And sounded all the depths and shoals of honour,- Found thee a way, out of his wrack, to rise in; A sure and safe one, though thy master missed it. Mark but my fall, and that that ruined me: Cromwell, I charge thee, fling away ambition; By that sin fell the angels; how can man then, The image of his Maker, hope to win by 't? Love thyself last: cherish those hearts that hate thee; Corruption wins not more than honesty.
Still in thy right hand carry gentle peace,
To silence envious tongues. Be just, and fear not. Let all the ends thou aim'st at be thy country's,
Thy God's, and truth's; then if thou fall'st, O Cromwell, Thou fall'st a blessed martyr. Serve the king;
And-Prithee, lead me in:
There take an inventory of all I have,
To the last penny; 'tis the king's: my robe, And my integrity to Heaven, is all
I dare now call mine own. O Cromwell, Cromwell, Had I but served my God with half the zeal
I served my king, he would not in mine age Have left me naked to mine enemies!
REASON thus with life:
If I do lose thee, I do lose a thing
That none but fools would keep: a breath thou art, Servile to all the skiey influences,
That dost this habitation, where thou keep'st, Hourly afflict: merely, thou art death's fool; For him thou labour'st by thy flight to shun,
And yet runn'st toward him still: Thou art not noble; For all the accommodations that thou bear'st
Are nursed by baseness: Thou art by no means valiant; For thou dost fear the soft and tender fork
Of a poor worm: Thy best of rest is sleep,
And that thou oft provok'st; yet grossly fear'st
Thy death, which is no more. Thou art not thyself; For thou exist'st on many a thousand grains That issue out of dust: Happy thou art not:
For what thou hast not still thou striv'st to get; And what thou hast, forgett'st: Thou art not certain; For thy complexion shifts to strange effects,
After the moon: If thou art rich, thou art poor; For, like an ass whose back with ingots bows, Thou bear'st thy heavy riches but a journey, And death unloads thee:
Thou hast nor youth, nor age;
But, as it were, an after-dinner's sleep, Dreaming on both: for all thy blessed youth Becomes as aged, and doth beg the alms
Of palsied eld; and when thou art old, and rich, Thou hast neither heat, affection, limb, nor beauty, To make thy riches pleasant.
That bears the name of life?
What's yet in this, Yet in this life
Lie hid more thousand deaths: yet death we fear, That makes these odds all even.
12.-FLATTERY UNWORTHY OF A POET.
FIE, sir! O fie! 'tis fulsome.
Sir, there's a soil fit for that rank weed flattery To trail its poisonous and obscene clusters: A poet's soul should bear a richer fruitage— The aconite grew not in Eden. Thou, That thou, with lips tipt with the fire of heaven, Th' excursive eye, that in its earth-wide range Drinks in the grandeur and the loveliness,
That breathes along this high-wrought world of man; That hast within thee apprehensions strong
Of all that's pure and passionless and heavenly— That thou, a vapid and a mawkish parasite, Shouldst pipe to that witch Fortune's favourites! 'Tis coarse-'tis sickly—'tis as though the eagle Should spread his sail-broad wings to flap a dunghill; As though a pale and withering pestilence Should ride the golden chariot of the sun; As one should use the language of the Gods To chatter loose and ribald brothelry.
13.-DESCRIPTION OF ADAM AND EVE.
Two of far nobler shape, erect and tall, Godlike erect, with native honour clad, In naked majesty seemed lords of all; And worthy seemed; for in their looks divine The image of their glorious Maker shone, Truth, wisdom, sanctitude severe and pure, (Severe, but in true filial freedom placed,) Whence true authority in men; though both Not equal, as their sex not equal seemed; For contemplation he, and valour formed: For softness she, and sweet attractive grace; He, for God only; she, for God in him: His fair large front, and eye sublime, declared Absolute rule; and hyacinthine locks
Round from his parted forelock manly hung Clustering, but not beneath his shoulders broad: She, as a veil, down to the slender waist, Her unadorned golden tresses wore
Dishevelled; but in wanton ringlets waved, As the vine curls her tendrils.
Is this the region, this the soil, the clime,— Said then the lost Archangel,-this the seat
That we must change for Heaven? this mournful gloom, For that celestial light? Be it so, since He,
Who now is sovereign, can dispose, and bid
What shall be right! Farthest from him is best,
equalled, force hath made supreme Above his equals. Farewell, happy fields,
Where joy for ever dwells! Hail, horrors! hail, Infernal world! and thou, profoundest hell, Receive thy new possessor!—one who brings A mind not to be changed by place or time: The mind is its own place, and in itself Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven.
What matter where, if I be still the same, And what I should be,-all but less than He Whom thunder hath made greater? Here at least We shall be free; the Almighty hath not built Here for his envy;-will not drive us hence: Here we may reign secure; and, in my choice To reign is worth ambition, though in hell: Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven. But wherefore let we then our faithful friends, The associates and copartners of our loss, Lie thus astonished on the oblivious pool, And call them not to share with us their part In this unhappy mansion; or once more, With rallied arms, to try what may be yet Regained in heaven, or what more lost in hell? So Satan spake, and him Beëlzebub
Thus answered:-Leader of those armies bright, Which but the Omnipotent none could have foiled! If once they hear that voice,—their liveliest pledge Of hope in fears and dangers, heard so oft In worst extremes, and on the perilous edge Of battle when it raged, in all assaults Their surest signal,-they will soon resume New courage and revive; though now they lie Groveling and prostrate on yon lake of fire, As we erewhile, astounded and amazed: No wonder, fallen such a pernicious height.
He scarce had ceased, when the superior fiend Was moving toward the shore: his ponderous shield, Ethereal temper, massy, large, and round,
Behind him cast: the broad circumference Hung on his shoulders like the moon, whose orb Through optic glass the Tuscan artist views At evening, from the top of Fesolé, Or in Valdarno, to descry new lands, Rivers, or mountains, in her spotty globe. His spear, to equal which the tallest pine, Hewn on Norwegian hills, to be the mast Of some great ammiral, were but a wand,— He walked with, to support uneasy steps Over the burning marle,―not like those steps On heaven's azure; and the torrid clime
Smote on him sore besides, vaulted with fire. Nathless he so endured, till on the beach Of that inflamed sea he stood, and called His legions, angel forms, who lay entranced
Thick as autumnal leaves that strew the brooks In Vallombrosa, where the Etrurian shades, High over-arched, imbower.
15.-AUTUMN EVENING SCENE.
BUT see the fading, many-coloured woods, Shade deepening over shade, the country round Imbrown; a crowded umbrage, dusk and dun, Of every hue, from wan declining green
To sooty dark. These now the lonesome muse, Low-whispering, lead into their leaf-strown walks, And give the season in its latest view.
Meantime, light-shadowing all, a sober calm Fleeces unbounded ether; whose least wave Stands tremulous, uncertain where to turn The gentle current: while illumined wide, The dewy-skirted clouds imbibe the sun, And through their lucid veil his softened force Shed o'er the peaceful world. Then is the time, For those whom virtue and whom nature charm, To steal themselves from the degenerate crowd, And soar above this little scene of things; To tread low-thoughted vice beneath their feet; To soothe the throbbing passions into peace, And woo lone Quiet in her silent walks. Thus solitary, and in pensive guise,
Oft let me wander o'er the russet mead,
And through the saddened grove, where scarce is heard One dying strain, to cheer the woodman's toil. Haply some widowed songster pours his plaint, Far, in faint warblings, through the tawny copse. While congregated thrushes, linnets, larks, And each wild throat, whose artless strains so late Swelled all the music of the swarming shades, Robbed of their tuneful souls, now shivering sit
« 前へ次へ » |