Oh! is it not the harmony within,
The music which hath for its dwelling-place
His own rich soul — the heart that can receive
And hold in its unlimited embrace
All things inanimate, and all that live?
When Nature, like a tired and stupid sloven, Twists with dull fingers the coarse threads of life, When all things, that, together interwoven,
In happy concord still agreeing,
Should join to form the web of being,
Are tangled in inextricable strife;
Who then can cheer life's drear monotony,
Bestow upon the dead new animation,
Restore the dissonant to harmony,
And bid the jarring individual be
A chord, that, in the general consecration,
Bears part with all in musical relation?
Who to the tempest's rage can give a voice
Like human passion? bid the serious mind
Glow with the colouring of the sunset hours?
Who in the dear path scatter spring's first flowers,
When wanders forth the ladye of his choice?
Who of the valueless green leaves can bind
A wreath-the artist's proudest ornament
Or, round the conquering hero's brow entwined
The best reward his country can present?
Whose voice is fame? who gives us to inherit
Olympus, and the loved Elysian field?
The soul of MAN sublimed man's soaring spirit
Seen in the POET, gloriously revealed.
A poet then should regulate his fancies,
Like that of life should get up his romances;
First a chance meeting - then the young folk tarry
Together toy and trifle, sigh and marry,
Are link'd for ever, scarcely half intending it,
Once met 'tis fixed-no changing and no mending
Thus a romance runs: fortune, then reverses;
Rapture, then coldness; bridal dresses-hearses;
The lady dying-letters from the lover,
And, ere you think of it, the thing is over.
Adopt this principle; write fast and gaily,
Give, in your play, the life we witness daily;
The life which all men live, yet few men notice,
Yet which will please ('tis very strange, but so 'tis),
Will please, when forced again on their attention
More than the wonders of remote invention;
Shift your scenes rapidly and in the mirror
You hold up to the age show its own error-
Glimmerings of truth. calm sentiment-
Actors in bustle - clouds of moving pictures -
Such pantomime is sure to be regarded;
The public pleased, the dramatist rewarded:
This will attract the tender and the feeling;
The young, whose minds are yet unformed and plastic,
Will crowd to you with love enthusiastic,
Hang rapturously o'er a work, revealing
Their own hearts to themselves, in solitude
Will feast on the remembered visions - stealing
From them their sweet and melancholy food:
Still the true charm, by which they are affected
Is this, each sees his secret heart reflected:
Ready alike to weep or smile are they,
Admire the bard, adore his fancy's play;
Float with him on imagination's wing,
Think all his thoughts, are his in every thing,
Are, while they dream not of it, all they see:
Youth youth is the true time for sympathy.
Hope little from the formal and the old;
Frozen with vanity, they must be cold;
Their sympathies are day by day diminished,
Till nothing can be made of men so finished;
Why they know every thing, all perfect they,
What could they learn from poet or from play?
With them all progress long ago is ended;
Try any novelty, they are offended:
Self is the secret; to enlarge their range
Of thought, were seeking in themselves a change:
Your true admirer is the generous spirit,
Unformed, unspoiled, he feels all kindred merit
As if of his own being it were part,
And growing with the growth of his own heart;
Feels gratitude, because he feels that truth
Is taught him by the poet- this is Youth;
Nothing can please your grown ones, they're so
And no one thanks the poet but the growing.
Give me, oh! give me back the days
When I-I too was young
And felt, as they now feel, each coming hour
New consciousness of power.
Oh happy, happy time, above all praise!
Then thoughts on thoughts and crowding fancies
And found a language in unbidden lays; Unintermitted streams from fountains ever flowing, Then, as I wander'd free,
In every field, for me
Its thousand flowers were blowing!
A veil through which I did not see,
A thin veil o'er the world was thrown
In every bud a mystery;
Magic in every thing unknown :
The fields, the grove, the air was haunted,
And all that age has disenchanted.
Yes! give me give me back the days of youth,
Poor, yet how rich!- my glad inheritance.
The inextinguishable love of truth,
While life's realities were all romance....
Give me, oh! give youth's passions unconfined,
The rush of joy that felt almost like pain,
Its hate, its love, its own tumultuous mind;
Give me my youth again!
Why, my good friend, for youth thus sigh and prattle,
I own 'twould be a fine thing in a battle;
If a young beauty on your arm were leaning,
Then, I admit, the wish would have some meaning;
In running, for a wager, a long distance,
young man's sinews would be some assistance; Or if, after a dance, a man was thinking
Of reeling out the night in glorious drinking;
But
you have only among chords, well known
Of the familiar harp, with graceful finger
Freely to stray at large, or fondly linger,
Courting some wandering fancies of your own;
While, with capricious windings and delays,
Loitering, or lost in an enchanted maze
Of sweet sounds, the rich melody, at will
Gliding, here rests, here indolently strays,
Is ever free, yet evermore obeys
The hidden guide, that journeys with it still.
This is, old gentleman, your occupation,
Nor think that it makes less our veneration.
Age," says the song, "the faculties bewildering,
Renders men childish"-no! it finds them children.
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