love;
And since they needs will judge the poet's art,
Point 'em with fescues to each shining part.
DRYDEN.
In thy felonious heart though venom lies,
It does but touch thy Irish pen, and dies.
DRYDEN.
Ev'ry one is eagle-eyed to see
Another's faults and his deformity.
DRYDEN.
Kind wits will those light faults excuse ;
Those are the common frailties of the muse.
DRYDEN.
Who would excel, when few can make a test
Betwixt indiff rent writing and the best?
DRYDEN.
The more inform'd, the less he understood,
And deeper sunk by flound'ring in the mud.
DRYDEN.
Free from all meaning, whether good or bad ;
And, in one word, heroically mad.
DRYDEN.
They give the scandal, and the wise discern,
Their glosses teach an age too apt to learn.
DRYDEN.
So bold, yet so judiciously you dare,
That your least praise is to be regular.
DRYDEN.
He match'd their beauties where they most
excel;
Of love sung better, and of arms as well.
DRYDEN.
Thy gen'rous fruits, though gather'd ere their
prime,
Still show'd a quickness; and maturing time
But mellows what we write to the dull sweets
of rhyme.
DRYDEN.
WTien did his wit on learning fix a brand,
And rail at arts he did not understand?
DRYDEN.
Pure clinches the suburban muse affords,
And Panton waging harmless war with words.
DRYDEN.
Malice in critics reigns so high
That for small errors they whole plays decry.
DRYDEN.
n6
CRITICISM.
No more accuse thy pen ; but charge the crime
On native sloth, and negligence of time;
Beware the public laughter of the town,
Thou spring's! a leak already in thy crown.
DRYDEN.
Winnow well this thought, and you shall find
'Tis light as chaff that flies before the wind.
DRYDEN.
Base rivals, who true wit and merit hate,
Caballing still against it with the great,
Maliciously aspire to gain renown
By standing up and pulling others down.
DRYDEN.
No carping critic interrupts his praise,
No rival strives but for a second place.
GRANVILLE.
These scenes were wrought,
Embellish'd with good morals and just thought.
GRANVILLE.
When, more indulgent to the writer's ease,
You are so good to be so hard to please,
No such convulsive pangs it will require
To write the pretty things that you admire.
GRANVILLE.
When Crito once a panegyric show'd,
He beat him with a staff of his own ode.
WALTER HARTE.
Courtling, I rather thou shouldst utterly
Dispraise my work than praise it frostily.
BEN JONSON.
I did but prompt the age to quit their clogs,
By the known rules of ancient liberty,
When straight a barbarous noise environs me.
MILTON.
In every work regard the writer's end;
For none can compass more than they intend :
And if the means be just, the conduct true,
Applause, in spite of trivial faults, is due.
POPE.
Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer,
And, without sneering, teach the rest to sneer :
Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike,
ast hint a fault, and hesitate dislike :
Alike reserved to blame or to commend ;
A tim'rous foe, and a suspicious friend.
POPE.
Those heads, as stomachs, are not sure the best,
Which nauseate all, and nothing can digest.
POPE.
The heaviest muse the swiftest course has gone,
As clocks run fastest when most lead is on.
POPE.
Learn then what morals critics ought to show :
'Tis not enough wit, art, and learning join ;
In all you speak, let truth and candour shine.
POPE.
Prune the luxuriant, the uncouth refine,
But show no mercy to an empty line.
POPE.
I lose my patience, and I own it too,
When works are censured not as bad, but new;
While, if our elders break all reason's laws,
Those fools demand, not pardon, but applause.
POPE.
Let those teach others who themselves excel ;
And censure freely, who have written well.
POPE.
I know there are to whose presumptuous
thoughts
Those freer beauties, ev'n in them, seem faults.
POPE.
Your defects to know,
Make use of ev'ry friend, and ev'ry foe.
POPE.
The piece you think is incorrect : why, take it ;
I'm all submission; what you'd have it, make it.
POPE.
Ah ! ne'er so dire a thirst of glory boast,
Nor in the critic let the man be lost !
Good nature and good sense must ever join :
To err is human ; to forgive, divine.
POPE.
Then criticism the muse's handmaid proved,
To dress her charms and make her more beloved.
POPE.
Great wits sometimes may gloriously offend,
And rise to faults true critics dare not mend.
POPE.
A perfect judge will read each work of wit
With the same spirit that its author writ ;
Survey the whole, nor seek slight faults to find,
Where nature moves, and rapture charms the
mind.
POPE.
Thus critics of less judgment than caprice,
Curious, not knowing, not exact, but nice,
Form short ideas, and offend in arts,
As most in manners, by a love to parts.
POPE.
CRITICISM.
He who, supreme in judgment as in wit,
Might boldly censure, as he boldly writ,
Yet judged with coolness, though he sung with
fire;
His precepts teach but what his works inspire:
Our critics take a contrary extreme ;
They judge with fury, but they write with phlegm.
POPE.
The critic eye, that microscope of wit,
Sees hairs and pores, examines bit by bit.
POPE.
These when they praise, the world believes no
more
Than when they promise to give scribbling o'er.
POPE.
Some have at first for wits, then poets past,
Turn'd critics next, and proved plain fools at
last.
POPE.
Concluding all were desp'rate sots and fools
That durst depart from Aristotle's rules.
POPE.
Thy hand strikes out some free design,
When life awakes and dawns at every line.
POPE.
Know well each ancient's proper character ;
Without all this at once before your eyes,
Cavil you may, but never criticise.
POPE.
But you with pleasure own your errors past,
And make each day a critic on the last.
POPE.
If wit so much from ignorance undergo,
Ah, let not learning too commence its foe.
POPE.
Thence arts o'er all the northern world advance,
But critic-learning flourish'd most in France.
POPE.
Critics I saw, that others' names deface,
And fix their own with labour in their place ;
Their own, like others, soon their place resigned,
Or disappear'd, and left the first behind.
POPE.
How severely with themselves proceed
The men who write such verse as who can read ?
Their own strict judges, not a word they spare
That wants or force, or light, or weight, or care.
POPE.
Not that my quill to critics was confined ;
My verse gave ampler lessons to mankind.
POPE.
Some to conceit alone their taste confine.
And glitt'ring thoughts struck out at ev'ry line.
POPE.
Most by the numbers judge a poet's song,
And smooth or rough with them is right or
wrong.
POPE.
The gen'rous critic fann'd the poet's fire,
And taught the world with reason to admire.
POPE.
Yet some there were among the sounder few,
Of those who less presumed, and better knew,
Who durst assert the juster ancient cause,
And here restored wit's fundamental laws.
POPE.
Neglect the rule each verbal critic lays :
For not to know some trifles is a praise.
POPE.
Leave such to tune their own dull rhymes, and
know
What's roundly smooth, or languishingly slow.
POPE.
'Tis more to guide than spur the muse's steed,
Restrain his fury than provoke his speed;
The winged courser, like a gen'rous horse,
Shows most true mettle when you check his
course.
POPE.
Those rules of old discover'd, not devised,
Are nature still, but nature methodized.
POPE.
These leave the sense, their learning to display,
And those explain the meaning quite away.
POPE.
The poring scholiasts mark ;
Wits who, like owls, see only in the dark;
A lumber-house of books in ev'ry head.
POPE.
Hear how learn'd Greece her useful rules indites,
When to repress, and when indulge our flights!
POPE.
Poets, a race long unconfined and free,
Still fond and proud of savage liberty,
Received his laws.
POPE.
n8
CRITICISM.
Commas and points they set exactly right,
And 'twere a sin to rob them of their mite.
POPE.
Some beauties yet no precepts can declare;
For there's a happiness as well as care :
Music resembles poetry : in each
Are nameless graces, which no methods teach,
And which a master-hand alone can reach.
POPE.
Still, with itself compared, his text peruse;
And let your comment be the Mantuan muse.
POPE.
Once on a time, La Mancha's knight, they say,
A certain bard encount'ring on the way,
Discoursed in terms as just, with looks as sage,
As ere could Dennis of the laws o' th' stage.
POPE.
Thee, bold Longinus ! all the Nine inspire,
And bless their critic with a poet's fire :
An ardent judge, who, zealous in his trust,
With warmth gives sentence, yet is always just;
Whose own example strengthens all his laws,
And is himself that great sublime he draws.
POPE.
And though the ancients thus their rules invade,
As kings dispense with laws themselves have
made;
Moderns, beware ! or, if you must offend
Against the precept, ne'er transgress its end.
POPE.
New graces yearly like thy works display,
Soft without weakness, without glaring gay.
POPE.
Some ne'er advance a judgment of their own,
But catch the spreading notion of the town.
POPE.
Should some more sober critic come abroad,
If wrong, I smile ; if right, I kiss the rod.
POPE.
At length I drop, but in unwilling ears,
This saving counsel, " Keep your piece nine
years."
POPE.
Lintot, dull rogue! will think your price too
much:
" Not, sir, if you revise it and retouch."
POPE.
Shun their fault, who, scandalously nice,
Will needs mistake an author into vice.
POPE.
Most critics, fond of some subservient art,
Still make the whole depend upon a part;
They talk of principles; but notions prize,
And all to one loved folly sacrifice.
POPE.
Fustian's so sublimely bad
It is not poetry, but prose run mad.
POPE.
Who shames a scribbler? break one cobweb
through,
He spins the slight self-pleasing thread anew :
Destroy his fib or sophistry : in vain !
The creature's at his dirty work again ;
Throned on the centre of his thin designs,
Proud of a vast extent of flimsy lines !
POPE.
Both must alike from heav'n derive their light;
These born to judge, as well as those to write.
POPE.
Curb that impetuous tongue ; nor rashly vain,
And singly mad, asperse the sov'reign reign.
POPE.
Some praise at morning what they blame at
night,
But always think the last opinion right.
A muse by these is like a mistress used ;
This hour she's idolized, the next abused.
POPE.
Here one poor word a hundred clinches makes.
POPE.
Each finding, like a friend,
Something to blame, and something to commend.
POPE.
In such lays as neither ebb nor flow,
Correctly cold, and regularly low,
That, shunning faults, one quiet tenor keep,
We cannot blame indeed but we may sleep.
POPE.
Eye Nature's walks, shoot folly as it flies,
And catch the manners living as they rise;
Laugh where we must, be candid where we can,
But vindicate the ways of God to man.
POPE.
The muse whose early voice you taught to sing,
Prescribed her heights, and pruned her tender
wing.
POPE.
Such shameless bards we have ; and yet 'tis true,
There are as mad, abandon'd critics too.
POPE.
CRITICISM.
119
Now they who reach Parnassus' lofty crown
Employ their pains to spurn some others down.
POPE.
'Tis hard to say, if greater want of skill
Appear in writing or in judging ill.
POPE.
To observations which ourselves we make,
We grow more partial for the observer's sake.
POPE.
Not that I'd lop the beauties from his book,
Like slashing Bentley with his desp'rate hook.
POPE.
Before his sacred name flies ev'ry fault,
And each exalted stanza teems with thought.
POPE.
That not for fame, but virtue's better end,
He stood the furious foe, the timid friend,
The damning critic.
POPE.
He checks the bold design ;
And rules as strict his labour'd work confine
As if the Stagyrite o'erlook'd each line.
POPE.
In poets as true genius is but rare,
True taste as seldom is the critic's share.
POPE.
'Tis best sometimes your censure to restrain,
And charitably let the dull be vain.
POPE.
Some dryly plain, without invention's aid,
Write dull receipts how poems may be made.
POPE.
'Tis not enough your counsel still be true:
Blunt truths more mischief than nice falsehoods
do;
Men must be taught as if you taught them not,
And things unknown proposed as things forgot.
POPE.
Critics I read on other men,
And hypers upon them again.
PRIOR.
From this last toil again what knowledge flows?
Just as much, perhaps, as shows
That all his predecessors' rules
Were empty cant, all jargon of the schools.
PRIOR.
Many knotty points there are,
Which all discuss, but few can clear.
PRIOR.
When Sappho writ,
By their applause the critics show'd their wit.
PRIOR.
Bold is the critic who dares prove
These heroes were no friends to love;
And bolder he who dares aver
That they were enemies to war.
PRIOR.
Some servile imitators
Prescribe at first such strict, uneasy rules,
As they must ever slavishly observe.
ROSCOMMON.
Ill-natured censors of the present age,
And fond of all the follies of the past.
ROSCOMMON.
Take pains the genuine meaning to explore;
There sweat, there strain, tug the laborious oar.
ROSCOMMON.
Let all your precepts be succinct and clear,
That ready wits may comprehend them soon.
ROSCOMMON.
And the rude notions of pedantic schools
Blaspheme the sacred founder of our rules.
ROSCOMMON.
The press, the pulpit, and the stage
Conspire to censure and expose our age.
ROSCOMMON.
In a poem elegantly writ,
I will not quarrel with a slight mistake.
ROSCOMMON.
Let no vain hope your easy mind seduce ;
For rich ill poets are without excuse.
ROSCOMMON.
Search every comment that your care can find,
Some here, some there, may hit the poet's mind.
ROSCOMMON.
Excursions are inexpiably bad,
And 'tis much safer to leave out than add.
ROSCOMMON.
For I am nothing, if not critical.
SHAKSPEARE.
These sentences to sugar, or to gall,
Being strong on both sides, are equivocal.
SHAKSPEARE.
Stubborn critics, apt, without a theme,
For depravation, to square the general sex.
SHAKSPEARE.
120
CRITICISM. CR UEL TY. CUSTOM.
I never yet saw man
But she would spell him backward ; if fair-faced,
She'd swear the gentleman should be her sister;
If black, why nature, drawing of an antic,
Made a foul blot.
SHAKSPEARE.
SWIFT.
SWIFT.
SWIFT.
SWIFT.
SWIFT.
Learn Aristotle's rules by rote,
And at all hazards boldly quote.
Read all the prefaces of Dryden,
For those our critics much confide in ;
Though merely writ at first for filling,
To raise the volume's price a shilling.
At Will's
Lie snug, and hear what critics say.
The critic to his grief will find
How firmly these indentures bind.
Till critics blame and judges praise,
The poet cannot claim his bays;
On me when dunces are satiric,
I take it for a panegyric ;
Hated by fools, and fools to hate,
Be that my motto and my fate.
After toiling twenty days
To earn a stock of pence and praise,
Thy labour's grown the critic's prey.
SWIFT.
Though they the lines on golden anvils beat,
It looks as if they struck them at a heat.
TATE.
Horace will our superfluous branches prune,
Give us new rules, and set our harp in tune.
WALLER.
Our lines reform'd, and not composed in haste,
Polish'd like marble, would like marble last ;
But as the present, so the last age writ :
In both we find like negligence and wit.
WALLER.
The muses' friend, unto himself severe,
With silent pity looks on all that err.
WALLER.
What ambitious fools are more to blame
Than those who thunder in the critic's name?
Good authors damn'd have their revenge in
this,
To see what wretches gain the praise they miss.
YOUNG.
How commentators each dark passage shun,
And hold their farthing candle to the sun.
YOUNG.
One judges as the weather dictates, right
The poem is at noon, and wrong at night;
Another judges by a surer gauge,
An author's principles or parentage.
. YOUNG.
Critics on verse, as squibs on triumphs, wait,
Proclaim the glory, and augment the state;
Hot, envious, noisy, proud, the scribbling fry
Burn, hiss, and bounce, waste paper, ink, and die.
YOUNG.
Not all on books their criticism waste :
The genius of a dish some justly taste,
And eat their way to fame.
YOUNG.
CRUELTY.
Man's inhumanity to man
Makes countless thousands mourn.
BURNS.
I would not enter on. my list of friends
(Though graced with polish'd manners and fine
sense,
Yet wanting sensibility) the man
Who needlessly sets foot upon a worm.
COWPER.
You may as well use question with the wolf,
Why he hath made the ewe bleat for the lamb.
SHAKSPEARE.
No care of justice, nor no rule of reason,
Did thenceforth ever enter in his mind,
But cruelty, the sign of currish kind.
SPENSER.
CUSTOM.
As custom arbitrates, whose shifting sway
Our life and manners must alike obey.
BYRON : Hints from Horace.
Such dupes are men to custom, and so prone
To rev'rence what is ancient, and can plead
A course of long observance for its use.
COWPER.
Man yields to custom as he bows to fate,
In all things ruled, mind, body, and estate;
In pain, in sickness, we for cure apply
To them we know not, and we know not why.
CRABBE.
CUSTOM. DANCE. DA Y.
121
Habit with him was all the test of truth :
" It must be right : I've done it from my youth."
CRABBE.
All habits gather by unseen degrees ;
As brooks make rivers, rivers run to seas.
* DRYDEN: Ovid.
Custom does often reason overrule,
And only serves for reason to the fool.
ROCHESTER.
That monster, custom, is angel yet in this,
That to the use of actions fair and good
He likewise gives a frock, or livery,
That aptly is put on.
SHAKSPEARE.
What custom wills in all things should we do't,
Mountainous error would be too highly heap'd
For truth to overpeer.
SHAKSPEARE.
Tyrant custom
Hath made the flinty and steel couch of war
My thrice-driven bed of down.
SHAKSPEARE.
It is a custom
More honour'd in the breach than the observance.
SHAKSPEARE.
Custom, 'tis true, a venerable tyrant,
O'er servile man extends her blind dominion.
THOMSON.
DANCE.
Musicians and dancers ! take some truce
With these your pleasing labours; for great use
As much weariness as perfection brings.
DONNE.
With songs and dance we celebrate the day,
And with due honours usher in the May.
DRYDEN.
The muses blush' d to see their friends exalting
Those elegant delights of jig and vaulting.
FENTON.
Such a light and mettled dance
Saw you never yet in France.
BEN JONSON.
When the merry bells ring round,
And the jocund rebecs sound,
To many a youth and many a maid,
Dancing in the checker'd shade.
All the swains that there abide,
With jigs and rural dance resort.
MILTON.
MILTON.
Forthwith from dance to sweet repast they turn.
MILTON.
Others import yet nobler arts from France,
Teach kings to fiddle, and make senates dance.
POPE.
Another Phcebus, thy own Phoebus reigns,
Joys in my jigs, and dances in my chains.
POPE.
Ridotta sips, and dances till she see
The doubling lustres dance as quick as she.
POPE.
Nature, I thought, perform'd too mean a part,
Forming her movements to the rules of art;
And, vex'd, I found that the musician's hand
Had o'er the dancer's mind too great command,
PRIOR.
He, perfect dancer! climbs the rope,
And balances your fear and hope.
PRIOR.
Let wantons, light of heart,
Tickle the senseless rushes with their heels :
For I am proverb'd with a grandsire phrase;
I'll be a candle-holder and look on.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thy grandsire loved thee well ;
Many a time he danced thee on his knee.
SHAKSPEARE.
What masks, what dances,
To wear away this long age of three hours.
SHAKSPEARE,
After them all dancing on a row,
The comely virgins came with garlands dight,
Ail fresh as flowers.
SPENSER.
DAY.
Scarce had he spoken when the cloud gave way;
The mists flew upwards, and dissolved in day.
DRYDEN.
122
DAY. DAY 'OF JUDGMENT.
When the following morn had chased away
The flying stars, and light restored the day.
DRYDEN.
Earthly limbs and gross allay
Blunt not the beams of heav'n, and edge of day.
DRYDEN.
From gilded roofs depending lamps display
Nocturnal beams that emulate the day.
DRYDEN.
And the gilded car of day
His glowing axle doth allay
In the steep Atlantic stream.
MILTON.
A waving glow his bloomy beds display,
Blushing in bright diversities of day.
POPE.
Through the plains, of one continual day,
Six shining months pursue their even way;
And six succeeding urge their dusky flight,
Obscured with vapours and o'erwhelm'd in night.
PRIOR.
Men judge by the complexion of the sky
The state and inclination of the day.
SHAKSPEARE.
The gaudy, blabbing, and remorseful day
Is crept into the bosom of the sea.
SHAKSPEARE.
The day begins to break, and night is fled,
Whose pitchy mantle over-veil'd the earth.
SHAKSPEARE.
Calm was the day, and through the trembling air
Sweet-breathing Zephyrus did softly play,
A gentle spirit, that lightly did allay
Hot Titan's beams, which then did glister fair.
SPENSER.
DAY OF JUDGMENT.
Christ's blood our balsam ; if that cure us here,
Him when our Judge we shall not find severe.
SIR J. DENHAM.
We are but farmers of ourselves ; yet may,
If we can stock ourselves and thrive, uplay
Much, much good treasure for the great rent-
day.
DONNE.
In the valley of Jehoshaphat
The judging God shall close the book of fate;
And there the last assizes keep
For those who wake, and those who sleep.
DRYDEN.
When the last and dreadful hour
This crumbling pageant shall devour,
The trumpet shall be heard on high,
The dead shall live, the living die,
And music shall untune the sky.
DRYDEN.
Minos, the strict inquisitor, appears,
And lives and crimes with his assessors hears;
Round in his urn the blended balls he rolls ;
Absolves the just and dooms the guilty souls.
DRYDEN.
Nor custom, nor example, nor vast numbers
Of such as do offend, make less the sin;
For each particular crime a strict account
Will be exacted ; and that comfort which
The damn'd pretend follows in misery,
Takes nothing from their torments : every one
Must suffer in himself the measure of
His wickedness.
MASSINGER.
Trumpet once more to sound at general doom.
MILTON.
Thence shall come,
When this world's dissolution shall be ripe,
With glory and pow'r to judge both quick and
dead.
MILTON.
Till the day
Appear of respiration to the just,
And vengeance to the wicked.
MILTON.
A peal shall rouse their sleep;
Then, all thy saints assembled, thou shall judge
Bad men and angels.
MILTON.
Forthwith the cited dead,
Of all past ages, to the general doom
Shall hasten.
MILTON.
Thence shall come
To judge th' unfaithful dead; but to reward
His faithful, and receive them into bliss.
MILTON.
Thou attended gloriously from heav'n
Shalt in the sky appear, and from thee send
Thy summoning archangels to proclaim
Thy dread tribunal.
MILTON.
On death and judgment, heaven and hell,
Who oft doth think, must needs die well.
SIR W. RALEIGH.
DAY OF JUDGMENT. DEATH.
123
What horror will invade the mind
When the strict Judge, who would be kind,
Shall have few venial faults to find !
ROSCOMMON.
O then, what interest shall I make
To save my last important stake,
When the most just have cause to quake!
ROSCOMMON.
Thou whom avenging pow'rs obey,
Cancel my debt, too great to pay,
Before the sad accounting day.
ROSCOMMON.
The dreadful judgment day
So dreadful will not be as was his sight.
SHAKSPEARE.
How would you be
If He, which is the top of judgment, should
But judge you as you are?
SHAKSPEARE.
DEATH.
But no frail man, however great or high,
Can be concluded blest before he die.
ADDISON.
And yet, methinks, a beam of light breaks in
On my departing soul.
ADDISON.
I could enjoy the pangs of death,
And smile in agony.
ADDISON.
Thus o'er the dying lamp th' unsteady flame
Hangs quivering on a point, leaps off by fits,
And falls again, as loth to quit its hold.
ADDISON.
Thus we well left, he better reft,
In heaven to take his place;
That by like life and death, at last,
We may obtain like grace.
AscHAM.
Be it what it may, or bliss or torment,
Annihilation, dark and endless rest,
Or some dread thing man's wildest range of
thought
Hath never yet conceived, that change I'll dare
Which makes me anything but 'what I am.
JOANNA BAILLIE: Basil.
It goes against the mind of man
To be turn'd out from its warm wonted home
Ere yet one rent admits the winter's chill.
JOANNA BAILLIE : Rayner.
How shocking must thy summons be, O death,
To him who is at ease in his possessions !
Who, counting on long years of pleasure here,
Is quite unfurnish'd for that world to come !
BLAIR: Grave.
For me, my heart, that erst did go
Most like a tired child at a show,
That sees through tears the mummers leap,
Would now its wearied vision close,
Would childlike on His love repose
Who giveth his beloved sleep.
MRS. BROWNING.
So live, that, when thy summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan, that moves
To that mysterious realm where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of death,
Thou go not like the quarry-slave at night
Scourged to his dungeon; but, sustain'd and
soothed
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave
Like one that wraps the drapery of his couch
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.
BRYANT : Thanatopsis.
O Death! the poor man's dearest friend,
The kindest and the best !
Welcome the hour my aged limbs
Are laid with thee at rest !
BURNS.
If from society we learn to live,
'Tis solitude should teach us how to die ;
It hath no flatterers : vanity can give
No hollow aid ; alone, man with his God must
strive.
BYRON.
The very generations of the dead
Are swept away, and tomb inherits tomb,
Until the memory of an age is fled,
And, buried, sinks beneath its offspring's doom.
BYRON.
Before decay's effacing fingers
Have swept the lines where beauty lingers.
BYRON.
Who with the weight of years would wish to bend,
Wherl youth itself survives young love and j oy ?
Alas ! when mingling souls forget to blend,
Death has but little left him to destroy !
BYRON.
Few men dare show their thoughts of worst or
best;
Dissimulation always sets apart
A corner for herself; and therefore fiction
Is that which passes with least contradiction.
BYRON.
DEATH.
'Whom the gods love die young," was said of
yore,
And many deaths do they escape by this :
The death of friends, and that which slays even
more
The death of friendship, love, youth, all that is,
Except mere breath.
BYRON.
Must I consume my little life this little life
In guarding against all may make it less?
It is not worth so much ! It were to die
Before my hour, to live in dread of death.
BYRON.
And thou art dead, as young and fair
As aught of mortal birth ;
And form so soft, and charms so rare,
Too soon return'd to earth !
Though earth received them in her bed,
And o'er the spot the crowd may tread
In carelessness or mirth,
There is an eye which could not brook
A moment on that grave to look.
BYRON.
Soon may this fluttering spark of vital flame
Forsake its languid melancholy frame !
Soon may these eyes their trembling lustre close,
Welcome the dreamless night of long repose ;
Soon may this woe-worn spirit seek the bourn
Where, lull'd to slumber, grief forgets to mourn !
CAMPBELL.
Nor virtue, wit, or beauty, could
Preserve from death's hand this their heav'nly
mould.
CAREW.
You shall die
Twice now, where others, that mortality
In her fair arms holds, shall but once decease.
CHAPMAN.
Ere sin could blight, or sorrow fade,
Death came with friendly care,
The opening bud to heav'n convey'd,
And bade it blossom there.
COLERIDGE.
Unhappy slave and pupil to a bell,
Unhappy till the last, the kind releasing knell.
COWLEY.
All has its date below. The fatal hour
Was register'd in heaven ere time began.
We turn to dust, and all our mightiest works
Die too.
COWPER.
Not to understand a treasure's worth
Till time has stolen away the slighted good,
Is cause of half the poverty we feel,
And makes the world the wilderness it is.
COWPER.
Spare him, death !
But oh, thou wilt not, canst not spare !
Haste hath never time to hear.
CRASHAW.
Therefore if he needs must go,
And the fates will have it so,
Softly may he be possest
Of his monumental rest. CRASHAW.
Him while fresh and fragrant time
Cherish'd in his golden prime,
The rush of death's unruly wave
Swept him off into his grave.
CRASHAW.
Peace, which he loved in life, did lend
Her hand to bring him to his end;
When age and death call'd for the score,
No surfeits were to reckon for.
CRASHAW.
The soul receives intelligence,
By her near genius, of the body's end,
And so imparts a sadness to the sense.
DANIEL.
Which public death, received with such a cheer,
As not a sigh, a look, a shrink bewrays
The least felt touch of a degen'rous fear,
Gave life to envy, to his courage praise.
DANIEL.
Then doth th' aspiring soul the body leave,
Which we call death ; but were it known to all,
What life our souls do by this death receive,
Men would it birth or gaol delivery call.
SIR ]. DA VIES.
If death do quench us quite, we have great
wrong,
That daws, and trees, and rocks should last so
long,
When we must in an instant pass to nought.
SIR ]. DAVIES.
What spreading virtue, what a sparkling fire,
How great, how plentiful, how rich a dow'r,
Dost thou within this dying flesh inspire !
SIR ]. DAVIES.
The foolish and short-sighted die with fear
That they go nowhere, or they know not where.
SIR ]. DENHAM.
DEATH.
125
Fond, foolish man ! with fear of death surprised,
Which either should be wish'd for, or despised :
This, if our souls with bodies death destroy;
That, if our souls a second life enjoy :
What else is to be .fear'd ? when we shall gain
Eternal life, or have no sense of pain.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Such madness, as for fear of death to die,
Is to be poor for fear of poverty.
SIR J. DENHAM.
To death I with such joy resort
As seamen from a tempest to their port ;
Yet to that port ourselves we must not force,
Before our pilot, Nature, steers our course.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Though all our ligaments betimes grow weak,
We must not force them till themselves they
break.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Death hath taken in the out-works,
And now assails the fort ; I feel, I feel him
Gnawing my heart-strings.
SIR J. DENHAM.
My soul is on her journey ; do not now
Divert, or lead her back, to lose herself
I' th' maze and winding labyrinths o' the world.
SIR J. DENHAM.
If the worst of all mishaps hath fallen,
Speak : for he could not die unlike himself.
SIR J. DENHAM.
That's Erythsea,
Or some angel voiced like her. 'Tis she ! my
struggling soul
Would fain go out to meet and welcome her.
SIR J. DENHAM.
To her grim death appears in all her shapes ;
The hungry grave for her dire tribute gapes.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Though no stone tell thee what I was, yet thou
In my grave's inside see'st what thou art now ;
Yet thou'rt not yet so good : rill death us lay
To ripe and mellow there, we're stubborn clay.
DONNE.
If this commerce 'twixt heaven and earth were
not
Embarr'd, and all this traffic quite -forgot,
She, for whose loss we have lamented thus,
Would work more fully and pow'rfully on us.
DONNE.
I shall survey, and spy
Death in thy cheeks, and darkness in, thy eye.
DONNE.
Think then, my soul ! that death is but a groom
Which brings a taper to the outward room.
DONNE.
As doth the pith, which, lest our bodies slack,
Strings fast the little bones of neck and back,
So by the soul doth death string heav'n and earth.
DONNE.
Then 'tis our best, since thus ordain'd to die,
To make a virtue of necessity.
Take what he gives, since to rebel is vain :
The bad grows better which we well sustain ;
And could we choose the time, and choose
aright,
'Tis best to die, our honour at the height.
DRYDEN.
No kings nor nations
One moment can retard th' appointed hour.
DRYDEN.
Sounded at once the bow, and swiftly flies
The feather'd death, and hisses through the skies.
DRYDEN.
Then round our death-bed ev'ry friend should
run,
And joy us of our conquest early won.
DRYDEN.
Jove saw from high, with just disdain,
The dead inspired with vital life again.
DRYDEN.
Obscure they went through dreary shades, that
led
Along the vast dominion of the dead.
DRYDEN.
father ! can it be, that souls sublime
Return to visit our terrestrial clime?
And that the gen'rous mind, released by death,
Can covet lazy limbs and mortal breath ?
DRYDEN.
These, when death
Comes like a rushing lion, couch like spaniels,
With lolling tongues, and tremble at the paw.
DRYDEN.
1 wish to die, yet dare not death endure;
Detest the medicine, yet desire the cure !
Oh! that I'd courage but to meet my fate,
That short dark passage to a future state.
DRYDEN.
126
DEATH.
Show me the flying soul's convulsive strife,
And all the anguish of departing life.
DRYDEN.
My soul grows hard, and cannot death endure :
Your convoy makes the dangerous way secure.
DRYDEN.
Deaths invisible come wing'd with fire;
They hear a dreadful noise, and straight expire.
DRYDEN.
He must his acts reveal,
From the first moment of his vital breath,
To his last hour of unrepenting death.
DRYDEN.
So should we make our death a glad relief
From future shame.
DRYDEN.
Our swords so wholly did the fates employ
That they at length grew weary to destroy,
Refused the work we brought, and, out of breath,
Made sorrow and despair attend for death.
DRYDEN.
Griefs always green, a household still in tears;
Sad pomps, a threshold throng'd with daily
biers
And liveries of black. DRYDEN.
They pass their precious hours in plays and
sports,
Till death behind came stalking on unseen.
DRYDEN.
More moderate gifts might have prolong'd his
date,
Too early fitted for a better state.
DRYDEN.
From thy corporeal prison freed,
Soon hast thou reach'd the goal with mended
pace;
A world of woes dispatch'd in little space.
DRYDEN.
To thy wishes move a speedy pace,
Or death will soon o'ertake thee in the chase.
DRYDEN.
What wondrous sort of death has heav'n de-
sign' d
For so untamed, so turbulent a mind ?
DRYDEN.
Too justly ravish'd from an age like this,
Now she is gone the world is of a piece.
DRYDEN.
Past hope of safety, 'twas his latest care,
Like falling Caesar, decently to die.
DRYDEN.
She vanish'd: we can scarcely say she died,
For but a now did heav'n and earth divide:
This moment perfect health, the next was death.
DRYDEN.
Death was denounced, that frightful sound,
Which ev'n the best can hardly bear:
He took the summons void of fear,
And unconcern'dly cast his eyes around,
As if to find and dare the grisly challenger.
DRYDEN.
Death came on amain,
And exercised below his iron reign ;
Then upward to the seat of life he goes :
Sense fled before him ; what he touch' d he froze.
DRYDEN.
Now pass'd, on either side they nimbly tack,
Both strive to intercept and guide the wind;
And in its eye more closely they come back ;
To finish all the deaths they left behind.
DRYDEN.
No man has more contempt than I of breath :
But whence hast thou the pow'r to give me
death ?
DRYDEN.
In combating, but two of you will fall ;
And we resolve we will despatch you all.
DRYDEN.
Despatch me quickly, I may death forgive ;
I shall grow tender else, and wish to live.
DRYDEN.
Whate'er befalls, your life shall be my care :
One death or one deli v' ranee we will share.
DRYDEN.
Since death is near, and runs with so much force,
We must meet first, and intercept his course.
DRYDEN.
I yet am tender, young, and full of fear,
And dare not die, but fain would tarry here.
DRYDEN,
Since then our Arcite is with honour dead,
Why should we mourn that he so soon is freed?
DRYDEN.
Death will dismiss me,
And lay me softly in my native dust,
To pay the forfeit of ill-managed trust.
DRYDEN.
DEATH.
127
I thought
To smooth your passage, and to soften death :
For I would have you, when you upward move,
Speak kindly of me to our friends above.
DRYDEN.
He was exhaled ; his great Creator drew
His spirit as the sun the morning dew.
DRYDEN.
A soul that can securely death defy,
And count it nature's privilege to die.
DRYDEN.
His sorrows bore him off; and softly laid
His languish'd limbs upon his homely bed.
DRYDEN.
Nor will I wretched thee
In death forsake, but keep thee company.
DRYDEN.
Behold
Those who by ling' ring sickness lose their breath,
And those who by despair suborn their death.
DRYDEN.
To dare that death, I will approach thee nigher;
Thus wert thou compassed with circling fire.
DRYDEN.
Heav'n gave him all at once, then snatch'd
away,
Ere mortals all his beauties could survey :
Just like the flower that buds and withers in a
day.
DRYDEN.
Then, loathing life, and yet of death afraid,
In anguish of her spirit thus she pray'd.
DRYDEN.
Thrice call upon my name, thrice beat your
breast,
And hail me thrice to everlasting rest.
DRYDEN.
The wandering breath was on the wing to part,
Weak was the pulse, and hardly heaved the
heart.
DRYDEN.
After death, we sprights have just such natures
We had, for all the world, when human creatures.
DRYDEN.
The living few and frequent funerals then
Proclaim'd thy wrath on this forsaken place;
And now those few, who are return'd again,
Thy searching judgments to their dwellings
trace.
DRYDEN.
The face of things a frightful image bears,
And present death in various forms appears.
DRYDEN.
Secure of death, I should contemn thy dart,
Though naked, and impassible depart.
DRYDEN.
I'm weary of the flesh which holds us here,
And dastards manly souls with hope and fear.
DRYDEN.
Happier for me, that all our hours assign'd
Together we had lived; ev'n not in death
disjoin'd.
DRYDEN.
Here hope began to dawn : resolved to try,
She fix'd on this her utmost remedy.
Death was behind; but hard it was to die.
DRYDEN.
Thy unoffending life I could not save ;
Nor weeping could I follow to thy grave.
DRYDEN.
Some few, by temperance taught, approaching
slow,
To distant fate by easy journeys go :
Gently they lay 'em down, as ev'ning sheep
On their own woolly fleeces softly sleep.
DRYDEN.
All parts resound with tumults, plaints, and
fears,
And grisly death, in sundry shapes, appears.
DRYDEN.
I'd show you
How easy 'tis to die by my example,
And handsel fate before you.
DRYDEN.
I am half-seas o'er to death ;
And since I must die once, I would be loth
To make a double work of what's half finish'd.
DRYDEN.
It stopp'd at once the passage of his wind,
And the free soul to flitting air resign'd.
DRYDEN.
Tysiphone there keeps the ward,
Girt in her sanguine gown, by night and day,
Observant of the souls that pass the downward
way.
DRYDEN.
What greater curse could envious fortune give,
Than just to die when I began to live ?
DRYDEN.
128
DEATH.
Limping death, lash'd on by fate,
Comes up to shorten half our date.
DRYDEN.
that I less could fear to lose this being,
Which, like a snow-ball, in my coward hand,
The more 'tis grasp'd, the faster melts away.
DRYDEN.
For death's become to me no dreadful name ;
In fighting fields, where our acquaintance grew,
1 saw him, and contemn'd him first for you.
DRYDEN.
An iron slumber shuts my swimming eyes;
And now farewell ! involved in shades of night,
Forever I am ravish'd from thy sight.
DRYDEN.
A hovering mist came swimming o'er his sight,
And seal'd his eyes in everlasting night.
DRYDEN.
Obstinately bent
To die undaunted, and to circumvent.
DRYDEN.
For me, my stormy voyage at an end,
I to the port of death securely tend.
DRYDEN.
Since every man who lives is born to die,
And none can boast sincere felicity,
With equal mind what happens let us bear,
Nor joy nor grieve for things beyond our care.
Like pilgrims to the appointed place we tend ;
The world's an inn, and death the journey's end.
DRYDEN.
Pale death our leader hath oppress'd :
Come wreak his loss whom bootless ye complain.
FAIRFAX.
Death's what the guilty fear, the pious crave,
Sought by the wretch, and vanquish'd by the
brave.
GARTH.
To die is landing on some silent shore,
Where billows never break, nor tempests roar;
Ere well we feel the friendly stroke, 'tis o'er.
GARTH.
The good man warn'd us from his text
That none could tell whose turn should be the
next.
GAY.
The solemn death-watch click'd the hour she
died,
And shrilling crickets in the chimney cried.
GAY.
Where the brass knocker wrapt in flannel band
Forbids the thunder of the footman's hand;
Th' upholder, rueful harbinger of death,
Waits with impatience for the dying breath.
GAY.
While there is life there's hope, he cried.
GAY.
The prince, who kept the world in awe,
The judge, whose dictate fix'd the law,
The rich, the poor, the great, the small,
Are levell'd : death confounds them all.
GAY.
Beside the bed where parting life was laid,
And sorrow, guilt, and pain by turns dismay'd,
The reverend champion stood. At his control
Despair and anguish fled the struggling soul ;
Comfort came down the trembling wretch to
raise,
And his last faltering accents whisper'd praise.
GOLDSMITH-. Deserted Village.
While resignation gently slopes the way,
And, all his prospects brightening to the last,
His heaven commences ere the world be past.
GOLDSMITH : Deserted Village.
Thy thoughts to nobler meditations give,
And study how to die, not how to live.
GRANVILLE.
The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power,
And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave,
Await alike the inevitable hour :
The paths of glory lead but to the grave.
GRAY: Elegy.
For who, to dumb forgetfulness a prey,
This pleasing, anxious being e'er resign' d,
Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day,
Nor cast one longing, lingering look behind !
GRAY: Elegy.
Can storied urn, or animated bust,
Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath?
Can honour's voice provoke the silent dust,
Or flatt'ry soothe the dull cold ear of death ?
GRAY: Elegy.
The breezy call of incense-breathing morn,
The swallow twittering from the straw-built
shed,
The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn,
No more shall rouse them from their lowly
bed.
GRAY: Elegy.
DEATH.
129
The bad man's death is horror; but the just
Keeps something of his glory in the dust.
HABINGTON: Castara,
Surrender up to me thy captive breath;
My pow'r is nature's pow'r, my name is death.
WALTER HARTE.
In souls prepared, the passage is a breath
From time t' eternity, from life to death.
WALTER HARTE.
Calm on the bosom of thy God,
Fair spirit, rest thee now !
E'en while with ours thy footsteps trod,
His seal was on thy brow.
Dust to its narrow house beneath !
Soul to its place on high !
They that have seen thy look in death
No more may fear to die.
MRS. HEMANS.
This hour is mine : if for the next I care, I
grow too wide,
And do encroach upon death's side.
GEORGE HERBERT.
Flesh is but the glass which holds the dust
That measures all our time, which also shall
Be crumbled into dust.
GEORGE HERBERT.
O loose this frame, this knot of man untie,
That my free soul may use her wing,
Which now is pinion'd with mortality,
As an entangled, hamper'd thing.
GEORGE HERBERT.
Our very hopes belied our fears,
Our fears our hopes belied;
We thought her dying while she slept,
And sleeping when she died.-
HOOD: The Death-bed.
All mankind
Is one of these two cowards ;
Either to wish to die
When he should live, or live when he should die.
SIR ROBERT HOWARD : Blind Lady.
For if, when dead, we are but dust or clay,
Why think of what posterity will say?
Her praise or censure cannot us concern,
Nor ever penetrate the silent urn.
SOAME JENYNS.
Catch, then, oh, catch the transient hour;
Improve each moment as it flies;
Life's a short summer man a flower
He dies, alas ! how soon he dies !
DR. S. JOHNSON.
9
Then, with no throbs of fiery pain,
No cold gradations of decay,
Death broke at once the vital chain,
And freed his soul the nearest way.
DR. S. JOHNSON : on Robert Levett.
This world death's region is, the other life's;
And here it should be one of our first strifes
So to front death as each might judge us past it:
For good men but see death, the wicked taste it.
BEN JONSON.
But hark ! my pulse, like a soft drum,
Beats my approach tells thee I come !
And, slow howe'er my marches be,
I shall at last sit down by thee.
BISHOP HENRY KING.
Death is the pledge of rest, and with one bail
Two prisons quits ; the body and the jail.
BISHOP HENRY KING.
There is no Death ! what seems so is transition ;
This life of mortal breath
Is but a suburb of the life elysian,
Whose portal we call Death.
LONGFELLOW : Resignation.
There is no flock, however watch'd and tended,
But one dead lamb is there !
There is no fireside, howsoe'er defended,
But has one vacant chair.
LONGFELLOW : Resignation.
There is a Reaper, whose name is Death,
And, with his sickle keen,
He reaps the bearded grain at a breath,
And the flowers that grow between.
LONGFELLOW: The Reaper and the
Flowers.
Then fell upon the house a sudden gloom,
A shadow on those features fair and thin,
And softly, from that hush'd and darken'd room,
Two angels issued where but one went in.
LONGFELLOW : Death of Maria Lowell.
Angels of life and death alike are his ;
Without his leave they pass no threshold o'er;
Who then would wish or dare, believing this,
Against his messengers to shut the door?
LONGFELLOW: Death of Maria Lowell.
The rich, the poor, one common bed
Shall find in the unhonour'd grave,
Where weeds shall crown alike the head
Of tyrant and of slave.
MARVELL.
130
DEATH.
The wisest men are glad to die; no fear
Of death can touch a true philosopher:
Death sets the soul at liberty to fly,
Which, whilst imprison'd in the body here,
She cannot learn.
THOMAS MAY: Continuation of Lucan.
If thou covet death, as utmost end
Of misery, so thinking to evade
The penalty pronounced, doubt not but God
Hath wiselier arm'd his vengeful ire, than so
To be forestall' d.
MILTON.
Death thou hast seen
In his first shape on man ; but many shapes
Of death, and many are the ways that lead
To his grim cave ; all dismal ! yet to sense
More terrible at th' entrance than within.
MILTON.
Then thou, the mother of so sweet a child,
Her false imagined loss cease to lament,
And wisely learn to curb thy sorrow wild.
MILTON.
Death
Grinn'd horrible a ghastly smile, to hear
His famine should be fill'd.
MILTON.
Sin, and her shadow death, and miseiy,
Death's harbinger.
MILTON.
Who brought me hither
Will bring me hence ; no other guide I seek.
MILTON.
However I with thee have fix'd my lot,
Certain to undergo like doom ; if death
Consort with thee ; death is to me as life.
MILTON.
But death comes not at call, justice divine
Mends not her slowest pace for pray'rs or cries.
MILTON.
Death becomes
His final remedy; and after life
Tried in sharp tribulation, and refined
By faith and faithful works.
MILTON.
Henceforth I fly not death, nor would prolong
Life much : bent rather how I may be quit
Fairest and easiest of this cumbrous charge.
MILTON.
So dear I love him, that with him all deaths
I would endure ; without him, life no life.
MILTON.
Death unawares, with his cold, kind embrace,
Unhoused thy virgin soul from her fair biding-
place.
MILTON.
Blood, death, and deathful deeds, are in that
noise,
Ruin, destruction at the utmost point.
MILTON.
Is there no way, besides
These painful passages, how we may come
To death, and mix with our connatural dust ?
MILTON.
Behind her death
Close following pace for pace, and mounted yet
On his purple horse.
MILTON.
Thou
Out of the ground wast taken, know thy birth.
For dust thou art, and shalt to dust return.
MILTON.
Speedy death,
The close of all my miseries, and the balm.
MILTON.
Nor will the light of life continue long,
But yields to double darkness nigh at hand ;
So much I feel my genial spirits droop.
MILTON.
Then all this earthly grossness quit,
Attired with stars, we shall forever sit,
Triumphing over death, and chance, and time.
MILTON.
I had hope to spend,
Quiet, though sad, the respite of that day
That must be mortal to us both.
MILTON.
Too secure, because from death released some
days.
MILTON.
Till, like ripe fruit, thou drop
Into thy mother's lap; or be with ease
Gather'd, not harshly pluck'd.
MILTON.
So shalt thou best prepared endure
Thy mortal passage when it comes.
MILTON.
Summers three times eight save one,
She had told; alas! too soon,
After so short time of breath,
To house with darkness and with death.
MILTON.
DEATH.
So much of death her thoughts
Had entertain'd as dyed her cheeks with pale.
MILTON.
O, all my hopes defeated
To free him hence ! But death, who sets all free,
Hath paid his ransom now and full discharge.
MILTON.
When faith and love, which parted from thee
never,
Had ripen'd thy just soul to dwell with God,
Meekly thou didst resign this earthly load
Of death call'd fife.
MILTON.
Nature seems
In all her functions weary of herself;
My race of glory run, and race of shame;
And I shall shortly be with them that rest.
MILTON.
There is a calm for those who weep,
A rest for weary pilgrims found,
They softly lie and sweetly sleep
Low in the ground.
JAMES MONTGOMERY.
No eye to mingle sorrow's tear,
No lip to mingle pleasure's breath,
No tongue to call me kind and dear
'Twas gloomy, and I wish'd for death !
MOORE.
Weep not for those whom the veil of the tomb
In life's happy morning hath hid from our
eyes,
Ere sin threw a blight o'er the spirit's young
bloom,
Or earth had profaned what was born for the
skies.
MOORE.
That tender farewell on the shore
Of this rude world, when all is o'er,
Which cheers the spirit, ere its bark
Puts off into the unknown dark.
MOORE : Lalla Rookh.
When true hearts lie wither'd,
And fond ones are flown,
Oh ! who would inhabit
This bleak world alone ?
MOORE: Last Rose of Summer.
Oft, too, when that disheartening fear
Which all who love beneath this sky
Feel when they gaze on what is dear,
The dreadful thought that it must die !
MOORE: Loves of the Angels.
Since, howe'er protracted, death will come,
Why fondly study with ingenious pains
To put it off! To breathe a little longer
Is to defer our fate, but not to shun it.
HANNAH MORE : David and Goliath.
It must be done, my soul : but 'tis a strange,
A dismal and mysterious change,
When thou shall leave this tenement of clay,
And to an unknown somewhere wing away;
When time shall be eternity, and thou
Shalt be thou know'st not what and live
thou know'st not how !
Amazing state ! no wonder that we dread
To think of death, or view the dead :
Thou'rt all wrapt up in clouds, as if to thee
Our very knowledge had antipathy.
Death could not a more sad retinue find :
Sickness and pain before, and darkness still
behind.
JOHN NORRIS.
Weep not for him that dieth,
For he hath ceased from tears,
And a voice to his replieth
Which he hath not heard for years.
MRS. NORTON.
Death's but a path that must be trod
If man would ever pass to God.
PARNELL.
The marble tombs that rise on high,
Whose dead in vaulted arches lie ;
These, all the poor remains of state,
Adorn the rich, or praise the great.
PARNELL.
Grim death, in different shapes,
Depopulates the nations ; thousands fall
His victims.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Merely to die no man of reason fears ;
For certainly we must,
As we are born, return to dust ;
'Tis the last point of many ling'ring years:
But whither then we go,
Whither we fain would know;
But human understanding cannot show :
This makes us tremble.
POMFRET: Prospect of Death.
Hope humbly, then ; with trembling pinions
Wait the great teacher, death ; and God adore :
What future bliss, he gives not thee to know,
But gives that hope to be thy blessing now.
DEATH.
Taught half by reason, half by mere decay,
To welcome death, and calmly pass away.
POPE.
These eyes behold
The deathful scene ; princes on princes roll'd.
POPE.
The best, the dearest fav'rite of the sky
Must taste that cup; for man is born to die.
POPE.
O Death ! all -eloquent ! you only prove
What dust we dote on when 'tis man we love.
POPE.
Nor think to die dejects my lofty mind ;
All that I dread is leaving you behind !
POPE.
Unblamed through life, lamented in thy end.
POPE.
The balmy zephyrs, silent since her death,
Lament the ceasing of a sweeter breath.
POPE.
As into air the purer spirits flow,
And sep'rate from their kindred dregs below,
So flew her soul to its congenial place.
POPE.
Such were the notes thy once-loved poet sung,
Till death untimely stopp'd his tuneful tongue.
Oh just beheld and lost !
POPE.
A shameful fate now hides my hopeless head :
Unwept, unnoted, and forever dead.
POPE.
At fear of death, that saddens all,
With terrors round, can reason hold her throne,
Despise the known, nor tremble at th' unknown ?
POPE.
Calmly he look'd on either life, and here
Saw nothing to regret, or there to fear ;
From nature's temperate feast rose satisfied ;
Thank'd heav'n that he had lived, and that he
died.
POPE.
If in the melancholy shades below
The flames of friends and lovers cease to glow,
Yet mine shall sacred last, mine undecay'd,
Borne on through death, and animate my shade.
POPE.
Destruction sure o'er all your heads impends,
Ulysses comes, and death his steps attends.
POPE.
They steer" d their course to the same quiet shore,
Not parted long, and now to part no more.
POPE.
Peace to thy gentle shade, and endless rest !
Blest in thy genius, in thy love too blest.
POPE.
See heav'n its sparkling portals wide display,
And break upon thee in a flood of day !
POPE.
Poets themselves must fall, like those they sung :
Deaf the praised ear, and mute the tuneful
tongue.
POPE.
The fainting soul stood ready wing'd for flight,
And o'er his eyeballs swum the shades of night.
POPE.
That wrath which hurl'd to Pluto's gloomy reign
The souls of mighty chiefs untimely slain.
POPE.
The rest are vanish'd, none repass the gate,
i a
And not a man appears to tell their fate
POPE.
Lend, lend your wings ! I mount ! I fly !
O grave ! where is thy victor)- ?
O death ! where is thy sting ?
POPE.
No friend's complaint, no kind domestic tear,
Pleased thy pale ghost, or graced thy mournful
bier.
By foreign hands thy dying eyes were closed,
By foreign hands thy decent limbs composed,
By foreign hands thy humble grave adorn' d,
By strangers honour'd, and by strangers mourn'd.
POPE.
To-morrow comes ; 'tis noon ; 'tis night :
This day like all the former flies ;
Yet on he runs to seek delight
To-morrow, till to-night he dies.
PRIOR.
Must the whole man (amazing thought !) return
To the cold marble and contracted urn ?
And never shall those particles agree
That were in life this individual he ?
PRIOR.
Happy the mortal man, who now at last
Has through this doleful vale of mis'ry past;
Who to his destined stage has carried on
The tedious load, and laid his burden down.
PRIOR.
DEATH.
'33
Wisdom and eloquence in vain would plead
One moment's respite for the learned head ;
Judges of writings and of men have died.
PRIOR.
Nought shall the psalt'ry and the harp avail,
When the quick spirits their warm march
forbear,
And numbing coldness has unbraced the ear.
PRIOR.
From earth all came, to earth must all return,
Frail as the cord, and brittle as the urn.
PRIOR.
Towns, forests, herds, and men promiscuous
drown'd,
With one great death deform the dreary ground.
PRIOR.
Must I pass
Again to nothing, when this vital breath
Ceasing, consigns me o'er to rest and death ?
PRIOR.
Shall our relics second birth receive ?
Sleep we to wake, and only die to live ?
PRIOR.
Nor Nature's law with fruitless sorrow mourn,
But die, O mortal man ! for thou wast born.
PRIOR.
This only object of my real care
In some few posting fatal hours is hurl'd
From wealth, from pow'r, from love, and from
the world.
PRIOR.
He happier yet, who, privileged by fate
To shorter labour and a lighter weight,
Received but yesterday the gift of breath,
Ordain'd to-morrow to return to death.
PRIOR.
We at the sad approach of death shall know
The truth which from these pensive numbers
flow,
That we pursue false joy, and suffer real woe.
PRIOR.
Till as the earthly part decays and falls,
The captive breaks her prison's mould'ring
walls,
Hovers awhile upon the sad remains,
Which now the pile, or sepulchre, contains,
And thence with liberty unbounded flies,
Impatient to regain her native skies.
PRIOR.
When obedient nature knows his will,
A fly, a grape-stone, or a hair can kill.
PRIOR.
A lovely bud, so soft and fair,
Call'd hence by early doom;
Just sent to show how sweet a flower
In Paradise would bloom.
LEGH RICHMOND.
Those that he loved so long, and sees no more,
Loved and still loves, not dead, but gone before.
ROGERS : Human Life.
Remember Milo's end :
W T edged in that timber which he strove to rend.
ROSCOMMON.
My God, my Father, and my Friend,
Do not forsake me in my end.
ROSCOMMON : Translation of Dies Tree.
Thy gentle eyes send forth a quick'ning spirit,
And feed the dying lamp of life within me.
ROWE.
'Tis not the Stoic's lessons got by rote,
The pomp of words and pedant dissertations,
That can sustain thee in that hour of terror :
Books have taught cowards to talk nobly of it,
But when the trial comes they stand aghast.
Hast thou consider'd what may happen after it?
How thy account may stand, and what to answer ?
ROWE.
I ere long that precipice must tread,
Whence none return, that leads unto the dead.
SANDYS.
A little ease to these my torments give,
Before I go where all in silence mourn,
From whose dark shores no travellers return.
SANDYS.
As torrents in the drouth of summer fail,
So perish'd man from death shall never rise.
SANDYS.
No prisoners there, enforced by torments, cry;
But fearless by their old tormentors lie.
SANDYS.
Time rolls his ceaseless course. The race of
yore,
Who danced our infancy upon their knee,
And told our marvelling boyhood legends store
Of strange adventures happ'd by land or sea,
How are they blotted from the things that be !
SCOTT : Lady of the Lake.
134
DEATH.
The sheeted dead
Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets.
SHAKSPEARE.
It is too late; the life of all his blood
Is touch'd corruptibly; and his pure brain
(Which some suppose the soul's frail dwelling-
house)
Doth, by the idle comments that it makes,
Foretell the ending of mortality.
SHAKSPEARE.
We cannot hold mortality's strong hand.
SHAKSPEARE.
To die by thee were but to die in jest ;
From thee to die, were torture more than death.
SHAKSPEARE.
Death, death ! oh, amiable, lovely death,
Come grin on me, and I will think thou smil'st.
SHAKSPEARE.
Death lies on her like an untimely frost
Upon the sweetest flower of all the field.
SHAKSPEARE.
He took my father grossly, full of bread,
With all his crimes broad blown, and flush as
May :
And how his audit stands, who knows save
Heaven?
SHAKSPEARE.
What thou art, resign to death.
SHAKSPEARE.
In death he cried,
Like to a dismal clangour heard from far,
Warwick ! revenge my death !
SHAKSPEARE.
Let me not burst in ignorance, but tell
Why thy canonized bones, hearsed in earth,
Have burst their cerements ?
SHAKSPEARE.
To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time ;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death.
SHAKSPEARE.
Have I not hideous death within my view ?
Retaining but a quantity of life,
Which bleeds away, ev'n as a form of wax
Resolveth from its figure 'gainst the fire ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Men must endure
Their going hence, even as their coming hiiher.
SHAKSPEARE.
'Tis our first intent
To shake all cares and business from our age,
Conferring them on younger strengths, whilst we
Unburthen'd crawl towards death.
SHAKSPEARE.
O, our lives' sweetness!
That with the pain of death we'd hourly die
Rather than die at once.
SHAKSPEARE.
Nothing can we call our own but death,
And that small model of the barren earth
Which serves as paste and cover to our bones.
SHAKSPEARE.
A tearing groan did break
The name of Antony ; it was divided
Between her heart and lips ; she render'd life,
Thy name so buried in her.
SHAKSPEARE.
I will despair, and be at enmity
With cozening hope : he is a flatterer,
A parasite, a keeper-back of death,
Who gently would dissolve the bands of life,
Which false hope lingers in extremity.
SHAKSPEARE.
That life is better life, past fearing death,
Than that which lives to fear.
SHAKSPEARE.
This world I do renounce ; and in your sights
Shake patiently my great affliction off.
SHAKSPEARE.
Vexation almost stops my breath,
That sunder'd friends greet in the hour of death.
SHAKSPEARE.
To die to sleep
To sleep ! perchance to dream ; ay, there's the
rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may
come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause.
SHAKSPEARE.
To be imprison'd in the viewless winds,
And blown with restless violence round about
The pendent world ; or to be worse than worst
Of those, that lawless and incertain thoughts
Imagine howling! 'tis too horrible!
SHAKSPEARE.
DEATH.
135
The weariest and most loathed worldly life
That age, ache, penury, imprisonment
Can lay on nature, is a paradise
To what we fear of death.
SHAKSPEARE.
How will my mother for a father's death
Take on with me, and ne'er be satisfied !
SHAKSPEARE.
The sense of death is most in apprehension ;
And the poor beetle that we tread upon
In corporal sufferance finds a pang as great
As when a giant dies.
SHAKSPEARE.
Bid him bring his power
Before sun-rising, lest his son George fall
Into the blind cave of eternal night.
SHAKSPEARE.
Ah, what a sign it is of evil life
When death's approach is seen so terrible !
SHAKSPEARE.
Mark! we use
To say the dead are well.
SHAKSPEARE.
But once put out thy light,
Thou cunning'st pattern of excelling nature,
I know not where is that Promethean heat
That can thy light relume..
SHAKSPEARE.
Thou hast finish'd joy and moan;
All lovers young, all lovers must
Consign to thee, and come to dust.
SHAKSPEARE.
What obscured light the heav'ns did grant
Did but convey unto our fearful minds
A doubtful warrant of immediate death.
SHAKSPEARE.
Had I but time (as this fell sergeant, death,
Is strict in his arrest), oh! I could tell.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thy eyes' windows fall,
Like death, when he shuts up the day of life;
Each part, deprived of supple government,
Shall, stiff, and stark, and cold, appear like
death.
SHAKSPEARE.
Poison, I see, hath been his timeless end !
O churl, drink all, and leave no friendly drop
To help me after !
SHAKSPEARE.
I must yield my body to the earth :
Thus yields the cedar to the axe's edge,
Whose arms gave shelter to the princely eagle ;
Under whose shade the ramping lion slept;
Whose top-branch overpeer'd Jove's spreading
tree,
And kept low shrubs from winter's pow'rful
wind.
SHAKSPEARE.
Disturb him not ; let him pass peaceably.
SHAKSPEARE.
I have heard thee say,
No grief did ever come so near thy heart
As when thy lady and thy true love died.
SHAKSPEARE.
Comfort, dear mother : God is much displeased
That you take with unthankfulness his doing;
In common worldly things 'tis called ungrateful
With dull unwillingness to repay a debt
Which with a bounteous hand was kindly lent;
Much more to be thus opposite with heaven,
For it requires the royal debt it lent you.
SHAKSPEARE.
He at Venice gave
His body to that pleasant country's earth,
And his pure soul unto his captain Christ,
Under whose colours he had fought so long.
SHAKSPEARE.
So shall you hear
Of accidencal judgments, casual slaughters;
Of deaths, put on by cunning and forced cause.
SHAKSPEARE.
But now the arbitrator of despairs,
Just death, kind umpire of man's miseries,
With sweet enlargement doth dismiss me hence.
SHAKSPEARE.
Let's choose executors, and talk of wills;
And yet not so for what can we bequeath,
Save our deposed bodies to the ground ?
SHAKSPEARE.
I am a tainted wether of the flock,
Meetest for death : the weakest kind of fruit
Drops earliest to the ground, and so let me.
SHAKSPEARE.
Vex not his ghost : oh, let him pass ! He hates
him
That would upon the rack of this rough world
Stretch him out longer.
SHAKSPEARE.
136
DEATH.
The sceptre, learning, physic, must
All follow this, and come to dust.
SHAKSPEARE.
That undiscover'd country, from whose bourn
No traveller returns.
SHAKSPEARE.
When beggars die, there are no comets seen :
The heav'ns themselves blaze forth the death of
princes.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thy death-bed is no lesser than thy land,
Wherein thou liest in reputation sick.
SHAKSPEARE.
Death, a necessary end,
Will come when it will come.
SHAKSPEARE.
Had I but died an hour before this chance,
I had lived a blessed time : for, from this instant,
There's nothing serious in mortality.
SHAKSPEARE.
I, in mine own woe charm'd,
Could not find death where I did hear him
groan,
Nor feel him where he struck.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thou thought'st to help me, and such thanks I
give
As one near death to those that wish him live.
SHAKSPEARE.
Death, that hath ta'en her hence to make me
wait,
Ties up my tongue, and will not let me speak.
SHAKSPEARE.
This day I breathed my first; time is come
round ;
And where I did begin, there shall I end :
My life is run its compass.
SHAKSPEARE.
The dead man's knell
Is there scarce ask'd, for who; and good men's
lives
Expire before the flowers in their caps,
Dying, or ere they sicken.
SHAKSPEARE.
Is not the causer of these timeless deaths
As blameful as the executioner ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Not helping, death's my fee;
But if I help, what do you promise me ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Without her, follows to myself, and thee,
Herself, the land, and many a Christian soul,
Death, desolation, ruin, and decay.
SHAKSPEARE.
When he shall hear she died upon his words,
The ever lovely organ of her life
Shall come apparell'd in more precious habit
Than when she lived indeed.
SHAKSPEARE.
Dark cloudy death o'ershades his beams of life,
And he nor sees nor hears us.
SHAKSPEARE.
Death and nature do contend about them,
W T hether they live or die.
SHAKSPEARE.
Witness my son, now in the shade of death,
Whose bright outshining beams thy cloudy wrath
Hath in eternal darkness folded up.
SHAKSPEARE.
Her physician tells me
She has pursued conclusions infinite
Of easy ways to die.
SHAKSPEARE.
How oft when men are at the point of death
Have they been merry ! which their keepers call
A lightning before death.
SHAKSPEARE.
The tongues of dying men
Enforce attention, like deep harmony;
Where words are scarce, they're seldom spent
in vain ;
For they breathe truth that breathe their words
in pain.
SHAKSPEARE.
Nothing in his life
Became him like the leaving it ; he died
As one that had been studied in his death
To throw away the dearest thing he owed
As 'twere a careless trifle.
SHAKSPEARE.
Giving his reason passport for to pass
Whither it would, so it would let him die.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
The reconciling grave
Swallows distinction first, that made us foes,
That all alike lie down in peace together.
SOUTHERN : Fatal Marriage.
What a world were this,
How unendurable its weight, if they
Whom Death hath sunder'd did not meet again !
SOUTHEY.
DEATH.
137
Death I to the happy thou art terrible ;
But how the wretched love to think of thee,
O thou true comforter : the friend of all
Who have no friend beside !
SOUTHEY: Joan of Arc.
Most glorious Lord of life, that on this day
Didst make thy triumph over death and sin,
And, having harrow'd hell, didst bring away
Captivity thence captive, us to win.
SPENSER.
The life did flit away out of her nest,
And all his senses were with deadly fit opprest.
SPENSER.
Such life should be the honour of your light;
Such death the sad ensample of your night.
SPENSER.
And now the prey of fowls he lies;
Nor wail'd of friends, nor laid on groaning bier.
SPENSER.
To dally thus with death is no fit toy :
Go find some other playfellows, mine own sweet
boy.
SPENSER.
Breaking off the end for want of breath,
And sliding soft, as down to sleep her laid,
She ended all her woe in quiet death.
SPENSER.
Leave, ah, leave off, whatever wight thou be,
To let a weary wretch from her due rest,
And trouble dying soul's tranquillity !
SPENSER.
But direful, deadly black, both leaf and bloom,
Fit to adorn the dead, and deck the dreary
tomb.
SPENSER.
The messenger of death, the ghastly owl,
With dreary shrieks did also yell;
And hungry wolves continually did howl
At her abhorred face, so horrid and so foul.
SPENSER.
Softly feel
Her feeble pulse, to prove if any drop
Of living blood yet in her veins did hop.
SPENSER.
O man ! have mind of that most bitter throe,
For as the tree does fall, so lies it ever low.
SPENSER.
Is it not better to die willingly,
Than linger till the glass be all outrun ?
SPENSER.
Come then, come soon; come, sweetest death,
to me,
And take away this long lent loathed light :
Sharpe be thy wounds, but sweete the medi-
cines be
That long captived soules from weary thral-
dome free.
SPENSER.
What life refused, to gain by death he thought :
For life and death are but indifPrent things,
And of themselves not to be shunn'd nor sought,
But for the good or ill that either brings.
EARL OF STIRLING.
Death is the port where all may refuge find,
The end of labour, entry unto rest;
Death hath the bounds of misery confined,
Whose sanctuary shrouds affliction best.
EARL OF STIRLING.
The fools, my juniors by a year,
Are tortured with suspense and fear,
Who wisely thought my age a screen,
When death approach'd to stand between.
SWIFT.
One year is past, a different scene !
No farther mention of the dean :
Who now, alas, no more is mist
Than if he never did exist.
SWIFT.
That loss is common would not make
My own less bitter, rather more :
Too common ! Never morning wore
To evening, but some heart did break.
TENNYSON : In Memoriam.
Whatever crazy sorrow saith,
No life that breathes with human breath
Has ever truly long'd for death.
TENNYSON: Two Voices.
Our drooping days are' dwindled down to nought,
Their period finish'd ere 'tis well begun.
THOMSON.
Ah ! little think they, while they dance along,
How many feel, this very moment, death,
And all the sad variety of pain !
THOMSON: Seasons.
The best
Are, by the playful children of this world,
At once forgot, as they had never been.
THOMSON : Tancred and Sigismund.
'38
DEA TH. -DE CEIT.
We must resign! heav'n his great soul doth
claim
In storms as loud as his immortal fame :
His dying groans, his last breath, shake our isle,
And trees uncut fall for his fun'ral pile.
WALLER.
While I listen to thy voice,
Chloris ! I feel my life decay;
That powerful noise
Calls my fleeting soul away.
WALLER.
O cruel death ! to those you are more kind
Than to the wretched mortals left behind.
WALLER.
Love and beauty still that visage grace ;
Death cannot fright 'em from their wonted
place.
WALLER.
Heart-rending news, and dreadful to those few
Who her resemble, and her steps pursue ;
That death should license have to rage among
The fair, the wise, the virtuous, and the young!
WALLER.
He first deceased, she for a little tried
To live without him, liked it not, and died.
WOTTON.
The chamber where the good man meets his
fate
Is privileged beyond the common walk
Of virtuous life, quite in the verge of heaven.
YOUNG.
At death's toll, whose restless iron tongue
Calls daily for his millions at a meal,
Starting I woke, and found myself undone.
YOUNG.
On death-beds some in conscious glory lie,
Since of the doctor in the mode they die.
YOUNG.
Men drop so fast, ere life's mid stage we tread,
Few know so many friends alive as dead.
YOUNG.
Like other tyrants, death delights to smite
What, smitten, most proclaims the pride of pow'r,
And arbitrary nod. His joy supreme,
To bid the wretch survive the fortunate ;
The feeble wrap the athletic in his shroud;
And weeping fathers build their children's tomb.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
Some weep in perfect justice to the dead,
As conscious all their love is in arrear.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
Life is the triumph of our mould'ring clay ;
Death, of the spirit infinite ! divine !
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
All men think all men mortal but themselves.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
That man lives greatly,
Whate'er his fate, or fame, who greatly dies ;
High flush'd with hope, where heroes shall
despair.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
Death loves a shining mark, a signal blow.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
A death-bed's a detector of the heart :
Here tired dissimulation drops her mask,
Through life's grimace that mistress of the scene;
Here real and apparent are the same.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
Death is the crown of life :
Were death denied, poor man would live in vain.
Death' wounds to cure; we fall, we rise, we reign;
Spring from our fetters, fasten to the skies,
Where blooming Eden withers from our sight.
This king of terrors is the prince of peace.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
Faith builds a bridge across the gulf of death,
To break the shock blind nature cannot shun,
And lands thought smoothly on the farther shore.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
DECEIT.
In troth, thou'rt able to instruct gray hairs,
And teach the wily African deceit.
ADDISON.
With such deceits he gain'd their easy hearts,
Too prone to credit his perfidious arts.
DRYDEN.
The walk, the words, the gesture could supply,
The habit mimic, and the mien belie.
DRYDEN.
An honest man may take a knave's advice,
But idiots only may be cozen'd twice.
DRYDEN.
Thou'lt fall into deception unaware,
Not keeping strictest watch.
MILTON.
DECEIT. DEEDS. DEL A Y.
139
Oh, colder than the wind that freezes
Founts that but now in sunshine play'd,
Is that congealing pang which seizes
The trusting bosom when betray'd.
MOORE: Lalla Rookh.
Adieu the heart-expanding bowl,
And all the kind deceivers of the soul.
POPE.
O what a tangled web we weave
When first we practise to deceive !
SIR W. SCOTT : Marmion.
Teach me, dear creature, how to think and
speak ;
Lay open to my earthy gross conceit,
Smother'd in errors, feeble, shallow, weak,
The folded meaning of your words' deceit.
SHAKSPEARE.
Yet there is a credence in my heart,
That doth invert th' attest of eyes and ears ;
As if those organs had deceptious functions,
Created only to calumniate.
SHAKSPEARE.
She that, so young, could give out such a seem-
ing,
To seal her father's eyes up close as oak.
SHAKSPEARE.
His givings out were of an infinite distance
From his true meant design.
O, that deceit should dwell
In such a gorgeous palace !
SHAKSPEARE.
SHAKSPEARE.
Sigh no more, ladies, sigh no more ;
Men were deceivers ever :
One foot in sea, and one on shore ;
To one thing constant never.
SHAKSPEARE.
What man so wise, what earthly wit so ware,
'As to descry the crafty cunning train
By which deceit doth mask in visor fair
And cast her colours dyed deep in grain,
To seem like truth, whose shape she well can
feign ?
SPENSER.
DEEDS.
Thousands were there, in darker fame that dwell,
Whose deeds some nobler poem shall adorn.
DRYDEN.
And deeds could only deeds unjust maintain.
DRYDEN.
I, on the other side,
Used no ambition to commend my deeds;
The deeds themselves, though mute, spoke loud
the doer.
' MILTON.
Instant, he cried, your female discord end,
Ye deedless boasters ! and the song attend.
POPE.
Speaking in deeds, and deedless in his tongue.
SHAKSPEARE.
From lowest place when virtuous things pro-
ceed,
The place is dignified by th' doer's deed.
SHAKSPEARE.
DELAY.
Defer not till to-morrow to be wise :
To-morrow's sun to thee may never rise.
CONGREVE : Letter to Cobham.
Think not to-morrow still shall be your care ;
Alas! to-morrow like to-day will fare.
Reflect that yesterday's to-morrow's o'er,
Thus one " to-morrow," one " to-morrow" more,
Have seen long years before them fade away,
And still appear no nearer than to-day.
GlFFORD: Perseus.
I have learn'd that fearful commenting
Is leaden servitor to dull delay;
Delay leads impotent and snail-paced beggary.
SHAKSPEARE.
Time, thou anticipat'st my dread exploits;
The flighty purpose never is o'ertook,
Unless the deed go with it.
SHAKSPEARE.
Be wise with speed;
A fool at forty is a fool indeed.
YOUNG: Love of Fame.
Be wise to-day; 'tis madness to defer.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
Procrastination is the thief of time.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
Time flies, death urges, knells call, heaven
invites,
Hell threatens.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
140
DELIGHT. DESOLA TION. DESPAIR.
DELIGHT.
Such huge extremes when nature doth unite,
Wonder from thence results, from thence delight.
SIR J. DENHAM.
She was his care, his hope, and his delight,
Most in his thought, and ever in his sight.
DRYDEN.
Longing they look, and, gaping at the sight,
Devour her o'er and o'er with vast delight.
DRYDEN.
With wonder seized, we view the pleasing
ground,
And walk delighted, and expatiate round.
POPE.
He heard, he took, and pouring down his throat,
Delighted, swill'd the large luxurious draught.
POPE.
Well I entreated her, who well deserved :
I call'd her often; for she always served:
Use made her person easy to my sight,
And ease insensibly produced delight.
PRIOR.
Come, sisters, cheer we up his sprights,
And show the best of our delights :
We'll charm the air to give a sound,
While you perform your antic round.
SHAKSPEARE.
These violent delights have violent endr,
And in their triumph die; like fire and powder,
Which, as they meet, consume.
SHAKSPEARE.
Why, all delights are vain; but that most vain,
Which with pain purchased doth inherit pain.
SHAKSPEARE.
Most happy he
Whose least delight sufficeth to deprive
Remembrance of all pains which him opprest.
SPENSER.
DESOLATION.
No one is so accursed by fate,
No one so utterly desolate,
But some heart, though unknown,
Responds unto his own.
LONGFELLOW: Endymion.
WTiere cities stood,
Well fenced, and numerous, desolation reigns,
And emptiness; dismay'd, unfed, unhoused,
The widow and the orphan stroll.
JOHN PHILIPS.
My desolation does begin to make
A better life. SHAKSPEARE.
DESPAIR.
Talk not of comfort ; 'tis for lighter ills :
I will indulge my sorrows, and give way
To all the pangs and fury of despair.
ADDISON : Cato.
I tell you, hopeless grief is passionless :
That only men incredulous of despair,
Half taught in anguish, through the midnight
air,
Beat upward to God's throne in loud access
Of shrieking and reproach.
MRS. BROWNING.
Eager to hope, but not less firm to bear ;
Acquainted with all feelings save despair.
BYRON: Island.
Beware of desperate steps: the darkest day,
Live till to-morrow, will have pass'd away.
COWPER : The Needless Alarm.
Uncertain ways unsafest are,
And doubt a greater mischief than despair.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Equal their flame, unequal was their care :
One loved with hope, one languish'd with de-
spair.
DRYDEN.
He raved with all the madness of despair ;
He roar'd, he beat his breast, he tore his hair.
DRYDEN.
Drown'd in deep despair,
He dares not offer one repenting prayer :
Amazed he lies, and sadly looks for death.
DRYDEN.
Nor flight was left, nor hopes to force his way,
Imbolden'd by despair, he stood at bay.
DRYDEN.
Her life she might have had ; but the despair
Of saving his, had put it past her care.
DRYDEN.
Expense, and after-thought, and idle care,
And doubts of motley hue, and dark despair.
DRYDEN.
Despair, that aconite does prove
And certain death to others' love,
That poison never yet withstood,
Does nourish mine, and turns to blood.
GRANVILLE.
DESPAIR. DESTINY. DE VO TION.
141
Wouldst thou unlock the door
To cold despairs and gnawing pensiveness ?
GEORGE HERBERT.
Despair takes heart when there's no hope to
speed :
The coward then takes arms and does the deed.
HERRICK.
So spake th' apostate angel, though in pain ;
Vaunting aloud, but rack'd with deep despair.
MILTON.
Some whose meaning hath at first been fair
Grow knaves by use, and rebels by despair.
ROSCOMMON.
If a wild uncertainty prevail,
And turn your veering heart with ev'ry gale,
You lose the fruit of all your former care,
For the sad prospect of a just despair.
ROSCOMMON.
My heart and my chill veins freeze with despair.
ROWE.
Oh, can your counsel his despair defer,
Who now is housed in his sepulchre ?
SANDYS.
How all the other passions fleet to air,
As doubtful thoughts, and rash embraced despair !
SHAKSPEARE.
Discomfort guides my tongue,
And bids me speak of nothing but despair.
SHAKSPEARE.
To-morrow in the battle think on me,
And fall thy edgeless sword; despair and die.
SHAKSPEARE.
Why should he despair, that knows to court
With words, fair looks, and liberality ?
SHAKSPEARE.
I will keep her ign'rant of her good,
To make her heav'nly comforts of despair,
When it is least expected.
SHAKSPEARE.
Curst be good haps, and curst be they that build
Their hopes on haps, and do not make despair
For all these certain blows the surest shield.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
DESTINY.
Had thy great destiny but given thee skill
To know, as well as pow'r to act, her will.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Chance, or forceful destiny,
Which forms in causes first whate'er shall be.
DRYDEN.
The father bore it with undaunted soul,
Like one who durst his destiny control.
DRYDEN.
Far from that hated face the Trojans fly;
All but the fool who sought his destiny.
DRYDEN.
How can hearts not free be tried whether they
serve
Willing or no, who will but what they must
By destiny, and can no other choose ?
MILTON.
He said, Dear daughter, rightly may I rue
The fall of famous children born of me ;
But who can turn the stream of destiny,
Or break the chain of strong necessity,
Which fast is tied to Jove's eternal seat?
SPENSER.
DEVOTION.
Think, O my soul, devoutly think,
How, with affrighted eyes,
Thou saw'st the wide-extended deep
In all its horrors rise.
ADDISON.
In vain doth man the name of just expect,
If his devotions he to God neglect.
SIR J. DENHAM.
For this, with soul devout, he thank'd the god,
And, of success secure, return'd to his abode.
DRYDEN.
Meantime her warlike brother on the seas
His waving streamers to the winds displays,
And vows for his return with vain devotion pays.
DRYDEN.
Grateful to acknowledge whence his good
Descends, thither with heart, and voice, and eyes
Directed to devotion, to adore
And worship God supreme, who made him chief
Of all his works.
MILTON.
From the full choir when loud hosannas rise,
And swell the pomp of dreadful sacrifice,
Amid that scene, if some relenting eye
Glance on the stone where our cold reliques lie,
Devotion's self shall steal a thought from
heaven,
One human tear shall drop, and be forgiven.
POPE.
142 DISCONTENT. DISHONOUR. DISPRAISE. DISTRESS.
View not this spire by measure given
To buildings raised by common hands :
That fabric rises high as heaven,
Whose basis on devotion stands.
PRIOR.
An aged holy man,
That night and day said his devotion,
Ne other worldly business did apply.
SPENSER.
DISCONTENT.
'Tis not my talent to conceal my thoughts,
Or carry smiles and sunshine in my face
When discontent sits heavy at my heart.
ADDISON.
Cellars and granaries in vain we fill
With all the bounteous summer's store,
If the mind thirst and hunger still :
The poor rich man's emphatically poor.
COWLEY.
Grieved with disgrace, remaining in their fears :
However seeming outwardly content,
Yet th' inward touch their wounded honour
bears.
DANIEL.
That grates my heart-strings : what should dis-
content him?
Except he thinks I live too long.
SIR J. DENHAM.
The discontented now are only they
Whose crimes before did your just cause betray.
DRYDEN.
Alone sometimes she walk'd in secret, where
To ruminate upon her discontent.
FAIRFAX.
Not that their pleasures caused her discontent :
She sigh'd, not that they stay'd, but that she went.
POPE.
The goddess, with a discontented air,
Seems to reject him, but she grants his prayer.
POPE.
Here comes a man of comfort, whose advice
Hath often still'd my brawling discontent.
SHAKSPEARE.
My heart is drown'd with grief,
My body round engirt with misery ;
For what's more miserable than discontent?
^SHAKSPEARE.
I know a discontented gentleman,
Whose humble means match not his haughty
mind.
SHAKSPEARE.
DISHONOUR.
Will you thus dishonour
Your past exploits, and sully all your wars?
ADDISON: Cato.
Our foe's too proud the weaker to assail,
Or doubles his dishonour if he fail.
DRYDEN.
I'd rather crack my sinews, break my back,
Than you should such dishonour undergo.
SHAKSPEARE.
DISPRAISE.
I need not raise
Trophies to thee from other men's dispraise.
SIR J. DENHAM.
To me reproach
Rather belongs, distrust, and all dispraise.
MILTON.
Nothing is here for tears, nothing to wail
Or knock the breasts, no weakness, no con-
tempt,
Dispraise, or blame. MILTON.
If I can do it
By aught that I can speak in his dispraise,
She shall not long continue love to him.
SHAKSPEARE.
DISTRESS.
There can I sit alone, unseen of any,
And to the nightingale's complaining notes
Tune my distresses, and record my woes.
SHAKSPEARE.
I often did beguile her of her tears,
When I did speak of some distressful stroke
That my youth suffer'd.
SHAKSPEARE.
DOUBTS.
To every doubt your answer is the same,
It so fell out, and so by chance it came.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
DOUB TS. DRAMA.
Known mischiefs have their cure, but doubts
have none ;
And better is despair than fruitless hope
Mix'd with a killing fear.
THOMAS MAY : Cleopatra.
Who shall decide when doctors disagree,
And soundest casuists doubt, like you and me ?
POPE.
The wound of peace is surety,
Surety secure ; but modest doubt is call'd
The beacon of the wise, the tent that searches
To the bottom of the worst.
SHAKSPEARE.
Doubting things go ill often hurts more
Than to be sure they do ; for certainties
Either are past remedies, or, timely knowing,
The remedy then born.
SHAKSPEARE.
Our doubts are traitors,
And make us lose the good we oft might win,
By fearing to attempt.
SHAKSPEARE.
DRAMA.
In this grave age, when comedies are few,
We crave your patronage for one that's new;
And let the scarceness recommend the fare.
ADDISON.
Long have your ears been fill'd with tragic
parts ;
Blood and blank verse have harden'd all your
hearts.
ADDISON.
Long has a race of heroes fill'd the stage,
That rant by note, and through the gamut rage,
In songs and airs express, their martial fire,
Combat in trills, and in a fugue expire.
ADDISON.
Then shall the British stage
More noble characters expose to view,
And draw her finish'd heroines from you.
ADDISON.
When a good actor doth his part present,
In ev'ry act he our attention draws,
That, at the last, he may find just applause.
SIR J. DENHAM.
By Shakspeare's, Jonson's, Fletcher's lines,
Our stage's lustre Rome outshines.
SIR J. DENHAM.
On the world's stage, when our applause grows
high,
For acting here life's tragi-comedy,
The lookers-on will say we act not well,
Unless the last the former scenes excel.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Now you will all be wits ; and he, I pray,
And you, that discommend it, mend the play.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Courts are theatres, where some men play
Princes, some slaves, and all end in one day.
JOHN DONNE.
Great Fletcher never treads in buskins here,
Nor greater Jonson dares in socks appear ;
But gentle Simkin just reception finds
Amidst the monuments of vanish'd minds.
DRYDEN.
Let Cully, Cockwood, Fopling charm the pit,
And in their folly show the author's wit.
DRYDEN.
Thus they jog on, still tricking, never thriving,
And murd'ring plays, which still they call re-
viving.
DRYDEN.
To the well-lung'd tragedian's rage
They recommend their labours of the stage.
DRYDEN.
Both adorn'd their age;
One for the study, t'other for the stage.
DRYDEN.
There's a dearth of wit in this dull town,
While silly plays so savourily go down.
DRYDEN.
Our poet may
Himself admire the fortune of his play;
And arrogantly, as his fellows do,
Think he writes well, because he pleases you.
DRYDEN.
Like mine, thy gentle numbers feebly creep,
Thy tragic muse gives smiles, thy comic sleep.
DRYDEN.
Thine be the laurel, then; support the stage,
Which so declines, that shortly we may see
Players and plays reduced to second infancy.
DRYDEN.
Ev'n kings but play; and when their part is done,
Some other, worse or better, mounts the throne.
DRYDEN.
144
DRAMA.
Unfledged actors learn to laugh and cry.
DRYDEN.
Now luck for us, and a kind hearty pit ;
For he who pleases never fails of wit.
DRYDEN.
These, waving plots, found out a better way :
Some god descended, and preserved the play.
DRYDEN.
'Twere well your judgments but in plays did
range ;
But ev'n your follies and debauches change
With such a whirl, the poets of your age
Are tired, and cannot score them on the stage.
DRYDEN.
His muse had starved, had not a piece unread,
And by a player bought, supplied her bread.
DRYDEX.
If his characters were good,
The scenes entire, and freed from noise and
blood,
The action great, yet circumscribed by time,
The words not forced, but sliding into rhyme,
He thought, in hitting these, his business done.
DRYDEN.
What men of spirit nowadays
Come to give sober judgment of new plays?
GARRICK.
Here saunt'ring 'prentices o'er Otway weep.
GAY.
Plays in themselves have neither hopes nor fears :
Their fate is only in their hearers' ears.
BEN JONSON.
Come, leave the loathed stage,
And this more loathsome age ;
Where pride and impudence, in faction knit,
Usurp the chair of wit.
BEN JONSON.
O that, as oft I have at Athens seen
The stage arise, and the big clouds descend,
So now in very deed I might behold
The pond'rous earth, and all yon marble roof,
Meet like the hands of Jove.
LEE: (Edipus.
Let gorgeous Tragedy
In sceptred pall come sweeping by.
MILTON.
Or what, though rare, of later age,
Ennobled hath the buskin' d stage?
MILTON.
Then to the well-trod stage anon,
If Jonson's learned sock be on,
Or sweetest Shakspeare, Fancy's child,
Warble his native wood-notes wild.
MILTON : L 1 Allegro.
Our scene precariously subsists too long
On French translation and Italian song:
Dare to have sense yourselves; assert the stage,
Be justly warm'd with your own native rage.
POPE.
Our author
Produced his play, and begg'd the knight's
advice ;
Made him observe the subject and the plot,
The manners, passions, unities, what not ?
POPE.
How tragedy and comedy embrace,
How farce and epic get a jumbled race.
POPE.
If three ladies like a play,
Take the whole house upon the poet's day.
POPE.
Pit, box, and gall'ry in convulsions hurl'd,
Thou stand's! unshook amidst a bursting world.
POPE.
Whilst all its throats the gallery extends,
And all the thunder of the pit ascends.
POPE.
A long, exact, and serious comedy;
In every scene some moral let it teach,
And, if it can, at once both please and preach.
POPE.
Oh, great restorer of the good old stage,
Preacher at once, and zany, of thy age.
POPE.
The man in graver tragic known,
Though his best part long since was done,
Still on the stage desires to tarry ;
And he who play'd the harlequin,
After the jest still loads the scene,
Unwilling to retire, though weary.
PRIOR?
Next, Comedy appear'd, with great applause,/
Till her licentious and abusive tongue
Waken'd the magistrate's coercive power.
ROSCOMMON,,
A comic subject loves an humble verse; "
Thyestes scorns a low and comic style; -
Yet Comedy sometimes may raise her voice. "*
ROSCOMMON.
DRAMA . DREAMS.
'45
Tragedy should blush as much to stoop
To the low mimic follies of a farce,
As a gay matron would to dance with girls.
ROSCOMMON.
The first tragedians found that serious style
Too grave for their uncultivated age.
ROSCOMMON.
Medea must not draw her murthering knife
And spill her children's blood upon the stage.
ROSCOMMON.
Like a strutting player, whose conceit
Lies in his hamstring, he doth think it rich
To hear the wooden dialogue and sound
'Twixt his stretch'd footing and the scaffoldage.
SHAKSPEARE.
I've heard that guilty creatures, at a play,
Have, by the very cunning of the scene,
Been struck so to the soul, that presently
They have proclaim' d their malefactions.
SHAKSPEARE.
Is it not monstrous that this player here,
But in a fiction, in a dream of passion,
Could force his soul so to his own conceit,
That, from her working, all his visage wann'd?
SHAKSPEARE.
What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba,
That he should weep for her? What would
he do,
Had he the motive and the cue for passion
That I have ? He would drown the stage with
tears.
SHAKSPEARE.
Your honour's players
Are come to play a pleasant comedy.
SHAKSPEARE.
Only they
That come to hear a merry play
Will be deceived.
SHAKSPEARE.
I can counterfeit the deep tragedian ;
Speak, and look back, and pry on every side,
Tremble and start at wagging of a straw,
Intending deep suspicion.
SHAKSPEARE.
\Yhy look you still so stern and tragical ?
SHAKSPEARE.
All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players ;
They have their exits and their entrances.
SHAKSPEARE.
10
for a muse of fire, that would ascend
The brightest heaven of invention !
A kingdom for a stage, princes to act,
And monarchs to behold the swelling scene.
SHAKSPEARE.
So to repel the Vandals of the stage,
Our vet'ran bard resumes his tragic rage ;
He throws the gauntlet Otway used to wield,
And calls for Englishmen to judge the field.
SOUTHERN.
The rout and tragical effect
Vouchsafe, O thou the mournful'st muse of nine,
That wont'st the tragic stage for to direct,
In funeral complaints and wailful tine
Reveal to me.
SPENSER.
Sometimes I joy, when glad occasion fits,
And mask in mirth like to a comedy;
Soon after, when my joy to sorrow flits,
I will make my woes a tragedy.
SPENSER.
You dread reformers of an impious age,
You awful cat-o'-nine-tails to the stage,
This once be just, and in our cause engage.
Prologue to VanbrugK's False Friend.
Of all our eldest plays,
This and Philaster have the loudest fame ;
Great are their faults, and glorious is their flame;
In both our English genius is exprest,
Lofty and bold, but negligently drest.
WALLER.
1 never yet the tragic muse essay'd,
Deterr'd by thy inimitable maid ;
And when I venture at the comic style,
Thy scornful lady seems to mock my toil.
WALLER.
The knowing artist may
Judge better than the people, but a play
Made for delight,
If you approve it not, has no excuse.
WALLER.
Hence Gildon rails, that raven of the pit,
Who thrives upon the carcasses of wit.
YOUNG.
DREAMS.
A kind refreshing sleep is fall'n upon him :
I saw him stretch'd at ease, his fancy lost
In pleasing dreams.
ADDISON.
146
DREAMS.
But dreams full oft are found of real events
The forms and shadows.
JOANNA BAILLIE : Ethelwald.
The heathen bards, who idle fables drest,
Illusive dreams in mystic forms exprest.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Close by a softly murm'ring stream,
Where lovers used to loll and dream.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
Dreams in their development have breath,
And tears, and tortures, and the touch of joy;
They leave a weight upon our waking thoughts,
They take a weight from off our waking toils ;
They do divide our being : they become
A portion of ourselves, 'as of our time,
And look like heralds of eternity.
BYRON: Dream.
I would recall a vision which I dream' d,
Perchance in sleep, for in itself a thought,
A slumb'ring thought, is capable of years,
And curdles a long life into one hour.
BYRON: Dream.
Well may dreams present us fictions,
Since our waking moments teem
With such fanciful convictions
As make life itself a dream.
CAMPBELL.
But sorrow return'd with the dawning of morn,
And the voice in my dreaming ear melted away.
CAMPBELL : Soldier's Dream.
In sleep, when fancy is let loose to play,
Our dreams repeat the wishes of the day :
Though further toil his tired limbs refuse,
The dreaming hunter still the chase pursues;
The judge a-bed dispenses still the laws,
And sleeps again o'er the unfinish'd cause ;
The dozing racer hears his chariot roll,
Smacks the vain whip, and shuns the fancied goal :
Me too the Muses, in the silent night,
With wonted chimes of jingling verse delight.
CLAUDIUS.
What studies please, what most delight,
And fill men's thoughts, they dream them o'er
at night,
v CREECH.
Nature else hath conference
With profound sleep, and so doth warning send
By prophetizing dreams.
DANIEL.
This busy power is working day and night;
For when the outward senses rest do take,
A thousand dreams, fantastical and light,
With fluttering wings do keep her still awake.
SIR J. DAVIES.
Think of all our miseries
But as some melancholy dream which has
awaked us
To the renewing of our joys.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Could we not wake from that lethargic dream
But to be restless in a worse extreme?
SIR J. DENHAM.
All thy fears,
Thy wakeful terrors, and affrighting dreams,
Have now their full reward.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Dreams are but interludes which fancy makes ;
When monarch reason sleeps, this mimic wakes,
Compounds a medley of disjointed things,
A court of cobblers, and a mob of kings.
Light fumes are merry, grosser fumes are sad :
Both are the reasonable soul run mad.
DRYDEN.
Their reason sleeps, but mimic fancy wakes,
Supplies her parts, and wild ideas takes
From words and things, ill sorted, and misjoin'd ;
The anarchy of thought, and chaos of the mind.
DRYDEN.
Many monstrous forms in sleep we see,
That neither were, nor are, nor e'er can be.
Sometimes forgotten things long cast behind
Rush forward in the brain, and come to mind.
DRYDEN.
All dreams
Are from repletion and complexion bred;
From rising fumes of undigested food.
DRYDEN.
The night restores our actions done by day;
As hounds in sleep will open for their prey.
DRYDEN.
Till grosser atoms, tumbling in the stream
Of fancy, madly met, and clubb'd into a dream.
DRYDEN.
Glorious dreams stand ready to restore
The pleasing shapes of all you saw before.
DRYDEN.
We walk in dreams on fairy land,
Where golden ore lies mix'd with common sand,
DRYDEN.
DREAMS.
In short, the force of dreams is of a piece,
Chimeras all, and more absurd, or less.
DRYDEN.
Adorn a dream, expressing human form,
The shape of him who suffer'd in the storm.
DRYDEN.
I thus conclude my theme,
The dominating humour makes me dream.
DRYDEN.
This dream all-powerful Juno sends ; I bear
Her mighty mandates, and her words you hear.
DRYDEN.
The virgin ent'ring bright, indulged the day
To the brown cave, and brush'd the dreams
away.
DRYDEN.
The priest on skins of off ring takes his ease,
And nightly visions in his slumbers sees.
DRYDEN.
In gentle dreams I often will be by,
And sweep along before your closing eye.
DRYDEN.
As one who in some frightful dream would shun
His pressing foe, labours in vain to run,
And his own slowness in his sleep bemoans,
In thick short sighs, weak cries, and tender
groans.
DRYDEN.
They thought at first they dream'd : for 'twas
offence
With them to question certitude of sense.
DRYDEN.
She interprets all your dreams for these ;
Foretells th' estate when the rich uncle dies,
And sees a sweetheart in the sacrifice.
DRYDEN.
I start as from some dreadful dream,
And often ask myself if yet awake.
DRYDEN.
He would have cry'd; but, hoping that he
dreamt,
Amazement tied his tongue, and stopp'd th'
attempt.
DRYDEN.
His dream returns ; his friend appears again :
The murd'rer's come ; now help, or I am slain !
'Twas but a vision still, and visions are but
vain.
DRYDEN.
He warn'd in dreams, his murder did foretell,
From point to point, as after it befell.
DRYDEN.
The vision said, and vanish'd from his sight ;
The dreamer waken'd in a mortal fright.
DRYDEN.
His friend smiled scornful, and with proud con-
tempt
Rejects as idle what his fellow dreamt.
DRYDEN.
At length in sleep their bodies they compose,
And dreamt the future fight, and early rose.
DRYDEN.
Such frantic nights are like a madman's dream j
And nature suffers in the wild extreme.
GRANVILLE.
O Spirit land ! thou land of dreams !
A world thou art of mysterious gleams,
Of startling voices and sounds of strife,
A world of the dead in the hues of life.
MRS. HEMANS.
Voice after voice hath died away,
Once in my dwelling heard;
Sweet household name by name hath changed
To grief's forbidden word!
From dreams of night on each I call,
Each of the far removed ;
And waken to my own wild cry :
Where are ye, my beloved ?
MRS. HEMANS.
Why, when the balm of sleep descends on man,
Do gay delusions, wand'ring o'er the brain,
Soothe the delighted soul with empty bliss ?
DR. JOHNSON : Irene.
Oft in her absence mimic Fancy wakes
To imitate her; but, misjoining shapes,
Wild work produces oft, and most in dreams,
111 matching words and deeds long past or late.
MILTON.
Or likest hovering dreams,
The fickle pensioners of Morpheus' train.
MILTON.
God is also in sleep, and dreams advise,
Which he hath sent propitious, some great
good
Presaging. MILTON.
And in clear dream and solemn vision,
Tell her of things that no gross ear can hear.
MILTON.
148
DREAMS.
Him God vouchsafed
To call by vision, from his father's house,
Into a land which he will show him.
MILTON.
Abstract as in a trance, methought I saw,
Though sleeping, where I lay, and saw the shape
Still glorious before whom awake I stood.
MILTON.
I have dream'd
Of much offence and trouble, which my mind
Knew never till this irksome night.
MILTON.
The trouble of my thoughts this night
Affects me equally; nor can I like
This uncouth dream, of evil sprung, I fear.
MILTON.
Whereat I waked, and found
Before mine eyes all real, as the dream
Had lively shadow'd.
MILTON.
When suddenly stood at my head a dream,
Whose inward apparition gently moved
My fancy.
MILTON.
Let some strange mysterious dream
Wave at his wings in airy stream
Of lively portraiture display'd,
Softly on my eyelids laid. MlLTON.
One sip of this
Will bathe the drooping spirits in delight
Beyond the bliss of dreams.
MILTON.
Such sights as youthful poets dream
On summer eves by haunted stream.
MILTON.
Strange is the power of dreams! who has not
felt,
When in the morning light such visions melt,
How the veil'd soul, though struggling to be free,
Ruled by that deep, unfathom'd mystery,
Wakes, haunted by the thoughts of good or ill,
Whose shading influence pursues us still ?
MRS. NORTON: Dream.
The last image of that troubled heap,
When sense subsides, and fancy sports in sleep,
Though past the recollection of the thought,
Becomes the stuff of which our dream is
wrought.
POPE.
Pallas pour'd sweet slumbers on his soul ;
And balmy dreams, the gift of soft repose,
Calm'd all his pains, and banish'd all his woes.
POPE.
While future realms his wand' ring thoughts
delight,
His daily vision, and his dream by night,
Forbidden Thebes appears before his eye,
From whence he sees his absent brother fly.
POPE.
In some fair evening, on your elbow laid,
You dream of triumphs in the rural shade.
POPE.
To dream once more I close my willing eyes;
Ye soft illusions, dear deceits, arise !
POPE.
Hence the fool's paradise, the statesman's
scheme,
The air-built castle, and the golden dream,
The maid's romantic wish, the chymist's flame,
And poet's vision of eternal fame.
POPE.
Grace shines around her with serenest beams,
And whisp'ring angels prompt her golden
dreams.
POPE.
Now may'rs and shrieves all hush'd and satiate
lay,
Yet eat, in dreams, the custard of the day.
POPE.
To the late revel, and protracted feast,
Wild dreams succeeded, and disorder' d rest.
PRIOR.
To all, to each, a fair good night,
And pleasing dreams, and slumbers light !
SIR W. SCOTT: Marmion.
I talk of dreams,
Which are the children of an idle brain;
Begot of nothing but vain fantasy ;
Which is as thin of substance as the air,
And more inconstant than the wind.
SHAKSPEARE.
He is superstitious grown of late,
Quite from the main opinion he held once
Of fantasy, of dreams, and ceremonies.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thousand 'scapes of wit
Make thee the father of their idle dreams,
And rack thee in their fancies.
SHAKSPEARE.
DREAMS.
[49
Thou hast beat me out
Twelve several times, and I have nightly since
Dreamt of encounters 'twixt thyself and me.
SHAKSPEARE.
We have been down together in my sleep,
Unbuckling helms, fisting each other's throat,
And waked half dead with nothing.
SHAKSPEARE.
O, I have past a miserable night ;
So full of ugly sights, of ghastly dreams,
So full of dismal terror was the time.
SHAKSPEARE.
I have dream'd
Of bloody turbulence ; and this whole night
Hath nothing been but forms of slaughter.
SHAKSPEARE.
In thy faint slumber I by thee have watch'd,
And heard thee murmur tales of iron wars,
Speak terms of manage to thy bounding steed.
SHAKSPEARE.
What dream'd my lord? Tell me, and I'll re-
quite it
With sweet rehearsal of my morning's dream.
SHAKSPEARE.
I have long dream'd of such a kind of man,
But, being awake, I do despise my dream.
SHAKSPEARE.
Never yet one hour in bed
Did I enjoy the golden dew of sleep
But with his tim'rous dreams was still awaked.
SHAKSPEARE.
He hearkens after prophecies and dreams.
SHAKSPEARE.
My Oberon ! what visions have I seen !
I thought I was enamour'd of an ass.
SHAKSPEARE.
This foolish, dreaming, superstitious girl
Makes all these bodements.
SHAKSPEARE.
Four days will quickly steep themselves in nights,
Four nights will quickly dream away the time.
SHAKSPEARE.
To sleep; perchance to dream; ay, there's the
rub.
SHAKSPEARE.
In that sleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause.
SHAKSPEARE.
And for his dreams, I wonder he's so fond
To trust the mock'ry of unquiet slumbers.
SHAKSPEARE.
We eat our meat in fear, and sleep
In the affliction of those terrible dreams
That shake us nightly.
SHAKSPEARE.
Dreams are toys;
Yet for this once, yea, superstitiously,
I will be squared by this.
SHAKSPEARE.
Last night the very gods show'd me a vision.
SHAKSPEARE.
If I may trust the flattering eye of sleep,
My dreams presage some joyful news at hand;
My bosom's lord sits lightly on his throne;
And all this day an unaccustom'd spirit
Lifts me above the ground with cheerful thoughts.
SHAKSPEARE.
The day seems long, but night is odious ;
No sleep, but dreams; no dreams, but visions
strange.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
Now when that idle dream was to him brought,
Unto that elfin knight he bade him fly,
Where he slept soundly.
SPENSER.
Suddenly out of this delightful dieam
The man awoke, and would have question'd
more ;
But he would not endure the woful theme.
SPENSER.
Like a dog, he hunts in dreams.
TENNYSON : Locksley Hall,
By the vocal woods and waters lull'd,
And lost in lonely musing in a dream.
THOMSON.
In waking whispers, and repeated dreams,
To hint pure thoughts, and warn the favour'd
soul.
THOMSON.
And yet, as angels in some brighter dreams
Call to the soul when man doth sleep,
So some strange thoughts transcend our wonted
themes,
And into glory peep.
HENRY VAUGHAN : They are all Gone.
Hunt half a day for a forgotten dream.
WORDSWORTH.
DXESS.
Our waking dreams are fatal : how I dreamt
Of things impossible! (could sleep do more?)
Of joys perpetual in perpetual change !
Of stable pleasures on the tossing wave !
Eternal sunshine in the storms of life !
YOUNG.
DRESS.
Nor the hack'd helmet, nor the dusty field,
Eut purple vests and flow'ry garlands please.
ADDISON.
Illustrious robes of satin and of silk,
And wanton lawns more soft and white than
milk.
BEAUMONT.
A painted vest Prince Voltager had on,
Which from a naked Pict his grandsire won.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
I'll please the maids of honour, if I can :
Without black velvet breeches, what is man ?
I will my skill in button-holes display,
And brag, how oft I shift me ev'ry day.
BRAMSTON.
Give laws for pantaloons,
The length of breeches and the gathers,
Part cannons, periwigs, and feathers.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
Purblind to poverty the worldling goes,
And scarce sees rags an inch beyond his nose,
But from a crowd can single out His Grace,
And cringe and creep to fools who strut in lace.
CHURCHILL.
Three or four suits one winter there does waste,
One suit there three or four winters last.
COWLEY.
We sacrifice to dress, till household joys
And comforts cease. Dress drains our cellar dry,
And keeps our larder lean ; puts out our fires,
And introduces hunger, frost, and woe,
Where peace and hospitality might reign.
COWPER: Task.
And sooner may a gulling weather-spy,
By drawing forth heaven's scheme, tell certainly
What fashion'd hats, or ruffs, or suits, next year
Oar giddy-headed antique,youth will wear.
DONNE.
Him all repute,
For his device in handsoming a suit,
To judge of lace, pink, panes, print, cut, and plait,
Of all the court to have the best conceit.
DONNE.
Can any dresses find a way
To stop th' approaches of decay
And mend a ruin'd face?
DORSET.
I pass their form, and ev'ry charming grace ;
But their attire, like liveries of a kind
All rich and rare, is fresh within my mind.
DRYDEN.
White seem'd her robes, yet woven so they were
As snow and gold together had been wrought.
DRYDEN.
These purple vests were weaved by Dardan
dames.
DRYDEN.
In velvet white as snow the troop was gown'd,
The seams with sparkling emeralds set around.
DRYDEN.
Her purple habit sits with such a grace
On her smooth shoulders, and so suits her face.
DRYDEN.
As in beauty she surpass'd the quire,
So nobler than the rest was her attire.
DRYDEN.
Meantime the pastor shears their hoary beards,
And eases of their hair the loaden herds :
Their camelots warm in tents the soldier hold,
And shield the shiv'ring manner from cold.
DRYDEN.
Nor pass unpraised the vest and veil divine,
Which wand' ring foliage and rich flow'rs en-
twine.
DRYDEN.
The ladies dress'd in rich symars were seen,
Of Florence satin, flower'd with white and
green,
And for a shade betwixt the bloomy gridelin.
DRYDEN.
Clad in white velvet all their troop they led,
With each an oaken chaplet on his head.
DRYDEN.
Rich was his soul, though his attire was poor,
As heav'n had clothed his own ambassador.
DRYDEN.
Let it likewise your gentle breast inspire
With sweet infusion, and put you in mind
Of that proud maid whom now those leaves
attire,
Proud Daphne. DRYDEN.
DRESS.
So may your hats your foretops never press,
Untouch'd your ribbons, sacred be your dress.
DRYDEN.
Young Pallas shone conspicuous o'er the rest ;
Gilded his arms, embroider'd was his vest.
DRYDEN.
He Mars deposed, and arms to gowns made
yield;
Successful councils did him soon approve
As fit for close intrigues as open field.
DRYDEN.
A robe of tissue, stiff with golden wire;
An upper vest, once Helen's rich attire.
DRYDEN.
Will any freedom here from you be borne,
Whose clothes are threadbare, and whose cloaks
are torn?
DRYDEN.
Aping the foreigners in every dress ;
Which, bought at greater cost, becomes him less.
DRYDEN.
In this remembrance, Emily ere day
Arose, and dress'd herself in rich array.
DRYDEN.
In length of train descends her sweeping gown,
And by her graceful walk the queen of love is
known.
DRYDEN.
A plain suit, since we can make but one,
Is better than to be by tarnish'd gaud'iy known.
DRYDEN.
Where's now that labour'd niceness in thy dress,
And all those arts that did the spark express?
DRYDEN.
Here, attired beyond our purse, we go
For useless ornament and flaunting show :
We take on trust, in purple robes to shine,
And poor, are yet ambitious to be fine.
DRYDEN.
The first request
He made was, like his brothers to be dress'd;
And, as his birth required, above the rest.
DRYDEN.
Since in braided gold her foot is bound,
And a long trailing manteau sweeps the ground,
Her shoe disdains the street.
GAY.
The ladies, gayly dress'd, the Mall adorn -
With curious dyes, and paint the sunny morn.
GAY.
The rich brocaded silk unfold,
Where rising flowers grow stiff with frosted gold.
GAY.
Beneath the lamp her tawdry ribbons glare,
The new scour'd manteau, and the slattern air.
GAY.
True Witney broadcloth with its shag unshorn,
Unpierced, is in the lasting tempest worn.
GAY.
In cloths, cheap handsomeness doth bear the
bell.
GEORGE HERBERT.
The curious unthrift makes his clothes too wide,
And spares himself, but would his tailor chide.
GEORGE HERBERT.
A vest of purple flow'd ;
Iris had dipp'd the woof.
MILTON.
Come, pensive nun, devout and pure,
Sober, steadfast, and demure,
All in a robe of darkest grain,
Flowing with majestic train,
And sober stole of Cyprus lawn
O'er the decent shoulders drawn.
MILTON.
Over his lucid arms
A military vest of purple flow'd,
Livelier than Melibsean, or the grain
Of Sarra, worn by kings and heroes old.
MILTON.
I must put off
These my sky-robes, spun out of Iris' woof.
MILTON.
Earth, in her rich attire,
Consummate lovely smiled.
MILTON.
Sturdy swains,
In clean array, for rustic dance prepare,
Mixt with the buxom damsels hand in hand.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Fortune in men has some small difference made:
One flaunts in rags, one flutters in brocade ;
The cobbler apron'd, and the parson gown'd,
The friar hooded, and the monarch crown'd.
POPE.
Oh ! if to dance all night, and dress all day,
Charm'd the small-pox, or chased old age away,
To patch, nay, ogle, might become a saint,
Nor could it sure be such a sin to paint.
POPE.
152
DRESS.
Not tyrants fierce that unrepenting die,
Not Cynthia when her manteau's pinn'd awry,
E'er felt such rage.
POPE.
In flow'd at once a gay embroider'd race,
And, titt'ring, push'd the pedants off the place.
POPE.
First, robed in white, the nymph intent adores,
With head uncover'd, the cosmetic pow'rs.
POPE.
Th' embroider'd suit, at least, he deem'd his
prey:
That suit an unpaid tailor snatch'd away.
POPE.
Such a doctrine in St. James's air
Should chance to make the well-dress'd rabble
stare.
POPE.
A veil of richest texture wrought she wears.
POPE.
Nay, oft in dreams invention we bestow
To change a flounce, or add a furbelow.
POPE.
Here stood Ill-nature, like an ancient maid,
Her wrinkled form in black and white array'd.
POPE.
Next these a youthful train their vows express'd,
With feathers crown'd, with gay embroidery
dress'd.
POPE.
Fair nymphs and well-dress'd youths around her
shone,
But ev'ry eye was fix'd on her alone.
POPE.
Scarce could the goddess from her nymphs be
known,
But by the crescent and the golden zone.
POPE.
The busy sylphs surround their darling care,
Some fold the sleeve, while others plait the gown ;
And Betty's praised for labours not her own.
POPE.
"Odious! in woollen! 'twould a saint provoke!"
(Were the last words that poor Narcissa spoke :)
"No! let a charming chintz, and Brussels lace,
Wrap my cold limbs, and shacl^ my lifeless face :
One would not, sure, be frightful when one's
dead:
And, Betty, give this cheek a little red."
POPE.
Our humble province is to tend the fair,
To save the powder from too rude a gale,
Nor let th' imprison'd essences exhale.
POPE.
The gown with stiff embroid'ry shining
Looks charming with a slighter lining;
The out if Indian figures stain,
The inside must be rich and plain.
PRIOR.
No longer shall thy bodice aptly lace,
That air and shape of harmony express,
Fine by degrees, and delicately less.
PRIOR.
That Chloe may be served in state,
The hours must at her toilet wait;
Whilst all the reasoning fools below
Wonder their watches go so slow.
PRIOR.
Fairer she seem'd, distinguished from the rest,
And better mien disclosed, as better drest:
A bright tiara round her forehead tied
To juster bounds confined its rising pride.
PRIOR.
Our dress, still varying, nor to forms confined,
Shifts like the sands, the sport of every wind.
PROFERTIUS.
A gown made of the finest wool,
Which from our pretty. lambs we pull;
Fair lined slippers for the cold,
With buckles of the purest gold.
SIR W. RALEIGH.
Then to her new love let her go,
And deck her in golden array;
Be finest at every fine show,
And frolic it all the long day.
ROWE.
What woman in the city do I name
When that I say, The city woman bears
The cost of princes on unworthy shoulders?
SHAKSPEARE.
She bears a duke's revenues on her back,
And in her heart she scorns her poverty.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thy sumptuous buildings, and thy wife's attire,
Hath cost a mass of public treasure.
SHAKSPEARE.
'Tis the mind that makes the body rich :
And as the sun breaks through the darkest
clouds,
So honour peereth in the meanest habit.
SHAKSPEARE.
153
Richer, than doing nothing for a bauble ;
Prouder than rustling in unpaid-for silk.
SHAKSPEARE.
Now will we revel it,
With silken coats, and caps, and golden rings.
SHAKSPEARE.
So tedious is this day,
As is the night before some festival
To an impatient child that hath new robes
And may not wear them.
SHAKSPEARE.
Through tatter'd clothes small vices do appear;
Robes and furr'd gowns hide all.
SHAKSPEARE.
Write,
In em'rald tuffs, flow'rs purfled, blue and white,
Like sapphire, pearl, in rich embroidery,
Buckled below fair knighthood's bending knee.
SHAKSPEARE.
Her mother hath intended
That quaint in green she shall be loose enrobed,
With ribands pendent, flaring 'bout her head.
SHAKSPEARE.
My Nan shall be the queen of all the fairies,
Finely attired in a robe of white.
SHAKSPEARE.
Be better suited :
These weeds are memories of those misfortunes;
F pr'ythee put them off to worser hours.
SHAKSPEARE.
The fashion
Wears out more apparel than the man.
SHAKSPEARE.
I'll disrobe me
Of these Italian weeds, and suit myself
As does a Briton peasant.
SHAKSPEARE.
I'll be at charges for a looking-glass;
And entertain a score or two of tailors
To study fashions to adorn my body :
Since I am crept in favour with myself,
I will maintain it with some little cost.
SHAKSPEARE.
Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,
But not express'd in fancy; rich, not gaudy;
For the apparel oft proclaims the man.
SHAKSPEARE.
Her cap, far whiter than the driven snow,
Emblem right meet of decency does yield.
SHENSTONE : Schoolmistress.
In robe of lily white she was array'd,
That from her shoulder to her heel down
raught,
The train whereof loose far behind her stray'd,
Branched with gold and pearl, most richly
wrought.
SPENSER.
Forth came that ancient lord and aged queen,
Array'd in antique robes down to the ground,
And sad habiliments right well beseen.
SPENSER.
Some pounce their curled hair in courtly guise,
Some prank their ruffs, and others timely dight
Their gay attire.
SPENSER.
A noble crew about them waited round
Of sage and sober peers, all gravely gown'd.
SPENSER.
In goodly garments, that her well became,
Fair marching forth in honourable wise,
Him at the threshold met, and well did enter-
prise.
SPENSER.
Her feet beneath her petticoat,
Like little mice, stole in and out,
As if they fear'd the light.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
To see some radiant nymph appear
In all her glitt'ring birthday gear,
You think some goddess from the sky
Descended ready cut and dry.
SWIFT.
Plain Goody would no longer down ;
'Twas Madam in her grogram gown.
SWIFT.
Her petticoat, transform' d apace,
Became black satin flounced with lace.
SWIFT.
Drest her again genteel and neat,
And rather tight than great.
SWIFT.
Loveliness
Needs not the foreign aid of ornament,
But is when unadorn'd adorn'd the most.
THOMSON: Autumn.
The graces put not more exactly on
Th' attire of Venus, when the ball she won,
Than that young beauty by thy care is dress'd
When all your youth prefer her to the rest.
WALLER.
154
DR O WNING. D ULNESS. D UTY.
Without the worm, in Persian silks we shine.
WALLER.
No worthies form'd by any muse but thine
Could purchase robes to make themselves so fine.
WALLER.
Gay mellow silks her mellow charms infold, ^
And nought of Lyce but herself is old.
YOUNG.
DROWNING.
Woeful shepherds, weep no more, '
For Lycidas, your sorrow, is not dead,
Sunk though he be beneath the wat'ry floor:
So sinks the day-star in the ocean bed,
And yet anon repairs his drooping head,
And tricks his beams, and with new spangled ore
Flames in the forehead of the morning sky.
MILTON.
O lord ! methought what pain it was to drown !
What dreadful noise of water in mine ears !
What sights of ugly death within mine eyes !
Methought I saw a thousand fearful wrecks,
A thousand men, that fishes gnaw'd upon.
SHAKSPEARE.
DULNESS.
Shadwell alone my perfect image bears,
Mature in dulness from his tender years.
DRYDEN.
Taught, or untaught, the dunce is still the same;
Yet still the wretched master bears the blame.
DRYDEN.
But, in her temple's last recess inclosed,
On Dulness' lap th' anointed head reposed :
Him close she curtain'd round with vapours blue,
And soft besprinkled with Cimmerian dew.
POPE.
Thy hand, great Dulness ! lets the curtain fall,
And universal darkness buries all.
POPE.
Dulness delighted eyed the lively dunce,
Rememb'ring she herself was pertness once.
POPE.
Modest dulness lurks in thought's disguise ;
Thou varnisher of fools, and cheat of all the wise.
POPE.
Me emptiness and dulness could inspire
And were my elasticity and fire.
POPE.
As things seem large which we through mists
descry,
Dulness is ever apt to magnify.
POPE.
They empty head console with empty sound.
No more, alas ! the voice of fame they hear,
The balm of dulness trickling in their ear.
POPE.
Angel of dulness, sent to scatter round
Her magic charms o'er all unclassic ground.
POPE.
He, great tamer of all human art,
Dulness ! whose good old cause I yet defend.
POPE.
On every thorn delightful wisdom grows,
In every stream a sweet instruction flows ;
But some untaught o'erhear the whispering rill :
In spite of sacred leisure, blockheads still.
YOUNG.
DUTY.
What is our duty here ? To tend
From good to better thence to best;
Grateful to drink life's cup then bend
Unmurmuring to our bed of rest;
To pluck the flowers that round us blow,
Scattering our fragrance as we go.
SIR J. BOWRING.
Duty by habit is to pleasure turn'd :
He is content who to obey has learn'd.
SIR S. E. BRYDGES.
To what gulfs
A single deviation from the track
Of human duties leads !
BYRON : Sardanapalus.
Whatever God did say,
Is all thy clear and smooth uninterrupted way.
COWLEY.
Of formal duty make no more thy boast ;
Thou disobey'st where it concerns me most.
DRYDEN.
I rule the Paphian race,
Whose bounds the deep circumfluent waves em-
brace ;
A duteous people, and industrious isle.
POPE.
Thy sum of duty let two words contain ;
O may they graven in thy heart remain :
Be humble and be just.
PRIOR.
EAR TH. ED UCA TION.
With mine own tongue deny my sacred right,
With mine own breath release all duteous ties.
SHAKSPEARE.
My duty,
As doth a rock against the chiding flood,
Should the approach of this wild river break,
And stand unshaken yours.
SHAKSPEARE.
She is peevish, sullen, froward,
Proud, disobedient, stubborn, lacking duty.
SHAKSPEARE.
To every duty he could minds engage,
Provoke their courage, and command their rage.
WALLER.
EARTH.
Imprison'd fires, in the close dungeons pent,
Roar to get loose, and struggle for a vent;
Eating their way, and undermining all,
Till with a mighty burst whole mountains fall.
ADDISON.
The earth, and each erratic world,
Around the sun their proper centre whirl'd,
Compose but one extended vast machine.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Adoring first the genius of the place,
Then earth, the mother of the heav'nly race.
DRYDEN.
Earth, in her rich attire
Consummate, lovely smiled.
MILTON.
The earth,
Though in comparison of heav'n so small,
Nor glist'ring, may of solid good contain
More plenty than the sun, that barren shines.
MILTON.
The hemisphere of earth, in clearest ken,
Stretch'd out to th' amplest reach of prospect lay.
MILTON.
By which the beauty of the earth appears,
The divers-colour'd mantle which she wears.
SANDYS.
Nought so vile that on the earth doth live,
But to the earth some special good doth give.
SHAKSPEARE.
Earth his uncouth mother was,
And blust'ring yolus his boasted sire.
SPENSER.
EDUCATION:
Oh ye who teach the ingenious youth of nations,
Holland, France, England, Germany, or Spain,
I pray ye flog them upon all occasions :
It mends their morals, never mind the pain.
BYRON.
Why did my parents send me to the schools,
That I with knowledge might enrich my
mind ?
Since the desire to know first made men fools,
And did corrupt the root of all mankind.
SIR J. DA VIES.
Children, like tender osiers, take the bow,
And as they first are fashion'd, always grow.
DRYDEN.
One son at home
Concerns thee more than many guests to come.
If to some useful art he be not bred,
He grows mere lumber, and is worse than dead.
DRYDEN.
To breed up the son to common sense,
Is evermore the parent's least expense.
DRYDEN.
Exalted hence, and drunk with secret joy,
Their young succession all their cares employ;
They breed, they brood, instruct, and educate,
And make provision for the future state.
DRYDEN.
The village all declared how much he knew ;
'Twas certain he could write and cypher too :
Lands he could measure, terms and tides presage ;
And even the story ran, that he could gauge.
GOLDSMITH: Deserted Village.
i 5 6
ED UCA TION. EL O Q UENCE.
Hail, foreign wonder !
Whom certain these rough shades did never
breed.
MILTON.
Take him to develop, if you can,
And hew the block off, and get out the man.
POPE.
'Tis education forms the common mind :
Just as the twig is bent the tree's inclined.
POPE : Moral Essays.
Schoolmasters will I keep within my house,
Fit to instruct her youth. To cunning men
I will be very kind ; and liberal
To mine own children, in good bringing up.
SHAKSPEARE.
I do present you with a man of mine,
Cunning in music and the mathematics,
To instruct her fully in those sciences.
SHAKSPEARE.
He had charge my discipline to frame,
And tutors nouriture to oversee.
SPENSER.
Whoe'er excels in what we prize
Appears a hero in our eyes :
Each girl, when pleased with what is taught,
Will have the teacher in her thought :
A blockhead with melodious voice
In boarding-schools may have his choice.
SWIFT : Cadenus and Vanessa.
Delightful task ! to rear the tender thought,
To teach the young idea how to shoot ;
To pour the fresh instruction o'er the mind,
To breathe th' enlivening spirit, and to fix
The generous purpose in the glowing breast.
THOMSON: Seasons.
Full in the midst of Euclid dip at once,
And petrify a genius to a dunce.
Who stifle nature, and subsist on art,
Who coin the face, and petrify the heart.
YOUNG.
ELOQUENCE.
Plead it to her,
With all the strength and heats of eloquence
Fraternal love and friendship can inspire.
ADDISON.
Henry, the forest-born Demosthenes,
Whose thunder shook the Philip of the seas.
BYRON : Age of Bronze.
No words suffice the secret soul to show;
For truth denies all eloquence to woe.
BYRON: Corsair.
Here rills of oily eloquence in soft
Meanders lubricate the course they take.
COWPER.
Power above powers ! O heavenly eloquence !
That, with the strong rein of commanding
words,
Dost manage, guide, and master th' eminence
Of men's affections, more than all their
swords !
DANIEL.
Now private pity strove with public hate,
Reason with rage, and eloquence with fate.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Soft elocution does thy style renown,
Gentle or sharp according to thy choice,
To laugh at follies, or to lash at vice.
DRYDEN.
Some who the depths of eloquence have, found,
In that unnavigable stream were drown'd.
DRYDEN.
Both orators so much renown'd
In their own depths of eloquence were drown'd.
DRYDEN.
O ! couldst thou break through fate's severe de-
cree,
A new Marcellus should arise in thee.
DRYDEN.
With eloquence innate his tongue was arm'd:
Though harsh the precept, yet the people
charm'd.
DRYDEN.
The Christian princess in her tent confers
With fifty of your learn'd philosophers,
Whom with such eloquence she does persuade,
That they are captives to her reasons made.
DRYDEN.
When sage Minerva rose,
From her sweet lips smooth elocution flows.
GAY.
As when of old some orator renown'd
In Athens or free Rome, where eloquence
Flourish'd, since mute ! to some great cause
address'd,
Stood in himself collected ; while each pait,
Motion, each act, won audience, ere the tongue
Sometimes in highth began, as no delay
Of preface brooking through his zeal of right.
MILTON.
Thence to the famous orators repair,
Those ancient, whose resistless eloquence
Wielded at will that fierce democratic.
MILTON.
ELOQ UENCE. EMULA TION.
157
Their orators thou then extoll'st, as those
The top of eloquence, statists indeed,
And lovers of their country.
MILTON.
Prompt eloquence
Flow'd from their lips, in prose or numerous
verse.
MILTON.
The breaking of that parliament
Broke him ; as that dishonest victory
At Cheronaea, fatal to liberty,
Kill'd with report that old man eloquent.
MILTON.
His tongue
Dropp'd manna, and could make the worse
appear
The better reason, to perplex and dash
Maturest counsels.
MILTON.
Look now for no enchanting voice, nor fear
The bait of honey'd words ; a rougher tongue
Draws hitherward.
MILTON.
Thy words had such a melting flow,
And spoke of truth so sweetly well,
They dropp'd like heaven's serenest snow,
And all was brightness where they fell !
MOORE.
False eloquence, like the prismatic glass,
Its gaudy colours spreads in ev'ry place :
The face of nature we no more survey,
All glares alike, without distinction gay :
But true expression, like th' unchanging sun,
Clears and improves whate'er it shines upon ;
It gilds all objects, but it alters none.
POPE.
Fit words attended on his weighty sense,
And mild persuasion flow'd in eloquence.
POPE.
Too plain thy nakedness of soul espy'd,
Why dost thou strive the conscious shame to
hide,
By masks of eloquence, and veils of pride ?
PRIOR.
Men are more eloquent than women made ;
But women are more pow'rful to persuade.
THOMAS RANDOLPH: Amyntas.
Mysterious secrets of a high concern,
And weighty truths, solid convincing sense,
Explain'd by unaffected eloquence.
ROSCOMMON.
Her humble gestures made the residue plain,
Dumb eloquence persuading more than speech.
ROSCOMMON.
And aged ears play truant at his tales,
And younger hearings are quite ravished,
So sweet and voluble is his discourse.
SHAKSPEARE.
When he speaks,
The air, a charter'd libertine, is still,
And the mute wonder lurketh in men's ears
To steal his sweet and honey'd sentences.
SHAKSPEARE.
But for your words, they rob the Hybla bees,
And leave them honeyless.
SHAKSPEARE.
There is such confusion in my pow'rs,
As, after some oration fairly spoke
By a beloved prince, there doth appear
Among the buzzing multitude.
SHAKSPEARE.
Say she be mute, and will not speak a word;
Then I'll commend her volubility,
And say she uttereth piercing eloquence.
SHAKSPEARE.
In such business
Action is eloquence, and the eyes of th'
ignorant
More learned than the ears.
SHAKSPEARE.
Listening senates hang upon thy tongue,
Devolving through the maze of eloquence
A roll of periods sweeter than her song.
THOMSON.
Eloquence, with all her pomp and charms,
Foretold us useful and sententious truths.
WALLER.
Now, with fine phrase, and foppery of tongue,
More graceful action, and a smoother tone.
That orator of fable, and fair face,
Will steal on your bribed hearts.
YOUNG.
EMULATION.
Those fair ideas to my aid I'll call,
And emulate my great original.
DRYDEN.
I would have
Him emulate you: 'tis no shame to follow
The better precedent.
BEN JONSON.
158
ENVY. EPITAPHS.
By strength
They measure all, of other excellence
Not emulous, nor care who them excels.
MILTON.
What madness ruies in brain-sick men,
When for so slight and frivolous a cause
Such factious emulations shall arise !
SHAKSPEARE.
ENVY.
He who ascends to mountain tops shall find
Their loftiest peaks most wrapp'd in clouds and
snow;
He who surpasses or subdues mankind
Must look down on the hate of those below.
BYRON : Childe. Harold.
Yet even her tyranny had such a grace,
The woman pardon'd all except her face.
BYRON.
With that malignant envy which turns pale,
And sickens, even if a friend prevail,
Which merit and success pursues with hate,
And damns the worth it cannot imitate.
CHURCHILL: Rosciad.
If envious eyes their hurtful rays have cast,
More pow'rful verse shall free thee from the
blast.
DRYDEN.
Let envy, then, those crimes within you see,
From which the happy never must be free.
DRYDEN.
Morat's too insolent, too much a brave,
His courage to his envy is a slave.
DRYDEN.
Fools may our scorn, not envy, raise :
For envy is a kind of praise.
GAY: Fables.
Envy not greatness ; for thou mak'st thereby
Thyself the worse ; and so the distance greater.
GEORGE HERBERT.
Less than half we find exprest,
Envy bid conceal the rest.
MILTON.
All human virtue, to its latest breath,
Finds envy never conquer'd but by death :
The great Alcides, ev'ry labour past,
Had still this monster to subdue at last.
POPE.
Envy will merit, as its shade, pursue ;
But, like a shadow, proves the substance true.
POPE.
Envy, to which th' ignoble mind's a slave,
Is emulation in the learn'd or brave.
POPE.
Madam, this is mere distraction ;
You turn the good we offer into envy.
SHAKSPEARE.
They will not stick to say you envied him;
And fearing he would rise, he was so virtuous,
Kept him a foreign man still, which so grieved
him,
That he ran mad and died. SHAKSPEARE.
No metal can,
No, not the hangman's axe, bear half the keen-
ness
Of thy sharp envy. SHAKSPEARE.
You dare patronage
The envious barking of your saucy tongue
Against my lord.
SHAKSPEARE.
My heart laments that virtue cannot live
Out of the teeth of emulation.
SHAKSPEARE.
Vile is the vengeance on the ashes cold,
And envy base, to bark at sleeping fame.
SPENSER.
Base envy withers at another's joy,
And hates that excellence it cannot reach.
THOMSON : Seasons.
Had you, some ages past, this race of glory
Run, with amazement we should read your
story;
But living virtue, all achievements past,
Meets envy still to grapple with at last.
WALLER.
High stations tumults, but not bliss, create ;
None think the great unhappy but the great !
Fools gaze and envy; Envy darts a sting,
Which makes a swain as wretched as a king.
YOUNG.
It is the art
Of such as have the world in their possession
To give it a good name, that fools may envy;
For envy to small minds is flattery.
YOUNG.
EPITAPHS.
How sleep the brave, who sink to rest
By all their country's wishes blest!
When Spring, with dewy fingers cold,
Returns to deck their hallow'd mould,
EPITAPHS.
159
She there shall dress a sweeter sod
Than Fancy's feet have ever trod.
By fairy hands their knell is rung ;
By forms unseen their dirge is sung;
There Honour comes, a pilgrim gray,
To bless the turf that wraps their clay ;
And Freedom shall awhile repair,
To dwell a weeping hermit there !
COLLINS.
Rich in the world's opinion, and men's praise,
And full in all we could desire but days :
He that is warn'd of this, and shall forbear
To vent a sigh for him, or shed a tear,
May he live long scorn'd, and unpitied fall,
And want a mourner at his funeral.
BISHOP CORBET.
In peace, ye shades of our great grandsires, rest,
Eternal spring and rising flow'rs adorn
The relics of each venerable urn.
DRYDEN.
Poor heart! She slumbers in her silent tomb :
Let her possess in peace that narrow room.
DRYDEN.
This avarice of praise in times to come;
Those long inscriptions, crowded on the tomb.
DRYDEN.
Should some wild fig-tree take her native bent,
And heave below the gaudy monument,
'Twould crack the marble titles, and disperse
The characters of all the lying verse.
DRYDEN : Juvenal.
Here rests his head upon the lap of earth
A youth to fortune and to fame unknown ;
Fair Science frown'd not on his humble birth,
And Melancholy mark'd him for her own.
Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere ;
Heaven did a recompense as largely send :
He gave to Misery all he had, a tear ;
He gain'd from Heaven ('twas all he wish'd)
a friend.
No farther seek his merits to disclose,
Or draw his frailties from their dread abode,
(There they alike in trembling hope repose,)
The bosom of his Father and his God.
GRAY: Elegy.
The breezy call of incense-breathing morn,
The swallow twittering from the straw-built
shed,
The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn,
No more shall rouse them from their lowly
bed.
GRAY: Elegy.
Green be the turf above thee,
Friend of my better days ;
None knew thee but to love thee,
Nor named thee but to praise.
FITZ-GREENE HALLECK.
Philips, whose touch harmonious could remove
The pangs of guilty power and hapless love ;
Rest here, distrest by poverty no more,
Here find that calm thou gav'st so oft before ;
Sleep, undisturb'd, within this peaceful shrine,
Till angels wake thee with a note like thine !
DR. S. JOHNSON: Epitaph on C. Philips,
the Musician.
Underneath this stone doth lie
As much beauty as could die ;
Which in life did harbour give
To more beauty than could live.
BEN JONSON.
Underneath this sable hearse
Lies the subject of all verse,
Sidney's sister, Pembroke's mother:
Death ! ere thou hast slain another,
Learn'd and fair and good as she,
Time shall throw a dart at thee.
BEN JONSON : Epitaph on the Cotmtess of
Pembroke.
Gentle lady, may thy grave
Peace and quiet ever have ;
After this day's travel sore,
Sweet rest seize thee evermore.
MILTON.
Thus peaceful rests, without a stone, a name,
What once had beauty, titles, wealth, and fame.
POPE.
Make sacred Charles's tomb forever known;
Obscure the place, and uninscribed the stone :
Oh fact accursed !
POPE.
What can atone, oh ever-injured shade !
Thy fate unpitied, and thy rites unpaid ?
POPE.
Yet shall thy grave with rising flow'rs be drest,
And the green turf lie lightly on thy breast.
POPE.
How loved, how honour'd once, avails thee not,
To whom related, or by whom begot;
A heap of dust alone remains of thee :
'Tis all thou art, and all the proud shall be !
POPE.
i6o
EPITAPHS. EQUANIMITY. ETERNITY.
Should some relenting eye
Glance on the stone where our cold reliques lie.
POPE.
The saint sustain'd it, but the woman died.
POPE : Epitaph on Mrs. Corbet.
Of manners gentle, of affections mild ;
In wit a man, simplicity a child.
POPE: Epitaph on Gay.
To this sad shrine, whoe'er thou art ! draw near.
Here lies the friend most loved, the son most
dear;
Who ne'er knew joy, but friendship might divide,
Or gave his father grief, but when he died.
How vain is Reason, Eloquence how weak !
If Pope must tell what Harcourt cannot speak.
Oh ! let thy once loved friend inscribe thy stone,
And with a father's sorrows mix his own.
POPE : from the Monument to the son of
Chancellor Harcourt.
Thy relicks, Rowe, to this fair shrine we trust,
And sacred place by Dryden's awful dust ;
Beneath a rude and nameless stone he lies,
To which thy tomb shall guide inquiring eyes.
POPE: Epitaph on Rowe.
The secret wound with which I bleed
Shall lie wrapt up, ev'n in my hearse ;
But on my tombstone thou shall read
My answer to thy dubious verse.
PRIOR.
Our grave,
Like Turkish mute, shall have a tongueless
mouth,
Not worshipp'd with a waxen epitaph.
SHAKSPEARE.
With fairest flow'rs, Fidele',
I'll sweeten thy sad grave.
SHAKSPEARE.
Live still, and write mine epitaph.
SHAKSPEARE.
May here her monument stand so,
To credit this rude age ; and show
To future times that even we
Some patterns did of virtue see. WALLER.
Here lies the learned Savile's heir,
So early wise, and lasting fair,
That none, except her years they told,
Thought her a child, or thought her old.
WALLER.
Under this stone lies virtue, youth,
Unblemish'd probity and truth;
Just unto all relations known,
A worthy patriot, pious son. WALLER.
Earth's highest station ends in " Here he lies,"
And " Dust to dust " concludes her noblest song.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
EQUANIMITY.
With equal mind what happens let us bear;
Nor joy nor grieve too much for things beyond
our care.
DRYDEN.
He laughs at all the vulgar cares and fears,
At their vain triumphs, and their vainer tears;
An equal temper in his mind he found
When Fortune flatter'd him, and when she
frown'd.
DRYDEN.
Your steady soul preserves her frame
In good and evil times the same.
SWIFT.
ETERNITY.
Eternity ! thou pleasing, dreadful thought !
Through what variety of untried being,
Through what new scenes and changes must
we pass?
The wide, th' unbounded prospect lies before
me;
But shadows, clouds, and darkness rest upon it.
ADDISON.
'Tis the Divinity that stirs within us,
'Tis Heav'n itself that points out an hereafter,
And intimates eternity to man.
ADDISON.
Hence came its name, in that the grateful Jove
Hath eternized the glory of his love.
CREECH.
And as the better spirit, when she doth bear
A scorn of death, doth show she cannot die;
So when the wicked soul death's face doth fear,
Ev'n then she proves her own eternity.
SIR J. DAVIES.
What's time, when on eternity we think?
A thousand ages in that sea must sink:
Time's nothing but a word ; a million
Is full as far from infinite as one.
SIR J. DENHAM.
E TERNITY. E VENING.
161
Hasting to pay his tribute to the sea,
Like mortal life to meet eternity.
SIR J. DENHAM.
He first the fate of Caesar did foretell,
And pitied Rome when Rome in Caesar fell;
In iron clouds conceal'd the public light,
And impious mortals fear'd eternal night.
DRYDEN.
Sure there is none but fears a future state ;
And when the most obdurate swear they do not,
Their trembling hearts belie their boasting
tongues.
DRYDEN.
Pure and unchanged, and needing no defence
From sins, as did my frailer innocence ;
Their joy sincere, with no more sorrow mix'd,
Eternity stands permanent and fix'd.
DRYDEN.
Beyond is all abyss,
Eternity, whose end no eye can reach.
MILTON.
I with two fair gifts
Created him, endow'd with happiness
And immortality ; that fondly lost,
This other served but to eternize woe.
MILTON.
Here condemn'd
To waste eternal days in woe and pain.
MILTON.
Yet some there be, that by due steps aspire
To lay their just hands on that golden key
That opes the palace of eternity.
MILTON.
Not so, when diadem'd with rays divine,
Touch'd with the flame that breaks from virtue's
shrine,
Her priestless muse forbids the good to die,
And opes the temple of eternity.
POPE.
All that live must die,
Passing through nature to eternity.
SHAKSPEARE.
EVENING.
It is the hour when from the boughs
The nightingale's high note is heard ;
It is the hour when lovers' vows
Seem sweet in every whisper'd word;
And gentle winds, and waters near,
Make music to the lonely ear.
BYRON.
The dews of the evening most carefully shun ;
Those tears of the sky for the loss of the sun.
CHESTERFIELD.
For noonday's heats are closer arbours made ;
And for fresh ev'ning air, the op'ner glade.
DRYDEN.
Meantime the sun descended from the skies,
And the bright evening star began to rise.
DRYDEN.
For winds, when homeward they return, will
drive
The loaded carriers from their evening hive.
DRYDEN.
Sweet was the sound, when oft at evening's close
Up yonder hill the village murmur rose ;
There, as I pass'd with careless steps and slow,
The mingling notes came soften'd from below.
GOLDSMITH: Deserted Village.
And hie him home at evening's close,
To sweet repast and calm repose.
GRAY: Ode.
One summer's eve when the breeze was gone,
And the nightingale was mute.
T. K. HERVEY.
Now came still evening on, and twilight gray
Had in her sober livery all things clad :
Silence accompanied; for beast and bird,
They to their grassy couch, these to their nests,
Were slunk, all but the woeful nightingale.
MILTON.
The sun,
Declined, was hasting now with prone career
To th' ocean isles, and in th' ascending scale
Of heav'n the stars that usher ev'ning rose.
MILTON.
Ev'ning mist,
Ris'n from a river, o'er the marish glides,
And gathers ground fast at the labourer's heels,
Homeward returning.
MILTON.
Now is the pleasant time,
The cool, the silent, save where silence yields
To the night-warbling bird.
MILTON.
Sweet the coming on
Of grateful evening mild.
MILTON.
When evening gray doth rise, I fetch my round
Over the mount.
MILTON.
ii
162
E VERLASTING.E VIL. EXAMPLE.
They left me then, when the gray -headed even,
Like a sad votarist in palmer's weed,
Rose from the hindmost wheels of Phoebus'
wain.
MILTON.
The evening comes
Kerchieft in a comely cloud,
While racking winds are piping loud.
MILTON.
Oft on a plat of rising ground
I hear the far-off curfew sound,
Over some wide-water'd shore,
Swinging slow with sullen roar.
MILTON.
It was an evening bright and still
As ever blush'd on wave or bower,
Smiling from heaven, as if nought ill
Could happen in so sweet an hour.
MOORE : Loves of the Angels.
Then take repast, till Hesperus display' d
His golden circlet in the western shade.
POPE.
You, whose pastime
Is to make midnight-mushrooms ; that rejoice
To hear the solemn curfew.
SHAKSPEARE.
The gaudy, blabbing, -and remorseful day
Is crept into the bosom of the sea.
SHAKSPEARE.
As gentle shepherd in sweet eventide,
When ruddy Phoebus 'gins to welk in west,
Marks which do bite their hasty supper best.
SPENSER.
And now fair Phoebus 'gan decline in haste
His weary wagon to the western vale.
SPENSER.
Now 'gan the golden Phcebus for to steep
His fiery face in billows of the west,
And his faint steeds water'd in ocean deep,
Whilst from their journal labours they did
rest.
SPENSER.
Now day is done, and night is nighing fast.
SPENSER.
Of evening tinct
The purple-streaming amethyst is thine.
THOMSON.
EVERLASTING.
And what a trifle is a moment's breath,
Laid in the scale with everlasting death !
SIR J. DENHAM.
Nothing could make me sooner to confess
That this world had an everlastingness,
Than to consider that a year is run
Since both this lower world's and the sun's sun
Did set.
JOHN DONNE.
Whether we shall meet again, I know not ;
Therefore our everlasting farewell take ;
Forever, and forever, farewell, Cassius.
SHAKSPEARE.
EVIL.
This is the curse of every evil deed,
That, propagating still, it brings forth evil.
COLERIDGE.
Evil into the mind of God or man
May come and go, so unapproved, and leave
No spot or blame behind.
MILTON.
The evil that men do lives after them ;
The good is oft interred with their bones.
SHAKSPEARE.
There is some soul of goodness in things evil,
Would men observingly distil it out.
SHAKSPEARE.
EXAMPLE.
I'll gaze forever on thy godlike father,
Transplanting one by one into my life
His bright perfections, till I shine like him.
ADDISON.
Your edicts some reclaim from sins,
But most your life and blest example wins.
DRYDEN.
The fault of others' sway
He set as sea-marks for himself to shun.
DRYDEN.
Since truth and constancy are vain,
Since neither love, nor sense of pain,
Nor force of reason, can persuade,
Then let example be obey'd.
GRANVILLE.
By thy example kings are taught to sway,
Heroes to fight, and saints may learn to pray.
GRANVILLE.
Just precepts thus from great examples given,
She drew from them what they derived from
Heav'n.
POPE.
EXER CISE.EXPE CTA TION. EXPERIENCE. EXTREMES 1 63
On the smooth expanse of crystal lakes,
The sinking stcne at first a circle makes ;
The trembling surface, by the motion stirr'd,
Spreads in a second circle, then a third ;
Wide, and more wide, the floating rings advance,
Fill all the wat'ry plain, and to the margin dance.
POPE.
Example is a living law, whose sway
Men more than all the written laws obey.
SIR C. SEDLEY.
EXERCISE.
The wise for cure on exercise depend :
God never made his work for man to mend.
DRYDEN.
Their airy limbs in sports they exercise,
And on the green contend the wrestler's prize.
DRYDEN.
Sea would be pools without the brushing air
To curl the waves ; and sure some little care
Should weary nature so, to make her want repose.
DRYDEN.
The purest exercise of health,
The kind refresher of the summer heats.
THOMSON.
EXPECTATION.
'Tis expectation makes a blessing dear.
POPE.
Expectation whirls me round ;
Th' imaginary relish is so sweet
That it enchants my sense.
SHAKSPEARE.
EXPERIENCE.
Not from experience, for the world was new,
He only from their cause their natures knew.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Some truths are not by reason to be tried,
But we have sure experience for our guide.
DRYDEN.
Till old experience do attain
To something of prophetic strain.
MILTON.
All things by experience
Are most improved ; then sedulously think
To meliorate thy stock ; no way or rule
Be unessay'd.
JOHN PHILIPS.
So fathers speak, persuasive speech and mild !
Their sage experience to the fav'rite child.
POPE.
This.sad experience cites me to reveal,
And what I dictate is from what I feel.
PRIOR.
Trust not my reading, nor my observations,
Which with experimental seal do warrant
The tenor of my book.
SHAKSPEARE.
EXTREMES.
Heat burns his rise, frost chills his setting beams,
And vex the world with opposite extremes.
CREECH.
Betwixt th' extremes, two happier climates hold
The temper that partakes of hot and cold.
DRYDEN.
Extremes in nature equal good produce.
POPE.
Avoid extremes, and shun the faults of such
Who still are pleased too little, or too much.
POPE.
EYES.
The beams of light had been in vain display'd
Had not the eye been fit for vision made;
In vain the author had the eye prepared
With so much skill, had not the light appeared.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Her deep blue eyes smile constantly, as if
they had by fitness
Won the secret of a happy dream, she does not
care to speak.
MRS. BROWNING.
And the large musing eyes, neither joyous nor
sorry,
Sing on like the angels in separate glory
Between clouds of amber.
MRS. BROWNING.
Her eye (I'm very fond of handsome eyes)
Was large and dark, suppressing half its fire
Until she spoke; then, through its soft disguise,
Flash'd an expression more of pride than ire,
And love than either.
BYRON.
Her eye's dark charm 'twere vain to tell;
But gaze on that of the gazelle,
It will assist thy fancy well. BYRON.
164
EYES.
An eye's an eye, and whether black or blue,
Is no great matter, so 'tis in request;
'Tis nonsense to dispute about a hue;
The kindest may be taken for the best. .
BYRON.
And her brow clear'd, but not her troubled eye :
The wind was down, but still the sea ran high.
BYRON.
Oh ! o'er the eye Death most exerts his might,
And hurls the spirit from her throne of light.
BYRON.
First, the two eyes, which have the seeing
pow'r,
Stand as one watchman, spy, or sentinel,
Being placed aloft, within the head's high tow'r;
And though both see, yet both but one thing
tell.
SIR J. DA VIES.
And yet the lights which in my tower do shine,
Mine eyes, which view all objects nigh and far,
Look not into this little world of mine.
SIR J. DA VIES.
For, if we chance to fix our thoughts elsewhere,
Though our eyes open be, we cannot see.
SIR J. DA VIES.
Nine things to sight required are :
The pow'r to see, the light, the visible thing,
Being not too small, too thin, too nigh, too far,
Clear space and time, the form distinct to
bring. SIR J. DAVIES.
Love to our citadel resorts
Through those deceitful sallyports;
Our sentinels betray our forts.
SIR J. DENHAM.
His awful presence did the crowd surprise,
Nor durst the rash spectator meet his eyes ;
Eyes that confess'd him born for kingly sway;
So fierce, they flash'd intolerable day.
DRYDEN.
Misdoubt my constancy, and do not try;
But stay and ever keep me in your eye.
DRYDEN.
My eyes are still the same; each glance, each
grace,
Keep their first lustre, and maintain their place,
Not second yet to any other face.
DRYDEN.
Some cruel pleasure will from thence arise,
To view the mighty ravage of your eyes.
DRYDEN.
Mark but how terribly his eyes appear;
And yet there's something roughly noble there ;
Which in unfashion'd nature looks divine,
And like a gem, does in the quarry shine.
DRYDEN.
I dare not trust these eyes :
They dance in mists, and dazzle with surprise.
DRYDEN.
All eyes you draw, and with the eyes the heart ;
Of your own pomp yourself the greater part.
DRYDEN.
Calm as the breath which fans our eastern
groves,
And bright as when thy eyes first lighted up our
loves.
DRYDEN.
From some she cast her modest eyes below ;
At some her gazing glances roving flew.
FAIRFAX.
Thy eyes are seen in diamonds bright.
GAY.
A sprightly red vermilions all her face;
And her eyes languish with unusual grace.
GRANVILLE.
And gospel light first beam'd from Bullen's
eyes.
GRAY : Long Story.
Her eyes the glow-worm lend thee,
The shooting stars attend thee;
And the elves also,
Whose little eyes glow
Like the sparks of fire, befriend thee.
HERRICK : Night Piece to Julia.
Thy eyes that were so bright, love,
Have now a dimmer shine;
But what they've lost in light, love,
Is what they gave to mine.
THOMAS HOOD.
All the gazers on the skies
Read not in fair heaven's story
Expresser truth, or truer glory,
Than they might in her bright eyes.
BEN JONSON.
The light of midnight's starry heaven
Is in those radiant eyes ;
The rose's crimson life has given
That cheek its glowing dyes.
L. E. LANDON.
EYES.
165
Why was the sight
To such a tender ball as th' eye confined,
So obvious and so easy to be quench' d,
And not, as feeling, through all parts diffused ;
That she might look at will through every pore?
MILTON.
Rain influence.
Ladies, whose bright eyes
MILTON: Z' Allegro.
And looks commercing with the skies,
Thy rapt soul sitting in thine eyes.
MILTON : // Penseroso.
O love ! for Sylvia let me gain the prize,
And make my tongue victorious as her eyes.
POPE.
Bright as the sun her eyes the gazers strike ;
And, like the sun, they shine on all alike.
POPE.
Her lovely looks a sprightly mind disclose,
Quick as her eyes, and as unfix'd as those.
POPE.
Why has not man a microscopic eye ?
For this plain reason man is not a fly.
POPE.
See by degrees a purer blush arise,
And keener lightnings quicken in her eyes.
POPE.
Sol through white curtains shot a tim'rous ray,
And oped those eyes that must eclipse the day.
POPE.
Those smiling eyes, attempting ev'ry ray,
Shone sweetly lambent with celestial day.
POPE.
Cold is that breast which warm'd the world be-
fore,
And these love -darting eyes must roll no more.
POPE.
No happier task these faded eyes pursue :
To read and weep is all they now can do.
POPE.
His pow'r can heal me, and relight my eye.
POPE.
Pass but some fleeting years, and these poor eyes,
Where now without a boast some lustre lies,
No longer shall their little honours keep,
But only be of use to read or weep.
PRIOR.
A slave I am to Clara's eyes :
The gipsy knows her pow'r, and flies.
PRIOR.
His eyebrow dark, and eye of fire,
Show'd spirit proud, and prompt to ire ;
Yet lines of thought upon his cheek
Did deep design and counsel speak.
SIR W. SCOTT.
From women's eyes this doctrine I derive :
They sparkle still the right Promethean fire ;
They are the books, the arts, academies,
That show, contain, and nourish all the world,
Else none at all in aught proves excellent.
SHAKSPEARE.
She will not stay the siege of loving terms,
Nor bide th' encounter of assailing eyes.
SHAKSPEARE.
Happy is Hermia, wheresoe'er she lies ;
For she hath blessed and attractive eyes.
SHAKSPEARE.
Churl, upon thy eyes I throw
All the pow'r this charm doth owe.
SHAKSPEARE.
Her eyes, in heaven,
Would through the airy region stream so bright
That birds would sing, and think it were not
night.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thy bones are marrowless ; thy blood is cold ;
Thou hast no speculation in those eyes
Thou starest with.
SHAKSPEARE.
Eyes and ears,
Two traded pilots 'twixt the dangerous shores
Of will and judgment.
SHAKSPEARE.
Nor doth the eye itself,
That most pure spirit of sense, behold itself,
Not going from itself; but eyes opposed,
Salute each other with each other's form.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thou tell'st me, there is murder in mine eye :
'Tis pretty, sure, and very probable,
That eyes that are the frail'st.and softest things,
Who shut their coward gates on atomies
Should be call'd tyrants, butchers, murderers !
SHAKSPEARE.
A wither'd hermit fivescore winters worn
Might shake off fifty looking in her eye.
SHAKSPEARE.
i66
EYES.
Now show the wound mine eye hath made in
thee!
Scratch thee but with a pin, and there remains
Some scar of it ; lean but upon a rush,
The cicatrice and capable impressure
Thy palm some moment keeps : but now mine
eyes,
Which I have darted at thee, hurt thee not.
SHAKSPEARE.
The night of sorrow now is turn'd to-day:
Her two blue windows faintly she upheaveth,
Like the fair sun, when in his fresh array
He cheers the morn, and all the world relieveth :
And as the bright sun glorifies the sky,
So is her face illumined with her eye.
SHAKSPEARE.
Yet looks he like a king : behold his eye,
As bright as is the eagle's, lightens forth
Controlling majesty.
SHAKSPEARE.
Though my heart's content firm love doth bear,
Nothing of that shall from mine eyes appear.
SHAKSPEARE.
The fixture of her eye hath motion in 't,
As we were mock'd with art.
SHAKSPEARE.
Those eyes, like lamps whose wasting oil is
spent,
Wax dim, as drawing to their exigent.
SHAKSPEARE.
Let him that makes but trifles of his eyes
First hand me ; on mine own accord, I'll off.
SHAKSPEARE.
A lover's eyes will gaze an eagle blind.
SHAKSPEARE.
Fetch me that flower; the herb I show'd thee
once :
The juice of it, on sleeping eyelids laid,
Will make or man or woman madly doat
Upon the next live creature that it sees.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thus are my eyes still captive to one sight ;
Thus all my thoughts are slaves to one thought
still.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
Believe thyself, thy eyes,
That first inflamed, and lit me to my love,
Those stars that still must guide me to my joy.
SOUTHERN.
Long while I sought to what I might compare
Those powerful eyes, which lighten my dark
spirit,
Yet found I nought on earth to which I dare
Resemble the image of their goodly light.
SPENSER.
His blazing eyes, like two bright shining fields,
Did burn with wrath, and sparkled living fire;
As two broad beacons set in open fields
Send forth their flames.
SPENSER.
Happy lines, on which with starry light
Those lamping eyes will deign sometimes to look.
SPENSER.
And her fair eyes, like stars that dimmed were
With darksome cloud, now show their goodly
beams.
SPENSER.
Some praise the eyes they love to see,
As rivalling the western star ;
But eyes I know well worth to me
A thousand firmaments afar.
JOHN STERLING.
'Tis true, but let it not be known,
My eyes are somewhat dimmish grown ;
For nature, always in the right,
To your decays adapts my sight.
SWIFT.
Amoret, my lovely foe,
Tell me where thy strength does lie,
Where the pow'r that charms us so,
In thy soul, or in thy eye ?
WALLER.
The heedless lover does not know
Whose eyes they are that wound him so.
WALLER.
Ye lofty beeches, tell this matchless dame,
That if together ye fed all one flame,
It would not equalize the hundredth part
Of what her eyes have kindled in my heart.
WALLER.
Sounds which address the ear are lost and die
In one short hour; but that which strikes the eye
Lives long upon the mind ; the faithful sight
Engraves the knowledge with a beam of light.
WATTS.
Those eyes,
Soft and capacious as a cloudless sky,
Whose azure depth their colour emulates,
Must needs be conversant with upward looks:
Prayer's voiceless service.
WORDSWORTH.
FAIRIES.
167
FAIRIES.
To pass their lives in fountains and on flowers,
And never know the weight of human hours.
BYRON.
The maskers come late, and I think will stay,
Like fairies, till the cock crow them away.
DONNE.
And now they throng the moonlight glade,
Above below on every side,
Their little minim forms array'd
In all the tricksy pomp of fairy pride.
DRAKE : Culprit Fay.
In days of old, when Arthur fill'd the throne,
Whose acts and fame to foreign lands were
blown,
The king of elves and little fairy queen
Gamboll'd on heaths, and danced on ev'ry
green ;
And when the jolly troop had led the round,
The grass unbidden rose, and mark'd the
ground.
DRYDEN.
In the bright moonshine while winds whistle
loud,
Tivy, tivy, tivy, we mount and we fly,
All rocking in a downy white cloud ;
And lest our leap from the sky should prove
too far,
We slide on the back of a new-falling star.
DRYDEN.
With songs and dance we celebrate the day;
At other times we reign by night alone,
And, posting through the skies, pursue the moon.
DRYDEN.
What you saw was all a fairy show,
And all those airy shapes you now behold
Were human bodies once.
DRYDEN.
Be secret and discreet : the fairy favours
Are lost, when not conceal' d.
DRYDEN.
You have no more work
Thun the coarse and country fairy,
That doth haunt the hearth or dairy.
BEN JONSON.
These are nights
Solemn to the shining rites
Of the fairy prince and knights,
While the moon their orgies lights.
BEN JONSON.
Fairy elves,
Whose midnight revels by a forest side,
Or fountain, some belated peasant sees,
Or dreams he sees, while overhead the moon
Sits arbitress, and nearer to the earth
Wheels her pale course: they on their mirth
and dance
Intent, with jocund music charm his ear:
At once with joy and fear his heart rebounds.
MILTON.
By dimpled brook, and fountain-brim,
The wood-nymphs deck'd with daisies trim
Their merry wakes and pastimes keep:
What hath night to do with sleep?
MILTON.
Demons found
In fire, air, flood, or under ground,
Whose power hath a true consent
With planet or with element. MILTON.
On the tawny sands and shelves
Trip the pert fairies and the dapper elves.
MILTON.
Good luck befriend thee, son ; for at thy birth
The fairy danced upon the hearth.
MILTON.
I took it for a fairy vision
Of some gay creatures of the element,
That in the colours of the rainbow live,
And play i' th' plighted clouds.
MILTON.
How the drudging goblin sweat
To earn his cream-bowl duly set;
When in one night, ere glimpse of morn.
His shadowy flail had thresh'd the corn.
MILTON.
He, stretch'd out all the chimney's length,
Basks at the fire his hairy strength ;
And crop-full out of doors he flings,
Ere the first cock his matin rings.
MILTON.
About this spring, if ancient bards say true,
The dapper elves their moonlight sports renew;
Their pigmy king and little fairy queen
In circling dances gamboll'd on the green,
While tuneful sprites a merry concert made,
And airy music warbled through the shade.
POPE.
The spirits,
Some thread the mazy ringlets of her hair,
Some hang upon the pendants of her ear.
POPE.
i68
FAIRIES.
If e'er one vision touch 1 d thy infant thought,
Of all the nurse and all the priest have taught,
Of airy elves by moonlight shadow seen,
The silver token, and the circled green.
POPE.
Ye sylphs and sylphids, to your chief give ear :
Fays, fairies, genii, elves, and demons, hear.
POPE.
The sylphs through mystic mazes guide their way,
Through all the giddy circle they pursue.
POPE.
Whatever spirit, careless of his charge,
His post neglects, or leaves the fair at large,
Shall feel sharp vengeance soon o'ertake his
sins,
Be stopt in vials, or transfix'd with pins.
POPE.
There the snake throws her enamell'd skin;
Weed wide enough to wrap a fairy in.
SHAKSPEARE.
And nightly, meadow fairies, look you sing,
Like to the garter-compass in a ring :
The expressure that it bears, green let it be,
More fertile fresh than all the world to see.
SHAKSPEARE.
You spotted snakes, with double tongue,
Thorny hedgehogs, be not seen ;
Newt and blind worms, do no wrong;
Come not near our fairy queen.
SHAKSPEARE.
Through this house give glimmering light,
By the dead and drowsy fire ;
Every elf, and fairy sprite,
Hop as light as bird from brier.
SHAKSPEARE.
To this great fairy I'll commend thy acts,
Make her thanks bless thee.
SHAKSPEARE.
This is the fairy land: oh, spite of spites,
We talk with goblins, owls, and elvish sprites.
SHAKSPEARE.
My Nan shall be the queen of all the fairies,
Finely attired in a robe of white.
SHAKSPEARE.
We fairies that do run
By the triple Hecate's team,
From the presence of the sun,
Following darkness like a dream,
Now are frolic.
SHAKSPEARE.
Fairies use flowers for their charactery.
SHAKSPEARE.
This is that very Mab
That plats the manes of horses in the night,
And bakes the elf-locks in foul sluttish hairs,
Which, once untangled, much misfortune bodes.
SHAKSPEARE.
In this state she gallops, night by night,
O'er ladies' lips, who straight on kisses dream,
Which oft the angry Mab with blisters plagues.
SHAKSPEARE.
Fairies, black, gray, green, and white,
You moonshine revellers, and shades of night,
You orphan-heirs of fixed destiny,
Attend your office.
SHAKSPEARE.
They're fairies ! he that speaks to them shall die:
I'll wink and couch; no man their sports must
eye.
SHAKSPEARE.
Her chariot is an empty hazel-nut,
Made by the joiner Squirrel, or old Grub,
Time out of mind the fairies' coach-makers.
SHAKSPEARE.
Where fires thou find'st unraked, and hearths
unswept,
There pinch the maids as blue as bilberry.
SHAKSPEARE.
Nan Page my daughter, and my little son,
And three or four more of their growth, we'll
dress
Like urchins, ouphes, and fairies, green and
white.
SHAKSPEARE.
Come now, a roundel and a fairy song,
SHAKSPEARE.
Never since that middle summer's spring
Met we on hill, in dale, forest, or mead,
But with thy brawls thou hast disturb'd our sport.
SHAKSPEARE.
Set your heart at rest;
The fairy-land buys not the child of me,
SHAKSPEARE.
The joyous nymphs and light-foot fairies,
Which thither came to hear their music sweet,
And to the measure of their melodies
Did learn to move their nimble-shifting feet.
SPENSER.
FAIRIES. FAITH.
169
I have a venturous fairy, that shall seek
The squirrel's hoard, and fetch thee thence new
nuts.
SHAKSPEARE.
But friendly fairies met with many graces,
And light-foot nymphs can chase the ling'ring
night
With heydegives, and trimly trodden traces.
SPENSER.
From thence a fairy thee unweeting reft,
There as thou slept'st in tender swaddling
band,
And her base elfin brood there for thee left :
Such men do changelings call, so changed by
fairies' theft.
SPENSER.
Love is all spirit : fairies sooner may
Be taken tardy, when they night-tricks play,
Than we ; we are too dull and lumpish.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
Before the downfall of the fairy state,
This dale, a pleasing region, not unblest,
This dale possess'd they, and had still possess'd.
TlCKELL.
There haply by the ruddy damsel seen,
Or shepherd boy, they featly foot the green.
TlCKELL.
FAITH.
His faith perhaps in some nice tenets might
Be wrong, his life I'm sure was in the right.
COWLEY.
If faith with reason never doth advise,
Nor yet tradition leads her, she is then
From heav'n inspired; and secretly grows wise
Above the schools, we know not how, nor
when.
SIR W. DAVENANT.
Fond men ! if we believe that men do live
Under the zenith of both frozen poles,
Though none come thence advertisement to give,
Why bear we not the like faith of our souls ?
SIR J. DAVIES.
For you alone
I broke my faith with injured Palamon.
DRYDEN.
His promise Palamon accepts ; but pray'd
To keep it better than the first hfe made :
Thus fair they parted, till the morrow's dawn;
For each had laid his plighted faith to pawn.
DRYDEN.
Observe the wretch who hath his faith forsook,
How clear his voice, and how assured his look !
Like innocence, and as serenely bold
As truth, how loudly he forswears thy gold !
DRYDEN.
A lively faith will bear aloft the mind,
And leave the luggage of good works behind.
DRYDEN.
Thy throne is darkness in the abyss of light,
A blaze of glory that forbids the sight ;
teach me to believe thee thus conceal'd,
And search no further than thyself reveal'd.
DRYDEN.
For mysterious things of faith rely
On the proponent, heaven's authority.
DRYDEN.
Th' unletter'd Christian, who believes in gross,
Plods on to heav'n, and ne'er is at a loss.
DRYDEN.
Then banish' d faith shall once again return,
And vestal fires in hallow'd temples burn.
DRYDEN.
Well I know him;
Of easy temper, naturally good,
And faithful to his word. DRYDEN.
The childlike faith that asks not sight,
Waits not for wonder or for sign,
Believes, because it loves, aright,
Shall see things greater, things divine.
Heaven to that gaze shall open wide,
And brightest angels to and fro
On messages of love shall glide
'Twixt God and Christ below. KEBLE.
And what is faith, love, virtue unessay'd,
Alone, without exterior help sustain'd ?
MILTON.
What will they, then ? what but unbuild
A living temple, built by faith to stand ?
MILTON.
Her failing, while her faith to me remains,
1 should conceal.
MILTON.
So spake the seraph Abdiel, faithful found;
Among the faithless faithful only he.
MILTON.
Then faith shall fail, and holy hope shall die;
One lost in certainty, and one in joy.
PRIOR.
170
FAITH. FALSE. FALSE HO OD.
I'll ne'er distrust my God for cloth and bread,
While lilies flourish, and the raven's fed.
QUARLES.
Now God be praised, that to believing souls
Gives light in darkness, comfort in despair.
SHAKSPEARE.
Which to believe of her
Must be a faith, that reason, without miracle,
Shall never plant in me.
SHAKSPEARE.
I have been forsworn
In breaking faith with Julia whom I loved.
SHAKSPEARE.
Now minutely revolts upbraid his faith-breach;
Those he commands move only in command,
Nothing in love.
SHAKSPEARE.
Is't not enough that to this lady mild
Thou falsed hath thy faith with perjury?
SPENSER.
Faith builds a bridge across the gulf of death,
To break the shock which nature cannot shun,
And lands thought smoothly on the farther shore.
YOUNG : Night Thoughts.
FALSE.
So hast thou cheated Theseus with a wile,
Against thy vow, returning to beguile
Under a borrow'd name ; as false to me,
So false art thou to him who set thee free.
DRYDEN.
So the false spider, when her nets are spread,
Deep ambush'd in her silent den does lie.
DRYDEN.
Tell him, I did in vain his brother move,
And yet he falsely said he was in love ;
Falsely; for had he truly loved, at least
He would have giv'n one day to my request.
DRYDEN.
He seem'd
For dignity composed, and high exploit ;
But all was false and hollow.
MILTON.
WTiat thou wouldst highly,
That thou wouldst holily; wouldst not play
false,
And yet wouldst wrongly win.
SHAKSPEARE.
FALSEHOOD.
But oh, that treacherous breast ! to whom weak
you
Did trust our counsels, and we both may rue,
Having his falsehood found too late!' Twas he
That made me cast you guilty, and you me.
JOHN DONNE.
Life and death are equal in themselves :
That which would cast the balance is thy false-
hood.
DRYDEN.
Artificer of fraud ; he was the first
That practised falsehood under saintly show.
MILTON.
For no falsehood can endure
Touch of celestial temper, but returns
Of force to its own likeness.
MILTON.
Who dares think one thing, and another tell,
My heart detests him as the gates of hell.
POPE.
The dull flat falsehood serves for policy,
And, in the cunning, truth's itself a lie.
POPE.
Thy better soul abhors a liar's part;
Wise is thy voice, and noble is thy heart.
POPE.
As folks, quoth Richard, prone to leasing,
Say things at first because they're pleasing;
Then prove what they have once asserted,
Nor care to have their lie deserted :
Till their own dreams at length deceive them,
And, oft repeating, they believe them.
PRIOR.
No falsehood shall defile my lips with lies,
Or with a veil of truth disguise.
SANDYS.
To lapse in fulness
Is sorer than to lie for need; and falsehood
Is worse in kings than beggars.
SHAKSPEARE.
For my part, if a lie may do thee grace,
I'll gild it with the happiest terms I have.
SHAKSPEARE.
Such is the face of falsehood, such the sight
Of foul Duessa, when her borrow'd light
Is laid away, and counterfessance known.
SPENSER.
FAME.
171
Let a man be ne'er so wise,
He may be caught with sober lies ;
For, take it in its proper light,
'Tis just what coxcombs call a bite.
SWIFT.
FAME.
How does the lustre of our father's actions,
Through the dark cloud of ills that cover him,
Break out, and bum with more triumphant blaze !
ADDISON.
Ah ! who can tell how hard it is to climb
The steep where fame's proud temple shines
afar?
Ah ! who can tell how many a soul sublime
Has felt the influence of malignant star
And waged with fortune an eternal war ?
BEATTIE: Minstrel.
Studious of good, man disregarded fame,
And useful knowledge was his eldest aim.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Absurd ! to think to overreach the grave,
And from the wreck of names to rescue ours:
The best concerted schemes men lay for fame
Die fast away : only themselves die faster.
The far-famed sculptor, and the laurell'd bard,
Those bold insurers of eternal fame,
Supply their little feeble aids in vain.
BLAIR : Grave.
Fame is the thirst of youth, but I am not
So young as to regard men's frown or smile
As loss or guerdon of a glorious lot;
I stood and stand alone, remember'd or forgot.
BYRON : Childe Harold.
What is the end of fame ? 'tis but to fill
A certain portion of uncertain paper :
Some liken it to climbing up a hill,
Whose summit, like all hills, is lost in vapour:
For this men write, speak, preach, and heroes
kill,
And bards burn what they call their " midnight
taper,"
To have, when the original is dust,
A name, a wretched picture, and worse bust.
BYRON.
The aspiring youth that fired the Ephesian dome
Outlives in fame the pious fool that raised it.
GIBBER : Richard III., altered.
If what I gain in empire
I lose in fame, I think myself no gainer.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Of ev'ry nation each illustrious name
Such toys as these have cheated into fame ;
Exchanging solid quiet to obtain
The windy satisfaction of the brain.
DRYDEN.
Their temples wreathed with leaves that still re-
new;
For deathless laurel is the victor's due.
DRYDEN.
Yet this mad chase of fame, by few pursued,
Has drawn destruction on the multitude.
DRYDEN.
May your sick fame still languish till it die,
And you grow cheap in every subject's eye.
DRYDEN.
I stand in need of one whose glories may
Redeem my crimes, ally me to his fame.
DRYDEN.
Tuscan Valerius by force o'ercame,
And not belied his mighty father's name.
DRYDEN.
If I by chance succeed,
Know I am not so stupid, or so hard,
Not to feel praise, or fame's deserved reward.
DRYDEN.
Had we but lasting youth and time to spare,
Some might be thrown away on fame and war.
DRYDEN.
This calm'd his cares ; soothed with his future
fame,
And pleased to hear his propagated name.
DRYDEN.
The good yEneas am I call'd ; a name,
While fortune favour'd, not unknown to fame.
DRYDEN.
His beauty these, and those his blooming age,
The rest his house and his own fame engage.
DRYDEN.
None was disgraced; for falling is no shame,
And cowardice alone is loss of fame :
The vent'rous knight is from the saddle thrown ;
But 'tis the fault of fortune, not his own.
DRYDEN.
A foreign son upon the shore descends,
Whose martial fame from pole to pole extends.
DRYDEN.
Yet, if desire of fame, and thirst of pow'r,
A beauteous princess with a crown in dow'r,
So fire your mind, in arms assert your right.
DRYDEN.
172
Some as justly fame extols
For lofty lines in Smithfield drolls.
DRYDEN.
P'or well you know, and can record alone,
What fame to future times conveys but darkly
down.
DRYDEN.
The more effeminate and soft his life,
The more his fame to struggle to the field.
DRYDEN.
A noble emulation heats your breast,
And your own fame now robs you of your rest :
Good actions still must be maintain'd with good,
As bodies nourish' d with resembling food.
DRYDEN.
They sung no more, or only sung his fame;
Struck dumb, they all admired the godlike man.
DRYDEN.
But who will call those noble, who deface,
By meaner acts, the glories of their race ;
Whose only title to their father's fame
Is couch'd in the dead letters of their name?
DRYDEN.
My soul is all the same,
Unmoved with fear, and moved with martial
fame;
But my chill blood is curdled in my veins,
And scarce the shadow of a man remains.
DRYDEN.
Draw him strictly so,
That all who view the piece may know
He needs no trappings of fictitious fame.
DRYDEN.
Like you, a man ; and hither led by fame,
Not by constraint, but by my choice, I came.
DRYDEN.
A chief renown'd in war,
Whose race shall bear aloft the Latian name,
And through the conquer' d world diffuse our
fame.
DRYDEN.
Life with ease I can disclaim,
And think it oversold to purchase fame.
DRYDEN.
But if to fame alone thou dost pretend,
The miser will his empty palace lend,
Set wide with doors, adorn'd with plated brass,
Where droves, as at a city-gate, may pass.
DRYDEN.
FAME.
Our best notes are treason to his fame,
Join'd with the loud applause of public voice.
DRYDEN.
Bigoted to this idol, we disclaim
Rest, health, and ease, for nothing but a name.
GARTH.
Honour's the noblest chase; pursue that game,
And recompense the loss of love with fame.
GRANVILLE.
What is an age in dull renown drudged o'er !
One little single hour of love is more.
GRANVILLE.
Let po vain fear thy gen'rous ardour tame;
But stand erect, and sound as loud as fame.
GRANVILLE.
Fame, not contented with her broad highway,
Delights, for change, through private paths to
stray.
WALTER HARTE.
If that thy fame with every toy be posed,
'Tis a thin web, which poisonous fancies
make;
But the great soldier's honour was composed
Of thicker stuff, which could endure a shake :
Wisdom picks friends ; civility plays the rest ;
A toy, shunn'd cleanly, passeth with the best.
GEORGE HERBERT.
He left the name, at which the world grew pale,
To point a moral, or adorn a tale.
DR. JOHNSON : Vanity of Human Wishes.
The fame that a man wins himself is best ;
That he may call his own : honours put on him
Make him no more a man than his clothes do,
Which are as soon ta'en off.
MlDDLETON.
Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise
(That last infirmity of noble mind)
To scorn delights, and live laborious days;
But the fair guerdon when we hope to find,
And think to burst out into sudden blaze,
Comes the blind Fury with th' abhorred shears,
And slits the thin-spun life.
MILTON.
Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil,
Nor in the glistering foil.
MILTON.
He can spread thy name o'er land and seas,
Whatever clime the sun's bright circle warms.
MILTON.
FAME.
173
Those other two, equall'd with me in fate,
So were I equall'd with them in renown!
Blind Thamyris, and blind Mseonides;
And Tiresias and Phineus, prophets old.
MILTON.
What is glory but the blaze of fame,
The people's praise, if always praise unmix'd ?
MILTON.
They cast to get themselves a name,
Regardless whether good or evil fame.
MILTON.
Strength to glory aspires
Vain-glorious, and through infamy seeks fame.
MILTON.
Thus fame shall be achieved, renown on earth;
And what most merits fame, in silence hid.
MILTON.
Fame, that her high worth to raise,
Seem'd erst so lavish and profuse,
We may justly now accuse
Of detraction from her praise.
MILTON.
Here let those who boast in mortal things
Learn how their greatest monuments of fame,
And strength, and art, are easily outdone
By spirits reprobate.
MILTON.
What's fame ? a fancied life in others' breath,
A thing beyond us, ev'n before our death.
Just what you hear, you have ; and what's
unknown,
The same, my lord, if Tully's, or your own.
All that we feel of it begins and ends
In the small circle of our foes or friends ;
To all beside as much an empty shade,
As Eugene living, as a Caesar dead.
POPE.
How vain that second life in others' breath,
Th' estate which wits inherit after death !
Ease, health, and life for this they must resign;
Unsure the tenure, but how vast the fine !
The great man's curse without the gain endure ;
Be envied, wretched; and be flatter'd, poor.
POPE.
Nor fame I slight, nor for her favours call :
She comes unlook'd for, if she comes at all.
POPE.
Unblemish'd let me live, or die unknown;
grant an honest fame, or p,rant me none.
POPE.
Fame's high temple stands ;
Stupendous pile ; not rear'd by mortal hands !
Whate'er proud Rome, or artful Greece, beheld,
Or elder Babylon, its frame excell'd.
POPE.
Along the stream of time thy name
Expanded flies, and gathers all its fame.
POPE.
The tomb with manly arms and trophies raise j
There, high in air, memorial of my name,
Fix the smooth oar, and bid me live to fame.
POPE.
But sure the eye of time beholds no name
So blest as thine in all the rolls of fame.
POPE.
Fast by the throne obsequious fame resides,
And wealth incessant rolls her golden tides.
POPE.
Their names inscribed unnumber'd ages past,
From time's first birth, with time itself shall last;
There ever new, nor subject to decays,
Spread and grow brighter with the length of
days.
POPE.
Hope, too long with vain delusion fed,
Deaf to the rumour of fallacious fame,
Gives to the roll of death his glorious name.
POPE.
All fame is foreign, but of true desert ;
Plays round the head, but comes not near the
heart ;
One self-approving hour whole years outweighs
Of stupid starers and of loud huzzas.
POPE-
Henry and Edward, brightest sons of fame,
And virtuous Alfred, a more sacred name,
After a life of glorious toils endured,
Closed their long glories with a sigh.
POPE.
Proud fame's imperial seat
With jewels blazed, magnificently great.
POPE.
Though short my stature, yet my name extends
To heav'n itself, and earth's remotest ends.
POPE.
Fame, impatient of extremes, decays
Not more by envy than excess of praise.
POPE.
Not Tyro, nor Mycene, match her name,
Nor great Alcmena, the proud boasts of fame.
POPE.
174
FAME.
Alas ! not dazzled with their noontide ray,
Compute the morn and evening to the day;
The whole amount of that enormous fame,
A tale that blends their glory with their shame.
POPE.
Yet wide was spread their fame in ages past,
And poets once had promised they should last.
POPE.
How shall I then your helpless fame defend ?
'Twill then be infamy to seem your friend.
POPE.
Fame, that delights around the world to stray,
Scorns not to take our Argos in her way.
POPE.
Whose honours with increase of ages grow,
As streams roll down enlarging as they go.
POPE.
And what is fame ? the meanest have their day ;
The greatest can but blaze, and pass away.
POPE.
The great Antilocus ! a name
Not unrecorded in the rolls of fame.
POPE.
Above all Greek, above all Roman fame.
POPE.
The flying rumours gather'd as they roll'd :
Scarce any tale was sooner heard than told ;
And all who told it added something new ;
And all who heard it made enlargement too :
In ev'ry ear it spread, on ev'ry tongue it grew.
POPE.
In arts and science 'tis the same,
Our rivals' hurts create our fame.
PRIOR.
His fame, like gold, the more 'tis try'd
The more shall its intrinsic worth proclaim.
PRIOR.
Thy arms pursue,
Paths of renown, and climb ascents of fame.
PRIOR.
Now, Mars, she said, let fame exalt her voice;
Nor let thy conquests only be her choice.
PRIOR.
Glory grows guilty of detested crimes,
When for fame's sake, for praise, an outward part,
We bend to that the working of the heart.
SHAKSPEARE.
Death makes no conquest of this conqueror,
For now he lives in fame, though not in life.
SHAKSPEARE.
Let fame, that all hunt after in their lives,
Live register'd upon our brazen tombs,
And then grace us in the disgrace of death ;
When, spite of cormorant devouring time,
The endeavour of this present breath may buy
That honour which shall bate his scythe's keen
And make us heirs of all eternity.
SHAKSPEARE.
I am sorry
That he approves the common liar, Fame,
Who speaks him thus at Rome.
SHAKSPEARE.
Let us satisfy our eyes
With the memorials and the things of fame
That do renown this city.
SHAKSPEARE.
The cry went once for thee,
And still it might, and yet it may again,
If thou wouldst not entomb thyself alive
And case thy reputation in a tent.
SHAKSPEARE.
Then shall our names,
Familiar in their mouth as household words,
Be in their flowing cups freshly remember'd.
SHAKSPEARE.
Still the fine's the crown;
Whate'er the course, the end is the renown.
SHAKSPEARE.
Famed by thy tutor, and thy parts of nature ;
Thrice famed, beyond all erudition.
SHAKSPEARE.
I have been
The book of his good acts, whence men have
read
His fame unparallel'd, haply, amplified.
SHAKSPEARE.
Die two months ago, and not forgotten yet ?
Then there is hope a great man's memory
May outlive his life half a year.
SHAKSPEARE.
Ah me ! full sorely is my heart forlorn,
To think how modest worth neglected lies,
While partial fame doth with her blasts adorn
Such deeds alone as pride and pomp disguise,
Deeds of ill sort, and mischievous emprise.
SHENSTONE : Schoolmistress.
And well beseems all knights of noble name,
That covet in the immortal book of fame
To be eternized, tSat same to haunt.
SPENSER.
FAME. FAMINE. FANCY.
'75
Joy may you have, and everlasting fame,
Of late most hard achievement by you done,
For which inrolled is your glorious name
In heav'nly registers above the sun.
SPENSER.
Certes, Sir Knight, ye been too much to blame,
Thus for to blot the honour of the dead,
And with foul cowardice his carcase shame,
Whose living hands immortalized his name.
SPENSER.
Let stubborn pride possess thee long,
And be thou negligent of fame;
With ev'ry muse to grace thy song,
May'st thou despise a poet's name.
SWIFT.
What so foolish as the chase of fame?
How vain the prize ! how impotent our aim !
For what are men, who grasp at praise sublime,
But bubbles on the rapid stream of time,
That rise and fall, that swell, and are no more,
Born and forgot, ten thousand in an hour?
YOUNG.
The well-swoln ties an equal homage claim,
And either shoulder has its share of fame.
YOUNG.
Fame is a bubble the reserved enjoy;
Who strive to grasp it, as they touch, destroy.
YOUNG.
Take up no more than you by worth may claim,
Lest soon you prove a bankrupt in your fame.
YOUNG.
The breath of others raises our renown,
Our own as soon blows the pageant down.
YOUNG.
Pursuit of fame with pedants fills our schools,
And into coxcombs burnishes our fools.
YOUNG.
With fame, in just proportion, envy grows;
The man that makes a character makes foes.
YOUNG.
For as by depredations wasps proclaim
The fairest fruit, so these the fairest fame.
YOUNG.
FAMINE.
This city never felt a siege before,
But from the lake received its daily store ;
Which now shut up, and millions crowded here,
Famine will soon in multitudes appear.
DRYDEN,
You tempt the fury of my three attendants,
Lean famine, quartering steel, and climbing fire.
SHAKSPEARE.
The sacred sons of vengeance, on whose course
Corrosive famine waits, and kills the year.
THOMSON.
FANCY.
With these sometimes she doth her time beguile ;
These do by fits her phantasy possess.
SIR J. DA VIES.
Yet in this agony his fancy wrought,
And fear supply'd him with this happy thought.
DRYDEN.
Love is by fancy led about,
From hope to fear, from joy to doubt :
Whom we now a goddess call,
Divinely graced in every feature,
Strait's a deform'd, a perjured creature :
Love and hate are fancy all.
GRANVILLE.
In the soul
Are many lesser faculties, that serve
Reason as chief: among these fancy next
Her office holds ; of all external things,
Which the five watchful senses represent,
She forms imaginations, airy shapes,
Which reason joining, or disjoining, frames
All what we affirm, or what deny, and call
Our knowledge or opinion.
MILTON.
Mine eyes he closed, but open left the cell
Of fancy, my internal sight.
MILTON.
The brain contains ten thousand cells ;
In each some active fancy dwells.
PRIOR.
Fancy flows in, and muse flies high ;
He knows not where my clack will lie.
PRIOR.
Some lower muse, perhaps, who lightly treads
The devious paths where wanton fancy leads.
ROWE.
Woe to the youth whom fancy gains,
Winning from reason's hand the reins :
Pity and woe ! for such a mind
Is soft, contemplative, and kind.
SIR W. SCOTT.
7 6
FANCY. FASHION.
Tell me, where is fancy bred,
Or in the heart, or in the head ?
How begot, how nourished ?
It is engender'd in the eyes,
With gazing fed ; and fancy dies
In the cradle where it lies.
SHAKSPEARE.
But all the story of the night told over
More witnesseth than fancy's images,
And grows to something of great constancy,
But, howsoever, strange and admirable.
SHAKSPEARE.
Horatio says : 'tis but our fantasy,
Touching this dreaded sight twice seen of us :
Therefore I have intreated him,
That, if again this apparition comes,
He may approve our eyes, and speak to it.
SHAKSPEARE.
How now, my lord, why do you keep alone,
Of sorriest fancies your companions making?
Using those thoughts which should indeed have
died
With them they think on ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Not so sick, my lord,
As she is troubled with thick-coming fancies.
SHAKSPEARE.
There in full opulence a banker dwelt,
Who all the joys and pangs of riches felt ;
His sideboard glitter'd with imagined plate,
And his proud fancy held a vast estate.
SWIFT.
My own breath still foments the fire,
Which flames as high as fancy can aspire.
WALLER.
FASHION.
Fashion, a word which knaves and fools may
use
Their knavery and folly to excuse.
CHURCHILL.
Fashion, leader of a chatt'ring train,
Whom man for his own hurt permits to reign,
Who shifts and changes all things but his shape,
And would degrade her vot'ry to an ape.
COWPER.
And sooner may a gulling weather-spy,
By drawing forth heav'n's scheme, tell certainly
What fashion'd hats, or ruffs, or suits, next year
Our giddy-headed antic youth will wear.
DONNE.
Rich, fashionable robes her person deck ;
Pendants her ears, and pearls adorn her neck.
DRYDEN.
In fashions wayward, and in love unkind;
For Cupid deigns not wound a currish mind.
FAIRFAX.
In times of old, when British nymphs were
known
To love no foreign fashions like their own.
GARTH.
A different toil another forge employs ;
Here the loud hammer fashions female toys :
Each trinket that adorns the modern dame
First to these little artists owed its frame.
GAY.
And even while Fashion's brightest arts decoy,
The heart, distrusting, asks if this be joy.
GOLDSMITH.
Be not the first by whom the new is tried,
Nor yet the last to lay the old aside.
POPE.
Painted for sight and essenced for the smell,
Like frigates fraught with spice and cochineal,
Sail in the ladies: how each pirate eyes
So weak a vessel and so rich a prize !
POPE.
She glares in balls, front boxes, and the ring ;
A vain, unquiet, glitt'ring, wretched thing.
POPE.
New customs,
Though they be never so ridiculous,
Nay, let them be unmanly, yet are follow'd.
SHAKSPEARE.
All with one consent praise new-born gawds.
Though they are made and moulded of things
past.
SHAKSPEARE.
Because I cannot flatter and look fair,
Duck with French nods and apish courtesy,
I must be held a rancorous enemy.
SHAKSPEARE.
Report of fashions in proud Italy;
Whose manners ill our tardy apish nation
Limps after, in base awkward imitation.
SHAKSPEARE.
When tyrant custom had not shackled man,
But free to follow nature was the mode.
THOMSON,
The loud daw, his throat displaying, draws
The whole assembly of his fellow daws.
WALLER.
FASHION. FA TE.
177
Nothing exceeds in ridicule, no doubt,
A fool in fashion, but a fool that's out;
His passion for absurdity's so strong
He cannot bear a rival in the wrong.
Though wrong the mode, comply : more sense
is shown
In wearing others' follies than our own.
YOUNG.
Yet, not superior to her sex's cares,
The mode she fixes by the gown she wears ;
Of silks and china she's the last appeal :
In these great points she leads the common weal.
YOUNG.
FATE.
The hand of fate is over us, and Heaven
Exacts severity from all our thoughts.
ADDISON.
The hand of fate
Has torn thee from me, and I must forget thee.
ADDISON.
Thy downcast looks, and thy disorder'd thoughts,
Tell me my fate: I ask not the success
My cause has found.
ADDISON.
Others will gape t' anticipate
The cabinet designs of fate ;
Apply to wizards to foresee
What shall, and what shall never be.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
A sacrifice to fall of state,
Whose thread of life the fatal sisters
Did twist together with its whiskers.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
To bear is to conquer our fate.
CAMPBELL.
Fate her own book mistrusted at the sight,
On that side war, on this a single fight.
COWLEY.
The slipp'ry tops of human state,
The gilded pinnacles of fate.
COWLEY.
Fate steals along with ceaseless tread,
And meets us oft when least we dread ;
Frowns in the storm with threatening brow,
Yet in the sunshine strikes the blow.
COWPER.
The Fates but only spin the coarser 'clue;
The finest of the wool is left for you.
DRYDEN.
12
Think it not hard, if at so cheap a rate
You can secure the constancy of fate,
Whose kindness sent what does your malice seem,
By lesser ills the greater to redeem.
DRYDEN.
As tides at highest mark regorge the flood,
So fate, that could no more improve their joy,
Took a malicious pleasure to destroy.
DRYDEN.
Dismiss thy fear,
And heaven's unchanged decrees attentive hear.
DRYDEN.
But God has wisely hid from human sight
The dark decrees of future fate,
And sown their seeds in depth of night.
DRYDEN.
If fate be not, then what can we foresee ?
And how can we avoid it if it be ?
If by free will in our own paths we move,
How are we bounded by decrees above ?
Whether we drive, or whether we are driven,
If ill, 'tis ours ; if good, the act of heaven.
DRYDEN.
Alas, what stay is there in human state ?
Or who can shun inevitable fate?
The doom was written, the decree was past,
Ere the foundations of the world were cast.
DRYDEN.
Man makes his fate according to his mind :
The weak, low spirit Fortune makes her slave :
But she's a drudge when hector'd by the brave.
If Fate weave common thread, I'll change the
doom,
And with new purple weave a nobler loom.
DRYDEN.
Heav'n has to all allotted, soon or late,
Some lucky revolutions of their fate.
DRYDEN.
Eternal deities,
Who rule the world with absolute decrees,
And write whatever time shall bring to pass,
With pens of adamant on plates of brass.
DRYDEN.
Fully ripe, his swelling fate breaks out,
And hurries him to mighty mischiefs on.
DRYDEN.
These are the realms of unrelenting fate ;
And awful Rhadamanthus rules the state !
DRYDEN.
1 7 8
FATE.
If, said he,
Your grief alone is hard captivity,
For love of heav'n with patience undergo
A cureless ill, since fate will have it so.
DRYDEN.
Fate and the dooming gods are deaf to tears.
DRYDEN.
I meant to meet
My fate with face unmoved and eyes unwet.
DRYDEN.
Whate'er betides, by destiny 'tis done ;
And better bear like men than vainly seek to
shun.
DRYDEN.
Our guardian angel saw them where they sate
Above the palace of our slumb'ring king;
He sigh'd, abandoning his charge to fate.
DRYDEN.
How have I fear'd your fate ! but fear'd it most
When love assail'd you on the Libyan coast.
DRYDEN.
Fate has cramm'd us all into one lease,
And that even now expiring.
DRYDEN.
Must I new bars to my own joy create ?
Refuse myself what I had forced from fate ?
DRYDEN.
You must obey me soon or late :
Why will you vainly struggle with your fate ?
DRYDEN.
With fates averse, the rout in arms resort
To force their monarch, and insult the court.
DRYDEN.
What if I please to lengthen out his date
A day, and take a pride to cozen fate ?
DRYDEN.
We follow fate, which does too fast, pursue.
DRYDEN.
Before our farther way the fates allow,
Here must we fix on high the golden bough.
DRYDEN.
Are we condemn'd by fate's unjust decree
No more our houses and our homes to see !
DRYDEN.
My fates permit me not from hence to fly ;
Nor he, the great comptroller of the sky.
DRYDEN.
Hear himself repine
At fate's unequal laws ; and at the clue
Which merciless in length the midmost sister
drew.
DRYDEN.
Like fawning courtiers, for success they wait,
And then come smiling, and declare for fate.
DRYDEN.
Fate makes you deaf, while I in vain implore :
My fate forebodes I ne'er shall see you more.
DRYDEN.
Each to his proper fortune stand or fall ;
Equal and unconcern'd I look on all ;
Rutilians, Trojans, are the same to me,
And both shall draw the lots their fate decree.
DRYDEN.
Death never won a stake with greater toil,
Nor e'er was fate so near a foil.
DRYDEN.
Unwilling I forsook your friendly state,
Commanded by the gods, and forced by fate.
DRYDEN.
What port can such a pilot find',
Who in the night of fate must blindly steer.
DRYDEN.
Himself to be the man the fates require,
I firmly judge, and what I judge desire,
DRYDEN.
There is a necessity in fate
Why still the brave bold man is fortunate.
DRYDEN.
'Tis fate that flings the dice ; and as she flings,
Of kings makes peasants, and of peasants kings.
DRYDEN.
How easy 'tis, when destiny proves kind,
With full-spread sails to run before the wind ;
But they who 'gainst stiff gales laveering go,
Must be at once resolved and skilful too.
DRYDEN.
An ancient augur, skill'd in future fate,
With these foreboding words restrains their hate.
DRYDEN.
Sing to those that hold the vital shears,
And turn the adamantine spindle round,
On which the fate of gods and men is wound.
MILTON.
And life more perfect have attain'd than fate
Meant me, by venturing higher than my lot.
MILTON.
FATE.
179
Others apart sat on a hill retired,
In thoughts more elevate, and reason'd high,
Of providence, foreknowledge, will, and fate.
MILTON.
Necessity or chance
Approach not me; and what I will is fate.
MILTON.
By fate the strength of gods
And this empyreal substance cannot fail.
MILTON.
While warmer souls command, nay, make their
fate,
Thy fate made thee, and forced thee to be great.
MOORE.
Heav'n from all creatures hides the book of
fate,
All but the page prescribed, their present state :
From brutes what men, from men what spirits
know:
Or who could suffer being .here below?
POPE.
This day black omens threat the brightest fair
That e'er deserved a watchful spirit's care ;
Some dire disaster, or by force or slight ;
But what, or where, the fates have wrapt in
night.
POPE.
Each sacred accent bears eternal weight,
And each irrevocable word is fate.
POPE.
Blind to former as to future fate,
What mortal knows his pre-existent state ?
POPE.
What time would spare, from steel receives its
date;
And monuments, like men, submit to fate.
POPE.
With beating hearts the dire event they wait,
Anxious and trembling for the birth of fate.
POPE.
O thou, who freest me from my doubtful state,
Long lost and wilder'd in the maze of fate !
Be present still : oh goddess, in our aid
Proceed, and 'firm those omens thou hast made.
POPE.
Oh, thoughtless mortals ! ever blind to fate !
Too soon dejected, and too soon ela.te !
I, of mind elate, and scorning fear,
Thus with new taunts insult the monster's ear.
POPE.
A brave man struggling in the storms of fate.
POPE.
Let wit her sails, her oars let wisdom lend;
The helm let politic experience guide :
Yet cease to hope thy short-lived bark shall ride
Down spreading fate's unnavigable tide.
PRIOR.
The future few or more, howe'er they be,
Were destined erst, nor can by fate's decree
Be now cut off.
PRIOR.
The gods, who portion out
The lots of princes as of private men,
Have put a bar between his hopes and empire.
ROWE.
Such harbingers preceding still the fates,
Have heav'n and earth together demonstrated
Unto our climatures and countrymen.
SHAKSPEARE.
But yet I'll make assurance double sure,
And take a bond of fate : thou shalt not live.
SHAKSPEARE.
The life thou gavest me first, was lost and done ;
Till with thy warlike sword, despite of fate,
To my determined time thou gav'st new date.
SHAKSPEARE.
The seed of Banquo kings!
Rather than so, come, Fate, into the list,
And champion me to the utterance.
SHAKSPEARE.
Think you I bear the shears of destiny?
Have I commandment on the pulse of life ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Let determined things to destiny
Hold unbewail'd their way.
SHAKSPEARE.
Fate, show thy force ; ourselves we do not owe;
What is decreed must be ; and be this so.
SHAKSPEARE.
What fates impose, that men must needs abide;
It boots not to resist both wind and tide.
SHAKSPEARE.
Fates ! we will know your pleasures :
That we shall die, we know ; 'tis but the time,
And drawing days out, that men stand upon.
SHAKSPEARE.
How eagerly he flew, when Europe's fate
Did for the seed of future actions wait !
GEORGE STEPNEY.
i8o
FEAR.
Though fear should lend him pinions like the
wind,
Yet swifter fate will seize him from behind.
SWIFT.
Fame and censure, with a tether,
By fate are always link'd together.
SWIFT.
Empires subversed, when ruling fate has struck
Th' unalterable hour.
THOMSON.
FEAR.
Here shame dissuades him, there his fear
prevails ;
And each, by turns, his aching heart assails.
ADDISON.
I laugh to think how your unshaken Cato
Will look aghast, while unforeseen destruction
Pours in upon him thus from ev'ry side.
ADDISON.
Speechless with wonder, and half dead with fear.
ADDISON.
Fear is an ague that forsakes
And haunts by fits those whom it takes ;
And they opine they feel the pain
And blows they felt to-day, again.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
His fear was greater than his haste ;
For fear, though fleeter than the wind,
Believes 'tis always left behind.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
Men as resolute appear
With too much as too little fear ;
And when they're out of hopes of flying,
Will run away from death by dying;
Or turn again to stand it out,
And those they fled, like lions, rout.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
Like one, that on a lonesome road
Doth walk in fear and dread,
And, having once turn'd round, walks on,
And turns no more his head,
Because he knows a frightful fiend
Doth close behind him tread.
COLERIDGE : Ancient Mariner.
The absent danger greater still appears ;
Less fears he who is near the thing he fears.
DANIEL: Cleopatra.
Alas ! my fears are causeless and ungrounded,
Fantastic dreams, and melancholy fumes.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Fear's a large promiser; who subject live
To that base passion, know not what they give.
DRYDEN.
I felt my curdled blood
Congeal with fear; my hair with horror stood.
DRYDEN.
My blood ran back,
My shaking knees against each other knock'd !
On the cold pavement down I fell entranced,
And so unfinish'd left the horrid scene !
DRYDEN.
Fear freezes minds ; but love, like heat,
Exhales the soul sublime to seek her native seat.
DRYDEN.
While we behold such dauntless worth appear
In dawning youth, and souls so void of fear.
DRYDEN.
His warlike mind, his soul devoid of fear,
His high-designing thoughts were figured there.
DRYDEN.
The more I know, the more my fears augment ;
And fears are oft prophetic of th' event.
DRYDEN.
Let him in arms the pow'r of Turnus prove,
And learn to fear whom he disdains to love.
DRYDEN.
Aghast he waked ; and, starting from his bed,
Cold sweat in clammy drops his limbs o'er-
spread.
DRYDEN.
As one condemn'd to leap a precipice,
Who sees before his eyes the depth below,
Stops short, and looks about for some kind
shrub
To break his dreadful fall.
DRYDEN.
Th' advice was true; but fear had seized the
man,
And all good counsel is on cowards lost.
DRYDEN.
I feel my sinews slacken'd with the fright,
And a cold sweat thrills down all o'er my limbs,
As if I were dissolving into water.
DRYDEN.
Fear never yet a gen'rous mind did gain ;
We yield on parley, but are storm'd in vain ;
Constraint, in all things, makes the pleasure less ;
Sweet is the love which comes with willingness.
DRYDEN.
FEAR.
181
This heard, th' imperious queen sat mute with
fear,
Nor further durst incense the gloomy thunderer.
Silence was in the court at this rebuke :
Nor could the gods, abash'd, sustain their sov-
ereign's look.
DRYDEN.
Bestow, base man, thy idle threats elsewhere ;
My mother's daughter knows not how to fear.
DRYDEN.
Who knows what adverse fortune may befall ?
Arm well your mind, hope little, and fear all.
DRYDEN.
A thousand fears
Still overawe when she appears.
GRANVILLE.
I see the gods
Upbraid our sufferings, and would humble them
By sending these affrights, while we are here ;
That we might laugh at their ridiculous fear.
BEN JONSON : Catiline.
Let terror strike slaves mute ;
Much danger makes great hearts most resolute.
MARSTON.
The flaming seraph, fearless, though alone,
Encompass'd round with foes, thus answer'd
bold.
MILTON.
Fearless of danger, like a petty god
I walk'd about admired of all, and dreaded
On hostile ground, none daring my affront.
MILTON.
A glorious apparition had (no doubt),
And carnal fear, that, day, dimm'd Adam's eyes.
MILTON.
The aged earth, aghast
With terror of that blast,
Shall from the surface to the centre shake.
MILTON.
Not half so swift the trembling doves can fly
When the fierce eagle cleaves the liquid sky.
POPE.
But now no face divine contentment wears;
'Tis all blank sadness, or continual fears.
POPE.
Invading fears repel my coward joy,
And ills foreseen the present bliss destroy.
PRIOR.
I tell thee, life is but one common care,
And man was born to suffer and to fear.
PRIOR.
But when vain doubt and groundless fear
Do that dear foolish bosom tear.
PRIOR.
His name struck fear, his conduct won the day;
He came, he saw, he seized the struggling prey.
ROSCOMMON
None knew, till guilt created fear,
What darts or poison'd arrows were.
ROSCOMMON.
Fear is the tax that conscience pays to guilt.
SEWELL.
Fear is the last of ills :
In time we hate that which we often fear.
SHAKSPEARE.
The mind I sway by, and the heart I bear,
Shall never sagg with doubt, nor shake with fear.
SHAKSPEARE.
A faint cold fear thrills through my veins,
That almost freezes up the heat of life.
SHAKSPEARE.
This is the very painting of your fear ;
This is the air-drawn dagger, which (you said)
Led you to Duncan.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thy name affrights me, in whose sound is death.
SHAKSPEARE.
Why, what should be the fear?
I do not set my life at a pin's fee;
And, for my soul, what can it do to that,
Being a thing immortal?
SHAKSPEARE.
I am fearful : wherefore frowns he thus ?
'Tis an aspect of terror. All's not well.
SHAKSPEARE.
To fear the foe, since fear oppresseth strength,
Gives, in your weakness, strength unto your foe-
SHAKSPEARE.
Possess'd with humours full of idle dreams,
Not knowing what they fear, but full of fear.
SHAKSPEARE.
I have almost forgot the taste of fears :
The time has been my senses would have cool'd
To hear a night shriek, and my fell of hair
Would at a dismal treatise rouse and stir
As life were in 't.
SHAKSPEARE.
182
FEAR. FEASTS.
Let me still take away the arms I fear,
Nor fear still to be harm'd.
SHAKSPEARE.
His horrid image doth unfix my hair,
And make my seated heart knock at my ribs,
Against the use of nature.
SHAKSPEARE.
You can behold such sights,
And keep the natural ruby of your cheeks,
When mine is blanch'd with fear.
SHAKSPEARE.
He answer'd nought at all; but adding new
Fear to his first amazement, staring wide,
With stony eyes, and heartless hollow hue,
Astonish'd stood, as one that had espy'd
Infernal furies, with their chains unty'd.
SPENSER.
As one affright
With hellish fiends, or furies' mad uproar,
He then uprose.
SPENSER.
Whilst she spake, her great words did appall
My feeble courage, and my heart oppress,
That yet I quake and tremble over all.
SPENSER.
From the ground she fearless doth arise,
And walketh forth without suspect of crime.
SPENSER.
As the moon, cloathed with cloudy night,
Doth show to him that walks in fear and sad
affright.
SPENSER.
Desponding fear, of feeble fancies full,
Weak and unmanly, loosens ev'ry power.
THOMSON.
WTiat are fears but voices airy,
Whispering harm where harm is not,
And deluding the unwary
Till the fatal bolt is shot ?
WORDSWORTH.
FEASTS.
Sated with nature's boons, what thousands seek,
With dishes tortured from their native taste,
And mad variety, to spur beyond
Its wiser will the jaded appetite !
DR. JOHN ARMSTRONG :
Art of Presei-ving Health.
Some men are born to feast, and not to fight ;
Whose sluggish minds, e'en in fair honour's field,
Still on their dinner turn.
JOANNA BAILLIE: Basil.
But 'twas a public feast, and public day
Quite full, right dull, guests hot, and dishes cold,
Great plenty, much formality, small cheer,
And everybody out of their own sphere.
BYRON.
That all-softening, overpowering knell,
The tocsin of the soul, the dinner-bell.
BYRON.
Unpurchased plenty our full tables loads,
And part of what they lent, return'd t' our gods.
SIR J. DENHAM.
All the tributes land and sea affords,
Heap'd in great chargers, load our sumptuous
boards.
.SIR J. DENHAM.
I was the first who set up festivals ;
Not with high tastes our appetites did force,
But fill'd with conversation and discourse ;
Which feasts, convivial meetings we did name.
SIR J. DENHAM.
'Tis holyday; provide me better cheer:
'Tis holyday; and shall be round the year:
Shall I my household gods and genius cheat,
To make him rich who grudges me my meat ?
That he may loll at ease, and, pamper'd high,
When I am laid, may feed on giblet pie ?
DRYDEN.
No sideboards then with gilded plate were
dress' d,
No sweating slaves with massive dishes press'd.
DRYDEN.
Ev'ry brow with cheerful green is crown'd ;
The feasts are doubled, and the bowls go round.
DRYDEN.
His jolly brother, opposite in sense,
Laughs at his thrift, and, lavish of expense,
Quaffs, crams, and guttles in his own defence.
DRYDEN.
She's gone unkindly, and refused to cast
One glance to feed me for so long a fast.
DRYDEN.
But such fine feeders are no guests for me ;
Riot agrees not with frugality :
Then that unfashionable man am I,
With me they'd starve for want of ivory.
DRYDEN-
FEASTS.
183
The lady of the leaf ordain' d a feast,
And made the lady of the flow'r her guest;
When lo ! a bow'r ascended on the plain,
With sudden seats ordain' d, and large for either
train.
DRYDEN.
Some coarse cold salad is before thee set ;
Bread with the bran, perhaps, and broken meat.
Fall on, and try thy appetite to eat.
DRYDEN.
No poignant sauce she knew, nor costly treat ;
Her hunger gave a relish to her meat.
DRYDEN.
She to the palace led her guest,
Then offer'd incense, and proclaim'd a feast.
DRYDEN.
Then with a second course the tables load,
And with full chargers offer to the god.
DRYDEN :
A feast prepared with riotous expense,
Much cost, more care, and most magnificence.
DRYDEN.
Not heath-pout, or the rarer bird
Which Phasis or Ionia yields,
More pleasing morsels would afford
Than the fat olives of my fields.
DRYDEN.
The day
Had summon'd him to due repast at noon.
DRYDEN.
What more than madness reigns,
When one short sitting many hundred drains,
And not enough is left him to supply
Board-wages, or a footman's livery !
DRYDEN.
What aim'st thou at? delicious fare,
And then to sun thyself in open air?
DRYDEN.
Content with food which nature freely bred,
On wildings and on strawberries they fed :
Cornels and bramble berries gave the rest,
And falling acorns furnish'd out a feast.
DRYDEN.
Such whose sole bliss is eating ; who can give
But that one brutal reason why they live.
DRYDEN.
There the coarse cake and homely husks of beans
From pamp'ring riot the young stomach weans.
DRYDEN.
A maple dresser in her hall she had,
On which full many a slender meal she made.
DRYDEN.
Meanwhile, thy indignation yet to raise,
The carver, dancing round, each dish surveys,
With flying knife, and, as his art directs,
With proper gestures ev'ry fowl dissects.
DRYDEN.
He for the feast prepared,
In equal portions with the ven'son shared.
DRYDEN.
Now purple hangings clothe the palace walls,
And sumptuous feasts are made in splendid halls.
DRYDEN.
The cook and sewer each his talent tries,
In various figures scenes of dishes rise.
DRYDEN.
When poor Rutilius spends all his worth
In hopes of setting one good dinner forth,
'Tis downright madness.
DRYDEN.
To the stage permit
Ragouts for Tereus or Thyestes dress'd ;
'Tis task enough for thee t'expose a Roman
feast.
DRYDEN.
Thus the voluptuous youth, bred up to dress,
For his fat grandsire, some delicious mess,
In feeding high his tutor will surpass,
An heir apparent of the gourmand race.
DRYDEN.
Wouldst thou with mighty beef augment thy
meal,
Seek Leadenhall ; St. James's sends thee veal.
GAY.
Blest be those feasts, with simple plenty crown'd,
Where all the ruddy family around
Laugh at the jests or pranks, that never fail,
Or sigh with pity at some mournful tale.
GOLDSMITH : Traveller.
Apicius, thou didst on thy guts bestow
Full ninety millions : yet, when this was spent,
Ten millions still remain'd to thee ; which thou,
Fearing to suffer thirst and famishment,
In poison'd potion drank'st.
HAKEWILL.
Not that we think us worthy such a guest,
But that your worth will dignify our feast.
BEN JONSON.
1 84
FEASTS.
No simple word
That shall be utter'd at our mirthful board
Shall make us sad next morning.
BEN JONSON.
The acceptance, sir, creates
The entertainment perfect, not the cates.
BEN JONSON.
The snow-white damask ensigns are display'd,
And glittering salvers on the sideboard laid.
DR. WM. KING : Art of Cookery.
Such the figure of a feast,
Which, were it not for plenty and for steam,
Might be resembled to a sick man's dream.
DR, WM. KING : Art of Cookery.
When art and nature join, th' effect will be
Some nice ragout, or charming fricasee.
DR. WM. KING : Art of Cookery.
Cornwall squab-pie, and Devon whitepot brings ;
And Leister beans and bacon, food of kings.
DR. WM. KING : Art of Cookery.
Cheerful looks make every dish a feast,
And 'tis that crowns a welcome.
MASSINGER.
I join with thee calm peace and quiet :
Spare fast, that oft the gods doth diet.
MILTON.
At a stately sideboard by the wine
That fragrant smell diffused.
MILTON.
He set before him spread
A table of celestial food divine,
Ambrosial fruits, fetch'd from the tree of life;
And from the fount of life ambrosial drink.
MILTON.
He look'd, and saw the face of things quite
changed :
The brazen throat of war had ceased to roar ;
All now was turn'd to jollity and game,
To luxury and riot, feast and dance.
MILTON.
His holy rites and solemn feasts profaned,
And with their darkness durst affront his light.
MILTON.
Up, up ! cries gluttony : 'tis break of day ;
Go drive the deer, and drag the finny prey.
POPE.
Then from the Mint walks forth the man of
rhyme,
Happy to catch me just at dinner-time.
POPE.
Catius is ever moral, ever grave,
Thinks who endures a knave, is next a knave,
Save just at dinner, then prefers, no doubt,
A rogue with venison to a saint without.
POPE.
The tables in fair order spread;
Viands of various kinds allure the taste,
Of choicest sort and savour ; rich repast !
POPE.
To feastful mirth be this white hour assign'd,
And sweet discourse,_the banquet of the mind.
POPE.
The chiming clocks to dinner call ;
A hundred footsteps scrape the marble hall.
POPE.
Is this a bridal or a friendly feast ?
Or from their deeds I rightlier may divine,
Unseemly flown with insolence or wine.
POPE.
From silver spouts the grateful liquors glide,
And China's earth receives the smoking tide.
POPE.
Of all the servile herd, the worst is he
That in proud dulness joins with quality;
A constant critic at the great man's board,
To fetch and carry nonsense for my lord.
POPE.
" I'm quite ashamed 'tis mighty rude
To eat so much but all's so good !
I have a thousand thanks to give :
My lord alone knows how to live."
POPE.
Mingles with the friendly bowl
The feast of reason and the flow of soul.
POPE.
Your wine lock'd,
Or fish denied : the river yet unthaw'd.
POPE.
The nymph the table spread,
Ambrosial cates, with nectar roses red.
POPE.
The plenteous board, high-heap'd with cates
divine,
And o'er the foaming bowl the laughing wine.
POPE.
At once they gratify their scent and taste,
While frequent cups prolong the rich repast.
POPE.
FEASTS.
185
One half-pint bottle serves them both to dine,
And is at once their vinegar and wine.
POPE.
Wines and cates the tables grace,
But most the kind inviter's cheerful face.
POPE.
In plenty starving, tantalized in state,
And complaisantly help'd to all I hate ;
Treated, caress'd, and tired, I take my leave.
POPE.
No turbots dignify my boards;
But gudgeons, flounders, what my Thames
affords.
POPE.
Let each becalm his troubled breast,
Wash and partake serene the friendly feast.
POPE.
Then bids prepare the hospitable treat,
Vain shows of love to veil his felon hate.
POPE.
The vulgar boil, the learned roast, an egg :
Hard task to hit the palate of such guests.
POPE.
The suitor train
Who crowd his palace, and with lawless pow'r
His herds and flocks in feastful rites devour.
POPE.
Thus of your heroes and brave boys,
With whom old Homer makes such noise,
The greatest actions I can find
Are that they did their work, and dined.
PRIOR.
The meat was served, the bowls were crown'd,
Catches were sung, and healths went round.
PRIOR.
The shining sideboard, and the burnish'd plate,
Let other ministers, great Ann, require.
PRIOR.
The feast was served ; the bowl was crown'd ;
To the king's pleasure went the mirthful round.
PRIOR.
Well, then, things handsomely were served;
My mistress for the strangers carved.
PRIOR.
Matter and figure they produce,
For garnish this, and that for use; '
They seek to feed and please their guests.
PRIOR.
Friendship shall still thy evening feasts adorn,
And blooming peace shall ever bless thy morn.
PRIOR.
wasteful riot, never well content
With low-prized fare ; hunger ambitious
Of cates by land and sea far fetcht and sent.
RALEIGH.
The veins unfill'd, our blood is cold, and then
We pout upon the morning, are unapt
To give or to forgive; but when we've stuff d
These pipes and these conveyances of blood
With wine and feeding, we have suppler souls.
SHAKSPEARE.
'Tis burnt, and so is all the meat.
What dogs are these ? Where is the rascal
cook?
How durst you, villains, bring it from the
dresser,
And serve it thus to me that love it not?
SHAKSPEARE.
Go to a gossip's feast, and gawd with me,
After so long grief such nativity.
SHAKSPEARE.
We may again
Give to our tables meat, sleep to our nights,
Free from our feasts and banquets bloody knives.
SHAKSPEARE.
Here's our chief guest. If he had been for-
gotten,
It had been as a gap in our great feast.
SHAKSPEARE.
Who can cloy the hungry edge of appetite
By bare imagination of a feast ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Tie up the libertine in a field of feasts,
Keep his brain fuming ; epicurean cooks
Sharpen with cloyless sauce his appetite.
SHAKSPEARE.
1 hold an old accustomed feast,
Whereto I have invited many a guest.
SHAKSPEARE.
As surfeit is the father of much fast,
So ev'ry scope, by the immoderate use,
Turns to restraint.
SHAKSPEARE.
He shall conceal it,
Whiles you are willing it shall come to note,
What time we will our celebration keep
According to my birth.
SHAKSPEARE.
i86
FEASTS. FICKLENESS. FICTION.
You do not give the cheer; the feast is sold
That is not often vouch' d, while 'tis making,
'Tis given with welcome.
SHAKSPEARE.
To feed were best at home ;
From thence the sauce to meat is ceremony;
Meeting were bare without it.
SHAKSPEARE.
Now good digestion wait on appetite,
And health on both.
SHAKSPEARE.
Were the graced person of our Banquo present,
Whom I may rather challenge for unkindness.
SHAKSPEARE.
But that our feasts
In every mess have folly, and the feeders
Jest with it as a custom, I should blush
To see you so attired.
SHAKSPEARE.
Through the hall there walked to and fro
A jolly yeoman, marshal of the same,
Whose name was Appetite ; he did bestow
Both guests and meats, whenever in they came,
And knew them how to order without blame.
SPENSER.
Thence she them brought into a stately hall,
Wherein were many tables fair dispred,
And ready dight with drapets feastival,
Against the viands should be ministred.
SPENSER.
What needs me tell their feasts and goodly guise,
In which was nothing riotous nor vain.
SPENSER.
Give no more to ev'ry guest
Than he's able to digest ;
Give him always of the prime,
And but little at a time.
SWIFT.
Deluded mortals, whom the great
Choose for companions tete-d-t2te ;
Who at their dinners, en famille,
Get leave to sit whene'er you will.
SWIFT.
With British bounty in his ship he feasts
Th' Hesperian princes, his amazed guests,
To find that wat'ry wilderness exceed
The entertainment of their great Madrid.
WALLER.
Rome's holy days you tell, as if a guest
With the old Romans you were wont to feast.
WALLER.
Venus her myrtle, Phoebus has his bays ;
Tea both excels, which you vouchsafe to praise.
WALLER.
Their various cares in one great point combine
The business of their lives, that is to dine.
YOUNG : Love of Fame.
FICKLENESS.
The thin chameleon, fed with air, receives
The colour of the thing to which he cleaves.
DRYDEN.
They know how fickle common lovers are;
Their oaths and vows are cautiously believed;
For few there are but have been once deceived
DRYDEN.
A feather shooting from another's head
Extracts his brains, and principle is fled.
POPE.
As the chameleon, which is known
To have no colours of his own, -
But borrows from his neighbour's hue,
His white or black, his green or blue.
PRIOR.
As I blow this feather from my face,
Obeying with my wind when I do blow,
And yielding to another when it blows,
Commanded always by the greatest gust;
Such is the lightness of you common men.
SHAKSPEARE.
Beware of fraud, beware of fickleness
In choice and change of thy dear loved dame.
SPENSER.
FICTION.
Unbind the charms that in slight fables lie,
And teach that truth is truest poesy.
COWLEY.
And novels (witness ev'ry month's Review)
Belie their name, and offer nothing new.
Cow PER : Retirement.
Who would with care some happy fiction frame,
So mimics truth, it looks the very same.
GRANVILLE.
Truth and fiction are so aptly mix'd
That all seems uniform and of a piece.
ROSCOMMON.
WISHES. FLA TTER Y.
187
A brave romance who would exactly frame,
.First brings his knight from some immortal
dame.
WALLER.
FISHES.
Thus mean in state, and calm in sprite,
My fishful pond is my delight.
CAREW.
Lest he should suspect it, draw it from him,
As fishes do the bait, to make him follow it.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Thus at half-ebb a rolling sea
Returns, and wins upon the shore;
The watery herd, affrighted at the roar,
Rest on their fins awhile, and stay,
Then backward take their wond'ring way.
DRYDEN.
The fish had long in Csesar's pond been fed,
And from its lord undutifully fled.
DRYDEN.
Would ye preserve a num'rous finny race?
Let your fierce dogs the rav'nous otter chase ;
Th' amphibious monster ranges all the shores,
Darts through, the waves, and every haunt
explores.
GAY.
Each bay
With fry innumerable swarm, and shoals
Of fish, that with their fins and shining scales
Glide under the green waves, in sculls that oft
Bank the mid sea.
MILTON.
The sounds and seas, with all their finny drove,
Now to the moon in wavering morrice move.
MILTON.
Or sporting, with quick glance,
Show to the sun their waved coats, dropp'd with
gold.
MILTON.
All fish from sea or shore,
Freshet, or purling brook, or shell, or fin.
MILTON.
Our plenteous streams a various race supply :
The bright-eyed perch, with fins of various dye;
The silver eel, in shining volumes roll'd ;
The yellow carp, in scales bedropt with gold;
Swift trouts, diversified with crimson stains,
And pikes, the tyrants of the watery plains.
POPE.
'Tis true no turbots dignify my boards;
But gudgeons, flounders, what my Thames
affords.
POPE.
Of carps and mullets why prefer the great,
Yet for small turbots such esteem profess ?
POPE.
To make baskets of bulrushes was my wont;
Who to entrap the fish in winding sale
Was better seen ?
SPENSER.
The glittering finny swarms
That heave our friths, and crowd upon our
shores.
THOMSON.
FLATTERY.
For praise that's due, does give no more
To worth than what it had before;
But to commend without desert
Requires a mastery of art ;
That sets a glass on what's amiss,
And says what should be, not what is.
BUTLER.
Flattery, the dang'rous nurse of vice,
Got hand upon his youth, to pleasures bent.
DANIEL.
If we from wealth to poverty descend,
Want gives to know the flatt'rer from the friend.
DRYDEN.
In this plain fable, you th' effect may see
Of negligence, and fond credulity ;
And learn besides of flatt'rers to beware,
Then most pernicious when they speak too fair
DRYDEN.
But flattery never seems absurd :
The flatter'd always take your word ;
Impossibilities seem just,
They take the strongest praise on trust ;
Hyperboles, though ne'er so great,
Will still come short of self-conceit.
GAY: Fables.
Who praises Lesbia's eyes and features
Must call her sisters awkward creatures ;
For the kind flattery's sure to charm
When we some other nymph disarm.
GAY: Fables.
Say, flatterer, say, all-fair deluder, speak ;
Answer me this, ere yet my heart does break.
GRANVILLE.
1 88
FLATTERY.
To shake with laughter ere the jest they hear,
To pour at will the counterfeited tear ;
And as her patron hints the cold or heat,
To shake in dog-days, in December sweat.
DR. JOHNSON: London.
I would give worlds could I believe
One-half that is profess'd me ;
Affection ! could I think it thee,
When Flattery has caress'd me.
Miss LANDON.
The firmest purpose of a woman's heart
To well-timed, artful flattery may yield.
. LILLO : Elmerick.
Tedious waste of time, to sit and hear
So many hollow compliments and lies,
Outlandish flatteries.
MILTON.
No adulation ; 'tis the death of virtue !
Who flatters is of all mankind the lowest,
Save he who courts the flatterer.
HANNAH MORE: Daniel.
A huffing, shining, flatt'ring, cringing coward,
A canker-worm of peace, was raised above him.
OTWAY.
All-potent Flattery, universal lord !
Reviled, yet courted ; censured, yet adored !
How thy strong spell each human bosom draws,
The very echo to our self-applause !
POPE.
When simple pride for flatt'ry makes demands,
May dunce by dunce be whistled off my hands !
POPE.
A scorn of flattery, and a zeal for truth.
POPE.
That flattery ev'n to kings he held a shame,
And thought a lie in verse or prose the same.
POPE.
Awkward and supple each devoir to pay,
She flatters her good lady twice a day.
POPE.
A vile encomium doubly ridicules ;
There's nothing blackens like the ink of fools.
POPE.
No wit to flatter left of all his store ;
No fool to laugh at, which he valued more.
POPE.
Strike a blush through frontless flattery.
POPE.
Averse alike to flatter or offend;
Not free from faults, nor yet too vain to mend.
POPE.
Leave dang'rous truths to unsuccessful satires,
And flattery to fulsome dedicators.
POPE.
" Dear countess ! you have charms all hearts to
suit !"
And, " Sweet Sir Fopling ! you have so much
wit!"
Such wits and beauties are not praised for nought,
For both the beauty and the wit are bought.
POPE.
Pernicious flatt'ry ! thy malignant seeds,
In an ill hour and by a fatal hand
Sadly diffused o'er virtue's gleby land,
With rising pride amidst the corn appear,
And choke the hopes and harvest of the year.
PRIOR.
Secure from foolish pride's affected state,
And specious flattery's more pernicious bait.
ROSCOMMON.
Minds
By nature great are conscious of their greatness,
And hold it mean to borrow aught from flattery.
ROWE : Royal Convert.
O, that men's ears should be
To counsel deaf, but not to flattery !
SHAKSPEARE.
Would I had never trod this English earth,
Or felt the flatteries that grow upon it !
SHAKSPEARE.
His nature is too noble for the world ;
He would not flatter Neptune for his trident,
Or Jove for 's power to thunder.
SHAKSPEARE.
When I tell him he hates flatterers,
He says he does ; being then most flatter'd.
SHAKSPEARE.
Yet better thus, and known to be contemn'd,
Than still contemn'd and flatter'd.
SHAKSPEARE.
Should the poor be flatter'd?
No : let the candied tongue lick absurd pomp,
And crook the pregnant hinges of the knee
Where thrift may follow fawning.
SHAKSPEARE.
So, when he saw his flatt'ring arts to fail,
With greedy force he 'gan the fort t' assail.
SPENSER.
FLA TTER Y. FL O WERS.
189
The world that cannot deem of worthy things,
When I do praise her, says I do but flatter ;
So doth the cuckoo, when the mavis sings,
Begin his witness note apace to clear.
SPENSER.
'Tis an old maxim in the schools
That flattery's the food of fools ;
Yet now and then your men of wit
Will condescend to take a bit.
SWIFT.
I am not form'd, by flattery and praise,
By sighs and tears, and all the whining trade
Of love, to feed a fair one's vanity;
To charm at once and spoil her.
THOMSON : Tancred and Sigismunda.
See how they beg an alms of flattery !
They languish; O! support them with a lie.
YOUNG.
Flatter'd crimes of a licentious age
Provoke our censure.
YOUNG.
FLOWERS.
E'en the rough rocks with tender myrtle bloom,
And trodden weeds send out a rich perfume.
ADDISON.
There the ever-blooming roses
Everlasting spring bestow,
There the snow-white lilies glisten
With the saffron's ruddy glow.
ST. AUGUSTINE: Hymn.
Not Eastern monarchs, on their nuptial day,
In dazzling gold and purple shine so gay,
As the bright natives of the unlabour'd field,
Unversed 'n spinning, and in looms unskill'd.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Wee, modest, crimson-tipped flow'r.
BURNS : To a Mountain Daisy.
Ye field flowers ! the gardens eclipse you, tis true ;
Yet, wildings of nature, I dote upon you ;
For ye waft me to summers of old,
When the earth teem'd around me with fairy
delight,
And when daisies and buttercups gladden'd my
sight,
Like treasures of silver and gold.
CAMPBELL.
The flowers, call'd out of their beds,
Start and raise up their drowsy heads.
JOHN CLEAVELAND.
The marigold, whose courtier's face
Echoes the sun, and doth unlace
Her at his rise, at his full stop
Packs and shuts up her gaudy shop.
JOHN CLEAVELAND.
Beauteous flowers why do we spread
Upon the monuments of the dead ?
COWLEY.
The tim'rous maiden blossoms on each bough
Peep'd forth from their first blushes; so that now
A thousand ruddy hopes smiled in each bud,
And flatter'd ev'ry greedy eye that stood.
CRASHAW.
Then as a bee which among weeds doth fall,
Which seem sweet flow'rs, with lustre fresh
and gay,
She lights on that, and this, and tasteth all,
But, pleased with none, doth rise, and soar
away.
SIR J. DAVIES,
The flowers which it had press'd
Appeared to my view
More fresh and lovely than the rest
That in the meadows grew.
SIR J. DENHAM,
A single violet transplant :
The strength, the colour, and the size,
All which before was poor and scant,
Redoubles still and multiplies.
DONNE,
The wealthy spring yet never bore
That sweet nor dainty flow'r,
That damask'd not the checker' d floor
Of Cynthia's summer bow'r.
DRAYTON.
I on a fountain light
Whose brim with pinks was platted ;
The bank with daffodillies dight,
With grass-like sleave was matted.
DRAYTON.
The rose is fragrant, but it fades in time,
The violet sweet, but quickly past the prime ;
White lilies hang their heads, and soon decay;
And whiter snow in minutes melts away.
DRYDEN.
Can flow'rs but droop in absence of the sun
Which waked their sweets ? and mine, alas ! is
gone.
DRYDEN.
FLOWERS.
No more, my goats, shall I behold you climb
The steepy cliffs, or crop the flow'ry thyme.
DRYDEN.
With greens and flow'rs recruit their empty
hives,
And seek fresh forage to sustain their lives.
DRYDEN.
The flow'r which lasts for little space,
A short-lived good, and an uncertain grace.
DRYDEN.
Arcadia's flow'ry plains and pleasing floods.
DRYDEN.
Sycamore with eglantine were spread,
A hedge about the sides, a covering overhead.
DRYDEN.
Then party-colour'd flow'rs of white and red
She wove, to make a garland for her head.
DRYDEN.
And set soft hyacinths with iron-blue
To shade marsh-marigolds of shining hue.
DRYDEN.
And where the vales with violets once were
crown'd,
Now knotty burs and thorns disgrace the ground.
DRYDEN.
For thee the groves green liv'ries wear,
For thee the Graces lead the dancing Hours,
And Nature's ready pencil paints the flow'rs.
DRYDEN.
The daughters of the flood have search'd the
mead
For violets pale, and cropp'd the poppy's head;
The short narcissus, and fair daffodil,
Pansies to please the sight, and cassia sweet to
smell.
DRYDEN.
Nature not bounteous now, but lavish grows,
Our paths with flow'rs she prodigally strows.
DRYDEN.
The fresh eglantine exhaled a breath
Whose odours were of pow'r to raise from death.
DRYDEN.
Fair as the face of nature did appear,
When flowers first peep'd,and trees did blossoms
bear,
And winter had not yet deform'd th' inverted
year.
DRYDEN.
Yet ere to-morrow's sun shall show his head,
The dewy paths of meadows we will tread
For crowns and chaplets to adorn thy bed.
DRYDEN.
Flow'rs are strew'd, and lamps in order placed,
And windows with illuminations graced.
DRYDEN.
You range the pathless wood,
While on a flow'ry bank he chews the cud.
DRYDEN.
Set rows of rosemary with flow'ring stem,
And let the purple violets drink the stream.
DRYDEN.
Mark well the flow'ring almonds in the wood,
If od'rous blooms the bearing branches load.
DRYDEN.
Then laughs the childish year with flow'rets
crown'd,
And lavishly perfumes the fields around;
But no substantial nourishment receives;
Infirm the stalk, unsolid are the leaves.
DRYDEN.
A tuft of daisies on a flowery lay
They saw, and thitherward they bent their way.
DRYDEN.
Then droop'd the fading flow'rs, their beauty
fled,
And closed their sickly eyes and hung the head,
And rivel'd up with heat, lay dying in their bed.
DRYDEN.
A flow'r in meadow ground, amellus call'd;
And from one root thy rising stem bestows
A world of leaves.
DRYDEN.
The flow'rs unsown in fields and meadows
reign'd,
And western winds immortal spring maintain'd.
DRYDEN.
Farewell, you flow'rs, whose buds with early care
I watch'd, and to the cheerful sun did rear :
Who now shall bind your stems? or, when you
fall,
With fountain streams your fainting souls recall ?
DRYDEN.
Around him dance the rosy Hours,
And, damasking the ground with flow'rs,
W T ith ambient sweets perfume the morn.
FENTON.
For cowslips sweet, let dandelions spread;
For Blouzelinda, blithesome maid, is dead 1
GAY.
FLOWERS.
191
Fair is the kingcup that in meadow blows ;
Fair is the daisy that beside her grows.
GAY.
Fair is the gillyflow'r of gardens sweet,
Fair is the marigold, for pottage meet.
GAY.
Let weeds, instead of butter flow'rs, appear ;
And meads, instead of daisies, hemlock bear.
GAY.
Her modest looks the cottage might adorn,
Sweet as the primrose peeps beneath the thorn.
GOLDSMITH : Deserted Village.
Her cheeks grow the brighter, recruiting their
colour ;
As flowers by sprinkling revive with fresh odour.
GRANVILLE.
Some plants the sunshine ask, and some the
shade ;
At night the nure trees spread, but check their
bloom
At morn, and lose their verdure and perfume.
WALTER HARTE.
Pulse of all kinds diffused their od'rous pow'rs,
Where nature pencils butterflies on flow'rs.
WALTER HARTE.
'Twas a lovely thought to mark the hours,
As they floated in light away,
By the opening and the folding flow'rs
That laugh to the summer's day.
MRS. HEMANS.
Fair daffodils, we weep to see
You haste away so soon :
As yet the early-rising sun
Has not attain'd his noon.
HERRICK.
God might have bade the earth bring forth
Enough for great and small,
The oak-tree and the cedar-tree,
Without a flower at all;
He might have made enough enough
For every want of ours,
For luxury, medicine, and toil,
And yet have made no flowers.
MARY HOWITT.
Have you seen but a bright lily grow,
Before rude hands have touch'd it ?
BEN JONSON.
Bring flowers to crown the cup and lute,
Bring flowers the bride is near ;
Bring flowers to soothe the captive's cell,
Bring flowers to strew the bier !
Miss LANDON.
Spake full well, in language quaint and olden,
One who dwelleth by the castled Rhine,
When he call'd the flowers, so blue and golden,
Stars, that in earth's firmament do shine.
LONGFELLOW : Flowers.
Let no sheep there play,
Nor frisking kids the flowery meadows lay.
THOMAS MAY.
Day's harbinger
Comes dancing from the east, and leads with her
The flow'ry May, who from her green lap throws
The yellow cowslip and the pale primrose.
MILTON.
Then herbs of every leaf that sudden flower'd,
Op'ning their various colours.
MILTON.
My mother Circe, with the syrens three,
Amidst the flow'ry-kirtled Naiades.
MILTON.
To the sylvan lodge
They came, that like Pomona's arbour smiled,
With flow'rets deck'd, and fragrant smells.
MILTON.
Bid amaranthus all his beauty shed,
And daffodillies fill their cups with tears,
To strew the laureate hearse where Lycid lies.
MILTON.
They sat recline
On the soft downy bank, damask'd with flow'rs.
MILTON.
It fed flow'rs worthy of paradise, which not
nice art
In beds and curious knots, but nature boon,
Pour'd forth profuse on hill and dale and plain.
MILTON.
Under foot the violet,
Crocus, and hyacinth, with rich inlay
Broider'd the ground.
MILTON.
Iris there, with humid bow,
Waters the odorous banks that blow
Flowers of more mingled hue
Than her purpled scarf can show.
MILTON.
Flow'rs of all hue, and without thorn the rose.
Whilst from off the waters fleet
Thus I set my printless feet
O'er the cowslip's velvet head,
That bends not as I tread.
MILTON.
MILTON.
192
FLOWERS.
So have I seen some tender slip,
Saved with care from winter's nip,
The pride of her carnation train,
Pluck'd up by some unheedy swain.
MILTON.
Stooping to support each flow'r of tender stalk.
MILTON.
Who now shall rear you to the sun, or rank
Your tribes, and water from th' ambrosial fount ?
MILTON.
O flow'rs
That neither will in other climate grow,
My early visitation, and my last
At ev'n, which I bred up with tender hand
From the first opening bud.
MILTON.
On a green shady bank profuse of flow'rs,
Pensive I sat.
MILTON.
Flow'r
Carnation, purple, azure, or speck'd with gold.
MILTON.
They at her coming sprung,
And touch'd by her fair tendance gladlier grew.
MILTON.
On flow'rs reposed, and with rich flow'rets
crown 'd
They eat, they drink, and, in communion sweet,
Quaff immortality and joy.
MILTON.
Throw hither all your quaint enamell'd eyes,
That on the green turf suck the honied show'rs,
And purple all the ground with vernal flow'rs.
MILTON.
He only thought to crop the flow'r
New shot up from a vernal show'r.
MILTON.
Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies,
The tufted crow-toe, and pale jessamine.
MILTON.
Each beauteous flow'r,
Iris all hues, roses, and jessamine,
Rear'd high their flourish'd heads between, and
wrought
Mosaic. MILTON.
He now is come
Into the blissful field, thro' groves of myrrh,
And flow'ring odours, cassia, nard, and balm.
MILTON.
Meadows trim with daisies pied,
Shallow brooks and rivers wide.
MILTON.
Beyond
The flow'ry dale of Sibma, clad with vine. ,
MILTON.
I sat me down to watch upon a bank
With ivy canopied, and interwove
With flaunting honeysuckle.
MILTON.
Mild as when Zephyrus on Flora breathes.
MILTON.
And all my plants 1 save from nightly ill
Of noisome winds and blasting vapours chill.
MILTON.
Yon flow'ry arbours, yonder alleys green.
MILTON.
See daisies open, rivers run.
PARNELL.
Look how the purple flower, which the plough
Hath shorn in sunder, languishing doth die.
PEACHAM.
In Eastern lands they talk in flowers,
And they tell in a garland their loves and
cares ;
Each blossom that blooms in their garden bowers
On its leaves a mystic language bears.
J. G. PERCIVAL.
Thy little sons
Permit to range the pastures ; gladly they
Will mow the cowslip posies, faintly sweet.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Where solar beams
Parch thirsty human veins, the damask'd meads
Unforced display ten thousand painted flow'rs,
Useful in potables.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Where opening roses breathing sweets diffuse,
And soft carnations shower their balmy dews ;
Where lilies smile in virgin robes of white,
The thin undress of superficial light;
And varied tulips show so dazzling gay,
Blushing in bright diversities of day.
POPE.
Fair from its humble bed I rear'd this flow'r,
Suckled and cheer'd with air, and sun, and
show'r;
Soft on the paper ruff its leaves I spread,
Bright with the gilded button tipt its head.
POPE.
FLOWERS.
193
Tell me in what more happy fields
The thistle springs to which the lily yields.
POPE.
I come, ye ghosts ! prepare your roseate bow'rs,
Celestial palms, and ever-blooming flow'rs,
POPE.
See where on earth the flow'ry glories lie !
With her they flourish'd, and with her they die.
POPE.
Now sliding streams the thirsty plants renew,
And feed their fibres with reviving dew.
POPE.
With chymic art exalts the min'ral pow'rs,
And draws the aromatic souls of flow'rs.
POPE.
To isles of fragrance, lily-silver' d vales,
Diffusing languor in the parting gales.
POPE.
And four fair queens, whose hands sustain a
flow'r,
Th' expressive emblem of their softer pow'r.
POPE.
Where'er you tread, the blushing flow'rs shall
rise,
And all things flourish where you turn your
eyes.
POPE.
Her gods and godlike heroes rise to view,
And all her faded garlands bloom anew.
POPE.
See spicy clouds from lowly Sharon rise,
And Carmel's flow'ry top perfumes the skies !
POPE.
Once I was skill'd in ev'ry herb that grew
And ev'ry plant that drinks the morning dew.
POPE.
No rich perfumes refresh the fruitful field,
Nor fragrant herbs their native incense yield.
POPE.
For her the limes their pleasing shades deny,
For her the lilies hang their heads, and die.
POPE.
See Pan with flocks, with fruits Pomona crown'd;
Here blushing Flora paints th' enamell'd ground.
POPE.
A wild, where weeds and flow'rs promiscuous
shoot.
POPE.
Like some fair flow'r, that early spring supplies,
That gayly blooms, but ev'n in blooming dies.
POPE.
13
Now hawthorns blossom, now the daisies spring;
Now leaves the trees, and flow'rs adorn the
ground.
POPE.
The silken fleece, impurpled for the loom,
Rival'd the hyacinth in vernal bloom.
POPE.
A fairer red stands blushing in the rose
Than that which on the bridegroom's vestment
flows ;
Take but the humblest lily of the field,
And, if our pride will to our reason yield,
It must, by sure comparison, be shown
That on the regal seat great David's son,
Array'd in all his robes and types of pow'r,
Shines with less glory than that simple flow'r.
PRIOR.
Ten thousand stalks their various blossoms
spread ;
Peaceful and lowly in their native soil,
They neither know to spin, nor care to toil.
PRIOR.
Why does one climate and one soil endue
The blushing poppy with a crimson hue,
Yet leave the lily pale, and tinge the violet blue ?
PRIOR.
While the fantastic tulip strives to break
In twofold beauty, and a parted streak.
PRIOR.
Where the old myrtle her good influence sheds,
Sprigs of like leaf erect their filial heads ;
And when the parent rose decays and dies,
With a resembling face the daughter buds arise.
PRIOR.
Let one great day
To celebrated sports and floral play
Be set aside.
PRIOR.
When you the flow'rs for Chloe twine,
Why do you to her garland join
The meanest bud that falls from mine ?
PRIOR.
The twining jessamine and blushing rose
With lavish grace their morning scents disclose.
PRIOR.
Flow'rs
Innumerable, by the soft south-west
Open'd, and gather'd by religious hands,
Rebound their sweets from th' odoriferous
pavement.
PRIOR.
194
FLOWERS.
Array 'd in ephods ; nor so few
As are those pearls of morning dew
Which hang on herbs and flowers.
SANDYS.
O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet South,
That breathes upon a bank of violets,
Stealing and giving odours.
SHAKSPEARE.
Pale primroses,
That die unmarried ere they can behold
Bright Phoebus in his strength.
SHAKSPEARE.
They are as gentle
As zephyrs blowing below the violet.
SHAKSPEARE.
The even mead, that erst brought sweetly forth
The freckled cowslip, burnet, and green clover.
SHAKSPEARE.
The canker galls the infants of the spring,
Too oft before their buttons be disclosed.
SHAKSPEARE.
I must go seek some dew-drops here,
And hang a pearl in every cowslip's ear.
SHAKSPEARE.
The fairest flowers o' th' season
Are our carnations and streak'd gillyflowers.
SHAKSPEARE.
When daisies pied, and violets blue,
And lady-smocks all silver white,
And cuckoo buds of yellow hue,
Do paint the meadows with delight.
SHAKSPEARE.
Then will I raise aloft the milk-white rose,
With whose sweet smell the air shall be
perfumed.
SHAKSPEARE.
Flow'rs, purple, blue, and white,
Like sapphire, pearl, and rich embroidery
Buckled below fair knighthood's bending knee.
SHAKSPEARE.
The leaf of eglantine, which not to slander,
Out-sweeten'd not thy breath.
SHAKSPEARE.
A bank whereon the wild thyme blows,
Where oxlip and the nodding violet grows.
SHAKSPEARE.
Bid her steal into the pleached bower,
Where honeysuckles, ripen' d by the sun,
Forbid the sun to enter; like to favourites
Made proud by princes, that advance their pride
Against the power that bred it.
SHAKSPEARE.
The cowslips tall her pensioners be;
In their gold coats spots you see :
Those be rubies, fairy favours ;
In those freckles live their savours.
SHAKSPEARE.
The same dew, which sometimes on the buds
Was wont to swell, like round and orient pearls,
Stood now within the pretty flow' rets' eyes,
Like tears that did their own disgrace bewail.
SHAKSPEARE.
The even mead that erst brought sweetly forth
The freckled cowslip.
SHAKSPEARE.
Good men's lives
Expire before the flowers in their caps,
Dying or ere they sicken.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thou shalt not lack
The flow'r that's like thy face, pale primrose ;
nor
The azured harebell, like thy veins.
SHAKSPEARE.
The bolt of Cupid fell.
It fell upon a little western flower ;
Before milkwhite, now purple with love's wound ;
And maidens call it, love-in-idleness.
SHAKSPEARE.
All the budding honours on thy crest
I'll crop, to make a garland for my head.
SHAKSPEARE.
Where the bee sucks, there suck I ;
In a cowslip's bell I lie.
SHAKSPEARE.
Within the infant rind of this small flow'r
Poison hath residence, and medicine pow'r.
SHAKSPEARE.
Or so much as it needs
To dew the sovereign flow'rs, and drown the
weeds.
SHAKSPEARE.
The paleness of this flow'r
Bewray'd the faintness of my master's heart.
SHAKSPEARE.
FLOWERS.
Daffodils that come before the swallow dares,
and take
The winds of March with beauty; violets dim,
But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes,
Or Cytherea's breath.
SHAKSPEARE.
Were I, O God, in churchless lands remaining,
Far from all voice of teachers or divines,
My soul would find, in flowers of thy ordaining,
Priests, sermons, shrines !
HORACE SMITH : Hymn to the Flowers.
Cool violets, and orpine growing still,
Embathed balm, and cheerful galingale,
Fresh costmary, and breathful chamomile,
Dull poppy, and drink-quick'ning setuale.
SPENSER.
So forth they marched in this goodly sort,
To take the solace of the open air,
And in fresh flow' ring fields themselves to sport.
SPENSER.
Sometimes her head she fondly would aguise
With gaudy garlands, of fresh flow'rets dight,
About her neck, or rings of rushes plight.
SPENSER.
Show me the green ground with daffodown-
dillies,
And cowslips, and kingcups, and loved lilies.
SPENSER.
All within with flow'rs was garnished,
That, when mild Zephyrus amongst them blew,
Did breathe out bounteous smells, and painted
colours shew.
SPENSER.
It feeds each living plant with liquid sap,
And fills with flow'rs fair Ffora's painted lap.
SPENSER.
Where be the nosegays that she dight for thee ?
The colour'd chaplets wrought with a chief,
The knottish rush-rings, and gilt rosemary ?
SPENSER.
Eftsoons the nymphs, which now had flowers
their fill,
Run all in haste to see that silver brood.
SPENSER.
In secret shadow from the sunny ray, .
On a sweet bed of lilies softly laid.
SPENSER.
He only fair, and what he fair hath made;
All other fair, like flow'rs, untimely fade.
SPENSER.
With store of vermeil roses
To deck the bridegroom's posies.
SPENSER.
Of every sort which in that meadow grew
They gather'd some; the violet pallid blue.
SPENSER.
A little wicker basket,
Made of fine twigs, entrailed curiously,
In which they gather'd flowers.
SPENSER.
As through the flow'ring forest rash she fled,
In her rude hairs sweet flowers themselves did
lap,
And flourishing fresh leaves and blossoms did
enwrap.
SPENSER.
For fear the stones her tender foot should wrong,
The ground he strew'd with flowers all along,
And diaper'd like the discolour'd mead.
SPENSER.
See thou how fresh my flowers being spread,
Dyed in lilie white and crimson red,
With leaves engrain'd in lusty green.
SPENSER.
Lilies more white than snow
New fall'n from heav'n, with violets, mix'd, did
grow;
Whose scent so chafed the neighbour air, that
you
Would surely swear Arabic spices grew.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
So chymists boast they have a pow'r,
From the dead ashes of a flow'r
Some faint resemblance to produce,
But not the virtue. SWIFT.
Nor gradual bloom is wanting,
Nor hyacinths of purest virgin white,
Low bent and blushing inward; nor jonquilles
Of potent fragrance.
THOMSON.
Another Flora there, of bolder hues,
Plays o'er the field, and show'rs with sudden
hand
Exuberant spring. THOMSON.
No gradual bloom is wanting from the bud,
Nor broad carnations, nor gay spotted pinks,
Nor, shower'd from ev'rybush, the damask rose.
THOMSON.
The daisy, primrose, violet darkly blue,
And polyanthus of unnumber'd dyes.
THOMSON.
196
FL O WERS. POLL Y. FO OLS.
And while they break
On the charm'd eye, th' exulting florist marks
With secret pride the wonders of his hand.
THOMSON.
The little shape, by magic pow'r,
Grew less and less, contracted to a flow'r;
A flow'r, that first in this sweet garden smiled,
To virgins sacred, and the snowdrop styled.
TlCKELL.
So some weak shoot which else would poorly
rise,
Jove's tree adopts, and lifts into the skies ;
Through the new pupil fost'ring juices flow,
Thrust forth the gems, and give the flowers to
blow.
TlCKELL.
This night shall see the gaudy wreath decline,
The roses wither, and the lilies pine.
TlCKELL.
Sees not my love how time resumes
The glory which he lent these flow'rs ?
Though none should taste of their perfumes,
Yet must they live but some few hours :
Time what we forbear devours.
WALLER.
Fade, flowers, fade ; nature will have it so ;
'Tis but what we must in our autumn do.
WALLER.
To me the meanest flower that blows can give
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.
WORDSWORTH.
A violet by a mossy stone
Half hidden from the eye :
Fair as a star when only one
Is shining in the sky.
WORDSWORTH: Lucy.
You violets, that first appear,
By your pure purple mantles known ;
What are you when the rose is blown ?
WOTTON.
We smile at florists, we despise their joy,
And think their hearts enamour'd of a toy.
YOUNG.
FOLLY.
Whose follies, blazed about, to all are known,
And are a secret to himself alone.
GRANVILLE.
Leave such to trifle with more grace and ease,
Whom folly pleases, or whose follies please.
POPE.
Pleads, in exception to all gen'ral rules,
Your taste of follies with our scorn of fools.
POPE.
Others the siren sisters compass round,
And empty heads console with empty sound.
POPE.
Nor think to-night of thy ill-nature,
But of thy follies, idle creature.
PRIOR.
Too many giddy foolish hours are gone,
And in fantastic measures danced away.
ROWE.
Thus in a sea of folly toss'd,
My choicest hours of life are lost.
SWIFT.
Their passions move in lower spheres,
Where'er caprice or folly steers.
SWIFT.
FOOLS.
Of fools the world has such a store,
That he who would not see an ass,
Must bide at home, and bolt his door,
And break his looking-glass.
BoiLEAU.
A fool must now and then be right by chance.
COWPER.
Fools ambitiously contend
For wit and pow'r ; their last endeavours bend
T' outshine each other.
DRYDEN.
A fool might once himself alone expose ;
Now one in verse makes many more in prose.
POPE.
No creature smarts so little as a fool.
POPE : Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot.
For fools rush in where angels fear to tread.
POPE.
When I did hear
The motley fool thus moral on the time,
My lungs began to crow like chanticleer,
That fools, should be so deep contemplative.
SHAKSPEARE.
This your all -licensed fool
Doth hourly carp and quarrel, breaking forth
In rank and not to be endured riots.
SHAKSPEARE.
FOPS. FOREKNO WLED GE. FORE ORDINA TION.
197
This fellow's wise enough to play the fool ;
And to do that well craves a kind of wit.
SHAKSPEARE.
What nature has denied, fools will pursue;
As apes are ever walking upon two.
YOUNG.
Yet proud of parts, with prudence some dispense,
And play the fool because they're men of sense.
YOUNG : Epistle to Pope.
Nothing exceeds in ridicule, no doubt,
A fool in fashion, but a fool that's out;
His passion for absurdity's so strong
He cannot bear a rival in the wrong.
Though wrong the mode, comply : more sense
is shown
In wearing others' follies than our own,
YOUNG.
Be wise with speed;
A fool at forty is a fool indeed.
YOUNG: Love of Fame.
'Tis not in folly not to scorn a fool,
And scarce in human wisdom to do more.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
Men may live fools, but fools they cannot die !
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
FOPS.
He had that grace, so rare in every clime,
Of being, without alloy of fop or beau,
A finish' d gentleman, from top to toe.
BYRON.
The solemn fop ; significant and budge ;
A fool with judges, amongst fools a judge;
He says but little, and that little said
Owes all its weight, like loaded dice, to lead.
COWPER.
Besides, thou art a beau : What's that, my
child ?
A fop well drest, extravagant, and wild :
She that cries herbs has less impertinence,
And in her calling more of common sense.
DRYDEN.
His various modes from various fathers follow;
One taught the toss, and one the new French
wallow;
His sword-knot this, his cravat that design'd.
DRYDEN.
Nature made ev'ry fop to plague his brother,
Just as one beauty mortifies another.
POPE.
Sir Plume (of amber snuff-box justly vain,
And the nice conduct of a clouded cane),
With earnest eyes, and round unthinking face,
He first the snuff-box open'd, then the case.
POPE: Rape of the Lock.
Why round our coaches crowd the white-gloved
beaux ?
POPE.
No place so sacred from such fops is barr'd;
Nor is Paul's church more safe than Paul's
church-yard.
POPE.
You laugh, half beau, half sloven, if I stand;
My wig half powder, and all snuff my band.
POPE.
Some positive persisting fops we know,
Who, if once wrong, will needs be always so ;
But you with pleasure own your errors past,
And make each day a critique on the last.
POPE.
Their methods various, but alike their aim ;
The sloven and the fopling are the same.
YOUNG.
FOREKNOWLEDGE.
Calchas, the sacred seer, who had in view
Things present and the past, and things to come
foreknew.
DRYDEN.
Who would the miseries of man foreknow !
Not knowing, we but share our part of woe.
DRYDEN.
If I foreknew,
Foreknowledge had no influence on their fault,
Which had no less proved certain unforeknown.
MILTON.
FOREORDINATION.
Fate foredoom'd, and all things tend
By course of time to their appointed end.
DRYDEN.
The willing metal will obey thy hand,
Following with ease : if favour'd by thy fate,
Thou art foredoom'd to view the Stygian state.
DRYDEN.
Through various hazards and events we move
To Latium, and the realms foredoom'd by Jove.
DRYDEN.
198
FORESTS.
And whatso heavens in their secret doom
Ordained have, how can frail fleshy wight
Forecast, but it must needs to issue come ?
SPENSER.
FORESTS.
Black with surrounding forests then it stood,
That hung above, and darken'd all the flood.
ADDISON.
Full in the centre of the sacred wood
An arm ariseth of the Stygian flood.
ADDISON.
View the wide earth adorn'd with hills and
woods,
Rich in her herbs, and fertile by her floods.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Then would be seen a farmer that would sell
Bargains of woods, which he did lately fell.
CHAUCER.
A new-born wood of various lines there grows,
And all the flourishing letters stand in rows.
COWLEY.
While the steep horrid roughness of the wood
Strives with the gentle calmness of the flood.
SIR JOHN DENHAM.
The plain the forests doth disdain :
The forests rail upon the plain.
DRAYTON.
There stood a forest on the mountain's brow,
Which overlook'd the shaded plains below;
No sounding axe presumed these trees to bite,
Coeval with the world; a venerable sight.
DRYDEN.
O may thy pow'r, propitious still to me,
Conduct my steps to find the fatal tree,
In this deep forest.
DRYDEN.
The waving harvest bends beneath his blast,
The forest shakes, the groves their honours cast.
DRYDEN.
Now nearer to the Stygian lake they draw,
Whom from the shore the surly boatman saw,
Observed their passage through the shady wood
And marked their approaches to the flood.
DRYDEN.
A venerable wood,
Where rites divine were paid, whose holy hair
Was kept and cut with superstitious care.
DRYDEN.
Soft whispers run along the leafy woods,
And mountains whistle to the murm'ring floods.
DRYDEN.
Ah, cruel creature, whom dost thou despise?
The gods, to live in woods, have left the skies.
DRYDEN.
He hears the crackling sounds of coral woods,
A.nd sees the secret source of subterranean
floods. DRYDEN.
The birds obscene to forests wing'd their flight
DRYDEN.
For them the Idumoean balm did sweat,
And in hot Ceilon spicy forests grew.
DRYDEN.
Straight as a line, in beauteous order stood
Of oaks unshorn a venerable wood ;
Fresh was the grass beneath, and ev'ry tree
At distance planted, in a due degree,
Their branching arms in air, with equal space,
Stretch'd to their neighbours with a long em-
brace.
DRYDEN.
Then toils for beasts, and lime for birds were
found,
And deep-mouth'd dogs did forest walks sur-
round.
DRYDEN.
The grottoes cool, with shady poplars crown'd,
And creeping vines on arbours weaved around.
DRYDEN.
Deep into some thick covert would I run,
Impenetrable to the stars or sun.
DRYDEN.
Black was the forest, thick with beech it stood,
Horrid with fern, and intricate with thorn ;
Few paths of human feet or tracks of beasts
were worn.
DRYDEN.
Hills, dales, and forests far behind remain,
While the warm scent draws on the deep-
mouth'd train.
GAY.
Hide me, ye forests, in your closest bow'rs,
Where flows the murm'ring brook, inviting
dreams,
Where bordering hazel overhangs the streams.
GAY.
FORESTS.
199
All things decay with time ; the forest sees
The growth and downfall of her aged trees :
That timber tall, which threescore lustres stood
The proud dictator of the state-like wood
I mean the sov'reign of all plants, the oak
Droops, dies, and falls without the cleaver's
stroke.
HERRICK.
I know each lane, and every alley green,
Dingle or bushy dell of this wild wood ;
And every busky bourn from side to side,
My daily walks and ancient neighbourhood.
MILTON.
Where the rude ax, with heaved stroke,
Was never heard the nymphs to daunt,
Or frown them from their hallow'd haunt.
MILTON.
He led me up
A woody mountain, whose high top was plain,
A circuit wide, enclosed.
MILTON.
I shall be your faithful guide
Through this gloomy covert wide.
MILTON.
Forbidding ev'ry bleak unkindly fog
To touch the prosperous growth of this tall wood.
MILTON.
Their way
Lies through the perplex'd paths of this drear
wood,
The nodding horror of whose shady brows
Threats the forlorn and wand'ring passenger.
MILTON.
A sylvan scene, and as the ranks ascend,
Shade above shade, a woody theatre.
MILTON.
Fresh gales and gentle airs
Whisper'd it to the woods; and from their wings
Flung rose, flung odours from the spicy shrub,
Disporting.
MILTON.
With high woods the hills were crown'd;
With tufts the valleys, and each fountain side
With borders 'long the rivers.
MILTON.
Thick as autumnal leaves that strow the brooks
In Vallombrosa, where the Etrurian shades
High overarch'd imbower.
MILTON.
Thy forests, Windsor! and thy green retreats
Invite my lays. Be present, sylvan maids !
Unlock your springs, and open all your shades.
POPE.
See lofty Lebanon his head advance,
See nodding forests on the mountains dance.
POPE.
From whence high Ithaca o'erlooks the floods,
Brown with o'erarching shades and pendent
woods.
POPE.
Amid an isle around whose rocky shore
The forests murmur, and the surges roar,
A goddess guards in her enchanted dome.
POPE.
But he deep-musing o'er the mountain stray'd,
Through many thickets of the woodland shade.
POPE.
My humble muse in unambitious strains
Paints the green forests and the flow'ry plains.
POPE.
The wood,
Whose shady horrors on a rising brow
Waved high, and frown' d upon the stream
below.
POPE.
For thee Idume's spicy forests blow,
And seeds of gold in Ophir's mountains glow.
POPE.
Up starts a palace ; lo ! th' obedient base
Slopes at its foot, the woods its sides embrace.
POPE.
O deign to visit our forsaken seats,
The mossy fountains and the green retreats.
POPE.
Thick as autumnal leaves, or driving sand,
The moving squadrons blacken all the strand.
POPE.
In the clear azure gleam the flocks are seen,
And floating forests paint the waves with green.
POPE.
Whose rising forests, not for pride or show,
But future buildings, future navies, grow :
Let his plantation stretch from down to down,
First shade a country, and then raise a town.
POPE.
Forests grew
Upon the barren hollows, high o'ershading
The haunts of savage beasts.
PRIOR.
Who set the twigs, shall he remember
That is in haste to sell the timber?
And what shall of thy woods remain,
Except the box that threw the main ?
PRIOR.
200
FOJtESTS.FOJt GETFULNESS.
The frequent errors of the pathless wood,
The giddy precipice, and the dang'rous flood.
PRIOR.
Pacing through the forest,
Chewing the cud of sweet and bitter fancy.
SHAKSPEARE.
Of all these bounds,
With shadowy forests and with champaigns
rich'd,
We make thee lady.
SHAKSPEARE.
Tow'rds him I made ; but he was 'ware of me,
And stole into the covert of the wood.
SHAKSPEARE.
This shadowy desert, unfrequented woods,
I better brook than flourishing peopled towns.
SHAKSPEARE.
Whate'er you are,
That in this desert inaccessible,
Under the shade of melancholy boughs,
Lose and neglect the creeping hours of time.
SHAKSPEARE.
Hath not old custom made this life more sweet
Than that of painted pomp ? are not these woods
More free from peril than the court ?
SHAKSPEARE.
The green leaves quiver with the cooling wind,
And make a checker'd shadow on the ground.
SHAKSPEARE.
Brave followers, yonder stands the thorny wood,
Which, by the heavens' assistance, and your
strength,
Must by the roots be hewn up yet ere night.
SHAKSPEARE.
As I did stand my watch upon the hill,
I look'd toward Birnam ; and anon methought
The wood began to move.
SHAKSPEARE.
It irks me, the poor dappled fools,
Being native burghers of this desert city,
Should, in their own confines, with forked heads
Have their round haunches gored.
SHAKSPEARE.
I teach the woods and waters to lament
Your doleful drearjment.
SPENSER : Epithalamium.
As fair Diana, in fresh summer's day,
Beholds her nymphs enranged in shady wood.
SPENSER: Fairie Queene.
Majestic woods of ev'ry vigorous green,
Stage above stage, high waving o'er the hills,
Or to the far horizon wide diffused,
A boundless deep immensity of shade.
THOMSON.
Through forests huge, and long unravell'd
heaths,
With desolation brown, he wanders waste.
THOMSON.
Strain'd to the root, the stooping forest pours
A rustling shower of yet untimely leaves.
THOMSON.
Low waves the rooted forest, vex'd, and sheds
What of its tarnish'd honours yet remain.
THOMSON.
Gradual sinks the breeze
Into a perfect calm ; that not a breath
Is heard to quiver through the closing wood.
THOMSON.
Her forests huge,
Incult, robust, and tall, by nature's hand
Planted of old.
THOMSON.
Nor undelightful is the ceaseless hum
To him who muses through the woods at noon.
THOMSON.
Strip from the branching Alps their piny load,
The huge encumbrance of horrific woods.
THOMSON.
FORGETFULNESS.
But when a thousand rolling years are past,
So long their punishments and penance last,
Whole droves of minds are by the driving god
Compell'd to drink the deep Lethean flood,
In large forgetful draughts to steep the cares
Of their past labours and their irksome years.
DRYDEN.
Lethe, the river of oblivion, rolls
His wat'ry labyrinth, which whoso drinks
Forgets both joy and grief.
MILTON.
Alive, ridiculous ; and dead, forgot.
POPE.
Unequal task! a passion to resign,
For hearts so touch'd, so pierced, so lost as mine !
Ere such a soul regains its peaceful state,
How often must it love, how often hate,
How often hope, despair, resent, regret,
Conceal, disdain do all things but forget!
POPE: Eloisa.
FOR GIVENESS.FOR TITUDE.
201
Of all affliction taught a lover yet,
'Tis sure the hardest science to forget !
POPE: Eloisa.
When I am forgotten, as I shall be,
And sleep in dull cold marble, where no men-
tion
Of me must more be heard.
SHAKSPEARE.
That is not forgot
Which ne'er I did remember; to my knowl-
edge,
I never in my life did look on him.
SHAKSPEARE.
FORGIVENESS.
Gently I took that which ungently came,
And without scorn forgave : do thou the same.
A wrong done to thee think a cat's-eye spark
Thou wouldst not see were not thine own heart
dark.
COLERIDGE.
Forgiveness to the injured does belong;
But they ne'er pardon, who commit the wrong.
DRYDEN.
Pity and he are one;
So merciful a king did never live,
Loth to revenge, and easy to forgive.
DRYDEN.
But those I can accuse, I can forgive :
By my disdainful silence let them live.
DRYDEN.
Some grave their wrongs on marble ; he, more
just,
Stoop' d down serene, and wrote them on the
dust:
Trod under foot, the sport of every wind,
Swept from the earth, and blotted from his mind ;
There, secret in the grave, he bade them lie,
And grieved they could not 'scape th' Almighty's
eye.
DR. S. MADDEN.
Wisest and best of men full oft beguiled,
With goodness principled, not to reject
The penitent, but ever to forgive,
Are drawn to wear out miserable days.
MILTON.
Good nature and good sense must ever join :
To err is human; to forgive, divine.
POPE.
Slowly provoked, she easily forgives.
PRIOR.
If ever any malice in your heart
Were hid against me, now forgive me frankly.
SHAKSPEARE.
'Tis easier for the generous to forgive
Than for offence to ask it.
THOMSON : Edward and Eleonora.
FORTITUDE.
True fortitude is seen in great exploits
That justice warrants, and that wisdom guides:
All else is tow'ring frenzy and distraction.
ADDISON.
With what strength, what steadiness of mind,
He triumphs in the midst of all his sufferings !
ADDISON.
Let fortune empty her whole quiver on me,
I have a soul that, like an ample shield,
Can take in all, and verge enough for more.
DRYDEN.
I, not by wants, or fears, or age opprest,
Stem the wild torrent with a dauntless breast.
DRYDEN.
My mind on its own centre stands unmoved,
And stable as the fabric of the world.
DRYDEN.
Some aged man who lives this act to see,
And who in former times remember'd me,
May say, The son, in fortitude and fame,
Outgoes the mark, and drowns his father's name.
DRYDEN.
The captive cannibal, opprest with chains,
Yet braves his foes, reviles, provokes, disdains ;
Of nature fierce, untamable, and proud,
He bids defiance to the gaping crowd,
And spent at last, and speechless as he lies,
With fiery glances mocks their rage, and dies.
GRANVILLE.
There is strength
Deep-bedded in our hearts, of which we reck
But little till the shafts of heaven have pierced
Its fragile dwelling. Must not earth be rent
Before her gems are found ?
MRS. HEMANS.
2O2
FOR TITUDE. FOR TUNE.
Against allurement, custom, and a world
Offended ; fearless of reproach and scorn,
Or violence.
MILTON.
Though plunged in ills, and exercised in care,
Yet never let the noble mind despair ;
When pfest by dangers, and beset with foes,
The gods their timely succour interpose,
And when our virtue sinks, o'erwhelm'd with
grief,
By unforeseen expedients bring relief.
AMBROSE PHILIPS.
A soul supreme in each hard instance tried,
Above all pain, all anger, and all pride,
The rage of pow'r, the blast of public breath,
The lust of lucre, and the dread of death.
POPE.
You were used
To say extremity was the trier of spirits ;
That common chances common men could bear.
SHAKSPEARE.
Are these things, then, necessities ?
Then let us meet them like necessities ;
And that same word even now cries out on us.
SHAKSPEARE.
Bid that welcome
Which comes to punish us, and we punish it,
Seeming to bear it lightly.
SHAKSPEARE.
Indiff rence, clad in wisdom's guise,
All fortitude of mind supplies ;
For how can stony bowels melt
In those who never pity felt ?
SWIFT.
FORTUNE.
Fair fortune next, with looks serene and kind,
Receives 'em, in her ancient fane enshrined.
ADDISON.
I am now in fortune's power :
He that is down can fall no lower.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
When fortune sends a stormy wind,
Then show a brave and present mind ;
And when with too indulgent gales
She swells too much, then furl thy sails.
CREECH.
He lends him vain Goliath's sacred sword,
The fittest help just fortune could afford.
COWLEY.
Extremes of fortune are true wisdom's test,
And he's of men most wise who bears them
best.
CUMBERLAND : Philemon.
They had th' especial engines been, to rear
His fortunes up into the state they were.
DANIEL.
The highest hill is the most slipp'ry place,
And fortune mocks us with a smiling face.
SIR J. DENHAM.
O fortune! thou art not worth my least ex-
claim,
And plague enough thou hast in thy own name :
Do thy great worst, my friends and I have arms,
Though not against thy strokes, against thy
harms.
I DONNE.
O how feeble is man's power,
That, if good fortune fall,
Cannot add another hour,
Nor a lost hotar recall ! DoNNE.
Fortune, that, \fith malicious joy,
Doth man her slave oppress,
Proud of her office to destroy,
Is seldom pleased to bless. DRYDEN.
O mortals ! blind in fate, who never know
To bear high fortune, or endure the low.
DRYDEN.
I'll strike my fortune with him at a heat,
And give him not the leisure to forget.
DRYDEN.
He sigh'd ; and could not but their fate deplore:
So wretched now, so fortunate before.
DRYDEN.
With better grace an ancient chief may yield
The long-contended honours of the field,
Than venture all his fortune at a cast,
And fight, like Hannibal, to lose at last.
DRYDEN.
Fortune's unjust ; she ruins oft the brave,
And him who should be victor, makes the slave.
DRYDEN.
Fortune came smiling to my youth, and woo'd it,
And purpled greatness met my ripen'd years.
DRYDEN.
You have already wearied fortune so,
She cannot farther be your friend or foe,
But sits all breathless, and admires to feel
A fate so weighty that it stops her wheel.
DRYDEN.
FORTUNE.
203
I would not take the gift,
Which, like a toy dropt from the hands of
fortune,
Lay for the next chance comer.
DRYDEN.
Fate's dark recesses we can never find;
But fortune at some hours to all is kind ;
The lucky have whole days which still they
choose,
The unlucky have but hours, and those they lose.
DRYDEN.
Fortune confounds the wise,
And, when they least expect it, turns the dice.
DRYDEN.
But thou, secure of soul, unbent with woes,
The more thy fortune frowns, the more oppose.
DRYDEN.
Enjoy the present smiling hour,
And put it out of fortune's pow'r.
DRYDEN.
Some secret charm did all her acts attend,
And what his fortune wanted, hers could mend.
DRYDEN.
Thine is th' adventure, thine the victory ;
Well has thy fortune turn'd the die for thee.
DRYDEN.
He little dream'd how nigh he was to care,
Till treach'rous fortune caught him in the snare.
DRYDEN.
The weak low spirit fortune makes her slave ;
But she's a drudge when hector'd by the brave.
DRYDEN.
I go with love and fortune, two blind guides,
To lead my way ; half loth and half consenting.
DRYDEN.
But fortune there extenuates the crime :
What's vice in me is only mirth in him.
DRYDEN.
While fortune favour'd, while his arms support
The cause, and ruled the counsels of the court,
I made some figure there ; nor was my name
Obscure, nor I without my share of fame.
DRYDEN.
His birth, perhaps, some paltry village hides,
And sets his cradle out of fortune's way.
DRYDEN.
But tell me, Tityrus, what heav'nly pow'r
Preserved your fortunes in that fatal hour ?
DRYDEN.
If fortune take not off this boy betimes,
He'll make mad work and elbow out his neigh-
bours.
DRYDEN.
The middle sort, who have not much to spare,
To chiromancers' cheaper art repair,
Who clap the pretty palm, to make the lines
more fair.
DRYDEN.
Let fortune empty her whole quiver on me,
I have a soul that, like an ample shield,
Can take in all, and verge enough for more.
Fate was not mine : nor am I Fate's :
Souls know no conquerors.
DRYDEN.
In this still labyrinth around her lie
Spells, philters, globes, and spheres of palmistry ;
A sigil in his hand the gypsy bears,
In th' other a prophetic sieve and shears.
GARTH.
I, near yon stile, three sallow gypsies met;
Upon my hand they cast a poring look,
Bid me beware, and thrice their heads they
shook.
GAY.
Alas ! the joys that fortune brings
Are trifling, and decay,
And those who prize the trifling things
More trifling still than they.
GOLDSMITH.
Dame Nature gave him comeliness and health,
And fortune, for a passport, gave him wealth.
WALTER HARTE.
Gad not abroad at ev'ry guest and call
Of an untrained hope or passion ;
To court each place or fortune that doth fall
Is wantonness in contemplation.
GEORGE HERBERT.
All human business fortune doth command
Without all order ; and with her blind hand
She, blind, bestows blind gifts, that still have
nurst
They see not who, nor how, but still the worst.
BEN JONSON.
How fortune plies her sports, when she begins
To practise them ! pursues, continues, adds,
Confounds, with varying her empassion'd moods !
BEN JONSON : Sejanus*
204
FORTUNE.
A most poor man made tame to fortune's blows,
Who, by the art of known and feeling sorrows,
Am pregnant to good pity.
SHAKSPEARE.
Many dream not to find, neither deserve,
And yet are steep'd in favours.
SHAKSPEARE.
We're not the first
Who, with best meaning, have incurr'd the
worst :
For thee, oppressed king, I am cast down :
Myself could else outfrown false fortune's frown.
SHAKSPEARE.
Happy is your grace,
That can translate the stubbornness of fortune
Into so quiet and so sweet a style.
SHAKSPEARE.
In the wind and tempest of fortune's frown,
Distinction, with a broad and powerful fan,
Puffing at all, winnows the light away.
SHAKSPEARE.
A good man's fortune may grow out at heels.
SHAKSPEARE.
It is fortune's use
To let the wretched man outlive his wealth,
To view with hollow eye, and wrinkled brow,
An age of poverty.
Love made my emergent fortune once more look
Above the main, which now shall hit the stars.
BEN JONSON.
Let not one look of fortune cast you down ;
She were not fortune if she did not frown :
Such as do braveliest bear her scorns awhile
Are those on whom at last she most will smile.
LORD ORRERY.
Avoid both courts and camps,
WTiere dilatory fortune plays the jilt
With the brave, noble, honest, gallant man,
To throw herself away on fools.
OTWAY.
Who thinks that fortune cannot change her
mind,
Prepares a dreadful jest for all mankind.
And who stands safest ? tell me, is it he
That spreads and swells in puffd prosperity?
Or, blest with little, whose preventing care
In peace provides fit arms against a war ?
POPE.
Behold ! if fortune or a mistress frowns,
Some plunge in business, others shave their
crowns.
POPE.
Fortune not much of humbling me can boast ;
Though double-tax'd, how little have I lost !
POPE.
Thus her blind sister, fickle fortune, reigns,
And undiscerning scatters crowns and chains.
POPE.
Nor happiness can I, nor misery feel,
From any turn of her fantastic wheel.
PRIOR.
Thy rise of fortune did I only wed,
From its decline determined to recede.
PRIOR.
But he whose word and fortunes disagree,
Absurd, unpitied, grows a public jest.
ROSCOMMON.
Now rising fortune elevates his mind,
He shines unclouded, and adorns mankind.
SAVAGE.
Will fortune never come with both hands full,
But write her fair words still in foulest letters ?
She either gives a stomach, and no food
Such are the poor in health ; or else a feast,
And takes away the stomach such the rich,
That have abundance, and enjoy it not.
SHAKSPEARE.
SHAKSPEARE.
Since this fortune falls to you,
Be content, and seek no new.
SHAKSPEARE.
I am a soldier, and unapt to weep,
Or to exclaim on fortune's fickleness.
SHAKSPEARE.
Well, I know not
What counts hard fortune casts upon my face.
SHAKSPEARE.
Wisdom and fortune combating together :
If that the fortune dare but what it can,
No chance may shake it.
SHAKSPEARE.
This accident and flood of fortune
So far exceed all instance, all discourse,
That I am ready to distrust mine eyes,
And wrangle with my reason, that persuades me
To any other trust.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thou art a slave, whom fortune's tender arm
With favour never claspt, but bred a dog.
SHAKSPEARE.
FOR TUNE. FO UNTAINS. FREED OM.
205
Blest are those
Whose blood and judgment are so well com-
mingled,
That they are not a pipe for fortune's finger
To sound what stop she please.
SHAKSPEARE.
There is a tide in the affairs of men,
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.
SHAKSPEARE.
In losing fortune, many a lucky elf
Has found himself;
As all our moral bitters are design'd
To brace the mind,
And renovate its healthy tone, the wise
Their sorest trials hail as blessings in disguise.
HORACE SMITH.
Fortune, the foe of famous chevisance,
Seldom, says Guyon, yields to virtue aid.
SPENSER.
And fie on fortune, mine avowed foe,
Whose wrathful wreaks themselves do now
allay.
SPENSER.
Forever, fortune, wilt thou prove
An unrelenting foe to love,
And when we meet a mutual heart,
Come in between and bid us part ?
THOMSON.
The lovely young Lavinia once had friends,
And fortune smiled, deceitful, on her birth.
THOMSON.
Yet, as immortal, in our uphill chase
We press coy fortune with unslacken'd pace.
YOUNG.
FOUNTAINS.
A fountain in a darksome wood,
Nor stain'd with falling leaves nor rising mud.
ADDISON.
Her fields he clothed, and cheer'd her blasted
face
With running fountains, and with springing
grass.
ADDISON.
Where Tigris at the foot of Paradise
Into a gulf shot under ground, till part
Rose up a fountain by the tree of life.
MILTON.
Wherever fountain or fresh current flow'd,
Against the eastern ray, translucent, pure,
With touch ethereal of heav'n's fiery rod,
I drank.
MILTON.
Under a tuft of shade, that on a green
Stood whisp'ring soft, by a fresh fountain's side,
They sat them down.
MILTON.
High at his head, from out the cavern'd rock,
In living rills, a gushing fountain broke.
POPE.
With here a fountain never to be play'd,
And there a summer-house that knows no shade.
POPE.
Two plenteous fountains the whole prospect
crown'd ;
This through the gardens leads its streams
around.
POPE.
The golden ewer a maid obsequious brings,
Replenish'd from the cool translucent springs.
POPE.
The mossy fountains and the sylvan shades
Delight no more.
POPE.
The weary traveller wandering that way
Therein did often quench his thirsty heat.
SPENSER.
FREEDOM.
But what avail her unexhausted stores,
Her blooming mountains, and her sunny shores,
With all the gifts that heaven and earth impart,
The smiles of nature, and the charms of art,
While proud oppression in her valleys reigns,
And tyranny usurps her happy plains ?
ADDISON.
We took up arms, not to revenge ourselves,
But free the commonwealth.
ADDISON.
Let freedom never perish in your hands,
But piously transmit it to your children.
ADDISON.
Hereditary bondsmen ! know ye not,
Who would be free, themselves must strike the
blow?
BYRON : Childe Harold.
206
FREEDOM.
For Freedom's battle, once begun,
Bequeathed from bleeding sire to son,
Though baffled oft, is ever won.
BYRON: Giaour.
Is't death to fall for Freedom's right?
He's dead alone who lacks her light !
CAMPBELL.
Hope for a season bade the world Farewell,
And Freedom shriek'd as Kosciusko fell.
CAMPBELL: Pleasures of Hope.
Where honour or where conscience does not
bind,
No other tie shall shackle me;
Slave to myself I will not be;
Nor shall my future actions be confined
By my own present mind.
COWLEY.
He is the freeman whom the truth makes free,
And all are slaves beside.
COWPER.
No ! Freedom has a thousand charms to show,
That slaves, howe'er contented, never know.
COWPER: Table-Talk.
O freedom! first delight of human kind!
Not that which bondmen from their masters
find,
The privilege of doles ; nor yet t' inscribe
Their names in this or t'other Roman tribe :
That false enfranchisement with ease is found;
Slaves are made citizens by turning round.
DRYDEN.
Restraining others, yet himself not free ;
Made impotent by pow'r, debased by dignity.
DRYDEN.
For freedom still maintain'd alive,
Freedom, an English subject's sole prerogative,
Accept our pious praise.
DRYDEN.
O last and best of Scots ! who didst maintain
Thy country's freedom from a foreign reign.
DRYDEN.
Wish'd freedom I presage you soon will find,
If heav'n be just, and if to virtue kind.
DRYDEN.
Freedom was first bestow'd on human race,
And prescience only held the second place.
DRYDEN.
Trade which, like blood, should circularly flow,
Stopp'd in their channels, found its freedom lost.
DRYDEN.
Freedom and zeal have choused you o'er and
o'er;
Pray give us leave to bubble you once more.
DRYDEN.
Till then, a helpless, hopeless, homely swain,
I sought not freedom, nor aspired to gain.
DRYDEN.
Whose grievance is satiety of ease,
Freedom their pain, and plenty their disease.
WALTER HARTE.
In the long vista of the years to roll,
Let me not see my country's honour fade ;
Oh ! let me see our land retain its soul !
Her pride in Freedom, and not Freedom's
shade.
KEATS.
Nations grown corrupt
Love bondage more than liberty;
Bondage with ease than strenuous liberty.
MILTON.
Freedom who loves, must first be wise and good ;
But from that mark how far they rove we see,
For all this waste of wealth and loss of blood.
MILTON.
Who can in reason then or right assume
Monarchy over such as live by right
His equals, if in pow'r or splendour less,
In freedom equal ?
MILTON.
Better to dwell in Freedom's hall,
With a cold damp floor and mouldering wall,
Than bow the head and bend the knee
In the proudest palace of slaverie.
MOORE.
Oh, stretch thy reign, fair peace ! from shore to
shore,
Till conquest cease, and slav'ry be no more;
Till the freed Indians in their native groves
Reap their own fruits and woo their sable loves.
TOPE.
Say, gentle princess, would you not suppose
Your bondage happy, to be made a queen ?
To be a queen in bondage is more vile
Than is a slave in base servility.
SHAKSPEARE.
But farewell, king, sith thus thou wilt appear,
Freedom lives hence, and banishment is here.
SHAKSPEARE.
FREEDOM. FREE WILL.
207
What art thou, Freedom ? Oh ! could slaves
Answer from their living graves
This demand, tyrants would flee
Like a dream's dim imagery,
What indignation in her mind
Against enslavers of mankind !
SHELLEY.
SWIFT.
Oh, give, great God, to freedom's waves to ride
Sublime o'er Conquest, Avarice, and Pride ;
To sweep where Pleasure decks her guilty bovvers,
And dark Oppression builds her thick-ribb'd
towers.
WORDSWORTH.
Slaves who once conceive the glowing thought
Of freedom, in that hope itself possess
All that the contest calls for; spirit, strength,
The scorn of danger, and united hearts,
The surest presage of the good they seek.
WORDSWORTH.
FREE WILL.
Faultless thou dropt from his unerring skill,
With the base power to sin, since free of will ;
Yet charge not with thy guilt his bounteous
love;
For who has power to \valk, has power to rove.
ARBUTHNOT.
Our souls at least are free, and 'tis in vain
We would against them make the flesh obey:
The spirit in the end will have its way.
BYRON.
Grace leads the right way: if you choose the
wrong,
Take it, and perish, but restrain your tongue ;
Charge not, with light sufficient, and left free,
Your wilful suicide on God's decree.
COWPER.
If love be compell'd, and cannot choose,
How can it grateful or thankworthy prove ?
SIR J. DAVIES.
Heav'n made us agents, free to good or ill ;
And forced it not, though he foresaw the will :
Freedom was first bestow'd on human race,
And prescience only held the second place.
DRYDEN.
Made for his use, yet he has form'd us so,
We, unconstrain'd, what he commands us, do.
DRYDEN.
O pass not, Lord ! an absolute decree,
Or bind thy sentence unconditional ;
But in thy sentence our remorse foresee,
And in that foresight this thy doom recall.
DRYDEN.
Th' Eternal when he did the world create
All other agents did necessitate ;
So what he order' d they by nature do;
Thus light things mount, and heavy downward
go:
Man only boasts an arbitrary state.
DRYDEN.
Tell me, which part it does necessitate ?
I'll choose the other: there I'll link th' effect;
A chain, which fools to catch themselves project
DRYDEN.
Others apart sat on a hill retired,
In thoughts more elevate, and reason'd high
Of providence, foreknowledge, will, and fate,
Fix'd fate, free will, foreknowledge absolute ;
And found no end, in wand'ring mazes lost.
MILTON.
God made thee perfect, not immutable,
And good he made thee, but to persevere
He left it in thy pow'r; ordain'd thy will
By nature free, not overruled by fate
Inextricable, or strict necessity.
MILTON.
Nor knew I not
To be with will and deed created free.
MILTON.
Firm we subsist, yet possible to swerve.
MILTON.
Who, in all things wise and just,
Hinder'd not Satan to attempt the mind
Of man, with strength entire and free will arm'd.
MILTON.
By original lapse, true liberty
Is lost, which always with right reason dwells,
Twined, and from her hath no dividual being.
MILTON.
Take heed lest passion sway
Thy judgment to do aught which else free will
Would not admit.
MILTON.
Stand fast ! to stand or fall,
Free in thine own arbitrament it stands :
Perfect within, no outward aid require,
And all temptation to transgress repel.
MILTON.
208
FREE WILL. FRIENDSHIP.
Man seduced,
And flatter'd out of all, believing lies
Against his Maker : no decree of mine
Concurring to necessitate his fall.
MILTON.
Man with strength and free will arm'd
Complete, to have discover'd and repulsed
Whatever wiles of foe or seeming friend.
MILTON.
Freely they stood who stood, and fell who fell :
Not free, what proof could they have given
sincere
Of true allegiance, constant faith, or love,
Where only what they needs must do, appear'd,
Not what they would ?
MILTON.
I else must change
Their nature, and revoke the high decree,
Unchangeable, eternal, which ordain'd
Their freedom ; they themselves ordain'd their
fall.
MILTON.
Perverse mankind ! whose wills, created free,
Charge all their woes on absolute decree;
All to the dooming gods their guilt translate,
And follies are miscall'd the crimes of fate.
POPE.
He, binding nature fast in fate,
Left conscience free, and will. POPE.
Man, though limited
By fate, may vainly think his actions free,
While all he does was, at his hour of birth,
Or by his gods, or potent stars, ordain'd.
ROWE.
FRIENDSHIP.
Great souls by instinct to each other turn,
Demand alliance, and in friendship burn.
ADDISON.
Plead it to her
With all the strength and heat of eloquence
Fraternal love and friendship can inspire.
ADDISON.
Nature first pointed out my Portius to me,
And easily taught me by her secret force
To love thy person ere I knew thy merit ;
Till what was instinct grew up into friendship.
ADDISON.
The friendships of the world are oft
Confederacies in vice, or leagues of pleasure.
ADDISON.
Friendship is not a plant of hasty growth ;
Though planted in esteem's deep-fixed soil,
The gradual culture of kind intercourse
Must bring it to perfection.
JOANNA BAILLIE.
Pride may cool what passion heated,
Time will tame the wayward will;
But the heart in friendship cheated
Throbs with woe's more maddening thrill.
BYRON.
Give me the avow'd, the erect, the manly foe;
Bold I can meet perhaps may turn his blow ;
But of all plagues, good Heaven, thy wrath can
send,
Save, save, oh ! save me from the Candid Friend.
CANNING : New Morality.
If she repent, and would make me amends,
Bid her but send me hers, and we are friends.
CAREW.
Friendship is the cement of two minds,
As of one man the soul and body is;
Of which one cannot sever but the other
Suffers a needful separation.
GEORGE CHAPMAN : Revenge.
Greatness and goodness are not means, but ends !
Hath he not always treasures, always friends,
The good great man? Three treasures, love
and light
And calm thoughts, regular as infants' breath ;
And three firm friends, more sure than day or
night,
Himself, his Maker, and the angel Death.
COLERIDGE : Reproof.
He loved my worthless rhymes; and, like a
friend,
Would always find out something to commend.
COWLEY.
Acquaintance I would have, but when 't depends
Not on the number but the choice of friends.
COWLEY.
The man that hails you Tom or Jack,
And proves by thumping on your back
His sense of your great merit, "*
Is such a friend that one had need
Be very much his friend indeed
To pardon or to bear it.
COWPER: On Friendship.
Well-chosen friendship, the most noble
Of virtues, all our joys makes double,
And into halves divides our trouble.
SIR J. DENHAM.
FRIENDSHIP.
209
Have we not plighted each our holy oath
That one should be the common good of both ;
One soul should both inspire, and neither prove
His fellow's hindrance in pursuit of love ?
DRYDEN.
Deserted at his utmost need
By those his former bounty fed. DRYDEN.
The wretched have no friends. DRYDEN,
Heroic virtue did his actions guide,
And he the substance, not th' appearance
chose :
To rescue one such friend he took more pride
Than to destroy whole thousands of such foes.
DRYDEN.
I would bring balm, and pour it in your wound,
Cure your distemper'd mind, and heal your for-
tunes.
DRYDEN.
What fate a wretched fugitive attends :
Scorn'd by my foes, abandon'd by my friends.
DRYDEN.
Ye moon and stars, bear witness to the truth :
His only crime, if friendship can offend,
Is too much love to his unhappy friend.
DRYDEN.
'Tis thine to ruin realms, o'erturn a state;
Betwixt the dearest friends to raise debate.
DRYDEN.
It upbraids you,
To let your father's friend, for three long months,
Thus dance attendance for a word of audience.
DRYDEN.
The fair blessing we vouchsafe to send ;
Nor can we spare you long, though often we may
lend.
DRYDEN.
They dare not give, and e'en refuse to lend,
To their poor kindred, or a wanting friend.
DRYDEN.
My sons, let your unseemly discord cease ;
If not in friendship, live at least in peace.
DRYDEN.
Let them who truly would appear my friends
Employ their swords, like mine, for noble ends.
DRYDEN,.
Wonder not to see this soul extend
The bounds, and seek some other self, a friend.
DRYDEN.
14
Hast thou been never base ? Did love ne'er
bend
Thy frailer virtue to betray thy friend ?
Flatter me, make thy court, and say it did :
Kings in a crowd would have their vices hid.
DRYDEN.
Command the assistance of a faithful friend,
But feeble are the succours I can send.
DRYDEN.
You love me for no other end
But to become my confidant and friend :
As such, I keep no secret from your sight.
DRYDEN.
Thanks are half lost when good turns are de-
lay'd.
FAIRFAX.
He who, malignant, tears an absent friend,
Or, when attack'd by others, don't defend,
Who friendship's secrets knows not to conceal
That man is vile.
FRANCIS.
Friendship, like love, is but a name,
Unless to one you stint the flame.
The child whom many fathers share
Hath seldom known a father's care.
'Tis thus in friendship : who depend
On many rarely find a friend. GAY.
Love is a sudden blaze which soon decays,
Friendship is like the sun's eternal rays;
Not daily benefits exhaust the flame :
It still is giving, and still burns the same.
GAY: Dione.
And what is friendship but a name,
A charm that lulls to sleep !
A shade that follows wealth or fame,
And leaves the wretch to weep !
GOLDSMITH: Hermit.
At this one stroke the man look'd dead in law;
His flatterers scamper, and his friends withdraw.
WALTER HARTE.
True happiness
Consists not in the multitude of friends,
But in the worth and choice : nor would I have
Virtue a popular regard pursue :
Let them be good that love, although but few.
BEN JONSON : Cynthia's Revels.
O summer friendship,
Whose flattering leaves, that shadow'd us in
Our prosperity, with the least gust drop off
In th' autumn of adversity !
MASSINGER : Maid of Honour.
FRIENDSHIP.
For I learn
Now of my own experience, not by talk,
How counterfeit a coin they are who friends
Bear in their superscription (of the most
I would be understood) : in prosperous days
They swarm, but in adverse withdraw their head,
Not to be found, though sought.
MILTON.
Friend after friend departs !
Who hath not lost a friend?
There is no union here of hearts
That hath not here its end.
JAMES MONTGOMERY.
The friends who in our sunshine live
When winter comes are flown ;
And he who has but tears to give
Must weep those tears alone.
MOORE.
For time will come, with all its blights,
The ruin'd hope the friend unkind.
MOORE.
Alas ! how light a cause may move
Dissension between hearts that love !
Hearts that the world in vain had tried,
And sorrow but more closely tied ;
That stood the storm when waves were rough,
Yet in a sunny hour fall off,
Like ships that have gone down at sea
When heaven was all tranquillity.
MOORE : Lalla Rookh.
-^ Friendship above all ties does bind the heart ;
And faith in friendship is the noblest part.
LORD ORRERY : Henry V.
You would not wish to count this man a foe !
In friendship, and in hatred, obstinate.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Friendship's an abstract of love's noble flame,
'Tis love refined, and purged from all its dross;
The next to angels' love, if not the same ;
As strong as passion is, though not so gross :
It antedates a glad eternity,
And is a heaven in epitome.
KATHERINE PHILIPS.
Who most to shun or hate mankind pretend,
Seek an admirer, or would fix a friend ;
Abstract what others feel, what others think,
All pleasures sicken, and all glories sink.
POPE.
/j. Thou wert my guide, philosopher, and friend.
POPE.
A generous friendship no cold medium knows,
Burns with one love, with one resentment glows.
POPE.
Ev'n thought meets thought ere from the lips it
part,
And each warm wish springs mutual from the
heart.
POPE.
Come then, my friend, my genius, come along :
Thou master of the poet and the song !
POPE.
But ancient friends, though poor or out of pay,
That touch my bell, I cannot turn away.
POPE.
Trust not yourself ; but, your defects to know,
Make use of ev'ry friend and ev'ry foe.
POPE. '
Each finding, like a friend,
Something to blame, and something to com-
mend.
POPE.
Absent or dead, still let a friend be dear ;
A sigh the absent claims, the dead a tear.
POPE.
\Vhen int'rest calls off all her sneaking train,
When all th' obliged desert, and all the vain,
She waits, or to the scaffold, or the cell,
When the last ling'ring friend has bid farewell.
POPE.
Lend me thy aid, I now conjure thee ! lend,
By the soft tie and sacred name of friend.
POPE.
To what new clime, what distant sky,
Forsaken, friendless, will ye fly?
POPE.
'Like friendly colours found our hearts unite,
And each from each contract new strength and
light.
POPE.
If in the melancholy shades below
The flames of friends and lovers cease to glow, ;
Yet mine shall sacred last ; mine undecay'd
Burn on through life, and animate my shade.
POPE.
I, in fact, a real interest have,
Winch to my own advantage I would save,
And with the usual courtier's trick intend
To serve myself, forgetful of my friend.
PRIOR.
FRIENDSHIP.
211
To my dear equal in my native land,
My plighted vow I gave : I his received :
Each swore with truth, with pleasure each be-
lieved :
The mutual contract was to heav'n convey'd.
PRIOR.
May he not craftily infer
The rules of friendship too severe,
Which chain him to a hated trust,
Which make him wretched to be just ?
PRIOR.
Some limbs again, in bulk or stature
Unlike, and not akin by nature,
In concert act, like modern friends,
Because one serves the other's ends.
PRIOR.
To tell thy mis'ries will no comfort breed ;
Men help thee most that think thou hast no need :
But if the world once thy misfortunes know,
Thou soon shalt lose a friend and find a foe.
THOMAS RANDOLPH.
A friend is gold : if true, he'll never leave thee :
Yet both, without a touchstone, may deceive thee.
THOMAS RANDOLPH.
True friends appear less moved than counterfeit.
ROSCOMMON.
Even he,
Lamenting that there had been cause of enmity,
Will often wish fate had ordain'd you friends.
ROWE.
Who knows the joys of friendship ?
The trust, security, and mutual tenderness,
The double joys, where each is glad for both ?
Friendship our only wealth, our last retreat and
strength,
Secure against ill fortune and the world.
ROWE.
Is this the counsel that we two have shared,
The sisters' vows, the hours that we have spent,
When we have chid the hasty-footed time
For parting us ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Is all forgot?
All school-days' friendship, childhood, inno-
cence ?
SHAKSPEARE.
We still have slept together,
Rose at an instant, learn'd, play'd, eat together;
And whereso'er we went, like Juno's swans,
Still we went coupled and inseparable.
SHAKSPEARE.
We created with our needles both one flower,
Both on one sampler, sitting on one cushion ;
Both warbling of one song, both in one key,
As if our hands, our sides, voices, and minds,
Had been incorp'rate.
SHAKSPEARE.
A friend should bear a friend's infirmities ;
But Brutus makes mine greater than they are.
SHAKSPEARE.
God's benison go with you, and with those
That would make good of bad, and friends of
foes.
SHAKSPEARE.
Why dost thou weep? Canst thou the con-
science lack
To think I shall lack friends ?
SHAKSPEARE.
So fellest foes,
Whose passions and whose plots have broke
their sleep,
To take the one the other, by some chance,
Some trick not worth an egg, shall grow dear
friends.
SHAKSPEARE.
Who alone suffers, suffers most i' th' mind;
But then the mind much sufPrance does o'erskip
When grief hath mates and bearing fellowship.
SHAKSPEARE.
If thou wilt lend this money, lend it not
As to thy friend ; for when did friendship take
A breed for barren metal of his friend ?
SHAKSPEARE.
The friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,
Grapple them to thy soul with hooks of steel :
But do not dull thy palm with entertainment
Of each new-hatch'd unfledged comrade.
SHAKSPEARE.
Neither a borrower nor a lender be ;
For loan oft loses both itself and friend,
And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.
SHAKSPEARE.
Has friendship such a faint and milky heart
It turns in less than two nights?
SHAKSPEARE.
I thank you for this profit, and from hence
I'll love no friend, sith love breeds such offence.
SHAKSPEARE.
It would become me better than to close
In terms of friendship with thine enemies.
SHAKSPEARE.
212
FRIENDSHIP.
Noble friends and fellows, whom to leave
Is only bitter to me, only dying ;
Go with me, like good angels, to myend.
SHAKSPEARE.
Friendship is constant in all other things
Save in the office and affairs of love :
Therefore all hearts in love use their own
tongues ;
Let ev'ry eye negotiate for itself,
And trust no agent : for beauty is a witch,
Against whose charms faith melteth into blood.
SHAKSPEARE.
My love and fear glew'd many friends to thee;
And now I fall, thy tough commixtures melt.
SHAKSPEARE.
Who'd be so mock'd with glory, as to live
But in a dream of friendship ?
To have his pomp, and all what state com-
pounds,
But only painted, like his varnish'd friends?
SHAKSPEARE.
Where you are liberal of your loves and coun-
sels,
Be sure you be not loose ; for those you make
friends,
And give your hearts to, when they once per-
ceive
The least rub in your fortunes, fall away
Like water from ye, never found again,
But where they mean to sink ye.
SHAKSPEARE.
Now comes the sick hour that his surfeit made ;
Now shall he try his friends that flatter'd him.
SHAKSPEARE.
Seeing the hurt stag alone,
Left and abandon'd of his velvet friends,
'Tis right, quoth he ; thus misery doth part
The flux of company.
SHAKSPEARE.
When I have most need to employ a friend,
Deep, hollow, treacherous, and full of guile
Be he to me this do I beg of heav'n !
When I am cold in zeal to you or yours.
SHAKSPEARE.
That, sir, which serves for gain,
And follows but for form,
Will pack when it begins to rain,
And leave thee in the storm.
SHAKSPEARE.
Who in want a hollow friend doth try,
Directly seasons him his enemy.
SHAKSPEARE.
The private wound is deepest. O time most
curst!
'Mongst all foes that a friend should be the
worst !
SHAKSPEARE.
The great man down, you mark, his fav'rite
flies;
The poor advanced makes friends of enemies.
SHAKSPEARE.
What the declined is,
He shall as soon read in the eyes of others
As feel in his own fall; for men, like butterflies,
Show not their mealy wings but to the summer.
SHAKSPEARE.
As we do turn our backs
From our companion thrown into his grave,
So his familiars to his buried fortunes
Slink all away; leave their false vows with him,
Like empty purses pick'd ; and this poor self,
A dedicated beggar to the air,
With his disease of all-shunn'd poverty,
Walks, like contempt, alone.
SHAKSPEARE.
To wail friends lost
Is not by much so wholesome, profitable,
As to rejoice at friends but newly found.
SHAKSPEARE.
Oh world! thy slippery turns! Friends now
fast sworn,
Whose double bosoms seem to wear one heart,
Whose hours, whose bed, whose meal and
exercise,
Are still together; who twin, as 'twere, in love
Unseparable, shall within this hour,
On a dissension of a doit, break out
To bitterest enmity.
SHAKSPEARE.
His friendship was exactly timed :
He shot before your foes were primed,
SWIFT.
His friendships, still to few confined,
Were always of the meddling kind.
SWIFT.
Perform'd what friendship, justice, truth, require,
What could he more but decently retire ?
SWIFT.
FRIENDSHIP. FR UIT.
213
That gen'rous boldness to defend
An innocent or absent friend.
Some dire misfortune to portend,
No enemy can match a friend.
SWIFT.
SWIFT.
Is there, kind heaven ! no constancy in man ?
No steadfast truth, no gen'rous fix'd affection,
That can bear up against a selfish world ?
No, there is none.
THOMSON : Tancred and Sigismunda.
Friendship's an empty name, made to deceive
Those whose good nature tempts them to
believe :
There's no such thing on earth; the best that we
Can hope for here is faint neutrality.
SIR SAMUEL TUKE : Adventures.
O I what a happiness is it to find I
A friend of our own blood, a brother kind !
WALLER.
Friendship has a power
To soothe affliction in her darkest hour.
H. KIRKE WHITE.
Small service is true service while it lasts;
Of friends, however humble, scorn not one :
The daisy, by the shadow that it casts,
Protects the ling'ring dewdrop from the sun.
WORDSWORTH.
They drop apace; bf nature some decay;
And some the blasts of fortune sweep away;
Till, naked quite of happiness, aloud
We call for death, and shelter in a shroud.
YOUNG.
Heaven gives us friends to bless the present
scene ;
Resumes them, to prepare us for the next.
YOUNG : Night Thoughts.
Hope not to find
A friend, but what has found a friend in thee ;
All like the purchase, few the price will pay;
And this makes friends such miracles below.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
First on thy friend deliberate with thyself;
Pause, ponder, sift; not eager in the'choice,
Nor jealous of the chosen; fixing, fix;
Judge before friendship, then confide till death.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
FRUIT.
No spring, nor summer, on the mountain seen,
Smiles with gay fruits or with delightful green.
ADDISON.
The poor inhabitant beholds in vain
The redd'ning orange and the swelling grain.
ADDISON.
Instead of golden fruits,
By genial show'rs and solar heat supplied,
Unsufferable winter hath defaced
Earth's blooming charms, and made a barren
waste.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
The fragrant fruit from bending branches shake,
And with the crystal stream their thirst at pleas-
ure slake.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
The fair pomegranate might adorn the pine,
The grape the bramble, and the sloe the vine.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
The fruits perish on the ground,
Or soon decay, by snows immod'rate chill'd,
By winds are blasted; or by lightning kill'd.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
The kernel of a grape, the fig's small grain,
Can clothe a mountain, and o'ershade a plain.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Lest thy redundant juice
Should fading leaves, instead of fruits, produce,
The pruner's" hand with letting blood must
quench
Thy heat, and thy exub'rant parts retrench.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Myself will search our planted grounds at home
For downy peaches and the glossy plum.
DRYDEN.
Let Araby extol her happy coast,
Her cinnamon and sweet amomum boast.
DRYDEN.
Now let me graff my pears and prune the vine.
DRYDEN.
On a neighb'ring tree descending light,
Like a large cluster of black grapes they show,
And make a large dependence from the bough.
DRYDEN.
Creeping 'twixt 'em all, the mantling vine
Does round their trunks her purple clusters twine.
DRYDEN.
214
FRUIT.
Let thy vines in intervals be set ;
Indulge their width, and add a roomy space,
That their extremest lines may scarce embrace.
DRYDEX.
He feeds on fruits, which of their own accord
The willing grounds and laden trees afford.
DRYDEN.
Sharp-tasted citrons Median climes produce :
Bitter the rind, but gen'rous is the juice.
DRYDEN.
And since that plenteous autumn now is past,
Whose grapes and peaches have indulged your
taste,
Take in good part, from our poor poet's board,
Such rivell'd fruits as winter can afford.
DRYDEN.
Those rich perfumes which from the happy
shore
The winds upon their balmy wings convey'd,
Whose guilty sweetness first the world betray'd.
DRYDEN.
Content with food which nature freely bred,
On wildings and on strawberries they fed ;
Cornels and bramble-berries gave the rest,
And falling acorns furnish'd out a feast.
DRYDEN.
Thus apple-trees, whose trunks are strong to bear
Their spreading boughs, exert themselves in air.
DRYDEN.
He seized the shining bough with griping hold,
And rent away with ease the ling'ring gold.
DRYDEN.
Ten wildings have I gather'd for my dear :
How ruddy, like your lips, their streaks appear !
DRYDEN.
Sweet grapes degen'rate there, and fruits, de-
clined
From their first flav'rous. taste, renounce their
kind.
DRYDEN.
'Tis usual now an inmate graff to see
With insolence invade a foreign tree.
DRYDEN.
He knew
For fruit the grafted pear-tree to dispose,
And tame to plums the sourness of the sloes.
DRYDEN.
The mother plant admires the leaves unknown
Of alien trees and apples not her own.
DRYDEN.
Walnuts the fruit'rer's hand in autumn stain,
Blue plums and juicy pears augment his gain.
GAY.
Melons on beds of ice are taught to bear,
And, strangers to the sun, yet ripen here.
GRANVILLE.
Let your various creams encircled be
With swelling fruit, just ravish'd from the tree.
DR. WM. KING : Art of Cookery.
Nor must all shoots of pears alike be set,
Crustumian, Syrian pears, and wardens great.
MAY.
Rose, as in dance, the stately trees, and spread
Their branches hung with copious fruit.
MILTON.
Small store will serve, where store
All seasons, ripe for use, hangs on the stalk.
MILTON.
Thy abundance wants
Partakers, and uncropp'd falls to the ground.
MILTON.
Fruit, like that
Which grew in Paradise, the bait of Eve
Used by the tempter.
MILTON.
Each tree,
Loaden with fairest fruit, that hung to th' eye
Tempting, stirr'd in me sudden appetite
To pluck and eat.
MILTON.
In her hand she held
A bough of fairest fruit, that downy smiled,
New gather'd, and ambrosial smell diffused.
MILTON.
Greedily they pluck'd
The fruitage, fair to sight, like that which grew
Near that bituminous lake where Sodom flamed.
MILTON.
The force of that fallacious fruit,
That with exhilarating vapour bland
About their spirits had play'd,and inmost pow'rs
Made err, was now exhaled.
MILTON.
Fruits of all kinds, in coat
Rough or smooth rind, or bearded husk, or shell,
She gathers tribute large, and on the board
Heaps with unsparing hand.
MILTON.
FRUIT.
215
Michael from Adam's eyes the film removed,
Which that false fruit, that promised clearer sight,
Had bred.
MILTON.
Fruits of palm-tree, pleasantest to thirst
And hunger both.
MILTON.
Best of fruits, whose taste gave elocution.
MILTON.
Higher than that wall, a circling row
Of goodliest trees, loaden with fairest fruit,
Blossoms, and fruits at once of golden hue,
Appeared with enamell'd colours mixed.
MILTON.
Where any row
Of fruit trees, over-woody, reach'd too far
Their pamper'd boughs.
MILTON.
Roving the field, I chanced
A goodly tree far distant to behold,
Loaden with fruit of fairest colours.
MILTON.
Ye myrtles brown, with ivy never sere,
I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude,
And with forced fingers .rude
Scatter your leaves before the mellowing year.
MILTON.
Where full-ear'd sheaves of rye
Grow wavy on the tilth, that soil select
For apples.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Ceres, in her prime,
Seems fertile, and with ruddiest freight bedeck'd.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Nor is it hard to beautify each month
With files of party-colour'd fruits.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Disburthen thou thy sapless wood
Of its rich progeny ; the turgid fruit
Abounds with mellow liquor.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Her private orchards walled on ev'ry side,
To lawless sylvans all access denied.
POPE.
Tall thriving trees confess'd the fruitful mould;
The redd'ning apple ripens here to gold.
POPE.
To him your orchard's early fruit's are due,
A pleasing off 'ring when 'tis made by you.
POPE.
Not the fair fruit that on yon branches glows,
With that ripe red th' autumnal sun bestows,
Can move the god.
POPE.
His pruning-hook corrects the vines,
And the loose stragglers to their ranks confines.
POPE.
To happy convents, bosom'd deep in vines,
Where slumber abbots purple as their wines.
POPE.
Depending vines the shelving cavern screen,
With purple clusters blushing through the green.
POPE.
Now golden fruits on loaded branches shine,
And grateful clusters swell with floods of wine.
POPE.
Full on its crown a fig's green branches rise,
And shoot, a leafy forest, to the skies.
POPE.
There grew a goodly tree him fair beside,
Loaden with fruit and apples rosy red,
As they in pure vermilion had been dyed,
Whereof great virtues over all were read.
SPENSER.
For streaks of red were mingled there,
Such as are on a Catherine pear,
The side that's next the sun.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
Bear me, Pomona ! to thy citron groves,
To where the lemon and the piercing lime,
With the deep orange glowing through the green,
Their lighter glories blend.
THOMSON.
Unnumber'd fruits
A friendly juice to cool thirst's rage contain.
THOMSON.
The downy orchard, and the melting pulp
Of mellow fruit, the nameless nations feed
Of evanescent insects.
THOMSON.
Nor, on its slender twigs
Low bending, be the full pomegranate scorn'd.
THOMSON.
Or lead me through the maze
Embowering endless of the Indian fig.
THOMSON.
The juicy pear
Lies in a soft profusion scatter' d round.
THOMSON.
2l6
FR UIT. FUNERALS.
Unripe fruit, whose verdant stalks do cleave
Close to the tree, which grieves no less to leave
The smiling pendent which adorns her so,
And until autumn on the bough should grow.
WALLER.
The tardy plants in our cold orchards placed
Reserve their fruit for the next age's taste.
WALLER.
With candied plantains and the juicy pine,
On choicest melons and sweet grapes they dine.
WALLER.
Figs there unplanted through the fields do grow,
Such as fierce Cato did the Romans show.
WALLER.
He ripens spices, fruit, and precious gum,
Which from remotest regions hither come.
WALLER.
Bermudas wall'd with rocks, who does not know
That happy island, where huge lemons grow ;
Where shining pearl, coral, and many a pound,
On the rich shore, of ambergris is found ?
WALLER.
FUNERALS.
I'll follow thee in fun'ral flames; when dead,
My ghost shall thee attend at board and bed.
SIR J. DENHAM.
His body shall be royally interr'd,
And the last funeral pomps adorn his hearse.
DRYDEN.
Your body I sought, and, had I found,
Design'd for burial in your native ground.
DRYDEN.
A tomb and fun'ral honours I decreed :
The place your armour and your name retains.
DRYDEN.
Thy hand o'er towns the fun'ral torch displays,
And forms a thousand ills ten thousand ways.
DRYDEN.
He slew Action, but despoil'd him not;
Nor in his hate the funeral rites forgot.
DRYDEN.
Your piety has paid
All needful rites, to rest my wand'ring shade.
DRYDEN.
He chose a thousand horse, the flow'r of all
His warlike troops, to wait the funeral.
DRYDEN.
Come, shepherds, come and strew with leaves
the plain ;
Such funeral rites your Daphnis did ordain.
DRYDEN.
The fun'ral pomp which to your kings you pay
Is all I want, and all you take away.
DRYDEN.
They to the master-street the corps convey'd ;
The houses to their tops with black were spread,
And e'en the pavements were with mourning hid.
DRYDEN.
The neighbours
Follow'd with wistful looks the damsel bier,
Sprigg'd rosemary the lads and lasses bore.
GAY.
WTiy is the hearse with scutcheons blazon'd
round,
And with the noddingplume of ostrich crown' d ?
No : the dead know it not, nor profit gain ;
It only serves to prove the living vain.
GAY: Trivia.
'Tis sweet, as year by year we lose
Friends out of sight, in faith to muse
How grows in Paradise our store.
KEBLE : Burial of the Dead.
Mine eye hath found that sad sepulchral rock
That was the casket of heav'n's richest store.
MILTON.
Here be tears of perfect moan,
Wept for thee in Helicon ;
And some flowers, and some bays,
For thy hearse, to strew the ways.
MILTON.
Thus unlamented pass the proud away,
The gaze of fools, the pageant of a day ;
So perish all whose breast ne'er learn'd to glow
For others' good, or melt at others' woe.
POPE.
The long fun'rals blacken all the way.
POPE.
Call round her tomb each object of desire ;
Bid her by all that cheers or softens life,
The tender sister, daughter, friend, and wife.
POPE.
But if his soul hath wing'd the destined flight,
Inhabitant of deep disastrous night,
Homeward with pious speed repass the main,
To the pale shade funereal rites ordain.
POPE.
FUNERALS. FUTURITY.
217
The mournful fair,
Oft as the rolling years return,
With fragrant wreaths and flowing hair,
Shall visit her distinguish'd urn.
PRIOR.
No widow at his funeral shall weep.
SANDYS.
All things that we ordained festival,
Turn from their office to black funeral :
Our instruments to melancholy bells ;
Our wedding cheer to a sad burial feast ;
Our solemn hymns to sullen dirges change;
Our bridal flowers serve for a buried corse,
And all things change them to the contrary.
SHAKSPEARE.
I thought thy bride -bed to have deck'd, sweet
maid,
And not have strew'd thy grave.
SHAKSPEARE.
On your family's old monument
Hang mournful epitaphs.
SHAKSPEARE.
We should profane the service of the dead,
To sing a requiem, and such rest to her
As to peace-parted souls.
SHAKSPEARE.
They bore him barefaced on the bier,
And on his grave rain'd many a tear.
SHAKSPEARE.
Let one spirit of the first-born Cain
Reign in all bosoms, that, each heart being set
On bloody courses, the rude scene may end,
And darkness be the burier of the dead.
SHAKSPEARE.
The sun of all the world is dim and dark ;
O heavy hearse !
Break we our pipes that shrill'd as loud as lark,
O careful verse !
SPENSER.
Those with whom I now converse
Without a tear will tend my hearse.
SWIFT.
What awe did the slow solemn knell inspire,
The pealing organ, and the passing choir,
And the last words that "dust to dust" con-
vey 'd !
TICKELL.
If you have kindness left, there see me laid ;
To bury decently the injured maid,
Is all the favour.
WALLER.
Shall funeral eloquence her colours spread,
And scatter roses on the wealthy dead ?
YOUNG.
FUTURITY.
Mine after-life ! what is mine after-life?
My day is closed ! the gloom of night is come !
A hopeless darkness settles o'er my fate.
JOANNA BAILLIE : Basil.
Shall I be left forgotten in the dust,
When Fate, relenting, lets the flower revive ?
Shall Nature's voice, to man alone unjust,
Bid him, though doom'd to perish, hope to
live?
BEATTIE : Minstrel.
What deem'd they of the future or the past ?
The present, like a tyrant, held them fast.
BYRON: Island.
When fates among the stars do grow,
Thou into the close nests of time dost peep,
And there, with piercing eye,
Through the firm shell and the thick white, dost
spy.
Years to come, a forming lie.
COWLEY.
The undislinguish'd seeds of good and ill
Heav'n in his bosom from our knowledge hides.
DRYDEN.
Too curious man ! why dost thou seek to know
Events, which, good or ill, foreknown, are woe ?
Th' all-seeing power that made thee mortal, gave
Thee every thing a mortal state should have.
DRYDEN.
Foreknowledge only is enjoy'd by heaven ;
And, for his peace of mind, to man forbidden :
Wretched were life if he foreknew his doom ;
Even joys foreseen give pleasing hope no room,
And griefs assured are felt before they come.
DRYDEN.
In fortune's empire blindly thus we go,
We wander after pathless destiny,
Whose dark resorts since prudence cannot know,
In vain it would provide for what shall be.
DRYDEN.
Sure there is none but fears a future state;
And when the most obdurate swear they do not,
Their trembling hearts belie their boastful
tongues.
DRYDEN.
218
FUTURITY. GAMBLING.
Old prophecies foretell our fall at hand,
When bearded men in floating castles land.
DRYDEN.
Calchas, the sacred seer, who had in view
Things present and the past, and things to come
foreknew :
Supreme of augurs. DRYDEN.
Our reason prompts us to a future state,
The last appeal from fortune and from fate,
When God's all-righteous ways will be declared.
DRYDEN.
O visions ill foreseen ! Better had I
Lived ignorant of future ! so had borne
My part of evil only.
MILTON.
Peace, brother ! be not over-exquisite
To cast the fashion of uncertain evils.
MILTON.
Let no man seek what may befall :
Evil he may be sure. MILTON.
Present to grasp, and future still to find,
The whole employ of body and of mind.
POPE.
Heaven from all creatures hides the book of fate ;
All but the page prescribed, their present state.
POPE.
The soul, uneasy and confined from home,
Rests and expatiates in a life to come.
POPE.
Vex'd with the present moment's heavy gloom,
Why seek we brightness from the years to come?
Disturb'd and broken like a sick man's sleep,
Our troubled thoughts to distant prospects leap,
Desirous still what flies us to o'ertake :
For hope is but the dream of those that wake.
PRIOR: Solomon.
I still shall wait
Seme new hereafter, and a future state.
PRIOR.
The spirit of deep prophecy she hath :
What's past, and what's to come, she can descry.
SHAKSPEARE.
There is a history in all men's lives,
Fig'ring the nature of the times deceased,
The which observed, a man may prophesy,
With a near aim, of the main chance of things
As yet not come to life ; which in their seeds
And weak beginnings lie entreasured.
SHAKSPEARE.
Oh, happy you, who, blest with present bliss.
See not with fatal prescience future tears,
Nor the dear moment of enjoyment miss
Through gloomy discontent, or sullen fears
Foreboding many a storm for coming years,
MRS. TIGHE: Psyche.
Those comforts that shall never cease,
Future in hope, but present in belief.
WOTTON.
GAMBLING.
So might the heir, whose father hath, in play,
Wasted a thousand pounds of ancient rent,
By painful earning of one groat a day,
Hope to restore the patrimony spent.
SIR J. DAVIES.
What more than madness reigns,
When one short sitting many hundreds drains,
And not enough is left him to supply
Board-wages, or a footman's livery ?
DRYDEN.
Bets at the first were fool-traps, where the wise
Like spiders lay in ambush for the flies.
DRYDEN.
But then my study was to cog the dice,
And dext'rously to throw the lucky sice:
To shun ames ace, that swept my stakes away,
And watch the box, for fear they should convey
False bones, and put upon me in the play.
DRYDEN.
This game, these carousals, Ascanius taught,
And building Alba to the Latins brought.
DRYDEN.
They say this town is full of cozenage,
As nimble jugglers that deceive the eye,
Disguised cheaters, prating mountebanks,
And many such like libertines of sin.
SHAKSPEARE.
GARDENS.
219
How can the muse her aid impart,
Unskill'd in all the terms of art?
Or in harmonious numbers put
The deal, the shuffle, and the cut ?
SWIFT.
GARDENS.
The garden was inclosed within the square
Where young Emilia took the morning air.
DRYDEN.
Well must the ground be digg'd, and better
dress'd,
New soil to make, and meliorate the rest.
DRYDEN.
Then let the learned gard'ner mark with care
The kinds of stocks, and what those kinds will
bear.
DRYDEN.
She stript the stalks of all their leaves ; the best
She cull'd, and them with handy care she drest.
DRYDEN.
For thee, large bunches load the bending vine,
And the last blessings of the year are thine.
DRYDEN.
My garden takes up half my daily care,
And my field asks the minutes I can spare.
WALTER HARTE.
At first, in Rome's poor age,
When both her kings and consuls held the
plough,
Or garden'd well. BEN JONSON.
Adam ! well may we labour still to dress
This garden ; still to tend plant, herb, and flow'r.
MILTON.
We lose the prime, to mark how spring
Our tender plants, how blows the citron grove,
What drops the myrrh and what the balmy reed.
MILTON.
Let us divide our labours : thou, where choice
Leads thee, or where most needs ; whether to
wind
The woodbine round this arbour, or direct
The clasping ivy where to climb.
MILTON.
They, looking back, all th' eastern side beheld
Of Paradise, so late their happy seat,
Waved over by that flaming brand ; the gate
With dreadful faces throng'd, and fiery arms.
MILTON.
She went forth among her fruits and flow'rs,
To visit how they prosper' d, bud and bloom
Her nursery : they at her coming sprung,
And touch' d by her fair tendance gladlier grew.
MILTON-
The rapid current, which, through veins
Of porous earth with kindly thirst updrawn,
Rose a fresh fountain, and with many a rill
Water'd the garden.
MILTON.
Plant it round with shade
Of laurel, evergreens, and branching plane.
MILTON.
Early, ere the odorous breath of morn
Awakes the slumbering leaves, or tassel'd horn
Shakes the high thicket, haste I all about,
Number my ranks, and visit every sprout.
MILTON.
When swelling buds their od'rous foliage shed,
And gently harden into fruit, the wise
Spare not the little offsprings, if they grow
Redundant.
JOHN PHILIPS.
His gardens next your admiration call ;
On every side you look, behold the wall !
No pleasing intricacies intervene,
No artful wildness to perplex the scene ;
Grove nods at grove, each alley has a brother,
And half the platform just reflects the other;
The suffering eye inverted nature sees,
Trees cut to statues, statues thick as trees ;
With here a fountain never to be play'd,
And there a summer-house that knows no shade.
POPE.
A wild where weeds and flow'rs promiscuous
shoot,
Or garden tempting with forbidden fruit.
POPE.
The thriving plants, ignoble broomsticks made,
Now sweep those alleys they were made to shade.
POPE.
A gushing fountain broke
Around it, and above, forever green,
The bushing alders form'd a shady scene.
POPE.
The hook she bor*>
To lop the growth of the luxuriant year,
To decent form the lawless shoots to bring,
And teach th' obedient branches where to spring.
POPE.
22O
GARDENS. GENIUS.
A waving glow his bloomy beds display,
Blushing in bright diversities of day.
POPE.
Happy you!
Whose charms as far all other nymphs' outshine
As others' gardens are excell'd by thine.
POPE.
Is't not enough to break into my garden,
Climbing my walls, in spite of me the owner ?
SHAKSPEARE.
I will go root away
The noisome weeds, that without profit suck
The soil's fertility from wholesome flowers.
SHAKSPEARE.
I am arrived from fruitful Lombardy,
The pleasant garden of great Italy.
SHAKSPEARE.
Nothing teems
But hateful docks, rough thistles, kecksies, burs,
Losing both beauty and utility.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thy promises are like Adonis' gardens,
Which one day bloom' d and fruitful were the
next.
SHAKSPEARE.
The garden of Proserpine this hight,
And in the midst thereof a silver seat,
With a thick arbour goodly overdight,
In which she often used from open heat
Herself to shroud, and pleasures to entreat.
SPENSER.
Seest not thilk hawthorn stud,
How bragly it begins to bud,
And utter his tender head ?
Flora now calleth forth each flow'r,
And bids him make ready Maia's bow'r.
SPENSER.
Over him, art striving to compare
With nature, did an arbour green dispread,
Framed of wanton ivy, flowing fair,
Through which the fragrant eglantine did spread,
His pricking arms entrail'd with roses red.
SPENSER.
Then he arriving, round about doth fly
From bed to bed, from one to other border ;
And takes survey, with curious busy eye,
Of ev'ry flower and herb there set in order.
SPENSER.
The gentle shepherd sat beside a spring,
All in the shadow of a bushy brier.
SPENSER.
At once, array'd
In all the colours of the flushing year,
The garden glows.
THOMSON.
The finish'd garden to the view
Its vistas opens, and its alleys green.
THOMSON.
Embroider'd so with flowers it had stood,
That it became a garden of a wood.
WALLER.
All with a border of rich fruit trees crown'd,
Whose loaded branches hide the lofty mound :
Such various ways the spacious alleys lead,
My doubtful muse knows not what path to tread.
WALLER.
GKNIUS.
Time, place, and action may with pains be
wrought,
But genius must be born, and never can be
taught.
DRYDEN.
A happy genius is the gift of nature.
DRYDEN.
And the tame demon that should guard my
throne
Shrinks at a genius greater than his own.
DRYDEN.
To your glad genius sacrifice this day;
Let common meats respectfully give way.
DRYDEN.
One science only will one genius fit,
So vast is art, so narrow human wit :
Like kings, we lose the conquests gain'd before
By vain ambition still to make them more.
POPE : Essay on Criticism.
There is none but he
Whose being I do fear : and under him,
My genius is rebuked ; as it is said
Antony's was by Caesar.
SHAKSPEARE.
The genius and the mortal instruments
Are then in council.
SHAKSPEARE.
GENTLEMAN. GENTLENESS. GLORY.
221
GENTLEMAN.
You say a long-descended race
Makes gentlemen, and that your high degree
Is much disparaged to be match'd with me.
DRYDEN.
I am a gentleman.
I'll be sworn thou art!
Thy tongue, thy face, thy limbs, action, and spirit,
Do give thee five-fold blazon.
SHAKSPEARE.
I am a gentleman of blood and breeding.
SHAKSPEARE.
I freely told you all the wealth I had
Ran in my veins ; I was a gentleman.
SHAKSPEARE.
A sweeter and a lovelier gentleman,
Framed in the prodigality of nature,
The spacious world cannot again afford.
SHAKSPEARE.
GENTLENESS.
Your brave and haughty scorn of all
Was stately and monarchical";
All gentleness with that esteem'd
A dull and slavish virtue seem'd.
COWLEY.
The gentlest heart on earth is proved unkind.
FAIRFAX.
Sweet speaking oft a currish heart reclaims.
SIDNEY.
The 'gentleness of all the gods go with thee.
SHAKSPEARE.
GLORY.
And glory long has made the sages smile ;
'Tis something, nothing, words, illusion,
wind
Depending more upon the historian's style
Than on the name a person leaves behind.
BYRON.
My glories are past danger ; they're full-blown :
Things that are blasted are but in the bud.
SIR J. DENHAM.
If glory was a bait that angels swallow'd,
How then should souls allied to sense resist it ?
DRYDEN: Aurengzebe.
Glory, like the dazzling eagle, stood
Perch'd on my bever in the Granic flood ;
When fortune's self my standard trembling bore,
And the pale fates stood frighted on the shore.
LEE.
All our glory extinct, and happy state,
Here swallow'd up in endless misery.
MILTON.
For what is glory but the blaze of fame,
The people's praise, if always praise unmixt ?
MILTON.
Glory, like time, progression does require ;
When it does cease t' advance, it does expire.
LORD ORRERY.
Transported demi-gods stood round,
And men grew heroes at the sound,
Inflamed with glory's charms.
POPE.
O greatly bless'd with ev'ry blooming grace !
With equal steps the paths of glory trace.
POPE.
Abstract what others feel, what others think,
All pleasures sicken, and all glories sink.
POPE.
He safe return'd, the race of glory past,
New to his friends' embrace, had breathed his
last.
POPE.
Who pants for glory finds but short repose,
A breath revives him, and a breath o'erthrows.
POPE.
Vanquish again; though she be gone
Whose garland crown'd the victor's hair,
And reign, though she had left the throne,
Who made thy glory worth thy care.
PRIOR.
Glory is like a circle in the water,
Which never ceaseth to enlarge itself,
Till by broad spreading it disperse to nought.
SHAKSPEARE.
Yet let them look they glory not in mischief,
Nor build their evils on the graves of great men :
For then my guiltless blood must cry against
them.
SHAKSPEARE.
I have ventured,
Like little wanton boys that swim on bladders,
This many summers in a sea of glory,
But far beyond my depth : my high-blown pride
At length broke under me.
SHAKSPEARE.
GLORY. GOD.
Unworthy wretch, quoth he, of so great grace,
How dare I think such glory to attain ?
Those that have it attain'd were in like case,
Quoth he, as wretched, and lived in like pain.
SPENSER.
Shames not to be with guiltless blood defiled ;
She taketh glory in her cruelness.
SPENSER.
Yet the stout fairy, 'mongst the middest crowd,
Thought all their glory vain in knightly view,
And that great princess too, exceeding proud,
That to strange knight no better countenance
allow'd.
SPENSER.
Real glory
Springs from the quiet conquest of ourselves ;
And without that the conqueror is nought
But the first slave.
THOMSON : Sophonisba.
Glories, like glow-worms, afar off shine bright,
But, look'd too near, have neither heat nor light,
WEBSTER : Duchess of Malfy.
To glory some advance a lying claim,
Thieves of renown, and pilferers of fame.
YOUNG.
GOD.
Since the world's wide frame does not include
A cause with such capacities endued,
Some other cause o'er nature must preside.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Reach th' Almighty's sacred throne,
And make his causeless pow'r the cause of all
things known.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
But, O ! thou bounteous Giver of all good,
Thou art, of all thy gifts, Thyself the crown !
Give what Thou canst, without Thee we are
poor,
And with Thee rich, take what thou wilt away.
COWPER.
To that great spring which doth great king-
doms move,
The sacred spring whence right and honour
streams ;
Distilling virtue, shedding peace and love
In every place, as Cynthia sheds her beams.
SIR J. DA VIES.
Of himself is none;
But that eternal Infinite, and one,
Who never did begin, who ne'er can end,
On him all beings, as their source, depend.
DRYDEN.
Where'er thou art, He is; th' eternal Mind
Acts through all places ; is to none confined;
Fills ocean, earth, and air, and all above,
And through the universal mass does move,
DRYDEN.
I move, I see, I speak, discourse, and know;
Though now I am, I was not always so :
Then that from which I was must be before,
Whom, as my spring of being, I adore.
DRYDEN.
Thy throne is darkness, in th' abyss of light ;
A blaze of glory that forbids the sight.
O teach me to believe Thee thus conceal'd,
And search no farther than Thyself reveal'd.
DRYDEN.
While these limbs the vital spirit feeds,
While day to night, and night to day, succeeds,
Burnt-off rings morn and evening shall be Thine,
And fires eternal in Thy temples shine.
DRYDEN.
From Thee, great God, we spring, to Thee we
tend,
Path, motive, guide, original, and end.
DR. S. JOHNSON : Rambler.
To th' infinitely Good we owe
Immortal thanks ; and His admonishment
Receive, with solemn purpose to observe
Immutably His sovereign will, the end
Of what we are.
MILTON.
Thus while God spake, ambrosial fragrance fill'd
All heaven, and in the blessed spirits elect
Sense of new joy ineffable infused.
MILTON.
God into the hands of their deliverer
Puts invincible might,
To quell the mighty of the earth, th' oppressor,
The brute and boist'rous force of violent men.
MILTON.
All these with ceaseless praise his works behold,
Both day and night.
MILTON.
God, to remove his ways from human sense,
Placed heav'n from earth so far.
MILTON.
GOD. GOLD.
223
Things not reveal'd, which th' invisible King
Only omniscient, hath suppress' d in night.
MILTON.
To attain
The height and depth of thy eternal ways,
All human thoughts come short, supreme of
things.
MILTON.
God will deign
To visit oft the dwellings of just men,
Delighted, and with frequent intercourse
Thither will send his winged messengers
On errands of supernal grace.
MILTON.
In human works, though labour'd on with pain,
A thousand movements scarce one purpose gain ;
In God's, one single can its ends produce,
Yet serves to second too some other use.
POPE.
Nor God alone in the still calm we find ;
He mounts the storm, and walks upon the wind.
POPE.
Father of all ! in every age,
In every clime adored,
By saint, by savage, and by sage,
Jehovah, Jove, or Lord.
POPE.
Thou sov'reign pow'r, whose secret will controls
The inward bent and motion of our souls !
Why hast thou placed such infinite degrees
Between the cause and cure of my disease ?
PRIOR.
No muffling clouds, nor shades infernal, can
From his inquiry hide offending man.
SANDYS.
The silent vaults of death, unknown to light,
And hell itself, lie naked to his sight.
SANDYS.
If any strength we have, it is to ill ;
But all the good is God's, both power and eke
will.
SPENSER.
Great God of might, that reigneth in the mind,
And all the body to thy hest dost frame ;
Victor of gods, subduer of mankind,,
That dost the lion and fell tiger tame,
Who can express the glory of thy might?
SPENSER.
GOLD.
For gold the merchant ploughs the main,
The farmer ploughs the manor.
BURNS.
The plague of gold strikes far and near,
And deep and strong it enters;
Our thoughts grow blank, our words grow
strange,
We cheer the pale gold-diggers,
Each soul is worth so much on 'change,
And mark'd, like sheep, with figures.
MRS. BROWNING.
Thou more than stone of the philosopher !
Thou touchstone of Philosophy herself!
Thou bright eye of the Mine ! thou loadstar
Of the Soul ! thou true magnetic Pole, to which
All hearts point duly north, like trembling
needles !
BYRON.
Gray -headed infant, and in vain grown old !
Art thou to learn that in another's gold
Lie charms resistless ? that all laugh to find
Unthinking plainness so o'erspread thy mind.
CREECH.
Gold is the strength, the sinews of the world ;
The health, the soul, the beauty most divine ;
A mask of gold hides all deformities ;
Gold is heaven's physic, life's restorative.
DECKER.
Now cursed steel, and more accursed gold,
Gave mischief birth, and made that mischief
bold;
And double death did wretched man invade,
By steel assaulted, and by gold betray'd.
DRYDEN.
His countenance did imprint an awe,
And naturally all souls to his did bow;
As wands of divination downward draw,
And point to beds where sov'reign gold doth
grow.
DRYDEN.
'Tis gold so pure
It cannot bear the stamp without alloy.
DRYDEN.
Why wouldst thou go, with one consent they cry,
When thou hast gold enough, and Emily?
DRYDEN.
Because its blessings are abused,
Must gold be censured, cursed, accused?
Even virtue's self by knaves is made
A cloak to carry on the trade.
GAY.
224
GOLD. GOOD.
To purchase heaven has gold the power ?
Can gold remove the mortal hour ?
In life can love be bought with gold?
Are friendship's pleasures to be sold ?
No ! all that's worth a wish a thought
Fair virtue gives, unbribed, unbought.
Cease then on trash thy hopes to bind :
Let nobler views engage thy mind.
DR. S. JOHNSON.
For gold his sword the hireling ruffian draws ;
For gold the hireling judge distorts the laws;
Wealth heap'd on wealth, nor truth nor safety
buys;
The dangers gather as the treasures rise.
DR. S. JOHNSON.
The earth hath lost
Most of her ribs, as entrails ; being now
Wounded no less for marble than for gold.
BEN JONSON.
Or where the gorgeous East with richest hand
Showers on her kings barbaric pearl and gold.
MILTON.
Is yellow dirt the passion of thy life ?
Look but on Gripus, or on Gripus' wife.
POPE.
Useful, we grant ; it serves what life requires,
But dreadful, too, the dark assassin hires.
POPE.
The starving chymist in his golden views
Supremely blest.
POPE.
For Indian spices, for Peruvian gold,
Prevent the greedy, and outbid the bold.
POPE.
Judges and senates have been bought for gold ;
Esteem and love were never to be sold.
POPE.
Trade it may help, society extend,
But lures the pirate, and corrupts the friend;
It raises armies in a nation's aid,
But bribes a senate, and a land's betray'd.
POPE.
Troy flamed in burnish'd gold; and o'er the
throne,
ARMS AND THE MAN in golden ciphers shone.
POPE.
The train prepare a cruise of curious mould,
A cruise of fragrance, form'd of burnish'd gold.
POPE.
Bless'd paper credit !
Gold, imp'd with this, can compass hardest
things,
Can pocket states, or fetch or carry kings.
POPE.
How quickly nature
Falls into revolt, when gold becomes her object!
For this the foolish, over-careful fathers
Have broke their sleep with thought, their
brains with care,
Their bones with industry;
For this they have engross'd and piled up
The canker' d heaps of strange-achieved gold;
For this they have been thoughtful to invest
Their sons with arts and martial exercises.
SHAKSPEARE.
There is thy gold ; worse poison to men's souls,
Doing more murther in this loathsome world
Than these poor compounds that thou mayst not
sell:
I sell thee poison, thou hast sold me none.
SHAKSPEARE.
Know'st thou not any whom corrupting gold
Would tempt into a close exploit of death ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Plate sin with gold,
And the strong lance of justice hurtless breaks :
Arm it in rags, a pigmy's straw doth pierce it.
SHAKSPEARE.
Can gold calm passion, or make reason shine?
Can we dig peace, or wisdom, from the mine?
Wisdom to gold prefer : for 'tis much less
To make our fortune than our happiness.
YOUNG.
GOOD.
What's good doth open to th' inquirers stand,
And itself offers to th' accepting hand.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Look round the habitable world, how few
Know their own good, or, knowing it, pursue.
DRYDEN.
Though sparing of his grace, to mischief bent,
He seldom does a good with good intent.
DRYDEN.
Nor holds this earth a more deserving knight
For virtue, valour, and for noble blood,
Truth, honour, all that is comprised in good.
DRYDEN.
GOOD.
225
Happy were men if they but understood
There is no safety but in doing good.
JOHN FOUNTAIN.
The sweetest cordial we receive at last,
Is conscience of our virtuous actions past.
GOFFE.
And learn the luxury of doing good.
GOLDSMITH : Traveller.
No further intercourse with Heav'n had he,
But left good works to men of low degree.
WALTER HARTE.
Goodness is beauty in its best estate.
MARLOWE.
Good, the more
Communicated, more abundant grows;
The author not impair'd, but honour'd more.
MILTON.
Little knows
Any, but God alone, to value right
The good before him, but perverts best things
To worst abuse, or to their meanest use.
MILTON.
My heart
Contains of good, wise, just, the perfect shape.
MILTON.
So shall the world go on,
To good malignant, to bad men benign,
Under her own weight groaning.
MILTON.
Worthiest by being good,
Far more than great or high.
MILTON.
O goodness ! that shall evil turn to good.
MILTON.
Wisest and best men full oft beguiled
With goodness principled not to reject
The penitent, but ever to forgive
Are drawn to wear out miserable days.
MILTON.
fair female troop thou saw'st, that
seem'd
Of goddesses, so blithe, so smooth, so gay,
Yet empty of all good.
MILTON.
Th' etern;i! art educes good from ill;
Grafts on ; \ as passion our best principle.
POPE.
All discord, harmony not understood;
All partial evil, universal good.
POPE.
Stranger to civil and religious rage,
The good man walk'd innoxious through his age.
POPE.
Do good by stealth, and blush to find it fame.
POPE.
Can the wiles of art, the grasp of power,
Snatch the rich relics of a well-spent hour ?
These, when the trembling spirit wings his
flight,
Pour round his path a stream of living light,
And gild those pure and perfect realms of rest
Where virtue triumphs, and her sons are blest.
S. ROGERS.
But I remember now
I'm in this earthly world, where to do harm
Is often laudable ; to do good, sometime
Accounted dangerous folly.
SHAKSPEARE.
That light you see is burning in my hall ;
How far that little candle throws his beams !
So shines a good deed in a naughty world.
SHAKSPEARE.
One good deed, dying tongueless,
Slaughters a thousand waiting upon that.
SHAKSPEARE.
We shall be winnow'd with so rough a wind,
That even our corn shall seem as light as chaff,
And good from bad find no partition.
SHAKSPEARE.
For nought so vile that on the earth doth live,
But to the earth some special good doth give,
SHAKSPEARE.
There is some soul of goodness in things evil,
Would men observingly 'distil it out.
SHAKSPEARE.
Howe'er it be, it seems to me
'Tis only noble to be good ;
Kind hearts are more than coronets,
And simple faith than Norman blood.
TENNYSON.
Some there are
By their good deeds exalted, lofty minds,
And meditative authors of delight
And happiness, which to the end of time
Will live and spread and flourish.
WORDSWORTH.
226
GOOD HUMOUR. GOVERNMENT.
Thy purpose firm is equal to the deed :
Who does the best his circumstance allows
Does well, acts nobly; angels could no more.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
GOOD HUMOUR.
Tempt not his heavy hand ;
But one submissive word which you let fall
Will make him in good humour with us all.
DRYDEN.
Calmness is great advantage : he that lets
Another chafe, may warm him at his fire,
Mark all his wand'rings, and enjoy his frets;
As cunning fencers suffer heat to tire.
HERBERT.
What then remains but well our power to use,
And keep good humour still, whate'er we lose?
And trust me, dear, \good humour can prevail
When airs, and flights, and screams, and scold-
ing fail.
Beauties in vain their pretty eyes may roll,
Charms strike the sight, but merit wins the soul.
POPE: Rape of the Lock.
Good humour only teaches charms to last,
Still makes new conquests, and maintains the
past.
POPE.
Oh ! bless'd with temper whose unclouded ray
Can make to-morrow cheerful as to-day.
POPE.
But since, alas ! frail beauty must decay,
Curl'd or uncurl'd since locks will turn to gray,
What then remains but well our pow'r to use,
And keep good humour still, whate'er we lose ?
POPE.
He keeps his temper'd mind, serene and pure,
And ev'ry passion aptly harmonized,
Amid a jarring world.
THOMSON.
GOVERNMENT.
In a commonwealth or realm
The government is call'd the helm;
With which, like vessels under sail,
They're turn'd and winded by the tail.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
The quacks of government, who sat
At th' unregarded helm of state,
Consider' d timely how t' withdraw,
And save their windpipes from the law.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
'Tis no less
To govern justly, make your empire flourish
With wholesome laws, in riches, peace, and
plenty,
Than by the expense of wealth and blood to
make
New acquisitions. SIR J. DENHAM.
While he survives, in concord and content
The commons live, by no division rent;
But the great monarch's death dissolves the
government.
DRYDEN.
In change of government
The rabble rule their great oppressors' fate,
Do sov' reign justice, and revenge the state.
DRYDEN.
Born to the spacious empire of the Nine,
One would have thought she should have been
content
To manage well that mighty government.
DRYDEN.
For just experience tells, in ev'ry soil,
That those who think must govern those who
toil;
And all that freedom's highest aims can reach
Is but to lay proportion'd loads on each.
GOLDSMITH: Traveller.
In ev'ry government, though terrors reign,
Though tyrant kings or tyrant laws restrain,
How small of all that human hearts endure
That part which laws or kings can cause or cure !
Still to ourselves in every place consign'd,
Our own felicity we make or find.
With secret course, which no loud storms annoy,
Glides the smooth current of domestic joy.
DR. S. JOHNSON :
in Goldsmith' 's Traveller.
Men divinely taught, and better teaching
The solid rules of civil government,
In their majestic, unaffected style,
Than all the oratory of Greece and Rome.
MILTON.
He that resists the power of Ptolemy
Resists the pow'r of heav'n ; for pow'r from
heav'n
Derives, and monarchs rule by gods appointed.
PRIOR.
GOVERNMENT. GRA CE.GRA CEFUL.
227
For government
Put into parts, doth keep in one consent,
Congreeing in a full and natural close.
SHAKSPEARE.
Take on you the charge
And kingly government of this your land :
Not as protector, steward, substitute,
Or lowly factor for another's gain.
SHAKSPEARE.
A thousand men have broke their fasts to-day,
That ne'er shall dine unless thou yield the
crown.
SHAKSPEARE.
All happy peace and goodly government
Is settled there in sure establishment.
SPENSER.
Safety and equal government are things
Which subjects make as happy as their kings.
WALLER.
Those governments which curb not evils, cause ;
And a rich knave's a libel on our laws.
YOUNG.
GRACE.
Though various features did the sisters grace,
A sister's likeness was in every face.
ADDISON.
Jove cannot fear ; they tell me to my face,
That I of all the gods am least in grace.
DRYDEN.
The mother's and her eldest daughter's grace,
It seems, had bribed him to prolong their space.
DRYDEN.
And shall grace not find means, that finds her
way,
The speediest of thy winged messengers,
To visit all thy creatures ?
MILTON.
This my long-suffering and my day of grace,
Those who neglect and scorn shall never taste.
MILTON.
Speaking or mute, all comeliness and grace
Attend thee, and each word, each motion, form.
MILTON.
Grace was in all her steps, heav'n in her eye,
In ev'ry gesture dignity and love !
MILTON.
Telemachus his bloomy face
Glowing celestial sweet, with godlike grace.
POPE.
More than mortal grace
Speaks the descendant of ethereal race.
POPE.
Blest peer ! his great forefather's ev'ry grace
Reflecting, and reflected in his face.
POPE.
How Van wants grace that never wanted wit.
POPE.
O momentary grace of mortal men,
Which we more hunt for than the grace of God !
SHAKSPEARE.
Nor lose the good advantage of his grace,
By seeming cold or careless of his will.
SHAKSPEARE.
Though all things foul would bear the brows of
grace,
Yet grace must still look so.
SHAKSPEARE.
In his own grace he doth exalt himself
More than in your advancement.
SHAKSPEARE.
Let me report to him
Your sweet dependency, and you shall find
A conqueror that will pray in aid for kindness,
When he for grace is kneel'd to.
SHAKSPEARE.
Great grace that old man to him given had,
For God he often saw, from heaven hight,
All were earthly eyen both blunt and bad.
SPENSER.
Lo ! two most lovely virgins came in place,
With countenance demure, and modest grace.
SPENSER.
GRACEFUL.
Turnus, for high descent and graceful mien,
Was first, and favour'd by the Latian queen.
DRYDEN.
Then grave Clarissa graceful waved her fan ;
Silence ensued, and thus the nymph began.
POPE.
Through nature and through art she ranged,
And gracefully her subject changed.
SWIFT.
228
GRA CES. GRA TITUDE.
Graceful to sight, and elegant to thought,
The great are vanquish'*!, and the wise are
taught.
YOUNG.
GRACES.
All those graces
The common fate of mortal charms may find ;
Content our short-lived praises to engage,
The joy and wonder of a single age.
ADDISON.
To some kind of men,
Their graces serve them but as enemies.
SHAKSPEARE.
The king-becoming graces,
As justice, verity, temp'rance, stableness,
Devotion, patience, courage, fortitude,
I have no relish of them.
SHAKSPEARE.
Mark when she smiles with amiable cheer,
And tell me whereto can ye liken it ?
When on each eyelid sweetly do appear
An hundred graces as in shade to sit.
SPENSER.
GRATITUDE.
Fidelity, that neither bribe nor threat
Can move or warp, and gratitude for small
And trivial favours, lasting as the life
And glist'ning even in the dying eye.
COWPER : Task.
Years of service past
From grateful souls exact reward at last.
DRYDEN.
Is no return due from a grateful breast ?
I grow impatient, till I find some way,
Great offices with greater to repay.
DRYDEN.
If you have lived, take thankfully the past;
Make, as you can, the sweet remembrance last.
DRYDEN.
Tell me, my friend, fronrwhence hadst thou
the skill
So nicely to distinguish good from ill ?
And what thou art to follow, what to fly,
This to condemn, and that to ratify?
DRYDEN.
You seem not high enough your joys to rate;
You stand indebted a vast sum to fate,
And should large thanks for the great blessing
pay.
DRYDEN.
The blue-eyed German shall the Tigris drink,
Ere I, forsaking gratitude and truth,
Forget the figure of that godlike youth.
DRYDEN.
Nor our admission shall your realm disgrace,
Nor length of time our gratitude efface.
DRYDEN.
Suspicious thoughts his pensive mind employ,
A sullen gratitude, and clouded joy.
WALTER HARTE.
When gratitude o'erflows the swelling heart,
And breathes in free and uncorrupted praise
For benefits received : propitious heaven
Takes such acknowledgment as fragrant incense,
And doubles all its blessings.
LILLO : Elmerick.
He that hath nature in him must be grateful ;
'Tis the Creator's primary great law
That links the chain of beings to each other.
MADDEN : Themistodes.
The debt immense of endless gratitude.
/ MILTON.
I understood not that a grateful mind
By owing owes not, but still pays, at once
Indebted and discharged.
MILTON.
Could he less expect
Than glory and benediction, that is, thanks ?
MILTON.
Fountain of mercy ! whose pervading eye
Can look within and read what passes there,
Accept my thoughts for thanks; I have no
words :
My soul, o'erfraught with gratitude, rejects
The aid of language : Lord ! behold my heart.
HANNAH MORE: Moses.
Indeed you thank'd me : but a nobler gratitude
Rose in her soul, for from that hour she loved
me.
OTWAY.
One grateful woman to thy fame supplied
What a whole thankless land to his denied.
POPE.
GRA VES. GREA TNESS.
229
Edward and Henry, now the boast of fame ;
And virtuous Alfred, a more sacred name ;
After a life of generous toil endured,
Closed their long glories with a sigh, to find
Th' unwilling gratitude of base mankind.
POPE.
What can I pay thee for this noble usage
But grateful praise ! so heav'n itself is paid.
ROWE : Tamerlane.
We owe thee much : within this wall of flesh
There is a soul counts thee her creditor,
And with advantage means to pay thy love.
SHAKSPEARE.
I've heard of hearts unkind, kind deeds
With coldness still returning;
Alas ! the gratitude of men
Hath oftener left me mourning.
WORDSWORTH.
GRAVES.
Here's an acre sown indeed
With the richest, royal'st seed
That the earth did e'er suck in.
Since the first man died of sin :
Here are sands, ignoble things,
Dropt from the ruin'd sides of kings.
BEAUMONT :
On the Tombs in Westminster Abbey.
He suffer'd their protractive arts,
And strove by mildness to reduce their hearts.
DRYDEN.
Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's
shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a mouldering
heap,
Each in his narrow cell forever laid,
The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.
GRAY: Elegy.
Fond fool ! six feet shall serve for all thy store ;
And he that cares for most shall find no more.
BISHOP HALL: Satires.
Blest 'are they
That earth to earth intrust ; for they may know
And tend the dwelling whence the slumberer's
clay
Shall rise at last, and bid the young flowers
bloom,
That waft a breath of hope around the tomb,
And kneel upon the dewy turf and pray !
MRS. HEMANS.
Household gifts that memory saves
But help to count the household graves.
T. K. HERVEY.
Oh ! let not tears embalm my tomb,
None but the dews by twilight given !
Oh ! let not sighs disturb the gloom,
None but the whispering winds of heaven.
MOORE.
Sing, while beside the shaded tomb I mourn,
And with fresh bays her rural shrine adorn.
POPE.
The grave, where ev'n the great find rest,
And blended lie th' oppressor and th' oppress'd.
POPE.
Who in the dark and silent grave,
When we have wander'd all our ways,
Shuts up the story of our days!
But from this earth, this grave, this dust,
My God shall raise me up, I trust !
SIR W. RALEIGH.
GREATNESS.
Great souls by instinct to each other turn,
Demand alliance, and in friendship burn.
ADDISON : Campaign.
In care they live, and must for many care ;
And such the best and greatest ever are.
LORD BROOKE.
The greatest chief
That ever peopled hell with heroes slain,
Or plunged a province or a realm in grief.
BYRON.
Where may the wearied eye repose
When gazing on the great,
Where neither guilty glory glows,
Nor despicable state?
Yes, one the first the last the best
The Cincinnatus of the West,
Whom envy dared not hate
Bequeathed the name of Washington,
To make men blush there was but one.
BYRON.
He who ascends to mountain-tops shall find
Their loftiest peaks most wrapt in clouds and
snow;
He who surpasses or subdues mankind
Must look down on the hate of those below.
2.3
GREA TNESS.
Though far above the sun of glory glow,
And far beneath the earth and ocean spread,
Round him are icy rocks, and loudly blow
Contending tempests on his naked head.
BYRON : Childe Harold.
The slippery tops of human state,
The gilded pinnacles of fate.
COWLEY.
If e'er ambition should my fancy cheat
With any wish so mean, as to be great,
Continue, Heav'n, still from me to remove
The humble blessings of the life I love.
COWLEY.
Blinded greatness ever in turmoil,
Still seeking happy life, makes life a toil.
DANIEL.
Though he in all the people's eyes seem'd great,
Yet greater he appear' d in his retreat.
SIR J. DENHAM.
While winds and storms his lofty forehead beat,
The common fate of all that's high or great.
SIR J. DENHAM.
These are they
Deserve their greatness and unenvied stand,
Since what they act transcends what they
command.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Injurious strength would rapine still excuse
By ofFring terms the weaker must refuse.
DRYDEN.
The great are privileged alone
To punish all injustice but their own.
DRYDEN.
Thus, by degrees, he rose to Jove's imperial
seat;
Thus difficulties prove a soul legitimately great.
DRYDEN.
When often urged, unwilling to be great,
Your country calls you from your loved retreat,
And sends to senates, charged with common
care,
Which none more shuns, and none can better
bear.
DRYDEN.
He observed th' illustrious throng,
Their names, their fates, their conduct, and their
care
In peaceful senates and successful war.
DRYDEN.
All greatness is in virtue understood ;
'Tis only necessary to be good.
DRYDEN.
His sweetness won a more regard
Unto his place, than all the boist'rous moods
That ignorant greatness practiseth.
BEN JONSON.
Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time.
LONGFELLOW: Psalm of Life.
Great
Or bright infers not excellence : the earth,
Though, in comparison of heav'n, so small,
Nor glistering, may of solid good contain
More plenty than the sun, that barren shines.
MILTON.
Of all the great how few
Are just to heav'n, and to their promise true !
POPE.
He dies, sad outcast of each church and state,
And, harder still, flagitious, yet not great.
POPE.
Despise the farce of state,
The sober follies of the wise and great.
POPE.
But grant that those can conquer, these can
cheat ;
'Tis phrase absurd to call a villain great :
Who wickedly is wise, or madly brave,
Is but the more a fool, the more a knave.
POPE.
At home surrounded by a servile crowd,
Prompt to abuse, and in detraction loud ;
Abroad begirt with men, and swords, and spears,
His very state acknowledging his fears.
PRIOR.
I will, alas! be wretched to be great,
And sigh in royalty, and grieve in state.
PRIOR.
Their purple majesty,
And all those outward shows which we call
greatness,
Languish and droop, seem empty and forsaken.
And draw the wond'ring gazer's eye no more.
ROWE.
As if Misfortune made the throne her seat,
And none could be unhappy but the great.
ROWE : Prologue to Fair Penitent.
GREA TNESS. GRIEF.
231
O place and greatness, millions of false eyes
Are stuck upon thee ! volumes of report
Run with these false and most contrarious guests
Upon thy doings ! thousand 'scapes of wit
Make thee the father of their idle dream,
And rack thee in their fancies.
SHAKSPEARE.
O ceremony ! show me but thy worth !
What is thy soul of adoration ?
Art thou aught else, but place, degree, and form,
Creating awe and fear in other men ?
Wherein thou art less happy being fear'd
Than they in fearing.
What drink'st thou oft, instead of homage sweet,
But poison'd flattery?
SHAKSPEARE.
O be sick, great Greatness !
And bid thy ceremony give thee cure.
Think'st thou the fiery fever will go out
With titles blown from adulation ?
SHAKSPEARE.
O hard condition ! twin-born with greatness,
Subject to the breath of ev'ry fool, whose sense
No more can feel but his own wringing !
What infinite heart's ease must kings neglect,
That private men enjoy !
And what have kings, that privates have not too,
Save ceremony, save general ceremony?
SHAKSPEARE.
But thou art fair, and at thy birth, dear boy,
Nature and fortune join'd to make thee great.
SHAKSPEARE.
They that stand high have many blasts to shake
them ;
And if they fall, they dash themselves to pieces.
SHAKSPEARE.
It is great
To do that thing that ends all other deeds ;
Which shackles accident, and bolts up change.
SHAKSPEARE.
He by my ruin thinks to make them great :
To make one great by other's loss, is bad excheat.
SPENSER.
And all that else this world's enclosure bare
Hath great or glorious in mortal eye,
Adorns the person of her majesty.
SPENSER.
The world knows nothing of its greatest men.
HENRY TAYLOR.
'Tis not from whom, but where, we live ;
The place does oft those graces give :
Great Julius, on the mountain bred,
A flock perhaps, or herd, had led ;
He that the world subdued had been
But the best wrestler on the green.
WALLER.
Illustrious acts high raptures do infuse,
And every conqueror creates a muse.
WALLER: on Cromwell.
High stations tumults, but not bliss create :
None think the great unhappy but the great.
YOUNG: Love of Fame.
GRIEF.
Now secretly with inward grief he pined ;
Now warm resentments to his griefs he join'd.
ADDISON.
Wonder at my patience !
Have I not cause to rave, and beat my breast,
To rend my heart with grief, and run distracted ?
ADDISON.
By fits my swelling grief appears
In rising sighs and falling tears.
ADDISON.
Ev'n now, while thus I stand blest in thy pres-
ence,
A secret damp of grief comes o'er my thoughts.
ADDISON.
Didst thou taste but half the griefs
That wring my soul, thou couldst not talk thus
coldly.
ADDISON.
For Titan, by the mighty loss dismay'd,
Among the heav'ns th' immortal fact display'd,
Lest the remembrance of his grief should fail.
ADDISON.
Where shall we find the man that bears afflic-
tion,
Great and majestic in his griefs, like Cato ?
ADDISON.
Oppress'd with grief, oppress'd with care,
A burden more than I can bear;
I sit me down and sigh.
O life ! thou art a galling load,
Along a rough, a weary road,
To wretches such as I.
BURNS.
232
GRIEF.
There is no darkness like the cloud of mind
On grief's vain eye the blindest of the blind,
Which may not, dare not see, but turns aside
To blackest shade, nor will endure a guide.
BYRON : Corsair,
Upon her face there was the tint of grief,
The settled shadow of an inward strife,
And an unquiet drooping of the eye,
As if its lid were charged with unshed tears.
BYRON: Dream.
Alas ! the breast that inly bleeds
Has nought to fear from outward blow !
Who falls from all he knows of bliss
Cares little into what abyss.
BYRON : Giaour.
Those closing skies may still continue bright,
But who can help it if you'll make it night.
DRYDEN.
Alas ! I have no words to tell my grief;
To vent my sorrow would be some relief;
Light sufferings give us leisure to complain ;
We groan, but cannot speak, in greater pain.
DRYDEN.
'Twas grief no more, or grief and rage were one
Within her soul : at last 'twas rage alone;
Which, burning upwards in succession, dries
The tears that stood considering in her eyes.
DRYDEN.
I'm stupefied with sorrow, past relief
Of tears ; parch'd up and wither'd with my grief.
DRYDEN.
Like Niobe we marble grow,
And petrify with grief.
DRYDEN.
Since both cannot possess what both pursue,
I'm grieved, my friend, the chance should fall
on you.
DRYDEN. .
He cannot his unmaster'd grief sustain,
But yields to rage, to madness, and disdain.
DRYDEN.
The father bore it with undaunted soul,
Like one who durst his destiny control;
Yet with becoming grief he bore his part,
Resign'd his son, but not resign'd his heart.
DRYDEN.
The father's grief restrain'd his art ;
He twice essay'd to cast his son in gold,
Twice from his hands he dropp'd the forming
mould.
DRYDEN.
On a bank, beside a willow,
Heav'n her cov'ring, earth her pillow,
Sad Amynta sigh'd alone,
From the cheerless dawn of morning
Till the dews of night returning.
DRYDEN.
He finds no respite from his anxious grief,
Then seeks from his soliloquy relief.
GARTH.
'Tis long ere time can mitigate your grief;
To wisdom fly, she quickly brings relief.
GROTIUS.
We know
There oft is found an avarice in grief,
And the wan eye of sorrow loves to gaze
Upon its secret hoard of treasured woes
And pine in solitude.
MASON.
There is a calm when Grief o'erflows,
A refuge from the worst of woes ;
It comes when Pleasure's dream is o'er,
And Hope, the charmer, charms no more.
'Tis where the heart is wrung till dry,
And not a tear bedews the eye ;
'Tis where we see the vacant gaze,
While not a smile the lip betrays. MOORE.
What plague is greater than the grief of mind,
The grief of mind that eats in every vein,
In every vein that leaves such clods behind,
Such clods behind as breed such bitter pain,
Such bitter pain that none shall ever find,
What plague is greater than the grief of mind ?
EARL OF OXFORD.
Prest with heart-corroding grief and years,
To the gay court a rural shed prefers.
POPE.
I oft, in bitterness of soul, deplored
My absent daughter, and my dearer lord.
POPE.
My heavy eyes, you say, confess
A heart to love and grief inclined.
PRIOR.
Bred up in grief, can pleasure be our theme ?
Our endless anguish does not nature claim ?
Reason and sorrow are to us the same.
PRIOR.
Cease, man of woman born, to hope relief
From daily trouble, and continued grief.
PRIOR.
GRIEF.
233
I have endured the rage of secret grief,
A malady that burns and rankles inward.
ROWE.
Then happy those, since each must drain
His share of pleasure, share of pain,
Then happy those, beloved of Heaven,
To whom the mingled cup is given,
Whose lenient sorrows find relief,
Whose joys are chasten'd by their grief.
SIR WALTER SCOTT.
Some grief shows much of love,
But much of grief shows still some want of wit.
SHAKSPEARE.
To persevere
In obstinate condolement, is a course
Of impious stubbornness, unmanly grief.
SHAKSPEARE.
Cease to lament for that thou canst not help ;
And study help for that which thou lament'st.
SHAKSPEARE.
The robb'd that smiles, steals something from
the thief;
He robs himself that spends a bootless grief.
SHAKSPEARE.
Then might'st thou tear thy hair,
And fall upon the ground as I do now,
Taking the measure of an unmade grave.
SHAKSPEARE.
What concern they ?
The general cause ? or is it a fee-grief
Due to some single breast ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Be factious for redress of all these griefs,
And I will set this foot of mine as far
As who goes farthest.
SHAKSPEARE.
If thou engrossest all the grief as thine,
Thou robb'st me of a moiety.
SHAKSPEARE.
These external manners of laments
Are merely shadows to the unseen grief
That swells with silence in the tortured soul.
SHAKSPEARE.
Conceit is still derived
From some forefather grief: mine is not so.
SHAKSPEARE.
I will instruct my sorrows to be proud ;
For grief is proud, and makes his owner stout.
SHAKSPEARE.
Know, then, I here forget all former griefs,
Cancel all grudge : repeal thee home again.
SHAKSPEARE.
You may my glory and my state depose,
But not my griefs ; still I am king of those.
SHAKSPEARE.
Grief hath changed me,
And careful hours, with Time's deformed hand,
Hath written strange defeatures in my face.
SHAKSPEARE.
The violence of either grief or joy,
Their own enactors with themselves destroy.
SHAKSPEARE.
Whilst you were here, o'erwhelmed with your
grief,
A passion most unsuiting such a man.
SHAKSPEARE.
Where joy most revels, grief doth most lament,
Grief joys, joy grieves, on slender accident.
SHAKSPEARE.
I do feel,
By the rebound of yours, a grief that shoots
My very heart.
SHAKSPEARE.
What's the newest grief?
Each minute teems a new one.
SHAKSPEARE.
O Juliet, I already know thy grief;
It strains me past the compass of my wits.
SHAKSPEARE.
Griefs of mine own lie heavy in my breast,
Which thou wilt propagate, to have them press'd
With more of thine.
SHAKSPEARE.
Woe to poor man, each outward thing annoys
him;
He heaps in inward grief, that most destroys him.
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY.
What torment's equal to the grief of mind
And pining anguish hid in gentle heart,
That inly feeds itself with thought unkind,
And nourishes it's own consuming smart ?
SPENSER.
She (sighing sore, as if her heart in twaine
Had riven been, and all her heart-strings brast)
With dreary drooping eyne look'd up, like one
aghast.
SPENSER.
234
GR O VES. G UIL T.
Quoth she, Great grief will not be told,
And can more easily be thought than said;
Right so, quoth he, but he that never would,
Could never; will to might gives greatest aid.
SPENSER.
\Vhat boots it to weep and to wayment,
When ill is chanced, but doth the ill increase,
And the weak mind with double woe torment ?
SPENSER.
Such helpless harms it's better hidden keep,
Than rip up grief, where it may not avail.
SPENSER.
GROVES.
In groves we live, and lie on mossy beds,
By crystal streams that murmur through the
meads.
DRYDEN.
Stretch' d at ease you sing your happy loves,
And Amaryllis fills the shady groves.
DRYDEN.
Betwixt two rows of rocks a sylvan scene
Appears above, and groves forever green.
DRYDEN.
With deeper brown the grove was overspread.
DRYDEN.
The deep recesses of the grove he gain'd.
DRYDEN.
With shadowy verdure flourish'd high,
A sudden youth the groves enjoy.
FENTON.
Groves whose rich trees wept od'rous gums and
balm.
MILTON.
In shady bow'r
More sacred and sequester'd, though but feign'd,
Pan or Sylvanus never slept.
MILTON.
All nature laughs, the groves are fresh and fair;
The sun's mild lustre warms the vital air.
POPE.
Her waving groves a checker'd scene display,
And part admit, and part exclude, the day.
POPE.
The senseless grove feels not your pious sorrows.
ROWE.
GUILT.
Let guilt or fear
Disturb man's rest; Cato knows neither of
them :
Indifferent in his choice to sleep or die.
ADDISON.
And oh ! that pang where more than madness
lies!
The worm that will not sleep, and never dies ;
Thought of the gloomy day and ghastly night,
That dreads the darkness, and yet loathes the
light ;
That winds around and tears the quivering
heart :
Ah, wherefore not consume it and depart ?
BYRON.
Not all that heralds rake from coffin' d clay,
Nor florid prose, nor honied words of rhyme,
Can blazon evil deeds, or consecrate a crime.
BYRON : Childe Harold.
Guilt is a timorous thing ; ere perpetration,
Despair alone makes guilty men be bold.
COLERIDGE.
Sure if the guilt were theirs, they could not
charge thee
With such a gallant boldness ; if t'were thine,
Thou couldst not hear 't with such a silent
scorn 1
DENHAM.
Try to imprison the resistless wind;
So swift is guilt, so hard to be confined.
DRYDEN.
My hands are guilty, but my heart is free.
DRYDEN.
My guilt thy growing virtues did defame ;
My blackness blotted thy unblemish'd name.
DRYDEN.
Ambitious Turnus in the press appears,
And aggravating crimes augment their fears.
DRYDEN.
Nor could his acts too close a vizard wear
To 'scape their eyes whom guilt had taught to
fear.
DRYDEN.
What a state is guilt,
When ev'ry thing alarms it! like a sentinel
Who sleeps upon his watch, it wakes in dread,
Ev'n at a breath of wind.
HAVARD : Scanderbeg.
G UIL T. HABIT. HAIR.
2 35
How guilt, once harbour'd in the conscious
breast,
Intimidates the brave, degrades the great !
DR. JOHNSON : Irene.
When men's intents are wicked, their guilt
haunts them ;
But when they're just, they're arm'd, and
nothing daunts them.
MlDDLETON.
Guilt is the source of sorrow ; 'tis the fiend
The avenging fiend that follows us behind
With whips and stings.
ROWE.
When at first from virtue's path we stray,
How shrinks the feeble heart with sad dismay !
More bold at length, by powerful habit led,
Careless and sered, the dreary wilds we tread;
Behold the gaping gulf of sin with scorn,
And, plunging deep, to endless death are borne.
JAMES SCOTT.
Guiltiness
Will speak though tongues were out of use.
SHAKSPEARE.
Since thou hast far to go, bear not along
The clogging burthen of a guilty soul.
SHAKSPEARE.
Close pent-up guilts
Rive your concealing continents, and ask
These dreadful summoners grace.
SHAKSPEARE.
Make mad the guilty, and appall the free,
Confound the ign'rant.
SHAKSPEARE.
Make known,
It is no vicious blot, murder, or foulness,
That hath deprived me.
SHAKSPEARE.
All murders past do stand excused in this,
And this so sole, and so unmatchable,
Shall prove a deadly bloodshed but a jest,
Exampled by this heinous spectacle.
SHAKSPEARE.
First got with guile, and then preserved with
dread,
And after spent with pride and lavishness.
SPENSER.
That cunning architect of canker'd guile,
Whom princes' late displeasure left in bands,
For falsed letters, and suborned wile.
SPENSER.
And were there rightful cause of difference,
Yet were 't not better, fair it to accord,
Than with bloodguiltiness to heap offence,
And mortal vengeance join to crime abhorr'd?
SPENSER.
From the body of one guilty deed
A thousand ghostly fears and haunting thoughts
proceed.
WORDSWORTH.
Let no man trust the first false step
Of guilt ; it hangs upon a precipice
Whose steep descent in lost perdition ends.
YOUNG : Busiris.
Where, where, for shelter shall the guilty fly,
When consternation turns the good man pale ?
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
HABIT.
If thou dost still retain
The same ill habits, the same follies too,
Still thou art bound to vice, and still a slave.
DRYDEN.
How use doth breed a habit in a man !
This shadowy desert, unfrequented woods,
I better brook than flourishing peopled towns.
SHAKSPEARE.
He walks ;
And that self-chain about his neck
Which he forswore, most monstrously, to have.
SHAKSPEARE.
HAIR.
His hair transforms to down, his fingers meet
In skinny films, and shape his oary feet.
ADDISON.
236
HAIR.
An infant Titan held she in her arms ;
Yet sufferably bright, the eye might bear
The ungrown glories of his beamy hair.
ADDISON.
The nymph nor spun, nor dress'd with artful
pride ;
Her vest was gather'd up, her hair was tied.
ADDISON.
Behold the locks that are grown white
Beneath a helmet in your father's battles.
ADDISON.
With lightsome brow, and beaming eyes, and
bright,
Long, glorious locks, which drop upon thy cheek,
Like gold-hued cloud-flakes on the rosy morn.
BAILEY : Festus.
\ Like a white brow through its o'ershadowing
hair.
BAILEY: Festus.
Her hair was roll'd in many a curious fret,
Much like a rich and curious coronet ;
Upon whose arches twenty Cupids lay,
And were or tied, or loath to put away.
WILLIAM BROWNE : Pastorals.
For the hair droops in clouds amber-colour'd
till stirr'd
Into gold by the gesture that comes with a word.
MRS. E. B. BROWNING.
Her glossy hair was cluster'd o'er a brow
Bright with intelligence, and fair and smooth ;
Her eyebrows' shape was like the aerial bow ;
Her cheek all purple with the beam of youth.
BYRON.
Down her white neck, long, floating auburn
curls,
The least of which would set ten poets raving.
BYRON.
By those tresses unconfined,
Woo'd by every ^Egean wind.
BYRON.
With a swimmer's stroke
Flinging the billows back from my drench'd hair.
BYRON.
Swift men of foot, whose broad-set backs their
trailing hair did hide.
CHAPMAN.
A soft responsive voice was heard at every close,
And Hope enchanted smiled, and waved her
golden hair.
COLLINS: Passions.
All clad in liveliest colours, fresh and fair
As the bright flowers that crown'd their brighter
hair.
COWLEY.
Merab's long hair was glossy chestnut brown.
COWLEY.
And Katerfelto, with his hair on end
At his own wonders, wondering for his bread.
Cow PER : Task.
That wind
About their shady brows in wanton rings.
CRASHAW.
Her hair down-gushing in an armful flows,
And floods her ivory neck, and glitters as she
goes.
ALLAN CUNNINGHAM.
Hair ! 'tis the robe which curious nature weaves
To hang upon the head, and does adorn
Our bodies ; in the first hour we are born
God does bestow that garment : when we die,
That, like a soft and silken canopy,
Is still spread over us : In spite of death,
Our hair grows in the grave, and that alone
Looks fresh, when all our other beauty's gone.
DECKER : Satiro-Mastix.
For every hour that thou wilt spare me now,
I will allow,
Usurious god of love, twenty to thee,
When with my brown my gray hairs equal be.
DONNE.
Off with that wiery coronet, and show
The hairy diadem which on your head doth
grow.
Powder thy radiant hair.
DONNE.
DONNE.
The sun's
Dishevel'cl beams and scatter'd fires
Serve but for ladies' periwigs and tires
In lovers' sonnets.
DONNE.
The flies, by chance mesh'd in her hair,
By the bright radiance thrown
From her clear eyes, rich jewels were,
They so like diamonds shone.
DRAYTON.
And trick them up in knotted curls anew.
DRAYTON.
HAIR.
237
What time the groves were clad in green,
The fields all drest in flowers,
And that the sleek-hair'd nymphs were seen
To seek their summer bowers.
DRAYTON.
Her head was bare,
But for her native ornament of hair,
Which in a simple knot was tied above :
Sweet negligence ! unheeded bait of love !
DRYDEN.
Her shining hair, uncomb'd, was loosely spread;
A crown of mastless oak adorn'd her head.
DRYDEN.
Emily dress'd herself in rich array ;
Fresh as the month, and as the morning fair,
Adown her shoulders fell her length of hair.
DRYDEN.
Her well-turn'd neck he view'd,
And on her shoulders her dishevell'd hair.
DRYDEN.
Now, now she meets you with a glorious prize,
And spreads her locks before her as she flies.
DRYDEN.
A riband did the braided tresses bind ;
The rest was loose, and wanton'd in the wind.
DRYDEN.
She hurries all her handmaids to the task ;
Her head alone will twenty dressers ask.
DRYDEN.
Her head with ringlets of her hair is crown'd ;
And in a golden caul the curls are bound.
DRYDEN.
For thee she feeds her hair,
And with the winding ivy wreathes her lance.
DRYDEN.
He shook the sacred honours of his head,
With terror trembled heav'n's subsiding hill,
And from his shaken curls ambrosial dews distil.
DRYDEN.
With odorous oil thy head and hair are sleek ;
And then thou kemp'st the tuzzes on thy cheek :
Of these thy barbers take a costly care.
DRYDEN.
They comb, and then they order ev'ry hair.
DRYDEN.
Aghast, astonish'd, and struck dumb with fear,
I stood ; like bristles rose my stiffening hair.
DRYDEN.
He roar'd, he beat his breast, he tore his hair.
DRYDEN.
Nor did my search of liberty begin
Till my black hairs were changed upon my chin.
DRYDEN.
Alike in feature both and garb appear,
With honest faces, though uncurled hair.
DRYDEN.
Mute, and amazed, my hair with horror stood ;
Fear shrunk my senses, and congeal' d my blood.
DRYDEN.
He look'd a lion with a gloomy stare,
And o'er his eyebrows hung his matted hair.
DRYDEN.
Those grizzled locks, which nature did provide
In plenteous growth their asses' ears to hide.
DRYDEN.
But you, loud sirs, who through your curls look
big,
Critics in plume and white valiancy wig.
DRYDEN.
Stood Theodore surprised in deadly fright,
With chatt'ring teeth, and bristling hair upright.
DRYDEN.
Thy locks uncomb'd like a rough wood appear.
DRYDEN.
This punishment pursues the unhappy maid,
And thus the purple hair is dearly paid.
DRYDEN.
The rugged hair began to fall away ;
The sweetness of her eyes did only stay.
DRYDEN.
When the yellow hair in flame should fall,
The catching fire might burn the golden cawl.
DRYDEN.
Thy hair so bristles with unmanly fears,
As fields of corn that rise in bearded ears.
DRYDEN.
The Trojan chief appear'd in open sight,
August in visage, and serenely bright;
His mother goddess, with her hands divine,
Had form'd his curling locks, and made his
temples shine.
DRYDEN.
Thou hast made my curdled blood run back,
My heart heave up, my hair to rise in bristles.
DRYDEN.
HAIR.
Instead of powder'd curls, let ivy twine
Around that head so full of " Caroline."
ON LORD ELDON : Surtees's Stowell and
Eldon, 173.
A tinsel veil her amber locks did shroud,
That strove to cover what it could not hide.
FAIRFAX.
The gamesome winds among her tresses play,
And curleth up those growing riches short.
FAIRFAX.
You'll sometimes meet a fop, of nicest tread,
Whose mantling peruke veils his empty head.
GAY.
Her tresses, loose behind,
Play on her neck, and wanton in the wind ;
The* rising blushes which her cheek o'erspread
Are opening roses in the lily's bed.
GAY: Dione.
Loose his beard and hoary hair
Stream'd, like a meteor, to the troubled air.
GRAY: Bard.
There's music in the forest leaves,
When summer winds are there,
And in the laugh of forest girls,
That braid their sunny hair.
HALLECK.
With dancing hair and laughing eyes,
That seem to mock me as it flies.
HALLECK.
The hairs on his head were silver-white,
And his blood was thin and cold.
HERVEY : Devil's Progress.
Where go the poet's lines ?
Answer, ye evening tapers !
Ye auburn locks, ye golden curls,
Speak from your folded papers !
O. W. HOLMES : Poefs Lot.
Give me a look, give me a face
That makes simplicity a grace ;
Robes loosely flowing, hair as free !
BEN JONSON.
Thy beauty, not a fault is there :
No queen of Grecian line
E'er braided more luxuriant hair
O'er forehead more divine.
L. E. LANDON.
Oh, richly fell the flaxen hair
Over the maiden's shoulders fair !
C. MACKAY.
His locks behind,
Illustrious on his shoulders, fledge with wings,
Lay waving round.
MILTON.
The river of bliss through midst of heaven
Rolls o'er Elysian flow'rs her amber stream ;
With these, that never fade, the spirits elect
Bind their resplendent locks inwreathed with
beams.
MILTON.
She, as a veil, down to her slender waist
Her unadorned golden tresses wore
Dishevell'd, but in wanton ringlets waved,
As the vine curls her tendrils, which implied
subjection.
MILTON.
Hyacinthine locks
Round from his parted forelock manly hung
Clust'ring, but not beneath his shoulders broad.
MILTON.
Adam had wove
Of choicest flow'rs a garland to adorn
Her tresses, and her rural labours crown.
MILTON.
The more
His wonder was, to find unwaken'd Eve
With tresses discomposed.
MILTON.
She a gentle tear let fall
From either eye, and wiped them with her hair.
MILTON.
These redundant locks,
Robustious to no purpose, clust'ring down,
Vast monument of strength.
MILTON.
God, when he gave me strength, to show withal
How slight the gift was, hung it in my hair.
MILTON.
This strength diffused
No less through all my sinews, joints, and bones,
Than thine, while I preserved these locks un-
shorn,
The pledge of my unviolated vow.
MILTON.
Sport with Amaryllis in the shade,
Or with the tangles of Neasrea's hair.
MILTON.
With ringlets quaint and wanton windings wove.
MILTON.
HAIR.
239
Listen where thou art sitting,
Under the glassy, cool, translucent wave,
In twisted braids of lilies knitting
The loose train of thy amber-dropping hair.
MILTON.
With flow'r inwoven, tresses torn,
The nymphs in twilight shade of tangled
thickets mourn.
MILTON.
By dead Parthenope's dear tomb,
And fair Ligea's golden comb,
Wherewith she sits on diamond rocks,
Sleeking her soft alluring locks.
MILTON.
Th' humble shrub
And bush, with frizzled'hair implicit.
MILTON.
What need a vermeil-tinctured lip for that,
Love-darting eyes, or tresses like the morn ?
MILTON.
There's not a look, a word of thine,
My soul hath e'er forgot ;
Thou ne'er hast bid a ringlet shine,
Nor given thy locks one graceful twine,
Which I remember not.
MOORE.
And nymphs were there whose very eyes ,
Seem'd almost to exhale in sighs ;
Whose every little ringlet thrill'd
As if with soul and passion fill'd !
MOORE.
So are those crisped snaky golden locks,
Which make such wanton gambols with the
wind,
Upon supposed fairness, often known
To be the dowry of a second head ;
The skull that bred them, in a sepulchre.
OTVVAY : Venice Preserved.
His golden locks time hath to silver turned;
O time too swift ! O swiftness never ceasing !
GEORGE PEELE: Polyhymnia.
Now Jove suspends his golden scales in air,
Weighs the men's wits against the lady's hair :
The doubtful beam long nods from side to side ;
At length the wits mount up, the hairs subside.
POPE.
Some thrid the mazy ringlets of her hair ;
Some hang upon the pendants of her ear.
POPE.
This nymph, to the destruction of mankind,
Nourish'd two locks, which graceful hung
behind
In equal curls, and well conspired to deck
With shining ringlets the smooth, ivory neck.
Love in these labyrinths his slaves detains,
And mighty hearts are held in slender chains.
With hairy springes we the birds betray;
Slight lines of hair surprise the finny prey :
Fair tresses man's imperial race ensnare,
And beauty draws us with a single hair.
POPE.
The meeting points the sacred hair dissever
From the fair head, forever, and forever.
POPE.
These, in two sable ringlets taught to break,
Once gave new beauties to the snowy neck.
POPE.
Coffee (which makes the politician wise,
And see through all things with his half-shut
eyes)
Sent up in vapours to the baron's brain
New stratagems the radiant lock to gain.
POPE.
Ev'n then, before the fatal engine closed,
A wretch'd Sylph too fondly interposed ;
Fate urged the shears, and cut the Sylph in
twain.
POPE.
What wonder then thy hairs should feel
The conquering force of unresisted steel ?
POPE.
Not Cynthia, when her mantua's pinn'd awry,
E'er felt such rage, resentment, and despair,
As thou, sad virgin ! for thy ravish'd hair.
POPE.
" Restore the lock !" she cries, and all around,
" Restore the lock !" the vaulted roofs rebound.
POPE.
Which never more shall join its parted hair,
Clipp'd from the lovely head where late it grew.
POPE.
Then cease, bright nymph ! to mourn the rav-
ish'd hair,
Which adds new glory to the shining sphere!
Not all the tresses that fair hair can boast
Shall draw such envy as the lock you lost.
POPE.
240
HAIR.
Shakes his ambrosial curls, and gives the nod ;
The stamp of fate, and sanction of the god.
POPE.
She scorn'd the praise of beauty, and the care;
A belt her waist, a fillet binds her hair.
POPE.
The fair-hair'd queen of love
Descends smooth-gliding from the courts above.
POPE.
No longer shall thy comely tresses break
In flowing ringlets on thy snowy neck,
Or sit behind thy head, an ample round,
In graceful braids, with various ribbon bound.
PRIOR.
What she demands, incessant I'll prepare ;
I'll weave her garlands, and I'll plait her hair.
PRIOR.
Her hair,
Untied, and ignorant of artful aid,
Adown her shoulders loosely lay display'd.
PRIOR.
When for thy head the garland I prepare,
A second wreath shall bind Aminta's hair ;
And when my choicest songs thy worth complain,
Alternate verse shall bless Aminta's name.
PRIOR.
The glowing garland from my hair I took ;
Love in my heart, obedience in my look.
PRICR.
Tuck back thy hair,
And I will pour into thy ear. PRIOR.
Wanting the scissors, with these hands I'll tear,
If that obstructs my flight, this load of hair.
PRIOR.
The flow'rs she wore along the day;
And ev'ry nymph and shepherd said
That in her hair they look'd more gay
Than growing in their native bed.
The dappled pink and blushing rose
Deck my charming Chloe's hair.
In our fantastic climes the fair
With cleanly powder dry their hair.
PRIOR.
PRIOR.
PRIOR.
Ere on thy chin the springing beard began
To spread a doubtful down, and promise man.
PRIOR.
Skin more fair,
More glorious head, and far more glorious hair.
RANDOLPH : Praise of Women.
With her hair flung back,
She listens to his song, "The song she loved."
ROGERS.
The great in honour are not always wise,
Nor judgment under silver tresses lies.
SANDYS.
For deadly fear can time outgo,
And blanch at once the hair.
SIR W. SCOTT : Marnrion.
Fall to thy prayers :
How ill white hairs become a fool and jester !
SHAKSPEARE.
Here in her hairs
The painter plays the spider, and hath woven
A golden mesh to intrap the hearts of men
Faster than gnats in cobwebs.
SHAKSPEARE.
Sing, syren, for thyself, and I will dote,
Spread o'er the silver waves thy golden hairs.
SHAKSPEARE.
Her sunny locks
Hang on her temples like a golden fleece.
QTT A VCT>17 A 13
SHAKSPEARE.
He said mine eyes were black, and my hair
black ;
And, now I am remember'd, scorn'd at me.
SHAKSPEARE.
His hair is sticking ;
His well-proportion'd beard made rough and
rugged,
Like to the summer's corn by tempest lodged.
SHAKSPEARE.
My fell of hair
Would at a dismal treatise rouse and stir
As life were in't.
SHAKSPEARE.
Old Salisbury, shame to thy silver hair,
Thou mad misleader of thy brain-sick son.
SHAKSPEARE.
Make false hair, and thatch
Your poor thin roofs with burthens of the dead.
SHAKSPEARE.
His hair is of a good colour,
An excellent colour: your chestnut was ever
the only colour.
SHAKSPEARE.
HAIR.
241
Had you not been their father, these white flakes
Did challenge pity of them.
SHAKSPEARE.
If in black my lady's brow be deck'd,
It mourns that painting and usurping hair
Should ravish doters with a false aspect;
And therefore she is born to make black fair.
SHAKSPEARE.
For who is he whose chin is but enrich'd
With one appearing hair, that will not follow
These cull'd and choice drawn cavaliers to
France ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Thy knotted and combined locks to part,
And each particular hair to stand on end,
Like quills upon the fretful porcupine.
SHAKSPEARE.
As sweet and musical
As bright Apollo's lute, strung with his hair.
SHAKSPEARE.
Had all his hairs been lives, my great revenge
Had stomach for them all.
SHAKSPEARE.
Then might'st thou speak, then might'st thou tear
thy hair.
SHAKSPEARE.
There came wand'ring by
A shadow like an angel, with bright hair.
SHAKSPEARE.
Comb down his hair; look! look! it stands
upright.
SHAKSPEARE.
Her hair is auburn, mine is perfect yellow;
If that be all the -difference in his love,
I'll get me such a colour'd periwig.
SHAKSPEARE.
See what a grace was seated on this brow ;
Hyperion's curls.
SHAKSPEARE.
Had I as many sons as I have hairs,
I would not wish them to a fairer death.
SHAKSPEARE.
Your high-engender'd battles 'gainst a head
So old and white as this.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thy gory locks at me.
16
Never shake
SHAKSPEARE.
Why do I yield to that suggestion,
Whose horrid image doth upfix my hair ?
SHAKSPEARE.
My fleece of woolly hair that now uncurls,
Ev'n as an adder when she doth unroll
To do some fatal execution.
SHAKSPEARE.
Finding force now faint to be,
He thought gray hairs afforded subtilty.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
Her yellow golden hair
Was trimly woven, and in tresses wrought :
No other tire she on her head did wear,
But crowned with a garland of sweet rosier.
SPENSER.
Whether art it were, or heedless hap,
As through the flow' ring forest rash she fled,
In her rude hairs sweet flowers themselves did
lap,
And flourishing fresh leaves and blossoms did
enwrap.
SPENSER.
Drawn with the power of an heart-robbing eye,
And wrapt in fetters of a golden tress.
SPENSER.
The dread knight's sword out of his sheath he
drew,
With which he cut a lock of all their hair.
SPENSER.
His grizly locks, long growen and unbound,
Disorder'd hung about his shoulders round.
SPENSER.
Her golden locks for haste were loosely shed
About her ears.
SPENSER.
They might perceive his head
To be unarm'd, and curl'd, uncombed hairs
Upstarting stiff.
SPENSER.
Her yellow locks crisped like golden wire
About her shoulders weren loosely shed ;
And when the wind amongst them did inspire,
They waved like a pennon wide dispred.
SPENSER.
Her golden locks she roundly did uptie
In braided trammels, that no looser hairs
Did out of order stray about her dainty ears.
SPENSER.
242
HAIR. HAPPINESS.
A list the cobblers' temples ties,
To keep the hair out of their eyes ;
From whence 'tis plain the diadem,
That princes wear, derives from them.
SWIFT.
If Molly happens to be careless,
And but neglects to warm her hair-lace,
She gets a cold as sure as death.
From her own head Megara takes
A periwig of twisted snakes.
SWIFT.
SWIFT.
So soft his tresses, fill'd with trickling pearl,
You doubt his sex, and take him for a girl.
TATE.
With prudes for proctors, dowagers for deans,
And sweet girl-graduates in their golden hair.
TENNYSON : The Princess.
But rising up,
Robed in the long night of her deep hair.
TENNYSON : The Princess.
These hairs of age are messengers,
Which bid me fast, repent, and pray;
They be of death the harbingers
That do prepare and dress the way :
Wherefore I joy that you may see
Upon my head such hair to be.
LORD VAUX.
A thousand Cupids in those curls do sit,
Those curious nets thy slender fingers knit.
WALLER.
A silver line, that from the brow to the crown,
And in the middle, parts the braided hair,
Just serves to show how delicate a soil
The golden harvest grows in.
WORDSWORTH.
That kill the bloom before its time,
And blanch, without the owner's crime,
The most resplendent hair.
WORDSWORTH.
Her grizzled locks assume a smirking grace,
And art has levell'd her deep-furrow'd face.
YOUNG.
A nail uncut and head uncomb'd she loves ;
And would draw on jack -boots as soon as gloves.
YOUNG.
HAPPINESS.
We shall meet
In happier climes, and on a safer shore.
ADDISON.
From the sad years of life
We sometimes do short hours, yea, minutes,
strike,
Keen, blissful, bright, never to be forgotten,
Which, through the dreary gloom of time o'er-
past,
Shine like fair sunny spots on a wild waste.
JOANNA BAILLIE: De Montfort.
I see there is no man but may make his paradise,
And it is nothing but his love and dotage
Upon the world's foul joys, that keeps him out
on't;
For he that lives retired in mind and spirit
Is still in paradise.
BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER : Nice Valour.
Oh, then the longest summer's day
Seem'd too, too much in haste : still the full heart
Had not imparted half: 'twas happiness
Too exquisite to last.
BLAIR: Grave.
There comes
Forever something between us and what
We deem our happiness.
BYRON: Sardanapalus.
So calm, the waters scarcely seem to stray,
And yet they glide, like happiness, away.
BYRON.
If we for happiness could leisure find,
And wand'ring time into a method bind,
We should not then the great man's favour need.
COWLEY.
A happy soul, that all the way
To heaven hath a summer's day.
CRASHAW.
Thou
Ow'st all thy losses to the fates ; but I,
Like wasteful prodigals, have cast away
My happiness.
SIR J. DENHAM.
'Tis with our souls
As with our eyes, that after a long darkness
Are dazzled at th' approach of sudden light ;
When i' the midst of fears we are surprised -,
With unexpected happiness, the first
Degrees of joy are mere astonishment.
SIR J. DENHAM : Sophy.
HAPPINESS,
243
Happy the man, and happy he alone,
He who can call to-day his own :
He who secure within can say,
To-morrow do thy worst, for I have lived to-day.
DRYDEN.
Since we have lost
Freedom, wealth, honour, which we value most,
I wish they would our lives a period give ;
They live too long who happiness outlive.
DRYDEN.
I have not quitted yet a victor's right ;
I'll make you happy in your own despite.
DRYDEN.
The happy have whole days, and those they use;
Th' unhappy have but hours, and those they lose.
DRYDEN.
You have still your happiness in doubt,
Or else 'tis past, and you have dream'd it out.
DRYDEN.
We toss and turn about our feverish will,
When all our ease must come by lying still ;
For all the happiness mankind can gain,
Is not in pleasure, but in rest from pain.
DRYDEN.
No happiness can be where is no rest;
Th' unknown, untalk'd-of man is only blest.
DRYDEN.
Nature stints our appetite,
And craves no more than undisturb'd delight ;
Which minds, unmix'd with cares and fears,
obtain ;
A soul serene, a body void of pain.
DRYDEN.
Ignorant of happiness, and blind to ruin,
How oft are our petitions our undoing !
HARTE.
That happiness does still the longest thrive
Where joys and grief have turns alternative.
HERRICK.
I at first with two fair gifts
Created him endow'd ; with happiness
And immortality ; that fondly lost,
This other served but to eternize woe.
MILTON.
Thrice happy if they know
Their happiness, and persevere upright !
MILTON.
Meanwhile enjoy
Your fill, what happiness this happy state
Can comprehend, incapable of more.
MILTON.
Let us not then suspect our happy state,
As not secure to single or combined.
MILTON.
Bereaved of happiness, thou may'st partake
His punishment, eternal misery;
Which would be all his solace and revenge,
Thee once to gain companion of his woe.
MILTON.
Oh! there are looks and tones that dart
An instant sunshine through the heart;
As if the soul that minute caught
Some treasure it through life had sought.
MOORE,
Let my soft minutes glide securely on,
Like subterraneous streams, unheard, unknown.
JOHN NORRIS.
O happiness : our being's end and aim !
Good, pleasure, ease, content ! whate'er thy
name ;
That something still which prompts th' eternal
sigh,
For which we bear to live, or dare to die.
POPE.
Form'd by some rule that guides but not con-
strains,
And finish'd more through happiness than pains.
POPE.
Grant the bad what happiness they would,
One they must want, which is, to pass for good.
POPE.
Some beauties yet no precepts can declare ;
For there's a happiness as well as care.
POPE.
Who that define it, say they more or less
Than this, that happiness is happiness ?
POPE,
Where grows? Where grows it not? If vain
our toil,
We ought to blame the culture, not the soil.
Fix'd to no spot is happiness sincere.
POPE.
Destroy all creatures for thy sport or gust,
Yet cry, if man's unhappy, God's unjust.
POPE.
244
HAPPINESS.
Happiness, object of that waking dream
Which we call life, mistaking ; fugitive theme
Of my pursuing verse, ideal shade,
Notional good, by fancy only made.
PRIOR.
We happiness pursue ; we fly from pain ;
Yet the pursuit, and yet the flight, is vain :
And while poor nature labours to be blest,
By day by pleasure, and by night with rest,
Some stronger power eludes our sickly will,
Dashing our rising hopes with certain ill,
And makes us, with reflective trouble, see
That all is destined which we fancy free.
PRIOR: Solomon.
Happiness courts thee in her best array ;
But, like a misbehaved and sullen wench,
Thou pout'st upon thy fortune and thy love :
Take heed, take heed ! for such die miserable.
SHAKSPEARE.
If I were now to die,
'Twere to be most happy; for I fear
My soul hath her content so absolute
That not another comfort like to this
Succeeds in unknown fate.
SHAKSPEARE.
My plenteous joys,
Wanton in fulness, seek to hide themselves
In drops of sorrow.
SHAKSPEARE.
What ! we have many goodly days to see :
The liquid drops of tears that you have shed
Shall come again, transform'd to orient pearl ;
Advantaging their loan, with interest
Of ten-times double gain of happiness.
SHAKSPEARE.
True happiness is not the growth of earth,
The soil is fruitless if you seek it there :
'Tis an exotic of celestial birth,
And never blooms but in celestial air.
R. B. SHERIDAN.
True happiness (if understood)
Consists alone in doing good.
SOMERVILE.
Fairer than fairest in his faining eye,
Whose sole aspect he counts felicity.
SPENSER.
Where all the bravery that eye may see,
And all the happiness that heart desire,
Is to be found.
SPENSER.
What thing so good which not some harm may
bring?
E'en to be happy is a dangerous thing.
EARL OF STIRLING : Darius.
The sweetest bird builds near the ground,
The loveliest flower springs low;
And we must stoop for happiness
If we its worth would know.
SWAIN.
E'en not all these, in one rich lot combined,
Can make the happy man, without the mind;
Where judgment sits, clear-sighted, and surveys
The chain of reason with unerring gaze ;
Where fancy lives, and to the brightening eyes
His fairest scenes and bolder figures rise ;
Where social love exerts her soft command,
And plays the passions with a tender hand ;
Whence every virtue flows, in rival strife,
And all the moral harmony of life.
THOMSON.
An elegant sufficiency, content,
Retirement, rural quiet, friendship, books,
Ease and alternate labour, useful life,
Progressive virtue, and approving Heaven !
THOMSON: Spring.
Happiness is a stranger to mankind,
And, like to a forced motion, it is ever
Strongest at the beginning ; then languishing
With time, grows weary of our company.
SIR SAMUEL TUKE: Adventures.
Bright as the deathless gods, and happy, she
From all that may infringe delight is free.
WALLER.
No fears to beat away, no strife to heal,
The past unsigh'd for, and the future sure.
WORDSWORTH.
Can gold calm passion, or make reason thine ?
Can we dig peace or wisdom from the mine ?
Wisdom to gold prefer; for 'tis much less
To make our fortune than our happiness.
YOUNG.
No man is blest by accident or guess :
True wisdom is the price of happiness.
YOUNG.
There, blest with health, with business un-
perplext,
This life we relish, and ensure the next.
YoUNG.
HAR VEST. HEAL TH.
245
How sad a sight is human happiness
To those whose thoughts can pierce beyond an
hour!
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
Beware what earth calls happiness; beware
All joys but joys that never can expire :
Who builds on less than an immortal base,
Fond as he seems, condemns his joy to death.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
HARVEST.
Unlabour'd harvests shall the fields adorn,
And cluster'd grapes shall blush on ev'ry thorn.
DRYDEN.
In Lydia born,
Where plenteous harvests the fat fields adorn.
DRYDEN.
Yours be the harvest, 'tis the beggar's gain
To glean the fallings of the loaded wain.
DRYDEN.
Oft did the harvest to the sickle yield,
Their harrow oft the stubborn glebe has
broke ;
How jocund did they drive their team a-field,
How bow'd the woods beneath their sturdy
stroke !
GRAY: Elegy.
There's merry laughter in the field,
And harmless jest and frolic rout;
And the last harvest wain goes by
With its rustling load so pleasantly
To the glad and clamorous harvest shout.
MARY HOWITT.
The hay is carried; and the Hours
Snatch, as they pass, the linden flowers ;
And children leap to pluck a spray
Bent earthward, and then run away.
W. S. LANDOR.
The sappy boughs
Attire themselves with bloom, sweet rudiments
Of future harvest.
JOHN PHILIPS.
The soil untill'd a ready harvest yields ;
With wheat and barley wave the golden fields.
POPE.
So may kind rains their vital moisture yield,
And swell the future harvest of thy field.
POPE.
Here Ceres' gifts in waving prospect stand,
And nodding tempt the joyful reaper's hand.
POPE.
A thousand forms he wears :
And first a reaper from the field appears ;
Sweating he walks, while loads of golden grain
O'ercharge the shoulders of the seeming swain.
POPE.
And when you crowd the old barn eaves,
Then think what countless harvest sheaves
Have pass'd within that scented door
To gladden eyes that are no more.
T. B. READ.
From hungry reapers they their sheaves with-
hold.
SANDYS.
The harvest treasures all
Now gather'd in, beyond the rage of storms,
Sure to the swain; the circling fence shut up;
And instant winter's utmost rage defied.
THOMSON: Seasons.
HEALTH.
Know, then, whatever cheerful and serene
Supports the mind supports the body too.
Hence the most vital movement mortals feel
Is hope : the balm and life-blood of the soul.
DR. JOHN ARMSTRONG :
Art of Preserving Health.
What health promotes, and gives unenviect
peace,
Is all expenseless, and procured with ease.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
There is no health : physicians say that we
At best enjoy but a neutrality.
DONNE.
My body is from all diseases free ;
My temp'rate pulse does regularly beat.
DRYDEN.
You hoard not health for your own private use,
But on the public spend the rich produce.
DRYDEN.
Reason's whole pleasure, all the joys of sense,
Lie in three words, health, peace, and compe-
tence.
POPE.
But health consists with temperance alone ;
And peace; oh virtue ! peace is all thine own.
POPE.
246
HEAL TH. HEAR T.HEA VEN.
Cheerful health,
His duteous handmaid, through the air improved
With lavish hand diffuses scents ambrosial.
PRIOR.
To lose these years which worthier thoughts re-
quire,
To lose that health which should those thoughts
inspire.
SAVAGE.
My lord leans wondrously to discontent ;
His comfortable temper has forsook him;
He is much out of health.
SHAKSPEARE.
Nature does require
Her time of preservation, which perforce
I her frail son amongst my brethren mortal
Must give my attendance to.
SHAKSPEARE.
My state of health none care to learn;
My life is here no soul's concern.
SWIFT.
HEART.
These spirits of sense, in fantasy's high court,
Judge of the forms of objects, ill or well ;
And so they sound a good or ill report
Down to the heart, where all affections dwell.
SIR J. DA VIES.
Weak soul ! and blindly to destruction led :
She break her heart ! she'll sooner break your
head.
DRYDEN.
Should not all relations bear a part ?
It were enough to break a single heart.
DRYDEN.
Now, heart,
Set ope thy sluices, send the vigorous blood
Through every active limb for my relief ;
Then take thy rest within the quiet cell,
For thou shall drum no more.
DRYDEN.
To failings mild, but zealous for desert;
The clearest head and the sincerest heart.
POPE.
Ah, friend ! to dazzle let the vain design ;
To raise the thought, to touch the heart, be thine.
POPE.
O cleave, my sides!
Heart, once be stronger than thy continent,
Crack thy frail case.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thou shalt not see me blush,
Nor change my countenance for this arrest ;
A heart unspotted is not easily daunted.
SHAKSPEARE.
All things but one you can restore :
The heart you get returns no more.
WALLER.
HEAVEN.
The ways of heaven are dark and intricate ;
Puzzled in mazes, and perplex' d with errors,
Our understanding traces them in vain,
Lost and bewilder'd in the fruitless search,
Nor sees with how much art the windings run,
Nor where the regular confusion ends.
ADDISON.
How has kind heav'n adorn'd the happy land,
And scatter'd blessings with a wasteful hand !
ADDISON.
Happy when I, from this turmoil set free,
That peaceful and divine assembly see.
SIR J. D*ENHAM.
Thus while the mute creation downward bend
Their sight, and to their earthly mother tend,
Man looks aloft, and with erected eyes
Beholds his own hereditary skies.
DRYDEN.
As if there were degrees in infinite,
And Heav'n itself had rather want perfection
Than punish to excess.
DRYDEN.
The god a clearer space for heav'n design'd ;
Where fields of light and liquid ether flow,
Purged from the pond' ro us dregs of earth below.
DRYDEN.
She shines above, we know, but in what place,
How near the throne, and heaven's imperial
face,
By our weak optics is but vainly guess'd ;
Distance and altitude conceal the rest.
DRYDEN.
Eye hath not seen it, my gentle boy ;
Ear hath not heard its deep song of joy !
Dreams cannot picture a world so fair;
Sorrow and death may not enter there;
Time doth not breathe on its fadeless bloom ;
For beyond the clouds, and beyond the tomb,
It is there, it is there, my child !
MRS. HEMANS.
HE A VEN.
247
Hell hath no limits, nor is circumscribed
In one self place ; but where we are is hell,
And where hell is, there must we ever be ;
And, to be short, when all the world dissolves,
And every creature shall be purified,
All places shall be hell that are not heaven.
MARLOWE : Faustus.
They open to themselves at length the way
Up hither, under long obedience tried.
MILTON.
Nor shall we need,
With dangerous expedition, to invade
Heav'n, whose high walls fear no assault or
siege,
Or ambush from the deep.
MILTON.
O for that warning voice which he, who saw
Th' apocalypse, heard cry in heav'n aloud.
MILTON.
Heav'n open'd wide
Her ever-during gates, harmonious sound !
On golden hinges moving.
MILTON.
Things to their thought
So unimaginable as hate in heaven.
MILTON.
Heaven and earth shall high extol
Thy praises with-th' innumerable sound
Of hymns and sacred songs, wherewith thy
throne
Encompass'd shall resound the ever-bless'd.
MILTON.
He form'd the powers of heav'n
Such as he pleased ; and circumscribed their
being !
MILTON.
Though heav'n be shut,
And heav'n's high arbitrator sits secure
In his own strength, this place may be exposed.
MILTON.
Each individual seeks a separate goal ;
But heav'n's great view is one, and that the
whole :
That counterworks each folly and caprice ;
That disappoints th' effects of ev'ry vice.
POPE.
From opening skies may streaming glories shine,
And saints embrace thee.
POPE.
Admitted to that equal sky,
His faithful dog shall bear him company.
POPE.
Things
Well-nigh equivalent, and neighb'ring value,
By lot are parted : but the value, high heav'n,
thy share,
In equal balance laid with earth and hell,
Flings up the adverse scale, and shuns propor-
tion.
PRIOR.
From that insatiable abyss
Where flames devour, and serpents hiss,
Promote me to thy seat of bliss.
ROSCOMMON.
Who hath not heard it spoken
How deep you were within the books of heav'n?
SHAKSPEARE.
Hereafter, in a better world than this,
I shall desire more love and knowledge of you.
I rest much bounden to you : fare you well !
SHAKSPEARE.
Banquo ! thy soul's flight,
If it find heav'n, must find it out to-night.
SHAKSPEARE.
Nor heav'n peep through the blanket of the dark,
To cry, Hold ! hold !
SHAKSPEARE.
Heaven's in my mouth,
As if I did but only chew its name.
SHAKSPEARE.
I would she were in heaven, so she could
Intreat some pow'r to change this currish Jew.
SHAKSPEARE.
There I'll rest, as after much turmoil
A blessed soul doth in elysium.
SHAKSPEARE.
What wonder,
Frail men, whose eyes seek heavenly things to
see,
At sight thereof so much enravish'd be ?
SPENSER.
For having yet, in his deducted spright,
Some sparks remaining of that heav'nly fire,
He is enlumined with that goodly light,
Unto like goodly semblance to aspire.
SPENSER.
That we up to your palaces may mount,
Of blessed saints for to increase the count.
SPENSER.
248
HER OES. HISTORY. HOME.
Mild vibrations soothe the parted soul,
New to the dawning of celestial day.
THOMSON.
Thrice happy world, where gilded toys
No more disturb our thoughts, no more pollute
our joys!
There light or shade succeed no more by turns,
There reigns th' eternal sun with an unclouded
ray,
There all is calm as night, yet all immortal day,
And truth forever shines, and love forever
burns.
ISAAC WATTS.
HEROES.
I sing of heroes and of kings,
In mighty numbers mighty things.
COWLEY.
We found the hero, for whose only sake
We sought the dark abodes, and cross'd the bitter
lake.
DRYDEN.
Heroes of old, by rapine and by spoil,
In search of fame did all the world embroil ;
Thus to their gods each then allied his name :
This sprang from Jove, and that from Titan came.
GRANVILLE.
For glory done
Of triumph, to be styled great conquerors,
Patrons of mankind, gods, and sons of gods;
Destroyers rightlier call'd, and plagues of men.
MILTON.
Not that which justly gives heroic name
To person or to poem.
MILTON.
Mark by what wretched steps their glory grows ;
From dirt and sea-weed as proud Venice rose :
In each how guilt and greatness equal ran,
And all that raised the hero sunk the man.
POPE.
Heroes in animated marble frown.
POPE.
Embattled nations strive in vain
The hero's glory to restrain :
Streams arm'd with rocks, and mountains red
with fire,
In vain against his force conspire.
PRIOR.
How heroes rise, how patriots set,
Thy father's bloom and death may tell ;
Excelling others, these were great :
Thou, greater still, must these excel.
PRIOR.
Heroes who overcome, or die,
Have their hearts hung extremely high ;
The strings of which in battle's heat
Against their very corslets beat ;
Keep time with their own trumpet's measure,
And yield them most excessive pleasure.
PRIOR.
Our heroes of the former days
Deserved and gain'd their never-fading bays.
ROSCOMMON.
Heroes and heroines of old
By honour only were enroll'd
Among their brethren of the skies ;
To which, though late, shall Stella rise.
SWIFT.
HISTORY.
Some lazy ages, lost in sleep and ease,
No actions leave to busy chronicles :
Such whose superior felicity but makes
In story chasms, in epochas mistakes.
DRYDEN.
Justly Caesar scorns the poet's lays;
It is to history he trusts for praise.
POPE.
What histories of toils could I declare !
But still long-wearied nature wants repair.
POPE.
Time, by necessity compell'd, shall go
Through scenes of war, and epochas of woe.
PRIOR.
After my death, I wish no other herald,
No other speaker of my living actions,
To keep mine honour from corruption.
SHAKSPEARE.
HOME.
We leave
Our home in youth no matter to what end
Study or strife or pleasure, or what not;
And coming back in few short years, we find
All as we left it outside : the old elms,
The house, the grass, gates, and latchet's self-
same click :
But lift that latchet, all is changed as doom.
BAILEY: Festus.
HOME.
249
On thy calm joys with what delight I dream,
Thou dear green valley of my native stream !
Fancy o'er thee still waves th' enchanting wand.
BLOOMFIELD : Broken Crutch.
The parted bosom clings to wonted home,
If aught that's kindred cheer the welcome hearth.
BYRON.
'Tis sweet to hear the watch-dog's honest bark
Bay deep-mouth'd welcome as we draw near
home;
'Tis sweet to know there is an eye will mark
Our coming, and look brighter when we come.
BYRON.
He enter'd in his house, his home no more,
For without hearts there is no home, and felt
The solitude of passing his own door
Without a welcome.
BYRON.
And say, without our hopes, without oftr fears,
Without the home that plighted love endears,
Without the smile from partial beauty won,
Oh, what were man ? a world without a sun.
BYRON.
I loathe that low vice, Curiosity;
But if there's anything in which I shine,
'Tis in arranging all my friends' affairs :
Not having, of my own, domestic cares.
BYRON.
Leans o'er its humble gate and thinks the while
Oh that for me some home like this would
smile!
Some hamlet shade, to yield my sickly form
Health in the breeze and shelter in the storm !
CAMPBELL : Pleasures of Hope.
If solid happiness we prize,
Within our breast this jewel lies,
And they are fools who roam ;
The world has nothing to bestow :
From our own selves our joys must flow,
And that dear hut our home.
COTTON.
Domestic happiness ! thou only bliss
Of Paradise that has survived the Fall !
Though few now taste thee unimpair'd and free,
Or, tasting, long enjoy thee ; too infirm,
Or too incautious, to preserve thy sweets
Unmix'd with drops of bitter.
COWPER: Task.
This fond attachment to the well-known place
Whence first we started into life's long race,
Maintains its hold with such unfailing sway
We feel it e'en in age, and at our latest day.
COWPER.
Our friends are as true, and our wives are as
comely,
And our home is still home, be it ever so homely.
C. DIBDIN: Songs.
Home is the sacred refuge of our life,
Secured from all approaches but a wife :
If thence we fly, the cause admits no doubt,
None but an inmate foe could force us out.
DRYDEN.
Those who have homes, when home they do
repair,
To a last lodging call their wand' ring friends.
DRYDEN.
Beholding thus, O happy as a queen !
We cry: but shift the gaudy, flatt'ring scene;
View her at home in her domestic light ;
For thither she must come, at least at night.
GRANVILLE.
In all my wand'rings round this world of care,
In all my griefs and God has given my share
I still had hopes my latest hours to crown,
Amidst these humble bow'rs to lay me down ;
To husband out life's taper at the close,
And keep the flame from wasting, by repose.
GOLDSMITH: Traveller.
Why do I weep? to leave the vine
Whose clusters o'er me bend
The myrtle yet, oh, call it mine !
The flowers I loved to tend.
A thousand thoughts of all things dear
Like shadows o'er me sweep;
I leave my sunny childhood here :
Oh, therefore let me weep !
MRS. HEMANS.
Still to ourselves in ev'ry place consign'd,
Our own felicity we make or find :
With secret course, which no loud storms annoy,
Glides the smooth current of domestic joy.
DR. S.JOHNSON : in Goldsmith's Traveller.
Sustain'd by him with comforts, till we end
In dust, our final rest and native home.
MILTON.
It is for homely features to keep home ;
They had their name thence.
MILTON.
2 5
HOME. HONESTY.
Yet they in pleasing slumber lull'd the sense,
And in sweet madness robb'd it of itself;
But such a sacred and homefelt delight,
Such sober certainty of waking bliss,
I never felt till now.
MILTON.
The angry word suppress'd, the taunting
thoughts ;
Subduing and subdued the petty strife,
Which clouds the colour of domestic life ;
The sober comfort, all the peace which springs
From the large aggregate of little things :
On these small cares of daughter, wife, or
friend,
The almost sacred joys of home depend.
HANNAH MORE.
Give me my home, to quiet dear,
Where hours untold and peaceful move ;
So fate ordain I sometimes there
May hear the voice of him I love.
MRS. OPIE.
Happy next him who to these shades retires,
Whom nature charms, and whom the muse
inspires ;
Whom humbler joys of homefelt quiet please,
Successive study, exercise, and ease.
POPE.
The god constrains the Greek to roam
A hopeless exile from his native home,
From death alone exempt.
POPE.
Fireside happiness, to hours of ease
Blest with that charm, the certainty to please.
ROGERS : Human Life.
Clamours our privacies uneasy make ;
Birds leave their nests disturb'd, and beasts their
haunts forsake.
ROWE.
I here forget all former griefs,
Cancel all grudge, repeal thee home again.
SHAKSPEARE.
Home is the resort
Of love, of joy, of peace and plenty, where,
Supporting and supported, polish'd friends
And dear relations mingle into bliss.
THOMSON: Seasons.
How dear to this heart are the scenes of my
childhood,
When fond recollection presents them to view !
The orchard, the meadow, the deep-tangled
wild wood,
And ev'ry loved spot which my infancy knew.
S. WOODWORTH.
And homeless near a thousand homes I stood,
And near a thousand tables pined and wanted
food.
WORDSWORTH: Guilt and Sorrow.
Denied what ev'ry wretch obtains of fate,
An humble roof and an obscure retreat.
YALDEN.
Man's greatest strength is shown in standing still:
The first sure symptom of a mind in health
Is rest of heart and pleasure felt at home.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
The man who builds, and wants wherewith to
pay.
Provides himself a home from which to run
away.
YOUNG.
HONESTY.
An honest man may take a knave's advice ;'
But idiots only may be cozen'd twice.
DRYDEN.
Unforced with punishment, unawed by fear,
His words were simple, and his soul sincere.
DRYDEN.
The baits of gifts and money to despise,
And look on wealth with undesiring eyes :
W r hen thou canst truly call these virtues thine,
Be wise, and free, by heav'n's consent and mine.
DRYDEN.
Each thought was visible that roll'd within,
As through a crystal case the figured hours are
seen;
And heav'n did this transparent veil provide
Because she had no guilty thought to hide.
DRYDEN.
It looks as fate with nature's law would strive,
To show plain dealing once an age may thrive.
DRYDEN.
But let not all the gold which Tagus hides,
And pays the sea in tributary tides,
Be bribe sufficient to corrupt thy breast,
Or violate with dreams thy peaceful rest.
DRYDEN.
Tigers and wolves shall in the ocean breed,
The whale and dolphin fatten on the mead,
And ev'ry element exchange its kind,
When thrifty honesty in courts we find.
GRANVILLE.
HONOUR.
25*
Who is the honest man ?
He that doth still and strongly good pursue,
To God, his neighbour, and himself most true :
Whom neither force nor fawning can
Unpin, or wrench from giving all their due.
HERBERT.
A wit's a feather, and a chief a rod ;
An honest man's the noblest work of God.
POPE.
To find an honest man I beat about,
And love him, court him, praise him, in or out.
POPE.
What other oath,
Than honesty to honesty engaged ?
That thus shall be, or we will fall for it.
SHAKSPEARE.
HONOUR.
Honour's a sacred tie, the law of kings,
The noble mind's distinguishing perfection,
That aids and strengthens virtue when it meets
her,
And imitates her actions when she is not :
It ought not to be sported with.
ADDISON.
When vice prevails, and impious men bear sway,
The post of honour is a private station.
ADDISON.
I know thy gen'rous temper :
Fling but the appearance of dishonour on it,
It straight takes fire.
ADDISON.
Greatly unfortunate, he fights the cause
Of honour, virtue, liberty, and Rome.
ADDISON.
Honour is like that glassy bubble
That finds philosophers such trouble ;
Whose least part crack'd, the whole does fly,
And wits are crack'd to find out why.
BUTLER.- Hitdibras.
Honour's a lease for lives to come,
And cannot be extended from
The legal tenant ; 'tis a chattle
Not to be forfeited in battle.
BUTLER: 'Hudibras.
It does not me a whit displease
Thai the rich all honours seize.
COWLEY.
Since 'tis decreed, and to this period lead
A thousand ways, the noblest paths we'll tread;
And bravely on, till they or we, or all,
A common sacrifice to honour fall.
SIR J. DENHAM.
So much the thirst of honour fires the blood ;
So many would be great, so few be good ;
For who would virtue for herself regard,
Or wed without the portion of reward ?
DRYDEN.
Wouldst thou to honour and preferments climb.
Be bold in mischief, dare some mighty crime,
Which dungeons, death, or banishment deserves;
For virtue is but dryly praised, and starves.
DRYDEN.
A lady's honour must be touch' d;
Which, nice as ermine, will not bear a soil.
DRYDEN.
Honour burns in me, not so'fiercely bright,
But pale as fires when master'd by the light.
DRYDEN.
Lose not the honour you have early won,
But stand the blameless pattern of a son.
DRYDEN.
Ah, what concerns did both your souls divide !
Your honour gave us what your love denied.
DRYDEN.
He stands in daylight, and disdains to hide
An act to which by honour he is tied.
DRYDEN.
Be kindred and relation laid aside,
And honour's cause by laws of honour tried.
DRYDEN.
Nor canst, nor durst thou, traitor, on thy pain,
Appeach my honour, or thine own maintain.
DRYDEN.
Some honour of your own acquire ;
Add to that stock, which justly we bestow,
Of those blest shades to whom you all things
owe.
DRYDEN.
Knights in knightly deeds should persevere,
And still continue what at first they were ;
Continue and proceed in honour's fair career.
DRYDEN.
These be the sheaves that honour's harvest bears ;
The seed, thy valiant acts ; the world the field.
FAIRFAX.
252
HONOUR.
Great honours are great burthens ; but on whom
They are cast with envy, he doth bear two loads :
His cares must still be double to his joys
In any dignity.
BEN JoNSON : Catiline.
True dignity is never gain'd by place,
And never lost when honours are withdrawn.
MASSINGER.
Nor shall I count it heinous to enjoy
The public marks of honour and reward
Conferr'd upon me.
MILTON.
All treasures and all gain esteem as dross,
And dignities and pow'rs, all but the highest.
MILTON.
Of honour void, of innocence, of faith, of purity,
Our wonted ornaments now soil'd and stain'd.
MILTON.
The trial hath endamaged thee no way;
Rather more honoilr left, and more esteem.
MILTON.
I doubt there's deep resentment in his mind,
For the late clight his honour suffer'd there.
OTWAY.
Honour and shame from no condition rise i
Act well your part : there all the honour lies.
POPE.
These are thy honours : not that here thy bust
Is mix'd with heroes, or with kings thy dust.
POPE.
Never on man did heav'nly favour shine
With rays so strong, distinguish'd and divine.
POPE.
Mentes, an evej-honour'd name of old ;
High in Ulysses' social list enroll'd.
POPE.
Honour unchanged, a principle profess'd ;
Fix'd to one side, but mod'rate to the rest.
POPE.
Statesman, yet friend to truth, in soul sincere,
In action faithful, and in honour clear.
POPE.
Much-sufPring heroes next their honours claim;
Those of less noisy and less guilty fame,
Fair virtue's silent train.
POPE.
True to his charge, the band preserved her long
In honour's limits; such the pow'r of song.
POPE.
Both gallant brothers bled in honour's cause,
In Britain yet while honour gain'd applause.
POPE.
Fair occasion shows the springing gale,
And int'rest guides the helm, and honour swells
the sail.
PRIOR.
Let us revolve that roll with strictest eye,
Where, safe from time, distinguish'd actions
lie.
PRIOR.
Give me a staff of honour for mine age ;
But not a sceptre to control the world.
SHAKSPEARE.
that estates, degrees, and offices
Were not derived corruptly ! that dear honour
Were purchased by the merit of the wearer.
SHAKSPEARE.
I'll to the king,
And from a mouth of honour quite cry down
This Ipswich fellow's insolence.
SHAKSPEARE.
New honours come upon him
Like our strange garments ; cleave not to their
mould
But with the aid of use.
SHAKSPEARE.
I lose no honour
In seeking to augment it ; but still keep
My bosom franchised, and allegiance clear.
SHAKSPEARE.
Honours best thrive
When rather from our acts we them derive
Than our foregoers.
SHAKSPEARE.
Mine emulation
Hath not that honour in 't it had : for where
1 thought to crush him in an equal force,
(True sword to sword,) I'll potch at him some
way;
Or wrath or craft may get him.
SHAKSPEARE.
Flight cannot stain the honour you have won ;
But mine it will that no exploit have done.
SHAKSPEARE.
He was
A noble servant to them ; but he could not
Carry his honours even.
SHAKSPEARE.
HONOUR.
253
Nor shall this blood be wiped from thy point,
But thou shalt wear it as a herald's coat,
To emblaze the honour which thy master got.
SHAKSPEARE.
Methinks it were an easy leap
To pluck bright honour from the pale-faced moon.
SHAKSPEARE.
If it be honour in your wars to seem
The same you are not, which for your best ends
You call your policy : how is it less or worse,
But it shall hold companionship in peace
With honour as in war ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Set honour in one eye, and death i' the other,
And I will look on death indifferently.
SHAKSPEARE.
Your oaths are past, and now subscribe your
names,
That his own hand may strike his honour down,
That violates the smallest branch herein.
SHAKSPEARE.
As the sun breaks through the darkest clouds,
So honour peereth in the meanest habit.
SHAKSPEARE.
He was not born to shame :
Upon his brow shame is ashamed to sit ;
For 'tis a throne where honour may be crown'd
Sole monarch of the universal earth.
SHAKSPEARE.
I am not covetous of gold,
Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost ;
It yearns me not if men my garments wear ;
Such outward things dwell not in my desires :
But if it be a sin to covet honour,
I am the most offending soul alive.
SHAKSPEARE.
From lowest place when virtuous things pro-
ceed,
The place is dignified by the doer's deed :
When great additions swell, and virtue none,
It is a dropsied honour: good alone
Is good.
SHAKSPEARE.
Love yourself; and in that love
Not unconsider'd leave your honour.
SHAKSPEARE.
You are nobly born,
Despoiled of your honour in your life.
SHAKSPEARE.
Who shall believe
But you misuse the reverence of your place ?
SHAKSPEARE.
See that you come
Not to woo honour, but to wed it ; when
The bravest questant shrinks, find what you
seek,
That fame may cry you loud.
SHAKSPEARE.
If I lose mine honour,
I lose myself; better I were not yours,
Than yours so branchless.
SHAKSPEARE.
Think that the clearest gods, who make them
honours
Of men's impossibilities, have preserved thee.
SHAKSPEARE.
The good Andronicus
With honour and with fortune is return'd ;
From whence he circumscribed with his sword,
And brought to yoke, the enemies of Rome.
SHAKSPEARE.
If you shall cleave to my consent, when 'tis,
It shall make honour for you.
SHAKSPEARE.
After my death I wish no other herald,
No other speaker of my living actions,
To keep mine honour from corruption,
But such an honest chronicler as Griffith.
SHAKSPEARE.
The honour is overpaid
When he that did the act is commentator.
SHIRLEY.
Honour ! thou spongy idol of man's mind,
Thou soak'st content away, thou hast confined
Ambitious man, and not his destiny,
Within the bounds of form and ceremony.
SIR P. SIDNEY : Arcadia.
Honour should be concern'd in honour's cause :
That is not to be cured by contraries,
As bodies are, whose health is often drawn
From rankest poisons.
SOUTHERN: Oroono/io.
So hast thou oft with guile thine honour blent;
But little may such guile thee now avail,
If wonted force and fortune do not much me
fail.
SPENSER.
254
HOPE.
One that to bounty never cast his mind ;
Ne thought of honour ever did assay
His baser breast.
SPENSER.
In points of honour to be tried,
Suppose the question not your own.
SWIFT.
He that depends upon another, must
Oblige his honour with a boundless trust.
WALLER.
HOPE.
When I behold the charming maid,
I'm ten times more undone; while hope and
fear
With variety of pain distract me.
ADDISON.
Then do not strike him dead with a denial,
But hold him up in life, and cheer his soul
With the faint glimmering of a doubtful hope.
ADDISON : Cato.
O Marcia, O my sister ! still there's hope :
Our father will not cast away a life
So needful to us all, and to his country.
ADDISON : Cato.
Our greatest good, and what we can least spare,
Is hope : the last of all our evils, fear.
DR. JOHN ARMSTRONG:
Art of Preserving Health.
Far greater numbers have been lost by hopes,
Than all the magazines of daggers, ropes,
And other ammunitions of despair,
Were ever able to despatch by fear.
BUTLER.
Be thou the rainbow to the storms of life,
The evening beam that smiles the clouds away,
And tints to-morrow with prophetic ray.
BYRON: Bride of Abydos.
White as a white sail on a dusky sea,
When half the horizon's clouded and half free,
Fluttering between the dun wave and the sky,
Is hope's last gleam in man's extremity.
BYRON: Island.
Auspicious hope ! in thy sweet garden grow
Wreaths for each toil, a charm for every woe.
CAMPBELL: Pleasures of Hope.
Congenial hope ! thy passion-kindling power,
How bright, how strong, in youth's untroubled
hour!
CAMPBELL: Pleasures of Hope.
Eternal Hope ! when yonder spheres sublime
Peal'd their first notes to sound the march of
time,
Thy joyous youth began, but not to fade
When all thy sister planets had decay'd;
W T hen wrapt in flames the clouds of ether glow,
And heaven's last thunder shakes the world
below,
Thou, undismay'd, shalt o'er the ruins smile,
And light thy torch at Nature's funeral pile.
CAMPBELL : Pleasures of Hope.
Unfading hope ! when life's last embers burn,
When soul to soul, and dust to dust, return,
Heaven to thy charge resigns the awful hour !
Oh, then thy kingdom comes! immortal power !
CAMPBELL: Pleasures of Hope.
Cease, every joy, to glimmer on my mind,
But leave oh ! leave the light of Hope behind !
What though my winged hours of bUss have
been,
Like angel-visits, few and far between.
CAMPBELL: Pleasures of Hope.
'Tis distance lends enchantment to the view,
And clothes the mountain in its azure hue.
CAMPBELL: Pleasures of Hope.
Without our hopes, without our fears,
Without the home that plighted love endears,
Without the smiles from plighted beauty won,
Oh ! what were man ? a world without a sun.
CAMPBELL.
Work without hope draws nectar in a sieve,
And hope without an object cannot live.
COLERIDGE.
But thou, O Hope, with eyes so fair,
What was thy delighted measure ?
Still it whisper'd promised pleasure,
And bade the lovely scenes at distance hail f
COLLINS: Passions.
Hope ! of all ills that men endure
The only cheap and universal cure !
Thou captive's freedom, and thou sick man's
health !
Thou lover's victory, and thou beggar's wealth !
COWLEY.
Hope ! fortune's cheating lottery,
Where for one prize an hundred blanks there be;
Fond archer, hope! who tak'st thy aim so far,
That still or short or wide thine arrows are !
COWLEY.
HOPE.
255
Hope! whose weak being ruin'd is
Alike if it succeed, and if it miss ;
Whom good or ill does equally confound,
And both the horns of fate's dilemma wound.
COWLEY.
Dear hope! earth's dowry and heav'n's debt,
The entity of things that are not yet :
Subtlest, but surest being.
CRASHAW.
Fair hope ! our earlier heav'n ! by thee
Young time is taster to eternity.
CRASHAW.
Sweet hope! kind cheat! fair fallacy! by thee
We are not where or what we be;
But what and where we would be : thus art thou
Our absent present, and our future now.
CRASHAW.
And now her hope a weak physician seems,
For hope, the common comforter, prevails,
Like med'cines, slowly in extremes.
SIR W. DAVENANT : Gondibert.
Why should not hope
As much erect our thoughts as fear deject them ?
SIR J. DENHAM.
He clips hope's wings, whose airy bliss
Much higher than fruition is.
SIR J. DENHAM.
But now our fears tempestuous grow,
And cast our hopes away;
Whilst you, regardless of our woe,
Sit careless at a play. DORSET.
Hope with a goodly prospect feeds the eye,
Shows from a rising ground possession nigh ;
Shortens the distance, or o'erlooks it quite :
So easy 'tis to travel with the sight.
DRYDEN.
Hast thou beheld when from the goal they start,
The youthful charioteers with heaving heart
Rush to the race, and, panting, scarcely bear
Th' extremes of fev'rish hope and chilling fear.
DRYDEN.
She was his care, his hope, and his delight,
Most in his thought, and ever in his sight.
DRYDEN.
For as an eagre rides in triumph o'er the tide,
The tyrant passions, hope and fear,
Did in extremes appear,
And flash'd upon the soul with equal force.
DRYDEN.
Here hope began to dawn ; resolved to try,
She fix'd on this her utmost remedy.
DRYDEN.
Your hopes without are vanish'd into smoke ;
Your captains taken, and your armies broke.
DRYDEN.
What hopes you had in Diomede, lay down :
Our hopes must centre on ourselves alone.
DRYDEN.
Desire's the vast extent of human mind ;
It mounts above, and leaves poor hope behind.
DRYDEN.
I now believed
The happy day approach' d, nor are my hopes
deceived.
DRYDEN.
Success I hope, and fate I cannot fear ;
Alive or dead I shall deserve a name;
Jove is impartial, and to both the same.
DRYDEN.
O hope ! sweet flatterer ! thy delusive touch
Sheds on afflicted minds the balm of comfort,
Relieves the load of poverty, sustains
The captive, bending with the weight of bonds,
And smoothes the pillow of disease and pain.
GLOVER : Boadicea.
Hope, like the glimm'ring taper's light,
Adorns and cheers the way,
And still, as darker grows the night,
Emits a brighter ray.
GOLDSMITH : The Captivity.
Thus heavenly hope is all serene ;
But earthly hope, how bright soe'er,
Still fluctuates o'er this changing scene,
As false and fleeting as 'tis fair.
HEBER.
He that sees a dark and shady grove
Stays not, but looks beyond it on the sky.
HERBERT.
And, as in sparkling majesty a star
Gilds the bright summit of some gloomy cloud,
Bright'ning the half-veil'd face of heaven afar,
So, when dark thoughts my boding spirit
shroud,
Sweet Hope ! celestial influence round me shed,
Waving thy silver pinions o'er my head !
KEATS.
HOPE.
Thine is a grief that wastes the heart,
Like mildew on a tulip's dyes
When hope, deferr'd but to depart,
Loses its smiles, but keeps its sighs.
L. E. LANDON.
She bids me hope ! and in that charming word
Has peace and comfort to my soul restored.
LORD LYTTELTON.
None without hope e'er loved the brightest fair :
But love can hope where reason would despair.
LORD LYTTELTON : Epigram.
Where an equal poise of hope and fear
Does arbitrate the event, my nature is
That I incline to hope rather than fear,
And gladly banish squint suspicion.
MILTON.
Hope elevates, and joy
Brightens his crest.
MILTON.
What reinforcement we may gain from hope,
If not what resolution from despair.
MILTON.
Hope never comes,
That comes to all ; but torture without end
Still urges.
MILTON.
So farewell hope, and with hope farewell fear;
Farewell remorse ! all good to me is lost.
Evil, be thou my good.
MILTON.
He can, I know, but doubt to think he will ;
Yet hope would fain subscribe, and tempts
belief.
MILTON.
He ended ; and his words their drooping cheer
Enlighten'd, and their languish'd hope revived.
MILTON.
And then, that hope, that fairy hope,
Oh ! she awaked such happy dreams,
And gave my soul such tempting scope
For all its dearest, fondest schemes !
MOORE.
Oh ! ever thus from childhood's hour
I've seen my fondest hopes decay ;
I never loved a tree or flower
But 'twas the first to fade away.
MOORE : Lalla Rookh.
Hope's precious pearl in sorrow's cup
Unmelted at the bottom lay,
To shine again when, all drunk up,
The bitterness should pass away.
MOORE : Loves of the Angels.
Take heart, nor of the laws of fate complain ;
Though now 'tis cloudy, 'twill clear up again.
JOHN NORRIS.
Though at times my spirit fails me,
And the bitter tear-drops fall,
Though my lot is hard and lonely,
Yet I hope I hope through all.
MRS. NORTON.
In those blest days when life was new,
And hope was false, but love was true.
PEACOCK : Newark Abbey.
Hope springs eternal in the human breast :
Man never is, but always to be, blest :
The soul uneasy, and confined from home,
Rests and expatiates in a life to come.
POPE.
Hope leads from goal to goal,
And opens still, and opens on his soul ;
Till, lengthen'd on to faith, and unconfined,
It pours the bliss that fills up all the mind.
POPE.
And hope and doubt alternate seize her soul.
POPE.
Cherish'd with hope, and fed with joy, it grows;
In cheerful buds their opening bloom disclose,
And round the happy soil diffusive odour flows.
PRIOR.
This only object of my real care,
Cut off from hope, abandon'd to despair,
In some few posting fatal hours is hurl'd
From wealth, from pow'r, from love, and from
the world.
PRIOR.
Thus we act, and thus we are,
Or toss'd by hope, or sunk by care.
PRIOR.
Some stronger pow'r eludes our sickly will,
Dashes our rising hope with certain ill.
PRIOR.
For hope is but the dream of those that wake.
PRIOR.
W T ith pity moved for others cast away
On rocks of hopes and fears.
ROSCOMMON.
HOPE. HORR OR. HORSES.
257
Do not blast my springing hopes,
Which thy kind hand has planted in my soul.
ROWE.
The rose is fairest when 'tis budding new,
And hope is brightest when it dawns from fears
SIR W. SCOTT : Lady of the Lake.
A cause on foot
Lives so on hope, as in an early spring
We see the appearing buds ; which, to prove fruit,
Hope gives not so much warrant as despair
That frosts will bite them.
SHAKSPEARE.
Uncharitably with me have you dealt,
And shamefully by you my hopes are butcher'd.
SHAKSPEARE.
True hope is swift, and flies with swallow's
wings ;
Kings it makes gods, and meaner creatures
kings.
SHAKSPEARE.
Hope is a lover's staff; walk hence with that,
And manage it against despairing thoughts.
SHAKSPEARE.
Oft expectation fails, and most oft there
Where most it promises ; and oft it hits
Where hope is coldest, and despair most sits.
SHAKSPEARE.
The miserable have no other medicine,
But only hope.
SHAKSPEARE.
This is the state of man : to-day he puts forth
The tender leaves of hope; to-morrow blossoms,
And bears his blushing honours thick upon him.
SHAKSPEARE.
It never yet did hurt
To lay down likelihood and forms of hope.
SHAKSPEARE.
To be worst,
The lowest and most dejected thing of fortune,
Stands still in esperance, lives not in fear :
The lamentable change is from the best ;
The worst returns to laughter.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thus is my summer worn away and wasted,
Thus is my harvest hasten'd all to rathe :
The ear, that budded fair, is burnt and blasted,
And all my hoped gain is turn'd to scathe.
SPENSER.
The mighty hopes that make us men.
TENNYSON: In Memoriam.
17
Hope, the glad ray, glanced from eternal good,
That life enlivens, and exalts its powers,
With views of fortune.
THOMSON: Liberty.
Well sung the Roman bard, All human things
Of dearest value hang on slender strings :
O see the then sole hope, and in design
Of heav'n our joy, supported by a line.
WALLER.
Hopes, what are they? Beads of morning
Strung on slender blades of grass,
Or a spider's web adorning
In a strait and treacherous pass.
WORDSWORTH.
Hope, of all passions, most befriends us here ;
Passions of prouder name befriend us less :
Joy has her tears ; and transport has her death :
Hope, like a cordial, innocent though strong,
Man's heart at once inspirits and serenes,
Nor makes him pay his wisdom for his joys.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
HORROR.
A sudden horror chill
Ran through each nerve, and thrill'd in ev'ry
vein.
ADDISON.
How can I
Repress the horror of my thoughts, which fly
The sad remembrance?
SIR J. DENHAM.
The cruel word her tender heart so thrill'd
That sudden cold did run through ev'ry vein,
And stormy horror all her senses fill'd
With dying fit, that down she fell for pain.
SPENSER.
HORSES.
Nor would you find it easy to compose
The mettled steeds, when from their nostrils
flows
The scorching fire that in their entrails glows.
ADDISON.
From their full racks the gen'rous steeds retire,
Dropping ambrosial foams, and snorting fire.
ADDISON.
The fiery war-horse paws the ground,
And snorts and trembles- at the trumpet's sound.
ADDISON.
258
HORSES.
He bids the nimble hours
Bring forth the steeds ; the nimble hours obey :
From their full racks the gen'rous steeds retire.
ADDISON.
Champing his foam, and bounding o'er the plain,
Arch his high neck, and graceful spread his
mane.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Lived in his saddle, loved the chase, the course,
And always, ere he mounted, kiss'd his horse.
COWPER : Retirement.
The sprightly horse
Moves to the music of his tinkling bells.
DODSLEY.
The fiery courser, when he hears from far
The sprightly trumpets, and the shout of war,
Pricks up his ears, and, trembling with delight,
Shifts place, and paws, and hopes the promised
fight.
DRYDEN.
A knight of swarthy face,
High on a coal-black steed, pursued the chase ;
With flashing flames his ardent eyes were fill'd.
DRYDEN.
Venetians do not more uncouthly ride
Than did your lubber state mankind bestride.
DRYDEN.
Which durst, with horses' hoof that beat the
ground,
And martial brass, belie the thunder's sound.
DRYDEN.
The courser paw'd the ground with restless feet,
And, snorting, foam'd, and champ' d the golden
bit.
DRYDEN.
O'er the Elean plains thy well-breathed horse
Impels the flying car, and wins the course.
DRYDEN.
The love of horses which they had alive,
And care of chariots, after death survive.
DRYDEN.
His white-maned steed, that bow'd beneath the
yoke,
He cheer'd to courage with a gentle stroke ;
Then urged his fiery chariot on the foe,
And rising shook his lance in act to throw.
DRYDEN.
The pamper'd colt will discipline disdain,
Impatient of the lash, and restiff of the rein.
DRYDEN.
He spurr'd his fiery steed
With goring rowels to provoke his speed.
DRYDEN.
Aventinus drives his chariot round;
Proud of his steeds, he smokes along the ground.
DRYDEN.
He with a graceful pride,
While his rider every hand survey'd,
Sprung loose, and flew into an escapade ;
Not moving forward, yet with every bound
Pressing, and seeming still to quit his ground.
DRYDEN.
On his fiery steed betimes he rode,
That scarcely prints the turf on which he trod.
DRYDEN.
You use me like a courser spurr'd and rein'd:
If I fly out, my fierceness you command.
DRYDEN.
Their steeds around,
Free from the harness, graze the flow'ry ground.
DRYDEN.
So fierce they drove, their coursers were so fleet,
That the turf trembled underneath their feet.
DRYDEN.
Then to his absent guest the king decreed
A pair of coursers, born of heav'nly breed ;
Who from their nostrils breathed ethereal fire,
Whom Circe stole from her celestial sire.
DRYDEN.
Three hundred horses, in high stables fed,
Stood ready, shining all, and smoothly dress'd.
DRYDEN.
A steed
Well mouth'd, well managed, which himself did
dress ;
His aid in war, his ornament in peace.
DRYDEN.
So four fierce coursers, starting to the race,
Scour through the plain, and lengthen ev'ry pace ;
Nor reins, nor curbs, nor threat'ning cries they
fear,
But force along the trembling charioteer.
DRYDEN.
The startling steed was seized with sudden fright,
And bounding, o'er the pommel cast the knight:
Forward he flew, and, pitching on his head,
He quiver'd with his feet and lay for dead.
DRYDEN.
HORSES.
259
At his command
The steeds caparison'd with purple stand,
And chainp between their teeth the foaming gold.
DRYDEN.
The timely noise the sprightly courser hears,
Paws the green turf, and pricks his trembling
ears.
GAY.
Part wield their arms, part curb the foaming
steed.
MILTON.
The high-prancing steeds
Spurn their dismounted riders ; they expire
Indignant, by unhostile wounds destroy'd.
JOHN PHILIPS.
The impatient courser pants in every vein,
And, pawing, seems to beat the distant plain ;
Hills, vales, and floods appear already cross'd;
And ere he starts, a thousand steps are lost.
POPE.
Ranged in a line the ready racers stand,
Start from the goal, and vanish o'er the strand:
Swift as on wings of wind upborn they fly,
And drifts of rising dust involve the sky.
POPE.
With hasty hand the ruling reins he drew,
He lash'd the coursers, and the coursers flew;
Beneath the bending yoke alike they held
Their equal pace, and smoked along the field.
POPE.
See the bold youth strain up the threat'ning
steep ;
Hang o'er their coursers' heads with eager
speed,
And earth rolls back beneath the flying steed.
POPE.
Then peers grew proud in horsemanship t'
excel ;
Newmarket's glory rose as Britain's fell.
POPE.
The bounding steed you pompously bestride
Shares with his lord the pleasure and the pride.
POPE.
Practise them now to curb the turning steed,
Mocking the foe ; now to his rapid speed
To give the rein, and in the full career
To draw the certain sword, or send the pointed
spear.
PRIOR.
Thy nags, the leanest things alive,
So very hard thou lov'st to drive,
I heard thy anxious coachman say,
It cost thee more in whips than hay.
PRIOR.
Long-hoofd, short-jointed, fetlocks shag and
long,
Broad breast, full eyes, small head and nostril
wide,
High crest, short ears, straight legs and passing
strong,
Thin mane, thick tail, broad buttocks, tender
hide.
SHAKSPEARE.
With that he gave his able horse the head,
And, bending forward, struck his agile heels
Against the panting sides of his poor jade,
Up to the rowel-head.
SHAKSPEARE.
That horse that thou so often hast bestrid ;
That horse that I so carefully have dress'd.
SHAKSPEARE.
Contention, like a horse
Full of high feeding, madly hath broke loose,
And bears down all before him.
SHAKSPEARE.
Those that tame wild horses
Pace 'em not in their hands to make 'em gentle,
But stop their mouths with stubborn bits.
SHAKSPEARE.
Where is the horse that doth untread again
His tedious measures with th' unbated fire
That he did pace them first ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Every horse bears his commanding rein,
And may direct his course as please himself.
SHAKSPEARE.
Duncan's horses,
Beauteous and swift, the minions of the race,
Turn'd wild in nature, broke their stalls, flung
out,
Contending 'gainst obedience.
SHAKSPEARE.
He proudly pricketh on his courser strong 1 ,
And Atin aye him pricks with spurs of shame
and wrong.
SPENSER.
Then, foaming tar, their bridles they would
champ,
And trampling the fine element would fiercely
ramp.
SPENSER.
260
HORSES. HOSPITALITY.
He with wide nostrils, snorting, skims the wave.
THOMSON.
Some nymphs affect a more heroic breed,
And vault from hunters to the managed steed.
YOUNG.
More than one steed must Delia's empire feel,
Who sits triumphant o'er the flying wheel ;
And, as she guides it through th' admiring
throng,
With what an air she smacks the silken thong !
YOUNG.
HOSPITALITY.
But the kind hosts their entertainment grace
With hearty welcome and an open face ;
In all they did, you might discern with ease
A willing mind, and a desire to please.
DRYDEN.
Then, leaving in the fields his grazing cows,
He sought himself some hospitable house :
Good Creton entertain'd his godlike guest.
DRYDEN.
The man their hearty welcome first express'd,
A common settle drew for either guest,
Inviting each his weary limbs to rest.
DRYDEN.
Receive the shipwreck'd on your friendly shore ;
With hospitable rites relieve the poor.
DRYDEN.
You, if your goodness does not plead my cause,
May think I broke all hospitable laws.
DRYDEN.
This night, at least, with me forget your care ;
Chestnuts, and curds, and cream, shall be your
fare.
DRYDEN.
For harbour at a thousand doors they knock'd ;
Not one of all the thousand but was lock'd.
DRYDEN.
So saying, with despatchful looks in haste
She turns, on hospitable thoughts intent,
What choice to choose for delicacy best.
MILTON.
His hospitable gate,
Unbarr'd to all, invites a numerous train
Of daily guests; whose board with plenty
crown 'd
Revives the feast-rites old.
JOHN PHILIPS.
More pleased to keep it till their friends could
come,
Than eat the sweetest by themselves at home.
POPE.
By Jove the stranger and the poor are sent,
And what to those we give to Jove is lent.
POPE.
Instant he flew with hospitable haste,
And the new friend with courteous air embraced.
POPE.
True friendship's laws are by this rule exprest:
Welcome the coming, speed the parting guest.
POPE.
Benighted wanderers, the forest o'er,
Curse the saved candle and unopening door.
POPE.
In plenty starving, tantalized in state,
And complaisantly help'd to all I hate ;
Treated, caress'd, and tired, I take my leave.
POPE.
He thought them folks that lost their way,
And ask'd them civilly to stay.
PRIOR.
And strangers with good cheer receive.
PRIOR.
Sir, you are very welcome to our house :
It must appear in other ways than words,
Therefore I scant this breathing courtesy.
SHAKSPEARE.
Ceremoniously let us prepare
Some welcome for the mistress of the house.
SHAKSPEARE.
But though my cates be mean, take them in
good part ;
Better cheer you may have, but not with better
heart.
SHAKSPEARE.
Sweet friends, your patience for my long abode ;
Not I, but my affairs, have made you wait.
SHAKSPEARE.
Gentle my lord, sleek o'er your rugged locks ;
Be bright and jovial 'mong your guests to-night.
SHAKSPEARE.
You do not give the cheer; the feast is sold
That is not often vouched, while 'tis making,
'Tis given with welcome.
SHAKSPEARE.
HUMILITY. HUMO UR. HUNTING.
261
Therein he them full fair did entertain,
Not with such forged shows as fitter been
For courting fools, that courtesies would faine,
But with entire affection and appearance plain.
SPENSER.
She to her guests doth bounteous banquet dight,
Attemper'd goodly well for health and for
delight.
SPENSER.
My master is of a churlish disposition,
And little recks to find the way to heav'n
By doing deeds of hospitality.
SWIFT.
HUMILITY.
In life's cool vale let my low scene be laid ;
Cover me, gods, with Tempe's thickest shade.
COWLEY.
When, through tasteless flat humility,
In dough-baked men some harmlessness we see,
"Pis but his phlegm that's virtuous, and not he.
DONNE.
As high turrets for their airy steep
Require foundations in proportion deep ;
And lofty cedars as far upwards shoot
As to the nether heavens they drive the root ;
So low did her secure foundation lie :
She was not humble, but humility.
DRYDEN.
Thus the sire of gods and men below :
What I have hidden, hope thou not to know.
DRYDEN.
The great controller of our fate
Deign'd to be man, and lived in low estate.
DRYDEN.
A grain of glory mixt with humbleness
Cures both a fever and lethargicness.
HERBERT.
Humility, that low, sweet root,
From which all heavenly virtues shoot.
MOORE: Loves of the Angels.
Humility is eldest-born of virtue,
And claims the birthright at the throne of
heav'n.
MURPHY: Zobeide.
I was not born for courts or great affairs :
I pay my debts, believe, and say my prayers.
POPE.
Forever in this humble cell
Let thee and I together dwell.
PRIOR.
HUMOUR.
You humour me when I am sick ;
Why not when I am splenetic ?
POPE.
Sir Balaam now, he lives like other folks,
He takes his chirping pint, he cracks his jokes.
POPE.
Though wond'ring senates hung on all he spoke,
The club must hail him master of the joke.
POPE.
Examine how your humour is inclined,
And which the ruling passion of your mind.
ROSCOMMON.
The priest was pretty well in case,
And show'd some humour in his face ;
Look'd with an easy, careless mien,
A perfect stranger to the spleen. SWIFT.
HUNTING.
By chase our long-lived fathers earn'd their food;
Toil strung the nerves, and purified the blood :
But we, their sons, a pamper'd race of men,
Are dwindled down to threescore years and ten.
DRYDEN.
I had a glimpse of him ; but he shot by me
Like a young hound upon a burning scent.
DRYDEN.
Let the keen hunter from the chase refrain,
Nor render all the ploughman's labour vain,
When Ceres pours out plenty from her horn,
And clothes the fields with golden ears of corn.
GAY.
Ye vig'rous swains ! while youth ferments yout
blood,
And purer spirits swell the sprightly flood,
Now range the hills, the thickest woods beset,
Wind the shrill horn, or spread the waving net.
POPE.
Together let us beat this ample field,
Try what the open, what the covert yield.
POPE.
Room for my lord ! three jockeys in his train ;
Six huntsmen with a shout precede his chair ;
He grins, and looks broad nonsense with a stare.
POPE.
262
HUSBANDS. HYPOCRISY.
When from the cave thou risest with the day
To beat the woods, and rouse the bounding prey.
PRIOR.
The hunt is up, the morn is bright and gray;
The fields are fragrant, and the woods are green ;
Uncouple here, and let us make a bay.
SHAKSPEARE.
The babbling echo mocks the hounds,
Replying shrilly to the well-tuned horns;
As if a double hunt were heard at once.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thick around
Thunders the sport of those, who with the gun
And dog impatient bounding at the shot,
Worse than the season desolate the fields.
THOMSON.
HUSBANDS.
What are husbands ? read the new world's won-
ders,
Such husbands as this monstrous world pro-
duces,
And you will scarcely find such deformities.
BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER :
Rule a Wife.
You, if an humble husband may request,
Provide and order all things for the best.
DRYDEN.
The lover in the husband may be lost.
LORD LYTTELTON : Advice to a Lady.
Husbands are like lots in
The lottery : you may draw forty blanks
Before you find one that has any prize
In him.
MARSTON.
Thy husband commits his body
To painful labour both by sea and land ;
And craves no other tribute at thy hands
But love, fair looks, and true obedience.
Too little payment for so great a debt.
SHAKSPEARE.
I will attend my husband, be his nurse,
Diet his sickness; for it is my office.
SHAKSPEARE.
A wooer
More hateful than the foul expulsion is
Of thy dear husband.
SHAKSPEARE.
That lord whose hand must take my plight
shall carry
Half my love with him, half my care and duty.
SHAKSPEARE.
HYPOCRISY.
Your cold hypocrisy's a stale device,
A worn-out trick : wouldst thou be thought in
earnest,
Clothe thy feign'd zeal in rage, in fire, in fury.
ADDISON.
'Tis not my talent to conceal my thoughts,
Or carry smiles and sunshine in my face,
When discontent sits heavy at my heart.
ADDISON : Cato.
Every man in this age has not a soul
Of crystal, for all men to read their actions
Through : men's hearts and faces are so far
asunder
That they hold no intelligence.
BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER : Philaster,
They varnish all their errors, and secure
The ills they act, and all the world endure.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Next stood hypocrisy, with holy leer,
Soft smiling and demurely looking down ;
But hid the dagger underneath the gown.
DRYDEN. '
If still thou dost retain
The same ill habits, the same follies too,
Gloss'd over only with a saintlike show,
Still thou art bound to vice.
DRYDEN.
Bartering his venal wit for sums of gold,
He cast himself into the saint-like mould ;
Groan'd, sigh'd, and pray'd, while godliness was
gain:
The loudest bagpipe of the squeaking train.
DRYDEN.
Fair hypocrite, you seek to cheat in vain ;
Your silence argues you seek time to reign.
DRYDEN.
Give me good fame, ye pow'rs, and make me
just:
Thus much the rogue to public ears will trust :
In private then : When wilt thou, mighty Jove,
My wealthy uncle from this world remove ?
DRYDEN.
HYP O CRIS Y. IDLENESS.
263
That thou may'st the better bring about
Thy wishes, thou art wickedly devout.
DRYDEN.
I, under fair pretence of friendly ends,
And well-placed words of glossy courtesy,
Baited with reason not unplausible,
Wind me into the easy-hearted man,
And hug him into snares.
MILTON: Cotnus.
Hypocrisy, the only evil that walks
Invisible, except to God alone,
By his permissive will, through heav'n and earth.
MILTON : Paradise Lost.
To just contempt ye vain pretenders fall,
The people's fable, and the scorn of all.
POPE.
Thou hast prevaricated with thy friend,
By under-hand contrivances undone me.
ROWE: Lady Jane Grey.
When my outward action doth demonstrate
The native act and figure of my heart
In compliment extern, 'tis not long after
But I will wear my heart upon my sleeve
For daws to peck at.
SHAKSPEARE.
Oh, what may man within him hide,
Though angel on the outward side !
SHAKSPEARE.
Away, and mock the time with fairest show :
False face must hide what the false heart doth
know.
SHAKSPEARE.
Not a courtier,
Although they wear their faces to the bent
Of the king's look, but hath a heart that is
Glad of the thing they scowl at.
SHAKSPEARE.
Ah, that deceit should steal such gentle shapes,
And with a virtuous visor hide deep vice !
SHAKSPEARE.
O serpent heart, hid with a flow'ring face !
Did ever dragon keep so fair a cave ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Time shall unfold what plaited cunning hides :
Who covers faults, at last with shame derides.
SHAKSPEARE.
The world's all title-page ; there's no contents ;
The world's all face : the man who shows his
heart
Is hooted for his nudities and scorn'd.
YOUNG : Night Thoughts.
IDLENESS.
Absence of occupation is not rest ;
A mind quite vacant is a mind distress'd.
COWPER: Retirement.
An idler is a watch that wants both hands ;
As useless if it goes as if it stands.
COWPER : Retirement.
How various his employments whom the world
Calls idle ; and who justly, in return,
Esteems the busy world an idler too !
COWPER: Task.
There, too, my Paridel ! she mark'd thee there,
Stretch' d on the rack of a too easy chair,
And heard thy everlasting yawn confess
The pains and penalties of idleness.
POPE.
rNo longer live the cankers of my court ;
All to your several states with speed resort;
Waste in wild riot what your land allows,
There ply the early feast and late carouse.
POPE.
A lazy, lolling sort,
Unseen at church, at senate, or at court,
Of ever-listless loit'rers, that attend
No cause, no trust, no duty, and no friend.
POPE.
What is a man,
If his chief good and market of his time
Be but to sleep and feed ? A beast, no more.
Sure he that made us with such large discourse.
Looking before and after, gave us not
That capability and godlike reason
To rust in us unused.
SHAKSPEARE.
264
IGNORANCE. IMA GIN A TION.
And though myself have been an idle truant,
Omitting the sweet benefit of time
To clothe mine age with angel-like perfection,
Yet hath Sir Proteus, for that's his name,
Made use and fair advantage of his days.
SHAKSPEARE.
And loathful idleness he doth detest,
The cauker-worni of every gentle breast.
SPENSER.
An empty form
Is the weak virtue that amid the shade
Lamenting lies, with future schemes amused ;
While wickedness and folly, kindred powers,
Confound the world.
THOMSON.
IGNORANCE.
The truest characters of ignorance
Are vanity, and pride, and arrogance;
As blind men use to bear their noses higher
Than those that have their eyes and sight entire.
BUTLER.
The greatest and most cruel foes we have,
Are those whom you would ignorantly save.
DRYDEN.
By ignorance is pride increased ;
Those most assume who know the least :
Their own self-balance gives them weight,
But every other finds them light.
GAY: Fables.
Yet ah ! why should they know their fate?
Since sorrow never comes too late,
And happiness too swiftly flies,
Thought would destroy their paradise.
No more : where ignorance is bliss,
'Tis folly to be wise.
GRAY: Eton College.
POPE.
Fools grant whate'er ambition craves,
And men, once ignorant, are slaves.
If we see right, we see our woes ;
Then what avails it to have eyes?
From ignorance our comfort flows :
The only wretched are the wise !
PRIOR.
Ignorance is the curse of God,
Knowledge the wing wherewith we fly to
heav'n.
SHAKSPEARE.
IMAGINATION.
Why wilt thou add to all the griefs I suffer
Imaginary ills and fancied tortures ?
ADDISON.
I have fed
Perhaps too much upon the lotos-fruits
Imagination yields, fruits that unfit
The palate for the more substantial food
Of our own land, reality.
L. E. LANDON.
O whither shall I run, or which way fly
The sight of this so horrid spectacle,
Which erst my eyes beheld, and yet behold !
For dire imagination still pursues me.
MILTON.
Condemn'd whole years in absence to deplore
And image charms he must behold no more.
POPE: Eloisa.
Where beams of warm imagination play,
The memory's soft figures melt away.
POPE.
Do what he will, he cannot realize
Half he conceives the glorious vision flies ;
Go where he may, he cannot hope to find
The truth, the beauty pictured in his mind.
ROGERS : Human Life.
Imagination,
With what's unreal thou co-active art,
And fellow'st nothing.
SHAKSPEARE.
This is the very coinage of your brain ;
This bodiless creation ecstasy
Is very cunning in.
SHAKSPEARE.
Oh, who can hold a fire in his hand
By thinking on the frosty Caucasus ?
Or cloy the hungry edge of appetite
By bare imagination of a feast ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Present fears
Are less than horrible imaginings.
SHAKSPEARE.
The lunatic, the lover, and the poet
Are of imagination all compact.
SHAKSPEARE.
Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible
To feeling as to sight ? Or art thou but
A dagger of the mind, a false creation,
Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain ?
SHAKSPEARE.
IMMOR TALITY. INGRA TITUDE.
265
IMMORTALITY.
It must be so : Plato, thou reasonest well :
Else whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire,
This longing after immortality ?
Or whence this secret dread and inward horror
Of falling into nought ? Why shrinks the soul
Back on itself, and startles at destruction ?
'Tis the divinity that stirs within us ;
'Tis heav'n itself that points out a hereafter,
And intimates eternity to man.
ADDISON: Cato,
Immortality o'ersweeps
All pains, all tears, all time, all fears and peals
Like the eternal thunders of the deep
Into my ears this truth Thou liv'st forever !
BYRON.
Cold in the dust this perish'd heart may lie,
But that which warm'd it once shall never die.
CAMPBELL.
Doubtless all souls have a surviving thought;
Therefore of death we think with quiet mind;
But if we think of being turn'd to nought,
A trembling horror in our souls we find.
SIR J. DAVIES.
Hence springs that universal strong desire
Which all men have of immortality :
Not some few spirits unto this thought aspire,
But all men's minds in this united be.
SIR J. DAVIES.
All these true notes of immortality
In our heart's table we shall written find.
SIR J. DAVIES.
If then all souls, both good and bad, do teach,
With gen'ral voice, that souls can never die,
'Tis not man's flatt'ring gloss, but nature's
speech,
Which, like God's oracles, can never lie.
SIR J. DAVIES.
Could the declining of this fate, O friend,
Our date to immortality extend ?
SIR J. DENHAM.
The spirit of man,
Which God inspired, cannot together perish
With this corporeal clod.
MILTON.
Your very fear of death shall make ye try
To catch the shade of immortality,
Wishing on earth to linger, and to save
Part of its prey from the devouring grave.
PRIOR.
When that which we immortal thought,
We saw so near destruction brought,
We felt what you did then endure,
And tremble yet, as not secure.
WALLER.
'Tis immortality 'tis that alone,
Amid life's pains, abasements, emptiness,
The soul can comfort, elevate, and fill ;
That only, and that amply, this performs.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts,
INGRATITUDE.
Not t' have written, then, seems little less
Than worst of civil vices, thanklessness.
DONNE.
Deserted in his utmost need
By those his former bounty fed.
DRYDEN.
I have been base ;
Base ev'n to him from whom I did receive
All that a son could to a father give :
Behold me punish'd in the self-same kind;
Th' ungrateful does a more ungrateful find.
DRYDEN.
But why, alas ! do mortal men complain ?
God gives us what he knows our wants require,
And better things than those which we desire !
DRYDEN.
I'll cut up, as plows
Do barren lands, and strike together flints
And clods, th' ungrateful senate and the people.
BEN JONSON.
On adamant our wrongs we all engrave,
But write our benefits upon the wave.
DR. WM. KING: Art of Love.
For vicious natures, when they once begin
To take distaste, and purpose no requital,
The greater debt they owe, the more they hate.
THOMAS MAY: Agrippina.
Who for so many benefits received
Turn'd recreant to God, ingrate and false,
And so of all true good himself despoil'd.
MILTON.
Blow, blow, thou winter wind,
Thou art not so unkind
As man's ingratitude ;
Thy tooth is not so keen,
Because thou art not seen,
Although thy breath be rude.
SHAKSPEARE.
2 66
INGRA TITUDE. INNO CENCE.
A sov'reign shame so bows him ; his unkindness,
That stript her from his benediction, turn'd her
To foreign casualties, gave her dear rights
To his dog-hearted daughters.
SHAKSPEARE.
All the stored vengeances of heaven fall
On her ingrateful top ! strike her young bones,
You taking airs, with lameness.
SHAKSPEARE.
That she may feel
How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is
To have a thankless child.
SHAKSPEARE.
She that herself will sliver and disbranch
From her maternal sap, perforce must wither,
And come to deadly use.
SHAKSPEARE.
Ingratitude ! thou marble-hearted fiend :
More hideous when thou show'st thee in a child,
Than the sea-monster.
SHAKSPEARE.
In common worldly things 'tis call'd ungrateful
With dull unwillingness to pay a debt,
Which, with a bounteous hand, was kindly lent;
Much more to be thus opposite with Heaven.
SHAKSPEARE.
I will lift the down-trod Mortimer
As high i' th' air as this unthankful king,
As this ingrate and canker'd Bolingbroke.
SHAKSPEARE.
See the monstrousness of man
When he looks out in an ungrateful shape !
SHAKSPEARE.
Nor can imagination guess
How that ungrateful charming maid
My purest passion has betray'd.
SWIFT.
All should unite to punish the ungrateful :
Ingratitude is treason to mankind.
THOMSON: Coriolanus.
He that's ungrateful has no guilt but one ;
All other crimes may pass for virtues in him.
YOUNG: Busiris.
INNOCENCE.
What men could do,
Is done already : heaven and earth will witness,
If Rome must fall, that we are innocent.
ADDISON.
With all the assurance innocence can bring,
Fearless without, because secure within,
Arm'd with my courage, unconcern'd I see
This pomp ; a shame to you, a pride to me.
DRYDEN.
Where seek retreat, now innocence is fled ?
Safe in that guard, I durst even hell defy;
Without it, tremble now when heav'n is nigh.
DRYDEN.
Your power you never use, but for defence,
To guard your own or others' innocence.
DRYDEN.
Against the head which innocence secures
Insidious malice aims her darts in vain,
Turn'd backwards by the pow'rful breath of
heav'n.
DR. JOHNSON : Irene.
He waits, with hellish rancour imminent,
To intercept thy way, or send thee back
Despoil'd of innocence, of faith, of bliss.
MILTON.
Her graceful innocence, her ev'ry air
Of gesture, or least action, overawed
His malice.
MILTON.
True conscious honour is to feel no sin :
He's arm'd without that's innocent within :
Be this thy screen, and this thy wall of brass.
POPE.
Thus wisely careless, innocently gay,
Cheerful he play'd.
POPE.
Well, Suffolk, yet thou shalt not see me blush
Nor change my countenance for this arrest :
A heart unspotted is not easily daunted.
SHAKSPEARE.
Innocence shall make
False accusation blush, and tyranny
Tremble at patience.
SHAKSPEARE.
It will help me nothing
To plead my innocence, for that dye is on me
Which makes my whit'st part black.
SHAKSPEARE.
There is no courage but in innocence,
No constancy but in an honest cause.
SOUTHERN : Fate of Capua.
Happy the innocent whose equal thoughts
Are free from anguish as they are from faults.
WALLER.
INSANITY. INSTINCT.
267
O that I had my innocence again !
My untouch'd honour! But I wish in vain.
The fleece that has been by the dyer stain'd
Never again its native whiteness gain'd.
WALLER.
INSANITY.
With curious art the brain, too finely wrought,
Preys on itself, and is destroy' d by thought;
Constant attention wears the active mind,
Blots out her powers, and leaves a blank behind.
CHURCHILL.
If a phrenzy do possess the brain,
It so disturbs and blots the form of things,
As fantasy proves altogether vain,
And to the wit no true relation brings.
SIR J. DAVIES.
Light fumes are merry, grosser fumes are sad ;
Both are the reasonable soul run mad.
DRYDEN.
Full of museful mopings, which presage
The loss of reason, and conclude in rage.
DRYDEN.
Great wits are sure to madness near allied,
And thin partitions do their bounds divide.
DRYDEN : Absalom and Achitophel.
There is a pleasure in being mad
Which none but madmen know.
DRYDEN : Spanish Friar.
In reason's absence fancy wakes,
111 matching words and deeds long past or late.
MILTON.
The king is mad : how stiff is my vile sense,
That I stand up and have ingenious feeling
Of my huge sorrows ! better I were distract :
So should my thoughts be sever'd from my griefs;
And woes, by wrong imaginations, lose
The knowledge of themselves.
SHAKSPEARE.
Now see that noble and most sovereign reason ;
Like sweet bells jangled out of tune, and harsh ;
That unmatch'd form, and feature of blown
youth,
Blasted with ecstasy. SHAKSPEARE.
How pregnant, sometimes, his replies are !
A happiness that often rradness hits on,
Which sanity and reason could not be
So prosp'rously deliver'd of.
SHAKSPEARE.
Ecstasy !
My pulse as yours doth temperately keep time,
And make as healthful music. It is not mad-
ness
That I have utter' d : bring me to the test,
And I the matter will re-word; which madness
Would gambol from.
SHAKSPEARE.
I am not mad ; I would to heaven I were !
For then, 'tis like I should forget myself;
O, if I could, what grief should I forget !
SHAKSPEARE.
The reason that I gather he is mad,
Is a mad tale he told to-day at dinner,
Of his own door being shut against his entrance.
SHAKSPEARE.
Fetter strong madness in a silken thread ;
Charm ache with air, and agony with words.
SHAKSPEARE.
Lovers and madmen have such seething brains ;
Such shaping fantasies that apprehend
More than cool reason ever comprehends.
SHAKSPEARE.
Her madness hath the oddest frame of sense,
Such a dependency of thing on thing,
As e'er I heard in madness.
SHAKSPEARE.
Were such things here as we do speak about ?
Or have we eaten of the insane root
That takes the reason prisoner ?
SHAKSPEARE.
He gave the little wealth he had
To build a house for fools and mad ;
To show by one satiric touch
No nation wanted it so much.
SWIFT.
INSTINCT.
Beasts can like, but not distinguish too,
Nor their own liking by reflection know.
DRYDEN.
Birds and beasts can fly their foe :
So chanticleer, who never saw a fox,
Yet shunn'd him as a sailor shuns the rocks.
DRYDEN.
In the nice bee what sense so subtly true
From pois'nous herbs extracts the healing dew?
POPE.
268
INSTINCT. INTEMPERANCE.
How bees forever, though a monarch reign,
Their sep'rate cells and properties maintain.
POPE.
Who taught the nations of the field and wood,
Prescient, the tides or tempests to withstand ?
POPE.
How instinct varies in the grovelling swine,
Compared, half-reasoning elephant, with thine !
'Twixt that and reason what a nice barrier !
Forever sep'rate, yet forever near.
POPE.
See then the acting and comparing powers,
One in their nature, which are two in ours ;
And reason raise o'er instinct as you can,
In this 'tis God directs, in that 'tis man.
POPE.
Jove's ethereal lays, resistless fire,
The chapter's soul and raptured song inspire;
Instinct divine ! nor blame severe his choice,
Warbling the Grecian woes with harp and voice.
POPE.
Then vainly the philosopher avers
That reason guides our deed, and instinct theirs :
Nor can we justly diff rent causes frame,
When the effects entirely are the same.
PRIOR.
Who taught the bee with winds and rains to
strive,
To bring her burden to the certain hive ;
And through the liquid fields again to pass,
Duteous, and heark'ning to the sounding brass ?
PRIOR.
Tell me why the ant
Midst summer's plenty thinks of winter's want;
By constant journeys careful to prepare
Her stores, and bringing home the corny ear.
PRIOR.
Hence, when anatomists discourse
How like brute organs are to ours,
They grant, if higher powers think fit,
A bear might soon be made a wit,
And that, for anything in nature,
Pigs might squeak love-odes, dogs bark satire.
PRIOR.
By a divine instinct, men's minds mistrust
Ensuing danger ; as by proof we see
The waters swell before a boisterous storm.
SHAKSPEARE.
Brutes find out where their talents lie :
A bear will not attempt to fly ;
A founder'd horse will oft debate
Before he tries a five-barr'd gate.
SWIFT.
INTEMPERANCE.
What dext'rous thousands just within the goal
Of wild debauch direct their nightly course.
DR. JOHN ARMSTRONG :
Art of Preserving Health.
Know whate'er
Beyond its natural fervour hurries on
The sanguine tide ; whether the frequent bowl,
High-season'd fare, or exercise to toil
Protracted, spurs to its last stage tired life,
And sows the temples with untimely snow.
DR. JOHN ARMSTRONG :
Art of Preserving Health.
An anxious stomach well
May be endured ; so may the throbbing head :
But such a dim delirium, such a dream
Involves you, such a dastardly despair
Unmans your soul, as maddening Pentheus felt
When, baited round Cithieron's cruel sides,
He saw two suns, and double Thebes ascend.
DR. JOHN ARMSTRONG :
Art of Preserving Health.
Man with raging drink inflamed
Is far more savage and untamed ;
Supplies his loss of wit and sense
With barb'rousness and insolence.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
Ten thousand casks,
Forever dribbling out their base contents,
Touch' d by the Midas finger of the state,
Bleed gold for ministers to sport with.
Drink and be mad, then. 'Tis your country bids.
COWPER : Task.
Wine is like anger ; for it makes us strong,
Blind and impatient, and it leads us wrong :
The strength is quickly lost, we feel the error
long.
CRABBE.
Some man's wit
Found th' art of cookery to delight his sense :
More bodies are consumed and kill'd with it
Than with the sword, famine, or pestilence.
SIR J. DA VIES.
INTEMPERANCE.
269
Intemp'rate youth, by sad experience found,
Ends in an age imperfect and unsound.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Nor need we tell what anxious cares attend
The turbulent mirth of wine, nor all the kinds
Of maladies that lead to death's grim cave,
Wrought by intemperance.
DRYDEN.
To full bowls each other they provoke :
At length, with weariness and wine oppress'd,
They rise from table, and withdraw to rest.
DRYDEN.
Far be from hence the glutton parasite,
Singing his drunken catches all the night.
DRYDEN.
He that is drunken
Is outlaw'd by himself; all kind of ill
Did with his liquor slide into his veins.
GEORGE HERBERT.
Shall I, to please another wine-sprung mind,
Lose all mine own ? God hath given me a
measure
Short of his can and body : must I find
A pain in that wherein he finds a pleasure ?
GEORGE HERBERT.
Some fiery fop, with new commission vain,
Who sleeps in brambles till he kills his man ;
Some frolic drunkard, reeling from a feast,
Provokes a broil, and stabs him for a jest.
DR. S. JOHNSON: London.
Bacchus, that first from out the purple grape
Crush' d the sweet poison of misused wine.
MILTON.
Desire of wine
Thou couldst repress, nor did the dancing ruby
Sparkling, outpour'd, the flavour, or the smell,
Or taste, that cheers the hearts of gods and men,
Allure thee from the cool crystalline stream.
MILTON.
O madness, to think use of strongest wines
And strongest drinks our chief support of health ;
When God, with these forbidden, made choice
to rear
His mighty champion, strong above compare,
Whose drink was only from the liquid brook.
MILTON : Samson Agonistes.
By hunger, that each other creature tames,
Thou art not to be harm'd, therefore not moved ;
Thy temperance invincible besides.
MILTON.
The pleasing poison
The visage quite transforms of him that drinks,
And the inglorious likeness of a beast
Fixes instead, unmoulding reason's mintage
Character' d in the face.
MILTON.
Now,
As with new wine intoxicated both,
They swim in mirth, and fancy that they feel
Divinity within them breeding wings
Wherewith to scorn the earth.
MILTON.
Some, as thou saw'st, by violent stroke shall die,
By fire, flood, famine, by intemp'rance more
In meats and drinks, which on the earth shall
bring
Diseases dire; of which a monstrous crew
Before thee shall appear.
MILTON.
From the clear milky juice allaying
Thirst, and refresh' d; nor envied them the grape
Whose heads that turbulent liquor fills with
fumes.
MILTON.
Thou sparkling bowl ! thou sparkling bowl !
Though lips of bards thy brim may press,
And eyes of beauty o'er thee roll,
And song and dance thy power confess,
I will not touch thee ! for there clings
A scorpion to thy side, that stings.
JOHN PIERPONT.
Rash Elpenor, in an evil hour,
Dried an immeasurable bowl, and thought
T' exhale his surfeit by irriguous sleep,
Imprudent : him death's iron sleep opprest.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Not when a gilt buffet's reflected pride
Turns you from sound philosophy aside ;
Not when from plate to plate your eyeballs roll,
And the brain dances to the mantling bowl.
POPE.
Or wafting ginger round the streets to go,
And visit ale-house where ye first did grow.
POPE-
Thee shall each ale-house, thee each gill-house
mourn,
And answering gin-shops sourer sighs return.
POPE.
270
INTEMPERANCE. INVENTION.
This calls the church to deprecate our sin,
And hurls the thunder of our laws on gin.
POPE.
In the flowers that wreathe the sparkling bowl,
Fell adders hiss, and pois'nous serpents roll.
PRIOR.
Who drinks, alas ! but to forget ; nor sees
That melancholy sloth, severe disease,
Memory confused, and interrupted thought,
Death's harbinger, lie latent in the draught.
PRIOR.
Frequent debauch to habitude prevails;
Patience of toil and love of virtue fails.
PRIOR.
Fly drunkenness, whose vile incontinence
Takes both away the reason and the sense :
Till with Circasan cups thy mind possest
Leaves to be man, and wholly turns a beast.
THOMAS RANDOLPH.
Though I am old, yet I am strong and lusty;
For in my youth I never did apply
Hot and rebellious liquors in my blood.
SHAKSPEARE.
Oh that men should put an enemy in
Their mouths to steal away their brains ! that we
Should with joy, pleasance, revel, and applause,
Transform ourselves into beasts.
SHAKSPEARE.
It was excess of wine that set him on,
And, on his more advice, we pardon him.
SHAKSPEARE.
Every inordinate cup
Is unbless'd, and th' ingredient is a devil.
Oh thou invisible spirit of wine,
If thou hast no name to be known by, let
Us call thee devil !
SHAKSPEARE.
And now, in madness,
Being full of supper and distempering draughts,
Upon malicious bravery, dost thou come
To start my quiet ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Boundless intemperance
In nature is a tyranny : it hath been
Th' untimely emptying of the happy throne
And fall of many kings.
SHAKSPEARE.
Through wise handling and fair governance
I him recured to a better will,
Purged from drugs of foul intemperance.
SPENSER.
Then a hand shall pass before thee,
Pointing to his drunken sleep,
To thy widow'd marriage-pillows,
To the tears that thou shall weep.
TENNYSON.
Their feeble tongues,
Unable to take up the cumbrous word,
Lie quite dissolved. Before their maudlin eyes,
Seen dim and blue, the double tapers dance,
Like the sun wading through the misty sky.
THOMSON.
A drunkard clasp his teeth, and not undo 'em
To suffer wet damnation to run through 'em.
TOURNEUR: Revenger's Tragedy.
INVENTION.
Reason, remembrance, wit, inventive art,
No nature, but immortal, can impart.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Mine is th' invention of the charming lyre :
Sweet notes and heav'nly numbers I inspire.
DRYDEN.
By improving what was writ before,
Invention labours less, but judgment more.
ROSCOMMON.
O for a muse of fire, that would ascend
The brightest heaven of invention !
SHAKSPEARE.
Be mindful, when invention fails,
To scratch your head and bite your nails.
SWIFT.
JEALOUSY.
271
JEALOUSY.
When hard words, jealousies, and fears
Set folks together by the ears.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
Yet he was jealous, though he did not show it :
For jealousy dislikes the world to know it.
BYRON.
Thy numbers, Jealousy, to nought were fix'd,
Sad proof of thy distressful state :
Of differing themes the veering song was mix'd,
And now it courted love, now raving call'd on
hate.
COLLINS: Passions.
A hateful prattling tongue,
That blows up jealousies and heightens fears,
By muttering pois'nous whispers in men's ears.
CREECH.
All jealousy
Must still be strangled in its birth; or time
Will soon conspire to make it strong enough
To overcome the truth.
SIR W. DA YEN ANT: Cruel Brother.
Some morosities
We must expect, since jealousy belongs
To age, of scorn, and tender sense of wrongs.
SIR J. DENHAM.
The rage of jealousy then fired his soul,
And his face kindled like a burning coal ;
Now cold despair succeeding in her stead
To livid paleness turns the glowing red.
DRYDEN.
Howe'er unjust your jealousy appear,
It does my pity, not my anger move :
I'll fond it as the froward child of love.
DRYDEN.
Suspicious and fantastical surmise,
And jealousy suffused, with jaundice in her eyes,
Discolouring all she view'd.
DRYDEN.
She wreaks her anger on her rival's head,
With furies frights her from her native home,
And drives her, gadding, round the world to
roam.
DRYDEN.
Like early lovers, whose unpractised hearts
Were long the May-game of malicious arts,
When once they find their jealousies were vain,
With double heat renew their fires again.
DRYDEN.
She drops a doubtful word that pains his mind,
And leaves a rankling jealousy behind.
DRYDEN.
With groundless fear he thus his soul deceives,
What phrenzy dictates, jealousy believes.
GAY : Dione.
When this disease of jealousy can find
A way to seize upon a crazy mind,
Most things, instead of help, or giving ease,
The humour feed, and turn to the disease.
SIR R. HOWARD: Vestal Virgin.
In gentle love the sweetest joys we find :
Yet even those joys dire jealousy molests,
And blackens each fair image in our breasts.
LORD LYTTELTON.
Can't I another's face commend,
And to her virtues be a friend,
But instantly your forehead lowers,
As if her merit lessen'd yours ?
EDWARD MOORE : Fables.
Shall jealousy a pow'r o'er judgment gain,
Though it does only in the fancy reign ?
With knowledge thou art inconsistent still :
The mind's foul monster, whom fair truth does
kill.
LORD ORRERY : Henry V.
From jealousy's tormenting strife
Forever be thy bosom freed.
PRIOR.
Thou, happy creature, art secure
From all the torments we endure ;
Despair, ambition, jealousy,
Lost friends, nor love, disquiets thee.
ROSCOMMON.
The bitterness and stings of taunting jealousy,
Vexatious days, and jarring joyless nights,
Have driv'n him forth.
ROWE.
Oh jealousy ! thou bane of pleasing friendship,
Thou worst invader of our tender bosoms,
How does thy poison rancour all our softness,
And turn our gentle natures into bitterness !
ROWE.
If you are wise, and prize your peace of mind,
Believe me true, nor listen to your jealousy:
Let not that devil which undoes your sex,
That cursed curiosity, seduce you
To hunt for needless secrets, which, neglected,
Shall never hurt your quiet, but, once known,
Shall sit upon your heart, pinch it with pain,
And banish sweet sleep forever from you.
ROWE.
272
JEALOUSY. JESTING. JE WELS.
Trifles, light as air,
Are to trie jealous confirmations strong
As proofs of holy writ.
SHAKSPEARE.
If you did know to whom I gave the ring,
And how unwillingly I left the ring,
You would abate the strength of your displeasure.
SHAKSPEARE.
Jealous souls will not be answer'd so :
They are not ever jealous for a cause,
But jealous for they're jealous.
SHAKSPEARE.
Doubtful thoughts, and rash-embraced despair,
And shudd'ring fear, and green-eyed jealousy.
SHAKSPEARE.
And but my noble Moor
Is true of mind, and made of no such baseness
As jealous creatures are, it were enough
To put him to ill-thinking.
SHAKSPEARE.
Alas ! why gnaw you so your nether lip ?
Some bloody passion shakes your very frame ;
These are portents : but yet I hope, I hope,
They do not point on me.
SHAKSPEARE.
It is my nature's plague
To spy into abuse; and oft my jealousy
Shapes faults that are not.
SHAKSPEARE.
Foul jealousy ! that turnest love divine
To joyless dread, and mak'st the loving heart
With hateful thoughts to languish and to pine
And feed itself with self-consuming smart :
Of all the passions in the mind thou vilest art.
SPENSER.
Wrath is a fire, and jealousy a weed ;
The sparks soon quench, the springing weed
out weed.
SPENSER.
As the earth may sometimes shake,
For winds shut up will cause a quake ;
So often jealousy and fear,
Stol'n to mine heart, cause tremblings there.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
This, this has thrown a serpent to my heart,
While it o'erflow'd with tenderness, with joy,
With all the sweetness of exulting love ;
Now nought but gall is there, and burning
poison.
THOMSON.
But through the heart
Should jealousy its venom once diffuse,
'Tis then delightful misery no more,
But agony unmix'd, incessant gall,
Corroding every thought, and blasting all
Love's paradise.
THOMSON.
O jealousy, each other passion's calm
To thee, thou conflagration of the soul !
Thou king of torments ! thou grand counterpoise
For all the transports beauty can inspire.
YOUNG: Revenge.
JESTING.
This jest was first of th' other house's making,
And five times tried, has never fail'd of taking.
DRYDEN.
Of all the griefs that harass the distrest,
Sure the most bitter is a scornful jest.
DR. S. JOHNSON : London.
The well-fraught bowl
Circles incessant ; whilst the humble cell
With quavering laugh and rural jests resounds.
JOHN PHILIPS.
Perhaps the jest that charm'd the sprightly
crowd,
And made the jovial table laugh so loud,
To some false notion owed its poor pretence.
PRIOR.
Close observe him for the sake of mockery,
Close, in the name of jesting, lie you there.
SHAKSPEARE.
A jest's prosperity lies in the ear
Of him that hears it, never in the tongue
Of him that makes it.
SHAKSPEARE.
He must observe their mood on whom he jests,
The quality of persons, and the time ;
And, like the haggard, check at every feather
That comes before his eye.
SHAKSPEARE.
JEWELS.
The bright sun compacts the precious stone,
Imparting radiant lustre like his own;
He tinctures rubies with their rosy hue,
And on the sapphire spreads a heavenly blue.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
JEWELS.
273
Stones of small worth may lie unseen by day;
But night itself does the rich gem betray.
COWLEY.
He furnishes her closet first, and fills
The crowded shelves with rarities of shells ;
Adds orient pearls, which from the conchs he
drew,
And all the sparkling stones of various hue.
DRYDEN.
Rich crowns were on their royal scutcheons
placed,
With sapphires, diamonds, and with rubies
graced.
DRYDEN.
Their long descending train,
With rubies edged and sapphires, swept the
plain.
DRYDEN.
The chiefs about their necks the scutcheons
wore,
With orient pearls and jewels powder'd o'er.
DRYDEN.
He from the glittering staff unfurl'd
Th' imperial ensign, streaming to the wind,
With gems and golden lustre rich emblazed,
Seraphic arms and trophies.
MILTON.
If metal, part seem'd gold, part silver clear :
If stone, carbuncle most, or chrysolite.
MILTON.
Though the same sun, with all-diffusive rays,
Blush in the rose, and in the diamond blaze,
We prize the stronger effort of his pow'r,
And always set the gem above the flow'r.
POPE.
Asleep and naked as an Indian lay,
An honest factor stole a gem away ;
He pledged it to the knight ; the knight had wit,
So kept the diamond, and the rogue was bit.
POPE.
For me the balm shall bleed, and amber flow,
The coral redden, and the ruby glow.
POPE.
Shall this prize,
Soon heighten'd by the diamond's circling rays,
On that rapacious hand forever blaze ?
POPE.
This casket India's glowing gems unlocks,
And all Arabia breathes from yonder box.
POPE.
18
Can blazing carbuncles with her compare ?
The topaz sent from scorched Meroe ?
Or pearls presented by the Indian sea ?
SANDYS.
I thought I saw
Wedges of gold, great anchors, heaps of pearl,
Inestimable stones, unvalued jewels.
SHAKSPEARE.
'Tis plate of rare device, and jewels
Of rich and exquisite form; their value's great;
And I am something curious, being strange,
To have them in safe stowage.
SHAKSPEARE.
I'll set thee in a shower of gold, and hail
Rich pearls upon thee.
SHAKSPEARE.
In emerald tufts, flowers purple, blue, and white :
Like sapphire, pearl, and rich embroidery.
SHAKSPEARE.
I see how thy eye would emulate the diamond.
SHAKSPEARE.
Such another world,
Of one entire and perfect chrysolite,
I'd not have sold her for.
SHAKSPEARE.
She saw Duessa sunny bright,
Adorn'd with gold and jewels shining clear.
SPENSER.
On her head she wore a tire of gold,
Adorn'd with gems and ouches. SPENSER.
Rocks rich in gems, and mountains big with
mines,
That on the high equator ridgy' rise,
Whence many a bursting stream auriferous plays.
THOMSON.
With light's own smile the yellow topaz burns.
THOMSON.
Nor deeper verdure dyes the robe of spring,
When first she gives it to the southern gale,
Than the green emerald shows.
THOMSON.
Like jewels to advantage set,
Her beauty by the shade does get.
WALLER.
You, her priest, declare
What off rings may propitiate the fair:
Rich orient pearls, bright stones that ne'er de-
cay,
Or polish'd lines which longer last than they.
WALLER.
274
JOY.
JOY.
Still there's something
That checks my joys : nor can I yet distinguish
Which is an apparition, this or that.
SIR J. DENHAM : The Sophy.
Joy is such a foreigner,
So mere a stranger to my thoughts, I know
Not how to entertain him.
SIR J. DENHAM.
All pain and joy is in their way ;
The things we fear bring less annoy
Than fear, and hope brings greater joy;
But in themselves they cannot stay.
DONNE.
You come in such a time
As if propitious fortune took a care
To swell my tide of joys to their full height.
DRYDEN.
What then remains, but, after past annoy,
To take the good vicissitude of joy ?
DRYDEN.
That's my joy
Not to have seen before ; for nature now
Comes all at once, confounding my delight.
DRYDEN.
Then on to-morrow's dawn your care employ
To search the land, but give this day to joy.
DRYDEN.
Can you be so hard-hearted to destroy
My ripening hopes, that are so near to joy ?
DRYDEN.
Be fair or foul, or rain or shine,
The joys I have possess'd, in spite of fate, are
mine.
DRYDEN.
We show our present, joking, giggling race
True joy consists in gravity and grace.
GARRICK.
These spiritual joys are dogg'd by no sad
sequels.
GLANVILLE.
Haste thee, my nymph, and bring with thee
Jest and youthful jollity,
Quips and cranks, and wanton wiles,
Nods and becks, and wreathed smiles,
Such as hang on Hebe's cheek
And love to live in dimple sleek.
MILTON.
O fleeting joys
Of Paradise, dear bought with lasting woes !
MILTON.
Wrath shall be no more
Thenceforth, but in thy presence joy entire.
MILTON.
All these and more came flocking, but with looks
Downcast and damp: yet such wherein appear'd
Obscure some glimpse of joy.
MILTON.
What nothing earthly gives, or can destroy,
The soul's calm sunshine, and the heartfelt joy.
POPE.
The joy unequall'd, if its end it gain,
Without satiety, though e'er so blest,
And but more relish'd as the more distress'd.
POPE.
There youths and nymphs, in consort gay,
Shall hail the rising, close the parting day;
With me, alas ! with me those joys are o'er,
For me the vernal garlands bloom no more.
POPE.
Ere the foundations of this earth were laid,
It was, opponent to our search, ordain'd
That joy still sought should never be attain'd.
PRIOR.
Thy constant quiet fills my peaceful breast
W T ith unmix'd joy, uninterrupted rest.
ROSCOMMON.
Let her, like me, of ev'ry joy forlorn,
Devote the hour when such a wretch was born ;
Like me, to deserts and to darkness run.
ROUTE.
'Tis safer to be that which we destroy,
Than by destruction dwell in doubtful joy.
SHAKSPEARE.
Her merry fit she freshly 'gan to rear,
And did of joy and jollity devise,
Herself to cherish and her guest to cheer.
SPENSER.
Oh ! how impatience gains upon the soul
When the long-promised hour of joy draws
near!
How slow the tardy moments seem to roll !
What spectres rise of inconsistent fear !
MRS. TIGHE : Psyche.
Rash man, forbear ! but for some unbelief,
My joy had been as fatal as my grief.
WALLER.
JUDGES.
275
To thee alone be praise,
From whom our joy descends,
Thou cheerer of our days.
WOTTON.
How exquisite is pleasure after pain !
Why throbs my heart so turbulently strong,
Pain'd at thy presence, this redundant joy,
Like a poor miser, beggar' d by his store ?
YOUNG.
JUDGES.
Were I a drowsy j udge, whose dismal note
Disgorgeth halters, as a juggler's throat
Doth ribands.
CLEAVELAND.
Our judges, like our laws, were rude and plain.
COWLEY.
The solemn fop, significant and budge,
A fool with judges, amongst fools a judge.
Cow PER : Conversation.
To follow foolish precedents, and wink
With both our eyes, is easier than to think.
COWPER : Tirocinium.
When pronouncing sentence, seem not glad :
Such spectacles, though they are just, are sad.
SIR J. DENHAM.
When a man's life is in debate,
The judge can ne'er too long deliberate.
DRYDEN.
They're pleased to hear their thick-skull'd judges
cry,
" Well moved !" " Oh, finely said !"
DRYDEN.
Those whom form of laws
andemn'd to die, when traitors judged their
cause,
Tor want they lots, nor judges to review
The wrongful sentence, and award anew.
DRYDEN.
Awful Rhadamanthus rules the state ;
He hears and judges each committed crime,
iquires into the manner, place, and time.
DRYDEN.
O Tyburn, couldst thou reason and dispute,
Couldst thou but judge as well as execute,
How often wouldst thou change the felon's
doom,
And truss some stem chief justice in his room !
DRYDEN.
Arise, true judges, in your own defence,
Control those foplings, and declare for sense;
For, should the fools prevail, they'll stop not
there,
But make their next descent upon the fair.
DRYDEN.
Some on the bench the knotty laws untie.
DRYDEN.
The women who would rather wrest the laws
Than let a sister plaintiff lose the cause,
As judges on the bench more gracious are
And more attent to brothers of the bar
Cried, one and all, the suppliant should have
right,
And to the grandame hag adjudged the knight.
DRYDEN.
He softens the hard rigour of the laws,
Blunts their keen edge, and grinds their harpy
claws.
GARTH.
The gods
Grow angry with your patience : 'tis their care,
And must be yours, that guilty men escape not :
As crimes do grow, justice should rouse itself.
BEN JONSON : Catiline.
You'd mollify a judge, would cram a squire;
Or else some smiles from court you may desire.
DR. WM. KING.
For in a government
Th' offence is greater in the instrument
That hath the power to punish ; and in laws
The author's trespass makes the foulest cause.
NABBES.
The hungry judges soon the sentence sign,
And wretches hang that jurymen may dine.
POPE.
The judge, to dance, his brother serjeant call;
The senator at cricket urge the ball.
POPE.
Judges and senates have been bought for gold;
Esteem and love were never to be sold.
POPE.
Causes uniudged disgrace the loaded file,
And sleeping laws the king's neglect revile.
PRIOR.
While the fierce monk does at his trial stand, "]
He chews revenge, abjuring his offence;
Guile in his tongue, and murder in his hand,
He stabs his judge to prove his innocence.
PRIOR.
276
JUD GES. yUD GHENT.
The judge corrupt, the long-depending cause,
And doubtful issue of misconstrued laws.
PRIOR.
They in the scorner's or the judge's seat
Dare to condemn the virtue which they hate.
PRIOR.
Her very judges wrung their hands for pity ;
Their old hearts melted in them as she spoke,
And tears ran down upon their silver beards.
ROWE: Lady Jane Grey.
The supernal Judge that stirs good thoughts
In any breast of strong authority
To look into the blots and stains of right.
SHAKSPEARE.
And then the justice,
In fair round belly, with good capon lined,
With eyes severe, and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances :
And so he plays his part.
SHAKSPEARE.
The sad-eyed justice, with his surly hum,
Delivers o'er to executors pale
The lazy yawning drone.
SHAKSPEARE.
A man busied about decrees,
Condemning some to death, and some to exile,
Ransoming him or pitying, threatening the other.
SHAKSPEARE.
He who the sword of heaven will bear
Should be as holy as severe;
Pattern in himself to know,
Grace to stand, and virtue go.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thieves for their robbery have authority,
When judges steal themselves.
SHAKSPEARE.
I charge you by the law,
Whereof you are a well-deserving pillar,
Proceed to judgment.
SHAKSPEARE.
You are a worthy judge;
You know the law : your exposition
Hath been most sound.
SHAKSPEARE.
They choose their magistrate !
And such a one as he, who puts his shall,
His popular shall, against a graver bench
Than ever frown'd in Greece.
SHAKSPEARE.
You are mine enemy ; I make my challenge,
You shall not be my judge.
SHAKSPEARE.
If little faults, proceeding, or distemper
Shall not be wink'd at, how shall we stretch
our eye
When capital crimes, chew'd, swallow'd, and
digested,
Appear before us ?
SHAKSPEARE.
I have seen,
When after execution judgment hath
Repented o'er his doom.
SHAKSPEARE.
The god of wit, to show his grudge,
Clapt ass's ears upon the judge.
SWIFT.
There was on both sides much to say:
He'd hear the cause another day.
And so he did ; and then a third
He heard it : there he kept his word ;
But with rejoinders or replies,
Long bills, and answers stufTd with lies,
Demur, imparlance, and essoign,
The parties ne'er could issue join :
For sixteen years the cause was spun,
And then stood where it first begun.
SWIFT: Cadenus and Vanessa.
It well becomes that judge to nod at crimes
That does commit greater himself, and lives.
TOURNEUR : Revenger's Tragedy.
Nor envies when a gypsy you commit,
And shake the clumsy bench with country wit ;
When you the dullest of dull things have said,
And then ask pardon for the jest you made.
YOUNG: Love of Fame.
JUDGMENT.
Men's judgments sway on that side fortune leans.
GEORGE CH.APMAN: Widow's Tears.
So strong a wit did Nature to him frame
As all things but his judgment overcame;
His judgment like the heavenly moon did show,
Tempering that mighty sea below.
COWLEY.
If judgment could in solemn dulness lie,
Which weaker rulers wear for gravity,
Then those must needs transcendent judgments
have
That would instruct wise natures to be grave.
SIR W. DAVENANT.
JUDGMENT.
277
When we judge, our minds we mirrors make,
And as those glasses which material be
Forms of material things do only take,
For thoughts or minds in them we cannot see.
SIR J. DA VIES.
His severe judgment giving law,
His modest fancy kept in awe.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Let none direct thee what to do or say,
Till thee thy judgment of the matter sway;
Let not the pleasing many thee delight ;
First judge, if those whom thou dost please,
judge right.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Their difference to measure, and to reach,
Reason well rectified must nature teach ;
And these high sci'utinies are subjects fit
For man's all-searching and inquiring wit.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Know'st with an equal hand to hold the scale,
See'st where the reasons pinch, and where they
fail,
And where exceptions o'er the general rule pre-
vail.
DRYDEN.
For favours cheap and common who would
strive ?
Vet scatter' d here and there I some behold
Who can discern the tinsel from the gold.
DRYDEN.
In short, so swift your judgments turn and wind,
You cast our fleetest wits a mile behind.
DRYDEN.
The nicest eye could no distinction make
Where lay the advantage, or what side to take.
DRYDEN.
In things which most concern,
Unpractised, unprepared, and still to seek.
MILTON.
Seized and tied down to judge, how wretched I !
Who can't be silent, and who will not lie :
To laugh were want of goodness and of grace;
And to be grave, exceeds all power of face.
POPE.
'Tis with our judgments as our watches: none
Go just alike, yet each believes his own.
POPE.
If we look more closely, we shall find
Most have the seeds of judgment in their mind.
POPE.
No longer now does my neglected mind
Its wonted stores and old ideas find :
Fix'd judgment there no longer does abide,
To taste the true, or set the false aside.
PRIOR.
Against experience he believes,
He argues against demonstration,
Pleased when his reason he deceives,
And sets his judgment by his passion.
PRIOR.
I see men's judgments are
A parcel of their fortunes ; and things outward
Do draw the inward quality after them,
To suffer all alike.
SHAKSPEARE.
Your dishonour
Mangles true judgment, and bereaves the state
Of that integrity which should become it.
SHAKSPEARE.
Give him heedful note;
For I mine eyes will rivet to his face ;
And, after, we will both our judgments join,
In censure of his seeming.
SHAKSPEARE.
You praise yourself
By laying defects of judgment to me.
SHAKSPEARE.
Reserve thy state ; with better judgment check
This hideous rashness.
SHAKSPEARE.
Blest are those
Whose blood and judgment are so well com
mingled
That they are not a pipe for fortune's finger
To sound what stop she please.
SHAKSPEARE.
His years but young, but his experience old ;
His head unmellow'd, but his judgment ripe.
SHAKSPEARE.
How little do they see what is, who frame
Their hasty judgment upon that which seems !
SOUTHEY.
Ev'n not all these, in one rich lot combined,
Can make the happy man, without the mind,
Where judgment sits clear-sighted, and surveys
The chain of reason with unerring gaze.
THOMSON.
278
JUST. JUSTICE.
JUST.
The man resolved, and steady to his trust,
Inflexible to ill, and obstinately just,
Can the rude rabble's influence despise.
ADDISON.
Be just in all thy actions, and if join'd
With those that are not, never change thy mind ;
If aught obstruct thy course, yet stand not still,
But wind about till thou hast topp'd the hill.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Be just in all you say, and all you do,
Whatever be your birth, you're sure to be
A peer of the first magnitude to me.
DRYDEN.
Take it, while yet 'tis praise, before my rage,
Unsafely just, break loose on this bad age.
DRYDEN.
When men's intents are wicked, their guilt
haunts them ;
But when they're just they're arm'd, and no-
thing daunts them.
MlDDLETON.
This is true glory, and renown, when God,
Looking on the earth, with approbation marks
The just man, and divulges him through heav'n
To all his angels, who with true applause
Recount his praises.
MILTON.
God will deign
To visit oft the dwellings of just men
Delighted.
MILTON.
The just shall dwell,
And, after all their tribulations long,
See golden days fruitful of golden deeds.
MILTON.
Just men they seem'd, and all their study bent
To worship God aright, and know his works.
MILTON.
Since living virtue is with envy cursed,
And the best men are treated like the worst,
Do thou, just goddess, call our merits forth,
And give each deed th' exact, intrinsic worth.
POPE.
Just of thy word, in ev'ry thought sincere,
Who knew no wish but what the world might
hear.
POPE.
Take physic, Pomp ;
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel,
That thou mayst shake the superflux to them,
And show the heavens more just.
SHAKSPEARE.
We may not think the justness of each act
Such and no other than event doth form it.
SHAKSPEARE.
The man that's resolute and just,
Finn to his principles and trust,
Nor hopes nor fears can blind.
WALSH.
JUSTICE.
The base degenerate age requires
Severity and justice in its rigour ;
This awes an impious bold offending world.
ADDISON.
Justice is their virtue : that alone
Makes them sit sure, and glorifies the throne.
/ DANIEL.
Justice, when equal scales she holds, is blind :
Nor cruelty nor mercy change her mind :
When some escape for that which others die,
Mercy to those, to these is cruelty.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Justice, that sits and frowns where public laws
Exclude soft mercy from a private cause,
In your tribunal most herself does please;
There only smiles, because she lives at ease.
DRYDEN.
Justice to merit does weak aid afford :
She quits the balance, and resigns the sword.
DRYDEN.
A
My secret wishes would my choice decide;
But open justice bends to neither side.
DRYDEN.
Justice must punish the rebellious deed;
Yet punish so, as pity shall exceed.
DRYDEN.
If justice will take all, and nothing give,
Justice, methinks, is not distributive.
DRYDEN
One rising, eminent
In wise deport, spake much of right and wrong,
Of justice, of religion, truth, and peace,
And judgment from above.
MILTON.
JUSTICE.
279
So near approach we their celestial kind
By justice, truth, and probity of mind.
POPE.
Impartial justice holds her equal scales,
Till stronger virtue does the weight incline ;
If over thee thy glorious foe prevails,
He now defends the cause that once was thine.
PRIOR.
Yet shall the axe of justice hew him down,
And level with the root his lofty crown.
SANDYS.
Isabella. Yet show some pity !
Angela. I show it most of all when I show
justice ;
For then I pity those I do not know,
Which a dismiss'd offence would after gall ;
And do him right, that, answering one foul
wrong,
Lives not to act another. SHAKSPEARE.
Though justice be thy plea, consider this,
That in the course of justice, none of us
Should see salvation : we do pray for mercy;
And that same prayer doth teach us all to render
The deeds of mercy.
SHAKSPEARE.
Plate sin with gold,
And the strong lance of justice hurtless breaks;
Arm it in rags, a pigmy's straw doth pierce it.
None does offend, none, I say, none; I'll able
'em:
Take that of me, my friend.
SHAKSPEARE.
All friends shall taste
The wages of their virtue, and all foes
The cups of their deserving.
SHAKSPEARE.
The honour' d gods
Keep Rome in safety, and the chairs of justice
Supply with worthy men.
SHAKSPEARE.
Poise the cause in justice' equal scales,
Whose beam stands sure, whose rightful cause
prevails.
SHAKSPEARE.
Her suit is now to repossess those lands ;
Which we in justice cannot well deny.
SHAKSPEARE.
Foul subornation is predominant,
And equity exiled your highness' land.
SHAKSPEARE.
Force would be right; or rather, right and
wrong,
Between whose endless jar justice presides,
Would lose their names, and so would justice too.
SHAKSPEARE.
Even-handed justice
Returns th' ingredients of our poison'd chalice
To our own lips.
SHAKSPEARE.
What stronger breast-plate than a heart un.
tainted ?
Thrice is he arm'd who hath his quarrel just,
And he but naked, though lock'd up in steel,
Whose conscience with injustice is corrupted.
SHAKSPEARE.
Where justice grows, there grows the greater
grace,
The which doth quench the brand of hellish
smart.
SPENSER.
Nor would, for gold or fee,
Be won their rightful causes down to tread.
SPENSER.
If but one virtue did adorn a king,
It would be justice ; many great defects
Are veil'd thereby : whereas each virtuous thing
In one who is not just, the world suspects.
EARL OF STIRLING : Darius.
Of mortal justice if thou scorn the rod,
Believe and tremble : thou art judged of God.
SWETNAM.
Justice, like lightning, ever should appear
To few men's ruin, but to all men's fear.
SWETNAM : Woman- Hater.
Of all virtues justice is the best ;
Valour without it is a common pest.
WALLER.
280
KINDNESS. KINGS.
KINDNESS.
The drying up a single tear has more
Of honest fame than shedding seas of gore.
BYRON.
To rest the weary, and to soothe the sad,
Doth lesson happier men, and shames at least
the bad.
BYRON.
'Tis the first sanction nature gave to man,
Each other to assist in what they can.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Kindness by secret sympathy is tied ;
For noble souls in nature are allied.
DRYDEN.
You have yourself your kindness overpaid :
He ceases to oblige who can upbraid.
DRYDEN.
Since trifles make the sum of human things,
And half our misery from our foibles springs ;
Since life's best joys consist in peace and ease,
And few can save or serve, but all may please ;
Oh ! let th' ungentle spirit learn from hence
A small unkindness is a great offence.
Large bounties to restore we wish in vain,
But all may shun the guilt of giving pain.
HANNAH MORE.
In nature there's no blemish but the mind ;
None can be call'd deform'd, but the unkind :
Virtue is beauty ; but the beauteous, evil,
Are empty trunks o'erflourish'd by the devil.
POPE.
Kindness has resistless charms ;
All things else but weakly move ;
Fiercest anger it disarms,
And clips the wings of flying love.
EARL OF ROCHESTER.
Yet do I fear thy nature ;
It is too full o' the milk of human kindness.
SHAKSPEARE.
KINGS.
Why dost thou cast out such ungenerous terms
Against the lords and sovereigns of the world ?
ADDISON.
From the monarch's virtue subjects take
Th' ingredient which does public virtue make :
At his bright beam they all their tapers light,
And by his dial set their motion right.
SIR W. DAVENANT : To the King.
Kings, by grasping more than they could hold,
First made their subjects by oppression bold ;
And popular sway, by forcing kings to give
More than was fit for subjects to receive,
Ran to the same extremes ; and one excess
Made both, by striving to be greater, less.
SIR J. DENHAM.
On the cold earth lies th' unregarded king,
A headless carcass, and a nameless thing.
SIR J. DENHAM.
He, looking down
With scorn or pity on the slippery state
Of kings, will tread upon the neck of fate.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Men do not stand
In so ill case that God hath with his hand
Sign'd kings blank charters to kill whom they
hate,
Nor are they vicars, but hangmen to fate.
DONNE.
'Tis true from force the noblest title springs :
I therefore hold from that which first made kings.
DRYDEN.
Doom, as they please, my empire not to stand,
I'll grasp my sceptre with my dying hand.
DRYDEN.
You that are a sov'reign prince, allay
Imperial pow'r with your paternal sway.
DRYDEN.
His awful presence did the crowd surprise,
Nor durst the rash spectator meet his eyes ;
Eyes that confess'd him born for kingly sway,
So fierce they flash'd intolerable day.
DRYDEN.
He who late a sceptre did command
Now grasps a floating fragment in his hand.
DRYDEN.
But peaceful kings, o'er martial people set,
Each other's poise and counterbalance are.
DRYDEN.
My crown is absolute, and holds of none :
I cannot in a base subjection live ;
Nor suffer you to take, though I would give.
DRYDEN : Indian Emperor.
Kings' titles commonly begin by force,
Which time wears off, and mellows into right ;
And power which in one age is tyranny
Is ripen'd in the next to true succession.
DRYDEN: Spanish Friar.
KINGS.
281
You shall be still plain Torrismond with me,
Th' abettor, partner (if you like the name),
The husband of a tyrant, but no king,
Till you deserve that title by your justice.
DRYDEN : Spanish Friar.
Nor shall the sacred character of king
Be urged, to shield me from thy bold appeal :
If I have injured thee, that makes us equal.
DRYDEN.
Where was then
The power that guards the sacred lives of kings ?
Why slept the lightnings and the thunderbolts,
Or bent their idle rage on fields and trees,
When vengeance call'd 'em here ?
DRYDEN.
Luxurious kings are to their people lost;
They live, like drones, upon the public cost.
DRYDEN.
When kings grow stubborn, slothful, or unwise,
Each private man for public good should rise.
DRYDEN.
He had been base had he released his right :
For such an empire none but kings should fight.
DRYDEN.
Empire ! thou poor and despicable thing,
When such as these make or unmake a king.
DRYDEN.
'Twixt kings and tyrants there's this diff rence
known,
Kings seek their subjects' good, tyrants their own.
HERRICK.
Princes that would their people should do well,
Must at themselves begin, as at the head ;
For men by their example pattern out
Their imitations, and regard of laws:
A virtuous court a world to virtue draws.
BEN JONSON: Cynthia's Revels.
A crown,
Golden in show, is but a wreath of thorns ;
Brings dangers, troubles, cares, and sleepless
nights,
To him who wears the regal diadem.
MILTON.
In himself was all his state ;
More solemn than the tedious pomp that waits
On princes ; when their rich retinue long,
Of horses led, and grooms besmear'd with gold,
Dazzles the crowd, and sets them all agape.
MILTON.
A crown ! what is it ?
Is it to bear the miseries of a people !
To hear their murmurs, feel their discontents,
And sink beneath a load of splendid care ?
HANNAH MORE: Daniel.
Thus states were form'd, the name of king un-
known,
Till common interest placed the sway in one :
'Twas virtue only, or in arts or arms,
Diffusing blessings, or averting harms ;
The same which in a sire the son obey'd
A prince the father of a people made.
POPE.
When love was all an easy monarch's care,
Jilts ruled the state, and statesmen farces writ.
POPE.
Behold four kings, in majesty revered,
With hoary whiskers and a forky beard.
POPE.
Not youthful kings in battle seized alive
E'er felt such grief, such terror, and despair.
POPE.
Admire we, then,
Or popularity, or stars, or strings,
The mob's applauses, or the gifts of kings ?
POPE.
They gave and she transferr'd the curst advice,
That monarchs should their inward soul disguise,
Dissemble and command, be false and wise;
By ignominious arts, for servile ends,
Should compliment their foes, and shun their
friends.
PRIOR.
A mighty king I am, an earthly god ;
I raise or sink, imprison or set free ;
And life or death depends on my decree.
PRIOR.
What is a king? A man condemn'd to bear
The public burthen of the nation's care ;
Now crown'd some angry faction to appease,
Now falls a victim to the people's ease.
PRIOR.
Unbounded power and height of greatness give
To kings that lustre which we think divine ;
The wise, who know 'em, know they are but
men;
Nay, sometimes weak ones too. The crowd,
indeed,
Who kneel before the image, not the god,
Worship the deity their hands have made.
ROWE: Ambitious Stepmother.
282
KINGS. KNA VES.
Princes have but their titles for their glories,
An outward honour for an inward toil ;
And for unfelt imaginations
They often feel a world of restless cares :
So that between their title and low name
There's nothing differs but the outward fame.
SHAKSPEARE.
The king-becoming graces,
As justice, verity, temp'rance, stableness,
Bounty, persev'rance, mercy, lowliness,
Devotion, patience, courage, fortitude,
I have no relish of them.
SHAKSPEARE.
There's such divinity doth hedge a king
That treason can but peep to what it would,
Acts little of his will.
SHAKSPEARE.
The hearts of princes kiss obedience,
So much they love it ; but to stubborn spirits
They swell and grow as terrible as storms.
SHAKSPEARE.
The king's name is a tow'r of strength,
Which they upon the adverse faction want.
SHAKSPEARE.
Awake, thou sluggard majesty ! thou sleepest :
Is not the king's name forty thousand names ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Shall the figure of God's majesty,
His captain, steward, deputy elect,
Anointed, crown'd, and planted many years,
Be judged by subject and inferior breath?
SHAKSPEARE.
Within the hollow crown
That rounds the mortal temples of a king,
Keeps death his court ; and there the antick sits,
Scoffing his state.
SHAKSPEARE.
When we are wrong' d, and would unfold our
griefs,
We are denied access unto his person,
Ev'n by those men that most have done us
wrong.
SHAKSPEARE.
A substitute shines brightly as a king,
Unless a king be by ; and then his state
Empties itself, as doth an inland brook
Into the main of waters.
SHAKSPEARE.
What surety of the world, what hope, what stay,
When this was once a king, and now is clay?
SHAKSPEARE.
Our coronation done, we will accite,
As I before remember' d, all our state ;
And (Heav'n consigning to my good intents)
No prince, nor peer, shall have just cause to say,
Heav'n shorten Harry's happy life one day.
SHAKSPEARE.
What infinite heart's ease must kings neglect
That private men enjoy?
And what have kings that privates have not too,
Save ceremony, save general ceremony ?
SHAKSPEARE.
He makes for England, here to claim the crown.
Is the chair empty? Is the sword unsway'd?
Is the king dead ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Then, happy low, lie down !
Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.
SHAKSPEARE.
Let us sit upon the ground,
And tell sad stories of the death of kings :
How some have been deposed, some slain in war,
Some haunted by the ghosts they dispossess'd,
Some poisoned by their wives, some sleeping
kill'd:
All murder' d.
SHAKSPEARE.
They rise with fear, and lie with danger down :
Huge are the cares that wait upon the crown.
EARL OF STIRLING : Darius.
A prince, the moment he is crown'd,
Inherits every virtue round,
As emblems of the sovereign pow'r,
Like other baubles of the Tow'r.
SWIFT.
The man whom heav'n appoints
To govern others, should himself first learn
To bend his passions to the sway of reason.
THOMSON : Tancred and Sigismunda.
Such kings
Favour the innocent, repress the bold,
And, while they flourish, make an age of gold.
WALLER.
KNAVES.
A knave's a knave to me in ev'ry state;
Alike my scorn if he succeed or fail ;
Sporus at court, or Japhet in a jail.
POPE.
Yes, while I live, no rich or noble knave
Shall walk the world in credit to his grave.
POPE.
KNOWLEDGE.
283
KNOWLEDGE.
Man loves knowledge, and the beams of truth
More welcome touch his understanding's eye
Than all the blandishments of sound his ear,
Than all of taste his tongue.
AKENSIDE.
The mind of man is this world's true dimension;
And knowledge is the measure of the mind :
And as the mind in her vast comprehension
Contains more worlds than all the world can
find,
So knowledge doth itself far more extend
Than all the minds of man can comprehend.
LORD BROOKE.
Knowledge is not happiness, and science
But an exchange of ignorance for that
Which is another kind of ignorance.
BYRON: Manfred.
Sorrow is knowledge : they who know the most
Must mourn the deepest o'er the fatal truth :
The tree of knowledge is not that of life.
BYRON : Manfred.
He did the utmost bounds of knowledge find,
Yet found them not so large as was his mind.
COWLEY.
Knowledge and wisdom, far from being one,
Have ofttimes no connection. Knowledge
dwells
In heads replete with thoughts of other men,
Wisdom in minds attentive to their own.
COWPER.
Knowledge is proud that he has learn'd so
much ;
Wisdom is humble that he knows no more.
COWPER.
Here in this world they do much knowledge
read,
And are the casements which admit most light.
SIR J. DAVIES.
First in man's mind we find an appetite
To learn and know the truth of everything;
Which is connatural, and born with it.
SIR J. DAVIES.
Through seas of knowledge we our course
advance,
Discov'ring still new worlds of ignorance
And these discov'ries make us all confess
That sublunary science is but guess.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Can knowledge have no bound, but must
advance
So far to make us wish for ignorance ?
And rather in the dark to grope our way,
Than, led by a false guide, to err by day?
SIR J. DENHAM.
The tree of knowledge, blasted by disputes,
Produces sapless leaves instead of fruits.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Though the offending part felt mortal pain,
Th' immortal part its knowledge did retain.
SIR J. DENHAM.
If our lives' motions theirs must imitate,
Our knowledge like our blood must circulate.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Till through those clouds the sun of knowledge
brake,
And Europe from her lethargy did wake.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Search not to find what lies too deeply hid ;
Nor to know things whose knowledge is forbid.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Who in deep mines for hidden knowledge toils,
Like guns o'ercharged, breaks, misses, or recoils.
SIR J. DENHAM.
You are good, but from a nobler cause ;
From your own knowledge, not from nature's
laws.
DRYDEN.
Of all your knowledge this vain fruit you have;
To walk with eyes broad open to the grave.
DRYDEN.
Knowledge of all avails the human kind ;
For all beyond the grave are joys of mind.
HOGG.
Mother of science, now I feel thy power
Within me clear, not only to discern
Things in their causes, but to trace the ways
Of highest agents, deem'd however wise.
MILTON.
Gently instructed I shall hence depart,
Greatly in peace of thought, and have my fill
Of knowledge what this vessel can contain.
MILTON.
The wish to know the endless thirst,
Which even by quenching is awaked,
And which becomes or bless' d or cursed,
As is the fount whereat 'tis slaked.
MOORE : Loves of the Angels.
284
KNO WLED GE. LAB O UR.
Life's stream hurries all too fast ;
In vain sedate reflections we would make,
When half our knowledge we must snatch, not
take.
POPE.
Some secret truths, from learned pride con-
ceal'd,
To maids alone and children are reveal'd;
What though no credit doubting wits may give,
The fair and innocent shall still believe.
POPE.
Remember that the cursed desire to know,
Offspring of Adam ! was thy source of woe :
Why wilt thou, then, renew the vain pursuit,
And rashly catch at the forbidden fruit ?
With empty labour and eluded strife,
Seeking by knowledge to attain to life.
PRIOR.
Knowledge, when wisdom is too weak to guide
her,
Is like a headstrong horse that throws the rider.
QUARLES.
Knowledge descries alone, wisdom applies ;
That makes some fools, this maketh none but
wise.
In my afflictions, knowledge apprehends
Who is the author, what the cause and ends :
It finds that patience is my sad relief,
And that the hand that caused can cure my
grief.
QUARLES.
By knowledge we do learn ourselves to know,
And what to man and what to God we owe.
SPENSER.
Let knowledge grow from more to more,
But more of reverence in us dwell;
That mind and soul, according well,
May make one music as before.
TENNYSON : In Memoriam.
O fertile head, which ev'ry year
Could such a crop of wonders bear !
Which, might it never have been cast,
Each year's growth added to the last,
The lofty branches had supplied
The earth's bold sons prodigious pride.
WALLER.
LABOUR.
From labour health, from health contentment
spring ;
Contentment opes the source of every joy.
BEATTIE: Minstrel.
Come, my fair love ! our morning's task we lose :
Some labour e'en the easiest life would choose :
Ours is not great; the dangling boughs to crop,
Whose too luxuriant growth our alleys stop.
DRYDEN.
With lifted arms they order every blow,
And chime their sounding hammers in a row ;
With labour'd anvils ^Etna groans below.
DRYDEN.
If little labour, little are our gains :
Man's fortunes are according to his pains.
HERRICK.
Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate ;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labour and to wait.
LONGFELLOW.
The field
To labour calls us, now with sweat imposed,
Though after sleepless night.
MILTON,
God hath set
Labour and rest, as day and night, to men,
Successive.
MILTON.
Man hath his daily work of body or mind
Appointed, which declares his dignity;
While other animals unactive range,
And of their doings God takes no account.
MILTON.
Not so strictly hath our Lord imposed
Labour, as to debar us when we need
Refreshment, whether food, or talk between,
Food of the mind.
MILTON.
Great things of small
One can create, and, in what place soe'er,
Thrive under evil, and work ease out of pain,
Through labour and endurance.
MILTON.
LAB O UR. LANDSCAPES.
285
Yet hence the poor are clothed, the hungry fed,
Health to himself, and to his infants bread,
The lab'rer bears.
POPE.
Anxious pains we all the day,
In search of what we like, employ ;
Scorning at night the worthless prey,
We find the labour gave the joy.
PRIOR.
If all the world were playing holidays,
To sport would be as tedious as to work ;
But when they seldom come, they wish'd-for
come.
SHAKSPEARE.
Service shall with steeled sinews toil,
And labour shall refresh itself with hope.
SHAKSPEARE.
The sweet thoughts do even refresh my labour,
Most busiless when I do it.
SHAKSPEARE.
Now all labour
Mars what it does, yea, very force entangles
Itself with strength.
SHAKSPEARE.
He cannot long hold out these pangs,
Th' incessant care and labour of his mind.
SHAKSPEARE.
But after labours long, and sad delay,
Bring them to joyous rest, and endless bliss.
SPENSER.
Our ardent labours for the toys we seek
Join night to day, and Sunday to the week.
YOUNG.
LANDSCAPES.
But I've already troubled you too long,
Nor dare attempt a more advent'rous song:
My humble verse demands a softer theme,
A painted meadow, or a purling stream.
ADDISON.
Where silver lakes, with verdant shadows
crown'd,
Disperse a grateful chillness all around.
ADDISON.
See the sweet brooks in silver mazes creep,
Enrich the meadows, and supply the deep.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Low at his foot a spacious plain is placed,
Between the mountain and the stream embraced ;
Which shade and shelter from the hill derives,
While the kind river wealth and beauty gives.
SIR J. DENHAM.
A sylvan scene, which, rising by degrees,
Leads up the eye below, nor gluts the sight
With one full prospect, but invites by many
To view at last the whole.
DRYDEN.
Please that sylvan scene to take
Where whistling winds uncertain shadows make;
Or will you to the cooler cave succeed,
Whose mouth the curling vines have overspread ?
DRYDEN.
In the midst of this fair valley stood
A native theatre, which, rising slow,
By just degrees o'erlook'd the ground below.
DRYDEN.
Now the dew with spangles deck'd the ground,
A sweeter spot of earth was never found.
DRYDEN.
Let purling streams be in her fancy seen,
And flow'ry meads, and vales of cheerful green.
DRYDEN.
The carpet ground shall be with leaves o'er-
spread,
And boughs shall weave a covering for your
head.
DRYDEN.
Ever charming, ever new,
When will the landscape tire the view ?
DYER : Grongar Hill.
Murm'ring waters fall
Down the slope hills dispersed, or in a lake,
That to the fringed bank with myrtle crown'd
Her crystal mirror holds, unite their streams.
MILTON.
About me round I saw
Hill, dale, and shady woods, and sunny plains,
And liquid lapse of murm'ring streams.
MILTON.
A mountain, at whose verdant feet
A spacious plain, outstretch'd in circuit wide,
Lay pleasant.
MILTON.
The quaint mazes in the wanton green,
For want of tread, are undistinguishable.
MILTON.
286
LANDSCAPES. LA UGHTER.LA W.
O'er the smooth enamell'd green,
Where no print of step hath been,
Follow me as I sing.
MILTON.
Fortunate fields, and groves, and flow'ry vales :
Thrice happy isles !
MILTON.
There, interspersed in lawns and op'ning glades,
Thin trees arise that shun each other's shades.
POPE.
Here, arm'd with silver bows, in early dawn,
Her buskin'd virgins traced the dewy lawn.
POPE.
Who for thy table feeds the wanton fawn,
For him as kindly spreads the flow'ry lawn.
POPE.
Make Windsor's hills in lofty numbers rise,
And lift her turrets nearer to the skies.
POPE.
Here hills and vales, the woodland and the plain,
Here earth and water seem to strive again.
POPE.
Here, in full light, the russet plains extend;
There, wrapt in clouds, the bluish hills ascend.
POPE.
And with each end of thy blue bow dost crown
My bosky acres and my unshrubb'd down.
SHAKSPEARE.
There fall those sapphire-colour' d brooks,
Which, conduit-like, with curious crooks,
Sweet islands make in that sweet land.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
On each hand the gushing waters play,
And down the rough cascade white dashing fall,
Or gleam in lengthen'd vistas through the trees.
THOMSON.
Among the crooked lanes, on every hedge,
The glow-worm lights his gem.
THOMSON.
LAUGHTER.
Sometimes a violent laughter screw'd his face,
And sometimes ready tears dropp'd down apace.
COWLEY.
Soft elocution doth thy style renown,
Gentle or sharp, according to thy choice,
To laugh at follies, or to lash at vice.
DRYDEN.
And while it lasts, let buffoonery succeed,
To make us laugh ; for never was more need.
DRYDEN.
Laugh not too much; the witty man laughs
least:
For wit is news only to ignorance :
Less at thine own things laugh ; lest in the jest
Thy person share, and the conceit advance.
GEORGE HERBERT.
Sport, that wrinkled care derides,
And Laughter, holding both his sides;
Come and trip it, as you go,
On the light fantastic toe.
MILTON.
At all I laugh, he laughs no doubt ;
The only difference is, I dare laugh out.
POPE.
Laugh at your friends ; and if your friends are
sore,
So much the better, you may laugh the more.
POPE.
To laugh were want of goodness and of grace ;
And to be grave, exceeds all power of face.
POPE.
Whose laughs are hearty, though his jests are
coarse,
And loves you best of all things but his horse.
POPE.
Madness, we fancy, gave an ill-timed birth
To grinning laughter and to frantic mirth.
PRIOR.
We look before and after,
And pine for what is not;
Our sincerest laughter
With some pain is fraught.
SHELLEY.
Folly painting humour, grave himself,
Calls laughter forth.
THOMSON.
LAW.
Shall poesy, like law, turn wrong to right,
And dedications wash an ^thiop white ?
See they suffer death;
But in their deaths remember they are men :
Strain not the laws to make their torture griev-
ous.
ADDISON.
LAW.
287
Remember, O my friends, the laws, the rights,
The gen'rous plan of power deliver'd down
From age to age to your renown' d forefathers.
ADDISON.
Could any but a knowing prudent cause
Begin such motions, and assign such laws ?
If the great Mind had form'd a different frame,
Might not your wanton wit the system blame ?
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
A conscious, wise, reflecting cause,
Which freely moves, and acts by reason's laws,
That can deliberate means elect, and find
Their due connection with the end design'd.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Nature's law, and unrepeal'd command,
That gives to lighter things the greatest height.
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Laws do not put the least restraint
Upon our freedom, but maintain 't;
Or if it does, 'tis for our good,
To give us freer latitude ;
For wholesome laws preserve us free
By stinting of our liberty.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
He that with injury is grieved,
And goes to law to be relieved,
Is sillier than a sottish chouse.
Who, when a thief has robb'd his house,
Applies himself to cunning men
To help him to his goods again.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
Witnesses, like watches, go
Just as they're set, too fast or slow ;
And, where in conscience they're strait-laced,
'Tis ten to one that side is cast.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
Until with subtle cobweb cheats,
They're catch'd in knotted law, like nets ;
In which, when once they are imbrangled,
The more they stir, the more they're tangled.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
Why should not conscience have vacation,
As well as other courts o' th' nation ?
Have equal power to adjourn,
Appoint appearance and return?
BUTLER : Hudibras.
What's justice to a man, or laws,
That never comes within their claws ?
BUTLER : Hudibras.
Oaths were not purposed more than law
To keep the good and just in awe,
But to confine the bad and sinful,
Like moral cattle in a pinfold.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
This forced the stubborn'st, for the cause,
To cross the cudgels to the laws,
That what by breaking them 't had gain'd
By their support might be maintain'd.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
And when th' are hamper'd by the laws,
Release the lab'rers for the cause.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
The law, that settles all you do,
And marries where you did but woo,
And if it judge upon your side,
Will soon extend her for your bride,
And put her person, goods, or lands,
Or which you like best, int' your hands.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
No choice was left his feelings or his pride,
Save death or Doctors' Commons so he died.
BYRON.
Six hours in sleep, in law's grave study six,
Four spend in prayer, the rest on nature fix.
Quoted in Latin by SIR E. COKE.
God gave him reverence of laws,
Yet stirring blood in freedom's cause,
A spirit to the rocks akin,
The eye of the hawk, and the fire therein.
COLERIDGE.
Where honour or where conscience does not
bind,
No other law shall shackle me ;
Slave to myself I will not be,
Nor shall my future actions be confined
By my own present mind.
COWLEY.
French laws forbid the female reign,
Yet love does them to slavery draw.
COWLEY.
To give religion her unbridled scope,
Nor judge by statute a believer's hope.
COWPER: Table-Talk.
Thus look'd he proudly on the vulgar crew,
Whom statutes govern, and whom fears subdue.
CRABBE.
Laws support those crimes they check' d before,
And executions now affright no more.
CREECH.
288
LA W.
The fix'd, unalterable laws,
Settling the same effect on the same cause.
CREECH.
The Norman conquering all by might,
Mixing our customs, and the form of right,
With foreign constitutions he had brought.
DANIEL.
One says, he never should endure the sight
Of that forsworn, that wrongs both lands and
laws.
DANIEL.
The laws are sinfully contrived. Justice
Should weigh the present crime, not future
Inference on deeds.
SIR W. DAVENANT : Just Italian,
If then a man, on light conditions, gain
A great estate to him and his, forever,
If wilfully he forfeit it again,
Who doth bemoan his heir, or blame the giver ?
SIR J. DAVIES.
When she from sundry arts one skill doth draw;
Gath'ring from divers fights one act of war ;
From many causes like, one rule of law :
These her collections, not the senses are.
SIR J. DAVIES.
As chymists gold from brass by fire would draw,
Pretexts are into treason forged by law.
SIR J. DENHAM.
He that dares to die
May laugh at the grim face of lawy and scorn
The cruel wrinkle of a tyrant brow.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Then withdraw
From Cambridge, thy old nurse; and, as the
rest,
Here toughly chew and sturdily digest
Th' immense vast volumes of our common law.
DONNE.
Not pedant's motley tongue, soldier's bombast,
Mountebank's drug-tongue, nor the terms of
law,
Are strong enough preparatives to draw
Me to hear this.
DONNE.
Wise legislators never yet could draw
A fox within the reach of common law :
For posture, dress, grimace, and affectation,
Though foes to sense, are harmless to the nation.
Our last redress is dint of verse to try,
And satire is our court of chancery.
DRYDEN.
With your cost you terminate the cause,
And save th' expense of long litigious laws,
Where suits are traversed, and so little won
That he who conquers is but last undone.
DRYDEN.
If men forswear the deeds and bonds they draw,
Though sign'd with all formality of law,
And though the signing and the seal proclaim
The barefaced perjury, and fix the shame.
DRYDEN.
Behold the law
And rule of beings in your Maker's mind ;
And thence, like limbecs, rich ideas draw,
To fit the levell'd use of human kind.
DRYDEN.
To kill man-killers man has lawful pow'r,
But not th' extended license to devour.
DRYDEN.
To swear he saw three inches through a door,
As Asiatic evidences swore.
DRYDEN.
Since once the living villains dare emplead,
Arraign them in the persons of the dead.
DRYDEN.
Nor seek to know
Their process, or the forms of law below.
DRYDEN.
I beg your greatness not to give the law
In other realms; but beaten, to withdraw.
DRYDEN.
Then those, whom form of laws
Condemn'd to die, when traitors judged their
cause.
DRYDEN.
Were he not by law withstood,
He'd manifest his own in human blood.
DRYDEN.
You should be hunted like a beast of prey ;
By your own law I take your life away.
DRYDEN.
No law betwixt two sov'reigns can decide
But that of arms, where fortune is the judge,
Soldiers the lawyers, and the bar the field.
DRYDEN.
Needless was written law, where none opprest;
The law of man was written in his breast.
DRYDEN.
Unhappy man ! to break the pious laws
Of nature, pleading in his children's cause !
DRYDEN.
LAW.
289
At each assize and term we try
A thousand rascals of as deep a dye.
DRYDEN.
There then we met; both tried, and both were
cast,
And this irrevocable sentence past.
DRYDEN.
A war ensues; the Cretans own their cause,
Stiff to defend their hospitable laws.
DRYDEN.
O queen ! indulged by favour of the gods
To build a town, with statutes to restrain
The wild inhabitants beneath thy reign.
DRYDEN.
You promised once a progeny divine
Of Romans, rising from the Trojan line,
In after-times should hold the world in awe,
And to the land and ocean give the law.
DRYDEN.
These, if the laws did that exchange afford,
Would save their lapdog sooner than their lord.
DRYDEN.
To peaceful Rome new laws ordain ;
CalPd from his mean abode a sceptre to sustain.
DRYDEN.
Salius then, exclaiming aloud,
Urges his cause may in the court be heard,
And pleads the prize is wrongfully conferr'd.
DRYDEN.
Shall freeborn men, in humble awe,
Submit to servile shame,
Who from consent and custom draw
The same right to be ruled by law,
Which kings pretend to reign ?
DRYDEN.
The bees have common cities of their own,
And common sort ; beneath one law they live,
And with one common stock their traffic drive.
DRYDEN.
No courts created yet, nor cause was heard ;
But all was safe, for conscience was their guard.
DRYDEN.
Some at the bar with subtilty defend
The cause of an unlearned noble friend.
DRYDEN.
Curse on th' unpard'ning prince, whom tears
can draw
To no remorse ; who rules by lion's law.
DRYDEN.
19
Then they who brothers' better claim disown
Defraud their clients, and, to lucre sold,
Sit brooding on unprofitable gold.
DRYDEN.
Some laws ordain, and some attend the choice
Of holy senates, and elect by voice.
DRYDEN.
Was ever criminal forbid to plead?
Curb your ill-manner'd zeal.
DRYDEN.
What ! since the praetor did my fetters loose,
And left me freely at my own dispose,
May I not live without control and awe,
Excepting still the letter of the law ?
DRYDEN.
My flocks, my fields, my woods, my pastures
take,
With settlement as good as law can make.
DRYDEN.
Our penal laws no sons of yours admit ;
Our test excludes your tribe from benefit.
DRYDEN.
The jealous sects that dare not trust their cause
So far from their own will as to the laws,
You for their umpire and their synod take.
DRYDEN.
A spirit fit to start an empire,
And look the world to law. DRYDEN.
My cause is call'd, and that long-look'd-for day
Is still incumber'd with some new delay.
DRYDEN.
Ask not what pains, nor further seek to know
Their process, or the forms of law below.
DRYDEN.
There's joy when to wild will you laws pre-
scribe ;
When you bid fortune carry back her bribe.
DRYDEN.
'Tis the procession of a funeral vow,
Which cruel laws to Indian wives allow.
DRYDEN.
'Tis law, though custom now diverts the course :
As nature's institute is yet in force,
UncancelPd, though disused. DRYDEN.
At length the muses stand restored again,
While you dispense the laws and guide the state.
DRYDEN.
290
LAW.
Pygmalion then the Tynan sceptre sway'd,
One who contemn' d divine and human laws;
Then strife ensued.
DRYDEN.
Add long prescription of establish'd laws,
And pique of honour to maintain a cause,
And shame of change.
DRYDEN.
The man who laugh'd but once to see an ass
Mumbling to make the gross-grain'd thistles pass,
Might laugh again to see a jury chaw
The prickles of unpalatable law.
DRYDEN.
Our law, that did a boundless ocean seem,
Was coasted all and fathom'd all by him.
DRYDEN : on Heneage Finch.
Since laws were made for ev'ry degree,
To curb vice in others, as well as in me.
GAY: Beggar's Opera.
Laws grind the poor, and rich men rule the law.
GOLDSMITH : Traveller.
Such precedents are numberless ; we draw
Our right from custom : custom is a law.
GRANVILLE.
The princes differ and divide;
Some follow law, and some with beauty side.
GRANVILLE.
For our reward,
All our debts are paid ; dangers of law,
Actions, decrees, judgments against us quitted.
BEN JONSON.
The good need fear no law ;
It is his safety, and the bad man's awe.
BEN JONSON.
Or the saddle turn'd round, or the girths brake ;
For low on the ground, woe for his sake,
The law is found.
BEN JONSON.
A single jail, in Alfred's golden reign,
Could half the nation's criminals contain;
Fair justice then, without constraint adored,
Held high the steady scale, but sheathed the
sword ;
No spies were paid, no special juries known ;
Blest age ! but ah ! how different from our own !
DR. JOHNSON : London.
And sovereign law, that state's collected will,
O'er thrones and globes elate,
Sits empress, crowning good, repressing ill.
SIR WM. JONES.
Seven hours to law, to soothing slumber seven,
Ten to the world allot, and all to heaven.
SIR WM. JONES.
What can innocence hope for,
When such as sit her judges are corrupted?
MASSINGER : Maid of Honour.
Whoso loves law dies either mad or poor.
MIDDLETON : Phcenix.
What rests but that the mortal sentence pass ?
MILTON.
The third best absent is condemn'd,
Convict by flight, and rebel to all law ;
Conviction to the serpent none belongs.
MILTON.
This also shall they gain by their delay
In the wide wilderness : there they shall found
Their government, and their great senate choose,
Through the twelve tribes, to rule by laws or-
dain' d.
MILTON.
This yet I apprehend not, why to those
Among whom God will deign to dwell on earth,
So many and so various laws are given ;
So many laws argue so many sins !
MILTON.
God, from Sinai descending, will himself,
In thunder, lightning, and loud trumpet's sound,
Ordain them laws; part such as appertain
To civil justice ; part, religious rites
Of sacrifice.
MILTON.
Nor can this be
But by fulfilling that which thou dost want,
Obedience to the law.
MILTON.
So violence
Proceeded, and oppression, and sword-law,
Through all the plain, and refuge none was
found.
MILTON.
Laws which none shall find
Left them enroll'd ; or what the spirit within
Shall on the heart engrave.
MILTON.
Laws can discover sin, but not remove.
MILTON.
But you invert the cov'nants of her trust,
And harshly deal, like an ill borrower,
With that which you received on other terms.
MILTON.
LA IV.
291
If aught against my life
Thy country sought of thee, it sought unjustly,
Against the law of nature, law of nations.
MILTON.
Justice is lame, as well as blind, amongst us :
The laws, corrupted to their ends that make
them,
Serve but for instruments of some new tyranny,
That every day starts up t' enslave us deeper.
OTWAY : Venice Preserved,
Once (says an author, where, I need not say)
Two travelers found an oyster in their way :
Both fierce, both hungry, the dispute grew strong,
While, scale in hand, Dame Justice pass'd along.
Before her each with clamour plead the laws,
Explain'd the matter, and would win the cause.
Dame Justice, weighing long the doubtful right,
Takes, opens, swallows it before their sight.
The cause of strife removed so rarely well,
There, take (says Justice), take ye each a shell;
We thrive at Westminster on fools like you :
'T was a fat oyster: live in peace: adieu!
POPE: from Boileati.
But we, brave Britons, foreign laws despised,
And kept unconquer'd, and uncivilized ;
Fierce for the liberties of wit, and bold,
We still defied the Romans, as of old.
POPE.
Yes, the last pen for freedom let me draw,
When truth stands trembling on the edge of law.
POPE.
Your plea is good ; but still I say, Beware ;
Laws are explain'd by men : so have a care.
POPE.
In such a cause the plaintiff will be hiss'd,
My lords the judges laugh, and you're dismiss'd.
POPE.
Certain laws, by stiff rers thought unjust,
Denied all posts of profit or of trust.
POPE.
The laws of God, as well as of the land,
Abhor a perpetuity should stand ;
Estates have wings, and hang in fortune's power.
POPE.
Your country, chief in arms, abroad defend ;
At home, with morals, arts, and laws amend.
POPE.
What's property? you see it alter,
Or, in a mortgage, prove a lawyer's share,
Or, in a jointure, vanish from the heir.
POPE.
No statute in his favour says
How free or frugal I shall pass my days ;
I who at some times spend, at others spare ;
Divided between carelessness and care.
POPE.
Speech submissively withdraws
From rights of subjects, and the poor man's
cause ;
Then pompous silence reigns, and stills the
noisy laws.
POPE.
All look up, with reverential awe,
At crimes that 'scape or triumph o'er the law.
POPE.
Ye know the spheres and various tasks assign'd
By laws eternal to th' ethereal kind.
POPE.
Thus long-succeeding cities justly reign'd,
License repress'd, and useful laws ordain'd ;
Learning and Rome alike in empire grew.
POPE.
Indentures, cov'nants, articles they draw,
Large as the fields themselves ; and larger far
Than civil codes with all their glosses are.
POPE.
With equal justice and historic care,
Their laws, their toils, their arms, with his
compare.
PRIOR.
Illustrious virtues, who by turns have rose,
With happy laws her empire to sustain,
And with full pow'r assert her ambient main.
PRIOR.
Justice submitted to what Abra pleased :
Her will alone could settle or revoke,
And law was fix'd by what she latest spoke.
PRIOR.
The goddess, studious of her Grecians' fate,
Sought them in laws and letters to excel,
In acting justly and in writing well.
PRIOR.
He died obedient to severest law :
Forbid to tread the promised land he saw.
PRIOR.
Witness for me, ye awful gods !
I took not arms till urged by self-defence,
The eldest law of nature.
ROWE.
292
LAW.
The great King of kings
Hath in the table of his law commanded
That thou shalt do no murder ; will you then
Spurn at his edict, and fulfil a man's ?
SHAKSPEARE.
He hath resisted law,
And therefore law shall scorn him further trial
Than the severity of public power.
SHAKSPEARE.
This bond is forfeit ;
And lawfully by this the Jew may claim
A pound of flesh.
SHAKSPEARE.
If you deny me, fie upon your law !
There is no force in the decrees of Venice :
I stand for judgment : answer, shall I have it ?
SHAKSPEARE.
If you deny it, let the danger light
Upon your charter, and your city's freedom.
SHAKSPEARE.
Till thou canst rail the seals from off my bond,
Thou but offend'st thy lungs to speak so loud.
SHAKSPEARE.
There is no power in Venice
Can alter a decree established :
'Twill be recorded for a precedent;
And many an error, by the same example,
Will rush into the state : it cannot be.
SHAKSPEARE.
I charge you by the law,
Whereof you are a well-deserving pillar,
Proceed to judgment.
SHAKSPEARE.
I beseech you,
Wrest once the law to your authority :
To do a great right, do a little wrong.
SHAKSPEARE.
The law hath yet another hold on you.
SHAKSPEARE.
It is enacted in the laws of Venice,
If it be proved against an alien
He seeks the life of any citizen,
The party 'gainst the which he doth contrive
Shall seize on half his goods.
SHAKSPEARE.
The world is not thy friend, nor the world's law :
The world affords no law to make thee rich ;
Then be not poor, .but break it and take this.
SHAKSPEARE.
Such mortal drugs I have, but Mantua's law
Is death to any he that utters them.
SHAKSPEARE.
When every case in law is right.
SHAKSPEARE.
According to our law,
Depose him in the justice of his cause.
SHAKSPEARE.
If little faults, proceeding on distemper,
Shall not be wink'd at, how shall we stretch our
eye
When capital crimes, chew'd, swallow'd, and
digested,
Appear before us ? SHAKSPEARE. '
Proceed by process,
Lest parties, as he is beloved, break out.
SHAKSPEARE.
Take heed, for he holds vengeance in his hancl.
To hurl upon their heads that break his law.
SHAKSPEARE.
Though well we may not pass upon his life
Without the form of justice, yet our pow'r
Shall do a courtesy to our wrath, which men
May blame, but not control.
SHAKSPEARE.
Pluck down my officers, break my decrees ;
For now a time is come to mock at form.
SHAKSPEARE.
Be you contented
To have a son set your decrees at naught,
To pluck down justice from your awful bench ?
SHAKSPEARE.
By thine own tongue thou art condemn'd, and
must
Endure our law.
SHAKSPEARE.
Now that God and friends
Have turn'd my captive state to liberty,
At our enlargement what are thy due fees ?
SHAKSPEARE.
For you, fair Hermia, look you arm yourself
To fit your fancies to your father's will ;
Or else the law of Athens yields you up
To death, or to a vow of single life.
SHAKSPEARE.
I have been a truant to the law
I never yet could frame my will to it,
And therefore frame the law unto my will.
SHAKSPEARE.
LAW.
293
Before I be convict by course of law,
To threaten me with death is most unlawful.
SHAKSPEARE.
The law hath judged thee, Eleanor:
I cannot justify whom law condemns.
SHAKSPEARE.
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's con-
tumely,
The pang of despised love, the law's delay.
SHAKSPEARE.
The jury, passing on the prisoner's life,
May in the sworn twelve have a thief or two
Guiltier than him they try.
SHAKSPEARE.
How innocent I was,
This noble jury and foul cause can witness.
SHAKSPEARE.
I will not tarry ; no, nor ever more
Upon this business my appearance make
In any of their courts.
SHAKSPEARE.
Of my land,
Loyal and natural boy ! I'll work the means
To make thee capable.
SHAKSPEARE.
His offence is so, as it appears
Accountant to the law upon that pain.
SHAKSPEARE.
There is a law in each well-order' d nation
To curb those raging appetites that are
Most disobedient and refractory.
SHAKSPEARE.
Your brother is a forfeit of the law,
And you but waste your words.
SHAKSPEARE.
We have strict statutes, and most biting laws
(The needful bits and curbs to headstrong steeds),
Which for these fourteen years we have let sleep,
Even like an overgrown lion in a cave,
That goes not out to prey.
SHAKSPEARE.
So our decrees,
Dead to infliction, to themselves are dead ;
And liberty plucks justice by the nose.
SHAKSPEARE.
Pity is the virtue of the law,
And none but tyrants use it cruelly.
SHAKSPEARE.
We must not make a scarecrow of the law,
Setting it up to fear the birds of prey,
And let it keep one shape, till custom make it
Their perch, and not their terror.
SHAKSPEARE.
Those many had not dared to do that evil
If the first man that did th' edict infringe
Had answer'd for his deed.
SHAKSPEARE.
The duke's unjust
Thus to retort your manifest appeal,
And put your trial in the villain's mouth
Whom here you come to accuse.
SHAKSPEARE.
It pleases time and fortune to lie heavy
Upon a friend of mine, who, in hot blood,
Hath stept into the law, which is past depth
To those that without heed do plunge into it.
SHAKSPEARE.
I am a subject,
And challenge law ; attorneys are denied me ;
And therefore personally I lay my claim
To mine inheritance.
SHAKSPEARE.
He now, forsooth, takes on him to reform
Some certain edicts, and some strait decrees,
That lay too heavy on the commonwealth.
SHAKSPEARE.
Stubbornly he did repugn the truth,
About a certain question in the law.
SHAKSPEARE.
When he had no power,
He was your enemy ; still spake against
Your liberties and charters.
SHAKSPEARE.
Still you keep o' the windy side of the law.
SHAKSPEARE.
If I shall be condemn'd
Upon surmises, all proofs sleeping else
But what your jealousies await, I tell you,
'Tis rigour, and not law.
SHAKSPEARE.
I'll undertake to bring him
Where he shall answer by a lawful form,
In peace, to his utmost peril.
SHAKSPEARE.
The brain may devise laws
For the blood, but a hot temper leaps o'er
A cold decree.
SHAKSPEARE.
294
LA IV. LA WYERS.
Blood hath been shed
Ere human statute purged the general weal.
SHAKSPEARE.
Your scope is as mine own,
So to enforce or qualify the laws
As to your soul seems good.
SHAKSPEARE.
After this cold consid'rance sentence me.
SHAKSPEARE.
To her laws
We do deliver you.
SHAKSPEARE.
In the corrupted currents of this world,
Offence's gilded hand may shove by justice;
And oft the wicked prize itself
Buys out the law.
SHAKSPEARE.
The bloody book of law
You shall yourself read in the bitter letter,
After your own sense ; yea, though our proper
son
Stood in your action.
SHAKSPEARE.
'Tis not ever
The justice and the truth o' th' question carries
The due o' the verdict with it. At what ease
Might corrupt minds procure knaves as corrupt
To swear against you ! such things have been
done.
SHAKSPEARE.
I do not love
Much ceremony; suits in love should not,
Like suits in law, be rock'd from term to term.
SHIRLEY.
Had women been the makers of our laws,
The men should slave at cards from morn to
night.
SWIFT.
If the heavenly folk should know
These pleadings in the- court below.
SWIFT.
'Tis not the coarser tie of human law
That binds their peace.
THOMSON.
Just men, by whom impartial laws were given;
And saints, who taught and led the way to
heaven.
TICKELL: on the Death of Addis on.
No man e'er felt the halter draw
With good opinion of the law.
TRUMBULL: McFingal.
Law-giving heroes, famed for taming brutes,
And raising cities with their charming lutes.
WALLER.
Having infringed the law, I waive my right
As king, and thus submit myself to fight.
WALLER.
To do thee honour I will shed their blood,
Which the just laws, if I were faultless, should.
WALLER.
When the law shows her teeth, but dares not
bite,
And South-Sea treasures are not brought to light.
YOUNG.
Instructive satire ; true to virtue's cause !
Thou shining supplement of public laws !
YOUNG.
LAWYERS.
Cato's voice was ne'er employ'd
To clear the guilty, and to varnish crimes.
ADDISON.
With books and money placed for show,
Like nest-eggs, to make clients lay,
And for his false opinion pay.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
Others believe no voice t' an organ
So sweet as lawyer's in his bar-gown,
Until with subtle cobweb cheats
They're catch'd in knotted law, like nets-
In which, when once they are imbrangled,
The more they stir, the more they're tangled.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
I wait not at the lawyer's gates,
Nor shoulder-climbers down the stairs.
CAREW.
Now like a lawyer, when he land would get,
Or sell fee-simples in his master's name.
CHAUCER.
Now he exacts of all, wastes in delight,
Riots in pleasure, and neglects the law.
DANIEL.
Men such as choose
Law practice for mere gam.
DONNE.
Old clients, wearied out with fruitless care,
Dismiss their hopes of eating, and despair ;
Though much against the grain, forced to retire,
Buy roots for supper, and provide a fire.
DRYDEN.
LA WYERS.
295
Learn what thou ow'st thy country and thy
friend,
What's requisite to spare, and what to spend :
Learn this ; and after, envy not the store
Of the greased advocate that grinds the poor.
DRYDEN.
With arts like these rich Matho, when he speaks,
Attracts all fees, and little lawyers breaks.
DRYDEN.
Fabius might joy in Scipio, when he saw
A beardless consul made against the law ;
And join his suffrage to the votes of Rome.
DRYDEN.
The best he was,
And faithfullest expounder of the laws.
DRYDEN.
The purple garments raise the lawyer's fees;
High pomp and state are useful properties.
DRYDEN.
At bar abusive, on the bench unable,
Knave on the woolsack, fop at council-table.
DRYDEN.
The charge is prepared, the lawyers are met,
The judges all ranged ; a terrible show !
GAY: Beggar's Opera.
Their ambush here relentless ruffians lay,
And here the fell attorney prowls for prey.
DR. S. JOHNSON: London.
Men of your large profession that could speak
To every cause, and things mere contraries,
Till they were hoarse again, yet all be law.
BEN JONSON.
Property, you see it alter;
Or, in a mortgage, prove a lawyer's share,
Or, in a jointure, vanish from the heir,
Or, in pure equity (the case not clear),
The chancery takes your rents for twenty year.
POPE.
Is there a variance ? enter but his door,
Balk'd are the courts, and contest is no more;
Despairing quacks with curses left the place,
And vile attorneys, now a useless race.
POPE : Moral Essays.
Alas ! the small discredit of a bribe
Scarce hurts the lawyer, but undoes the scribe.
POPE.
What says my counsel, learned in- the law?
POPE.
Fat fees from the defended Umbrian draws,
And only gains the wealthy client's cause.
POPE.
Graced as thou art, with all the power of words,
So known, so honour'd, at the house of lords:
Conspicuous scene ! another yet is nigh
(More silent far), where kings and poets lie :
Where Murray (long enough his country's
pride)
Shall be no more than Tully or than Hyde !
POPE.
Him you will find in letters and in laws
Not unexpert.
PRIOR.
Your dainty speakers have the curse
To plead bad causes down to worse.
PRIOR.
Some things admit of mediocrity :
A counsellor, or pleader at the bar,
May want Messala's powerful eloquence,
Or be less read than deep Casselius ;
Yet this indiffrent lawyer is esteem'd.
ROSCOMMON.
The busy, subtile serpents of the law
Did first my mind from true obedience draw;
While I did limits to the king prescribe,
And took for oracle that canting tribe.
ROSCOMMON.
Why meet we thus, like wrangling advocates,
To urge the justice of our cause with words ?
ROWE.
Do as adversaries do in law;
Strive mightily, but eat and drink as friends.
SHAKSPEARE.
As I was then
Advertising, and holy to your business,
Not changing heart with habit, I am still
Attornied at your service.
SHAKSPEARE.
Why should calamity be full of words ?
Windy attorneys to their client woes,
Airy succeeders to intestate joys ;
Poor breathing orators of miseries.
SHAKSPEARE.
Malmutius
Ordain'd our laws, whose use the sword of
Caesar
Hath too much mangled.
SHAKSPEARE.
296
LA WYERS. LEARNING.
I will attend my husband ; it is my office ;
And will have no attorney but myself;
And therefore let me have him home.
SHAKSPEARE.
He pleaded still not guilty;
The king's attorney, on the contrary,
Urged on examinations, proofs, confessions,
Of divers witnesses.
SHAKSPEARE.
The nymphs with scorn beheld their foes,
When the defendant's counsel rose ;
And, what no lawyer ever lack'd,
With impudence own'd all the fact.
SWIFT.
The judge
Directed them to mind their brief,
Nor spend their time to show their reading :
She'd have a summary proceeding.
SWIFT.
The brief with weighty crimes was charged,
On which the pleader much enlarged.
SWIFT.
He knows in law nor text nor margint.
SWIFT.
Orphans around his bed the lawyer sees,
And takes the plaintiff's and defendant's fees;
His fellow pick-purse, watching for a job,
Fancies his finger's in the cully's fob.
SWIFT.
Is't not enough the blockhead scarce can read,
But must he wisely look, and gravely plead ?
YOUNG.
LEARNING.
But grant our hero's hopes long toil
And comprehensive genius crown,
Each science and each art his spoil,
Yet what reward, or what renown ?
BENTLEY.
We say that learning's endless, and blame fate
For not allowing life a longer date :
He did the utmost bounds of knowledge find ;
He found them not so large as was his mind.
COWLEY.
He had so many languages in store
That only fame shall speak of him in more.
COWLEY.
Solon the wise his progress never ceased,
But still his learning with his days increased.
SIR J. DENHAM.
When did his pen on learning fix a brand,
Or rail at arts he did not understand ?
DRYDEN.
Fine fruits of learning ! old ambitious fool,
Durst thou apply that adage of the school :
As if 'tis nothing worth, that lies conceal'd ;
And science is not science, till reveal'd ?
DRYDEN.
Without a genius, learning soars in vain,
And without learning, genius sinks again :
Their force united crowns the sprightly reign.
ELPHINSTON.
Learning by study must be won :
'Twas ne'er entail'd from sire to son.
GAY: Fables.
While words of learned length and thund'ring
sound
Amazed the gazing rustics ranged around;
And still they gazed, and still the wonder grew,
That one small head should carry all he knew.
GOLDSMITH: Deserted Village.
The helm may rust, the laurel bough may fade,
Oblivion's grasp may blunt the victor's blade :
But that bright holy wreath which learning gives,
Untorn by hate, unharm'd by envy lives.
GRAHAME.
Learning was posed, philosophy was set,
.Sophisters taken in a fisher's net.
GEORGE HERBERT.
Deign on the passing world to turn thine eyes,
And pause awhile from letters to be wise ;
There mark what ills the scholar's life assail,
Toil, envy, want, the patron, and the jail:
See nations slowly wise and meanly just,
To buried merit raise the tardy bust.
DR. JOHNSON: Vanity of Human Wishes.
A little learning is a dangerous thing!
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring :
There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,
And drinking largely sobers us again.
Fired at first sight with what the muse imparts,
In fearless youth we tempt the height of arts,
While from the bounded level of our mind
Short views we take, nor see the lengths behind ;
But more advanced, behold, with strange sur-
prise,
New distant scenes of endless science rise.
POPE.
From the same foes, at last, both felt their doom ;
And the same age saw learning fall, and Rome.
POPE.
LEARNING. LE TTERS.
297
The vulgar thus by imitation err,
As oft the learn'd by being singular;
So much they scorn the crowd, that if the throng
By chance go right, they purposely go wrong.
POPE.
Love seldom haunts the breast where learning
lies,
And Venus sets ere Mercury can rise.
POPE : Wife of Bath.
Foe to loud praise, and friend to learned ease,
Content with science in the vale of peace.
POPE.
Like buoys that never sink into the flood,
On learning's surface we but lie and nod.
POPE.
Though learn'd, well bred; and though well
bred, sincere;
Modestly bold, and humanly severe.
POPE.
He roll'cl his eyes, that witness'd huge dismay,
Where yet, unpawn'd, much learned lumber lay.
POPE.
But as the slightest sketch, if justly traced,
Is by ill colouring but the more disgraced ;
So by false learning is good sense defaced :
Some are bewilder' d in the maze of schools,
And some made coxcombs nature meant but
fools.
POPE.
Ask of the learn'd the way? The learn'd are
blind ;
This bids to serve, and that to shun, mankind;
Some place the bliss in action, some in ease ;
These call it pleasure, and contentment these.
POPE.
To tongue or pudding thou hast no pretence ;
Learning thy talent is, but mine is sense.
PRIOR.
And by succession of unlearned times,
As bards began, so monks rung on the chimes.
ROSCOMMON.
Let him with pedants hunt for praise in books,
Pore out his life amongst the lazy gownmen,
Grow old and vainly proud in fancied knowl-
edge.
ROWE.
Learning is but an adjunct to ourself;
And where we are, our learning likewise is.
SHAKSPEARE.
\He was a scholar, and a ripe and good one.
SHAKSPEARE.
Why did my parents send me to the schools,
That I with knowledge might enrich my
mind,
Since the desire to learn first made men fools,
And did corrupt the root of all mankind ?
SPENSER.
Learning's little household did embark,
With her world's fruitful system, in her sacred
ark.
SWIFT.
SWIFT.
His learning, though a poet said it,
Before a play would lose no credit.
Aspiring, factious, fierce, and loud,
With grace and learning unendow'd.
SWIFT.
How empty learning, and how vain is art,
But as it mends the life, and guides the heart !
YOUNG : Last Day.
Voracious learning, often overfed,
Digests not into sense her motley meal ;
This bookcase, with dark booty almost burst,
This forager on others' wisdom, leaves
Her native farm, her reason, quite untill'd.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
Much learning shows how little mortals know ;
Much wealth, how little worldlings can enjoy.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
But you are learn'd; in volumes deep you sit;
In wisdom shallow : pompous ignorance !
YOUNG : Night Thoughts.
LETTERS.
Mark if to get them she o'erskip the rest,
Mark if she read them twice, or kiss the name.
DONNE.
The welcome news is in the letter found ;
The carrier's not commission'd to expound;
It speaks itself.
DRYDEN : Religio Laid.
Soon as thy letters trembling I unclose,
That well-known name awakens all my woes.
POPE.
298
LE TTERS. LIBER TY.
Heaven first taught letters for some wretch's
aid,
Some banish'd lover, or some captive maid ;
They live, they speak, they breathe what love
inspires,
Warm from the soul, and faithful to its fires ;
The virgin's wish without her fears impart,
Excuse the blush, and pour out all the heart,
Speed the soft intercourse from soul to soul,
And waft a sigh from Indus to the pole !
POPE: Eloisa.
Let me hear from thee by letters
Of thy success in love ; and what news else
Betideth here in absence of thy friend.
SHAKSPEARE.
For often have you writ to her; and she, in
modesty,
Or else for want of idle time, could not again
reply.
SHAKSPEARE.
LIBERTY.
O liberty ! thou goddess heavenly bright,
Profuse of bliss, and pregnant with delight !
Eternal pleasures in thy presence reign,
And smiling plenty leads thy wanton train.
ADDISON : Italy.
A day, an hour of virtuous liberty
Is worth a whole eternity in bondage.
ADDISON.
When liberty is gone,
Life grows insipid, and has lost its relish.
ADDISON.
It makes the gloomy face of nature gay;
Gives beauty to the sun, and pleasure to the day.
ADDISON.
For freedom's battle, once begun,
Bequeathed by bleeding sire to son,
Though baffled oft, is ever won.
BYRON: Giaour.
The wish which ages have not yet subdued
In man to have no master save his mood.
BYRON: Island.
Eternal spirit of the chainless mind !
Brightest in dungeons, liberty, thou art !
For there thy habitation is the heart
The heart, which love of thee alone can bind.
BYRON : Prisoner of Chilian.
Oh, could I worship aught beneath the skies,
That earth hath seen or fancy can devise,
Thine altar, sacred liberty ! should stand,
Built by no mercenary vulgar hand,
With fragrant turf, and flowers as wild and fair
As ever dress'd a bank, or scented summer air.
COWPER: Charity.
Slaves cannot breathe in England ! if their
lungs
Receive our air, that moment they are free :
They touch our country, and their shackles fall.
That's noble, and bespeaks a nation proud
And jealous of the blessing.
COWPER: Task.
The love of liberty with life is given,
And life itself th' inferior gift of heaven.
DRYDEN.
What should I do ? while here I was enchain'd,
No glimpse of godlike liberty remain'd.
DRYDEN.
Thou canst not be so pleased at liberty,
As I shall be to find thou dar'st be free.
DRYDEN.
He, in a loathsome dungeon doom'd to lie,
In bonds retain'd his birthright liberty,
And shamed oppression, till it set him free.
DRYDEN.
The greatest glory of a free-born people
Is to transmit that freedom to their children.
HAVARD : Regulus.
Yet sometimes nations will decline so low
From virtue, which is reason, that no wrong,
But justice, and some fatal course annex'd,
Deprives them of their outward liberty,
Their inward lost.
MILTON.
They bawl for freedom in their senseless moods,
And still revolt when truth would set them free ;
License they mean, when they cry liberty !
MILTON.
For orders and degrees
Jar not with liberty, but well consist.
MILTON.
Justly thou abhorr'st
That son, who on the quiet state of men
Such trouble brought, affecting to subdue
Rational liberty.
MILTON.
LIBERTY. LIFE.
299
I did but prompt the age to quit their clogs,
By the known rules of ancient liberty.
MILTON.
When will the world shake off such yokes ? oh,
when
Will that redeeming day shine out on men
That shall behold them rise, erect and free,
As heav'n and nature meant mankind should be ?
MOORE : Fudge Family.
Our vanquish'd wills that pleasing force obey :
Her goodness takes our liberty away;
And haughty Britain yields to arbitrary sway.
PRIOR.
I must have liberty,
Withal as large a charter as the wind,
To blow on whom I please ; for so fools have ;
And they that are most galled with my folly,
They most must laugh.
SHAKSPEARE.
Why, headstrong liberty is lash'd with woe :
There's nothing situate under heaven's eye
But hath his bound, in earth, in sea, in sky.
SHAKSPEARE.
They've chose a consul that will from them take
Their liberties ; make them of no more voice
'Hian dogs, that are often beat for barking.
SHAKSPEARE.
Might I but through my prison, once a day,
Behold this maid, all corners else o' th' earth
Let liberty make use of.
SHAKSPEARE.
When liberty is lost,
Let abject cowards live ; but in the brave
It were a treachery to themselves, enough
To merit chains.
THOMSON : Sophonisba.
Let partial spirits still aloud complain,
Think themselves injured that they cannot reign ;
And own no liberty, but where they may
Without control upon their fellows prey.
WALLER.
LIFE.
Then let us fill
This little interval, this pause of life,
With all the virtues we can crowd into it.
ADDISON: Cato.
To make man mild and sociable to man,
To cultivate the wild licentious savage
With wisdom, discipline, and liberal arts,
Th' embellishments of life.
ADDISON: Cato.
My life, if thou preserv'st my life,
Thy sacrifice shall be ;
And death, if death must be my doom,
Shall join my soul to thee.
ADDISON.
Life ! we've been long together,
Through pleasant and through cloudy weather;
'Tis hard to part when friends are dear;
Perhaps 'twill cost a sigh, a tear;
Then steal away, give little warning:
Choose thine own time ;
Say not "Good-night;" but in some brighter
clime
Bid me " Good-morning."
MRS. BARBAULD: Life.
Say, would the tender creature, in despite
Of heat by day, and chilling dews by night,
Its life maintain ?
SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Not many lives, but only one, have we
Frail, fleeting man !
How sacred should that one life ever be
That narrow span !
Day after day fill'd up with blessed toil,
Hour after hour still bringing in new spoil !
H. BONAR.
So to live that when the sun
Of our existence sinks in night,
Memorials sweet of mercies done
May shrine our names in memory's light,
And the blest seeds we scatter'd bloom
A hundred-fold in days to come.
SIR J. BOWRING.
Yet time, who changes all, had alter'd him
In soul and aspect as in age : years steal
Fire from the mind, as vigour from the limb :
And life's enchanted cup but sparkles near the
brim.
BYRON : Childe Harold.
To know, to esteem, to love, and then to part,
Makes up life's tale to many a feeling heart.
COLERIDGE.
The game of life
Looks cheerful when one carries in one's heart
The unalienable treasure.
COLERIDGE.
Nature to each allots his proper sphere,
But that forsaken, we like comets err.
Toss'd through the void, by some rude shock
we're broke,
And all our boasted fire is lost in smoke.
CONGREVE.
300
LIFE.
O life, thou nothing's younger brother!
So like, that we may take the one for t'other !
Dream of a shadow ! a reflection made
From the false glories of the gay reflected bow,
Is more a solid thing than thou !
COWLEY.
His faith perhaps in some nice tenets might
Be wrong; his life I'm sure was in the right.
COWLEY: on Crashaw.
Ask, What is human life ? the sage replies,
With disappointment low'ring in his eyes :
A painful passage o'er a restless flood ;
A vain pursuit of fugitive false good ;
A sense of fancied bliss and heart-felt care,
Closing at last in darkness and despair.
COWPER : Hope.
Whether we work or play, or sleep or wake,
Our life doth pass, and with time's wings doth fly.
SIR J. DAVIES.
This work goeth fast on and prospereth :
Skill comes so slow, and life so fast doth fly.
SIR J. DAVIES.
Our life so fast away doth slide
As doth an hungry eagle through the wind;
Or as a ship transported with the tide,
Which in their passage leaves no print behind.
SIR J. DAVIES.
The youngest in the morning are not sure
That till the night their life they can secure.
SIR J. DENHAM.
On their life no grievous burden lies,
Who are well-natured, temperate, and wise :
But an inhuman and ill-temper'd mind
Not any easy part in life can find.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Look forward what's to come, and back what's
past;
Thy life will be with praise and prudence
graced ;
W 7 hat loss or gain may follow thou may'st guess :
Then wilt thou be secure of the success.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Oh, let me live my own, and die so too !
To live and die is all I have to do.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Satiety from all things else doth come,
TLen life must to itself grow wearisome.
SIR J. DENHAM.
The same uneasiness which every thing
Gives to our nature, life must also bring.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Lords of the world have but for life their lease,
And that too, if the lessor please, must cease.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Should some god tell me that I should be born,
And cry again, his offer I should scorn';
Ashamed, when I have ended well my race,
To be led back to my first starting-place.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Live while you live, the epicure would say,
And seize the pleasures of the present day ;
Live while you live, the sacred preacher cries,
And give to God each moment as it flies :
Lord, in my view let both united be;
I live in pleasure when I live to thee.
DODDRIDGE :
Epigram on his Family Arms.
You are both fluid, changed since yesterday ;
Next day repairs but ill last day's decay :
Nor are, although the river keep the name,
Yesterday's waters and to-day's the same.
DONNE.
But dearest heart, and dearer image, stay!
Alas! true joys at best are dreams enough :
Though you stay here, you pass too fast away ;
For even at first life's taper is a snuff.
DONNE.
When I consider life, 'tis all a cheat,
Yet, fool'd with hope, men favour the deceit;
Trust on, and think to-morrow will repay:
To-morrow's falser than the former day ;
Lies more, and while it says we shall be bless'd
With some new joys, cuts off what we possess'd.
Strange coz'nage ! none would live past years
again,
Yet all hope pleasure in what yet remain ;
And from the dregs of life think to receive
What the first sprightly running could not give.
I'm tired of waiting for this chymic gold,
Which fools us young, and beggars us when old.
DRYDEN.
On what strange ground we build our hopes
and fears :
Man's life is all a mist, and in the dark
Our fortunes meet us.
Whether we drive, or whether we are driven,
If ill, 'tis ours; if good, the act of Heaven.
DRYDEN.
LIFE.
301
Had heav'n decreed that I should life enjoy,
Heav'n had decreed to save unhappy Troy.
DRYDEN.
This hour's the very crisis of your fate ;
Your good or ill, your infamy or fame,
And all the colour of your life, depends
On this important now.
DRYDEN.
Death stalks behind thee, and each flying hour
Does some loose remnant of thy life devour.
DRYDEN.
Nothing but a blank remains, a dead void space ;
A step of life, that promised such a race.
DRYDEN.
To live uprightly, then, is sure the best;
To save ourselves, and not to damn the rest.
DRYDEN.
First vegetive, then feels, and reasons last ;
Rich of three souls, and lives all three to waste.
DRYDEN.
Improperly we measure life by breath:
Such do not truly live who merit death.
DRYDEN.
Life with my Indamora I would choose ;
But, losing her, the end of living lose.
DRYDEN.
Recall your gift, for I your pow'r confess ;
But first take back my life, a gift's that less.
DRYDEN.
Renevv'd to life that she might daily die ;
I daily doom'd to follow.
DRYDEN.
Fate sees thy life lodged in a brittle glass,
And looks it through, but to it cannot pass.
DRYDEN.
O frail estate of human things !
Now to our cost your emptiness we know.
DRYDEN.
Hast thou no mark at which to bend thy bow?
Or, like a boy, pursuest the carrion crow
With pellets and with stones from tree to tree,
A fruitless toil, and livest extempore?
DRYDEN.
The points of honour poets may produce ;
Trappings of life, for ornament, not use.
DRYDEN.
If life sunk through you like a leaky sieve,
Accuse yourself you lived not while you might.
DRYDEN.
Could I but live till burdensome they prove,
My life would be immortal as my love.
DRYDEN.
They wish to live,
Their pains and poverty desire to bear,
To view the light of heav'n, and breathe the
vital air.
DRYDEN.
Since ev'ry man who lives is born to die,
And none can boast sincere felicity,
With equal mind what happens let us bear,
Nor joy nor grieve too much for things beyond
our care :
Like pilgrims to th' appointed place we tend ;
The world's an inn, and death the journey's end.
DRYDEN.
If like a hundred years, or e'er so few,
'Tis repetition all, and nothing new:
A fair where thousands meet, but none can
stay;
An inn where travellers bait, then post away.
FRANCIS FAWKES.
Life is a jest, and all things show it ;
I thought so once, but now I know it.
GAY : My own Epitaph.
How short is life ! Why will vain courtiers toil,
And crowd a vainer monarch for a smile ?
GRANVILLE.
His conscience cheer'd him with a life well
spent ;
His prudence a superfluous something lent,
Which made the poor who took, and poor who
gave, content.
WALTER HARTE.
Sink not beneath imaginary sorrows;
Call to your aid your courage and your wisdom ,
Think on the sudden change of human scenes ;
Think on the various accidents of war;
Think on the mighty power of awful virtue ;
Think on the Providence that guards the good.
DR. S. JOHNSON.
Catch, then, O catch the transient hour;
Improve each moment as it flies ;
Life's a short summer man a flower
He dies alas ! how soon he dies !
DR. S. JOHNSON : Winter : An Ode.
" Enlarge my life with multitude of days !"
In health, in sickness, thus the suppliant prays:
Hides from himself his state, and shuns to know
That life protracted is protracted \voe.
DR. S. JOHNSON:
Vanity of Human Wishes.
302
LIFE.
Delay is bad, doubt worse, depending worst :
Each best day of our life escapes us first.
Then, since we more than many, these truths
know,
Though life be short, let us not make it so.
BEN JONSON : Epigrams.
Life is a weary interlude,
Which doth short joys, long woes include :
The world the stage, the prologue tears,
The acts vain hopes and varied fears ;
The scene shuts up with loss of breath,
And leaves no epilogue but death.
BISHOP HENRY KING.
Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
" Life is but an empty dream!"
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem.
LONGFELLOW: Psalm of Life.
Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time :
Footprints that perhaps another,
Sailing o'er life's solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwreck'd brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again.
LONGFELLOW : Psalm of Life.
Who would lose,
Though full of pain, this intellectual being,
Those thoughts that wander through eternity,
To perish rather, swallow'd up and lost
In the wide womb of uncreated night,
Devoid of sense and motion ?
MILTON.
For man to tell how human life began
Is hard ; for who himself beginning knew ?
MILTON.
To measure life learn thou betimes, and know
Toward solid good what leads the nearest way.
MILTON.
Taught to live
The easiest way; nor with perplexing thoughts
To interrupt the sweet of life.
MILTON.
Not love thy life, nor hate ; but what thou liv'st
i^ive well, how long or short permit to heav'n.
MILTON.
His leisure told him that his time was come,
And lack of load made his life burdensome.
MILTON.
Henceforth I fly not death, nor would prolong
Life much ! Bent, rather, how I may be quit,
Fairest and easiest, of this cumbrous charge.
MILTON.
pity and shame, that they who to live well
Enter'd so fair, should turn aside to tread
Paths indirect, or in the midway faint.
MILTON.
\Vho that hath ever been
Could bear to be no more ?
Yet who would tread again the scene
He trod through life before ?
JAMES MONTGOMERY.
'Tis not the whole of life to live :
Nor all of death to die.
JAMES MONTGOMERY.
They may rail at this life from the hour I be-
gan it,
I've found it a life full of kindness and bliss ;
And until they can show me some happier planet,
More social and bright, I'll content me with
this.
MOORE.
The world had just begun to steal
Each hope that led me lightly on ;
1 felt not as I used to feel,
And life grew dark, and love was gone !
MOORE.
Life is a waste of wearisome hours,
Which seldom the rose of enjoyment adorns;
And the heart that is soonest awake to the flow-
ers
Is always the first to be touch'd by the thorns.
MOORE.
Love, hope, and joy, fair pleasure's smiling
train ;
Hate, fear, and grief, the family of pain ;
These, mix'd with art, and to due bounds con-
fined,
Make and maintain the balance of the mind$
The lights and shades whose well-accorded
strife
Gives all the strength and colour of our life.
POPE.
Like following life through creatures you dissect,
You lose it in the moment you detect.
POPE.
While life informs these limbs, the king replied,
Well to deserve be all my cares employ'd.
POPE.
LIFE.
33
In known images of life, I guess
The labour greater as th' indulgence less.
POPE.
All that cheers or softens life :
The tender sister, daughter, friend, and wife.
POPE.
My life a long dead calm of fix'd repose;
No pulse that riots, and no blood that glows.
POPE.
Stranger, cease thy care ;
Wise is the soul ; but man is born to bear :
Jove weighs affairs of earth in dubious scales,
And the good suffers, while the bad prevails.
POPE.
Let joy or ease, let affluence or content,
And the gay conscience of a life well spent,
Calm ev'ry thought, inspirit ev'ry grace.
POPE.
Cease, man of woman born, to hope relief
From daily trouble and continued grief;
The hope of joy deliver to the wind,
Suppress thy passions, and prepare thy mind.
Free and familiar with misfortune grow,
Be used to sorrow, and inured to woe ;
By weakening toil and hoary age o'ercome,
See thy decrease, and hasten to the tomb.
PRIOR.
Teach the glad hours to scatter, as they fly,
Soft quiet, gentle love, and endless joy.
PRIOR.
Such we find they are, as can control
The servile actions of our wav'ring soul,
Can fright, can alter, or can chain the will ;
Their ills all built on life, that fundamental ill.
PRIOR.
Others ill-fated are condemn'd to toil
Their tedious life, and mourn their purpose
blasted
With fruitless act.
PRIOR.
O impotent estate of human life !
Where fleeting joy does lasting doubt inspire,
And most we question what we most desire.
PRIOR.
With endless pain this man pursues
What if he gain'd he could not use;
And t'other fondly hopes to see
What never was, nor e'er shall be.
, PRIOR.
O how short my interval of woe !
Our griefs how swift, our remedies how slow !
PRIOR.
Till by one countless sum of woes oppress'd,
Hoary with cares, and ignorant of rest,
We find the vital springs relax'd and worn ;
Compell'd our common impotence to mourn,
Thus through the round of age to childhood we
return.
PRIOR.
Bid her exalt her melancholy wing,
And raised from earth, and saved from passion.
sing
Of human hope by cross event destroy'd,
Of useless wealth, and greatness unenjoy'd.
PRIOR.
Be the fair level of thy actions laid
As temp' ranee wills, and prudence may per-
suade,
And try if life be worth the liver's care.
PRIOR.
An age they live released
From all the labour, process, clamour, woe,
Which our sad scenes of daily action know.
PRIOR.
So vanishes our state, so pass our days ;
So life but opens now, and now decays;
The cradle and the tomb, alas ! so nigh,
To live is scarce distinguish'd from to die.
PRIOR.
Our life is nothing but a winter's day :
Some only break their fast, and so away;
Others stay dinner, and depart full-fed ;
The deepest age but sups and goes to bed :
He's most in debt that -lingers out the day ;
Who dies betimes has less and less to pay.
QUARLES.
All was jollity,
Feasting and mirth, light wantonness and
laughter,
Piping and playing, minstrelsy and masking,
Till life fled from us like an idle dream,
A show of mommery without a meaning.
ROWE.
My life is but a wind,
Which passeth by, and leaves no print behind.
SANDYS.
Life's but a walking. shadow; a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more : it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
SHAKSPEARE.
34
LIFE.
O, if this were seen,
The happiest youth viewing his progress
through,
What perils past, what crosses to ensue
Would shut the book, and sit him down and die.
SHAKSPEARE.
To ease them of their griefs,
Their fears of hostile strokes, their aches, losses,
Their pangs of love, with other incident throes,
That nature's fragile vessel doth sustain
In life's uncertain voyage, I will do
Some kindness to them.
SHAKSPEARE.
This carol they began that hour,
With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino,
How that a life was but a flower,
In spring-time, etc.
SHAKSPEARE.
He that cuts off twenty years of life,
Cuts off so many years of fearing death.
SHAKSPEARE.
gentlemen, the time of life is short ;
To spend that shortness basely were too long,
If life did ride upon a dial's point,
Still ending at the arrival of an hour.
SHAKSPEARE.
My life thou shalt command, but not my shame :
The one my duty owes ; but my fair name,
Despite of death, that lives upon my grave,
To dark dishonour's use thou shalt not have.
SHAKSPEARE.
1 have set my life upon a cast,
And I will stand the hazard of the die.
SHAKSPEARE.
So minutes, hours, and days, weeks, months, and
years,
Past over, to the end they were created,
Would bring white hairs unto a quiet grave.
SHAKSPEARE.
There's nothing in this world can make me joy :
Life is as tedious as a twice-told tale
Vexing the dull ear of a drowsy man.
SHAKSPEARE.
I send it through the rivers of your blood,
Even to the court, the heart, to the seat o' the
brain,
And through the cranks and offices of man ;
The strongest nerves, and small inferior veins,
From me receive that natural competency
Whereby they live.
SHAKSPEARE.
He hath a daily beauty in his life
That makes me ugly.
SHAKSPEARE.
O our lives' sweetness !
That we the pain of death would hourly bear,
Rather than die at once.
SHAKSPEARE.
But thought's the slave of life, and life time's
fool;
And time, that takes survey of all the world,
Must have a stop.
SHAKSPEARE.
This feather stirs ! she lives ! if it be so,
It is a: chance which does redeem all sorrows
That ever I have felt.
SHAKSPEARE.
This life is best
If quiet life is best ; sweeter to you,
That have a sharper known.
SHAKSPEARE.
How brief the life of man
Runs his erring pilgrimage !
That the stretching of a span
Buckles in his sum of age.
SHAKSPEARE.
The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve !
And, like this unsubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind : we are such stuff
As dreams are made of, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.
SHAKSPEARE.
Whoe'er has travell'd life's dull round,
Where'er his stages may have been,
May sigh to think he still has found
The warmest welcome at an inn.
SHENSTONE : On the Window of an Inn.
How sudden do our prospects vary here !
And how uncertain ev'ry good we boast !
Hope oft deceives us ; and our very joys
Sink with fruition, pall and rust away.
How wise are we in thought ! how weak in
practice !
Our very virtue, like our will, is nothing.
SHIRLEY: Parricide.
The term of life is limited,
Ne may a man prolong or shorten it;
The soldier may not move from watchful stead,
Nor leave his stand until his captain bed.
SPENSER.
LIFE. LIGHT.
35
O why do wretched men so much desire
To draw their days unto the utmost date,
And do not rather wish them soon expire,
Knowing the misery of their estate,
And thousand perils which them still await ?
SPENSER.
Whoever doth to temperance apply
His stedfast life, and all his actions frame,
Trust me, shall find no greater enemy
Than stubborn perturbation to the same.
SPENSER.
Had but the heart that thrills a three years' boy
A voice to speak, 'twould say that life is joy !
Note thou the youth whose impulse nought can
tame,
That life is action, tongue and limbs proclaim !
The man whom well-spent years from dread re-
lease,
Secure in knowledge, tells thee, life is peace ;
And the gray sage who smiles beside the grave,
Knows life is all, and death a dusty slave !
JOHN STERLING.
Say, Stella, feel you no content,
Reflecting on a life well spent ?
SWIFT.
Even so luxurious men unheeding pass
An idle summer-life in fortune's shine ;
A season's glitter ! thus they flutter on
From toy to toy, from vanity to vice,
Till, blown away by death, oblivion comes
Behind, and strikes them from the book of life.
THOMSON : Seasons.
Where now, ye living vanities of life ?
Ye ever-tempting, ever-cheating train,
Where are ye now, and what is your amount?
Vexation, disappointment, and remorse.
THOMSON: Seasons.
Circles are praised, not that abound
In largeness, but th' exactly round :
So life we praise that does excel
Not in much time, but acting well.
WALLER.
Not numerous are our joys when life is new,
And yearly some are falling of the few.
YOUNG.
The days of life are sisters ; all alike ;
None just the same; which serve to fool us on,
Through blasted hopes, with change of fallacy ;
While joy is, like to-morrow, still to come :
Nor ends the fruitless chase but in the grave.
YOUNG : Brothers.
2O
Vain man ! to be so fond of breathing long,
And spinning out a thread of misery :
The longer life, the greater choice of evil ;
The happiest man is but a wretched thing,
That steals poor comfort from comparison.
YOUNG: Busiris.
Is not the mighty mind, that son of heav'n,
By tyrant life dethroned, imprison'd, pain'd?
By death enlarged, ennobled, deify'd ?
Death but entombs the body ; life the soul.
YOUNG : Night Thoughts.
That life is long which answers life's great end.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
LIGHT.
O Light ! which mak'st the light which makes
the day,
Which sett'st the eye without, and mind
within ;
Lighten my spirit with one clear heav'nly ray ;
Which now to view itself doth first begin.
SIR J. DAVIES.
There fields of light and liquid ether flow,
Purged from the pond'rous dregs of earth below.
DRYDEN.
Then shook the sacred shrine, and sudden light
Sprang through the roof, and made the temple
bright.
DRYDEN.
Thou, stronger, may'st endure the flood of light;
And, while in shades I cheer my fainting sight,
Encounter the descending excellence.
DRYDEN.
Hail, holy light! offspring of heav'n, first-born?
MILTON.
The sacred influence of light appears.
MILTON-
Light from her native east
To journey through the airy gloom began,
Sphered in a radiant cloud ; for yet the sun
Was not.
MILTON.
Earth receives,
As tribute, such a sumless journey brought
Of incorporeal speed, her warmth and light ;
Speed to describe whose swiftness number fails.
MILTON.
Light dies before her uncreating word.
POPE.
306
LIGHT. L O GIC.L O VE.
As where the Almighty's lightning brand does
light,
It dims the dazed eyes, and daunts the senses
quite.
SPENSER.
Prime cheerer, light !
Of all material beings first and best !
Efflux divine.
THOMSON.
Light ! Nature's resplendent robe ;
Without whose vesting beauty all were wrapt
In gloom.
THOMSON.
LOGIC.
He was in logic a great critic,
Profoundly skill'd in analytic ;
He could distinguish and divide
A hair 'twixt south and southwest side.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
We system-makers can sustain
The thesis which you grant was plain;
And with remarks and comments tease ye,
In case the thing before was easy.
PRIOR.
Can syllogisms set things right ?
No: majors soon with minors fight:
Or, both in friendly concert join'd,
The consequence limps false behind.
PRIOR.
Talk logic with acquaintance,
And practise rhetoric in your common talk.
SHAKSPEARE.
She studied well the point, and found
Her foe's conclusions were not sound ;
From premises erroneous brought,
And therefore the deductions nought.
SWIFT.
LOVE.
Mysterious Love ! uncertain treasure,
Hast thou more of pain or pleasure ?
Endless torments dwell about thee,
Yet who would live and live without thee?
ADDISON.
Love is not to be reason'd down, or lost
In high ambition, or a thirst of greatness :
'Tis second life ; it grows into the soul,
Warms ev'ry vein, and beats in ev'ry pulse.
ADDISON.
Why will you fight against so sweet a passion,
And steel your heart to such a world of charms ?
ADDISON.
Think not thy friend can ever feel the soft
Unmanly warmth and tenderness of love.
ADDISON.
With what a graceful tenderness he loves !
And breathes the softest, the sincerest vows !
ADDISON.
Would one think 'twere possible for love
To make such ravage in a noble soul ?
ADDISON.
Oh, he was all made up of love and charms ;
Whatever maid could wish, or man admire.
ADDISON.
Why wouldst thou urge me to confess a flame
I long have stifled, and would fain conceal ?
ADDISON.
When love's well timed, 'tis not a fault to love;
The strong, the brave, the virtuous, and the wise,
Sink in the soft captivity together.
ADDISON.
Thou know'st it is a blind and foolish passion,
Pleased and disgusted with it knows not what.
ADDISON.
My heart had still some foolish fondness for
thee;
But hence ! 'tis gone ; I give it to the winds.
ADDISON.
You strive in vain
To hide your thoughts from him, who knew too
well
The inward glowings of a heart in love.
ADDISON.
For as his own bright image he survey'd,
He fell in love with the fantastic shade.
ADDISON.
If I disclose my passion,
Our friendship's at an end ; if I conceal it,
The world will call me false.
ADDISON.
Thy words shoot through my heart,
Melt my resolves, and turn me all to love.
ADDISON.
To quell the tyrant love, and guard thy heart
On this weak side, where most our nature fails,
Would be a conquest worthy Cato's son.
ADDISON.
LOVE.
37
What wouldst thou have me do ? consider well
The train of ills our love would draw behind it.
ADDISON.
The nymph, when nothing could Narcissus move,
Still dash'd with blushes for her slighted love.
ADDISON.
Passion unpitied and successless love
Plant daggers in my heart, and aggravate
My other griefs.
ADDISON.
Alas ! Sempronius, wouldst thou talk of love
To Marcia, whilst her father's life's in danger ?
Thou might'st as well court the pale trembling
vestal
While she beholds the holy flame expiring.
ADDISON.
She burns, she raves, she dies, 'tis true ;
But burns, and raves, and dies, for you.
ADDISON.
Adieu for him
The dull engagements of the bustling world !
Adieu the sick impertinence of praise !
And hope, and action ! for with her alone,
By streams and shades, to steal these sighing
hours,
Is all he asks, and all that fate can give.
AKENSIDE : Pleasures of the Imagination.
Love is a passion whose effects are various :
It ever brings some change upon the soul,
Some virtue, or some vice, till then unknown,
Degrades the hero, and makes cowards valiant.
BROOKE: Gustavus Vasa.
Learn to win a lady's faith
Nobly as the thing is high ;
Bravely, as for life and death,
With a loyal gravity.
Lead her from the festive boards,
Point her to the starry skies,
Guard her by your truthful words,
Pure from courtship's flatteries.
MRS. E. B. BROWNING.
She that would raise a noble love must find
Ways to beget a passion for her mind ;
She must be that which she to the world would
seem,
For all true love is grounded on esteem :
Plainness and truth gain more a generous heart
Than all the crooked subtleties of art.
DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM.
Had we never loved so kindly,
Had we never loved so blindly,
Never met, or never parted,
We had ne'er been broken-hearted.
BURNS.
If nothing can oppugn his love,
And virtue invious ways can prove,
What may not he confide to do,
That brings both love and virtue too ?
BUTLER: Htidibras.
Love is a fire which burns and sparkles
In men as nat'rally as in charcoals,
Which sooty chymists stop in holes,
When out of wood they extract coals.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
Oh, Love ! what is there in this world of ours
Which makes it fatal to be loved? Ah,
why
With cypress branches hast thou wreathed thy
bowers,
And made thy best interpreter a sigh ?
BYRON.
Love bears within itself the very germ
Of change, and how should this be other-
wise?
That violent things more quickly find a term,
Is shown through nature's whole analogies.
BYRON.
Yet, it is love if thoughts of tenderness,
Tried in temptation, strengthen'd by distress,
Unmoved by absence, firm in every clime,
And yet oh ! more than all ! untired by
time.
BYRON.
Man's love is of man's life a thing apart ;
'Tis woman's whole existence : man may
range
The court, camp, church, the vessel, and the
mart ;
Sword, gown, gain, glory, offer in exchange
Pride, fame, ambition, to fill up his heart,
And few there are whom these cannot
estrange.
BYRON.
Who loves, raves 'tis youth's phrenzy; but
the cure
Is bitterer still.
BYRON: Childe Harold.
3o8
LOVE.
Few none find what they love, or could have
loved,
Though accident, blind contact, and the strong
Necessity of loving, have removed
Antipathies.
BYRON : Childe Harold. '
Not much he kens, I ween, of woman's heart,
Who thinks that wanton thing is won by sighs :
Do proper homage to thy idol's eyes,
But not too humbly, or she will despise :
Disguise even tenderness, if thou art wise.
BYRON : Childe Harold.
Why did she love him ? Curious fool, be still :
Is human love the growth of human will?
BYRON: Lara.
Then crown my joys, or cure my pain;
Give me more love, or more disdain ;
The torrid or the frozen zone
Bring equal ease unto my pain ;
The temperate affords me none :
Either extreme, of love or hate,
Is sweeter than a calm estate.
CAREW.
No tears, Celia, now shall win
My resolved heart to return ;
I have search'd thy soul within,
And find nought but pride and scorn.
CAREW.
Love no more is made
By the fireside, but in the cooler shade.
CAREW.
Love's soft sympathy imparts
That tender transport of delight
That beats in undivided hearts.
CARTWRIGHT.
Thou hast no faults, or I no faults can spy ;
Thou art all beauty, or all blindness I.
C. CODRINGTON.
In many ways does the full heart reveal
The presence of the love it would conceal.
COLERIDGE.
And to be wroth with one we love,
Doth work like madness in the brain.
COLERIDGE: Christabel.
All thoughts, all passions, all delights,
Whatever stirs this mortal frame,
All are but ministers of Love,
And feed his sacred flame.
COLERIDGE: Genevieve.
Life without love's a load, and time stands still;
What we refuse to him, to death we give ;
And then, then only, when we love, we live.
CONGREVE.
If there's delight in love, 'tis when I see <
That heart which others bleed for, bleed for me.
CONGREVE: Way of (he World.
You who men's fortunes in their faces read,
To find out mine, look not, alas, on me :
But mark her face, and all the features heed ;
For only there is writ my destiny.
COWLEY.
Love's of a strangely open simple kind,
And think none sees it, 'cause itself is blind.
COWLEY.
Impossibilities ! oh, no ; there's none,
Could I bring thy heart captive home.
COWLEY.
I could not love, I'm sure,
One who in love were wise.
COWLEY.
If her chill heart I cannot move,
Why, I'll enjoy the very love.
COWLEY.
Hence love himself, that tyrant of my days.
COWLEY.
Still new favourites she chose,
Till up in arms my passion rose,
And cast away her yoke.
COWLEY.
A mighty pain to love it is,
And 'tis a pain that pain to miss ;
But of all pains the greatest pain
It is to love and love in vain.
COWLEY: Anacreon.
Thou know'st a face in whose each look
Beauty lays ope love's fortune-book;
On whose fair revolutions wait
The obsequious motions of love's fate.
CRASHAW.
Though Heaven's inauspicious eye
Lay black on love's nativity,
Her eye a strong appeal can give :
Beauty smiles, and love shall live.
CRASHAW.
She sees, she cries, but nowhere spies him :
Love is lost, and thus she cries him.
CRASHAW.
Love must free-hearted be, and voluntary;
And not enchanted, or by fate constrain'd.
SIR J. DA VIES.
LOVE.
39
Love, though most sure,
Yet always to itself seems insecure.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Nor is my flame
So earthy as to need the dull material force
Of eyes, or lips, or cheeks.
SIR J. DENHAM.
These outward beauties are but the props and
scaffolds
On which we build our love, which, now made
perfect,
Stands without those supports.
SIR J. DENHAM.
He faintly now declines the fatal strife;
So much his love was dearer than his life !
SIR J. DENHAM.
Fortunes, honour, friends,
Are mere diversions from love's proper object,
Which only is itself.
SIR J. DENHAM.
All that I ask is but a short reprieve,
Till I forget to love, and learn to grieve.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Why love among the virtues is not known,
It is, that love contracts them all in one.
DONNE.
I wonder much what thou and I
Did till we loved ? Were we not wean'd till
then,
But suck'd on childish pleasures sillily ?
Or slumber'd we in the seven sleepers' den ?
DONNE.
No more can impure man retain and move
In that pure region of a worthy love,
Than earthly substance can unforced aspire
And leave his nature to converse with fire.
DONNE.
Disuse me from the queasy pain
Of being beloved and loving.
DONNE.
For, nor in nothing, nor in things
Extreme and scattering bright, can love inhere.
DONNE.
Poor heretics in love these,
Which think to 'stablish dangerous constancy ;
But I have told them, .-%ince you will be true,
You shall be true to them who're false to you.
DONNE.
A weather-beaten lover, but once known,
Is sport for every girl to practise on.
DONNE.
In parchment then, large as the fields, he draws
Assurances, big as gloss'd civil laws.
DONNE.
Must business thee from hence remove ?
Oh! that's the worst disease of love.
DONNE.
Dull "sublunary lovers ! love,
Whose soul is sense, cannot admit
Of absence, 'cause it doth remove
The thing which elemented it.
DONNED
Love never fails to master what he finds,
But works a different way in different minds ;
The fool enlightens, and the wise he blinds.
DRYDEN.
Love oft to virtuous acts inflames the mind,
Awakes the sleepy vigour of the soul,
And, brushing o'er, adds vigour to the pool.
DRYDEN.
My heart is yours ; but, oh ! you left it here,
Abandon 'd to those tyrants hope and fear;
If they forced from me one kind look or word,
Could you not that, nor that small part, afford ?
DRYDEN.
They know how fickle common lovers are :
Then oaths and vows are cautiously believed ,
For few there are but have been once deceived.
DRYDEN.
Fly the pursuit of my disastrous love ;
From my unhappy neighbourhood remove.
DRYDEN.
Me you have often counsell'd to remove
My vain pursuit of unregarded love.
DRYDEN.
What poems think you soft, and to be read
With languishing regards, and bending head?
DRYDEN.
Arise, ye subtler spirits, that can spy
When love is center'd in a female's eye;
You that can read it in the midst of doubt,
And in the midst of frowns can find it out.
DRYDEN.
The fate of love is such
That still it sees too little or too much.
DRYDEN.
3 io
LOVE.
Yet, as in duty bound, they serve him on ;
Nor ease, nor wealth, nor life itself regard :
For 'tis their maxim, Love is love's reward.
DRYDEN.
Hitherto she kept her love conceal'd,
And with those graces ev'ry day beheld
The graceful youth.
DRYDEN.
The proverb holds, that to be wise and love
Is hardly granted to the gods above.
DRYDEN.
Love him by parts in all your num'rous race, '
And from those parts form one collected grace ;
Then, when you have refined to that degree, ,'
Imagine all in one, and think that one is he. /
DRYDEN.
Had he lived to see her happy change,
He would have cancell'd that harsh interdict,
And join'd our hands himself.
DRYDEN.
Love did his reason blind,
And love's the noblest frailty of the mind.
DRYDEN.
In your excuse your love does little say;
You might, howe'er, have took a fairer way.
DRYDEN.
That love which first was set will first decay ;
Mine, of a fresher date, will longer stay.
DRYDEN./'
My hopes pursue a brighter diadem :
Can any brighter than the Roman be ?
I find my proffer'd love has cheapen'd me.
DRYDEN.
Her lovers' names in order to run o'er,
The girl took breath full thirty times and more.
DRYDEN.
Do not wantonly my passion move :
I pardon nothing that relates to love.
DRYDEN.
He whose firm faith no reason could remove
Will melt before that soft seducer, love.
DRYDEN.
Could you see into my secret soul,
There you might read your own dominion
doubled.
DRYDEN.
She still insults, and you must still adore :
Grant that the honey's much, the gall is more.
DRYDEN.
Love once given from her, and placed in you,
Would leave no ground I ever would be true.
DRYDEN.
Since love obliges not, I from this hour
Assume the right of man's despotic power.
DRYDEN.
But love had clipp'd his wings and cut him
short,
Confined within the purlieus of the court.
DRYDEN.
Love made his doubt his broad barbarian sound :
By love, his want of words and wit he found.
DRYDEN.
Was it his youth, his valour, or success?
These might perhaps be found in other men :
'Twas that respect, that awful homage paid me,
That fearful love which trembled in his eyes
And with a silent earthquake shook his soul.
DRYDEN.
You pine, you languish, love to be alone,
Think much, speak little, and in speaking sigh,
DRYDEN.
In a sad look or womanish complaint
I melt to womanish tears, and if I stay,
I find my love my courage will betray.
DRYDEN.
s
What did I not her stubborn heart to gain ?
But all my vows were answer' d with disdain.
DRYDEN.
With inauspicious love a wretched swain
Pursued the fairest nymph of all the plain ;
She plunged him hopeless in a deep despair.
DRYDEN.
I would have ask'd you, if I durst for shame,
If still you loved : you gave it air before me.
DRYDEN.
Your soul's above the baseness of distrust :
Nothing but love could make you so unjust.
DRYDEN.
'Tis in her heart alone that you must reign ;
You'll find her person difficult to gain.
DRYDEN.
Pains of love be sweeter far
Than all other pleasures are. DRYDEN.
Yourself first made that title which I claim,
First bid me love, and authorized my flame.
DRYDEN.
LOVE.
She said she loved,
Loved me desertless; who with shame confess' d
Another flame had seized upon my breast.
DRYDEN.
If she can make me blest ! she only can :
Empire and wealth, and all she brings beside,
Are but the train and trappings of her love.
DRYDEN.
You misjudge ;
f ou see through love, and that deludes your
sight;
As what is straight seems crooked through the
water.
DRYDEN.
He had his calmer influence, and his mien
Did love and majesty together blend.
DRYDEN.
With two fair eyes his mistress burns his breast ;
He looks and languishes, and leaves his rest,
Forsakes his food, and, pining for the lass,
Is joyless of the grove, and spurns the growing
grass.
DRYDEN.
Pleased with his idol, he commends, admires,
.Adores; and last, the thing adored desires.
DRYDEN.
What have I done ?
To see my youth, my beauty, and my love
No sooner gain'd, but slighted and betray'd;
And, like a rose just gather'd from the stalk,
But only smelt, and cheaply thrown aside,
To wither on the ground !
DRYDEN.
The ills of love, not those of fate, I fear;
These I can brave, but those I cannot bear.
DRYDEN.
Look on me as a man abandon'd o'er
To an eternal lethargy of love :
To pull and pinch and wound me, cannot cure,
And but disturbs the quiet of my death.
DRYDEN.
What secret springs their eager passions move !
How capable of death for injured love !
DRYDEN.
See their wide streaming wounds ! they neither
came
For pride of empire nor desire of fame :
Kings fight for kingdoms, madmen for applause ;
But love for love alone, that crowns the lover's
cause.
DRYDEN.
No, Aurengzebe, you merit all my heart,
And I'm too noble but to give a part.
DRYDEN.
Love softens me, and blows up fires which pass
Through my tough heart, and melt the stubborn
mass.
DRYDEN.
She changed her state ;
Resistless in her love, as in her hate.
DRYDEN.
This noble youth to madness loved a dame
Of high degree, Honoria was her name.
DRYDEN
The fire which choked in ashes lay
A load too heavy for his soul to move,
Was upward blown below and brush'd away by
love.
DRYDEN.
To her the weeping heav'ns become serene ;
For her the ground is clad in cheerful green.
DRYDEN.
All other debts may compensation find ;
But love is strict, and will be paid in kind.
DRYDEN.
Mine is a love which must perpetual be,
If you can be so just as I am true.
DRYDEN.
My love your claim inviolate secures ;
'Tis writ in fate, I can be only yours.
DRYDEN.
How much I suffer'd, and how long}! strove
Against th' assaults of this imperious*Tove !
DRYDEN.
I fear to try new love,
As boys to venture on the unknown ice
That crackles underneath them.
DRYDEN.
Love various minds does variously inspire :
He stirs in gentle natures gentle fire,
Like that of incense on the altar laid ;
But raging flames tempestuous souls invade :
A fire which every windy passion blows ;
With pride it mounts, and with revenge it glows.
DRYDEN.
One she found
With all the gifts of bounteous nature crown'd:
Of gentle blood; but one whose niggard fate
Had set him far below her high estate.
DRYDEN.
3 I2
LOVE.
Laws are but positive ; love's pow'r we see
Is nature's sanction, and her first decree.
DRYDEN.
New loves you seek,
New vows to plight, and plighted vows to break.
DRYDEN.
For I am young, a novice in the trade,
The fool of love, unpractised to persuade,
And want the soothing arts that catch the fair,
But, caught myself, lie struggling in the snare ;
And she I love, or laughs at all my pain,
Or knows her worth too well, and pays me with
disdain.
DRYDEN.
Maids, women, wives, without distinction fall;
The sweeping deluge, love, comes on, and covers
all.
DRYDEN.
Since you can love, and yet your error see,
The same resistless pow'r may plead for me;
With no less ardour I my claim pursue ;
I love, and cannot yield her ev'n to you.
DRYDEN.
You doubt not me ; nor have I spent my blood
To have my faith no better understood :
Your soul's above the baseness of distrust ;
Nothing but love could make you so unjust.
DRYDEN.
For this 'tis needful to prevent her art,
And fire with love the proud Phoenician's heart.
iiiTfc DRYDEN.
^fccheus through the shady grove,
"Wfa^wBlffd all her cares, and equall'd all
her love. "*
DRYDEN.
He shall ever love, and always be
The subject of my scorn and cruelty.
DRYDEN.
How I have loved ! excuse my faj
My spirit's feeble, and my pains j
O love ! thou sternly dost thy power mafcton,
And wilt not bear a rival in thy reign ;
Tyrants and thou all fellowship disdain^
DRYI
aintain,
*
YDCT.
I hate to see a brave bold fellow sotted,
Made sour and senseless, turn'd to whey, by
love ;
A drivelling hero, fit for a romance.
DRYDEN.
Now low'ring looks presage approaching storms,
And now prevailing love her face reforms.
DRYDEN.
Love, fixt to one, still safe at anchor rides,
And dares the fury of the winds and tides ;
But, losing once that hold, to the wide ocean
borne,
It drives away at will, to ev'ry wave a scorn.
DRYDEN.
Have I not managed my contrivance well,
To try your love, and make you doubt of mine?
DRYDEN.
And must I own, she said, my secret smart,
What with more decence were in silence kept ?
DRYDEN.
Your cavalcade the fair spectators view
From their high standings, yet look up to
you:
From your brave train each singles out a ray,
And longs to date a conquest from your day.
DRYDEN.
Love the sense of right and wrong confounds ;
Strong love and proud ambition have no bounds.
DRYDEN.
Love's a malady without a cure ;
Fierce love has pierced me with his fiery dart ;
He fires within, and hisses at my heart.
DRYDEN.
You are too young your power to understand ;
Lovers take wing upon the least command.
DRYDEN.
Would you so dote upon your first desire
As not to entertain a nobler fire ?
DRYDEN.
My wily nurse by long experience found,
And first discover'd to my soul its wound ;
" 'Tis love," said she; and then my downcast
eyes,
And guilty dumbness, witness'd my surprise.
DRYDEN.
And when two hearts were join'd by mutual
love,
The sword of justice cuts upon the knot,
And severs 'em forever.
DRYDEN.
If it were so, which but to think were pride,
My constant love would dangerously be tried.
DRYDEN.
LOVE.
We're both love's captives ; but with fate so cross,
One must be happy by the other's loss.
DRYDEN.
She either from her hopeless lover fled,
Or with disdainful glances shot him dead.
DRYDEN.
To myself I owe this due regard :
Not to make love my gift, but my reward.
DRYDEN.
She loves me, ev'n to suffer for my sake,
And on herself would my refusal take.
DRYDEN.
Of my heart I now a present make ;
Accept it as when early fruit we send,
And let the rareness the small gift commend.
DRYDEN.
Search her cabinet, and thou shalt find
Each tiller there with love-epistles lined.
DRYDEN.
Beauty, wealth, and wit,
And prowess, to the pow'r of love submit;
The spreading snare for all mankind is laid,
And lovers all betray, or are betray'd.
DRYDEN.
Love was no more when loyalty was gone,
The great supporter of his awful throne.
DRYDEN.
For this a hundred voices I desire,
To tell thee what a hundred tongues would tire,
Yet never could be worthily exprest :
How deeply thou art seated in my breast.
DRYDEN.
Wise men love you in their own despite,
And, finding in their native wit no ease,
Are forced to put your folly on to please.
DRYDEN.
This quell'd her pride; but other doubts re-
main'd,
That, once disdaining, she might be disdain'd.
DRYDEN.
I find your love, and would reward it too ;
But anxious fears solicit my weak breast.
DRYDEN.
As in some weather-glass my love I hold,
Which falls or rises with the heat or cold ;
I will be constant yet.
DRYDEN.
Was plighted faith so weakly seal'd above,
That for one error I must lose your love ?
DRYDEN.
Well may he then to you his cares impart,
And share his burden where he shares his heart.
DRYDEN.
Thirst and hunger may be satisfied ;
But this repletion is to love denied.
DRYDEN.
My love was such,
It could, though he supplied no fuel, burn;
Rich in itself, like elemental fire,
Whose pureness doth no aliment require.
DRYDEN.
He loved so fast,
As if he fear'd each day would be her last;
Too true a prophet to foresee the fate
That should so soon divide their happy state.
DRYDEN.
He, surprised, with humble joy survey'd
One sweet regard shot by the royal maid.
DRYDEN.
The peaceful pow'r that governs love repairs
To feast upon soft vows and silent pray'rs.
DRYDEN.
I'm waning in his favour, yet I love him.
DRYDEN.
In love's voyage nothing can offend;
Women are never seasick.
DRYDEN.
Be sure a general doom on man is past,
And all are fools or lovers, first or last.
He thinks by flight his mistress must be won,
And claims the prize because he best did run.
DRYDEN.
With smiling aspect you serenely move
In your fifth orb, and rule the realms of love.
DRYDEN.
He took a low'ring leave ; but who can tell
What outward hate might inward love conceal !
DRYDEN.
Jove left the blissful realms above,
Such is the pow'r of mighty love.
DRYDEN.
Thou hast deserved more love than I can show ;
But 'tis thy fate to give, and mine to owe.
DRYDEN.
LOVE.
I find she loves him much, because she hides it.
Love teaches cunning even to innocence ;
And when he gets possession, his first work
Is to dig deep within the heart, and there
Lie hid, and, like a miser in the dark,
To feast alone.
DRYDEN.
Time ! I dare thee to discover
Such a youth and such a lover.
DRYDEN.
True love's a miser; so tenacious grown,
He weighs to the least grain of what's his own.
DRYDEN.
Quench, Cory don, thy long-unanswer'd fire ;
Mind what the common wants of life require.
DRYDEN.
The cause of love can never be assign' d:
'Tis in no face, but in the lover's mind.
DRYDEN.
Force never yet a generous heart did gain ;
We yield on parley, but are storm'd in vain !
DRYDEN.
Love endures no tie,
\ And Jove but laughs at lovers' perjury.
DRYDEN : from the Latin.
Love, like spring tides, full and high,
Swells in every youthful vein ;
But each tide doth less supply,
Till they quite shrink in again :
If a flow in age appear,
'Tis but rain, and runs not clear.
DRYDEN.
. That love alone which virtue's laws control
Deserves reception in the human soul.
EURIPIDES.
Wayward beauty doth not fancy move :
A frown forbids, a smile engendereth love.
FAIRFAX.
Till fate shall with a single dart
Transfix the pain it cannot part.
FENTON.
Love is not in our power,
Nay, what seems stranger, is not in our choice :
We only love where fate ordains we should,
And, blindly fond, oft slight superior merit.
FROWDE: Fall of Saguntum.
In moving lines these few epistles tell
What fate attends the nymph who loves too well.
GARTH.
Sooner shall cats disport in water clear,
And speckled mack'rels graze the meadows fair,
Than I forget my shepherd's wonted love.
GAY.
Say how this instrument of love began ;
And in immortal strains display the fan.
GAY.
Eftsoons, O sweetheart kind, my love repay,
And all the year shall then be holiday.
GAY.
True constancy no time, no power, can move :
He that hath known to change, ne'er knew to
love.
GAY: Dione.
Love ! thou hast every bliss in store :
'Tis friendship, and 'tis something more;
Each other ev'ry wish they give :
Not to know love is not to live.
GAY: Fables.
In change of torment would be ease :
Could you divine what lovers bear,
Even you, Prometheus, would confess
There is no vulture like despair.
GRANVILLE.
Condemn'd on Caucasus to lie,
Still to be dying, not to die ;
With certain pain, uncertain of relief:
True emblem of a wretched lover's grief.
GRANVILLE.
The stone that labours up the hill,
Mocking the lab'rer's toil, returning still,
Is love.
GRANVILLE.
No warning of the approaching flame ;
Swiftly, like sudden death, it came :
I loved the moment I beheld.
GRANVILLE.
A little hope but I have none.
On air the poor chameleons live :
Denied ev'n that, my love can live.
GRANVILLE.
This sun is set, but see in bright array
What hosts of heavenly lights recruit the day !
Love in a shining galaxy appears,
Triumphant still.
GRANVILLE.
LOVE.
I'll be this abject thing no more !
Love, give me back my heart again.
GRANVILLE.
Thy love, still arm'd with fate,
Is dreadful as thy hate.
GRANVILLE.
Though train'd in arms, and learn'd in martial
arts,
Thou choosest not to conquer men, but hearts.
GRANVILLE.
I have no will but what your eyes ordain ;
Destined to love, as they are doom'd to reign.
GRANVILLE.
Love is a plant of the most tender kind,
That shrinks and shakes with ev'ry ruffling wind.
GRANVILLE.
When love could teach a monarch to be wise,
And gospel light first dawn'd from Bullen's
eyes.
GRAY.
Small is the soul's first wound from beauty's
dart,
And scarce th' unheeded fever warms the heart ;
Long we mistake it under liking's name,'
A soft indulgence, that deserves no blame.
Excited, though, the smother'd fire at length
Bursts into blaze and burns with open strength ;
That image which before but soothed the mind
Now lords it there, and rages unconfined ;
Mixing with all our thoughts, it wastes the day,
And when night comes it dreams the soul away.
AARON HILL.
Let us now, in whisper'd joy,
Evening's silent hours employ :
Silence best, and conscious shades,
Please the hearts that love invades ;
Other pleasures give them pain :
Lovers all but love disdain.
DR. S. JOHNSON.
Know'st thou not yet, when love invades the
soul,
That all her faculties receive his chains ?
That reason gives her sceptre to his hand,
Or only struggles to be more enslaved ?
DR. S. JOHNSON.
Let it not your wonder move,
Less your laughter, that I love ;
Though I now write fifty years,
I have had, and have, my peers.
BEN JONSON.
Young I'd have him too;
Yet a man with crisped hair,
Cast in thousand snares and rings
For love's fingers and his wings.
BEN JONSON.
Follow a shadow, it flies you ;
Seem to fly it, it will pursue :
So court a mistress, she denies you ;
Let her alone, she will court you.
BEN JONSON.
Man while he loves is never quite depraved,
And woman's triumph is a lover saved.
LAMB.
Oh ! only those
Whose souls have felt this one idolatry
Can tell how precious is the slightest thing
Affection gives and hallows ! A dead flower
Will long be felt, remembrancer of looks
That made each leaf a treasure.
L. E. LANDON,
I need not say how, one by one,
Love's flowers have dropp'd from off love's
chain ;
Enough to say that they are gone,
And that they cannot bloom again.
L. E. LANDON.
They parted as all lovers part ;
She with her wrong' d and breaking heart,
But he, rejoicing to be free,
Bounds like a captive from his chain,
And wilfully believing she
Hath found her liberty again ;
Or if dark thoughts will cross his mind,
They are but clouds before the wind.
L. E. LANDON.
That proud heart had been given to one
Who sought it not to win ;
And now she only strove to hide
The burning shame within.
L. E. LANDON.
And had he not long read
The heart's hush'd secret in the soft dark eye
Lighted at his approach, and on the cheek
Colouring all crimson at his lightest look?
L. E. LANDON.
I strove not to resist so sweet a flame,
But gloried in a happy captive's name;
Nor would I now, would love permit, be free !
LORD LYTTELTON.
LOVE.
None without hope e'er loved the brightest
fair;
But love can hope where reason would despair.
LORD LYTTELTON.
Not all her arts my steady soul shall move ;
And she shall find indifference conquers love.
LORD LYTTELTON.
Who ever loved that loved not at first sight ?
MARLOWE : Hero and Leander.
Love refines
The thoughts, and heart enlarges ; hath his seat
In reason, and is judicious ; is the scale
By which to heav'nly love thou may'st ascend.
MILTON. /
Be obedient, and retain
Unalterably firm his love entire.
MILTON.
I no sooner in my heart divined,
My heart, which by a secret harmony
Still moves with thine, join'd in connection
sweet !
MILTON.
What seem'd fair in all the world, seem'd now
Mean, or in her summ'd up, in her contain'd.
MILTON.
I pleased, and with attractive graces won,
The most averse, thee chiefly.
MILTON.
This sweet intercourse
Of looks and smiles ; for smiles from reason
flow,
To brute denied, and are of love the food.
MILTON.
Hopeful to regain
Thy love, from thee I would not hide
What thoughts in my unquiet breast are ris'n.
MILTON.
How can I live without thee, how forego
Thy sweet converse, and love so dearly join'd,
To live again in these wild woods forlorn ?
MILTON.
She fair, divinely fair, fit love for gods.
MILTON.
Her looks from that time infused
Sweetness into my heart unfelt before.
MILTON.
Love, sweetness, goodness, in her person shined.
MILTON.
What higher in her society thou find'st,
Attractive, humane, rational, love still.
MILTON.
This not mistrust, but tender love enjoins.
MILTON.
Nor set thy heart,
Thus over-fond, on that which is not thine.
MILTON.
nightingale, that on yon bloomy spray
Warblest at eve, when all the woods are still ;
^Thou with fresh hope the lover's heart dost fill,
While the jolly Hours lead on propitious May.
MILTON.
Oh ! if there be an elysium on earth,
It is this
When two that are link'd in one heavenly tie
Love on through all ills, and love on till they
die.
MOORE.
Love was to his impassion'd soul
Not, as with others, a mere part
Of its existence, but the whole :
The very life-breath of the heart.
MOORE.
Oh ! there's nothing half so sweet in life
As love's young dream.
MOORE.
To feel that we adore
To such refined excess,
That, though the heart would burst with more,
We could not live with less.
MOORE.
Oh ! colder than the wind that freezes
Founts that but now in sunshine play'd,
Is that congealing pang that seizes
The trusting bosom when betray'd.
MOORE.
Oh ! what was love made for, if 'tis not the
same
Through joy and through sorrow, through glory
and shame ?
MOORE.
Well do vanish'd frowns enhance
The charms of every brighten' d glance,
And dearer seems each dawning smile
For having lost its light awhile.
MOORE.
1 know not, I ask not, if guilt's in that heart ;
I but know that I love thee, whatever thou art.
MOORE.
LOVE.
The lover now, beneath the western star,
Sighs through the medium of his sweet segar,
And fills the ears of some consenting she
With puffs and vows, with smoke and constancy.
MOORE.
Can I again that look recall
That once would make me die for thee ?
No, no ! the eye that burns on all
Shall never more be prized by me !
MOORE.
In pleasure's dream, or sorrow's hour,
In crowded hall, or lonely bower,
The business of my soul shall be
Forever to remember thee !
MOORE.
Oh, thou shalt be all else to me
That heart can feel or tongue can feign ;
I'll praise, admire, and worship thee,
But must not, dare not love again.
MOORE.
Here still is the smile that no cloud can o'ercast,
And the heart, and the hand, all thy own to the
last.
MOORE.
Then fare thee well ! I'd rather make
My bower upon some icy lake
When thawing suns begin to shine,
Than trust to love so false as thine !
MOORE.
Thinkest thou
That I could live, and let thee go
"Who art my life itself ? No no !
MOORE.
No, the heart that has truly loved never forgets,
But as truly loves on to the close ;
As the sunflower turns on her god, when he sets,
The same look which she turn'd when he
rose.
MOORE.
And when once the young heart of a maiden is
stolen,
The maiden herself will steal after it soon.
MOORE.
Oh ! that a dream so sweet, so long enjoy'd,
Should be so sadly, cruelly destroy'd.
MOORE.
Oh ! had we never, never met,
Or could this heart e'en now forget -
How link'd, how bless'd we might have been,
Had fate not frown'd so dark between !
MOORE.
A something light as air, a look,
A word Wkind or wrongly taken,
Oh ! love that tempests never shook,
A breath, a touch, like this has shaken.
MOORE.
Love, sole lord and monarch of itself,
Allows no ties, no dictates but its own.
To that mysterious arbitrary power
Reason points out and duty pleads in vain.
MOTTLEY : Imperial Captives.
Say, Stella, what is love, whose fatal power
Robs virtue of content, and youth of joy?
\Vhat nymph or goddess in a luckless hour
Disclosed to light the mischief-making boy ?
MRS. MULSO.
Love not ! love not ! the thing you love may
change ;
The rosy lip may cease to smile on you,
The kindly beaming eye grow cold and strange,
The heart still warmly beat, and not for you,
MRS. NORTON.
Castalio ! thou hast caught
My foolish heart ; and, like a tender child,
That trusts his plaything to another hand,
1 fear its harm, and fain would have it back.
OTWAY.
Happy my eyes when they behold thy face :
My heavy heart will leave its doleful beating
At sight of thee, and bound with sprightful joys.
OTWAY.
I loved her first; I cannot quit the claim,
But will preserve the birthright of my passion.
OTWAY.
Oh tyrant love !
Wisdom and wit in vain reclaim,
And arts but soften us to feel thy flame.
POPE.
Love in these labyrinths his slaves detains,
And mighty hearts are held in slender chains.
POPE.
Who love too much hate in the like extreme.
POPE.
The garlands fade, the vows are worn away ;
So dies her love, and so my hopes decay.
POPE.
Hear what from love unpractised hearts endure ;
From love, the sole disease thou canst not cure.
POPE.
LOVE.
The god of love retires ;
Dim are his torches, and extinct his fires.
POPE.
Ah ! come not, write not, think not once of me,
Nor share one pang of all I felt for thee.
POPE.
Love indulged my labours past,
Matures my present, and shall bound my last.
POPE.
Let mutual joys our mutual trust combine,
And love, and love-born confidence, be thine.
POPE.
I'll fly from shepherds, flocks, and flow'ry
plains ;
From shepherds, flocks, and plains I may remove,
Forsake mankind, and all the world but love.
POPE.
Deign to be loved, and ev'ry heart subdue !
What nymph could e'er attract such crowds
as you ?
POPE.
The birds shall cease to tune their ev'ning song,
The winds to breathe, the waving woods to move,
And streams to murmur, ere I cease to love.
POPE.
Sudden he view'd, in spite of all her art,
An earthly lover lurking at her heart.
POPE.
How loved, how honour' d once, avails thee not.
POPE.
Now warm in love, now with'ring in thy bloom,
Lost in a convent's solitary gloom.
POPE.
Smooth flow the waves, the zephyrs gently play,
Belinda smiled, and" all the world was gay.
POPE.
What should most excite a mutual flame,
Your rural cares and pleasures are the same.
POPE.
Warn'd by the sylph, O pious maid, beware !
This to disclose is all thy guardian's care ;
Beware of all, but most beware of man.
POPE.
Nor at first sight, like most, admire the fair :
For you he lives ; and you alone shall share
His last affection, as his early care.
POPE.
Yet, guiltless too, this bright destroyer lives;
At random wounds, nor knows the wounds she
gives.
POPE.
Not bubbling fountains to the thirsty swain,
Not show'rs to larks, or sunshine to the bee,
Are half so charming as thy sight to me.
POPE.
Anxious cares the pensive nymph oppress'd,
And secret passions labour'd in her breast.
POPE.
Then let this dictate of my love prevail.
POPE.
For when success a lover's toil attends,
Few ask if fraud or force attain' d his ends.
POPE.
Thy place is here, sad sister; come away:
Once, like thyself, I trembled, wept, and pray'd;
Love's victim then, though now a sainted maid.
POPE.
From opening skies may streaming glories shine,
And saints embrace thee with a love like mine.
POPE.
O mighty love ! from thy unbounded power
How shall the human bosom rest secure ?
How shall our thoughts avoid the various snare,
Or wisdom to our caution' d soul declare
The different shapes thou pleasest to employ
When bent to hurt, and certain to destroy ?
PRIOR.
Has thy uncertain bosom ever strove
With the first tumults of a real love ?
Hast thou now dreaded and now bless'd his
sway,
By turns averse and joyful to obey?
PRIOR.
The infant flames, whilst yet they were conceal'd
In tim'rous doubts, with pity I beheld ;
With easy smiles dispell'd the silent fear
That durst not tell me what I died to hear.
PRIOR.
Forced compliments and formal bows
Will show thee just above neglect;
The fire which in thy lover glows
Will settle into cold respect.
PRIOR.
From thy foolish heart, vain maid, remove
A useless sorrow and an ill-starr'd love.
PRIOR.
LOVE.
You may neglect, or quench, or hate the flame
Whose smoke too long obscured your rising
name,
And quickly cold indiffrence will ensue
When you love's joys thro' honour's optic view.
PRIOR.
In vain I strove to check my growing flame,
Or shelter passion under friendship's name;
You saw my heart.
The happy whimsey you pursue,
Till you at length believe it true ;
Caught by your own delusive art,
You fancy first, and then assert.
PRIOR.
PRIOR.
By thy each look, and thought, and care, 'tis
shown
Thy joys are centred all in me alone.
PRIOR.
The god of love himself inhabits there,
With all his rage, and dread, and grief, and care,
His complement of stores, and total war.
PRIOR.
The maid
Shall weep the fury of my love decay 'd,
And weeping follow me, as thou dost now,
With idle clamours of a broken vow.
v PRIOR.
Love ! fantastic pow'r ! that is afraid
To stir abroad till watchfulness be laid,
Undaunted then o'er cliffs and valleys strays,
And leads his vot'ries safe through pathless
ways.
PRIOR.
When thus the gather' d storms of wretched love,
In my swoln bosom, with long war had strove,
Laid all the civil bonds of manhood waste,
And scatter' d ruin as the torrent past.
PRIOR.
Moved by my charms, with them your love may
cease ;
And as the fuel sinks, the flame decrease.
PRIOR.
She soothes, but never can inthrall my mind :
Why may not peace and love for once be join'd ?
PRIOR.
The coast
Where first my shipwreck'd heart was lost.
PRIOR.
When, fired by passion, we attack the fair,
Delusive sighs and brittle, vows we bear.
PRIOR.
For I was born to love, and thou to reign.
PRIOR.
How oft from pomp and state did I removt,
To feed despair, and cherish hopeless love !
PRIOR.
To me pertains not, she replies,
To know or care where Cupid flies,
What are his haunts, or which his way,
Where he would dwell, or whither stray.
PRIOR.
Could thirst of vengeance, and desire of fame,
Excite the female breast with martial flame ?
And shall not love's diviner pow'r inspire
More hardy virtue and more gen'rous fire ?
PRIOR.
Now gall is bitter with a witness ;
And love is all delight and sweetness.
PRIOR.
'Tis then that with delight I rove
Upon the boundless depth of love :
I bless my chains, I hand my oar,
Nor think on all I left on shore. PRIOR.
Henry in knots involved his Emma's name
Upon this tree ; and as the tender mark
Grew with the year, and widen'd with the bark,
Venus had heard the virgin's soft address,
That as the wound the passion might increase.
PRIOR.
Love, well thou know'st, no partnership allows;
Cupid averse rejects divided vows.
PRIOR.
Charge Venus to command her son,
Wherever else she lets him rove,
To shun my house, and field, and grove ;
Peace cannot dwell with hate or love.
PRIOR.
If love, alas ! be pain, the pain I bear
No thought can figure, and no tongue declare.
PRIOR.
In vain you tell your parting lover
You wish fair winds may waft him over.
PRIOR.
In her forehead's fair half-round
Love sits in open triumph crown'd;
He in the dimple of her chin
In private state by friends is seen. PRIOR
320
LOVE.
I reason'd much, alas ! but more I loved ;
Sent and recall'd, ordain'd and disapproved.
PRIOR.
What is true passion, if unblest it dies ?
And where is Emma's joy, if Henry flies?
PRIOR.
Then shun the ill ; and know, my dear,
Kindness and constancy will prove
Tne only pillars fit to bear
So vast a weight as that of love. PRIOR.
But could youth last, and love still breed,
Had joys no date, and age no need,
Then these delights my mind might move
To live with thee, and be thy love.
RALEIGH.
Urge your success ; deserve a lasting name ;
She'll crown a grateful and a constant flame.
ROSCOMMON.
With easy freedom and a gay address
A pressing lover seldom wants success.
ROWE.
My heart was made to fit and pair within,
Simple and plain, and fraught with artless ten-
derness.
ROWE.
Fools that we are, we know that ye deceive us,
Yet act as if the fraud was pleasing to us,
And our undoing joy.
ROWE.
Such is love,
And such the laws of his fantastic empire ;
The wanton boy delights to bend the mighty,
And scoffs at the vain wisdom of the wise.
ROWE.
Have I not set at naught my noble birth,
A spotless fame, and an unblemish'd race,
The peace of innocence and pride of virtue ?
My prodigality has given thee all.
ROWE.
Love is, or ought to be, our greatest bliss;
Since every other joy, how dear soever,
Gives way to that, and we leave all for love.
ROWE: Lady Jane Grey.
O love ! how are thy precious sweetest moments
Thus ever cross'd, thus vex'd with disappoint-
ments !
Now pride, now fickleness, fantastic quarrels,
And sullen coldness, give us pain by turns !
ROWE: Ulysses.
In peace, Love tunes the shepherd's reed,
In war, he mounts the warrior's steed
In halls, in gay attire is seen,
In hamlets, dances on the green :
Love rules the court, the camp, the grove,
And man below, and saints above ;
For love is heaven, and heaven is love !
SCOTT : Lay of the Last Minstrel.
When change itself can give no more,
'Tis easy to be true.
SIR C. SEDLEY : Reasons for Constancy.
The fire of love in youthful blood,
Like what is kindled in brush-wood,
But for a moment burns.
SHADWELL.
Writers say, as the most forward bud
Is eaten by the canker ere it blow,
Even so by love the young and tender wh
Is turn'd to folly, blasting in the bud,
Losing his verdure even in the prime.
SHAKSPEARE.
Yet writers say, as in the sweetest bud
The eating canker dwells, so eating love
Inhabits in the finest wits of all.
SHAKSPEARE.
He is far gone, and, truly, in my youth
I suffer'd much extremity for love,
Very near this.
SHAKSPEARE.
The pale complexion of true love,
And the red glow of scorn and proud disdain.
SHAKSPEARE.
This love of theirs myself have often seen,
Haply when they have judged me fast asleep.
SHAKSPEARE.
He wooes both high and low, both rich and
poor.
SHAKSPEARE.
You know that love
Will creep in service where it cannot go.
SHAKSPEARE.
A lover may bestride the gossamer
That idles in the wanton summer air,
And yet not fall ; so light is vanity.
SHAKSPEARE.
To sense 'tis gross
You love my son : invention is ashamed,
Against the proclamation of thy passion,
To say thou dost not.
SHAKSPEARE.
LOVE.
321
Alas, that love, whose view is muffled still,
Should without eyes see pathways to his ill !
SHAKSPEARE.
There lives within the very flame of love
A kind of wick or snuff that will abate it.
SHAKSPEARE.
Such as I am all true lovers are ;
Unstaid and skittish in all motions else,
Save in the constant image of the creature
That is beloved.
SHAKSPEARE.
She will not fail ; for lovers break not hours,
Unless it be to come before their time :
So much they spur their expedition.
SHAKSPEARE.
If thou remember'st not the slightest folly
That ever love did make thee run into,
Thou hast not loved.
SHAKSPEARE.
Love's tongue proves dainty Bacchus gross in
taste :
For valour, is not love a Hercules ?
Still climbing trees in the Hesperides ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Yet mark'd I where the bolt of Cupid fell;
It fell upon a little western flower,
Before milk-white, now purple with love's
wound.
SHAKSPEARE.
Then let thy love be younger than thyself,
Or thy affection cannot hold the bent. ^*
SHAKSPEARE.
I look'd upon her with a soldier's eye;
That liked, but had a rougher task in hand
Than to drive liking to the name of love.
SHAKSPEARE.
Now our joy,
Although our last though not our least young
love,
What say you ? SHAKSPEARE.
Since thou canst talk of love so well,
Thy company, which erst was irksome to me,
I will endure. SHAKSPEARE.
Love is a smoke raised with a fume of sighs :
Being purged, a fire sparkling in lovers' eyes.
SHAKSPEARE.
The expedition of my violent love
Outruns the pauser, reason.
SHAKSPEARE.
21
Brown groves,
Whose shadow the dismissed bachelor loves,
Being lass-lorn.
SHAKSPEARE.
She's so conjunctive to my life and soul,
That as the star moves not but in his sphere,
I could not but by her.
SHAKSPEARE.
What man who knows
What woman is, yea, what she cannot choose
But must be, will his free hours languish out
For assured bondage ?
SHAKSPEARE.
With love's light wings I did o'erperch these
walls;
For stony limits cannot hold love out.
SHAKSPEARE.
How rarely does it meet with this time's guise
When man was will'd to love his enemies !
SHAKSPEARE.
A contract of true love to celebrate,
And some donation freely to estate
On the blest lovers.
SHAKSPEARE.
Gentle lady,
When first I did impart my love to you,
I freely told you, all the wealth I had
Ran in my veins.
SHAKSPEARE.
Love's not love
When it is mingled with regards that stand
Aloof from th' entire point.
SHAKSPEARE.
This ring.
Which when you part from, lose, or give away,
Let it presage the ruin of your love,
And be my 'vantage to exclaim on you.
SHAKSPEARE.
Sing no more ditties, sing no mo
Of dumps so dull and heavy;
The frauds of men were ever so,
Since summer first was leafy.
SHAKSPEARE.
This is the very ecstasy of love,
Whose violent property forgets itself,
And leads the will to desperate undertakings.
SHAKSPEARE.
How furious and impatient they be,
And cannot brook competitors in love.
SHAKSPEARE.
322
LOVE.
Whenever Buckingham doth turn his hate
Upon your grace, and not with duteous love
Doth cherish you and yours, God punish me
With hate in those where I expect most love.
SHAKSPEARE.
Love is your master, for he masters you :
And he that is so yoked by a fool,
Methinks, should not be chronicled for wise.
SHAKSPEARE.
Upon my knees
I charm you by my once-commended beauty,
By all your vows of love, and that great vow
Which did incorporate and make us one.
SHAKSPEARE.
Against all checks, rebukes, and manners,
I must advance the colours of my love,
And not retire.
SHAKSPEARE.
A beauty-waning and distressed widow,
Ev'n in the afternoon of her best days,
Made prize and purchase of his wanton eye.
SHAKSPEARE. >
Under the colour of commending him,
I have access my own love to prefer.
SHAKSPEARE.
All hearts in love use their own tongues ;
Let every eye negotiate for itself,
And trust no agent.
SHAKSPEARE.
Tranio, I burn, I pine, I perish, Tranio,
If I achieve not this young modest girl !
SHAKSPEARE.
I here do give thee that with all my heart,
Which, but thou hast already, with all my heart
I would keep from thee.
SHAKSPEARE.
Be thou as thou wast wont to be,
See as thou wast wont to see ;
Dian's bud o'er Cupid's flower
Hath such force and blessed power.
SHAKSPEARE.
If my offence be of such mortal kind,
That neither service past, nor present sorrows,
Can ransom me into his love again,
But to know so must be my benefit.
SHAKSPEARE.
I have acquainted you
With the dear love I bear to fair Anne Page,
Who mutually hath answer'cl my affection.
SHAKSPEARE.
spirit of love, how quick and fresh art thou !
That, notwithstanding thy capacity
Receiveth as the sea, naught enters there,
Of what validity and pitch soe'er,
But falls into abatement and low price,
Even in a minute !
SHAKSPEARE.
Thou, Julia, thou hast metamorphosed me,
Made me neglect my studies, lose my time,
War with good counsel, set the world at naught,
Made wit with musing weak, heart-sick with
thought.
SHAKSPEARE.
1 hold him but a fool, that will endanger
His body for a girl that loves him not.
SHAKSPEARE.
I would I were thy bird.
Sweet, so would I ;
Yet I should kill thee with much cherishing.
SHAKSPEARE.
This bud of love, by summer's ripening breath,
May prove a beauteous flower when next we
meet.
SHAKSPEARE.
I have done penance for contemning love,
Whose high imperious thoughts have punish'd
me
With bitter fasts and penitential groans.
SHAKSPEARE.
Never durst poet touch a pen to write,
Until his ink were temper'd with love's sighs.
SHAKSPEARE.
She is my essence, and I leave to be,
If I be not by her fair influence
Foster'd, illumined, cherish'd, kept alive.
SHAKSPEARE.
You are already love's firm votary,
And cannot soon revolt and change your mind.
SHAKSPEARE.
Love adds a precious seeing to the eye.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thou hast given me, in this beauteous face,
A world of earthly blessings to my soul,
If sympathy of love unite our thoughts.
SHAKSPEARE.
Notwithstanding all her sudden quips,
The least whereof would quell a lover's hope,
Yet, spaniel-like, the more she spurns my love
The more it grows, and fawneth on her still.
SHAKSPEARE.
LOVE.
3 2 3
Love is blind, and lovers cannot see
The pretty follies that themselves commit :
For if they could, Cupid himself would blush
To see me thus transformed to a boy.
SHAKSPEARE.
Love will not be spurr'd to what it loathes.
SHAKSPEARE.
Lay lime to tangle her desires
By wailful sonnets, whose composed rhymes
Should be full fraught with serviceable vows.
SHAKSPEARE.
What is love ? 'tis not hereafter :
Present mirth hath present laughter ;
What's to come is still unsure.
SHAKSPEARE.
They love the least that let men know their love.
SHAKSPEARE.
The next thing then she waking looks upon,
On meddling monkey, or on busy ape,
She shall pursue it with the soul of love.
SHAKSPEARE.
Love is full of unbefitting strains,
All wanton as a child, skipping in vain.
SHAKSPEARE.
How wayward is this foolish love,
That like a testy babe will scratch the nurse,
And presently, all humbled, kiss the rod !
SHAKSPEARE.
My love is thaw'd,
Which, like a waxen image 'gainst a fire,
Bears no impression of the thing it was.
SHAKSPEARE.
Every night he. comes
With music of all sorts, and songs composed
To her unworthiness : it nothing steads us
To chide him from our eaves, for he persists
As if his life lay on't.
SHAKSPEARE.
I've charged thee not to haunt about my doors;
In honest plainness thou hast heard me say,
My daughter's not for thee.
SHAKSPEARE.
O thou, that dost inhabit in my breast,
Leave not the mansion so long tenantless ;
Lest growing ruinous the building fall,
And leave no memory of what it was !
SHAKSPEARE.
I do not seek to quench your love's hot fire,
But qualify the fire's extreme rage,
Lest it should burn above the bounds of reason.
SHAKSPEARE.
A love that makes breath poor, and speech un-
able;
Beyond all manner of so much I love you.
SHAKSPEARE.
It is my love that calls upon my name :
How silver sweet sound lovers' tongues by night !
Like softest music to attending ears.
SHAKSPEARE.
Love that comes too late,
Like a remorseful pardon slowly carried,
To the great sender turns a sour offence.
SHAKSPEARE.
Unhappy that I am ! I cannot heave
My heart into my mouth : I love your majesty
According to my bond, no more nor less.
SHAKSPEARE.
Blunt not his love ;
Nor lose the good advantage of his grace,
By seeming cold.
SHAKSPEARE.
The time was once, when thou unurged wouldst
vow
That never words were music to thine ear,
Unless I spake.
SHAKSPEARE.
All thy vexations
Were but my trials of thy love, and thou
Hast strangely stood the test.
SHAKSPEARE,
You dote on her that cares not for your love.
SHAKSPEARE.
What though I be not fortunate ;
But miserable most, to love unloved !
SHAKSPEARE.
This aspect of mine
The best-regarded virgins of our clime
Have loved.
SHAKSPEARE.
Do not fall in love with me ;
For I am falser than vows made in wine.
SHAKSPEARE.
Love moderately : long love doth so ;
Too swift arrives as tardy as too slow.
SHAKSPEARE.
324
LOVE.
Fye, fye, unreverend tongue ! to call her bad,
Whose sovereignty so oft thou hast preferr'd
With twenty thousand soul-confirming oaths.
SHAKSPEARE.
Here she stands:
Take but possession of her with a touch ;
I dare thee but to breathe upon my love.
SHAKSPEARE.
I am of ladies most deject and wretched,
That suck'd the honey of his music vows.
SHAKSPEARE.
Who dotes, yet doubts, suspects, yet strongly
loves.
SHAKSPEARE.
As much love in rhyme
As would be cramm'd up in a sheet of paper,
Writ on both sides the leaf, margent and all.
SHAKSPEARE.
Love looks not with the eyes, but with the
mind;
And therefore is wing'd Cupid painted blind.
SHAKSPEARE.
Reason thus with reason fetter :
Love sought is good, but given unsought is
better.
SHAKSPEARE.
Alas, that love, so gentle in his view,
Should be so tyrannous and rough in proof!
SHAKSPEARE.
If thou hast not sat as I do now,
Wearying thy hearer in thy mistress' praise,
Thou hast not loved.
SHAKSPEARE.
Things base and vile, holding no quality,
Love can transpose to form and dignity.
SHAKSPEARE.
To be in love where scorn is bought with groans ;
Coy looks, with heart-sore sighs; one fading
moment's mirth,
With twenty watchful, weary, tedious nights :
If haply won, perhaps a hapless gain ;
If lost, why then a grievous labour won.
SHAKSPEARE.
Why, what would you?
Make me a willow cabin at your gate,
And call upon my soul within the house ;
Write loyal cantons of contemned love.
SHAKSPEARE.
O 'tis the course of love, and still approved,
When women cannot love where they' re beloved.
SHAKSPEARE.
Affection is a coal that must be cool'd,
Else, suffer' d, it will set the heart on fire.
SHAKSPEARE.
My love doth so approve him
That even his stubbornness, his checks and
frowns,
Have grace and favour in them.
SHAKSPEARE.
When love begins to sicken and decay,
It useth an enforced ceremony.
SHAKSPEARE.
Didst thou but know the inly touch of love,
Thou wouldst as soon go kindle fire with snow
As seek to quench the fire of love with words-
SHAKSPEARE.
Too early seen unknown, and known too late.
SHAKSPEARE.
Prosperity's the very bond of love ;
Whose fresh complexion and whose heart to
gether
Affliction alters.
SHAKSPEARE.
They do not love that do not show their love.
SHAKSPEARE.
A murderous guilt shows not itself more soon
Than love that would seem hid : love's night is
noon.
SHAKSPEARE.
I cannot love him :
Yet I suppose him virtuous, know him noble,
Of great estate, of fresh and stainless youth ;
In voices well divulged, free, learn'd, and
valiant,
And in dimensions, and the shape of nature,
A gracious person : but yet I cannot love him :
He might have took his answer long ago.
SHAKSPEARE.
The man that has a tongue, I say, is no man,
If with his tongue he cannot win a woman.
SHAKSPEARE.
If she do frown, 'tis not in hate of you,
But rather to beget more love in you.
If she do chide, 'tis not to have you gone.
SHAKSPEARE.
LOVE.
325
But though I loved you well, I woo'd you
not;
And yet, good faith, I wish'd myself a man;
Or, that we women had men's privilege
Of speaking first.
SHAKSPEARE.
She never told her love,
But let concealment, like a worm i' the bud,
Feed on her damask cheek; she pined in
thought ;
And with a green and yellow melancholy,
She sat (like patience on a monument)
Smiling at grief.
SHAKSPEARE.
'Twas pretty, though a plague,
To see him every hour ; to sit and draw
His arched brows, his hawking eye, his curls,
In our heart's table ; heart too capable
Of every line and trick of his sweet favour :
But now he's gone, and my idolatrous fancy
Must sanctify his relics.
SHAKSPEARE.
how this spring of love resembleth
The uncertain glory of an April day ;
Which now shows all the beauty of the sun,
And by-and-by a cloud takes all away.
SHAKSPEARE.
Methinks I feel this youth's perfections
Steal with an invisible and subtle stealth,
To creep in at mine eyes. Well, let it be.
SHAKSPEARE.
I know not why
1 love this youth ; and I have heard you say,
Love's reason without reason.
SHAKSPEARE.
All fancy-sick she is, and pale of cheer
With sighs of love.
SHAKSPEARE.
Mine eyes
Were not in fault, for she was beautiful;
Mine ears, that heard her flattery ; nor mine heart,
That thought her like her seeming : it had been
vicious
To have mistrusted her.
SHAKSPEARE.
It were all one
That I should love a bright particular star,
And think to wed it ; he is so above me :
In his bright radiance and collateral light
Must I be comforted ; not in his sphere.
SHAKSPEARE.
Believe not that the dribbling dart of love
Can pierce a complete bosom.
SHAKSPEARE.
Ah me ! for aught that I could ever read,
Could ever hear by tale or history,
The course of true love never did run smooth.
SHAKSPEARE.
Forgive me that I do not dream on thee,
Because thou seest me dote upon my love.
SHAKSPEARE.
But say, Lucetta, now we are alone,
Would'st thou then counsel me to fall in love ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Since his exile she hath despised me most,
Forsworn my company, and rail'd at me,
That I am desperate of obtaining her.
SHAKSPEARE.
He did hold me dear
Above this world ; adding thereto, moreover,
That he would wed me, or else die my lover.
^ SHAKSPEARE.
If ever
You meet in some fresh cheek the power of
fancy,
Then you shall know the wounds invisible
That love's keen arrows make.
SHAKSPEARE.
What passion hangs these weights upon my
tongue ?
I cannot speak to her; yet she urged conference.
SHAKSPEARE.
Love doth to her eyes repair
To help him of his blindness.
SHAKSPEARE.
Love cools, friendship falls off,
Brothers divide.
SHAKSPEARE.
If you do sorrow at my grief in love,
By giving love, your sorrow and my grief
Were both extermined.
SHAKSPEARE.
I firmly vow
Never to woo her more ; but do forswear her,
As one unworthy all the former favours
That I have fondly flatter'd her withal.
SHAKSPEARE.
But my poor heart first set free,
Bound in those icy chains by thee.
SHAKSPEARE.
326
LOVE.
Love like a shadow flies, when substance love
pursues ;
Pursuing that which flies, and flying what
pursues.
SHAKSPEARE.
She that hath a heart of that fine frame,
To pay this debt of love but to a brother,
How will she love when the rich golden shaft
Hath kill'd the flock of all affections else
That live in her !
SHAKSPEARE.
His soul is so enfetter'd to her love,
That she may make, unmake, do what she list.
SHAKSPEARE.
Farewell ; the leisure, and the fearful time,
Cuts off" the ceremonious vows of love,
And ample interchange of sweet discourse.
SHAKSPEARE.
A contract of eternal bond of love,
Confirm'd by mutual joinder of your hands,
Attested by the holy close of lips,
Strengthen'd by interchangement of your rings.
SHAKSPEARE.
I know I love in vain, strive against hope ;
Yet in this captious and intenible sieve
I still pour in the waters of my love.
SHAKSPEARE.
My love to Hermia
Is melted as the snow ; seems to me now
As the remembrance of an idle gawd,
Which in my childhood I did dote upon.
SHAKSPEARE.
Take no repulse, whatever she doth say;
For, Get you gone, she doth not mean Away !
SHAKSPEARE.
Three crabbed months had sour'd themselves
to death,
Ere I could make thee open thy white hand
And clepe thyself my love; then didst thou
utter,
" I am yours forever."
SHAKSPEARE.
Here I clip
The anvil of my sword ; and do contest
As hotly and as nobly with thy love,
As ever in ambitious strength I did
Contend against thy valour.
SHAKSPEARE.
Nature gives her o'er ;
For scorn at first makes after love the more.
SHAKSPEARE.
Although I joy in thee,
I have no joy of this contract to-night ;
It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden,
Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be
Ere one can say, It lightens !
SHAKSPEARE.
Thou hast by moonlight at her window sung,
With feigning voice, verses of feigning love ;
And stolen the impression of her fantasy
With bracelets of thy hair, rings, gawds, conceits,
Knacks, trifles, nosegays, sweetmeats ; mes-
sengers
Of strong prevailment in unharden'd youth.
SHAKSPEARE.
Love's heralds should be thoughts
Which ten times faster glide than the sunbeams,
Driving back shadows over low'ring hills.
Therefore do nimble-pinion'd doves draw love;
And therefore hath the wind-swift Cupid wings.
SHAKSPEARE.
No style is held for base, where love well
named is.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
Love which lover hurts is inhumanity.
SIR P. SIDNEY.
Keen are the pangs
Of hapless love, and passion unapproved :
But where consenting wishes meet, and vows,
Reciprocally breathed, confirm the tie ;
Joy rolls on joy, an inexhausting stream !
And virtue crowns the sacred scene.
SMOLLETT: Regicide.
As love can exquisitely bless,
Love only feels the marvellous of pain,
Opens new veins of torture in the soul,
And wakes the nerve where agonies are born.
SMOLLETT: Regicide.
No man condemn me who has never felt
A woman's pow'r, or tried the force of love:
All tempers yield and soften in those fires :
Our honours, interests, resolving down,
Run in the gentle current of our joys.
SOUTHERN.
They sin who tell us Love can die :
\Vith life all other passions fly,
All others are but vanity.
SOUTHEY : Curse of Kehama.
Love is indestructible :
Its holy flame forever burneth ;
From heaven it came, to heaven returneth.
SOUTHEY : Curse of Kehama.
LOVE,
3 2 7
The joys of love, if they should ever last
Without affliction or disquietness
That worldly chances do among them cast,
Would be on earth too great a blessedness,
Liker to heaven than mortal wretchedness.
SPENSER.
True he it said, whatever man it said,
That love with gall and honey doth abound :
But if the one be with the other weigh' d,
For every drachm of honey therein found
A pound of gall doth over it redound.
. SPENSER.
Albee my love he seeks with daily suit,
His clownish gifts and curtesies I disdain ;
His kids, his cracknels, and his early fruit.
SPENSER.
One loving hour
For many years of sorrow can dispense ;
A dram of sweet is worth a pound of sour.
SPENSER.
Each to these ladies' love did countenance,
And to his mistress each himself strove to ad-
vance.
SPENSER.
Yet is my truth yplight
And love avow'd to other lady late,
That to remove the same, I have no might :
To change love causeless is reproach to warlike
knight.
SPENSER. .
It was my fortune, common to that age,
To love a lady fair, of great degree,
The which was born of noble parentage,
And set in highest seat of dignity.
SPENSER.
Her joyous presence and sweet company
In full content he there did long enjoy;
Ne wicked envy, nor vile jealousy,
His dear delights were able to annoy.
SPENSER.
The herald of love's mighty king,
In whose coat-armour richly are display'd
All sorts of flowers the which on earth do spring.
SPENSER.
Love they him call'd that gave me the check-
mate;
But better might they have behote him hate.
SPENSER.
Thy muse too long slumbereth in sorrowing,
Lulled asleep through love's misgovernance.
SPENSER.
My frail fancy, fed with full delight,
Doth bathe in bliss, and mantleth most at
ease;
Ne thinks of other heaven, but how it might
Her heart's desire with most contentment
please.
SPENSER.
For unto knight there is no greater shame
Than lightness and inconstancy in love.
SPENSER.
Penelope, for her Ulysses' sake,
Devised a web her wooers to deceive :
In which the work that she all day did make,
The same at night she did unreave.
SPENSER.
Joy of my life, full oft for loving you
I bless my lot, that was so lucky placed ;
But then the more your own mishap I rue,
That are so much by so mean love embased.
SPENSER.
With fawning words he courted her awhile,
And looking lovely, and oft sighing sore,
Her constant heart did court with divers guile ;
But words and looks and sighs she did abhor.
SPENSER.
Her ivory forehead, full of bounty brave,
Like a broad table, did itself dispread,
For love his lofty triumphs to engrave,
And write the battles of his great godhead.
SPENSER.
The doubts and dangers, the delays and woes,
The feigned friends, the unassured foes,
Do make a lover's life a wretched hell.
SPENSER.
Nor this nor that so much doth make me mourn,
But for the lad whom long I loved so dear
Now loves a lass that all his love doth scorn ;
He plunged in pain his tressed locks doth teas
SPENSER.
With one look she doth my life dismay,
And with another doth it straight recure.
SPENSER.
From that day forth, I cast in careful mind
To seek her out with labour and long time.
SPENSER.
But were thy years green as now be mine,
Then wouldst thou learn to carol of love,
And hery with hymns thy lass's glove.
SPENSER.
328
LOVE.
Such is the power of that sweet passion,
That it all sordid baseness doth expel.
SPENSER.
I'll teach mine eyes, with meek humility,
Love-learned letters to her eyes to read ;
Which her deep wit, that true heart's thought
can spell,
Will soon conceive, and learn to construe well.
SPENSER.
So oft as homeward I from her depart,
I go like one that, having lost the field,
Is prisoner led away with heavy heart.
SPENSER.
Fondness it were for any, being free,
To covet fetters, though they golden be.
SPENSER.
And let fair Venus, that is queen of love,
With her heart-quelling son, upon you smile.
SPENSER.
I love thilk lass : alas, who do I love ?
She deigns not my good will, but doth reprove,
And of my rural music holdeth scorn.
SPENSER.
By that count which lovers' books invent,
The sphere of Cupid forty years contains ;
Which I have wasted in long languishment,
That seem'd the longer for my greater pains.
SPENSER.
If when she appears in th' room
Thou dost not quake and art struck dumb,
Know this,
Thou lov'st amiss ;
And to love true,
Thou must begin again, and love anew.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
I do confess
The blind lad's pow'r, while he inhabits there;
But I'll be ev'n with him, nevertheless.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
The crafty boy, that had full oft essay'd
To pierce my stubborn and resisting breast,
But still the bluntness of his darts betray'd.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
Then let him, that my love shall blame,
Or clip love's wings, or quench love's flame.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
But, alas ! no sea I find
Is troubled like a lover's mind.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
Why so pale and wan, fond lover?
Pr'ythee, why so pale ?
Will, when looking well can't move her,
Looking ill prevail ?
SIR J. SUCKLING.
Quit, quit, for shame ; this will not move,
This cannot take her :
If of herself she will not love,
Nothing can make her.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
Out upon it ! I have loved
Three whole days together ;
And am like to love three more,
If it prove fair weather.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
We shorten'd days to moments by love's art,
Whilst our two souls
Perceived no passing time, as if a part
Our love had still been of eternity.
SIR J. SUCKLING.
Love why do we one passion call ;
When 'tis a compound of them all?
Where hot and cold, where sharp and sweet,
In all their equipages meet ;
Where pleasures mix'd with pains appear,
Sorrow with joy, and hope with fear.
SWIFT.
By poets we are well assured
That love, alas ! can ne'er be cured ;
A complicated heap of ills,
Despising bolusses and pills. SWIFT.
SWIFT.
Love such nicety requires,
One blast will put out all his fires.
Vanessa, though by Pallas taught,
By love invulnerable thought,
Searching in books for wisdom's aid,
Was in the very search betray'd.
SWIFT.
How can heav'nly wisdom prove
An instrument to earthly love ?
Know'st thou not yet that men commence
Thy votaries for want of sense ?
SWIFT.
'Tis better to have loved and lost,
Than never to have loved at all.
TENNYSON : In Memoriam^
Ye fair !
Be greatly cautious of your sliding hearts.
THOMSON.
LOVE.
3 2 9
Dear youth, by fortune favour'd, but by love,
Alas ! not favour'd less, be still as now
Discreet.
THOMSON.
Agony unmix'd, incessant gall,
Corroding every thought, and blasting all
Love's paradise.
THOMSON.
And let the aspiring youth beware of love,
Of the smooth glance beware ; for 'tis too late,
When on his heart the torrent-softness pours :
Then wisdom prostrate lies, and fading fame
Dissolves in air away.
THOMSON: Seasons.
Won by the charm
Of goodness irresistible, and all
In sweet disorder lost, she blush'd consent.
THOMSON : Seasons.
Those fond sensations, those enchanting dreams,
Which cheat a toiling world from day to day,
And form the whole of happiness they know.
THOMSON : Sophonisba.
Why should we kill the best of passions, love ?
It aids the hero, bids ambition rise
To nobler heights, inspires immortal deeds,
Ev'n softens brutes, and adds a grace to virtue.
THOMSON : Sophonisba.
Love
Can answer love, and render bliss secure.
THOMSON.
Such their guiltless passion was,
As in the dawn of time inform'd the heart
Of innocence and undissembling truth.
THOMSON.
Alone amid the shades,
Still in harmonious intercourse they lived
The rural day, and talk'd with flowing heart,
Or sigh'd, and look'd unutterable things.
THOMSON: Seasons.
A lover is the very fool of nature,
Made sick by his own wantonness of thought,
His fever'd fancy.
THOMSON : Sophonisba.
Oh, never may suspicion's gloomy sky
Chill the sweet glow of fondly trusting love !
Nor ever may he feel the scowling eye
Of dark distrust his confidence reprove !
MRS. TIGHE: Psyche.
The gay, the wise, the gallant, and the grave,
Subdued alike, all but one passion have.
WALLER.
<- -Jtfone so lovely, sweet, and fair,
Or do more ennoble love.
They that are to love inclined,
Sway'd by chance, not choice or art,
To the first that's fair or kind
Make a present of their heart.
WALLER.
Celia, for thy sake I part
With all that grew so near my heart ;
And that I may successful prove,
Transform myself to what you love.
WALLER.
Here the proud lover, that has long endured
Some proud nymph's scorn, of his fond passion's
cured.
WALLER.
It is not that I love you less
Than when before your feet I lay;
But to prevent the sad increase
Of hopeless love, I keep away.
WALLER.
WALLER.
In love, the victors from the vanquish'd fly;
They fly that wound, and they pursue that die.
WALLER.
Fair course of passion, where two lovers start
And run together, heart still yoked with heart.
WALLER.
Love is a medley of endearments, jars,
Suspicions, quarrels, reconcilements, wars,
Then peace again.
WALSH.
Love's like a torch, which, if secured from
blasts,
Will faintly bum ; but then it longer lasts :
Exposed to storms of jealousy and doubt,
The blaze grows greater, but 'tis sooner out.
WALSH.
Ill-grounded passions quickly wear away;
What's built upon esteem can ne'er decay.
WALSH.
To all obliging, yet reserved to all,
None could himself the favour'd lover call.
WALSH.
But how perplex'd, alas ! is human fate !
I whom nor avarice nor pleasures move,
Yet must myself be made a slave to love.
WALSH.
33
LOVE. LUXURY.
Mightier far
Than strength of nerve or sinew, or the sway
Of magic potent over sun and star,
Is love, though oft to agony distrest,
And though his favourite seat be feeble woman's
breast.
WORDSWORTH.
Ladies, whose love is constant as the wind ;
Cits, who prefer a guinea to mankind.
YOUNG.
The young and gay declining, Alma flies
At nobler game, the mighty and the wise :
By nature more an eagle than a dove,
She impiously prefers the world to love.
YOUNG.
LUXURY.
With costly cates Rome stain'd her frugal board ;
Then with ill-gotten gold she bought a lord;
Corruption, discord, luxury combined,
Down sunk the far-famed mistress of mankind.
ARBUTHNOT.
War, and luxury, more direful rage
Thy crimes have brought, to shorten mortal
breath,
With all the num'rous family of death.
DRYDEN.
O luxury ! thou cursed by heaven's decree,
How ill-exchanged are things like these for thee !
How do thy potions, with insidious joy,
Diffuse their pleasures only to destroy !
GOLDSMITH: Deserted Village.
These thoughts he strove to bury in expense,
Rich meats, rich wines, and vain magnificence.
WALTER HARTE.
Luxury
Held out her lure to his superior eye,
And grieved to see him pass contemptuous by.
MADDEN.
Solomon lived at ease, nor aim'd beyond
Higher design than to enjoy his state.
MILTON.
If all the world
Should in a pet of temperance feed on pulse,
Drink the clear stream, and nothing wear but
frieze,
The All-giver would be unthank'd, would be
unpraised.
MILTON.
But just disease to luxury succeeds;
And ev'ry death its own avenger breeds.
POPE.
'Tis use alone that sanctifies expense,
And splendour borrows all her rays from sense.
POPE.
In the fat age of pleasure, wealth, and ease,
Sprung the rank weed, and thrived with large
Then, grown wanton by prosperity,
Studied new arts of luxury and ease.
ROSCOMMON.
Superfluity comes sooner
By white hairs, but competency lives longer.
SHAKSPEARE.
I have disabled mine estate,
By showing something a more swelling port
Than my faint means would grant continuance;
Nor do I now make moan, to be abridged
From such a noble rate.
SHAKSPEARE.
MAN.
MAN.
Though sprightly, gentle ; though polite, sincere ;
And only of thyself a judge severe.
BEATTIE.
For we are animals no less,
Although of different species.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
O ignorant poor man ! what dost thou bear
Lock'd up within the casket of thy breast?
What jewels and what riches hast thou there ?
What heav'nly treasure in so weak a chest ?
SIR J. DAVIES.
Oh ! what is man, great Maker of mankind !
That thou to him so great respect dost bear!
That thou adorn'st him with so bright a mind,
Mak'st him a king, and ev'n an angel's peer.
SIR J. DAVIES.
And if that wisdom still wise ends propound,
Why made he man of other creatures king;
When, if he perish here, there is not found
In all the world so poor and vile a thing ?
SIR J. DAVIES.
The wits that dived most deep, and soar'd most
high,
Seeking man's pow'rs, have found his weakness
such.
SIR J. DAVIES.
God, when heav'n and earth he did create,
Form'd man, who should of both participate.
SIR J. DENHAM.
How dull and how insensible a beast
Is man, who yet would lord it o'er the rest !
Philosophers and poets vainly strove
In every age the lumpish mass to move.
DRYDEN.
Man is but man, inconstant still, and various !
There's no to-morrow in him like to-day !
Perhaps the atoms rolling in his brain
Make him think honestly the present hour;'
The next, a swarm of base ungrateful thoughts
May mount aloft.
DRYDEN.
That crawling insect, who from mud began,
Warm'd by my beams, and kindled into man !
DRYDEN.
Man, the tyrant of our sex, I hate ;
A lowly servant, but a lofty mate.
1 * DRYDEN.
Man must be known, his strength, his state,
And by that tenure he holds all of fate.
DRYDEN.
A creature of a more exalted kind
Was wanted yet, and then was man design'd,
Conscious of thought.
DRYDEN.
Vain men, how vanishing a bliss we crave :
Now warm in love, now with'ring in the grave.
DRYDEN.
Men are but children of a larger growth :
Our appetites are apt to change as theirs,
And full as craving too, and full as vain.
DRYDEX.
Mankind one day serene and free appear ;
The next, they're cloudy, sullen, and severe;
New passions, new opinions, still excite ;
And what they like at noon, they leave at night.
GARTH.
Consider, man, weigh well thy frame :
The king, the beggar, are the same;
Dust form'd us all. Each breathes his day,
Then sinks into his native clay.
GAY: Fables.
Even the peasant dares these rights to scan,
And learn to venerate himself as man.
GOLDSMITH.
These Jittle things are great to little man.
GOLDSMITH : Traveller.
Man's feeble race what ills await !
Labour and penury, the racks of pain,
Disease and sorrow's sweeping train,
And death, sad refuge from the storms of fate.
GRAY : Progress of Poesy.
Nobler birth
Of creatures animate with gradual life,
Of growth, sense, reason, all summ'd up in man.
MILTON.
In their looks divine
The image of their glorious Maker shone,
Truth, wisdom, sanctitude serene and pure.
MILTON.
God on thee
Abundantly his gifts hath also pour'd ;
Inward and outward both, his image fair.
MILTON.
Nor think though men were none
That heav'n would want spectators, God want
praise.
MILTON.
So deep a malice to confound the race
Of mankind in one root.
MILTON.
332
MAN.
Trust not a man : we are by nature false,
Dissembling, subtle, cruel, and inconstant;
When a man talks of love, with caution hear him ;
But if he swears, he'll certainly deceive thee.
OTWAY: Orphan.
Behold the child, by nature's kindly law,
Pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw ;
Some livelier plaything gives his youth delight,
A little louder, but as empty quite;
Scarfs, garters, gold, amuse his riper stage,
And beads and prayer-books are the toys of age,
Pleased with this bauble still, as that before,
Till tired, he sleeps, and life can charm no more.
POPE.
See the same man in vigour, in the gout ;
Alone, in company ; in place, or out ;
Early at business, and at hazard late ;
Mad at a fox-chase, wise in a debate ;
Drunk at a borough, civil at a ball ;
Friendly at Hackney, faithless at Whitehall.
POPE.
Chaos of thought and passion, all confused ;
Still by himself abused or disabused ;
Created half to rise, and half to fall;
Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all ;
Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurl'd;
The glory, jest, and riddle of the world.
POPE.
Vast chain of being, which from God began,
Nature's ethereal, human; angel, man.
POPE.
Of man, who dares in pomp with Jove contest,
Unchanged, immortal, and supremely blest?
POPE.
As full, as perfect, in vile man that mourns,
As the rapt seraph that adores and burns.
POPE.
Weak, foolish man ! will heaven reward us there
With the same trash mad mortals wish for here ?
POPE.
There must be somewhere such a rank as man ;
And all the question, wrangle e'er so long,
Is only this, If God has placed him wrong ?
POPE.
Not always actions show the man ; we find
Who does a kindness is not therefore kind ;
Perhaps prosperity bccalm'd his breast,
Perhaps the wind just shifted from the east.
POPE.
With too much knowledge for the skeptic's side,
With too much weakness for the stoic's pride,
Man hangs between.
POPE.
They bore as heroes, but they felt as men.
POPE.
Thus the mercury of man is fix'd,
Strong grows the virtue with his nature mix'd;
The dross cements what else were too refined,
And in one int'rest body acts with mind.
POPE.
On human actions reason though you
It may be reason, but it is not man.
POPE.
What would this man? Now upward will he
soar,
And, little less than angel, would be more:
Now, looking downward, just as grieved appears
To want the strength of bulls or fur of bears.
POPE.
The bliss of man (could pride that blessing find)
Is not to act or think beyond mankind ;
No pow'rs of body or of soul to share,
But what his nature and his state can bear.
POPE.
\Vhy has not man a microscopic eye ?
For this plain reason, man is not a fly;
Say what the use, were finer optics given,
T' inspect a mite, not comprehend the heav'n ?
POPE.
Expatiate free o'er all the scene of man ;
Almighty maze ! but not without a plan.
POPE.
Man is a very worm by birth,
Vile reptile, weak and vain !
Awhile he crawls upon the earth,
Then shrinks to earth again.
POPE.
So man, who here seems principal alone,
Perhaps acts second to some sphere unknown ;
Touches some wheel, or verges to some goal :
'Tis but a part we see, and not the whole.
POPE.
Prepared I stand : he was but born to try
The lot of man, to suffer and to die.
POPE.
Know then thyself, presume not God to scan :
The proper study of mankind is man.
POPE.
MAN.
333
Like leaves on trees the race of man is found,
Now green in youth, now withering on the
ground :
Another race the following spring supplies ;
They fall successive, and successive rise.
POPE.
Man, foolish man!
Scarce know'st thou how thyself began ;
Scarce hadst thou thought enough to prove thou
art;
Yet, steel' d with studied boldness, thou dar'st
try
To send thy doubting Reason's dazzled eye
Through the mysterious gulf of vast immensity.
PRIOR.
On thy chin the springing beard began
To spread a doubtful down, and promise man.
PRIOR.
The vile worm, that yesterday began
To crawl ; thy fellow-creature, abject man.
PRIOR.
Thyself but dust, thy stature but a span ;
A moment thy duration, foolish man !
PRIOR.
But what a thoughtless animal is man,
How very active in his own trepan !
ROSCOMMON.
This is the state of man ; to-day he puts forth
The tender leaves of hope, to-morrow blossoms,
And bears his blushing honours thick upon him ;
The third day comes a frost, a killing frost,
And when he thinks, good easy man, full surely
His greatness is a ripening, nips his root;
And then he falls as I do.
SHAKSPEARE.
His life was gentle ; and the elements
So mix't in him that nature might stand up,
And say to all the world, This is a man !
SHAKSPEARE.
If that the heavens do not their visible spirits
Send quickly down to tame these vile offences,
Humanity must perforce prey on itself,
Like monsters of the deep.
SHAKSPEARE.
Thy noble shape is but a form of wax,
Digressing from the valour of a man.
SHAKSPEARE.
I do not think
So fair an outward, and such stuff within,
Endows a man but him.
SHAKSPEARE.
I dare do all that may become a man ;
Who dares do more, is none.
SHAKSPEARE.
A combination and a form indeed,
Where every god did seem to set his seal
To give the world assurance of a man.
SHAKSPEARE.
But man we find the only creature
Who, led by folly, combats nature ;
Who, when she loudly cries, Forbear !
With obstinacy fixes there ;
And, where his genius least inclines,
Absurdly bends his whole designs.
Vain human kind ! fantastic race !
Thy various follies who can trace ?-
Self-love, ambition, envy, pride,
Their empire in our hearts divide.
SWIFT.
SWIFT.
What were unenlighten'd man?
A savage roaming through the woods and wilds
In quest of prey.
THOMSON.
Man is thy theme, his virtue or his rage
Drawn to the life in each elab'rate page.
WALLER.
More danger now from man alone we find
Than from the rocks, the billows, and the wind.
WALLER.
No forest, cave, or savage den
Holds more pernicious beasts than men ;
Vows, oaths, and contracts they devise,
And tell us they are sacred ties.
WALLER.
How poor, how rich, how abject, how august,
How complicate, how wonderful is man !
How passing wonder He who made him such !
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
Ah ! how unjust to nature, and himself,
Is thoughtless, thankless, inconsistent man !
YOUNG : Night Thoughts.
And all may do what has by man been done.
YOUNG: Night Thoughts.
Fond man ! the vision of a moment made !
Dream of a dream ! and shadow of a shade !
YOUNG : Paraphrase of Job.
This vast and solid earth, that blazing sun,
Those skies, through which it rolls, must all
have end.
What then is man ? the smallest part of nothing.
YOUNG: Revenge.
334
MANNERS.
MANNERS.
What are these wondrous civilizing arts,
This Roman polish, and this smooth behaviour,
That render man thus tractable and tame ?
ADDISON.
The maid improves her charms
With inward greatness, unaffected wisdom,
And sanctity of manners.
ADDISON.
And rash enthusiasm in good society
Were nothing but a moral inebriety.
BYRON.
What's a fine person, or a beauteous face,
Unless deportment gives them decent grace ?
Bless'd with all other requisites to please,
Some want the striking elegance of ease :
The curious eye their awkward movement tires,
They seem like puppets led about by wires.
CHURCHILL: Rosciad.
Our sensibilities are so acute,
The fear of being silent makes us mute.
COWPER.
A moral, sensible, and well-bred man
Will not affront me, and no other can.
COWPER : Conversation.
Her air, her manners, all who saw admired ;
Courteous, though coy, and gentle, though re-
tired ;
The joy of youth and health her eyes display'd,
And ease of heart her every look convey'd.
CRABBE: Parish Register.
'Tis true (as the old proverb doth relate)
Equals with equals often congregate.
SIR J. DENHAM.
Oh, monstrous, superstitious puritan,
Of refined manners, yet ceremonial man,
That, when thou meet'st one, with inquiring
'eyes
Dost search, and, like a needy broker, prize
The silk and gold he wears.
DONNE.
He the stubborn soil manured,
With rules of husbandry the rankness cured;
Tamed as to manners.
DRYDEN.
But never was there a man, of his degree,
So much esteemed, so well beloved, as he:
So gentle of condition was he known,
That through the court his courtesy was blown.
DRYDEN.
Love taught him shame ; and shame, with love
at strife,
Soon taught the sweet civilities of life.
DRYDEN.
He bore his great commission in his look ;
But sweetly temper' d awe, and soften' d all he
spoke.
DRYDEN.
Bertram has been taught the arts of courts,
To gild a face with smiles, and leer a man to
ruin.
DRYDEN.
In minds and manners, twice opposed we see ;
In the same sign, almost the same degree.
DRYDEN.
His brutal manners from his breast exiled,
His mien he fashion'd, and his tongue he filed.
DRYDEN.
Nothing reserved or sullen was to see ;
But sweet regards.
DRYDEN.
Good manners bound her to invite
The stranger dame to be her guest that night.
DRYDEN.
Attend the court, and thou shalt briefly find
In that one place the manners of mankind ;
Hear the indictments, then return again,
Call thyself wretch, and, if thou dar'st, com-
plain.
DRYDEN.
The gen'ral voice
Sounds him, for courtesy, behaviour, language,
And ev'ry fair demeanour, an example :
Titles of honour add not to his worth,
Who is himself an honour to his title.
JOHN FORD.
The one intense, the other still remiss,
Cannot well suit with either ; but soon prove
Tedious alike.
MILTON.
Those thousand decencies, that daily flow
From all her words and actions.
MILTON.
'Tis not enough your counsel still be true ;
Blunt truths more mischief than nice false-
hoods do.
Men must be taught as if you taught them not,
And things unknown proposed as things forgot.
Without good breeding truth is disapproved;
That only makes superior sense beloved.
POPE.
MANNERS.
335
Form'd by thy converse happily to steer
From grave to gay, from lively to severe ;
Correct with spirit, eloquent with ease,
Intent to reason, or polite to please.
POPE.
Yet graceful ease, and sweetness void of pride,
Might hide her faults; if belles had faults to
hide.
POPE.
She speaks, behaves, and acts just as she ought;
But never, never reached one gen'rous thought:
Virtue she finds too painful an endeavour;
Content to dwell in decencies forever.
POPE.
My lord advances with majestic mien,
Smit with the mighty pleasure to be seen.
POPE.
A decent boldness ever meets with friends,
Succeeds, and even a stranger recommends.
POPE.
All manners take a tincture from our own,
Or come discolour'd through our passions shown.
POPE.
Of manners gentle, of affections mild;
In wit a man, simplicity a child.
POPE.
Of softest manners, unaffected mind;
Lover of peace, and friend of human kind.
POPE.
Trifles themselves are elegant in him.
POPE.
Manners with fortunes, humours turn with
climes,
Tenets with books, and principles with times.
POPE.
Thus affable and mild the prince precedes,
And to the dome th' unknown celestial leads.
POPE.
Morality, by her false guardians drawn,
Chicane in furs, and casuistry in lawn.
POPE.
Eye Nature's walks, shoot folly as it flies,
And catch the manners living as they rise ;
Laugh where we must, be candid where we can,
But vindicate the ways of God to man.
POPE.
Charm'd by their eyes, their manners I acquire,
And shape my foolishness to their desire.
PRIOR.
PRIOR.
Beyond the fix'd and settled rules
Of vice and virtue in the schools,
The better sort shall set before 'em
A grace, a manner, a decorum.
The nymph did like the scene appear,
Serenely pleasant, calmly fair ;
Soft fell her words as blew the air.
PRIOR.
Nature hath framed strange fellows in her time;
Some that will evermore peep through their eye,
And laugh like parrots at a bagpiper ;
And others of such vinegar aspect
That they'll not show their teeth in way of
smile,
Though Nestor swear the jest be laughable.
SHAKSPEARE.
This is some fellow
Who, having been praised for bluntness, doth
affect
A saucy roughness, and constrains the garb
Quite from his nature.
SHAKSPEARE.
Art thou thus bolden'd, man, by thy distress,
Or else a rude despiser of good manners,
That in civility thou seem'st so empty ?
SHAKSPEARE.
Proud Italy,
Whose manners still our tardy apish nation
Limps after in base awkward imitation.
SHAKSPEARE.
What reverence he did throw away on slaves,
Wooing poor craftsmen with the craft of smiles.
SHAKSPEARE.
Oh form !
How often dost thou with thy case, thy habit,
Wrench awe from fools, and tie the wiser souls
To thy false seeming !
SHAKSPEARE.
Thy years want wit, thy wit wants edge
And manners, to intrude where I am graced.
SHAKSPEARE.
Oh, she is
Ten times more gentle than her father's crabbed ;
And he's composed of harshness.
SHAKSPEARE.
This rudeness is a sauce to his good wit,
Which gives men stomach to digest his words
With better appetite.
SHAKSPEARE.
336
MANNERS. MA TRIMONY.
You needs must learn, lord, to amend this fault ;
Though sometimes it shows greatness, courage,
blood,
Yet oftentimes it doth present harsh rage,
Defect of manners, want of government,
Pride, haughtiness, opinion, and disdain.
SHAKSPEARE.
These kinds of knaves, in plainness,
Harbour more craft and more corrupter ends
Than twenty silky ducking observants,
That stretch their duties nicely.
SHAKSPEARE.
Poor Brutus, with himself at war,
Forgets the shows of love to other men.
SHAKSPEARE.
A heavy heart bears not an humble tongue ;
Excuse me so, coming so short of thanks.
SHAKSPEARE.
The thorny point
Of bare distress hath ta'en from me the show
Of smooth civility.
SHAKSPEARE.
Men's evil manners live in brass, their virtues
We write in water.
SHAKSPEARE.
You are above
The little forms which circumscribe your sex.
SOUTHERN.
How else, said he, but with a good bold face,
And with big words, and with a stately pace ?
SPENSER.
Let be thy bitter scorn,
And leave the rudeness of that antique age
To them that lived therein in state forlorn.
SPENSER.
Study with care politeness, that must teach
The modish forms of gesture and of speech :
In vain formality, with matron mien,
And pertness apes with her familiar grin ;
They against nature for applauses strain,
Distort themselves, and give all others pain.
BENJ. STILLINGFLEET.
What fairer cloak than courtesy for fraud ?
EARL OF STIRLING.
Some clergy too she would allow,
NoFqnarrell'd at their awkward bow.
SWIFT.
Yet, of manners mild,
And winning every heart, he knew to please,
Nobly to please ; while equally he scorn'd
Or adulation to receive or give.
THOMSON.
Ease in your mien, and sweetness in your face,
You speak a siren, and you move a grace ;
Nor time shall urge these beauties to decay,
While virtue gives what years shall steal away.
TICKELL.
Your looks must alter, as your subject does;
From kind to fierce, from wanton to severe.
WALLER.
In simple manners all the secret lies :
Be kind and virtuous, you'll be blest and wise.
YOUNG.
Stiff forms are bad, but let not worse intrude,
Nor conquer art and nature to be rude.
YOUNG.
In glitt'ring scenes o'er her own heart severe;
In crowds collected, and in courts sincere.
YOUNG.
MATRIMONY.
No little scribbler is of wit so bare,
But has his fling at the poor wedded pair.
ADDISON.
A senator of Rome, while Rome survived,
Would not have match'd his daughter with a
king.
ADDISON.
No jealousy their dawn of love o'ercast,
Nor blasted were their wedded days with
strife ;
Each season look'd delightful, as it past,
To the fond husband and the faithful wife.
BEATTIE: Minstrel.
Ah, gentle dames ! it gars me greet
To think how monie counsels sweet,
How monie lengthen'd sage advices,
The husband frae the wife despises.
BURNS.
A widow who, by solemn vows,
Contracted to me for my spouse,
Combined with him to break her word,
And has abetted all.
BUTLER : Hudibras.
MATRIMONY.
337
Find all his having and his holding
Reduced t' eternal noise and scolding;
The conjugal petard that tears
Down all portcullises of ears.
BUTLER: Hudibras.
Few none find what they love or could have
loved :
Though accident, blind accident, and the strong
Necessity of loving, have removed
Antipathies : but to recur, ere long,
Envenom'd with irrevocable wrong.
BYRON : Childe Harold.
Maidens, like moths, are ever caught by glare,
And Mammon wins his way where seraphs might
despair.
BYRON : ng. Bards and Scot. Reviewers.
But a smooth and steadfast mind,
Gentle thoughts and calm desires,
Hearts with equal love combined,
Kindle never-dying fires.
CAREW.
Thus grief still treads upon the heels of pleas-
ure;
Married in haste, we may repent at leisure.
CONGREVE: Old Bachelor.
Though fools spurn Hymen's gentle powers,
We, who improve his golden hours,
By sweet experience know
That marriage, rightly understood,
Gives to the tender and the good
A Paradise below.
COTTON.
Misses ! the tale that I relate
This lesson seems to carry,
Choose not alone a proper mate,
But proper time to marry.
COWPER.
The kindest and the happiest pair
Will find occasion to forbear ;
And something, every day they live,
To pity, and perhaps forgive.
COWPER : Mutual Forbearance.
The hour of marriage ends the female reign,
And we give all we have to buy a chain;
Hire men to be our lords who were our slaves,
And bribe our lovers to be perjured knaves.
JOHN CROWNE.
Nor in a secret cloister doth he keep'
These virgin spirits until their marriage-day.
SIR J. DAVIES.
22
Marriage-rings are not of this stuff:
Oh-! why should aught less precious or less
tough
Figure our loves ? DONNE.
Thou dost protest thy love, and would it show
By matching her as she would match her foe.
DONNE.
All of a tenor was their after-life,
No day discolour'd with domestic strife;
No jealousy, but mutual truth believed,
Secure repose, and kindness undeceived.
DRYDEN.
Some country girl, scarce to a court'sy bred,
Would I much rather than Cornelia wed,
If, supercilious, haughty, proud, and vain,
She brought her father's triumphs in her train.
DRYDEN.
What if I ne'er consent to make you mine;
My father's promise ties me not to time,
And bonds without a date, they say, are void.
DRYDEN.
These truths with his example you disprove
Who with his wife is monstrously in love.
DRYDEN.
But, whether marriage bring joy or sorrow,
Make sure of this day, and hang to-morrow.
DRYDEN.
They soon espoused; for they with ease were
join'd,
Who were before contracted in the mind.
DRYDEN.
This yoke of marriage from us both remove,
Where two are bound to draw, though neither
love.
DRYDEN.
One thought the sex's prime felicity
Was from the bonds of wedlock to be free,
And uncontroll'd to give account to none.
DRYDEN.
O fatal maid ! thy marriage is endow'd
With Phrygian, Latian, and Rutilian blood.
DRYDEN.
Ill bears the sex a youthful lover's fate,
When just approaching to the nuptial state.
DRYDEN.
The roofs with joy resound;
And Hymen, lo Hymen, rung around.
DRYDEN.
338
MATRIMONY.
Since I am turn'd the husband, you the wife,
The matrimonial victory is mine,
Which, having fairly gain'd, I will resign.
DRYDEN.
He had such things to urge against our marriage
As, now declared, would blunt my sword in
battle
And dastardize my courage.
DRYDEN.
I love my husband still ;
But love him as he was when youthful grace
And the first down began to shade his face.
DRYDEN.
Then, mixing pow'rful herbs with magic art,
She changed his form who could not change
his heart.
DRYDEN.
Thou shalt secure her helpless sex from harms,
And she thy cares will sweeten with her charms.
DRYDEN.
Short were her marriage joys ; for in the prime
Of youth her lord expired before his time.
DRYDEN.
With him she strove to join Lavinia's hand,
But dire portents the purposed match withstand.
DRYDEN.
Errors of wives reflect on husbands still.
DRYDEN.
Secrets of marriage still are sacred held ;
Their sweet and bitter by the wise conceal'd.
DRYDEN.
With unresisted might the monarch reigns :
He levels mountains, and he raises plains;
And, not regarding difference of degree,
Abased your daughter, and exalted me.
DRYDEN.
In bond of virtuous love together tied,
Together served they, and together died.
FAIRFAX.
Wedded love is founded on esteem,
Which the fair merits of the mind engage ;
For those are charms which never can decay,
But time, which gives new whiteness to the
swan,
Improves their lustre.
FENTON: Mariamne.
He sighs with most success that settles well.
GARTH.
Will she with huswife's hand provide thy meat,
And ev'ry Sunday morn thy neckcloth plait ?
GAY.
The husband's sullen, dogged, shy,
The wife grows flippant in reply ;
He loves command and due restriction,
And she as well likes contradiction.
She never slavishly submits :
She'll have her will, or have her fits ;
He this way tugs, she that way draws, '
And both find fault with equal cause.
GAY: Fables,
Nuptials of form, of int'rest, or of state,
Those seeds of pride, are fruitful in debate ;
Let happy men for generous love declare,
And choose the needy virgin, chaste and fair.
GLANVILLE.
So, with decorum all things carried,
Miss frown'd, and blush'd, and then was
married.
GOLDSMITH.
Follow, ye nymphs and shepherds all,
Come celebrate this festival,
And merrily sing and sport and play ;
'Tis Ariana's nuptial day.
GRANVILLE.
O marriage ! marriage ! what a curse is thine
Where hands alone consent, and hearts abhor!
AARON HILL.
There have been wedlock's joys of swift decay,
Like lightning, seen at once and shot away ;
But theirs were hopes which, all unfit to pair,
Like fire and powder, kiss'd, and flash'd to air.
Thy soul and mine, by mutual courtship won,
Meet like two mingling flames, and make but
one.
Union of hearts, not hands, does marriage make,
And sympathy of mind keeps love awake.
. AARON HILL.
Where many a man at variance with his wife
With soft'ning mead and cheese-cake ends the
strife> DR. WM. KING.
To all married men be this caution,
WTiich they should duly tender as their life,
Neither to dote too much, nor doubt a wife.
MASSINGER: Picture.
O, we do all offend !
There's not a day of wedded life, if we
Count at its close the little, bitter sum
Of thoughts and words and looks unkind and
fro ward,
Silence that chides, and woundings of the eye,
But prostrate at each other's feet we should
Each night forgiveness ask.
MATURIN: Bertram.
MATRIMONY.
339
He never shall find out fit mate, but such
As some misfortune brings him, or mistake;
Or whom he wishes most shall seldom gain,
Through her perverseness, but shall see her
gain'd
By a far worse. MILTON.
The virgin quire for her request
The god that sits at marriage-feast ;
He at their invoking came,
But with a scarce well-lighted flame.
MILTON.
Hail ! wedded love,
Perpetual fountain of domestic sweets !
MILTON.
The virgins also shall on feastful days
Visit his tomb with flow'rs, only bewailing
His lot unfortunate in nuptial choice,
From whence captivity and loss of eyes.
MILTON.
God's universal law
Gave to the man despotic power
Over his female in due awe,
Nor from that right to part an hour,
Smile she or lour.
MILTON.
Ofttimes nothing profits more
Than self-esteem, grounded on just and right,
Well managed ; of that skill the more thou
know'st,
The more she will acknowledge thee her head.
MILTON.
In us both one soul,
Harmony to behold in wedded pair!
More grateful than harmonious sounds to th'
ear.
MILTON.
What thou art is mine :
Our state cannot be sever'd ; we are one,
One flesh ; to lose thee were to lose myself.
MILTON. \
Of fellowship I speak,
Such as I see, fit to participate
All rational delight, wherein the brute
Cannot be human consort.
MILTON.
Defaming 
