ページの画像
PDF
ePub

That plann'd, and built, and still upholds a world
So clothed with beauty for rebellious man?
Yes-ye may fill your garners, ye that reap
The loaded soil, and ye may waste much good
In senseless riot; but ye will not find,
In feast or in the chase, in song or dance,
A liberty like his, who, unimpeach'd
Of usurpation, and to no man's wrong,
Appropriates nature as his Father's work,
And has a richer use of yours than you.
He is indeed a freeman. Free by birth
Of no mean city; plann'd or e'er the hills
Were built, the fountains open'd, or the sea
With all his rolling multitude of waves.
His freedom is the same in every state;
And no condition of this changeful life,
So manifold in cares, whose every day
Brings its own evil with it, makes it less:
For he has wings that neither sickness, pain,
Nor penury, can cripple or confine.

No nook so narrow but he spreads them there
With ease, and is at large. Th' oppressor holds
His body bound; but knows not what a range
His spirit takes, unconscious of a chain;
And that to bind him is a vain attempt,
Whom God delights in, and in whom he dwells.

England.

England, with all thy faults, I love thee stillMy country! and, while yet a nook is left Where English minds and manners may be found, Shall be constrain'd to love thee. Though thy clime Be fickle, and thy year most part deform'd With dripping rains, or wither'd by a frost, I would not yet exchange thy sullen skies, And fields without a flower, for warmer France With all her vines; nor for Ausonia's groves Of golden fruitage, and her myrtle bowers. To shake thy senate, and from heights sublime Of patriot eloquence to flash down fire

COWPER.

Upon thy foes, was never meant my task:
But I can feel thy fortunes, and partake
Thy joys and sorrows, with as true a heart
As any thunderer there. And I can feel
Thy follies too; and with a just disdain
Frown at effeminates, whose very looks
Reflect dishonour on the land I love.

How, in the name of soldiership and sense,

Should England prosper, when such things, as smooth
And tender as a girl, all essenced o'er
With odours, and as profligate as sweet;

Who sell their laurel for a myrtle wreath,

And love when they should fight; when such as these
Presume to lay their hand upon the ark

Of her magnificent and awful cause?

Time was when it was praise and boast enough
In every clime, and travel where we might,
That we were born her children. Praise enough
To fill the ambition of a private man,

That Chatham's language was his mother tongue,
And Wolfe's great name compatriot with his own.
Farewell those honours, and farewell with them
The hope of such hereafter! They have fallen
Each in his field of glory; one in arms,
And one in council-Wolfe upon the lap
Of smiling Victory that moment won,

And Chatham heart-sick of his country's shame!
They made us many soldiers. Chatham, still
Consulting England's happiness at home,
Secured it by an unforgiving frown,

If any wrong'd her. Wolfe, where'er he fought,
Put so much of his heart into his act,

That his example had a magnet's force,

And all were swift to follow whom all loved.
Those suns are set. Oh, rise some other such!

Or all that we have left is empty talk

Of old achievements, and despair of new.

381

London.

Ambition, avarice, penury despatch

The world of wandering knights and squires to town: London engulfs them all! The shark is there,

And the shark's prey; the spendthrift, and the leech

That sucks him. There the sycophant, and he
Who, with bare-headed and obsequious bows,

Begs a warm office, doom'd to a cold jail
And groat per diem, if his patron frown.
The levee swarms, as if, in golden pomp,
Were character'd on every statesman's door,
"Batter'd and bankrupt fortunes mended here."
These are the charms that sully and eclipse
The charms of nature. 'Tis the cruel gripe
That lean, hard-handed Poverty inflicts,
The hope of better things, the chance to win,
The wish to shine, the thirst to be amused,
That at the sound of Winter's hoary wing
Unpeople all our counties of such herds

Of fluttering, loitering, cringing, begging, loose
And wanton vagrants, as make London, vast
And boundless as it is, a crowded coop.

O thou, resort and mart of all the earth,
Chequer'd with all complexions of mankind,
And spotted with all crimes; in whom I see
Much that I love, and more that I admire,
And all that I abhor; thou freckled fair,
That pleasest and yet shock'st me, I can laugh,
And I can weep, can hope, and can despond,
Feel wrath and pity, when I think on thee!
Ten righteous would have saved a city once,
And thou hast many righteous.-Well for thee-
That salt preserves thee; more corrupted else,
And therefore more obnoxious, at this hour
Than Sodom in her day had power to be,
For whom God heard His Abr'am plead in vain.

COWPER.

Patriotism and Providence.

A. Patriots, alas! the few that have been found,
Where most they flourish, upon English ground,
The country's need have scantily supplied,

And the last left the scene when Chatham died.
B. Not so-1
-the virtue still adorns our age,
Though the chief actor died upon the stage.
In him Demosthenes was heard again;
Liberty taught him her Athenian strain;
She clothed him with authority and awe,
Spoke from his lips, and in his looks gave law.
His speech, his form, his action, full of grace,
And all his country beaming in his face,
He stood, as some inimitable hand

Would strive to make a Paul or Tully stand.
No sycophant or slave, that dared oppose
Her sacred cause, but trembled when he rose ;
And every venal stickler for the yoke
Felt himself crush'd at the first word he spoke.

Such men are raised to station and command,
When Providence means mercy to a land.
He speaks, and they appear; to Him they owe
Skill to direct, and strength to strike the blow;
To manage with address, to seize with power,
The crisis of a dark decisive hour.

So Gideon earn'd a victory not his own;
Subserviency his praise, and that alone.

Poor England! thou art a devoted deer,

Beset with every ill but that of fear.

The nations hunt; all mark thee for a prey;

They swarm around thee, and thou stand'st at bay.
Undaunted still, though wearied and perplex'd.

Once Chatham saved thee; but who saves thee next?
Alas! the tide of pleasure sweeps along

All that should be the boast of British song.

'Tis not the wreath that once adorn'd thy brow,

The prize of happier times, will serve thee now.
Our ancestry, a gallant Christian race,
Patterns of every virtue, every grace,

383

Confess'd a God; they kneel'd before they fought,
And praised Him in the victories He wrought.
Now from the dust of ancient days bring forth
Their sober zeal, integrity, and worth;
Courage, ungraced by these, affronts the skies,
Is but the fire without the sacrifice.

The stream that feeds the wellspring of the heart
No more invigorates life's noblest part,
Than virtue quickens, with a warmth divine,
The powers that sin has brought to a decline.

The Pulpit.

The pulpit

Must stand acknowledged, while the world shall stand,

The most important and effectual guard,

Support, and ornament, of Virtue's cause.

There stands the messenger of truth: there stands

The legate of the skies!-His theme divine,
His office sacred, his credentials clear.

By him the violated law speaks out

Its thunders; and by him, in strains as sweet
As angels use, the gospel whispers peace.
He 'stablishes the strong, restores the weak,
Reclaims the wanderer, binds the broken heart,
And, arm'd himself in panoply complete
Of heavenly temper, furnishes with arms
Bright as his own, and trains, by every rule
Of holy discipline, to glorious war,

The sacramental host of God's elect!

I venerate the man whose heart is warm,

Whose hands are pure, whose doctrine and whose life, Coincident, exhibit lucid proof

That he is honest in the sacred cause:

To such I render more than mere respect,

Whose actions say that they respect themselves.
But loose in morals, and in manners vain,

In conversation frivolous, in dress
Extreme, at once rapacious and profuse;
Frequent in park with lady at his side,

« 前へ次へ »