\
WILLIAM BLAKE
MYSTIC
NOTE.
This issue of Young's poem with
Blake engravings; is reproduced in
reduced facsimile from the original
Edition 15 * 12 published by Edwards,
New Bond Street, London, in the
year 1797.
TO
STANLEY
MY BROTHER
WILLIAM BLAKE, MYSTIC
A STUDY
BY
ADELINE M. BUTTERWORTH
TOGETHER WITH
YOUNG'S NIGHT THOUGHTS : NIGHTS I & II
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY
WILLIAM BLAKE
AND FRONTISPIECE
DEATH'S DOOR, FROM BLAIR'S 'THE GRAVE'
LIVERPOOL
THE LIVERPOOL BOOKSELLERS CO.. LTD.
LONDON ( y (,
SIMPKIN. MARSHALL. HAMILTON. KENT 4 CO.. LTD.
1911
(^
WILLIAM BLAKE, MYSTIC
A Study
WILLIAM BLAKE, poet, artist and engraver !
Yet to how few persons is he known, and
how much beloved by the few who do know
him ! He belongs, to use an old Quaker phrase,
1 to the world outside,' yet that is the world that
cannot understand him, for he speaks to the inner
soul, ' to the world inside,' and it is only the few
who can interpret that speech ; so that William
Blake stands little chance of ever becoming the idol
even of the literary world.
A cultured person may be interested in or
attracted by either a poem or a painting of his, but
he must possess a kindred spirit he must belong to
'the world inside,' if he would grasp the real mean-
ing of any one of Blake's poems or pictures. It is not
sufficient to have an intelligent appreciation of art
to understand wherein lies the charm of Blake's
airy figures it is not sufficient to know the laws of
rhythm to comprehend his poems, for more than
mere culture is demanded from Blake's appreciator,
and that more cannot be learned in the schools it
must be innate he must know, almost intuitively,
that which Blake's soul has grasped and which his
mind and hand have put into concrete form. If it
is not seized by intuition, its power will never be
realised, for no amount of technical knowledge aids
in understanding the deep things of the soul. If
such an one does not possess that power, let him
close the book of poems by William Blake let
such an one leave unopened the copy of Young's
Night Thoughts or that of Blair's Grave, both
illustrated by Blake, as he would in all probability
only see some grotesque figures, which in their
huge proportions bear perhaps some resemblance to
those of Michael Angelo and would fail to find any
reason for Blake choosing to engrave the moment
of the 'soul's departure from the body,' or the
're-union of the soul and of the body after death,'
for, unless he feel their charm when first he sees
them, he will never discover it, though he spend
many hours in studying them. No ! It needs the
insight of the mystic of those belonging to the
'world inside' to understand the mystic soul of
William Blake ; therefore, he is to-day, as he was
more than a century ago, neglected and passed over
by the literary and artistic world, unless with their
culture they possess a soul capable of responding to
the inner meaning of the moments depicted in
Blake's pictures, apart from their artistic merit.
Yet to appreciate him it is not enough to possess
the mystical insight unless it is allied with culture
and intelligence, for an uneducated mystic would no
more be able to appreciate nor understand his
poems or pictures than would the cultured non-
mystical person ; there lies his charm and therein
lies the explanation possibly why William Blake is
gaining at last some notoriety of the reason why
more than a century after he illustrated the 'Blair,'
he is receiving recognition as a mystical poet and
artist.
Why should he have had to wait so long ?
Why should he now be receiving the homage of
the few who know and appreciate his great talent
for depicting the soul's deep feeling ?
Surely because to-day Mysticism stands on a
new level. When William Blake lived and wrote
his mystical poems and painted his visions, "the
world outside " condemned them, for it knew
nothing of such things. It was a cultured world
the world that condemned him for then, as now,
the general public passed him by because he never
came within their radius Blake could never be
that which Tennyson became, the poetical idol of
the people.
It was a cultured world in a conventional period
that condemned him, a world that condemned all
originality, a world without any understanding of .
mysticism and as it was obliged to explain these I
/ ~&*~jtf/P-A. ,..
B I
original productions of Blake productions which
seemed quite incomprehensible to it and as it had
no knowledge of the psychical mind nor of things
mystical, it disposed of Blake and of his poems and
pictures by stigmatising them as the work of a
madman. Yet even in that material age there
were some who possessed the insight necessary to
appreciate Blake and his great genius, as Gilchrist's
standard Life of William Blake records ; they
prevented his name from passing into oblivion
by keeping the tiny flame of interest burning until
the world of culture that had condemned Blake a
century ago awoke to the fact that he was, at least,
an interesting personality, now realising that person-
ality under any form is worth studying ; so from that
interest in him as a man as an unusual personality
as a subject for the psychologists to dissect, and also
because the mystical mind is now acknowledged to
be a sane mind, therefore its utterances and pro-
ductions are on the same level as the productions
of other normal minds, Blake has been rescued
and has at last a chance of winning lasting fame by
his appeal to those whose souls are attuned to his,
and who can feel with him and see
4 ... a world in a grain of sand,
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.'
The cultured world of to-day knows the name
of William Blake, because the term culture now
includes some knowledge of the science of psychology,
and all who would study that subject gladly avail
themselves of so unique a personality, for did he
not repeat during his lifetime, when accused of
making his figures of so fantastic a character, that
he only painted his visions. These visions were
real things to Blake, as they are to all mystics,
only in Blake's case the visionary power which he
possessed in so remarkable a degree was accompanied
by the gifts of a poet and also of those of an artist.
Think what a unique position he therefore holds
among the great spirits of the world, for a great
spirit Blake must assuredly be named if we accede
to the usually -accepted formula that a man is great
in spirit if he possesses the power of discerning the
inner truth which underlies all things if he is large-
souled enough to respond to its demand. In fact,
it seems almost a condition of greatness that it, and
it alone, is capable of grasping and understanding
the truth which lies hidden. Pater speaks in his
Marius of the ' hiddenness of perfect things,'
which perhaps means that the thing in its perfection
is hidden from the perception of the meaner spirit
and so protected, though nevertheless its hiddenness
is no bar to the true spirit of the mystic, who is
in some inexpressible way 'one' with its perfec-
tion.
We have only to read a few verses of some of
Blake's poems to find the mystic spirit running
through them ; to see how underneath the outward
form he finds an inner form, which thought he
clothes as a true mystic ever does in the outer
resemblance. Notice how he speaks of the 'angels'
which he sees in the 'blossom trees' of how a
thistle at his feet appeared to him to be an ' old man
grey' who stood in his path how he wrote to his
friend, Mr. Butts, of his 'first vision of light'
which he saw one day when he was sitting on the
'yellow sands' of the seashore, and notice also the
true mystic's delight in his visions when he writes
of how they will be
' Re-engraved time after time
Ever in their youthful prime ;
My designs unchanged remain ;
Time may rage, but rage in vain ;
For above time's troubled fountains
On the great Atlantic Mountains,
In my golden house on high
There they shine eternally.'
When we turn to examine his engravings, we
find perhaps more clearly still the mystic spirit both
in the choice of subject and in its delineation. Blake
would possibly have preferred exclusively engraving
his visions ; but, unfortunately, though he might
engrave and colour them, he could not find pur-
chasers, so that when he was obliged to earn money
to support himself and his wife, he had perforce to
paint subjects which suited the taste of his patron,
even engraving and colouring portraits. It is
difficult to imagine Blake working upon so uncon-
genial a subject as a portrait of the famous Brighton
beauty, Mrs. Q (uentin), yet those who have been
fortunate enough to have chanced upon an original
copy of that coloured engraving must have noticed
the master touch in the softness and wonder of the
flesh colour, and felt that the perfectness which he
put into a work which must have been distasteful
to him proves yet again how great a spirit he
possessed within him.
But it is in his original designs that we see the
real Blake those designs which were literal copies
of his visions. Of course, all great artists have an
inner vision of the subject they propose to paint ;
they see it in their imagination ; but few, if any,
excepting William Blake, have painted what to them
have been objective mental visions, for few people
seem to have, to that extent, the mystic temperament
allied with the artistic. It is a well-established fact
to-day that these objective mental visions do come
to persons of a certain temperament, as, for instance,
in the recorded historical references to the visions
of S. Francis of Assisi and those of Joan of Arc.
C I
In fact, it was not until such recorded incidents had
been vindicated by the study of psychology that
Blake had a chance of coming into his inheritance
of fame, for he has consistently affirmed that he
only painted that which he perceived as an objective
vision he apparently saw its form and colour
though perhaps he did not always succeed in recalling
those visions quite accurately ; yet it is told of him
that when the visions came, perhaps during the
night time, he would rise from his bed and imme-
diately begin to paint, having, as it were, the vision
in front of him, and once, on being asked what
happened if the visions failed him, his wife replied,
' We kneel down and pray.''
It can thus easily be seen that his work bears the
stamp of originality and true greatness, for the
objective mental visions are a resultant effect of the'
percipient's inner-self which, in Blake's case, reaches
up to a level of spiritual insight which is only found
in those who are pure in heart.
Allied with this visionary power, he possessed a
very vivid imagination, which he draws upon largely
in his illustrations to Blair's Grave illustrations
which are full of beauty of form and depth of feeling,
and which reveal to all who have the power of
perceiving it what must have been Blake's innate
mystical genius which made it possible for him to
design that perfect figure of a youth which he has
placed (in his plate named ' Death's Door,') over the
cell hewn out of a rock into which a weather-beaten
old man, leaning on a crutch, is apparently being
driven by a strong wind from behind, while above
the doorway Blake has placed the figure of the youth
half reclining on the rock, with the rays of the sun
surrounding him, full of life, hope, and strength.
When we gaze upon it, it is not of death which we
think but of life eternal life, eternal strength,
eternal love which are typified by Blake in that
look of glad expectation which he has placed, not
only upon the face, but on every part of the body,
for to Blake's mystical soul death was not the end
but the gateway to eternal life.
Yet it does not follow that only a mystical nature
can see beneath the surface of things, or alone pos-
sesses the power of catching the intensest moments
in the lives of his fellow-men, nor that an artist
who is able to depict that moment at its highest pitch
must necessarily be a mystic.
Take Giotto, for instance, in almost any of his
fresco work, especially perhaps the fresco in the
cloister of Santa Maria Novella, at Florence, of the
meeting of Anna and Joachim at the Golden Gate,
and notice how he there portrays just the great
moment in the lives of Anna and Joachim when
they meet after a long separation. Giotto depicts
their joy in that meeting. He has seized the inner
spirit of that meeting, and yet no man is less of a
mystic than Giotto, the Florentine painter, who
perhaps ranks highest of the world's great painters
as a delineator of a passing moment at its intensest
point ; yet he is not a mystic, for he never chooses a
mystical subject. Whereas Blake, though he too
catches the spirit of the moment, searches deeper
into the intricacies of the life of the spirit, seeing
that side of life which seems to be only apprehended
by the mystic, and therefore instead of painting as
Giotto the meeting of two beloved persons, Blake
,
chooses for his subject the re-union of the soul and
of the body. There we see wherein the difference
lies, and why Blake's great characteristic is not so
much that he is a great artist or a great poet, but
that he is before all things essentially a mystic a
seer of visions.
When we turn to the Young illustrations,
which were invented and engraved by him, we see
the same characteristics which mark him as a mystic
in his choice of subject.
In Night the First, which treats of life, death,
and immortality, we find him, instead of dwelling on
death or the grave, choosing to depict the author
and what an effort Blake made to be conventional
in doing so lying on the ground asleep, while his
soul soars 'thro' fairy fields' (lines in the poem
which seized Blake's fancy), and we have the most
perfect figures representative of the soul's ' fan-
tastick measures ' airy figures of pure delight
poised in the air, as only Blake could poise them.
IO
Again, in the last plate of the same Night, we
find the lines
' Oft bursts my song beyond the bounds of life,'
claiming Blake out of many other lines containing
words of grief or sorrow ; but his mystical mind
passes them by while he seizes that which is his very
own by innate right of comprehension and delineates
a marvellous figure mounting upward with out-
stretched hands, in one of which is a lyre, while the
chain which binds him to earth is falling from him,
and the soul is rejoicing in its newly-found freedom.
It holds us spell-bound.
We note, also, in the Young how Blake
conveys a sense of motion in his figures ; they
appear to be coming straight from some ethereal
region, only touching earth in passing, as, in the
last two plates of Night the Second, we have
figures coming to take the soul of the just man at
the moment of death, though there is nothing in the
engraving that suggests anything which we usually
connect with death, and in the succeeding plate we see
the soul carefully being carried upward by attendant
angels, while a graceful figure leans down, as
Rossetti's Blessed Damozel ' from the gold bar of
heaven,' and with outstretched arm and hand would
gently draw him upward. The two plates make a
perfect whole with figures almost revolving in a
circle, suggesting movement in every line of their
bodies and joy in the new life of the soul. It could
D I II
surely only be the insight of the mystic which caused
Blake so consistently to see always the life of the
soul as something quite distinct from the life of the
body, which is so clearly depicted in his illustrations
to the Young, where he had so varied a choice
of subject, but where we find him choosing so often
to depict mystical things in preference to any other
subject.
It is interesting to read the comment upon these
designs to Young's Night Thoughts, published in
the " advertisement" supposed to have been written
by Fuseli, for the original edition of 1797:
' Of the merit of Mr. Blake in those designs
which form not only the ornament of the page, but,
in many instances, the illustration of the poem, the
editor conceives it to be unnecessary to speak. To
the eyes of the discerning it need not be pointed
out ; and while a taste for the arts of design shall
continue to exist, the original conception and the
bold and masterly execution of this artist cannot
be unnoticed or unadmired.'
Blake's mysticism is, of course, only one part of
him that he had many other sides to his character
is well known, yet I maintain that though he may
be praised for his productions as an artist or a poet,
or condemned because of much that is incompre-
hensible in his work, yet running through all is a
mystical spirit which can only be known and judged
by a mystical mind, for it needs the possession of
12
that faculty to realise the deep beauty of the
following words, taken from one of his poems :
' He who bends to himself a joy
Does the winged life destroy ;
But he who kisses the joy as it flies
Lives in eternity's sunrise.'
And so Blake stands at last on the threshold of
fame, because men have grown to understand him.
It is still but the threshold, for he is only known
and loved by a few kindred spirits. Books engraved
by him may still be found in what is named by the
booksellers as 'the two-penny box.' They can
still be picked up cheaply in out-of-the-way book
shops, though each year they are becoming more
scarce. The collectors of old books, old prints, and
coloured engravings do not yet know the name of
William Blake, nor do they yet know the value of
his productions, though here or there one may be
found who has been asked for a Blake ; but it is
an unusual occurrence to find a bookseller who
knows anything of his works, even though
Blair's Grave and Young's Night Thoughts are
becoming very rare, and it is hard to obtain a copy
of either book in the original boards, which fact
seems to indicate that there is at last some demand
for his books.
And what a reward awaits those who discover
him ! What a great treasure awaits the seeking of
those who, intuitively, will understand his greatness
of spirit ! How their grasp of the deeper side of
things will be widened when they come face to
face with one of his wonderful productions forms,
which in his delineation, seem to be all spirit.
The world has many rare treasures awaiting
those who have the opportunity for seeking such
things, but none will fill with purer joy the mind
of the mystic than the discovery of an original
engraving by William Blake, or the chance hap-
pening, perhaps, upon some of Blake's shorter
poems, which are indeed masterpieces of mystical
poetry.
September, 1910.
Explanation of the Engravings.
FRONTISPIECE TO NIGHT THE FIRST.
J)EATH, in the character of an old man, having
swept away with one hand part of the family
seen in this print, is presenting with the other
their spirits to immortality.
Page 1. Sleep, forsaking the couch of care, sheds
his influence, by the touch of his magic wand, on
the shepherd's flock.
Page 4. The imagery of dreaming variously de-
lineated according to the poet's description in the
passage referred to by the *.
Page 7. Death, tolling a bell, summons a person
from sleep to his kingdom the grave.
Page 8. The universal empire of Death characterized
by his plucking the sun from his sphere.
Page 10. An evil genius holding two phials, from
one pours disease into the ear of a shepherd, and
from the other scatters a blight among his flock ;
intimating that no condition is exempt from
affliction.
E I
Page 12. The frailty of the blessings of this life
demonstrated, by a representation in which the
happiness of a little family is suddenly destroyed
by the accident of the husband's death from the
bite of a serpent.
Page 13. The insecurity of life exemplified by the
figure of Death menacing with his dart, and
doubtful which he shall strike ; the mother, or
the infant at her breast.
Page 15. The author, encircled by thorns, em-
blematical of grief, lamenting the loss of his
friend to the midnight hours.
Page 16. The struggling of the soul for immortality,
represented by a figure holding a lyre and spring-
ing into the air, but confined by a chain to the
earth.
FRONTISPIECE TO NIGHT THE SECOND.
Time endeavouring to avert the arrow of Death
from two friends.
Page 19. A skeleton discovering the first symptoms
of re-animation on the sounding of the archangel's
trump.
Page 23. A man measuring an infant with his span,
in allusion to the shortness of life.
K 2
Page 24. Our inattention to the progress of Time
illustrated by a figure of that god, (as he is called
by the poet) creeping towards us with stealthy
pace, and carefully concealing his wings from our
view.
Page 25. Time having passed us, is seen displaying
his " broad pinions," and treading nearly on the
summit of the globe, eager "to join anew Eternity
his sire."
Page 26. The same power in his character of
destroyer, mowing down indiscriminately the
frail inhabitants of this world.
Page 27. Conscience represented as a recording
angel ; who is veiled, and in the act of noting
down the sin of intemperance in a bacchanalian.
Page 31. A good man conversing with his past
hours, and examining their report. The hours
are drawn as aerial and shadowy beings, some of
whom are bringing their scrolls to the inquirer,
while others are carrying their record to heaven.
Page 33. Belshazzar terrified in the midst of his
impious debauch by the hand-writing on the wall.
The passage marked out by the asterisk, suffi-
ciently explains the propriety with which the
story is alluded to by the poet, and delineated by
the artist.
Page 35. A parent communicating instruction to his
family.
Page 37. The story of the good Samaritan, intro-
duced by the artist as an illustration of the poet's
sentiment, that love alone and kind offices can
purchase love.
Page 40. Angels attending the death-bed of the
righteous, and administering consolation to his
last moments.
Page 41. Angels conveying the spirit of the good
man to heaven.
. i
O X
L I F K.
D E A T II
A XI)
IMMORTALIT
n*
i >
*
NIGHT THE FIRST.
A IRED nature's sweet restorer, balmy Sleep !
He, like the world, his ready visit pays
Where fortune smiles ; the wretched he forsakes :
* Swift on his downy pinion flies from woe,
And lights on lids unsullied with a tear.
From short, as usual, and disturb' d repose,
I wake : how happy they, who wake no more !
Yet that were vain, if dreams infest the grave.
I wake, emerging from a sea of dreams
Tumultuous ; where my wreck'd, desponding thought
From wave to wave of fancied misery,
At random drove, her helm of reason lost :
Though now restored, 'tis only change of pain,
A bitter change ! severer for severe :
The day too short for my distress ! and night,
Even in the zenith of her dark domain,
Is sunshine, to the colour of my fate.
Night, sable goddess ! from her ebon throne.
In rayless majesty, now stretc'hes forth
Her leaden sceptre o'er a slumb'nng world :
Silence, how dead ! and darkness, how profound !
Nor eye, nor list'ning ear an object finds ;
Creation sleeps. "Tis, as the general pulse
Of life stood still, and nature made a pause:
An aweful pause ! prophetick of her end.
And let her prophecy be soon fulfill'd ;
Fate' drop the curtain; I can lose no more.
Silence, and Darkness ! solemn sisters ! twins
From ancient night, who nurse the tender thought
To reason, and on reason build resolve,
That column of true majesty in man,
Assist me : I \\ ill thank you in the grave
The grave, your kingdom : there this frame shall fall
A \ictim sacred to your dreary shrine :
But what are ye r THOU, who didst put to flight
Primeval silence, when the morning stars.
Exulting, shouted o'er the rising ball ;
O THOU ! whose word from solid darkness struck
That spark, the sun; strike wisdom from my soul
My soul, which Hies to THEE, her trust, her treasure.
As misers to their gold, while others rest.
Through this opaque of nature, and of soul.
This double night, transmit one pitying ray,
To lighten, and to cheer ; O lead my mind,
A mind that fain would wander from its woe,
Lead it through various scenes of life, and death ;
And from each scene, the noblest truths inspire :
Nor less inspire my conduct, than my song;
Teach my best reason, reason; my best will
Teach rectitude ; and fix my firm resolve
Wisdom to wed, and pay her long arrear :
Nor let the phial of thy vengeance, pour'd
On this devoted head, be pour'd in vain.
The bell strikes one ! We take no note of time,
But from its loss : to give it then a tongue,
Is wise in man. As if an angel spoke,
I feel the solemn sound. If heard aright,
It is the knell of my departed hours :
Where are they ? With the years beyond the flood
It is the signal that demands dispatch :
How much is to be done ! My hopes and fears
Start up alarm'd, and o'er life's narrow verge
Look down On what ? A fathomless abyss !
A dread eternity ' how surely mine '
And can eternity belong to me.
Poor pensioner on the bounties of an hour?
How poor, how rich, how abject, how august.
How complicate, how wonderful is man '
How passing wonder HE, who made him such!
Who centred in our make such strange extremes r
From different natures marvellously mix'd,
Connexion exquisite of distant worlds'
Distinguish'd link in being's endless chain'
Midway from nothing to the Deity !
A beam ethereal, sullied, and absorb'd '
Though sullied and dishonour'd, still divine '
Dim miniature of greatness absolute '
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An heir of glory ! a frail child of dust !
Helpless immortal ! insect infinite !
A worm ! a God ! 1 tremble at myself,
And in myself am lost ! At home a stranger,
" Thought wanders up and down, surprised, aghast,
And wond'ring at her own : how reason reels !
O what a miracle to man is man,
Triumphantly distress'd ! what joy, what dread !
Alternately transported, and alarm' d !
What can preserve my life ? or what destroy ?
An angel's arm can't snatch me from the grave
Legions of angels can't confine me there.
'Tis past conjecture : all things rise in proof.
While o'er my limbs sleep's solt dominion spread:
* ^\ hat, though my soul fantastick measures trod
O'er fairy fields; or mourn' d along the gloom
Of pathless woods ; or down the craggy steep
Hurl'd headlong, swam with pain the mantled pool ;
Or scaled the chft'; or danced on hollow winds,
With antick shapes wild natives of the brain ?
Her ceaseless flight, though devious, speaks her nature
Of subtler essence than the trodden clod ;
Active, aerial, tow'ring, unconfined,
Unfetter' d with her gross companion's fall.
Even silent night proclaims my soul immortal ;
Even silent night proclaims eternal day.
For human weal, Heaven husbands all events ;
Dull sleep instructs, nor sport vain dreams in vain.
Why then their loss deplore that are not lost ?
Why wanders wretched thought their tombs around,
Si
In 'infidel distress ? Are angels there ?
Slumbers, raked up in dust, ethereal fire ?
They live ! they greatly live a life on earth
Unkindled, unconceived ! and from an eye
Of tenderness, let heavenly pity fall
On me, more justly number'd with the dead.
This is the desart, this the solitude :
How populous, how vital, is the grave !
This is creation's melancholy vault,
The vale funereal, the sad cypress gloom ;
The land of apparitions, empty shades !
AH, all on earth is shadow, all beyond
Is substance : the reverse is folly's creed :
How solid all, where change shall be no more !
This is the bud of being, the dim dawn,
The twilight of our day, the vestibule ;
Life's theatre as yet is shut, and death,
Strong death alone can heave the massy bar,
This gross impediment of clay remove,
And make us, embryos of existence, free.
From real life, but little more remote
Is he, not yet a candidate for light,
The future embryo, slumb'ring in his sire :
Embryos we must be, till we burst the shell,
Yon ambient azure shell, and spring to life,
The life of gods, O transport ! and of man.
Yet man, fool man ! here buries all his thoughts ;
Inters celestial hopes without one sigh :
Pns'ner of earth, and pent beneath the moon,
Here pinions all his wishes ; wmg'd by heaven
To fly at infinite ; and reach it there,
Where seraphs gather immortality
On life's fair tree, fast by the throne of GOD.
What golden joys ambrosial clust'ring glow
In HIS full beam, and ripen for the just
Where momentary ages are no more !
Where time, and pain, and chance, and death expire
And is it in the flight of threescore years,
To push eternity from human thought,
And smother souls immortal in the dust ?
A soul immortal, spending all her fires,
Wasting her strength in strenuous idleness,
Thrown into tumult, raptured, or alarm'd
At aught this scene can threaten, or indulge,
Resembles ocean into tempest wrought,
To waft a feather, or to drown a fly.
Where falls this censure ? It o'erwhelms myself:
How was my heart incrusted by the world !
O how self-fetter'd was my groveling soul !
How, like a worm, was I wrapt round and round
In silken thought, which reptile fancy spun ;
Till darken'd reason lay quite clouded o'er
With soft conceit of endless comfort here,
Nor yet put forth her wings to reach the skies !
Night- visions may befriend, as sung above :
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 !
How richly were my noontide trances hung
With gorgeous tapestries of pictured joys,
Joy behind joy, in endless perspective !
* Till at Death's toll, whose restless iron tongue
Calls daily for his millions at a meal,
Starting I 'woke, and found myself undone.
Where's now my frenzy's pompous furniture ? .
The cobweb'd cottage, with its ragged wall
Of mould' ring mud, is royalty to me :
The spider's most attenuated thread,
Is cord, is cable, to man's tender tie
On earthly bliss ; it breaks at every breeze.
O ye blest scenes of permanent delight !
Full, above measure! lasting, beyond bound!
A perpetuity of bliss, is bliss.
Could yon, so rich in rapture, fear an end,
That ghastly thought would drink up all your joy,
And quite unparadise the realms of light.
Safe are you lodged above these rolling spheres ;
The baleful influence of whose giddy dance
Sheds sad vicissitude on all beneath.
Here teems with revolutions every hour,
And rarely for the better ; or the best,
More mortal than the common births of fate :
Each moment has its sickle, emulous
Of time's enormous scythe, whose ample sweep
Strikes empires from the root; each moment plays
His little weapon in the narrower sphere
Of sweet domestick comfort, and cuts down
The fairest bloom of sublunary bliss.
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Bliss! sublunary bliss ! proud words, and vain!
Implicit treason to divine decree !
A bold invasion of the rights of heaven !
I clasp' d the phantoms, and I found them air :
() had I weigh d it ere my fond embrace,
What darts of agony had miss'd my heart !
' Death! great proprietor of all ! 'tis thine
To tread out empire, and to quench the stars ;
The sun himself by thy permission shines ;
And, one dav, tliou shall pluck him from his sphere.
Amidst such mightv plunder, wlyy exhaust
Thy partial quiver on a mark so mean ?
Why thy peculiar rancour wreak' d on me?
Insatiate archer ! could not one suffice '
Tin- shaft flew thncc and thrice my peace was slain :
And thrice, ere thrice yon moon had fill'd her horn.
O (."vnthia ' why so pale ? dost thou lament
Thy wretched neighbour? grieve to see thy wheel
OF ceaseless change outwhirl'd in human lile ?
How wanes my borrow'd bliss from fortune's smile !
.is courtesy ! not virtue's sure,
Self-given, solar ray of sound delight.
In every varied posture, place, and hour,
How widow d every thought ot every jay \
Thought, busy thought! too busy for my peace.
Through the dark postern of time long elapsed,
Ltd softly ; by the stillness of the night,
Led like a murderer, and such it proves ;
Strays, wretched rover ! o'er the pleasing past ;
In quest of wretchedness perversely strays ;
And finds all desert now ; and meets the ghosts
Of my departed joys, a numerous train !
I rue the riches of my former fate :
Sweet comfort's blasted clusters I lament :
I tremble at the blessings once so dear;
And every pleasure pains me to the heart.
Yet why complain ? or why complain for one ?
Hangs out the sun his lustre but for me,
The single man ? are angels all beside ?
I mourn for millions 'tis the common lot :
In this shape, or in that, has fate entail'd
The mother's throes on all of woman born,
Not more the children, than sure heirs of pain.
War, famine, pest, volcano, storm, and fire,
Intestine broils, oppression, with her heait
Wrapp'd up in triple brass, besiege mankind .
GOD's image, disinherited of day,
Here, plunged in mines, forgets a sun was made ;
There, beings, deathless as their haughty lord,
Are hammer' d to the galling oar for life ;
And plough the winter's wave, and reap despair :
Some, for hard masters broken under arms,
In battle lopp'd away, with half their limbs
Beg bitter bread through realms their valour saved,
If so the tyrant, or his minions doom.
Want and incurable disease, fell pair !
On hopeless multitudes remorseless seize
At once ; and make a refuge of the grave :
How groaning hospitals eject their dead !
What numbers groan for sad admission there !
10
What numbers, once in fortune's lap high-fed,
Solicit the cold hand of charity
To shock us more solicit it in vain !
Ye silken sons of pleasure ! since in pains
You rue more modish visits, visit here,
And breathe from your debauch : give, and reduce
Surfeit's dominion o'er you but so great
Your impudence, you blush at what is right.
Happy ! did sorrow seize on such alone:
Not prudence can defend, or virtue save :
* Disease invades the chastest temperance,
And punishment the guiltless ; and alarm,
Through thickest shades pursues the fond of peace.
Man's caution often into danger turns,
And, his guard falling, crushes him to death.
Not happiness itself makes good her name ;
Our very wishes give us not our wish :
How distant oft the thing we doat on most,
From that for which we doat, felicity !
The smoothest course of nature has its pains;
And truest friends, through error, wound our rest
Without misfortune what calamities !
And what hostilities without a foe !
Nor are foes wanting to the best on earth :
But endless is the list of human ills,
And sighs might sooner fail, than cause to sigh.
A part how small of the terraqueous globe
Is tenanted by man ! the rest a waste ;
Rocks, deserts, frozen seas, and burning sands
Wild haunts of monsters, poisons, stings, and death :
11
Such is earth's melancholy map ! but, far
More sad, this earth is a true map of man :
So bounded are its haughty lord's delights
To woe's wide empire ; where deep troubles toss,
Loud sorrows howl, envenom'd passions bite,
Ravenous calamities our vitals seize,
And threatening fate wide opens to devour.
What then am I, who sorrow for myself?
In age, in infancy, from others aid
Is all our hope to teach us to be kind
That, nature's first, last lesson to mankind :
The selfish heart deserves the pain it feels ;
More generous sorrow, while it sinks, exalts ;
And conscious virtue mitigates the pang :
Nor virtue, more than prudence, bids me give
Swoln thought a second channel; wlio divide,
They weaken too the torrent of their grief.
Take then, O world ! thy much-indebted tear :
How sad a sight is human happiness
To those, whose thought can pierce beyond an hour !
thou ! whate'cr thou art, whose heart exults !
Wouldst thou I should congratulate thy fate ?
1 know thou wouldst ; thy pride demands it from me :
Let thy pride pardon, what thy nature needs
The salutary censure of a friend.
Thou happy wretch ! by blindness thou art blest ;
By dotage dandled to perpetual smiles :
Know, smiler, at thy peril art thou pleased ;
Thy pleasure is the promise of thy pain :
Misfortune, like a creditor severe,
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But rises in demand for her delay ;
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She makes a scourge of past prosperity
To sting thee more, and double thy distress.
LORENZO, fortune makes her court to thee ;
Thv fond heart dances, while the syren sings :
Dear is thy welfare ; think me not unkind,
I would not damp, but to secure thy joys :
Think not that fear is sacred to the storm;
Stand on thy guard against the smiles of fate.
Is heayen tremendous in its frowns ? most sure
And in its fayours formidable too :
* Its fayours here are trials, not rewards ;
A call to duty, not discharge from care ;
And should alarm us, lull as much as woes ;
Awake us to their cause and consequence ;
And make us tremble, weisi'h'd with our desert.
Awe nature's tumults, and chastise her joys,
Lest, while we clasp, we kill them ; nay, invert
To worse than simple misery their charms :
Revolted joys, like foes in civil war,
Like bosom -friendships to resentment sour'd,
^Vith rage envenom d rise against our peace.
Beware what earth calls happiness ; beware
All jovs, but joys that never can expire :
Who builds on less than an immortal base,
Fond as he seems, condemns his joys to death.
Mine died with thee, PHILANDER ! thy last sigh
Dissolved the charm ; the disenchanted earth
Lost all her lustre: where her glitt'ring towers?
Her golden mountains where ? all darken'd down
13
To naked waste ; a dreary vale of tears :
The great magician's dead! thou poor pale piece
Of outcast earth in darkness ! what a change
From yesterday ! thy darling hope so near,
Long-labour' d prize, O how ambition flush'd
Thy glowing cheek ! ambition, truly great,
Of virtuous praise : death's subtle seed within,
Sly, treacherous miner ! working in the dark,
Smiled at thy well-concerted scheme, and beckon'd
The worm to riot on that rose so red,
Unfaded ere it fell one moment's prey !
Man's foresight is conditionally wise ;
LORENZO ! wisdom into folly turns
Oft, the first instant its idea fair
To lab' ring thought is born : how dim our eye !
* The present moment terminates our sight ;
Clouds, thick as those on doomsday, drown the next
\Ve penetrate, we prophesy in vain :
Time is dealt out by particles ; and each,
Ere mingled with the streaming sands of life,
By fate's inviolable oath is sworn
Deep silence, " where eternity begins.'
By nature's law, what may be, may be now ;
There's no prerogative in human hours :
In human hearts what bolder thought can rise,
Than man's presumption on to-morrow's dawn ?
Where is to-morrow ? in another world !
For numbers this is certain ; the reverse
Is sure to none ; and yet on this perhaps,
This peradventure infamous for lies,
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As on a rock of adamant we build
Our mountain hopes ; spin our eternal schemes,
As we the fatal sisters would outspin,
And, big with file's futurities, expire.
Not even PHILANDER had bespoke his shroud,
Nor had he cause ; a warning was denied :
How many fall as sudden not as safe !
As sudden, though for years admomsh'il home.
Of human ills the last extreme beware,
lie ware, LORENZO ! a slow-sudden death :
I low dreadful that deliberate surprise !
He wise to-day, 'tis madness to defer ;
Next day the fatal precedent will plead ;
Thus on, till wisdom is push'd out of life :
Procrastination is the thief of time ;
Year after year it steals, till all are fled ;
And to the mercies of a moment leaves
The vast concerns of an eternal scene :
If not so frequent, would not this be strange ?
That 'tis so frequent, this is stranger still.
Of man's miraculous mistakes, this bears
The palm, " That all men are about to live"
For ever on the brink of being born.
All pay themselves the compliment to think
They one day shall not drivel ; and their pride
On this reversion takes up ready praise,
At least their own, their future selves applauds:
How excellent that life they ne'er will lead !
Time lodged in tneir own hands is folly's vrils ;
That lodged in fate's, to wisdom they consign ;
15
The thing they can't but purpose, they postpone :
'Tis not in folly, not to scorn a fool ;
And scarce in human wisdom to do more :
All promise is poor dilatory mail,
And that through every stage : 'when young, indeed,
In full content we sometimes nobly rest,
Unanxious for ourselves ; and only wish,
As duteous sons, our fathers were more wise :
At thirty man suspects himself a fool ;
Knows it at forty, and reforms his plan ;
At fifty chides his infamous delay,
Pushes his prudent purpose to resolve ;
In all the magnanimity of thought
Resolves, and re-resolves ; then dies the same.
And why ? because he thinks himself immortal :
All men think all men mortal, but themselves ;
Themselves ; when some alarming shock of fate
Strikes through their wounded hearts the sudden dread ;
But their hearts wounded, like the wounded air,
Soon close ; where pass'd the shaft no trace is found.
As from the wing no scar the sky retains ;
The parted wave no furrow from the keel ;
So dies in human hearts the thought of death :
Even with the tender tear which nature sheds
O'er those we love, we drop it in their grave.
Can I forget PHILANDER ? that were strange :
O my full heart ! but should I give it vent,
* The longest night though longer far, would fail,
And the lark listen to my midnight song.
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The sprightly lark's shrill matin wakes the morn,
Griefs sharpest thorn hard pressing on my breast ;
I strive, with wakeful melody, to cheer
The sullen gloom, sweet philomel ! like thee,
And call the stars to listen ; every star
Is deaf to mine, enamour'd of thy lay :
Yet be not vain ; there are, who thine excel,
And charm through distant ages : wrapp'd in shade,
Pris'ner of darkness ! to the silent hours,
How often I repeat their rage divine,
To lull my griefs, and steal my heart from woe !
I roll their raptures, but not catch their fire :
Dark, though not blind, like thee Maeonides !
Or, Milton ! thee ; ah, could I reach your strain !
Or his, who made Maaonides our own :
Man too he sung immortal man I sing :
* Oft bursts my song beyond the bounds of life ;
What now, but immortality, can please ?
O had he press'd his theme, pursued the track,
Which opens out of darkness into day !
O had he mounted on his wing of fire,
Soar'd, where I sink, and sung immortal man !
How had it bless'd mankind, and rescued me !
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NIGHT THE SECOND.
' WHEN the cock crew, he wept" smote by that eye
Which looks on me, on all ; that power, who bids
This midnight centinel, with clarion shrill,
* Emblem of that which shall awake the dead,
Rouse souls from slumber into thoughts of heaven :
Shall I too weep ? where then is fortitude ?
And, fortitude abandon'cl, where is man ?
I know the terms on which he sees the light ;
He that is born, is listed ; life is war,
Eternal war with woe : who bears it best,
Deserves it least on other themes I'll dwell.
LORENZO ! let me turn my thoughts on thee,
And thine, on themes may profit ; profit there,
Where most thy need themes, too, the genuine grow
Of dear PHILANDERS dust: he, thus, though dead,
May still befriend. What themes ? time's wondrous price,
Death, friendship, and PHILANDERS final scene.
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So could I touch these themes, as might obtain
Thine ear, nor leave thy heart quite disengaged,
The good deed would delight me ; half impress
On my dark cloud an iris ; and from grief
Call glory: dost thou mourn PHILANDER' s fate ?
* I know thou say st it : says thy life the same ?
He mourns the dead, who lives as they desire.
"Where is that thrift, that avarice oT time,
O glorious avarice ! thought of death inspires,
As rumour' d robberies endear our gold ?
O tune ! than gold more sacred ; more n load
Than lead, to fools; and fools reputed wise:
What moment granted man without account ?
^\ hat years are squander'd, wisdom's debt unpaid !
Our wealth in days all due to that discharge.
Haste, haste, he lies in wait, he's at the door,
Insidious death ! should his strong hand arrest,
No composition sets the pris'ner free ;
Eternity's inexorable chain
Fast binds, and vengeance claims the full arroar.
How late I shudder'd on the brink ! how late
Life call'd for her last refuge in despair !
That time is mine, O MEAD ! to thee I owe ;
Fain would I pay thee with eternity :
But ill my genius answers my desire ;
My sickly song is mortal, past thy cure :
Accept the will that dies not with my strain.
For what calls thy disease, LORENZO ? not
For esculapian, but for moral aid :
Thou think'st it folly to be wise too soon.
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Youth is not rich in time ; it may be, poor ;
Part with it as with money sparing ; pay
No moment but in purchase of its worth ;
And what its worth, ask death-beds ; they can tell :
Part with it as with life reluctant ; big
With holy hope of nobler time to come ;
Time highev aim'd, still nearer the great mark
Of men and angels virtue more divine.
Is this our duty, wisdom, glory, gain ?
These Heaven benign in vital union binds ;
And sport we like the natives of the bough,
When vernal suns inspire ? amusement reigns
Man's great demand ; to trifle is to live :
And is it then a trifle too to die ?
Thou say'st I preach, Lonr.v/o ! 'tis confess' d :
What, if lor once I preach thee quite awake ?
Who wants amusement in the flame of battle ?
Is it not treason to the soul immortal,
Her foes in arms, eternity the pn/c ?
Will toys amuse, when med'cmes cannot cure ?
When spirits ebb, when life's enchanting scenes
Their lustre lose, and lessen in our sight,
As lands and cities with their glitt'ring spires,
To the poor shatter' cl bark, by sudden storm
Thrown off to sea, and soon to perish there ;
Will toys amuse ? No : thrones will then be toys,
And earth and skies seem dust upon the scale.
Redeem we time ? Its loss we dearly buy :
What pleads LORI uxo for his high-prized sports ?
He pleads time's numerous blanks ; he loudly pleads
22
The straw-like trifles on life's common stream :
From whom those blanks and trifles, but from thee ?
No blank, no trifle nature made, or meant.
Virtue, or purposed virtue, still be thine ;
This cancels thy complaint at once, this leaves
In act no trifle, and no blank in time ;
This greatens, fills, immortalizes all ;
This, the blest art of fuming all to gold ;
This, the good heart's prerogative to raise
A royal tribute from the poorest hours :
Immense revenue ! every moment pays.
If nothing more than purpose in thy power ;
Thy purpose firm, is equal to the deed:
Who does the best his circumstance allows,
Does well, acts nobly ; angels could no more.
Our outward act, indeed, admits restraint :
Tis not in things o'er thought to domineer ;
Guard well thy thought; our thoughts are heard in heaven.
On all-important tune, through every age,
Though much, and warm, the wise have urged ; the man
Is yet unborn, who duly weighs an hour.
" I ve l< )s t a day" the prince who nobly cried,
Had been an emperor without his crown
Ol Rome ? say rather, lord of human race ;
He spoke, as if deputed by mankind :
So should all speak ; so reason speaks in all :
From the soft whispers of that God in man,
Why fly to folly, why to frenzy fly,
For rescue from the blessings we possess ?
Time, the supreme ! Time is eternity ;
23
Pregnant with all eternity can give ;
Pregnant with all that makes archangels smile :
Who murders time, he crushes in the birth
A power ethereal, only not adored.
Ah ! how unjust to nature and himself,
Is thoughtless, thankless, inconsistent man !
Like children babbling nonsense in their sports,
* We censure nature for a span too short ;
That span too short, we tax as tedious too ;
Torture invention, all expedients tire,
To lash the ling'ring moments into speed,
And whirl us, happy riddance ! from ourselves.
Art, brainless art ! our furious charioteer,
For nature's voice unsttfled would recall,
Drives headlong tow'rds the precipice of death
Death, most our dread ; death thus more dreadful made
O what a riddle of absurdity !
Leisure is pain ; take off our chariot-wheels,
How heavily we drag the load of life !
Blest leisure is our curse ; like that of Cain,
It makes us wander ; wander earth around
To fly that tyrant, thought. As Atlas groan'd
The world beneath, we groan beneath an hour :
We ciy for mercy to the next amusement ;
The next amusement mortgages our fields
Slight inconvenience ! prisons hardly frown
From hateful time if prisons set us free ;
Yet when death kindly tenders us relief,
We callhim cruel ; years to moments shrink,
Ages to years : the telescope is turn'd,
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To man's false opticks, from his folly false,
* Time, in advance, behind him hides his wings,
And seems to creep decrepit with his age :
Behold him, when past by ; what then is seen,
But his broad pinions swifter than the winds ?
And all mankind, in contradiction strong,
Rueful aghast cry out on his career.
Leave to thy foes these errors, and these ills ;
To nature just, their cause and cure explore.
Not short Heaven's bounty, boundless our expence ;
No niggard nature ; men are prodigals :
We waste, not use our time ; we breathe, not live :
Time wasted is existence, used is life :
1 And bare existence, man, to live ordain'd,
Wrings and oppresses with enormous weight :
And wliy ? since time was given for use, not waste,
Enjoin'd to fly ; with tempest, tide, and stars
To keep Ins speed, nor ever wait for man :
Time's use was doom'd a pleasure ; waste, a pain :
That man might feel his error, if unseen ;
And, feeling, fly to labour for his cure ;
Not, bin nd' ring, split on idleness for ease.
Life's cares are comforts, such by Heaven design'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.
Here, then, the riddle mark'd above, unfolds ;
Then time turns torment, when man turns a fool :
We rave, we wrestle with great nature's plan ;
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We thwart the DEITY ; and 'tis decreed,
Who thwart his will shall contradict their own :
Hence our unnatural quarrel with ourselves ;
Our thoughts at enmity ; our bosom-broil :
We push time from us, and we wish him back;
Lavish of lustrums, and yet fond of life ;
Life we think long, and short ; death seek, and shun
Body and soul, like peevish man and wife,
United jar, and yet are loth to part.
Oh the dark davs of vanity ! while here,
How tasteless ! and how terrible when gone !
Gone! they ne'er go ; when past, they haunt us still
The spirit walks of every dav deceased ;
And smiles an angel, or a fury frowns :
Xor death, nor life delight us if time past,
And time possess'd, both pain us, what can please ?
That which the DEITY to please ordain' d
Time used . the man who consecrates his hours
By vigorous effort and an honest aim,
At once he draws the sting of life and death ;
He walks with nature and her paths are peace.
Our error's cause and cure are seen : see next
Time's nature, origin, importance, speed ;
And thy great gam from urging his career.
All-sensual man, because untotich'd, unseen,
He looks on time as nothing : nothing else
Is truly man's ; 'tis fortune's Time's a God :
Hast thou ne'er heard of time's omnipotence ?
For, or against, what wonders can he do
And will ! to stand blank neuter he disdains
26
Not on those terms was time, heaven's stranger, sent
On his important embassy to man.
LORENZO ! no : on the long-destined hour,
From everlasting ages growing ripe,
That memorable hour of wondrous birth.
When the DREAD SIRE, on emanation bent.
And big with nature, rising in his might,
Call'd forth creation,- for then time was born,
By godhead streaming through a thousand worlds ;
Not on those terms, from the great days of heaven,
From old eternity's mysterious orb,
AVas time cut otlj and cast beneath the skies ;
The skies, which watch linn in his new abode,
* Measuring his motions bv revolving spheres ;
That horologe machinery divine :
Hours, days, and months, and years, his children play
Like numerous wings, around him, as he flies ;
Or rather, as unequal plumes they shape
His ample pinions, swift as darted flame,
'I o gain Ins goal, to reach his ancient rest,
And join anew eternity his sire ;
In his immutability to nest,
When worlds, that count his circles now, unhinged.
Fate the loud signal sounding, headlong rush
To tuneless night and chaos, whence they rose.
Why spur the speedy ? why with levities
New-wing thy short, short day's too rapid flight ?
Know'st thou, or what thou dost, or what is done ?
Man flies from time, and time from man, too soon
sad divorce this double flight must end :
27
And then, where are we ? where, LORENZO, then
Thy sports thy pomps ? I grant thee, in a state
Not unambitious ; in the ruffled shroud,
Thy parian tomb's triumphant arch beneath :
Has death his fopperies r then well may life
Put on her plume, and in her rainbow shine.
Ye well-array'd ! ye lilies of our land !
Ye lilies male ! who neither toil, nor spin,
As sister lilies might ; if not so wise
As Solomon, more sumptuous to the sight !
Ye delicate ! who nothing can support,
Yourselves most insupportable ! for whom
The winter rose must blow, the sun put on
A brighter beam in Leo, silky-soft
Favonuis breathe still softer, or be chid ;
And other worlds send odours, sauce, and song,
And robes, and notions framed in foreign looms !
O ve LOKENZOS of our age ! who deem
One moment unamused, a misery
Not made for feeble man ; who call aloud
For every bauble, drivell'd o'er by sense,
For rattles and conceits of every cast,
For change of lollies and relays ol joy,
To drag your patience through the tedious length
Of a short winter's day say sages ; say
Wit's oracles ; say dreamers of gay dreams ;
How will you weather an eternal night,
Where such expedients fail ?
* O treacherous conscience ! while she seems to sleep
On rose and myrtle, lull'd with syren song ;
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While she seems, nodding o'er her charge, to drop
On headlong appetite the slacken'd rein,
And give us up to licence, unrecall'd,
Unmark'd ; see, from behind her secret stand,
The sly informer minutes every fault,
And her dread diary with horror fills :
Not the gross act alone employs her pen ;
She reconnoitres fancy's airy band,
A watchful foe ! the formidable spy,
List'ning, o'erhears the whispers of our camp ;
Our dawning purposes of heart explores,
And steals our embryos of iniquity.
As all-rapacious usurers conceal
Their doomsday-book from all-consuming heirs,
Thus, with indulgence most severe she treats
Us spendthrifts of inestimable tune ;
Unnoted, notes each moment misapplied ;
In leaves more durable than leaves of brass,
Writes our whole history ; which death shall read
In every pale delinquent's private ear,
And judgment publish publish to more worlds
Than this ; and endless age in groans resound.
LORENZO, such that sleeper in thy breast !
Such is her slumber ; and her vengeance such
For slighted counsel ; such thy future peace !
And think'st thou still thou canst be wise too soon ?
But why on time so lavish is my song ?
On this great theme kind nature keeps a school,
To teach her sons herself: each night we die,
Each morn are born anew : each'day a hie !
29
And shall we kill each day ? If trifling kills,
Sure vice must butcher : O what heaps of slain
Cry out for vengeance on us ! time destroy' d
Is suicide, where more than blood is spilt:
Time flies, death urges, knells call, heaven invites,
Hell threatens : all exerts ; in effort, all
More than creation labours ! labours more ?
And is there in creation, what, amidst
This tumult universal, wing'd dispatch,
And ardent energy, supinely yawns ?
Man sleeps and man alone ; and man, whose fate
Fate irreversible, entire, extreme,
Endless, hair-hung, breeze-shaken, o'er the gulph
A moment trembles drops ! and man, for whom
All else is in alarm ; man, the sole cause
Of this surrounding storm ! and yet he sleeps,
As the storm rock'd to rest. Throw years away
Throw empires and be blameless ? moments seize ;
Heaven 's on their wing : a moment we may wish,
When worlds want wealth to buy : bid day stand still,
Bid him drive back his car, and reimport
The period past, regive the given hour.
LORENZO, more than miracles we want ;
LORENZO O for yesterdays to come !
Such is the language of the man awake ;
His ardour such, for what oppresses thee :
And is his ardour vain, LORENZO ? no,
That more than miracle the gods indulge ;
To-day is yesterday return'd ; return'd
Full-power'd to cancel, expiate, raise, adorn,
so
And reinstate us on the rock of peace.
Let it not share its predecessor s fate ;
Nor, like its elder sisters, die a fool :
Shall it evaporate in fume fly off'
Fuliginous, and stain us deeper still ?
Shall we be poorer for the plenty pour'd ?
More wretched for the clemencies of heaven ?
Where shall I find him ? angels ! tell me where
You know him : he is near you point him out :
Shall I see glories beaming from his brow ?
Or trace his footsteps by the rising flowers ? x
Your golden wings, now hov'nng o'er him, shed
Protection ; now, are waving in applause
To that blest son of foresight lord of fate
That aweful independent on to-morrow !
Whose work is done ; who triumphs in the past ;
Whose yesterdays look backward with a smile,
Nor, like the Parthian, wound him as they fly ;
That common, but opprobrious lot ! past hours,
If not by guilt, yet wound us by their flight,
If folly bounds our prospect by the grave.
All feeling of futurity benumb' d ;
All god-like passion for eternals quench'd ;
All relish of realities expired ;
Renounced all correspondence with the skies ;
Our freedom chain'd ; quite wingless our desire ;
In sense dark-prison'd all that ought to soar;
Pron*> to the centre ; crawling in the dust ;
Dismounted every great and glorious aim :
Embruted every faculty divine ;
I
31
Heart-buried in the rubbish of the world
The world, that gulph of souls, immortal souls,
Souls elevate, angelic, wing'd with fire
To reach the distant skies, and triumph there
On thrones, which shall not mourn their masters changed.
Though we from earth ; ethereal, they that fell.
Such veneration due, O man ! to man.
Who venerate themselves, the world despise.
For what, gay friend, is this escutcheon' d world,
Which hangs out death in one eternal night ?
A night, that glooms us in the noon-tide ray,
And wraps our thought, at banquets, in the shroud.
Life's little stage is a small eminence,
Inch-high the grave above ; that home of man,
Where dwells the multitude ; we ga/.e around;
We read their monuments ; we sigh ; and while
We sigh, we sink ; and are what we deplored :
i Lamenting, or lamented, all our lot !
Is death at distance ? no : he has been on thee ;
1 And given sure earnest of his final blow.
Those hours, which lately smiled, where are they now ?
, Pallid to thought, and ghastly ! drown'd, all drown'd
In that great deep, which nothing disembogues ;
And, dying, they bequeath'd thee small renown :
I The rest are on the wing ; how fleet their flight !
I Already has the fatal tram took fire ;
A moment, and the world 's blown up to thee ;
The sun is darkness, and the stars are dust.
* 'Tis greatly wise to talk with our past hours,
And ask them, what report they bore to heaven ;
a a
And how they might have borne more welcome news :
Their answers form what men experience call ;
If wisdom's friend, her best; if not, worst foe.
O reconcile them ! kind experience cries,
" There 's nothing here, but what as nothing weighs ;
" The more our joy, the more we know it vain ;
" And by success are tutor' cl to despair."
Nor is it only thus, but must be so :
Who knows not this, though gray, is still a child :
Loose then from earth the grasp of fond desire,
Weigh anchor, and some happier clime explore.
Art thou so moor'd thou canst not disengage,
Nor give thy thoughts a ply to future scenes ?
Since, by life's passing breath, blown up from earth,
Light, as the summer's dust, we take in air
A moment's giddy flight, and fall again ;
Join the dull mass, increase the trodden soil,
And sleep 'till earth herself shall be no more ;
Since then, as emmets, their small world o'erthrown,
We, sore amazed, from out earth's ruins crawl,
And rise to fate extreme of foul or fair,
As man's own choice, controller of the skies !
As man's despotic will, perhaps one hour
O how omnipotent is time ! decrees ;
Should not each warning give a strong alarm-
Warning, far less than that of bosom torn
From bosom, bleeding o'er the sacred dead ?
Should not each dial strike us as we pass,
Portentous, as the written wall which struck,
O'er midnight bowls, the proud Assyrian pale,
Erewhile high-flush d vith insolence and wine r
* Like that, the dial speaks ; and points to thce,
LOHF.NZO ! loth to break thy banquet up.
" O man, thy kingdom is departing from thee ;
" And, while it lasts, is emptier than my shade."
Its silent language such ; nor need'st them call
Thy magi, to decypher what it means :
Know, like the Median, fate is in thy walls :
Dost ask, how ? whence ? Belshazzar-like, amazed
Man's make encloses the sure seeds <>( death ;
Life feeds the murderer : ingrate ! he thrives
On her own meal, and then his nurse devours.
But here, LORENZO, the delusion lies ;
That solar shadow, as it measures lite,
It life resembles too : life speeds away
From point to point, though seeming to stand still :
The cunning fugitive is swift by stealth,
Too subtle is the movement to be seen ;
Yet soon man's hour is up, and we are gone.
Warnings point out our danger ; gnomons, time :
As these are useless when the sun is set ;
So those, but when more glorious reason shines :
Reason should judge in all ; in reason's eye,
That sedentary shadow travels hard :
But such our gravitation to the wrong,
So prone our hearts to whisper what we wish,
'Tis later with the wise, than he's aware ;
A Wilmington goes slower than the sun ;
And all mankind mistake their time of day ;
Even ace itself: fresh hopes are hourly sown
o
o
34
In furrow' d brows : so gentle life's descent,
We shut our eyes, and think it is a plain.
We take lair days in winter for the spring ;
And turn our blessings into bane : since oft
Man must compute that age he cannot feel,
He scarce believes he 's older for his years :
Thus, at life's latest eve, we keep in store
OIK- disappointment sure, to crown the rest
The disappointment of a promised hour.
On this, or similar, PHILANDER! thou,
Whose mind was moral, as the preacher's tongue ;
And strong to wield all science, worth the name ;
How often we talk'd down the summer's sun,
And cool'd our passions by the breezy stream !
How often thaw'd and shorten'd winter's eve,
By conflict kind, that struck out latent truth,
Best found, so sought ; to the recluse more coy !
Thoughts disentangle passing o'er the lip ;
Clean runs the thread ; if not, 'tis thrown away,
Or kept to tie up nonsense for a song
Song, fashionably fruitless ! such as stains
The limey, and unhallow'd passion fires ;
Chiming her saints to Cytherea's fane.
Know'st thou, LORENZO ! what a friend contains ?
As bees mix'd nectar draw from fragrant flowers,
So men from friendship, wisdom and delight ;
Twins tied by nature ; if they part, they die.
Hast thou no friend to set thy mind abroach ?
Good sense will stagnate : thoughts shut up, want air,
And spoil, like bales unopen'cl to the sun.
35
Had thought been all, sweet speech had been denied ;
Speech, thought's canal ! speech, thought's criterion too !
Thought in the mine may come forth gold or dross ;
When coin'd in words, we know its real worth :
If sterling, store it for thy future use ;
'Twill buy thee benefit, perhaps renown :
Thought too, deliver' d, is the more possess'd ;
* Teaching, we learn ; and giving, we retain
The births of intellect ; when dumb, forgot.
Speech ventilates our intellectual fire ;
Speech burnishes our mental magazine ;
Brightens for ornament, and whets for use.
What numbers, sheath'd in erudition, lie
Plunged to the hilts in venerable tomes,
And rusted ; who might have borne an edge,
And play'd a sprightly beam, if born to speech !
If born blest heirs to half their mother's tongue !
Tis thought's exchange, which, like th' alternate push
Of waves conflicting, breaks the learned scum,
And defecates the student's standing pool.
In contemplation is his proud resource ?
'Tis poor as proud : by converse unsustain'd
Rude thought runs wild in contemplation's field :
Converse, the menage, breaks it to the bit
Of due restraint ; and emulation's spur
Gives graceful energy, by rivals awed:
Tis converse qualifies for solitude,
As exercise for salutary rest :
By that untutor'd, contemplation raves ;
And nature's fool, by wisdom's is outdone.
36
Wisdom, though richer than Peruvian mines,
And sweeter than the sweet ambrosial hive,
What is she but the means of happiness ?
That unobtain'd, than folly more a fool ;
A melancholy fool, without her bells.
Friendship, the means of wisdom, richly gives
The precious end, which makes our wisdom wise.
Nature, in zeal for human amity,
Denies, or damps an undivided joy :
Joy is an import -joy is an exchange
Joy flies monopolists ; it calls for two :
Rich fruit ! heaven-planted ! never pluck'd by one.
Needful auxiliars are our friends, to give
To social man true relish of himself.
Full on ourselves descending in a line,
Pleasure's bright beam is feeble in delight :
Delight intense is taken by rebound ;
Reverberated pleasures fire the breast.
Celestial happiness, whene'er she stoops
To visit earth, one shrine the goddess finds,
And one alone, to make her sweet amends
For absent heaven the bosom of a friend ;
Where heart meets heart, reciprocally soft,
Each other's pillow to repose divine.
Beware the counterfeit: in passion's flame
Hearts melt ; but melt like ice, soon harder froze :
True love strikes root in reason, passion's foe :
Virtue alone entenders us for life
I wrong her much entenders us for ever :
Of friendship's fairest fruits, the fruit most fair
Is virtue kindling at a rival fire,
And, emulously rapid in her race.
O the soft enmity ! endearing strife !
This carries friendship to her noon-tide point,
And gives the rivet of eternity.
From friendship, which outlives my former themes,
Glorious surviver of old time, and death !
From friendship thus, that flower of heavenly seed,
The wise extract earth's most hyblean bliss,
Superior wisdom crown'd with smiling joy.
But for whom blossoms this elysian flower ?
Abroad they find, who cherish it at home.
LORENZO ! pardon what my love extorts,
An honest love, and not afraid to frown.
Though choice of follies fasten on the great,
None clings more obstinate than fancy fond
That sacred friendship is their easy prey ;
Caught by the wafture of a golden lure,
Or fascination of a high-born smile.
Their smiles, the great, and the coquet throw out
For other hearts, tenacious of their own ;
And we no less of ours, when such the bait.
Ye fortune's cofferers ! ye powers of wealth !
You do your rent-rolls most felonious wrong,
By taking our attachment to yourselves :
Can gold gain friendship ? impudence of hope !
As well mere man an angel might beget :
* Love, and love only, is the loan for love.
LORENZO ! pride repress ; nor hope to find
mt what has found a friend in thee.
ffl
IT
^'.
V
38
All like the purchase few the price will pay ;
And this makes friends such miracles below.
What if, since daring on so nice a theme,
I shew thee friendship delicate as dear,
Of tender violations apt to die ?
Reserve will wound it, and distrust destroy :
Deliberate on all things with thy friend :
But since friends grow not thick on every bough,
Nor every friend unrotten at the core,
First on thy friend deliberate with thyself;
Pause, ponder, silt ; not eager in the choice,
Nor jealous of the chosen, fixing fix :
Judge before friendship, then confide till death:
Well for thy friend ; but nobler far for thce ;
How gallant danger for earth's highest prixe !
A friend is worth all hazard we can run :
" Poor is the friendless master of a world ;
" A world in purchase lor a friend is gain."
So sung he, angels hear that angel sing !
Angels from friendship gather half their joy ;
So sung Piiir.Asnr.n, as his friend went round
In the rich ichor, in the generous blood
Of Bacchus, purple god of joyous wit,
A brow solute, and ever-laughing eye :
He drank long health, and virtue to his friend ;
His friend, who warin'd him more, who more inspired.
Friendship's the wine of life ; but friendship new,
Not such was his, is neither strong nor pure.
O ! for the bright complexion, cordial warmth,
And elevating spirit of a friend,
For twenty summers ripening by my side ;
All feculence of falsehood long thrown down
All social virtues rising in Ins soul
As crystal clear, and smiling as they rise !
Here nectar flows ; it sparkles in our .sight ;
Rich to the taste, and genuine from the heart .
High-flavour'd bliss lor gods ! on earth how rare !
On earth how lost ! PIIILANDKK us no more.
Think'st thou the theme intoxicates my ^^ng ?
And I too warm ? too warm I cannot be
I loved him much ; but now I love him more.
Like birds whose beauties languish, half conceal' d,
Till, mounted ori the wing, their glossy plumes
Expanded shine with azure, green and gold ;
How blessings brighten as they take their flight !
His flight PHILANDER took his upward flight,
If ever souJ ascended 1 had he dropt,
That eagle genius 1 O had he let fall
One feather as he flew ! I then had wrote
What friends might flatter : prudent foes forbear ;
Rivals scarce damn ; and Zoilus reprieve :
Yet what I can, I must : it were prolane
To quench a glory lighted at the skies,
And cast in shadows his illustrious rlo.sc.
Strange! the theme most affecting, must sublime,
Momentous most to man, should sleep unsung!
And yet it sleeps by genius unawakcd
Painim or Christian, tu the blush of wit.
Man's highest triumph ! man's profbundest fall '
The death-bed of the just is yet undrawn
4O
By mortal hand it merits a divine :
* Angels should paint it, angels ever there ;
There on a post of honour, and of joy.
Dare I presume then ? but PHILANDER bids,
And glory tempts, and inclination calls :
Yet am I struck ; as struck the soul beneath
Aerial groves' impenetrable gloom ;
Or in some might; ruin's solemn shade ;
Or gazing by pale lamps on high-born dust
In vaults ; thin courts of poor unflatter'd kings !
Or al the midnight altar's hallo\v'c flame :
It is religion to proceed : I pause
And enter, awed, the temple of my theme :
Is it his death-bed ? no it is his shrine :
Behold him, there, just rising to a god.
The chamber, where the good man meets his fate,
Is privileged beyond the common walk
Of virtuous life, quite in the verge of heaven.
Fly, ye profane ! if not, draw near with awe,
Receive the blessing, and adore the chance
That threw in this Bethesda your disease;
If unrestored by this, despair v your cure :
For here resistless demonstration dwells ;
A death-bed 's a detecter of the heart ;
Here tired dissimulation drops her mask.
Through life's grimace that mistress ol the scene !
Here real and apparent are tf" same
You see the man ; you see his hold on heaven ;
If sound his virtue, as PHILANDER'S sound.
Heaven waits not the last moment ; owns her friends
41
On this side death ; and points them out to men :
A lecture silent, but of sovereign power !
To vice, confusion ; and to virtue, peace.
Whatever farce the boastful hero plays,
Virtue alone has majesty in death ;
And greater still, the more the tyrant frowns :
PHILANDER! he severely frown'd on thee:
" No warning given unceremonious fate !
" A sudden rush from life's meridian joys !
" A wrench from all we love from all we are !
" A restless bed of pain ! a plunge opaque
" Beyond conjecture ! feeble nature's dread !
" Strong reason's shudder at the dark unknown !
" A sun extinguish'd ! a just opening grave !
" And oh ! the last last what ? can words express ?
" Thought reach ? the last, last silence of a friend '"
Where are those horrors, that amazement where,
This hideous group of ills, which singly shock ?
Demand from man I thought him man till now.
Through nature's wreck, through vanquish'd agonies
Like the stars struggling through this midnight gloom,
What gleams of joy ! what more than human peace !
Where, the frail mortal ? the poor abject worm ?
No, not in death, the mortal to be found.
His conduct is a legacy for all,
Richer than Mammon's for his single heir:
His comforters he comforts ; great in ruin,
With unreluctant grandeur gives, not yields
His soul sublime ; and closes with his fate.
42
How our hearts burnt within us at the scene !
Whence this brave bound o'er limits fix'd to man ?
His GOD sustains him in his final hour
His final hour brings glory to his, GOD !
Man's glory HEAVEN vouchsafes to call her own.
We gaze ; we weep mix'd tears of grief and joy !
Ama/ement strikes ; devotion bursts to flame ;
Christians adore and infidels believe.
As some tall tower, or lofty mountain's brow
Detains the sun, illustrious from its height ,
While rising vapours and descending shades
With damps and darkness drown the spacious vale ;
Undamp'd by doubt, undarken'd by despair
PHILANDER, thus, augustly rears his head
At that black hour, which general horror sheds
On the low level of the inglorious throng :
Sweet peace, and heavenly hope, and humble joy
Divinely beam on his exalted soul,
Destruction gild, and crown him for ihe skies.
With incommunicable lustre bright.
BINDING SECT. MAY 1 8 1982
PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE
CARDS OR SLIPS FROM THIS POCKET
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO LIBRARY
NC Butterworth, Adeline M.
1115 William Blake, mystic
B8 '
1911
