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The Treasure And The Two Men. | Jean de La Fontaine | [1]
A man whose credit fail'd, and what was worse,
Who lodged the devil in his purse, -
That is to say, lodged nothing there, -
By self-suspension in the air
Concluded his accounts to square,
Since, should he not, he understood,
From various tokens, famine would -
A death for which no mortal wight
Had ever any appetite.
A ruin, crown'd with ivy green,
Was of his tragedy the scene.
His hangman's noose he duly tied,
And then to drive a nail he tried; -
But by his blows the wall gave way,
Now tremulous and old,
Disclosing to the light of day
A sum of hidden gold.
He clutch'd it up, and left Despair
To struggle with his halter there.
Nor did the much delighted man
E'en stop to count it as he ran.
But, while he went, the owner came,
Who loved it with a secret flame,
Too much indeed for kissing, -
And found his money - missing!
'O Heavens!' he cried, 'shall I
Such riches lose, and still not die?
Shall I not hang? - as I, in fact,
Might justly do if cord I lack'd;
But now, without expense, I can;
This cord here only lacks a man.'
The saving was no saving clause;
It suffer'd not his heart to falter,
Until it reach'd his final pause
As full possessor of the halter, -
'Tis thus the miser often grieves:
Whoe'er the benefit receives
Of what he owns, he never must -
Mere treasurer for thieves,
Or relatives, or dust.
But what say we about the trade
In this affair by Fortune made?
Why, what but that it was just like her!
In freaks like this delighteth she.
The shorter any turn may be,
The better it is sure to strike her.
It fills that goddess full of glee
A self-suspended man to see;
And that it does especially,
When made so unexpectedly. |
Post Festum | Bj'rnstjerne Martinius Bj'rnson | (See Note 68)
A man in coat of ice arrayed
Stood up once by the Arctic Ocean;
The whole earth shook with proud emotion
And honor to the giant paid.
A king came, to him climbing up,
An Order in his one hand bearing:
"Who great become, this sign are wearing."
- The growling giant said but "Stop!"
The frightened king fell down again,
Began to weep with features ashen:
"My Order is in this rude fashion
Refused by just the greatest men.
"My dear man, take it, 't is but fit,
Of your king's honor be the warder;
On your breast greater grows the Order,
And we who bear it, too, by it." -
The Arctic giant was too good, -
A foible oft ascribed to giants,
Who foolish trust in little clients, -
He took it, - while we mocking stood.
But all the kings crept to him then,
And each his Order brought, to know it
Thereby renewed and greater, so it
Gave rank to needy noblemen.
Honi soit ... and all the rest;
Soon Orders covered all his breast.
But oh! they greater grew no tittle,
And he grew so confounded little. |
A Tale Of A Nettle[1] | Jonathan Swift | A man with expense and infinite toil,
By digging and dunging, ennobled his soil;
There fruits of the best your taste did invite,
And uniform order still courted the sight.
No degenerate weeds the rich ground did produce,
But all things afforded both beauty and use:
Till from dunghill transplanted, while yet but a seed,
A nettle rear'd up his inglorious head.
The gard'ner would wisely have rooted him up,
To stop the increase of a barbarous crop;
But the master forbid him, and after the fashion
Of foolish good nature, and blind moderation,
Forbore him through pity, and chose as much rather,
To ask him some questions first, how he came thither.
Kind sir, quoth the nettle, a stranger I come,
For conscience compell'd to relinquish my home,
'Cause I wouldn't subscribe to a mystery dark,
That the prince of all trees is the Jesuit's bark,[2]
An erroneous tenet I know, sir, that you,
No more than myself, will allow to be true.
To you, I for refuge and sanctuary sue,
There's none so renown'd for compassion as you;
And, though in some things I may differ from these,
The rest of your fruitful and beautiful trees;
Though your digging and dunging, my nature much harms,
And I cannot comply with your garden in forms:
Yet I and my family, after our fashion,
Will peaceably stick to our own education.
Be pleased to allow them a place for to rest 'em,
For the rest of your trees we will never molest 'em;
A kind shelter to us and protection afford,
We'll do you no harm, sir, I'll give you my word.
The good man was soon won by this plausible tale,
So fraud on good-nature doth often prevail.
He welcomes his guest, gives him free toleration
In the midst of his garden to take up his station,
And into his breast doth his enemy bring,
He little suspected the nettle could sting.
'Till flush'd with success, and of strength to be fear'd,
Around him a numerous offspring he rear'd.
Then the master grew sensible what he had done,
And fain he would have his new guest to be gone;
But now 'twas too late to bid him turn out,
A well rooted possession already was got.
The old trees decay'd, and in their room grew
A stubborn, pestilent, poisonous crew.
The master, who first the young brood had admitted,
They stung like ingrates, and left him unpitied.
No help from manuring or planting was found,
The ill weeds had eat out the heart of the ground.
All weeds they let in, and none they refuse
That would join to oppose the good man of the house.
Thus one nettle uncropp'd, increased to such store,
That 'twas nothing but weeds what was garden before. |
The Gardener And His Landlord (Prose Fable) | Jean de La Fontaine | A man who had a great fondness for gardening, being half a countryman and half town-bred, possessed in a certain village a fair-sized plot with a field attached, and all enclosed by a quickset hedge. Here sorrel and lettuce grew freely, as well as such flowers as Spanish jasmine and wild thyme, and from these his good wife Margot culled many a posy for her high days and holidays.
This happy state of things was soon troubled by the visits of a hare, and to such an extent that the man had to go to his landlord and lodge a complaint. "This wretched animal," he said, "comes here and stuffs himself night and morning, and simply laughs at traps and snares. As for stones and sticks they make no difference whatever to him. He must be enchanted."
"Enchanted!" cried the landlord. "I defy enchantment! Were he the devil himself old Towler would soon rout him out in spite of his tricks. I'll rid you of him, my man, never fear!"
"And when?" asked the man.
"Oh, to-morrow, without more delay!"
The affair being thus arranged, on the morrow came the landlord with all his following. "First of all," he said, "how about breakfast? Your chickens are tender I'll be bound. Come here, my dear," he added, addressing the man's daughter, and then, to her father, "When are you going to let her marry? Hasn't a son-in-law come on the scene yet? My dear fellow, this is a thing that positively must be done you know, you'll have to put your hand in your pocket to some purpose." So saying he sat down beside the damsel, took her hand, held her by the arm, toyed with her fichu, and took other silly and trifling liberties which the girl resented with great self-respect, whilst the father grew a little uneasy in his mind.
Nevertheless, the cooking went on. There was quite a run on the kitchen.
"How ripe are your hams? They look good."
"Sir," replied the flattered host, "they are yours."
"Oh, really now! Well I'll take them, and that right gladly."
The landlord and his family, his dogs, his horses, and his men-servants, all take breakfast with hearty appetites. He assumes the host's place and privileges, drinks his wine and caresses his daughter. After this a crowd of hunters take seats at the breakfast table.
Now everybody is lively and busy with preparations for the hunt. They wind the horns to such purpose that the good man is dumbfounded by the din. Worse than that they make terrible havoc in the poor garden. Good-bye to all the neat rows and beds! Good-bye to the chickory and the leeks! Good-bye to all the pot-herbs!
The hare lies hidden under the leaves of a great cabbage, but being discovered is quickly started, whereupon he rushes to a hole - nay, worse than a hole, a great and horrible gap in the poor hedge, made by the landlord's order, so that they might all burst out of the garden in fine style; for it would have looked ridiculous for them to ride out at the gate.
The poor man objected. "This is fine fun for princes, no doubt - - "; but they let him talk, whilst dogs and men together did more harm in one hour than all the hares in the province would have done in a century.
Little princes, settle your own quarrels amongst yourselves. It is madness to have recourse to kings. You should never let them engage in your wars, nor even enter your domains.
|
The Touchstone | William Allingham | A man there came, whence none could tell,
Bearing a Touchstone in his hand;
And tested all things in the land
By its unerring spell.
Quick birth of transmutation smote
The fair to foul, the foul to fair;
Purple nor ermine did he spare,
Nor scorn the dusty coat.
Of heirloom jewels, prized so much,
Were many changed to chips and clods,
And even statues of the Gods
Crumbled beneath its touch.
Then angrily the people cried,
'The loss outweighs the profit far;
Our goods suffice us as they are
We will not have then tried.'
And since they could not so prevail
To check this unrelenting guest,
They seized him, saying - 'Let him test
How real it is, our jail!'
But, though they slew him with the sword,
And in a fire his Touchstone burn'd,
Its doings could not be o'erturned,
Its undoings restored.
And when to stop all future harm,
They strew'd its ashes on the breeze;
They little guess'd each grain of these
Convey'd the perfect charm.
North, south, in rings and amulets,
Throughout the crowded world 'tis borne;
Which, as a fashion long outworn,
In ancient mind forgets. |
Epigram 4. - Circumstance. | Percy Bysshe Shelley | FROM THE GREEK.
A man who was about to hang himself,
Finding a purse, then threw away his rope;
The owner, coming to reclaim his pelf,
The halter found; and used it. So is Hope
Changed for Despair - one laid upon the shelf,
We take the other. Under Heaven's high cope
Fortune is God - all you endure and do
Depends on circumstance as much as you. |
The Miser And The Monkey. | Jean de La Fontaine | [1]
A man amass'd. The thing, we know,
Doth often to a frenzy grow.
No thought had he but of his minted gold -
Stuff void of worth when unemploy'd, I hold.
Now, that this treasure might the safer be,
Our miser's dwelling had the sea
As guard on every side from every thief.
With pleasure, very small in my belief,
But very great in his, he there
Upon his hoard bestow'd his care.
No respite came of everlasting
Recounting, calculating, casting;
For some mistake would always come
To mar and spoil the total sum.
A monkey there, of goodly size, -
And than his lord, I think, more wise, -
Some doubloons from the window threw,
And render'd thus the count untrue.
The padlock'd room permitted
Its owner, when he quitted,
To leave his money on the table.
One day, bethought this monkey wise
To make the whole a sacrifice
To Neptune on his throne unstable.
I could not well award the prize
Between the monkey's and the miser's pleasure
Derived from that devoted treasure.
With some, Don Bertrand, would the honour gain,
For reasons it were tedious to explain.
One day, then, left alone,
That animal, to mischief prone,
Coin after coin detach'd,
A gold jacobus snatch'd,
Or Portuguese doubloon,
Or silver ducatoon,
Or noble, of the English rose,
And flung with all his might
Those discs, which oft excite
The strongest wishes mortal ever knows.
Had he not heard, at last,
The turning of his master's key,
The money all had pass'd
The same short road to sea;
And not a single coin but had been pitch'd
Into the gulf by many a wreck enrich'd.
Now, God preserve full many a financier
Whose use of wealth may find its likeness here! |
Lolita Gardens | Paul Cameron Brown | A man weeps at your ankles,
climbs the stairs to peek-a-boo
panties, with finger clasps,
a Rapunzel lowering your hair,
the long-matted braids
a skilful weaver turns to gold.
An ivy forest in
a castle impregnated with doors,
the prince overhears the code
"let down your hair" and,
with perilous grasp,
mounts the stirrup wall,
foot to clasp,
searching cloud grey &
storm blasts for billowy mists
green within this empress queen.
Walking plasticine ledge
in the shower with a mermaid
soaping her perfumed treasure trove,
at an intersection within that woman,
her tulip trees explode -
faeryland syrupy,
tasting of apricot and sugar cane;
a swallow parting indigo sky.
|
Ode To Man. | Thomas Frederick Young | A man is not what oft he seems,
On this terrestrial sphere,
No pow'r to wield, no honor'd place,
Oft curb his spirit here.
He knows not what within him lies,
Until his pow'rs be tried,
And when for them some use is found,
They spring from where they hide,
To startle and to puzzle him,
Who never knew their force,
Because his unfreed spirit kept
A low and shackl'd course.
Dishearten'd and despairing, he
Had often sigh'd alone,
Not thinking that in other ways
His spirit might have grown.
Not thinking that another course,
Which needed pluck and vim,
Might raise his drowning spirit high,
And teach it how to swim;
To battle with the rolling tide,
That hurries onward men,
And raise his head above the waves,
That come and go again. |
Man, The | Stephen Crane | A man said to the universe,
"Sir, I exist!"
"However," replied the universe,
"The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation." |
Cuchulain Comforted | William Butler Yeats | A man that had six mortal wounds, a man
Violent and famous, strode among the dead;
Eyes stared out of the branches and were gone.
Then certain Shrouds that muttered head to head
Came and were gone. He leant upon a tree
As though to meditate on wounds and blood.
A Shroud that seemed to have authority
Among those bird-like things came, and let fall
A bundle of linen. Shrouds by two and thrce
Came creeping up because the man was still.
And thereupon that linen-carrier said:
"Your life can grow much sweeter if you will
"Obey our ancient rule and make a shroud;
Mainly because of what we only know
The rattle of those arms makes us afraid.
"We thread the needles' eyes, and all we do
All must together do.' That done, the man
Took up the nearest and began to sew.
"Now must we sing and sing the best we can,
But first you must be told our character:
Convicted cowards all, by kindred slain
"Or driven from home and left to dic in fear.'
They sang, but had nor human tunes nor words,
Though all was done in common as before;
They had changed their thtoats and had the throats of
birds. |
Farewell To The Reader. | Friedrich Schiller | A maiden blush o'er every feature straying,
The Muse her gentle harp now lays down here,
And stands before thee, for thy judgment praying,
She waits with reverence, but not with fear;
Her last farewell for his kind smile delaying.
Whom splendor dazzles not who holds truth dear.
The hand of him alone whose soaring spirit
Worships the beautiful, can crown her merit.
These simple lays are only heard resounding,
While feeling hearts are gladdened by their tone,
With brighter phantasies their path surrounding,
To nobler aims their footsteps guiding on.
Yet coming ages ne'er will hear them sounding,
They live but for the present hour alone;
The passing moment called them into being,
And, as the hours dance on, they, too, are fleeing.
The spring returns, and nature then awaking,
Bursts into life across the smiling plain;
Each shrub its perfume through the air is shaking,
And heaven is filled with one sweet choral strain;
While young and old, their secret haunts forsaking,
With raptured eye and ear rejoice again.
The spring then flies, to seed return the flowers.
And naught remains to mark the vanished hours. |
Writing | William Allingham | A man who keeps a diary, pays
Due toll to many tedious days;
But life becomes eventful then
His busy hand forgets the pen.
Most books, indeed, are records less
Of fullness than of emptiness. |
The Lover And The Moon | Paul Laurence Dunbar | A lover whom duty called over the wave,
With himself communed: "Will my love be true
If left to herself? Had I better not sue
Some friend to watch over her, good and grave?
But my friend might fail in my need," he said,
"And I return to find love dead.
Since friendships fade like the flow'rs of June,
I will leave her in charge of the stable moon."
Then he said to the moon: "O dear old moon,
Who for years and years from thy thrown above
Hast nurtured and guarded young lovers and love,
My heart has but come to its waiting June,
And the promise time of the budding vine;
Oh, guard thee well this love of mine."
And he harked him then while all was still,
And the pale moon answered and said, "I will."
And he sailed in his ship o'er many seas,
And he wandered wide o'er strange far strands:
In isles of the south and in Orient lands,
Where pestilence lurks in the breath of the breeze.
But his star was high, so he braved the main,
And sailed him blithely home again;
And with joy he bended his footsteps soon
To learn of his love from the matron moon.
She sat as of yore, in her olden place,
Serene as death, in her silver chair.
A white rose gleamed in her whiter hair,
And the tint of a blush was on her face.
At sight of the youth she sadly bowed
And hid her face 'neath a gracious cloud.
She faltered faint on the night's dim marge,
But "How," spoke the youth, "have you kept your charge?"
The moon was sad at a trust ill-kept;
The blush went out in her blanching cheek,
And her voice was timid and low and weak,
As she made her plea and sighed and wept.
"Oh, another prayed and another plead,
And I could n't resist," she answering said;
"But love still grows in the hearts of men:
Go forth, dear youth, and love again."
But he turned him away from her proffered grace.
"Thou art false, O moon, as the hearts of men,
I will not, will not love again."
And he turned sheer 'round with a soul-sick face
To the sea, and cried: "Sea, curse the moon,
Who makes her vows and forgets so soon."
And the awful sea with anger stirred,
And his breast heaved hard as he lay and heard.
And ever the moon wept down in rain,
And ever her sighs rose high in wind;
But the earth and sea were deaf and blind,
And she wept and sighed her griefs in vain.
And ever at night, when the storm is fierce,
The cries of a wraith through the thunder pierce;
And the waves strain their awful hands on high
To tear the false moon from the sky. |
The Woodman and Mercury. | Jean de La Fontaine | A man that labour'd in the wood
Had lost his honest livelihood;
That is to say,
His axe was gone astray.
He had no tools to spare;
This wholly earn'd his fare.
Without a hope beside,
He sat him down and cried,
"Alas, my axe! where can it be?
O Jove! but send it back to me,
And it shall strike good blows for thee."
His prayer in high Olympus heard,
Swift Mercury started at the word.
"Your axe must not be lost," said he:
"Now, will you know it when you see?
An axe I found upon the road."
With that an axe of gold he show'd.
"Is't this?" The woodman answer'd, "Nay."
An axe of silver, bright and gay,
Refused the honest woodman too.
At last the finder brought to view
An axe of iron, steel, and wood.
"That's mine," he said, in joyful mood;
"With that I'll quite contented be."
The god replied, "I give the three,
As due reward of honesty."
This luck when neighbouring choppers knew,
They lost their axes, not a few,
And sent their prayers to Jupiter
So fast, he knew not which to hear.
His winged son, however, sent
With gold and silver axes, went.
Each would have thought himself a fool
Not to have own'd the richest tool.
But Mercury promptly gave, instead
Of it, a blow upon the head.
With simple truth to be contented,
Is surest not to be repented;
But still there are who would
With evil trap the good, -
Whose cunning is but stupid,
For Jove is never dup'd. |
Passion And Love | Paul Laurence Dunbar | A maiden wept and, as a comforter,
Came one who cried, "I love thee," and he seized
Her in his arms and kissed her with hot breath,
That dried the tears upon her flaming cheeks.
While evermore his boldly blazing eye
Burned into hers; but she uncomforted
Shrank from his arms and only wept the more.
Then one came and gazed mutely in her face
With wide and wistful eyes; but still aloof
He held himself; as with a reverent fear,
As one who knows some sacred presence nigh.
And as she wept he mingled tear with tear,
That cheered her soul like dew a dusty flower,--
Until she smiled, approached, and touched his hand! |
The Old Man And The Three Young Ones. | Jean de La Fontaine | [1]
A man was planting at fourscore.
Three striplings, who their satchels wore,
'In building,' cried, 'the sense were more;
But then to plant young trees at that age!
The man is surely in his dotage.
Pray, in the name of common sense,
What fruit can he expect to gather
Of all this labour and expense?
Why, he must live like Lamech's father!
What use for thee, grey-headed man,
To load the remnant of thy span
With care for days that never can be thine?
Thyself to thought of errors past resign.
Long-growing hope, and lofty plan,
Leave thou to us, to whom such things belong.'
'To you!' replied the old man, hale and strong;
'I dare pronounce you altogether wrong.
The settled part of man's estate
Is very brief, and comes full late.
To those pale, gaming sisters trine,
Your lives are stakes as well as mine.
While so uncertain is the sequel,
Our terms of future life are equal;
For none can tell who last shall close his eyes
Upon the glories of these azure skies;
Nor any moment give us, ere it flies,
Assurance that another such shall rise,
But my descendants, whosoe'er they be,
Shall owe these cooling fruits and shades to me.
Do you acquit yourselves, in wisdom's sight,
From ministering to other hearts delight?
Why, boys, this is the fruit I gather now;
And sweeter never blush'd on bended bough.
Of this, to-morrow, I may take my fill;
Indeed, I may enjoy its sweetness till
I see full many mornings chase the glooms
From off the marble of your youthful tombs.'
The grey-beard man was right. One of the three,
Embarking, foreign lands to see,
Was drown'd within the very port.
In quest of dignity at court,
Another met his country's foe,
And perish'd by a random blow.
The third was kill'd by falling from a tree
Which he himself would graft. The three
Were mourn'd by him of hoary head,
Who chisel'd on each monument -
On doing good intent -
The things which we have said. |
At The Papyrus Club | Oliver Wendell Holmes | A lovely show for eyes to see
I looked upon this morning, -
A bright-hued, feathered company
Of nature's own adorning;
But ah! those minstrels would not sing
A listening ear while I lent, -
The lark sat still and preened his wing,
The nightingale was silent;
I longed for what they gave me not -
Their warblings sweet and fluty,
But grateful still for all I got
I thanked them for their beauty.
A fairer vision meets my view
Of Claras, Margarets, Marys,
In silken robes of varied hue,
Like bluebirds and canaries;
The roses blush, the jewels gleam,
The silks and satins glisten,
The black eyes flash, the blue eyes beam,
We look - and then we listen
Behold the flock we cage to-night -
Was ever such a capture?
To see them is a pure delight;
To hear them - ah! what rapture!
Methinks I hear Delilah's laugh
At Samson bound in fetters;
"We captured!" shrieks each lovelier half,
"Men think themselves our betters!
We push the bolt, we turn the key
On warriors, poets, sages,
Too happy, all of them, to be
Locked in our golden cages!"
Beware! the boy with bandaged eyes
Has flung away his blinder;
He 's lost his mother - so he cries -
And here he knows he'll find her:
The rogue! 't is but a new device, -
Look out for flying arrows
Whene'er the birds of Paradise
Are perched amid the sparrows! |
Cuchulain's Fight With The Sea | William Butler Yeats | A man came slowly from the setting sun,
To Emer, raddling raiment in her dun,
And said, "I am that swineherd whom you bid
Go watch the road between the wood and tide,
But now I have no need to watch it more."
Then Emer cast the web upon the floor,
And raising arms all raddled with the dye,
Parted her lips with a loud sudden cry.
That swineherd stared upon her face and said,
"No man alive, no man among the dead,
Has won the gold his cars of battle bring."
"But if your master comes home triumphing
Why must you blench and shake from foot to crown?"
Thereon he shook the more and cast him down
Upon the web-heaped floor, and cried his word:
"With him is one sweet-throated like a bird."
"You dare me to my face," and thereupon
She smote with raddled fist, and where her son
Herded the cattle came with stumbling feet,
And cried with angry voice, "It is not meet
To ide life away, a common herd."
"I have long waited, mother, for that word:
But wherefore now?"
"There is a man to die;
You have the heaviest arm under the sky."
"Whether under its daylight or its stars
My father stands amid his battle-cars."
"But you have grown to be the taller man."
"Yet somewhere under starlight or the sun
My father stands."
"Aged, worn out with wars
On foot, on horseback or in battle-cars."
"I only ask what way my journey lies,
For He who made you bitter made you wise."
"The Red Branch camp in a great company
Between wood's rim and the horses of the sea.
Go there, and light a camp-fire at wood's rim;
But tell your name and lineage to him
Whose blade compels, and wait till they have found
Some feasting man that the same oath has bound."
Among those feasting men Cuchulain dwelt,
And his young sweetheart close beside him knelt,
Stared on the mournful wonder of his eyes,
Even as Spring upon the ancient skies,
And pondered on the glory of his days;
And all around the harp-string told his praise,
And Conchubar, the Red Branch king of kings,
With his own fingers touched the brazen strings.
At last Cuchulain spake, "Some man has made
His evening fire amid the leafy shade.
I have often heard him singing to and fro,
I have often heard the sweet sound of his bow.
Seek out what man he is."
One went and came.
"He bade me let all know he gives his name
At the sword-point, and waits till we have found
Some feasting man that the same oath has bound."
Cuchulain cried, "I am the only man
Of all this host so bound from childhood on.
After short fighting in the leafy shade,
He spake to the young man, 'Is there no maid
Who loves you, no white arms to wrap you round,
Or do you long for the dim sleepy ground,
That you have come and dared me to my face?"
"The dooms of men are in God's hidden place,"
"Your head a while seemed like a woman's head
That I loved once."
Again the fighting sped,
But now the war-rage in Cuchulain woke,
And through that new blade's guard the old blade broke,
And pierced him.
"Speak before your breath is done."
"Cuchulain I, mighty Cuchulain's son."
"I put you from your pain. I can no more."
While day its burden on to evening bore,
With head bowed on his knees Cuchulain stayed;
Then Conchubar sent that sweet-throated maid,
And she, to win him, his grey hair caressed;
In vain her arms, in vain her soft white breast.
Then Conchubar, the subtlest of all men,
Ranking his Druids round him ten by ten,
Spake thus: "Cuchulain will dwell there and brood
For three days more in dreadful quietude,
And then arise, and raving slay us all.
Chaunt in his ear delusions magical,
That he may fight the horses of the sea."
The Druids took them to their mystery,
And chaunted for three days.
Cuchulain stirred,
Stared on the horses of the sea, and heard
The cars of battle and his own name cried;
And fought with the invulnerable tide. |
O'Dowd Of The Jefferson Club. | Edwin C. Ranck | A maddened horse comes down the street,
With waving mane and flying feet.
The crowd scatters in every direction;
It looks like a fight at a city election.
A big policeman waves his hands,
And the air is full of vague commands,
While across the street a retail grocer
Shrieks to his child as the horse draws closer
When suddenly out of the mad hubbub,
Steps Jimmie O'Dowd of the Jefferson Club.
Every man there holds his breath--
To stop the horse means sudden death.
But quick as a flash,
O'Dowd makes a dash.
With all his might and the horse's mane,
He brings the old plug to a halt again.
Then every man there doffs his hat
And cries "Well, what do you think of that?"
Never since the days of Nero
Has there been a greater hero. |
A Man Doesn't Have Time In His Life | Yehuda Amichai | A man doesn't have time in his life
to have time for everything.
He doesn't have seasons enough to have
a season for every purpose. Ecclesiastes
Was wrong about that.
A man needs to love and to hate at the same moment,
to laugh and cry with the same eyes,
with the same hands to throw stones and to gather them,
to make love in war and war in love.
And to hate and forgive and remember and forget,
to arrange and confuse, to eat and to digest
what history
takes years and years to do.
A man doesn't have time.
When he loses he seeks, when he finds
he forgets, when he forgets he loves, when he loves
he begins to forget.
And his soul is seasoned, his soul
is very professional.
Only his body remains forever
an amateur. It tries and it misses,
gets muddled, doesn't learn a thing,
drunk and blind in its pleasures
and its pains.
He will die as figs die in autumn,
Shriveled and full of himself and sweet,
the leaves growing dry on the ground,
the bare branches pointing to the place
where there's time for everything. |
Any One Will Do | Unknown | A maiden once, of certain age,
To catch a husband did engage;
But, having passed the prime of life
In striving to become a wife
Without success, she thought it time
To mend the follies of her prime.
Departing from the usual course
Of paint and such like for resource,
With all her might this ancient maid
Beneath an oak-tree knelt and prayed;
Unconscious that a grave old owl
Was perched above, the mousing fowl!
"Oh, give! a husband give!" she cried,
"While yet I may become a bride;
Soon will my day of grace be o'er,
And then, like many maids before,
I'll die without an early Jove,
And none to meet me there above!
"Oh, 'tis a fate too hard to bear!
Then answer this my humble prayer,
And oh, a husband give to me!"
Just then the owl from out the tree,
In deep bass tones cried, "Who, who, who!"
"Who, Lord? And dost Thou ask me who?
Why, any one, good Lord, will do." |
Man's Devotion | James Whitcomb Riley | A lover said, "O Maiden, love me well,
For I must go away:
And should ANOTHER ever come to tell
Of love - What WILL you say?"
And she let fall a royal robe of hair
That folded on his arm
And made a golden pillow for her there;
Her face - as bright a charm
As ever setting held in kingly crown -
Made answer with a look,
And reading it, the lover bended down,
And, trusting, "kissed the book."
He took a fond farewell and went away.
And slow the time went by -
So weary - dreary was it, day by day
To love, and wait, and sigh.
She kissed his pictured face sometimes, and said:
"O Lips, so cold and dumb,
I would that you would tell me, if not dead,
Why, why do you not come?"
The picture, smiling, stared her in the face
Unmoved - e'en with the touch
Of tear-drops - HERS - bejeweling the case -
'Twas plain - she loved him much.
And, thus she grew to think of him as gay
And joyous all the while,
And SHE was sorrowing - "Ah, welladay!"
But pictures ALWAYS smile!
And years - dull years - in dull monotony
As ever went and came,
Still weaving changes on unceasingly,
And changing, changed her name.
Was she untrue? - She oftentimes was glad
And happy as a wife;
But ONE remembrance oftentimes made sad
Her matrimonial life. -
Though its few years were hardly noted, when
Again her path was strown
With thorns - the roses swept away again,
And she again alone!
And then - alas! ah THEN! - her lover came:
"I come to claim you now -
My Darling, for I know you are the same,
And I have kept my vow
Through these long, long, long years, and now no more
Shall we asundered be!"
She staggered back and, sinking to the floor,
Cried in her agony:
"I have been false!" she moaned, "I am not true -
I am not worthy now,
Nor ever can I be a wife to YOU -
For I have broke my vow!"
And as she kneeled there, sobbing at his feet,
He calmly spoke - no sign
Betrayed his inward agony - "I count you meet
To be a wife of mine!"
And raised her up forgiven, though untrue;
As fond he gazed on her,
She sighed, - "SO HAPPY!" And she never knew
HE was a WIDOWER. |
The Father And Jupiter. | John Gay | A man to Jupiter preferred
Prayers for a wife: his prayer was heard.
Jove smiled to see the man caressing
The granted prayer and doubtful blessing.
Again he troubled Jove with prayers:
Fraught with a wife, he wanted heirs:
They came, to be annoys or joys -
One girl and two big bouncing boys.
And, a third time, he prayed his prayer
For grace unto his son and heir -
That he, who should his name inherit,
Might be replete with worth and merit.
Then begged his second might aspire,
With strong ambition, martial fire;
That Fortune he might break or bend,
And on her neck to heights ascend.
Last, for the daughter, prayed that graces
Might tend upon her face and paces.
Jove granted all and every prayer,
For daughter, and cadet, and heir.
The heir turned out a thorough miser,
And lived as lives the college sizar;
He took no joy in show or feat,
And starving did not choose to eat.
The soldier - he held honours martial,
And won the baton of field-marshal;
And then, for a more princely elf,
They laid the warrior on the shelf.
The beauty viewed with high disdain
The lover's hopes - the lover's pain;
Age overtook her, undecided,
And Cupid left her much derided.
The father raised his voice above,
Complaining of the gifts to Jove;
But Jove replied that weal and woe
Depended not on outward show -
That ignorant of good or ill,
Men still beset the heavenly will:
The blest were those of virtuous mind,
Who were to Providence resigned.
|
Prehistoric Smith, Quaternary Epoch, Post-Pliocene Period | David Law Proudfit | A man sat on a rock and sought
Refreshment from his thumb;
A dinotherium wandered by
And scared him some.
His name was Smith. The kind of rock
He sat upon was shale.
One feature quite distinguished him,
He had a tail.
The danger past, he fell into
A revery austere;
While with his tail he whisked a fly
From off his ear.
"Mankind deteriorates," he said,
"Grows weak and incomplete;
And each new generation seems
Yet more effete.
"Nature abhors imperfect work,
And on it lays her ban;
And all creation must despise
A tailless man.
"But fashion's dictates rule supreme,
Ignoring common sense;
And fashion says, to dock your tail
Is just immense.
"And children now come in the world
With half a tail or less;
Too stumpy to convey a thought,
And meaningless.
"It kills expression. How can one
Set forth, in words that drag,
The best emotions of the soul,
Without a wag?"
Sadly he mused upon the world,
Its follies and its woes;
Then wiped the moisture from his eyes,
And blew his nose.
But clothed in earrings, Mrs. Smith
Came wandering down the dale;
And, smiling, Mr. Smith arose,
And wagged his tail. |
The Gardener And His Lord. | Jean de La Fontaine | A lover of gardens, half cit and half clown,
Possess'd a nice garden beside a small town;
And with it a field by a live hedge inclosed,
Where sorrel and lettuce, at random disposed,
A little of jasmine, and much of wild thyme,
Grew gaily, and all in their prime
To make up Miss Peggy's bouquet,
The grace of her bright wedding day.
For poaching in such a nice field - 'twas a shame;
A foraging, cud-chewing hare was to blame.
Whereof the good owner bore down
This tale to the lord of the town: -
'Some mischievous animal, morning and night,
In spite of my caution, comes in for his bite.
He laughs at my cunning-set dead-falls and snares;
For clubbing and stoning as little he cares.
I think him a wizard. A wizard! the coot!
I'd catch him if he were a devil to boot!'
The lord said, in haste to have sport for his hounds,
'I'll clear him, I warrant you, out of your grounds;
To morrow I'll do it without any fail.'
The thing thus agreed on, all hearty and hale,
The lord and his party, at crack of the dawn,
With hounds at their heels canter'd over the lawn.
Arrived, said the lord in his jovial mood,
'We'll breakfast with you, if your chickens are good.
That lass, my good man, I suppose is your daughter:
No news of a son-in-law? Any one sought her?
No doubt, by the score. Keep an eye on the docket,
Eh? Dost understand me? I speak of the pocket.'
So saying, the daughter he graciously greeted,
And close by his lordship he bade her be seated;
Avow'd himself pleased with so handsome a maid,
And then with her kerchief familiarly play'd, -
Impertinent freedoms the virtuous fair
Repell'd with a modest and lady-like air, -
So much that her father a little suspected
The girl had already a lover elected.
Meanwhile in the kitchen what bustling and cooking!
'For what are your hams? They are very good looking.'
'They're kept for your lordship.' 'I take them,' said he;
'Such elegant flitches are welcome to me.'
He breakfasted finely his troop, with delight, -
Dogs, horses, and grooms of the best appetite.
Thus he govern'd his host in the shape of a guest,
Unbottled his wine, and his daughter caress'd.
To breakfast, the huddle of hunters succeeds,
The yelping of dogs and the neighing of steeds,
All cheering and fixing for wonderful deeds;
The horns and the bugles make thundering din;
Much wonders our gardener what it can mean.
The worst is, his garden most wofully fares;
Adieu to its arbours, and borders, and squares;
Adieu to its chiccory, onions, and leeks;
Adieu to whatever good cookery seeks.
Beneath a great cabbage the hare was in bed,
Was started, and shot at, and hastily fled.
Off went the wild chase, with a terrible screech,
And not through a hole, but a horrible breach,
Which some one had made, at the beck of the lord,
Wide through the poor hedge! 'Twould have been quite absurd
Should lordship not freely from garden go out,
On horseback, attended by rabble and rout.
Scarce suffer'd the gard'ner his patience to wince,
Consoling himself - 'Twas the sport of a prince;
While bipeds and quadrupeds served to devour,
And trample, and waste, in the space of an hour,
Far more than a nation of foraging hares
Could possibly do in a hundred of years.
Small princes, this story is true,
When told in relation to you.
In settling your quarrels with kings for your tools,
You prove yourselves losers and eminent fools. |
How The Helpmate Of Blue-Beard Made Free With A Door | Guy Wetmore Carryl | A maiden from the Bosphorus,
With eyes as bright as phosphorus,
Once wed the wealthy bailiff
Of the caliph
Of Kelat.
Though diligent and zealous, he
Became a slave to jealousy.
(Considering her beauty,
'Twas his duty
To be that!)
When business would necessitate
A journey, he would hesitate,
But, fearing to disgust her,
He would trust her
With his keys,
Remarking to her prayerfully:
"I beg you'll use them carefully.
Don't look what I deposit
In that closet,
If you please."
It may be mentioned, casually,
That blue as lapis lazuli
He dyed his hair, his lashes,
His mustaches,
And his beard.
And, just because he did it, he
Aroused his wife's timidity:
Her terror she dissembled,
But she trembled
When he neared.
This feeling insalubrious
Soon made her most lugubrious,
And bitterly she missed her
Elder sister
Marie Anne:
She asked if she might write her to
Come down and spend a night or two,
Her husband answered rightly
And politely:
"Yes, you can!"
Blue-Beard, the Monday following,
His jealous feeling swallowing,
Packed all his clothes together
In a leather-
Bound valise,
And, feigning reprehensibly,
He started out, ostensibly
By traveling to learn a
Bit of Smyrna
And of Greece.
His wife made but a cursory
Inspection of the nursery;
The kitchen and the airy
Little dairy
Were a bore,
As well as big or scanty rooms,
And billiard, bath, and ante-rooms,
But not that interdicted
And restricted
Little door!
For, all her curiosity
Awakened by the closet he
So carefully had hidden,
And forbidden
Her to see,
This damsel disobedient
Did something inexpedient,
And in the keyhole tiny
Turned the shiny
Little key:
Then started back impulsively,
And shrieked aloud convulsively--
Three heads of girls he'd wedded
And beheaded
Met her eye!
And turning round, much terrified,
Her darkest fears were verified,
For Blue-Beard stood behind her,
Come to find her
On the sly!
Perceiving she was fated to
Be soon decapitated, too,
She telegraphed her brothers
And some others
What she feared.
And Sister Anne looked out for them,
In readiness to shout for them
Whenever in the distance
With assistance
They appeared.
But only from her battlement
She saw some dust that cattle meant.
The ordinary story
Isn't gory,
But a jest.
But here's the truth unqualified.
The husband wasn't mollified
Her head is in his bloody
Little study
With the rest!
The Moral: Wives, we must allow,
Who to their husbands will not bow,
A stern and dreadful lesson learn
When, as you've read, they're cut in turn. |
A Man Who Would Woo A Fair Maid | William Schwenck Gilbert | A man who would woo a fair maid,
Should 'prentice himself to the trade;
And study all day,
In methodical way,
How to flatter, cajole, and persuade.
He should 'prentice himself at fourteen
And practise from morning to e'en;
And when he's of age,
If he will, I'll engage,
He may capture the heart of a queen!
It is purely a matter of skill,
Which all may attain if they will:
But every Jack
He must study the knack
If he wants to make sure of his Jill!
If he's made the best use of his time,
His twig he'll so carefully lime
That every bird
Will come down at his word.
Whatever its plumage and clime.
He must learn that the thrill of a touch
May mean little, or nothing, or much;
It's an instrument rare,
To be handled with care,
And ought to be treated as such.
It is purely a matter of skill,
Which all may attain if they will:
But every Jack,
He must study the knack
If he wants to make sure of his Jill!
Then a glance may be timid or free;
It will vary in mighty degree,
From an impudent stare
To a look of despair
That no maid without pity can see.
And a glance of despair is no guide -
It may have its ridiculous side;
It may draw you a tear
Or a box on the ear;
You can never be sure till you've tried.
It is purely a matter of skill,
Which all may attain if they will:
But every Jack
He must study the knack
If he wants to make sure of his Jill! |
The Hypnotist | Banjo Paterson (Andrew Barton) | A man once read with mind surprised
Of the way that people were "hypnotised";
By waving hands you produced, forsooth,
A kind of trance where men told the truth!
His mind was filled with wond'ring doubt;
He grabbed his hat and he started out,
He walked the street and he made a "set"
At the first half-dozen folk he met.
He "tranced" them all, and without a joke
'Twas much as follows the subjects spoke:
First Man
"I am a doctor, London-made,
Listen to me and you'll hear displayed
A few of the tricks of the doctor's trade.
'Twill sometimes chance when a patient's ill
That a dose, or draught, or a lightning pill,
A little too strong or a little too hot,
Will work its way to a vital spot.
And then I watch with a sickly grin
While the patient 'passes his counters in'.
But when he has gone with his fleeting breath
I certify that the cause of death
Was something Latin, and something long,
And who is to say that the doctor's wrong!
So I go my way with a stately tread
While my patients sleep with the dreamless dead."
Next, Please
"I am a barrister, wigged and gowned;
Of stately presence and look profound.
Listen awhile till I show you round.
When courts are sitting and work is flush
I hurry about in a frantic rush.
I take your brief and I look to see
That the same is marked with a thumping fee;
But just as your case is drawing near
I bob serenely and disappear.
And away in another court I lurk
While a junior barrister does your work;
And I ask my fee with a courtly grace,
Although I never came near the case.
But the loss means ruin too you, maybe,
But nevertheless I must have my fee!
For the lawyer laughs in his cruel sport
While his clients march to the Bankrupt Court."
Third Man
"I am a banker, wealthy and bold,
A solid man, and I keep my hold
Over a pile of the public's gold.
I am as skilled as skilled can be
In every matter of ' s. d.
I count the money, and night by night
I balance it up to a farthing right:
In sooth, 'twould a stranger's soul perplex
My double entry and double checks.
Yet it sometimes happens by some strange crook
That a ledger-keeper will 'take his hook'
With a couple of hundred thousand 'quid',
And no one can tell how the thing was did!"
Fourth Man
"I am an editor, bold and free.
Behind the great impersonal 'We'
I hold the power of the Mystic Three.
What scoundrel ever would dare to hint
That anything crooked appears in print!
Perhaps an actor is all the rage,
He struts his hour on the mimic stage,
With skill he interprets all the scenes,
And yet next morning I give him beans.
I slate his show from the floats to flies,
Because the beggar won't advertise.
And sometimes columns of print appear
About a mine, and it makes it clear
That the same is all that one's heart could wish,
A dozen ounces to every dish.
But the reason we print those statements fine
Is, the editor's uncle owns the mine."
The Last Straw
"A preacher I, and I take my stand
In pulpit decked with gown and band
To point the way to a better land.
With sanctimonious and reverent look
I read it out of the sacred book
That he who would open the golden door
Must give his all to the starving poor.
But I vary the practice to some extent
By investing money at twelve per cent,
And after I've preached for a decent while
I clear for 'home' with a lordly pile.
I frighten my congregation well
With fear of torment and threats of hell,
Although I know that the scientists
Can't find that any such place exists.
And when they prove it beyond mistake
That the world took millions of years to make,
And never was built by the seventh day
I say in a pained and insulted way
that 'Thomas also presumed to doubt',
And thus do I rub my opponents out.
For folks may widen their mental range,
But priest and parson, thay never change."
With dragging footsteps and downcast head
The hypnotiser went home to bed,
And since that very successful test
He has given the magic art a rest;
Had he tried the ladies, and worked it right,
What curious tales might have come to light!
|
Red Fox (Red Horse Lake) | Paul Cameron Brown | A magnificent Red Devil
splayed out in his tracks;
this tumultuous soul, baron of the backwoods
with his provenance unknown ...
this compromise to individuality
abandons him to chorome death
under a canopy-canap' dream-coated rock dome.
Trepanned, empire of trees, dark matter
& a castle of leaves,
a fish-hawk for a tomahawk
in his thermo-cline eyes ...
dithyrambic young osprey in the offing,
candelabra under stars.
Going inland for freshwater prawns,
sandalwood and tortoiseshells
finding bewitchment amid moving cars. |
Penitency. | Robert Herrick | A man's transgressions God does then remit,
When man He makes a penitent for it. |
The Way Of Wooing. | William Schwenck Gilbert | A maiden sat at her window wide,
Pretty enough for a Prince's bride,
Yet nobody came to claim her.
She sat like a beautiful picture there,
With pretty bluebells and roses fair,
And jasmine-leaves to frame her.
And why she sat there nobody knows;
But this she sang as she plucked a rose,
The leaves around her strewing:
"I've time to lose and power to choose;
'T is not so much the gallant who woos,
But the gallant's way of wooing!"
A lover came riding by awhile,
A wealthy lover was he, whose smile
Some maids would value greatly -
A formal lover, who bowed and bent,
With many a high-flown compliment,
And cold demeanour stately,
"You've still," said she to her suitor stern,
"The 'prentice-work of your craft to learn,
If thus you come a-cooing.
I've time to lose and power to choose;
'T is not so much the gallant who woos,
As the gallant's way of wooing!"
A second lover came ambling by -
A timid lad with a frightened eye
And a colour mantling highly.
He muttered the errand on which he'd come,
Then only chuckled and bit his thumb,
And simpered, simpered shyly.
"No," said the maiden, "go your way;
You dare but think what a man would say,
Yet dare to come a-suing!
I've time to lose and power to choose;
'T is not so much the gallant who woos,
As the gallant's way of wooing!"
A third rode up at a startling pace -
A suitor poor, with a homely face -
No doubts appeared to bind him.
He kissed her lips and he pressed her waist,
And off he rode with the maiden, placed
On a pillion safe behind him.
And she heard the suitor bold confide
This golden hint to the priest who tied
The knot there's no undoing;
With pretty young maidens who can choose,
'T is not so much the gallant who woos,
As the gallant's way of wooing!" |
Broken Raft Adventure. | James McIntyre | A man on Nova Scotian Bay
On broken raft was borne away,
Right out on the open sea
Where the storm did blow so free,
No shelter from the wind or wave
He thought the gulf would be his grave,
He had no food life to sustain,
He laid him down there to remain,
What happened he did know no more,
But old man on Prince Edward's shore
Saw raft drifting near his shed
And thought the poor man was quite dead,
He called for help and soon they bore
His lifeless body to the shore,
But old man he did them desire
To place the body near the fire,
And wrap it up in blankets warm,
Which did act like to a charm,
And soon the breath it did return,
With gratitude his heart did burn,
To think he was again restored
Unto his friends whom he adored. |
How The Babes In The Wood Showed They Couldn't Be Beaten | Guy Wetmore Carryl | A man of kind and noble mind
Was H. Gustavus Hyde.
'Twould be amiss to add to this
At present, for he died,
In full possession of his senses,
The day before my tale commences.
One half his gold his four-year-old
Son Paul was known to win,
And Beatrix, whose age was six,
For all the rest came in,
Perceiving which, their Uncle Ben did
A thing that people said was splendid.
For by the hand he took them, and
Remarked in accents smooth:
"One thing I ask. Be mine the task
These stricken babes to soothe!
My country home is really charming:
I'll teach them all the joys of farming."
One halcyon week they fished his creek,
And watched him do the chores,
In haylofts hid, and, shouting, slid
Down sloping cellar doors:--
Because this life to bliss was equal
The more distressing is the sequel.
Concealing guile beneath a smile,
He took them to a wood,
And, with severe and most austere
Injunctions to be good,
He left them seated on a gateway,
And took his own departure straightway.
Though much afraid, the children stayed
From ten till nearly eight;
At times they wept, at times they slept,
But never left the gate:
Until the swift suspicion crossed them
That Uncle Benjamin had lost them.
Then, quite unnerved, young Paul observed:
"It's like a dreadful dream,
And Uncle Ben has fallen ten
Per cent. in my esteem.
Not only did he first usurp us,
But now he's left us here on purpose!"
* * * * *
For countless years their childish fears
Have made the reader pale,
For countless years the public's tears
Have started at the tale,
For countless years much detestation
Has been expressed for their relation.
So draw a veil across the dale
Where stood that ghastly gate.
No need to tell. You know full well
What was their touching fate,
And how with leaves each little dead breast
Was covered by a Robin Redbreast!
But when they found them on the ground,
Although their life had ceased,
Quite near to Paul there lay a small
White paper, neatly creased.
"Because of lack of any merit,
B. Hyde," it ran, "we disinherit!"
The Moral: If you deeply long
To punish one who's done you wrong,
Though in your lifetime fail you may,
Where there's a will, there is a way! |
Nursery Rhyme. LXXXIX. Proverbs. | Unknown | [One version of the following song, which I believe to be the genuine one, is written on the last leaf of MS. Harl. 6580, between the lines of a fragment of an old charter, originally used for binding the book, in a hand of the end of the seventeenth century, but unfortunately it is scarcely adapted for the "ears polite" of modern days.]
A man of words and not of deeds,
Is like a garden full of weeds;
And when the weeds begin to grow,
It's like a garden full of snow;
And when the snow begins to fall,
It's like a bird upon the wall;
And when the bird away does fly,
It's like an eagle in the sky;
And when the sky begins to roar,
It's like a lion at the door;
And when the door begins to crack,
It's like a stick across your back;
And when your back begins to smart,
It's like a penknife in your heart;
And when your heart begins to bleed,
You're dead, and dead, and dead, indeed. |
The Christian Militant. | Robert Herrick | A man prepar'd against all ills to come,
That dares to dead the fire of martyrdom;
That sleeps at home, and sailing there at ease,
Fears not the fierce sedition of the seas;
That's counter-proof against the farm's mishaps,
Undreadful too of courtly thunderclaps;
That wears one face, like heaven, and never shows
A change when fortune either comes or goes;
That keeps his own strong guard in the despite
Of what can hurt by day or harm by night;
That takes and re-delivers every stroke
Of chance (as made up all of rock and oak);
That sighs at others' death, smiles at his own
Most dire and horrid crucifixion.
Who for true glory suffers thus, we grant
Him to be here our Christian militant. |
The Man Between Two Ages, And His Two Mistresses.[1] | Jean de La Fontaine | A man of middle age, whose hair
Was bordering on the grey,
Began to turn his thoughts and care
The matrimonial way.
By virtue of his ready,
A store of choices had he
Of ladies bent to suit his taste;
On which account he made no haste.
To court well was no trifling art.
Two widows chiefly gain'd his heart;
The one yet green, the other more mature,
Who found for nature's wane in art a cure.
These dames, amidst their joking and caressing
The man they long'd to wed,
Would sometimes set themselves to dressing
His party-colour'd head.
Each aiming to assimilate
Her lover to her own estate,
The older piecemeal stole
The black hair from his poll,
While eke, with fingers light,
The young one stole the white.
Between them both, as if by scald,
His head was changed from grey to bald.
'For these,' he said, 'your gentle pranks,
I owe you, ladies, many thanks.
By being thus well shaved,
I less have lost than saved.
Of Hymen, yet, no news at hand,
I do assure ye.
By what I've lost, I understand
It is in your way,
Not mine, that I must pass on.
Thanks, ladies, for the lesson.' |
Woman's Love. | Frances Anne Kemble (Fanny) | A maiden meek, with solemn, steadfast eyes,
Full of eternal constancy and faith,
And smiling lips, through whose soft portal sighs
Truth's holy voice, with ev'ry balmy breath;
So journeys she along life's crowded way,
Keeping her soul's sweet counsel from all sight;
Nor pomp, nor vanity, lead her astray,
Nor aught that men call dazzling, fair, or bright:
For pity, sometimes, doth she pause, and stay
Those whom she meeteth mourning, for her heart
Knows well in suffering how to bear its part.
Patiently lives she through each dreary day,
Looking with little hope unto the morrow;
And still she walketh hand in hand with sorrow. |
That 30 U.S. On The Wall | Pat O'Cotter | A man that's spent years knocking round "out in front"
Has most usually had lots of pals--
He's mixed up with pardners at various times
And he's had his affairs with the gals.
Now, a pardner's peculiar in lots of his ways
And he'll ditch you for various reasons,
And a gal never knows straight up from twice
And her mind seems to change with the seasons.
I've been in on good ground with pardners I've staked
And I thought they were square, till I found
They were trying to cross me, the miserable pups,
And whipsaw me out of my ground.
I've had a few pards that would stand the hard grind
And they'd stick through hard luck night and day;
They were all you could ask while you rustled for grub,
But they blew up when you uncovered the "pay."
Way back in the "eighties" when I'm just a kid,
I crossed up with a breed gal I'd met
One winter at Circle; she cleaned me that year
And skipped out with all she could get.
I've fallen for females in half of the camps
That's spread over this country up here,
But "square guys" or "pretzels" I couldn't get by
And none of them stuck for a year.
I got kind of discouraged and quit the she sex
And figgered I'd just herd with males,
But it don't make no difference, I guess that I'm wrong,
'Cause there's always the parting of trails.
I've had lots of dogs, but a dog always dies,
Or else the poor devil gets killed.
When you like 'em and lose 'em, their loss leaves a hole
That seems for a time can't be filled.
So pardners and females and dogs is taboo
And I know, 'cause I've fussed with 'em all.
There's only one pal that I know is true blue
And it's that Thirty U.S. on the wall.
She's stood by my shoulder and stopped a brown bear
And she keeps the cache full in the Fall;
She's got the one talk that a claim jumper knows
And she craves no attention at all.
I'm getting old now, and some sot in my ways,
And I don't loosen up like I did.
I'm slower to make friends and slower to trust
Than I used to be when I'm a kid.
So it's good-by to females and good-by to dogs,
And good-by to pardners and all,
For the only one pal that I find I can trust
Is that Thirty U.S. on the wall. |
The Athlete | Alfred Lichtenstein | A man walked back and forth in his torn slippers
In the small room
He inhabited.
He thought about the events
About which he was informed by the evening paper.
And sadly yawned, the way only that man yawns
Who has read much that is strange -
And the thought suddenly overcame him,
Like a timid person who gets gooseflesh,
And the way the person who stuffs himself
Starts to burp,
Like a mother in labor:
The great yawn might perhaps be a sign,
A nod from fate,
To lie down to rest.
And the thought would not leave him.
And then he began to undress...
When he was stark naked, he lifted something. |
The Crisis | Paul Laurence Dunbar | A man of low degree was sore oppressed,
Fate held him under iron-handed sway,
And ever, those who saw him thus distressed
Would bid him bend his stubborn will and pray.
But he, strong in himself and obdurate,
Waged, prayerless, on his losing fight with Fate.
Friends gave his proffered hand their coldest clasp,
Or took it not at all; and Poverty,
That bruised his body with relentless grasp,
Grinned, taunting, when he struggled to be free.
But though with helpless hands he beat the air,
His need extreme yet found no voice in prayer.
Then he prevailed; and forthwith snobbish Fate,
Like some whipped cur, came fawning at his feet;
Those who had scorned forgave and called him great--
His friends found out that friendship still was sweet.
But he, once obdurate, now bowed his head
In prayer, and trembling with its import, said:
"Mere human strength may stand ill-fortune's frown;
So I prevailed, for human strength was mine;
But from the killing pow'r of great renown,
Naught may protect me save a strength divine.
Help me, O Lord, in this my trembling cause;
I scorn men's curses, but I dread applause!" |
The Husband, The Wife, And The Thief. | Jean de La Fontaine | [1]
A man that loved, - and loved his wife, -
Still led an almost joyless life.
No tender look, nor gracious word,
Nor smile, that, coming from a bride,
Its object would have deified,
E'er told her doting lord
The love with which he burn'd
Was in its kind return'd.
Still unrepining at his lot,
This man, thus tied in Hymen's knot,
Thank'd God for all the good he got.
But why? If love doth fail to season
Whatever pleasures Hymen gives,
I'm sure I cannot see the reason
Why one for him the happier lives.
However, since his wife
Had ne'er caress'd him in her life,
He made complaint of it one night.
The entrance of a thief
Cut short his tale of grief,
And gave the lady such a fright,
She shrunk from dreaded harms
Within her husband's arms.
'Good thief,' cried he,
'This joy so sweet, I owe to thee:
Now take, as thy reward,
Of all that owns me lord,
Whatever suits thee save my spouse;
Ay, if thou pleasest, take the house.'
As thieves are not remarkably
O'erstock'd with modesty,
This fellow made quite free.
From this account it doth appear,
The passions all are ruled by fear.
Aversion may be conquer'd by it,
And even love may not defy it.
But still some cases there have been
Where love hath ruled the roast, I ween.
That lover, witness, highly bred,
Who burnt his house above his head,
And all to clasp a certain dame,
And bear her harmless through the flame.
This transport through the fire,
I own, I much admire;
And for a Spanish soul, reputed coolish,
I think it grander even than 'twas foolish.[2] |
In Tara's Halls | William Butler Yeats | A man I praise that once in Tara's Hals
Said to the woman on his knees, "Lie still.
My hundredth year is at an end. I think
That something is about to happen, I think
That the adventure of old age begins.
To many women I have said, ""Lie still,''
And given everything a woman needs,
A roof, good clothes, passion, love perhaps,
But never asked for love; should I ask that,
I shall be old indeed.'
Thereon the man
Went to the Sacred House and stood between
The golden plough and harrow and spoke aloud
That all attendants and the casual crowd might hear.
"God I have loved, but should I ask return
Of God or woman, the time were come to die.'
He bade, his hundred and first year at end,
Diggers and carpenters make grave and coffin;
Saw that the grave was deep, the coffin sound,
Summoned the generations of his house,
Lay in the coffin, stopped his breath and died. |
Beer | Unknown | A man to whom illness was chronic,
When told that he needed a tonic,
Said, "O Doctor dear,
Won't you please make it beer?"
"No, no," said the Doc., "that's Teutonic." |
Nursery Rhyme. DCIV. Local. | Unknown | A man went a hunting at Reigate,
And wished to leap over a high gate;
Says the owner, "Go round,
With your gun and your hound,
For you never shall leap over my gate." |
Nursery Rhyme. XC. Proverbs. | Unknown | A man of words and not of deeds,
Is like a garden full of weeds;
For when the weeds begin to grow,
Then doth the garden overflow. |
The Magnet And The Churn. | William Schwenck Gilbert | A magnet hung in a hardware shop,
And all around was a loving crop
Of scissors and needles, nails and knives,
Offering love for all their lives;
But for iron the magnet felt no whim,
Though he charmed iron, it charmed not him,
From needles and nails and knives he'd turn,
For he'd set his love on a Silver Churn!
His most 'sthetic,
Very magnetic
Fancy took this turn
"If I can wheedle
A knife or needle,
Why not a Silver Churn?"
And Iron and Steel expressed surprise,
The needles opened their well drilled eyes,
The pen-knives felt "shut up," no doubt,
The scissors declared themselves "cut out."
The kettles they boiled with rage, 'tis said,
While every nail went off its head,
And hither and thither began to roam,
Till a hammer came up and drove it home,
While this magnetic
Peripatetic
Lover he lived to learn,
By no endeavor,
Can Magnet ever
Attract a Silver Churn! |
A Man In His Life | Yehuda Amichai | A man doesn't have time in his life
to have time for everything.
He doesn't have seasons enough to have
a season for every purpose. Ecclesiastes
Was wrong about that.
A man needs to love and to hate at the same moment,
to laugh and cry with the same eyes,
with the same hands to throw stones and to gather them,
to make love in war and war in love.
And to hate and forgive and remember and forget,
to arrange and confuse, to eat and to digest what history
takes years and years to do.
A man doesn't have time.
When he loses he seeks, when he finds
he forgets, when he forgets he loves, when he loves he begins to forget. |
Birchington Churchyard. | Christina Georgina Rossetti | A lowly hill which overlooks a flat,
Half sea, half country side;
A flat-shored sea of low-voiced creeping tide
Over a chalky, weedy mat.
A hill of hillocks, flowery and kept green
Round Crosses raised for hope,
With many-tinted sunsets where the slope
Faces the lingering western sheen.
A lowly hope, a height that is but low,
While Time sets solemnly,
While the tide rises of Eternity,
Silent and neither swift nor slow. |
The Old Scottish Minister. | W. M. MacKeracher | A man he was of Scottish race,
And ancient Scottish name;
Of common mould, but lofty mien,
That dignified his frame.
And he lived a humble, quiet life,
Obscure, unknown to fame;
God's glory and the good of man
His constant, only aim:
Like a fine old Scottish minister,
All of the olden time.
He dearly loved his gentle wife,
As everyone could tell;
And watched his children as they grew,
Lest any ill befell;
And as he looked upon his boys
His bosom oft would swell;
For he reared them in the fear of God,
And ruled his household well:
Like a true old Scottish minister,
All of the olden time.
A father, too, he was to all
His congregation there:
To all he felt a father's love,
And showed a father's care:
He wisely counselled them with speech,
And pled for them in prayer;
And ever for the needy ones
He something had to spare:
Like a kind old Scottish minister,
All of the olden time.
The servant of the Lord he was,
In hovel and in hall, -
The high ambassador of heaven
Whom earth could not enthrall;
Like Christ among the wedding guests,
Or by the funeral pall;
And he made his daily life sublime,
A pattern unto all:
Like a grand old Scottish minister,
All of the olden time.
For truth and righteousness and love
His voice was ever heard;
And minds were kindled into thought,
And consciences were stirred,
And weary, heavy-laden hearts
To faith and hope were spurred,
As from the pulpit he proclaimed
The everlasting Word:
Like a faithful Scottish minister,
All of the olden time.
And when, amid his elders grave,
Extended in a line
Beside the table of the Lord,
He kept the rite divine,
His face with a rapt, unearthly look
Was seen to strangely shine,
As he broke the white, symbolic bread,
And passed the sacred wine:
Like a saintly Scottish minister,
All of the olden time.
His lot was hard, his task severe;
He found the burden light:
When darkly o'er his pathway hung
The shadows of the night,
His heart was steadfast, for he walked
By faith, and not by sight;
And ran triumphantly his course,
And fought a goodly fight:
Like a brave old Scottish minister,
All of the olden time.
And when upon a summer's day
He laid him down to die,
He called his household to his side
Without a moan or sigh,
And blessed his children each in turn,
And said a fond good-bye,
And then consigned his soul to God,
And went to live on high:
Like a good old Scottish minister,
All of the olden time.
|
Feud. | Madison Julius Cawein | A Mile of lane, hedged high with iron-weeds
And dying daisies, white with sun, that leads
Downward into a wood; through which a stream
Steals like a shadow; over which is laid
A bridge of logs, worn deep by many a team,
Sunk in the tangled shade.
Far off a wood-dove lifts its lonely cry;
And in the sleepy silver of the sky
A gray hawk wheels scarce larger than a hand.
From point to point the road grows worse and worse,
Until that place is reached where all the land
Seems burdened with some curse.
A ragged fence of pickets, warped and sprung,
On which the fragments of a gate are hung,
Divides a hill, the fox and ground-hog haunt,
A wilderness of briers; o'er whose tops
A battered barn is seen, low-roofed and gaunt,
'Mid fields that know no crops.
Fields over which a path, o'erwhelmed with burs
And ragweeds, noisy with the grasshoppers,
Leads, lost, irresolute as paths the cows
Wear through the woods, unto a woodshed; then,
With wrecks of windows, to a huddled house,
Where men have murdered men.
A house, whose tottering chimney, clay and rock,
Is seamed and crannied; whose lame door and lock
Are bullet-bored; around which, there and here,
Are sinister stains. One dreads to look around.
The place seems thinking of that time of fear
And dares not breathe a sound.
Within is emptiness: the sunlight falls
On faded journals papering its walls;
On advertisement chromos, torn with time,
Around a hearth where wasps and spiders build.
The house is dead; meseems that night of crime
It, too, was shot and killed. |
The Mother's Return | William Wordsworth | A month, sweet Little-ones, is past
Since your dear Mother went away,,
And she tomorrow will return;
Tomorrow is the happy day.
O blessed tidings! thought of joy!
The eldest heard with steady glee;
Silent he stood; then laughed amain,,
And shouted, " Mother, come to me!"
Louder and louder did he shout,
With witless hope to bring her near;
"Nay, patience! patience, little boy!
Your tender mother cannot hear."
I told of hills, and far-off town,
And long, long vale to travel through;,
He listens, puzzled, sore perplexed,
But he submits; what can he do ?
No strife disturbs his sister's breast;
She wars not with the mystery
Of time and distance, night and day;
The bonds of our humanity.
Her joy is like an instinct, joy
Of kitten, bird, or summer fly;
She dances, runs without an aim,
She chatters in her ecstasy.
Her brother now takes up the note,
And echoes back his sister's glee;
They hug the infant in my arms,
As if to force his sympathy.
Then, settling into fond discourse,
We rested in the garden bower;
While sweetly shone the evening sun
In his departing hour.
We told o'er all that we had done,,
Our rambles by the swift brook's side
Far as the willow-skirted pool,
Where two fair swans together glide.
We talked of change, of winter gone,
Of green leaves on the hawthorn spray,
Of birds that build their nests and sing
And all "since Mother went away!"
To her these tales they will repeat,
To her our new-born tribes will show,
The goslings green, the ass's colt,
The lambs that in the meadow go.
But, see, the evening star comes forth!
To bed the children must depart;
A moment's heaviness they feel,
A sadness at the heart;
'Tis gone, and in a merry fit
They run up stairs in gamesome race;
I, too, infected by their mood,
I could have joined the wanton chase.
Five minutes past, and, O the change!
Asleep upon their beds they lie;
Their buy limbs in perfect rest,
And closed the sparkling eye. |
A Good Husband. | Robert Herrick | A Master of a house, as I have read,
Must be the first man up, and last in bed.
With the sun rising he must walk his grounds;
See this, view that, and all the other bounds:
Shut every gate; mend every hedge that's torn,
Either with old, or plant therein new thorn;
Tread o'er his glebe, but with such care, that where
He sets his foot, he leaves rich compost there. |
Lavender | Paul Cameron Brown | A mind is a ray of light running to the sea;
an arch of wood upon which birds rest.
Minds roam the ocean's crest, sit as antlers upon a beach,
watch eddies of water trap themselves in the sand.
And minds are in anything but a state of rest - they violate
physics, make mockery of other bodies not in ready motion.
I have seen a mind enclosed above fresh air and sunshine,
frolicking on its own strength, the elasticity of its thought lassoing
all the stars assembled.
Golden points of light caught in this sand with an oval sun
marching blue legions across the sky bring more harmony than
all the stars assembled.
Admiral. Fakir. Harem. They are all here as is batik, geisha,
sarong, teak and gingham. I have seen them in quiet pools near
the atolls.
Rapture is a word to be eaten with persimmon and pears.
The closed wood. Copse and fragrant bush. White mare alone in
a green-studded pasture aback groves and groves of pleasant
trees. Bright insects making a curry of the forest floor with leaves
as trinkets bartered to the wind.
And the endless sky overturned like a bowl across the horizon.
Water and air, the two chief elements in a brisk compound with
earth and fire.
The land itself nursing a presence by the sea as a lizard might
devour a fly on a bough above a tree.
Then there are the granaries of this empire, the washed up logs
darting into footprints from the inlets. A white sand making its
presence felt like a tireless magician. Green strands of the
cucumber bush big with melon, a mother with expectant child
hushed and sitting by a clearing.
"The waters of the stream please me more than the sea,"
coconut groves with hand-me-down messages for the ages.
Strands among weeds, wine bottles as ferrymen ready for
circumnavigation around islands crisscrossing bucolic charts.
And everywhere reefs and coral and sugarbush fish darting
between the sieve of land breaking bread with sea; exchanging
colours from many coloured coats.
Kangaroo, koala, tepee, bayou hula, lei.
Sights which gallop against the senses, act as brigands to mature
reason. Faraway in the mountain fastness of the mind, alpine
meadows look out upon further marvels, exchange cocoa for
quinine, adjust the mind as a stirrup before a long, night ride.
The shaman with a hammock in his catamaran dolefully accepts
the waves as the skin must a tatoo.
The lovely collision of sound with twilight on fragrant sea-grape,
the hush of storm clouds preparing to administer their own
bromide of fire before the appearance of a band-aid patch of
lightning streaks against the divide.
Perhaps lavender is a language here, the juxtaposition of mind
with energy coming to a halt from a brisk canter, then proceeding
to nibble a currant from my hand. |
Earth. | William Cullen Bryant | A midnight black with clouds is in the sky;
I seem to feel, upon my limbs, the weight
Of its vast brooding shadow. All in vain
Turns the tired eye in search of form; no star
Pierces the pitchy veil; no ruddy blaze,
From dwellings lighted by the cheerful hearth,
Tinges the flowering summits of the grass.
No sound of life is heard, no village hum,
Nor measured tramp of footstep in the path,
Nor rush of wing, while, on the breast of Earth,
I lie and listen to her mighty voice:
A voice of many tones, sent up from streams
That wander through the gloom, from woods unseen,
Swayed by the sweeping of the tides of air,
From rocky chasms where darkness dwells all day,
And hollows of the great invisible hills,
And sands that edge the ocean, stretching far
Into the night, a melancholy sound!
O Earth! dost thou too sorrow for the past
Like man thy offspring? Do I hear thee mourn
Thy childhood's unreturning hours, thy springs
Gone with their genial airs and melodies,
The gentle generations of thy flowers,
And thy majestic groves of olden time,
Perished with all their dwellers? Dost thou wail
For that fair age of which the poets tell,
Ere the rude winds grew keen with frost, or fire
Fell with the rains, or spouted from the hills,
To blast thy greenness, while the virgin night
Was guiltless and salubrious as the day?
Or haply dost thou grieve for those that die,
For living things that trod thy paths awhile,
The love of thee and heaven, and now they sleep
Mixed with the shapeless dust on which thy herds
Trample and graze? I too must grieve with thee,
O'er loved ones lost. Their graves are far away
Upon thy mountains; yet, while I recline
Alone, in darkness, on thy naked soil,
The mighty nourisher and burial-place
Of man, I feel that I embrace their dust.
Ha! how the murmur deepens! I perceive
And tremble at its dreadful import. Earth
Uplifts a general cry for guilt and wrong,
And heaven is listening. The forgotten graves
Of the heart-broken utter forth their plaint.
The dust of her who loved and was betrayed,
And him who died neglected in his age;
The sepulchres of those who for mankind
Laboured, and earned the recompense of scorn;
Ashes of martyrs for the truth, and bones
Of those who, in the strife for liberty,
Were beaten down, their corses given to dogs,
Their names to infamy, all find a voice.
The nook in which the captive, overtoiled,
Lay down to rest at last, and that which holds
Childhood's sweet blossoms, crushed by cruel hands,
Send up a plaintive sound. From battle-fields,
Where heroes madly drave and dashed their hosts
Against each other, rises up a noise,
As if the armed multitudes of dead
Stirred in their heavy slumber. Mournful tones
Come from the green abysses of the sea,
story of the crimes the guilty sought
To hide beneath its waves. The glens, the groves,
Paths in the thicket, pools of running brook,
And banks and depths of lake, and streets and lanes
Of cities, now that living sounds are hushed,
Murmur of guilty force and treachery.
Here, where I rest, the vales of Italy
Are round me, populous from early time,
And field of the tremendous warfare waged
'Twixt good and evil. Who, alas, shall dare
Interpret to man's ear the mingled voice
That comes from her old dungeons yawning now
To the black air, her amphitheatres,
Where the dew gathers on the mouldering stones,
And fanes of banished gods, and open tombs,
And roofless palaces, and streets and hearths
Of cities dug from their volcanic graves?
I hear a sound of many languages,
The utterance of nations now no more,
Driven out by mightier, as the days of heaven
Chase one another from the sky. The blood
Of freemen shed by freemen, till strange lords
Came in the hour of weakness, and made fast
The yoke that yet is worn, cries out to Heaven.
What then shall cleanse thy bosom, gentle Earth
From all its painful memories of guilt?
The whelming flood, or the renewing fire,
Or the slow change of time? that so, at last,
The horrid tale of perjury and strife,
Murder and spoil, which men call history,
May seem a fable, like the inventions told
By poets of the gods of Greece. O thou,
Who sittest far beyond the Atlantic deep,
Among the sources of thy glorious streams,
My native Land of Groves! a newer page
In the great record of the world is thine;
Shall it be fairer? Fear, and friendly hope,
And envy, watch the issue, while the lines,
By which thou shalt be judged, are written down. |
Before Parting | Algernon Charles Swinburne | A month or twain to live on honeycomb
Is pleasant; but one tires of scented time,
Cold sweet recurrence of accepted rhyme,
And that strong purple under juice and foam
Where the wine's heart has burst;
Nor feel the latter kisses like the first.
Once yet, this poor one time; I will not pray
Even to change the bitterness of it,
The bitter taste ensuing on the sweet,
To make your tears fall where your soft hair lay
All blurred and heavy in some perfumed wise
Over my face and eyes.
And yet who knows what end the scyth'd wheat
Makes of its foolish poppies' mouths of red?
These were not sown, these are not harvested,
They grow a month and are cast under feet
And none has care thereof,
As none has care of a divided love.
I know each shadow of your lips by rote,
Each change of love in eyelids and eyebrows;
The fashion of fair temples tremulous
With tender blood, and colour of your throat;
I know not how love is gone out of this,
Seeing that all was his.
Love's likeness there endures upon all these:
But out of these one shall not gather love.
Day hath not strength nor the night shade enough
To make love whole and fill his lips with ease,
As some bee-builded cell
Feels at filled lips the heavy honey swell.
I know not how this last month leaves your hair
Less full of purple colour and hid spice,
And that luxurious trouble of closed eyes
Is mixed with meaner shadow and waste care;
And love, kissed out by pleasure, seems not yet
Worth patience to regret. |
The Newcastle Apothecary. | George Colman | A man, in many a country town, we know,
Professes openly with death to wrestle;
Ent'ring the field against the grimly foe,
Arm'd with a mortar and a pestle.
Yet, some affirm, no enemies they are;
But meet just like prize-fighters, in a Fair,
Who first shake hands before they box,
Then give each other plaguy knocks,
With all the love and kindness of a brother:
So (many a suff'ring Patient saith)
Tho' the Apothecary fights with Death,
Still they're sworn friends to one another.
A member of this 'sculapian line,
Lived at Newcastle upon Tyne:
No man could better gild a pill:
Or make a bill;
Or mix a draught, or bleed, or blister;
Or draw a tooth out of your head;
Or chatter scandal by your bed;
Or give a clyster.
Of occupations these were quantum suff.:
Yet, still, he thought the list not long enough;
And therefore Midwifery he chose to pin to't.
This balance'd things:--for if he hurl'd
A few score mortals from the world,
He made amends by bringing others into't.
His fame full six miles round the country ran;
In short, in reputation he was solus:
All the old women call'd him "a fine man!"
His name was Bolus.
Benjamin Bolus, tho' in trade,
(Which oftentimes will Genius fetter)
Read works of fancy, it is said;
And cultivated the Belles Lettres.
And why should this be thought so odd?
Can't men have taste who cure a phthysic;
Of Poetry tho' Patron-God,
Apollo patronises physick.
Bolus love'd verse;--and took so much delight in't,
That his prescriptions he resolve'd to write in't.
No opportunity he e'er let pass
Of writing the directions, on his labels,
In dapper couplets,--like Gay's Fables;
Or, rather, like the lines in Hudibras.
Apothecary's verse!--and where's the treason?
'Tis simply honest dealing:--not a crime;--
When patients swallow physick without reason,
It is but fair to give a little rhyme.
He had a Patient lying at death's door,
Some three miles from the town,--it might be four;
To whom, one evening, Bolus sent an article,
In Pharmacy, that's call'd cathartical.
And, on the label of the stuff,
He wrote this verse;
Which, one would think, was clear enough,
And terse:--
"When taken,
To be well shaken."
Next morning, early, Bolus rose;
And to the Patient's house he goes;--
Upon his pad,
Who a vile trick of stumbling had:
It was, indeed, a very sorry hack;
But that's of course:
For what's expected from a horse
With an Apothecary on his back?
Bolus arrive'd; and gave a doubtful tap;--
Between a single and a double rap.--
Knocks of this kind
Are given by Gentlemen who teach to dance:
By Fiddlers, and by Opera-singers:
One loud, and then a little one behind;
As if the knocker fell, by chance,
Out of their fingers.
The Servant lets him in, with dismal face,
Long as a courtier's out of place--
Portending some disaster;
John's countenance as rueful look'd, and grim,
As if th' Apothecary had physick'd him,--
And not his master.
"Well, how's the Patient?" Bolus said:--
John shook his head.
"Indeed!--hum! ha!--that's very odd!
He took the draught?"--John gave a nod.
"Well,--how?--what then?--speak out, you dunce!"
"Why then"--says John--"we shook him once."
"Shook him!--how?"--Bolus stammer'd out:
"We jolted him about."
"Zounds! Shake a Patient, man!--a shake won't do."
"No, Sir,--and so we gave him two."
"Two shakes! od's curse!
'Twould make the Patient worse."
"It did so, Sir!--and so a third we tried."
"Well, and what then?"--"then, Sir, my master died."
Ere WILL had done 'twas waxing wond'rous late;
And reeling Bucks the streets began to scour;
While guardian Watchmen, with a tottering gait,
Cried every thing, quite clear, except the hour.
"Another pot," says TOM, "and then,
A Song;--and so good night, good Gentlemen!
"I've Lyricks, such as Bons Vivants indite,
In which your bibbers of Champagne delight,--
The Poetaster, bawling them in clubs,
Obtains a miserably noted name;
And every noisy Bacchanalian dubs
The Singing-Writer with a bastard Fame." |
The Bell(e) of Baltimore. | Hattie Howard | [One of the notable features of Baltimore is the big bell that hangs in the city hall tower, to strike the hour and sound the fire alarm. It is called "Big Sam," and weighs 5,000 pounds]
A million feet above the ground
(For so it seemed in winding round),
A million, and two more,
The latter stiff and sore,
While perspiration formed a part
Of every reeking pore,
I viewed the city like a chart
Spread out upon the floor.
And said: "Great guide Jehoiakin,
To me is meagre pleasure in
The height of spires and domes,
Of walls like ancient Rome's;
Nor care I for the marts of trade,
Or shelves of musty tomes,
Nor yet for yonder colonnade
Before your palace homes;
"But curiosity is keen
To know the city's reigning queen,
Who suiteth well the score
Of suitors at her door;
Oh, which of your divinities
Is she whom all adore?
Embodiment of truth, who is
The belle of Baltimore?"
Veracity's revolving eyes
Looked up as if to read the skies:
"Why, Lor'-a-miss, see dar -
De bell is in de air!
Lan' sakes! of all de missteries
Yo' nebber learn before!
Why, don' yo' know 'Big Sam'? He is
De bell of Baltimore!" |
Visor'd | Walt Whitman | A mask, a perpetual natural disguiser of herself,
Concealing her face, concealing her form,
Changes and transformations every hour, every moment,
Falling upon her even when she sleeps.
|
Okhouan | Edward Powys Mathers (As Translator) | A mole shows black
Between her mouth and cheek.
As if a negro,
Coming into a garden,
Wavered between a purple rose
And a scarlet camomile.
From the Arabic. |
The Millennium. | Thomas Moore | SUGGESTED BY THE LATE WORK OF THE REVEREND MR. IRVING "ON PROPHECY."
1826
A millennium at hand!--I'm delighted to hear it--
As matters both public and private now go,
With multitudes round us all starving or near it.
A good, rich Millennium will come '-propos.
Only think, Master Fred, what delight to behold,
Instead of thy bankrupt old City of Rags,
A bran-new Jerusalem built all of gold,
Sound bullion throughout from the roof to the flags--
A City where wine and cheap corn[1] shall abound--
A celestial Cocaigne on whose buttery shelves
We may swear the best things of this world will be found,
As your Saints seldom fail to take care of themselves!
Thanks, reverend expounder of raptures Elysian,
Divine Squintifobus who, placed within reach
Of two opposite worlds, by a twist of your vision
Can cast at the same time a sly look at each;--
Thanks, thanks for the hope thou affordest, that we
May even in our own times a Jubilee share.
Which so long has been promist by prophets like thee,
And so often postponed, we began to despair.
There was Whiston[2] who learnedly took Prince Eugene
For the man who must bring the Millennium about;
There's Faber whose pious productions have been
All belied ere his book's first edition was out;--
There was Counsellor Dobbs, too, an Irish M. P.,
Who discoursed on the subject with signal eclat,
And, each day of his life sat expecting to see
A Millennium break out in the town of Armagh![3]
There was also--but why should I burden my lay
With your Brotherses, Southcotes, and names less deserving,
When all past Millenniums henceforth must give way
To the last new Millennium of Orator Irving.
Go on, mighty man,--doom them all to the shelf,--
And when next thou with Prophecy troublest thy sconce,
Oh forget not, I pray thee, to prove that thyself
Art the Beast (Chapter iv.) that sees nine ways at once. |
Joe - An Etching | Emily Pauline Johnson | A meadow brown; across the yonder edge
A zigzag fence is ambling; here a wedge
Of underbush has cleft its course in twain,
Till where beyond it staggers up again;
The long, grey rails stretch in a broken line
Their ragged length of rough, split forest pine,
And in their zigzag tottering have reeled
In drunken efforts to enclose the field,
Which carries on its breast, September born,
A patch of rustling, yellow, Indian corn.
Beyond its shrivelled tassels, perched upon
The topmost rail, sits Joe, the settler's son,
A little semi-savage boy of nine.
Now dozing in the warmth of Nature's wine,
His face the sun has tampered with, and wrought,
By heated kisses, mischief, and has brought
Some vagrant freckles, while from here and there
A few wild locks of vagabond brown hair
Escape the old straw hat the sun looks through,
And blinks to meet his Irish eyes of blue.
Barefooted, innocent of coat or vest,
His grey checked shirt unbuttoned at his chest,
Both hardy hands within their usual nest -
His breeches pockets - so, he waits to rest
His little fingers, somewhat tired and worn,
That all day long were husking Indian corn.
His drowsy lids snap at some trivial sound,
With lazy yawns he slips towards the ground,
Then with an idle whistle lifts his load
And shambles home along the country road
That stretches on, fringed out with stumps and weeds,
And finally unto the backwoods leads,
Where forests wait with giant trunk and bough
The axe of pioneer, the settler's plough. |
The Student | Thomas William Hodgson Crosland | A minx of seventeen, with rather fine
Brown eyes and freckles and a cheerful grin,
She saunters up the ward, and stricken sin
Nods and looks pleasant (why should one repine?).
She takes "her cases," looks for every "sign,"
Hammers and sounds the portly and the thin,
Plies them with questions till their cheap heads spin
And keeps them busy saying "ninety-nine."
It's my turn now! Oh, let me bare my chest
And spread a level sheet across my crib,
And be as wax for our meticulous Miss;
While she, poor dear, doing her anxious best,
Feels for the apex under the wrong rib
And wonders fiercely where my liver is. |
Translations. - Milton's Italian Poems. VI. | George MacDonald | A modest youth, in love a simpleton,
When to escape myself I seek and shift,
Lady, I of my heart the humble gift
Vow unto thee. In trials many a one,
True, brave, I've found it, firm to things begun;
By gracious, prudent, worthy thoughts uplift.
When roars the great world, in the thunder-rift,
Its own self, armour adamant, it will don,
From chance and envy as securely barred,
From fears and hopes that still the crowd abuse,
As inward gifts and high worth coveting,
And the resounding lyre, and every Muse:
There only wilt thou find it not so hard
Where Love hath fixed his ever cureless sting. |
The National Anthem | William Schwenck Gilbert | A monarch is pestered with cares,
Though, no doubt, he can often trepan them;
But one comes in a shape he can never escape -
The implacable National Anthem!
Though for quiet and rest he may yearn,
It pursues him at every turn -
No chance of forsaking
Its ROCOCO numbers;
They haunt him when waking -
They poison his slumbers -
Like the Banbury Lady, whom every one knows,
He's cursed with its music wherever he goes!
Though its words but imperfectly rhyme,
And the devil himself couldn't scan them;
With composure polite he endures day and night
That illiterate National Anthem!
It serves a good purpose, I own:
Its strains are devout and impressive -
Its heart-stirring notes raise a lump in our throats
As we burn with devotion excessive:
But the King, who's been bored by that song
From his cradle - each day - all day long -
Who's heard it loud-shouted
By throats operatic,
And loyally spouted
By courtiers emphatic -
By soldier - by sailor - by drum and by fife -
Small blame if he thinks it the plague of his life!
While his subjects sing loudly and long,
Their King - who would willingly ban them -
Sits, worry disguising, anathematising
That Bogie, the National Anthem! |
The Country Schoolmaster. | Johann Wolfgang von Goethe | I.
A Master of a country school
Jump'd up one day from off his stool,
Inspired with firm resolve to try
To gain the best society;
So to the nearest baths he walk'd,
And into the saloon he stalk'd.
He felt quite. startled at the door,
Ne'er having seen the like before.
To the first stranger made he now
A very low and graceful bow,
But quite forgot to bear in mind
That people also stood behind;
His left-hand neighbor's paunch he struck
A grievous blow, by great ill luck;
Pardon for this he first entreated,
And then in haste his bow repeated.
His right hand neighbor next he hit,
And begg'd him, too, to pardon it;
But on his granting his petition,
Another was in like condition;
These compliments he paid to all,
Behind, before, across the hall;
At length one who could stand no more,
Show'd him impatiently the door.
* * * *
May many, pond'ring on their crimes,
A moral draw from this betimes!
II.
As he proceeded on his way
He thought, "I was too weak to-day;
To bow I'll ne'er again be seen;
For goats will swallow what is green."
Across the fields he now must speed,
Not over stumps and stones, indeed,
But over meads and cornfields sweet,
Trampling down all with clumsy feet.
A farmer met him by-and-by,
And didn't ask him: how? or why?
But with his fist saluted him.
"I feel new life in every limb!"
Our traveller cried in ecstasy.
"Who art thou who thus gladden'st me?
May Heaven such blessings ever send!
Ne'er may I want a jovial friend!" |
The Master of the Dance | Vachel Lindsay | A chant to which it is intended a group of children shall dance and improvise pantomime led by their dancing-teacher.
I
A master deep-eyed
Ere his manhood was ripe,
He sang like a thrush,
He could play any pipe.
So dull in the school
That he scarcely could spell,
He read but a bit,
And he figured not well.
A bare-footed fool,
Shod only with grace;
Long hair streaming down
Round a wind-hardened face;
He smiled like a girl,
Or like clear winter skies,
A virginal light
Making stars of his eyes.
In swiftness and poise,
A proud child of the deer,
A white fawn he was,
Yet a fawn without fear.
No youth thought him vain,
Or made mock of his hair,
Or laughed when his ways
Were most curiously fair.
A mastiff at fight,
He could strike to the earth
The envious one
Who would challenge his worth.
However we bowed
To the schoolmaster mild,
Our spirits went out
To the fawn-footed child.
His beckoning led
Our troop to the brush.
We found nothing there
But a wind and a hush.
He sat by a stone
And he looked on the ground,
As if in the weeds
There was something profound.
His pipe seemed to neigh,
Then to bleat like a sheep,
Then sound like a stream
Or a waterfall deep.
It whispered strange tales,
Human words it spoke not.
Told fair things to come,
And our marvellous lot
If now with fawn-steps
Unshod we advanced
To the midst of the grove
And in reverence danced.
We obeyed as he piped
Soft grass to young feet,
Was a medicine mighty,
A remedy meet.
Our thin blood awoke,
It grew dizzy and wild,
Though scarcely a word
Moved the lips of a child.
Our dance gave allegiance,
It set us apart,
We tripped a strange measure,
Uplifted of heart.
II
We thought to be proud
Of our fawn everywhere.
We could hardly see how
Simple books were a care.
No rule of the school
This strange student could tame.
He was banished one day,
While we quivered with shame.
He piped back our love
On a moon-silvered night,
Enticed us once more
To the place of delight.
A greeting he sang
And it made our blood beat,
It tramped upon custom
And mocked at defeat.
He builded a fire
And we tripped in a ring,
The embers our books
And the fawn our good king.
And now we approached
All the mysteries rare
That shadowed his eyelids
And blew through his hair.
That spell now was peace
The deep strength of the trees,
The children of nature
We clambered her knees.
Our breath and our moods
Were in tune with her own,
Tremendous her presence,
Eternal her throne.
The ostracized child
Our white foreheads kissed,
Our bodies and souls
Became lighter than mist.
Sweet dresses like snow
Our small lady-loves wore,
Like moonlight the thoughts
That our bosoms upbore.
Like a lily the touch
Of each cold little hand.
The loves of the stars
We could now understand.
O quivering air!
O the crystalline night!
O pauses of awe
And the faces swan-white!
O ferns in the dusk!
O forest-shrined hour!
O earth that sent upward
The thrill and the power,
To lift us like leaves,
A delirious whirl,
The masterful boy
And the delicate girl!
What child that strange night-time
Can ever forget?
His fealty due
And his infinite debt
To the folly divine,
To the exquisite rule
Of the perilous master,
The fawn-footed fool?
III
Now soldiers we seem,
And night brings a new thing,
A terrible ire,
As of thunder awing.
A warrior power,
That old chivalry stirred,
When knights took up arms,
As the maidens gave word.
THE END OF OUR WAR,
WILL BE GLORY UNTOLD.
WHEN THE TOWN LIKE A GREAT
BUDDING ROSE SHALL UNFOLD!
Near, nearer that war,
And that ecstasy comes,
We hear the trees beating
Invisible drums.
The fields of the night
Are starlit above,
Our girls are white torches
Of conquest and love.
No nerve without will,
And no breast without breath,
We whirl with the planets
That never know death! |
Prologue. Government House, March 1879. | John Campbell | A moment's pause before we play our parts,
To speak the thought that reigns within your hearts.--
Now from the Future's hours, and unknown days,
Affection turns, and with the Past delays;
For countless voices in our mighty land
Speak the fond praises of a vanished hand;
And shall, to mightier ages yet, proclaim
The happy memories linked with Dufferin's name.
Missed here is he, to whom each class and creed,
Among our people lately bade "God speed;"
Missed, when each Winter sees the skater wheel
In ringing circle on the flashing steel;
Missed in the Spring, the Summer and the Fall,
In many a hut, as in the Council Hall;
Where'er his wanderings on Duty's hest
Evoked his glowing speech, his genial jest.
We mourn his absence, though we joy that now
Old England's honours cluster round his brow,
And that he left us but to serve again
Our Queen and Empire on the Neva's plain!
Amidst the honoured roll of those whose fate
It was to crown our fair Canadian State,
And bind in one bright diadem alone,
Each glorious Province, each resplendent stone,
His name shall last, and his example give
To all her sons a lesson how to live:
How every task, if met with heart as bold,
Proves the hard rock is seamed with precious gold,
And Labour, when with Mirth and Love allied,
Finds friends far stronger than in Force and Pride,
And Sympathy and Kindness can be made
The potent weapons by which men are swayed.
He proved a nation's trust can well be won
By loyal work and constant duty done;
The wit that winged the wisdom of his word
Set forth our glories, till all Europe heard
How wide the room our Western World can spare
For all who nobly toil and bravely dare.
And while the statesman we revere, we know
In him the friend is gone, to whom we owe
So much of gaiety, so much which made
Life's duller round to seem in joy repaid.
These little festivals by him made bright,
With grateful thoughts of him renewed to-night,
Remind no less of her who deigned to grace
This mimic world, and fill therein her place
With the sweet dignity and gracious mien
The race of Hamilton has often seen;
But never shown upon the wider stage
Where the great "cast" is writ on History's page,
More purely, nobly, than by her, whose voice
Here moved to tears, or made the heart rejoice,
And who in act and word, at home, or far,
Shone with calm beauty like the Northern Star!
Green as the Shamrock of their native Isle
Their memory lives, and babes unborn shall smile
And share in happiness the pride that blends
Our country's name with her beloved friends!
|
The Warden Of The Cinque Ports | Henry Wadsworth Longfellow | A mist was driving down the British Channel,
The day was just begun,
And through the window-panes, on floor and panel,
Streamed the red autumn sun.
It glanced on flowing flag and rippling pennon,
And the white sails of ships;
And, from the frowning rampart, the black cannon
Hailed it with feverish lips.
Sandwich and Romney, Hastings, Hithe, and Dover
Were all alert that day,
To see the French war-steamers speeding over,
When the fog cleared away.
Sullen and silent, and like couchant lions,
Their cannon, through the night,
Holding their breath, had watched, in grim defiance,
The sea-coast opposite.
And now they roared at drum-beat from their stations
On every citadel;
Each answering each, with morning salutations,
That all was well.
And down the coast, all taking up the burden,
Replied the distant forts,
As if to summon from his sleep the Warden
And Lord of the Cinque Ports.
Him shall no sunshine from the fields of azure,
No drum-beat from the wall,
No morning gun from the black fort's embrasure,
Awaken with its call!
No more, surveying with an eye impartial
The long line of the coast,
Shall the gaunt figure of the old Field Marshal
Be seen upon his post!
For in the night, unseen, a single warrior,
In sombre harness mailed,
Dreaded of man, and surnamed the Destroyer,
The rampart wall has scaled.
He passed into the chamber of the sleeper,
The dark and silent room,
And as he entered, darker grew, and deeper,
The silence and the gloom.
He did not pause to parley or dissemble,
But smote the Warden hoar;
Ah! what a blow! that made all England tremble
And groan from shore to shore.
Meanwhile, without, the surly cannon waited,
The sun rose bright o'erhead;
Nothing in Nature's aspect intimated
That a great man was dead. |
The Tavern Of Last Times (At Box Hill, Surrey) | Ella Wheeler Wilcox | A modern hour from London (as we spin
Into a silver thread the miles of space
Between us and our goal), there is a place
Apart from city traffic, dust, and din,
Green with great trees, where hides a quiet Inn.
Here Nelson last looked on the lovely face
Which made his world; and by its magic grace
Trailed rosy clouds across each early sin.
And, leaning lawnward, is the room where Keats
Wrote the last one of those immortal songs
(Called by the critics of his day 'mere rhymes').
A lark, high in the boxwood bough repeats
Those lyric strains, to idle passing throngs,
There by the little Tavern-of-Last-Times. |
The Hind And The Panther. | John Dryden | A Poem, In Three Parts.
--Antiquam exquirite matrem.
Et vera incessa patuit Dea.
VIRG.
PREFACE.
The nation is in too high a ferment for me to expect either fair war, or even so much as fair quarter, from a reader of the opposite party. All men are engaged either on this side or that; and though conscience is the common word, which is given by both, yet if a writer fall among enemies, and cannot give the marks of _their_ conscience, he is knocked down before the reasons of his own are heard. A preface, therefore, which is but a bespeaking of favour, is altogether useless. What I desire the reader should know concerning me, he will find in the body of the poem, if he have but the patience to peruse it. Only this advertisement let him take beforehand, which relates to the merits of the cause. No general characters of parties (call them either Sects or Churches) can be so fully and exactly drawn, as to comprehend all the several members of them; at least all such as are received under that denomination. For example, there are some of the Church by law established, who envy not liberty of conscience to Dissenters, as being well satisfied that, according to their own principles, they ought not to persecute them. Yet these, by reason of their fewness, I could not distinguish from the numbers of the rest, with whom they are embodied in one common name. On the other side, there are many of our sects, and more indeed than I could reasonably have hoped, who have withdrawn themselves from the communion of the Panther, and embraced this gracious indulgence of his Majesty in point of toleration. But neither to the one nor the other of these is this satire any way intended: it is aimed only at the refractory and disobedient on either side. For those who are come over to the royal party are consequently supposed to be out of gun-shot. Our physicians have observed, that, in process of time, some diseases have abated of their virulence, and have in a manner worn out their malignity, so as to be no longer mortal; and why may not I suppose the same concerning some of those who have formerly been enemies to kingly government, as well as Catholic religion? I hope they have now another notion of both, as having found, by comfortable experience, that the doctrine of persecution is far from being an article of our faith.
It is not for any private man to censure the proceedings of a foreign prince; but, without suspicion of flattery, I may praise our own, who has taken contrary measures, and those more suitable to the spirit of Christianity. Some of the Dissenters, in their addresses to his Majesty, have said, "that he has restored God to his empire over conscience." I confess I dare not stretch the figure to so great a boldness; but I may safely say, that conscience is the royalty and prerogative of every private man. He is absolute in his own breast, and accountable to no earthly power, for that which passes only betwixt God and him. Those who are driven into the fold are, generally speaking, rather made hypocrites than converts.
This indulgence being granted to all the sects, it ought in reason to be expected, that they should both receive it, and receive it thankfully. For, at this time of day, to refuse the benefit, and adhere to those whom they have esteemed their persecutors, what is it else, but publicly to own, that they suffered not before for conscience-sake, but only out of pride and obstinacy, to separate from a church for those impositions, which they now judge may be lawfully obeyed? After they have so long contended for their classical ordination (not to speak of rites and ceremonies) will they at length submit to an episcopal? If they can go so far, out of complaisance to their old enemies, methinks a little reason should persuade them to take another step, and see whither that would lead them.
Of the receiving this toleration thankfully I shall say no more, than that they ought, and I doubt not they will consider from what hand they received it. It is not from a Cyrus, a heathen prince, and a foreigner, but from a Christian king, their native sovereign; who expects a return in specie from them, that the kindness, which he has graciously shown them, may be retaliated on those of his own persuasion.
As for the poem in general, I will only thus far satisfy the reader, that it was neither imposed on me, nor so much as the subject given me by any man. It was written during the last winter, and the beginning of this spring; though with long interruptions of ill health and other hindrances. About a fortnight before I had finished it, his Majesty's declaration for liberty of conscience came abroad; which, if I had so soon expected, I might have spared myself the labour of writing many things which are contained in the third part of it. But I was always in some hope, that the Church of England might have been persuaded to have taken off the penal laws and the test, which was one design of the poem, when I proposed to myself the writing of it.
It is evident that some part of it was only occasional, and not first intended: I mean that defence of myself, to which every honest man is bound, when he is injuriously attacked in print; and I refer myself to the judgment of those who have read the Answer to the Defence of the late King's Papers, and that of the Duchess (in which last I was concerned), how charitably I have been represented there. I am now informed both of the author and supervisors of this pamphlet, and will reply, when I think he can affront me; for I am of Socrates's opinion, that all creatures cannot. In the mean time let him consider whether he deserved not a more severe reprehension than I gave him formerly, for using so little respect to the memory of those whom he pretended to answer; and at his leisure, look out for some original treatise of humility, written by any Protestant in English; I believe I may say in any other tongue: for the magnified piece of Duncomb on that subject, which either he must mean, or none, and with which another of his fellows has upbraided me, was translated from the Spanish of Rodriguez; though with the omission of the seventeenth, the twenty-fourth, the twenty-fifth, and the last chapter, which will be found in comparing of the books.
He would have insinuated to the world, that her late Highness died not a Roman Catholic. He declares himself to be now satisfied to the contrary, in which he has given up the cause; for matter of fact was the principal debate betwixt us. In the mean time, he would dispute the motives of her change; how preposterously, let all men judge, when he seemed to deny the subject of the controversy, the change itself. And because I would not take up this ridiculous challenge, he tells the world I cannot argue: but he may as well infer, that a Catholic cannot fast, because he will not take up the cudgels against Mrs James, to confute the Protestant religion.
I have but one word more to say concerning the poem as such, and abstracting from the matters, either religious or civil, which are handled in it. The first part, consisting most in general characters and narration, I have endeavoured to raise, and give it the majestic turn of heroic poesy. The second being matter of dispute, and chiefly concerning Church authority, I was obliged to make as plain and perspicuous as possibly I could; yet not wholly neglecting the numbers, though I had not frequent occasions for the magnificence of verse. The third, which has more of the nature of domestic conversation, is, or ought to be, more free and familiar than the two former.
There are in it two episodes, or fables, which are interwoven with the main design; so that they are properly parts of it, though they are also distinct stories of themselves. In both of these I have made use of the commonplaces of satire, whether true or false, which are urged by the members of the one Church against the other: at which I hope no reader of either party will be scandalized, because they are not of my invention, but as old, to my knowledge, as the times of Boccace and Chaucer on the one side, and as those of the Reformation on the other.
PART I.
A milk-white Hind, immortal and unchanged,
Fed on the lawns, and in the forest ranged;
Without unspotted, innocent within,
She fear'd no danger, for she knew no sin.
Yet had she oft been chased with horns and hounds,
And Scythian shafts; and many winged wounds
Aim'd at her heart; was often forced to fly,
And doom'd to death, though fated not to die.
Not so her young; for their unequal line
Was hero's make, half human, half divine.
Their earthly mould obnoxious was to fate,
The immortal part assumed immortal state.
Of these a slaughter'd army lay in blood,
Extended o'er the Caledonian wood,
Their native walk; whose vocal blood arose,
And cried for pardon on their perjured foes.
Their fate was fruitful, and the sanguine seed,
Endued with souls, increased the sacred breed.
So captive Israel multiplied in chains,
A numerous exile, and enjoy'd her pains.
With grief and gladness mix'd, the mother view'd
Her martyr'd offspring, and their race renew'd;
Their corpse to perish, but their kind to last,
So much the deathless plant the dying fruit surpass'd.
Panting and pensive now she ranged alone,
And wander'd in the kingdoms once her own,
The common hunt, though from their rage restrain'd
By sovereign power, her company disdain'd;
Grinn'd as they pass'd, and with a glaring eye
Gave gloomy signs of secret enmity.
'Tis true, she bounded by, and tripp'd so light,
They had not time to take a steady sight;
For truth has such a face and such a mien,
As to be loved needs only to be seen.
The bloody Bear, an independent beast,
Unlick'd to form, in groans her hate express'd.
Among the timorous kind the quaking Hare[1]
Profess'd neutrality, but would not swear.
Next her the buffoon Ape[2], as Atheists use,
Mimick'd all sects, and had his own to choose:
Still when the Lion look'd, his knees he bent,
And paid at church a courtier's compliment.
The bristled Baptist Boar, impure as he,
But whiten'd with the foam of sanctity,
With fat pollutions fill'd the sacred place,
And mountains levell'd in his furious race;
So first rebellion founded was in grace.
But since the mighty ravage, which he made
In German forests, had his guilt betray'd,
With broken tusks, and with a borrow'd name;
He shunn'd the vengeance, and conceal'd the shame:
So lurk'd in sects unseen. With greater guile
False Reynard[3] fed on consecrated spoil:
The graceless beast by Athanasius first
Was chased from Nice, then by Socinus nursed:
His impious race their blasphemy renew'd,
And nature's King through nature's optics view'd.
Reversed they view'd him lessen'd to their eye,
Nor in an infant could a God descry:
New swarming sects to this obliquely tend,
Hence they began, and here they all will end.
What weight of ancient witness can prevail,
If private reason hold the public scale?
But, gracious God, how well dost thou provide
For erring judgments an unerring guide!
Thy throne is darkness in the abyss of light,
A blaze of glory that forbids the sight.
O teach me to believe thee thus conceal'd,
And search no farther than thyself reveal'd;
But her alone for my director take,
Whom thou hast promised never to forsake!
My thoughtless youth was wing'd with vain desires;
My manhood, long misled by wandering fires,
Follow'd false lights; and when their glimpse was gone,
My pride struck out new sparkles of her own.
Such was I, such by nature still I am;
Be thine the glory, and be mine the shame.
Good life be now my task; my doubts are done:
What more could fright my faith, than Three in One?
Can I believe Eternal God could lie
Disguised in mortal mould and infancy?
That the great Maker of the world could die?
And after that trust my imperfect sense,
Which calls in question His Omnipotence?
Can I my reason to my faith compel,
And shall my sight, and touch, and taste rebel?
Superior faculties are set aside;
Shall their subservient organs be my guide?
Then let the moon usurp the rule of day,
And winking tapers show the sun his way;
For what my senses can themselves perceive,
I need no revelation to believe.
Can they who say the Host should be descried
By sense, define a body glorified?
Impassable, and penetrating parts?
Let them declare by what mysterious arts
He shot that body through the opposing might
Of bolts and bars impervious to the light,
And stood before his train confess'd in open sight.
For since thus wondrously he pass'd, 'tis plain,
One single place two bodies did contain.
And sure the same Omnipotence as well
Can make one body in more places dwell.
Let reason, then, at her own quarry fly,
But how can finite grasp infinity?
'Tis urged again, that faith did first commence
By miracles, which are appeals to sense,
And thence concluded, that our sense must be
The motive still of credibility.
For latter ages must on former wait,
And what began belief must propagate.
But winnow well this thought, and you shall find
'Tis light as chaff that flies before the wind.
Were all those wonders wrought by power divine,
As means or ends of some more deep design?
Most sure as means, whose end was this alone,
To prove the Godhead of the Eternal Son.
God thus asserted, man is to believe
Beyond what sense and reason can conceive,
And for mysterious things of faith rely
On the proponent, Heaven's authority.
If, then, our faith we for our guide admit,
Vain is the farther search of human wit;
As when the building gains a surer stay,
We take the unuseful scaffolding away.
Reason by sense no more can understand;
The game is play'd into another hand.
Why choose we, then, like bilanders,[4] to creep
Along the coast, and land in view to keep,
When safely we may launch into the deep?
In the same vessel which our Saviour bore,
Himself the pilot, let us leave the shore,
And with a better guide a better world explore.
Could he his Godhead veil with flesh and blood,
And not veil these again to be our food?
His grace in both is equal in extent,
The first affords us life, the second nourishment.
And if he can, why all this frantic pain
To construe what his clearest words contain,
And make a riddle what he made so plain?
To take up half on trust, and half to try,
Name it not faith, but bungling bigotry.
Both knave and fool the merchant we may call,
To pay great sums, and to compound the small:
For who would break with Heaven, and would not break for all?
Rest, then, my soul, from endless anguish freed:
Nor sciences thy guide, nor sense thy creed.
Faith is the best insurer of thy bliss;
The bank above must fail before the venture miss.
But heaven and heaven-born faith are far from thee,
Thou first apostate[5] to divinity.
Unkennell'd range in thy Polonian plains;
A fiercer foe the insatiate Wolf[6] remains.
Too boastful Britain, please thyself no more,
That beasts of prey are banish'd from thy shore:
The Bear, the Boar, and every savage name,
Wild in effect, though in appearance tame,
Lay waste thy woods, destroy thy blissful bower,
And, muzzled though they seem, the mutes devour.
More haughty than the rest, the wolfish race
Appear with belly gaunt and famish'd face:
Never was so deform'd a beast of grace.
His ragged tail betwixt his legs he wears,
Close clapp'd for shame; but his rough crest he rears,
And pricks up his predestinating ears.
His wild disorder'd walk, his haggard eyes,
Did all the bestial citizens surprise.
Though fear'd and hated, yet he ruled awhile,
As captain or companion of the spoil.
Full many a year[7] his hateful head had been
For tribute paid, nor since in Cambria seen:
The last of all the litter 'scaped by chance,
And from Geneva first infested France.
Some authors thus his pedigree will trace,
But others write him of an upstart race:
Because of Wickliff's brood no mark he brings,
But his innate antipathy to kings.
These last deduce him from th' Helvetian kind,
Who near the Leman lake his consort lined:
That fiery Zuinglius first th' affection bred,
And meagre Calvin bless'd the nuptial bed.
In Israel some believe him whelp'd long since,
When the proud Sanhedrim oppress'd the prince;
Or, since he will be Jew, derive him higher,
When Corah with his brethren did conspire
From Moses' hand the sovereign sway to wrest,
And Aaron of his ephod to divest:
Till opening earth made way for all to pass,
And could not bear the burden of a class.
The Fox and he came shuffled in the dark,
If ever they were stow'd in Noah's ark:
Perhaps not made; for all their barking train
The Dog (a common species) will contain.
And some wild curs, who from their masters ran,
Abhorring the supremacy of man,
In woods and caves the rebel race began.
O happy pair, how well have you increased!
What ills in Church and State have you redress'd!
With teeth untried, and rudiments of claws,
Your first essay was on your native laws:
Those having torn with ease, and trampled down,
Your fangs you fasten'd on the mitred crown,
And freed from God and monarchy your town.
What though your native kennel[8] still be small,
Bounded betwixt a puddle[9] and a wall;
Yet your victorious colonies are sent
Where the north ocean girds the continent.
Quicken'd with fire below, your monsters breed
In fenny Holland, and in fruitful Tweed:
And, like the first, the last affects to be
Drawn to the dregs of a democracy.
As, where in fields the fairy rounds are seen,
A rank, sour herbage rises on the green;
So, springing where those midnight elves advance,
Rebellion prints the footsteps of the dance.
Such are their doctrines, such contempt they show
To Heaven above and to their prince below,
As none but traitors and blasphemers know.
God, like the tyrant of the skies, is placed,
And kings, like slaves, beneath the crowd debased.
So fulsome is their food, that flocks refuse
To bite, and only dogs for physic use.
As, where the lightning runs along the ground,
No husbandry can heal the blasting wound;
Nor bladed grass, nor bearded corn succeeds,
But scales of scurf and putrefaction breeds:
Such wars, such waste, such fiery tracks of dearth
Their zeal has left, and such a teemless earth,
But, as the poisons of the deadliest kind
Are to their own unhappy coasts confined;
As only Indian shades of sight deprive,
And magic plants will but in Colchos thrive;
So Presbytery and pestilential zeal
Can only nourish in a commonweal.
From Celtic woods is chased the wolfish crew;
But ah! some pity even to brutes is due:
Their native walks methinks they might enjoy,
Curb'd of their native malice to destroy.
Of all the tyrannies on human kind,
The worst is that which persecutes the mind.
Let us but weigh at what offence we strike;
'Tis but because we cannot think alike.
In punishing of this, we overthrow
The laws of nations and of nature too.
Beasts are the subjects of tyrannic sway,
Where still the stronger on the weaker prey.
Man only of a softer mould is made,
Not for his fellows' ruin, but their aid:
Created kind, beneficent, and free,
The noble image of the Deity.
One portion of informing fire was given
To brutes, the inferior family of heaven:
The Smith Divine, as with a careless beat,
Struck out the mute creation at a heat:
But when arrived at last to human race,
The Godhead took a deep-considering space;
And to distinguish man from all the rest,
Unlock'd the sacred treasures of his breast;
And mercy mix'd with reason did impart,
One to his head, the other to his heart:
Reason to rule, and mercy to forgive;
The first is law, the last prerogative.
And like his mind his outward form appear'd,
When, issuing naked, to the wondering herd,
He charm'd their eyes; and, for they loved, they fear'd:
Not arm'd with horns of arbitrary might,
Or claws to seize their furry spoils in fight,
Or with increase of feet to o'ertake them in their flight:
Of easy shape, and pliant every way;
Confessing still the softness of his clay,
And kind as kings upon their coronation day:
With open hands, and with extended space
Of arms, to satisfy a large embrace.
Thus kneaded up with milk, the new-made man
His kingdom o'er his kindred world began:
Till knowledge misapplied, misunderstood,
And pride of empire, sour'd his balmy blood.
Then, first rebelling, his own stamp he coins;
The murderer Cain was latent in his loins:
And blood began its first and loudest cry,
For differing worship of the Deity.
Thus persecution rose, and further space
Produced the mighty hunter of his race[10].
Not so the blessed Pan his flock increased,
Content to fold them from the famish'd beast:
Mild were his laws; the Sheep and harmless Hind
Were never of the persecuting kind.
Such pity now the pious pastor shows,
Such mercy from the British Lion flows,
That both provide protection from their foes.
O happy regions, Italy and Spain,
Which never did those monsters entertain!
The Wolf, the Bear, the Boar, can there advance
No native claim of just inheritance.
And self-preserving laws, severe in show,
May guard their fences from the invading foe.
Where birth has placed them, let them safely share
The common benefit of vital air.
Themselves unharmful, let them live unharm'd;
Their jaws disabled, and their claws disarm'd:
Here, only in nocturnal howlings bold,
They dare not seize the hind, nor leap the fold.
More powerful, and as vigilant as they,
The Lion awfully forbids the prey.
Their rage repress'd, though pinch'd with famine sore,
They stand aloof, and tremble at his roar:
Much is their hunger, but their fear is more.
These are the chief: to number o'er the rest,
And stand, like Adam, naming every beast,
Were weary work; nor will the muse describe
A slimy-born and sun-begotten tribe;
Who far from steeples and their sacred sound,
In fields their sullen conventicles found.
These gross, half-animated lumps I leave;
Nor can I think what thoughts they can conceive.
But if they think at all, 'tis sure no higher
Than matter, put in motion, may aspire:
Souls that can scarce ferment their mass of clay;
So drossy, so divisible are they,
As would but serve pure bodies for allay:
Such souls as shards produce, such beetle things
As only buzz to heaven with evening wings;
Strike in the dark, offending but by chance,
Such are the blindfold blows of ignorance.
They know not beings, and but hate a name;
To them the Hind and Panther are the same.
The Panther[11] sure the noblest, next the Hind,
And fairest creature of the spotted kind;
Oh, could her inborn stains be wash'd away,
She were too good to be a beast of prey!
How can I praise, or blame, and not offend,
Or how divide the frailty from the friend?
Her faults and virtues lie so mix'd, that she
Nor wholly stands condemn'd, nor wholly free.
Then, like her injured Lion, let me speak;
He cannot bend her, and he would not break.
Unkind already, and estranged in part,
The Wolf begins to share her wandering heart.
Though unpolluted yet with actual ill,
She half commits, who sins but in her will.
If, as our dreaming Platonists report,
There could be spirits of a middle sort,
Too black for heaven, and yet too white for hell,
Who just dropt half way down, nor lower fell;
So poised, so gently she descends from high,
It seems a soft dismission from the sky.
Her house not ancient, whatsoe'er pretence
Her clergy heralds make in her defence.
A second century not half-way run,
Since the new honours of her blood begun.
A Lion[12] old, obscene, and furious made
By lust, compress'd her mother in a shade;
Then, by a left-hand marriage, weds the dame,
Covering adultery with a specious name:
So Schism begot; and Sacrilege and she,
A well match'd pair, got graceless Heresy.
God's and king's rebels have the same good cause,
To trample down divine and human laws:
Both would be call'd reformers, and their hate
Alike destructive both to Church and State:
The fruit proclaims the plant; a lawless prince
By luxury reform'd incontinence;
By ruins, charity; by riots, abstinence.
Confessions, fasts, and penance set aside,
Oh, with what ease we follow such a guide,
Where souls are starved, and senses gratified!
Where marriage pleasures midnight prayers supply,
And matin bells, a melancholy cry,
Are tuned to merrier notes, Increase and multiply.
Religion shows a rosy-colour'd face;
Not batter'd out with drudging works of grace:
A down-hill reformation rolls apace.
What flesh and blood would crowd the narrow gate,
Or, till they waste their pamper'd paunches, wait?
All would be happy at the cheapest rate.
Though our lean faith these rigid laws has given,
The full-fed Mussulman goes fat to heaven;
For his Arabian prophet with delights
Of sense allured his eastern proselytes.
The jolly Luther, reading him, began
To interpret Scriptures by his Alcoran;
To grub the thorns beneath our tender feet,
And make the paths of Paradise more sweet;
Bethought him of a wife ere half way gone,
For 'twas uneasy travelling alone;
And, in this masquerade of mirth and love,
Mistook the bliss of heaven for Bacchanals above.
Sure he presumed of praise, who came to stock
The ethereal pastures with so fair a flock,
Burnish'd, and battening on their food, to show
Their diligence of careful herds below.
Our Panther, though like these she changed her head,
Yet, as the mistress of a monarch's bed,
Her front erect with majesty she bore,
The crosier wielded, and the mitre wore.
Her upper part of decent discipline
Show'd affectation of an ancient line;
And Fathers, Councils, Church, and Church's head,
Were on her reverend phylacteries read.
But what disgraced and disavow'd the rest,
Was Calvin's brand, that stigmatized the beast.
Thus, like a creature of a double kind,
In her own labyrinth she lives confined.
To foreign lands no sound of her is come,
Humbly content to be despised at home.
Such is her faith, where good cannot be had,
At least she leaves the refuse of the bad:
Nice in her choice of ill, though not of best,
And least deform'd, because reform'd the least.
In doubtful points betwixt her differing friends,
Where one for substance, one for sign contends,
Their contradicting terms she strives to join;
Sign shall be substance, substance shall be sign.
A real presence all her sons allow,
And yet 'tis flat idolatry to bow,
Because the Godhead's there they know not how.
Her novices are taught that bread and wine
Are but the visible and outward sign,
Received by those who in communion join.
But the inward grace, or the thing signified,
His blood and body, who to save us died;
The faithful this thing signified receive:
What is't those faithful then partake or leave?
For what is signified and understood,
Is, by her own confession, flesh and blood.
Then, by the same acknowledgment, we know
They take the sign, and take the substance too.
The literal sense is hard to flesh and blood,
But nonsense never can be understood.
Her wild belief on every wave is toss'd;
But sure no Church can better morals boast:
True to her king her principles are found;
O that her practice were but half so sound!
Steadfast in various turns of state she stood,
And seal'd her vow'd affection with her blood:
Nor will I meanly tax her constancy,
That interest or obligement made the tie
Bound to the fate of murder'd monarchy.
Before the sounding axe so falls the vine,
Whose tender branches round the poplar twine.
She chose her ruin, and resign'd her life,
In death undaunted as an Indian wife:
A rare example! but some souls we see
Grow hard, and stiffen with adversity:
Yet these by fortune's favours are undone;
Resolved into a baser form they run,
And bore the wind, but cannot bear the sun.
Let this be nature's frailty, or her fate,
Or Isgrim's[13] counsel, her new-chosen mate;
Still she's the fairest of the fallen crew,
No mother more indulgent, but the true.
Fierce to her foes, yet fears her force to try,
Because she wants innate authority;
For how can she constrain them to obey,
Who has herself cast off the lawful sway?
Rebellion equals all, and those who toil
In common theft, will share the common spoil.
Let her produce the title and the right
Against her old superiors first to fight;
If she reform by text, even that's as plain
For her own rebels to reform again.
As long as words a different sense will bear,
And each may be his own interpreter,
Our airy faith will no foundation find:
The word's a weathercock for every wind:
The Bear, the Fox, the Wolf, by turns prevail;
The most in power supplies the present gale.
The wretched Panther cries aloud for aid
To Church and Councils, whom she first betray'd;
No help from Fathers or Tradition's train:
Those ancient guides she taught us to disdain,
And, by that Scripture, which she once abused
To reformation, stands herself accused.
What bills for breach of laws can she prefer,
Expounding which she owns herself may err?
And, after all her winding ways are tried,
If doubts arise, she slips herself aside,
And leaves the private conscience for the guide.
If then that conscience set the offender free,
It bars her claim to Church authority.
How can she censure, or what crime pretend,
But Scripture may be construed to defend?
Even those, whom for rebellion she transmits
To civil power, her doctrine first acquits;
Because no disobedience can ensue,
Where no submission to a judge is due;
Each judging for himself, by her consent,
Whom thus absolved she sends to punishment.
Suppose the magistrate revenge her cause,
'Tis only for transgressing human laws.
How answering to its end a Church is made,
Whose power is but to counsel and persuade?
Oh, solid rock, on which secure she stands!
Eternal house, not built with mortal hands!
Oh, sure defence against the infernal gate,--
A patent during pleasure of the state!
Thus is the Panther neither loved nor fear'd,
A mere mock queen of a divided herd;
Whom soon by lawful power she might control,
Herself a part submitted to the whole.
Then, as the moon who first receives the light
By which she makes our nether regions bright,
So might she shine, reflecting from afar
The rays she borrow'd from a better star;
Big with the beams which from her mother flow,
And reigning o'er the rising tides below:
Now, mixing with a savage crowd, she goes,
And meanly flatters her inveterate foes;
Ruled while she rules, and losing every hour
Her wretched remnants of precarious power.
One evening, while the cooler shade she sought,
Revolving many a melancholy thought,
Alone she walk'd, and look'd around in vain,
With rueful visage, for her vanish'd train:
None of her sylvan subjects made their court;
Lev'es and couch'es pass'd without resort.
So hardly can usurpers manage well
Those whom they first instructed to rebel.
More liberty begets desire of more;
The hunger still increases with the store.
Without respect they brush'd along the wood,
Each in his clan, and, fill'd with loathsome food,
Ask'd no permission to the neighbouring flood.
The Panther, full of inward discontent,
Since they would go, before them wisely went;
Supplying want of power by drinking first,
As if she gave them leave to quench their thirst.
Among the rest, the Hind, with fearful face,
Beheld from far the common watering place,
Nor durst approach; till, with an awful roar,
The sovereign Lion[14] bade her fear no more.
Encouraged thus she brought her younglings nigh,
Watching the motions of her patron's eye,
And drank a sober draught; the rest amazed
Stood mutely still, and on the stranger gazed;
Survey'd her part by part, and sought to find
The ten-horn'd monster in the harmless Hind,
Such as the Wolf and Panther had design'd.
They thought at first they dream'd; for 'twas offence
With them to question certitude of sense,
Their guide in faith: but nearer when they drew,
And had the faultless object full in view,
Lord, how they all admired her heavenly hue!
Some, who before her fellowship disdain'd,
Scarce, and but scarce, from in-born rage restrain'd,
Now frisk'd about her, and old kindred feign'd.
Whether for love or interest, every sect
Of all the savage nation show'd respect.
The viceroy Panther could not awe the herd;
The more the company, the less they fear'd.
The surly Wolf with secret envy burst,
Yet could not howl; (the Hind had seen him first:)
But what he durst not speak the Panther durst.
For when the herd, sufficed, did late repair,
To ferny heaths, and to their forest lair,
She made a mannerly excuse to stay,
Proffering the Hind to wait her half the way:
That, since the sky was clear, an hour of talk
Might help her to beguile the tedious walk.
With much good-will the motion was embraced,
To chat a while on their adventures pass'd:
Nor had the grateful Hind so soon forgot
Her friend and fellow-sufferer in the Plot.
Yet, wondering how of late she grew estranged,
Her forehead cloudy, and her countenance changed,
She thought this hour the occasion would present
To learn her secret cause of discontent,
Which well she hoped might be with ease redress'd,
Considering her a well-bred civil beast,
And more a gentlewoman than the rest.
After some common talk what rumours ran,
The lady of the spotted muff began.
PART II.
Dame, said the Panther, times are mended well,
Since late among the Philistines[15] you fell.
The toils were pitch'd, a spacious tract of ground
With expert huntsmen was encompass'd round;
The enclosure narrow'd; the sagacious power
Of hounds and death drew nearer every hour.
'Tis true, the younger Lion[16] 'scaped the snare,
But all your priestly Calves[17] lay struggling there,
As sacrifices on their altar laid;
While you, their careful mother, wisely fled,
Not trusting destiny to save your head;
For, whate'er promises you have applied
To your unfailing Church, the surer side
Is four fair legs in danger to provide.
And whate'er tales of Peter's chair you tell,
Yet, saving reverence of the miracle,
The better luck was yours to 'scape so well.
As I remember, said the sober Hind,
Those toils were for your own dear self design'd,
As well as me, and with the self-same throw,
To catch the quarry and the vermin too.
(Forgive the slanderous tongues that call'd you so.)
Howe'er you take it now, the common cry
Then ran you down for your rank loyalty.
Besides, in Popery they thought you nursed,
As evil tongues will ever speak the worst,
Because some forms, and ceremonies some
You kept, and stood in the main question dumb.
Dumb you were born indeed; but thinking long
The Test[18] it seems at last has loosed your tongue.
And to explain what your forefathers meant,
By real presence in the sacrament,
After long fencing push'd against the wall.
Your salvo comes, that he's not there at all:
There changed your faith, and what may change may fall.
Who can believe what varies every day,
Nor ever was, nor will be at a stay?
Tortures may force the tongue untruths to tell,
And I ne'er own'd myself infallible,
Replied the Panther: grant such presence were,
Yet in your sense I never own'd it there.
A real virtue we by faith receive,
And that we in the sacrament believe.
Then, said the Hind, as you the matter state,
Not only Jesuits can equivocate;
For real, as you now the word expound,
From solid substance dwindles to a sound.
Methinks an 'sop's fable you repeat;
You know who took the shadow for the meat:
Your Church's substance thus you change at will,
And yet retain your former figure still.
I freely grant you spoke to save your life;
For then you lay beneath the butcher's knife.
Long time you fought, redoubled battery bore,
But, after all, against yourself you swore;
Your former self: for every hour your form
Is chopp'd and changed, like winds before a storm.
Thus fear and interest will prevail with some;
For all have not the gift of martyrdom.
The Panther grinn'd at this, and thus replied:
That men may err was never yet denied.
But, if that common principle be true,
The canon, dame, is levell'd full at you.
But, shunning long disputes, I fain would see
That wondrous wight Infallibility.
Is he from Heaven, this mighty champion, come;
Or lodged below in subterranean Rome?
First, seat him somewhere, and derive his race,
Or else conclude that nothing has no place.
Suppose (though I disown it), said the Hind,
The certain mansion were not yet assign'd;
The doubtful residence no proof can bring
Against the plain existence of the thing.
Because philosophers may disagree
If sight by emission or reception be,
Shall it be thence inferr'd, I do not see?
But you require an answer positive,
Which yet, when I demand, you dare not give;
For fallacies in universals live.
I then affirm that this unfailing guide
In Pope and General Councils must reside;
Both lawful, both combined: what one decrees
By numerous votes, the other ratifies:
On this undoubted sense the Church relies.
'Tis true, some doctors in a scantier space,
I mean, in each apart, contract the place.
Some, who to greater length extend the line,
The Church's after-acceptation join.
This last circumference appears too wide;
The Church diffused is by the Council tied;
As members by their representatives
Obliged to laws which Prince and Senate gives.
Thus some contract, and some enlarge the space:
In Pope and Council, who denies the place,
Assisted from above with God's unfailing grace?
Those canons all the needful points contain;
Their sense so obvious, and their words so plain,
That no disputes about the doubtful text
Have hitherto the labouring world perplex'd.
If any should in after-times appear,
New Councils must be call'd, to make the meaning clear:
Because in them the power supreme resides;
And all the promises are to the guides.
This may be taught with sound and safe defence;
But mark how sandy is your own pretence,
Who, setting Councils, Pope, and Church aside,
Are every man his own presuming guide.
The Sacred Books, you say, are full and plain.
And every needful point of truth contain:
All who can read interpreters may be:
Thus, though your several Churches disagree,
Yet every saint has to himself alone
The secret of this philosophic stone.
These principles your jarring sects unite,
When differing doctors and disciples fight.
Though Luther, Zuinglius, Calvin, holy chiefs,
Have made a battle royal of beliefs;
Or, like wild horses, several ways have whirl'd
The tortured text about the Christian world;
Each Jehu lashing on with furious force,
That Turk or Jew could not have used it worse;
No matter what dissension leaders make,
Where every private man may save a stake:
Ruled by the Scripture and his own advice,
Each has a blind by-path to Paradise;
Where, driving in a circle, slow or fast,
Opposing sects are sure to meet at last.
A wondrous charity you have in store
For all reform'd to pass the narrow door:
So much, that Mahomet had scarcely more.
For he, kind prophet, was for damning none;
But Christ and Moses were to save their own:
Himself was to secure his chosen race,
Though reason good for Turks to take the place,
And he allow'd to be the better man,
In virtue of his holier Alcoran.
True, said the Panther, I shall ne'er deny
My brethren may be saved as well as I:
Though Huguenots condemn our ordination,
Succession, ministerial vocation;
And Luther, more mistaking what he read,
Misjoins the sacred body with the bread:
Yet, lady, still remember, I maintain,
The Word in needful points is only plain.
Needless, or needful, I not now contend,
For still you have a loop-hole for a friend;
Rejoin'd the matron: but the rule you lay
Has led whole flocks, and leads them still astray,
In weighty points, and full damnation's way.
For did not Arius first, Socinus now,
The Son's Eternal Godhead disavow?
And did not these by gospel texts alone
Condemn our doctrine, and maintain their own?
Have not all heretics the same pretence
To plead the Scriptures in their own defence?
How did the Nicene Council then decide
That strong debate? was it by Scripture tried?
No, sure; to that the rebel would not yield;
Squadrons of texts he marshall'd in the field:
That was but civil war, an equal set,
Where piles with piles[19], and eagles eagles met.
With texts point-blank and plain he faced the foe.
And did not Satan tempt our Saviour so?
The good old bishops took a simpler way;
Each ask'd but what he heard his father say,
Or how he was instructed in his youth,
And by tradition's force upheld the truth.
The Panther smiled at this; and when, said she,
Were those first Councils disallow'd by me?
Or where did I at sure Tradition strike,
Provided still it were apostolic?
Friend, said the Hind, you quit your former ground,
Where all your faith you did on Scripture found:
Now 'tis Tradition join'd with Holy Writ;
But thus your memory betrays your wit.
No, said the Panther, for in that I view,
When your tradition's forged, and when 'tis true.
I set them by the rule, and, as they square,
Or deviate from, undoubted doctrine there,
This oral fiction, that old faith declare.
Hind: The Council steer'd, it seems, a different course;
They tried the Scripture by Tradition's force:
But you Tradition by the Scripture try;
Pursued by sects, from this to that you fly,
Nor dare on one foundation to rely.
The Word is then deposed, and in this view,
You rule the Scripture, not the Scripture you.
Thus said the dame, and, smiling, thus pursued:
I see Tradition then is disallow'd,
When not evinced by Scripture to be true,
And Scripture, as interpreted by you.
But here you tread upon unfaithful ground;
Unless you could infallibly expound:
Which you reject as odious Popery,
And throw that doctrine back with scorn on me.
Suppose we on things traditive divide,
And both appeal to Scripture to decide;
By various texts we both uphold our claim,
Nay, often ground our titles on the same:
After long labour lost, and time's expense,
Both grant the words, and quarrel for the sense.
Thus all disputes for ever must depend;
For no dumb rule can controversies end.
Thus, when you said, Tradition must be tried
By Sacred Writ, whose sense yourselves decide,
You said no more, but that yourselves must be
The judges of the Scripture sense, not we.
Against our Church-Tradition you declare,
And yet your clerks would sit in Moses' chair;
At least 'tis proved against your argument,
The rule is far from plain, where all dissent.
If not by Scriptures, how can we be sure,
Replied the Panther, what Tradition's pure?
For you may palm upon us new for old:
All, as they say, that glitters, is not gold.
How but by following her, replied the dame,
To whom derived from sire to son they came;
Where every age does on another move,
And trusts no farther than the next above;
Where all the rounds like Jacob's ladder rise,
The lowest hid in earth, the topmost in the skies.
Sternly the savage did her answer mark,
Her glowing eye-balls glittering in the dark,
And said but this: Since lucre was your trade,
Succeeding times such dreadful gaps have made,
'Tis dangerous climbing: to your sons and you
I leave the ladder, and its omen too.
Hind: The Panther's breath was ever famed for sweet;
But from the Wolf such wishes oft I meet:
You learn'd this language from the Blatant Beast,
Or rather did not speak, but were possess'd.
As for your answer, 'tis but barely urged:
You must evince Tradition to be forged;
Produce plain proofs: unblemish'd authors use
As ancient as those ages they accuse;
'Till when 'tis not sufficient to defame:
An old possession stands, 'till elder quits the claim.
Then for our interest, which is named alone
To load with envy, we retort your own,
For when Traditions in your faces fly,
Resolving not to yield, you must decry.
As when the cause goes hard, the guilty man
Excepts, and thins his jury all he can;
So when you stand of other aid bereft,
You to the Twelve Apostles would be left.
Your friend the Wolf did with more craft provide
To set those toys, Traditions, quite aside;
And Fathers too, unless when, reason spent,
He cites them but sometimes for ornament.
But, madam Panther, you, though more sincere,
Are not so wise as your adulterer:
The private spirit is a better blind,
Than all the dodging tricks your authors find.
For they, who left the Scripture to the crowd,
Each for his own peculiar judge allow'd;
The way to please them was to make them proud.
Thus, with full sails, they ran upon the shelf:
Who could suspect a cozenage from himself?
On his own reason safer 'tis to stand,
Than be deceived and damn'd at second-hand.
But you, who Fathers and Traditions take,
And garble some, and some you quite forsake,
Pretending Church-authority to fix,
And yet some grains of private spirit mix,
Are like a mule, made up of differing seed,
And that's the reason why you never breed;
At least not propagate your kind abroad,
For home dissenters are by statutes awed.
And yet they grow upon you every day,
While you, to speak the best, are at a stay,
For sects, that are extremes, abhor a middle way.
Like tricks of state, to stop a raging flood,
Or mollify a mad-brain'd senate's mood:
Of all expedients never one was good.
Well may they argue, nor can you deny,
If we must fix on Church authority,
Best on the best, the fountain, not the flood;
That must be better still, if this be good.
Shall she command who has herself rebell'd?
Is Antichrist by Antichrist expell'd?
Did we a lawful tyranny displace,
To set aloft a bastard of the race?
Why all these wars to win the Book, if we
Must not interpret for ourselves, but she?
Either be wholly slaves, or wholly free.
For purging fires Traditions must not fight;
But they must prove Episcopacy's right.
Thus those led horses are from service freed;
You never mount them but in time of need.
Like mercenaries, hired for home defence,
They will not serve against their native prince.
Against domestic foes of hierarchy
These are drawn forth, to make fanatics fly;
But, when they see their countrymen at hand,
Marching against them under Church-command,
Straight they forsake their colours, and disband.
Thus she, nor could the Panther well enlarge
With weak defence against so strong a charge;
But said: For what did Christ his Word provide,
If still his Church must want a living guide?
And if all saving doctrines are not there,
Or sacred penmen could not make them clear,
From after ages we should hope in vain
For truths, which men inspired could not explain.
Before the Word was written, said the Hind,
Our Saviour preach'd his faith to human kind:
From his apostles the first age received
Eternal truth, and what they taught believed.
Thus by Tradition faith was planted first;
Succeeding flocks succeeding pastors nursed.
This was the way our wise Redeemer chose
(Who sure could all things for the best dispose),
To fence his fold from their encroaching foes.
He could have writ himself, but well foresaw
The event would be like that of Moses' law;
Some difference would arise, some doubts remain,
Like those which yet the jarring Jews maintain.
No written laws can be so plain, so pure,
But wit may gloss, and malice may obscure;
Not those indited by his first command,
A prophet graved the text, an angel held his hand.
Thus faith was ere the written word appear'd,
And men believed not what they read, but heard.
But since the apostles could not be confined
To these, or those, but severally design'd
Their large commission round the world to blow,
To spread their faith, they spread their labours too.
Yet still their absent flock their pains did share;
They hearken'd still, for love produces care,
And, as mistakes arose, or discords fell,
Or bold seducers taught them to rebel,
As charity grew cold, or faction hot,
Or long neglect their lessons had forgot,
For all their wants they wisely did provide,
And preaching by epistles was supplied:
So great physicians cannot all attend,
But some they visit, and to some they send.
Yet all those letters were not writ to all;
Nor first intended but occasional,
Their absent sermons; nor if they contain
All needful doctrines, are those doctrines plain.
Clearness by frequent preaching must be wrought:
They writ but seldom, but they daily taught.
And what one saint has said of holy Paul,
"He darkly writ," is true, applied to all.
For this obscurity could Heaven provide
More prudently than by a living guide,
As doubts arose, the difference to decide?
A guide was therefore needful, therefore made;
And, if appointed, sure to be obey'd.
Thus, with due reverence to the Apostle's writ,
By which my sons are taught, to which submit;
I think those truths their sacred works contain,
The Church alone can certainly explain;
That following ages, leaning on the past,
May rest upon the Primitive at last.
Nor would I thence the Word no rule infer,
But none without the Church-interpreter.
Because, as I have urged before, 'tis mute,
And is itself the subject of dispute.
But what the Apostles their successors taught,
They to the next, from them to us is brought,
The undoubted sense which is in Scripture sought.
From hence the Church is arm'd, when errors rise,
To stop their entrance, and prevent surprise;
And, safe entrench'd within, her foes without defies.
By these all festering sores her Councils heal,
Which time or has disclosed, or shall reveal;
For discord cannot end without a last appeal.
Nor can a Council national decide,
But with subordination to her guide;
(I wish the cause were on that issue tried.)
Much less the Scripture; for suppose debate
Betwixt pretenders to a fair estate,
Bequeath'd by some legator's last intent;
(Such is our dying Saviour's Testament:)
The will is proved, is open'd, and is read;
The doubtful heirs their differing titles plead:
All vouch the words their interest to maintain,
And each pretends by those his cause is plain.
Shall then the Testament award the right?
No, that's the Hungary for which they fight;
The field of battle, subject of debate;
The thing contended for, the fair estate.
The sense is intricate, 'tis only clear
What vowels and what consonants are there.
Therefore 'tis plain, its meaning must be tried
Before some judge appointed to decide.
Suppose, the fair apostate said, I grant,
The faithful flock some living guide should want,
Your arguments an endless chase pursue;
Produce this vaunted leader to our view,
This mighty Moses of the chosen crew.
The dame, who saw her fainting foe retired,
With force renew'd, to victory aspired;
And, looking upward to her kindred sky,
As once our Saviour own'd his Deity,
Pronounced his words:--"She whom ye seek am I,"
Nor less amazed this voice the Panther heard,
Than were those Jews to hear a God declared.
Then thus the matron modestly renew'd:
Let all your prophets and their sects be view'd,
And see to which of them yourselves think fit
The conduct of your conscience to submit:
Each proselyte would vote his doctor best,
With absolute exclusion to the rest:
Thus would your Polish diet disagree,
And end, as it began, in anarchy:
Yourself the fairest for election stand,
Because you seem crown-general of the land:
But soon against your superstitious lawn
Some Presbyterian sabre would be drawn:
In your establish'd laws of sovereignty
The rest some fundamental flaw would see,
And call rebellion gospel-liberty.
To Church-decrees your articles require
Submission modified, if not entire.
Homage denied, to censures you proceed:
But when Curtana[20] will not do the deed.
You lay that pointless clergy-weapon by,
And to the laws, your sword of justice, fly.
Now this your sects the more unkindly take
(Those prying varlets hit the blots you make),
Because some ancient friends of yours declare,
Your only rule of faith the Scriptures are,
Interpreted by men of judgment sound,
Which every sect will for themselves expound;
Nor think less reverence to their doctors due
For sound interpretation, than to you.
If then, by able heads, are understood
Your brother prophets, who reform'd abroad;
Those able heads expound a wiser way,
That their own sheep their shepherd should obey.
But if you mean yourselves are only sound,
That doctrine turns the Reformation round,
And all the rest are false reformers found;
Because in sundry points you stand alone,
Not in communion join'd with any one;
And therefore must be all the Church, or none.
Then, till you have agreed whose judge is best,
Against this forced submission they protest:
While sound and sound a different sense explains,
Both play at hardhead till they break their brains;
And from their chairs each other's force defy,
While unregarded thunders vainly fly.
I pass the rest, because your Church alone
Of all usurpers best could fill the throne.
But neither you, nor any sect beside,
For this high office can be qualified,
With necessary gifts required in such a guide.
For that which must direct the whole must be
Bound in one bond of faith and unity:
But all your several Churches disagree.
The consubstantiating Church and priest
Refuse communion to the Calvinist:
The French reform'd from preaching you restrain,
Because you judge their ordination vain;
And so they judge of yours, but donors must ordain.
In short, in doctrine, or in discipline,
Not one reform'd can with another join:
But all from each, as from damnation, fly;
No union they pretend, but in Non-Popery.
Nor, should their members in a Synod meet,
Could any Church presume to mount the seat,
Above the rest, their discords to decide;
None would obey, but each would be the guide:
And face to face dissensions would increase;
For only distance now preserves the peace.
All in their turns accusers, and accused:
Babel was never half so much confused:
What one can plead, the rest can plead as well;
For amongst equals lies no last appeal,
And all confess themselves are fallible.
Now since you grant some necessary guide,
All who can err are justly laid aside:
Because a trust so sacred to confer
Shows want of such a sure interpreter;
And how can he be needful who can err?
Then, granting that unerring guide we want,
That such there is you stand obliged to grant:
Our Saviour else were wanting to supply
Our needs, and obviate that necessity.
It then remains, the Church can only be
The guide, which owns unfailing certainty;
Or else you slip your hold, and change your side,
Relapsing from a necessary guide.
But this annex'd condition of the crown,
Immunity from errors, you disown;
Here then you shrink, and lay your weak pretensions down.
For petty royalties you raise debate;
But this unfailing universal state
You shun; nor dare succeed to such a glorious weight;
And for that cause those promises detest
With which our Saviour did his Church invest;
But strive to evade, and fear to find them true,
As conscious they were never meant to you:
All which the Mother Church asserts her own,
And with unrivall'd claim ascends the throne.
So, when of old the Almighty Father sate
In council, to redeem our ruin'd state,
Millions of millions, at a distance round,
Silent the sacred consistory crown'd,
To hear what mercy, mix'd with justice, could propound:
All prompt, with eager pity, to fulfil
The full extent of their Creator's will.
But when the stern conditions were declared,
A mournful whisper through the host was heard,
And the whole hierarchy, with heads hung down,
Submissively declined the ponderous proffer'd crown.
Then, not till then, the Eternal Son from high
Rose in the strength of all the Deity:
Stood forth to accept the terms, and underwent
A weight which all the frame of heaven had bent.
Nor he himself could bear, but as Omnipotent.
Now, to remove the least remaining doubt,
That even the blear-eyed sects may find her out,
Behold what heavenly rays adorn her brows,
What from his wardrobe her beloved allows
To deck the wedding-day of his unspotted spouse.
Behold what marks of majesty she brings;
Richer than ancient heirs of eastern kings!
Her right hand holds the sceptre and the keys,
To show whom she commands, and who obeys:
With these to bind, or set the sinner free,
With that to assert spiritual royalty.
One in herself, not rent by schism,[21] but sound,
Entire, one solid shining diamond;
Not sparkles shatter'd into sects like you:
One is the Church, and must be to be true:
One central principle of unity.
As undivided, so from errors free,
As one in faith, so one in sanctity.
Thus she, and none but she, the insulting rage
Of heretics opposed from age to age:
Still when the giant-brood invades her throne,
She stoops from heaven, and meets them half way down,
And with paternal thunder vindicates her crown.
But like Egyptian sorcerers you stand,
And vainly lift aloft your magic wand,
To sweep away the swarms of vermin from the land:
You could like them, with like infernal force,
Produce the plague, but not arrest the course.
But when the boils and blotches, with disgrace
And public scandal, sat upon the face,
Themselves attack'd, the Magi strove no more,
They saw God's finger, and their fate deplore;
Themselves they could not cure of the dishonest sore.
Thus one, thus pure, behold her largely spread,
Like the fair ocean from her mother-bed;
From east to west triumphantly she rides,
All shores are water'd by her wealthy tides.
The Gospel-sound, diffused from pole to pole,
Where winds can carry, and where waves can roll,
The self-same doctrine of the sacred page
Convey'd to every clime, in every age.
Here let my sorrow give my satire place,
To raise new blushes on my British race;
Our sailing-ships like common sewers we use,
And through our distant colonies diffuse
The draught of dungeons, and the stench of stews,
Whom, when their home-bred honesty is lost,
We disembogue on some far Indian coast:
Thieves, panders, paillards,[22] sins of every sort;
Those are the manufactures we export;
And these the missioners our zeal has made:
For, with my country's pardon be it said,
Religion is the least of all our trade.
Yet some improve their traffic more than we;
For they on gain, their only god, rely,
And set a public price on piety.
Industrious of the needle and the chart,
They run full sail to their Japonian mart;
Prevention fear, and, prodigal of fame,
Sell all of Christian,[23] to the very name;
Nor leave enough of that, to hide their naked shame.
Thus, of three marks, which in the Creed we view,
Not one of all can be applied to you:
Much less the fourth; in vain, alas! you seek
The ambitious title of Apostolic:
God-like descent! 'tis well your blood can be
Proved noble in the third or fourth degree:
For all of ancient that you had before,
(I mean what is not borrow'd from our store)
Was error fulminated o'er and o'er;
Old heresies condemn'd in ages past,
By care and time recover'd from the blast.
'Tis said with ease, but never can be proved,
The Church her old foundations has removed,
And built new doctrines on unstable sands:
Judge that, ye winds and rains: you proved her, yet she stands.
Those ancient doctrines charged on her for new,
Show when and how, and from what hands they grew.
We claim no power, when heresies grow bold,
To coin new faith, but still declare the old.
How else could that obscene disease be purged,
When controverted texts are vainly urged?
To prove tradition new, there's somewhat more
Required, than saying, 'twas not used before.
Those monumental arms are never stirr'd,
Till schism or heresy call down Goliah's sword.
Thus, what you call corruptions, are, in truth,
The first plantations of the Gospel's youth;
Old standard faith: but cast your eyes again,
And view those errors which new sects maintain,
Or which of old disturb'd the Church's peaceful reign;
And we can point each period of the time,
When they began, and who begot the crime;
Can calculate how long the eclipse endured,
Who interposed, what digits were obscured:
Of all which are already pass'd away,
We know the rise, the progress, and decay.
Despair at our foundations then to strike,
Till you can prove your faith Apostolic;
A limpid stream drawn from the native source;
Succession lawful in a lineal course.
Prove any Church, opposed to this our head,
So one, so pure, so unconfinedly spread,
Under one chief of the spiritual state,
The members all combined, and all subordinate.
Show such a seamless coat, from schism so free,
In no communion join'd with heresy.
If such a one you find, let truth prevail:
Till when your weights will in the balance fail:
A Church unprincipled kicks up the scale.
But if you cannot think (nor sure you can
Suppose in God what were unjust in man)
That He, the fountain of eternal grace,
Should suffer falsehood, for so long a space,
To banish truth, and to usurp her place:
That seven successive ages should be lost,
And preach damnation at their proper cost;
That all your erring ancestors should die,
Drown'd in the abyss of deep idolatry:
If piety forbid such thoughts to rise,
Awake, and open your unwilling eyes:
God hath left nothing for each age undone,
From this to that wherein he sent his Son:
Then think but well of him, and half your work is done.
See how his Church, adorn'd with every grace,
With open arms, a kind forgiving face,
Stands ready to prevent her long-lost son's embrace.
Not more did Joseph o'er his brethren weep,
Nor less himself could from discovery keep,
When in the crowd of suppliants they were seen,
And in their crew his best-loved Benjamin.
That pious Joseph in the Church behold,
To feed your famine,[24] and refuse your gold:
The Joseph you exiled, the Joseph whom you sold.
Thus, while with heavenly charity she spoke,
A streaming blaze the silent shadows broke;
Shot from the skies; a cheerful azure light:
The birds obscene to forests wing'd their flight,
And gaping graves received the wandering guilty sprite.
Such were the pleasing triumphs of the sky,
For James his late nocturnal victory;
The pledge of his Almighty Patron's love,
The fireworks which his angels made above.
I saw myself the lambent easy light
Gild the brown horror, and dispel the night:
The messenger with speed the tidings bore;
News, which three labouring nations did restore;
But Heaven's own Nuntius was arrived before.
By this, the Hind had reach'd her lonely cell,
And vapours rose, and dews unwholesome fell.
When she, by frequent observation wise,
As one who long on heaven had fix'd her eyes,
Discern'd a change of weather in the skies;
The western borders were with crimson spread,
The moon descending look'd all flaming red;
She thought good manners bound her to invite
The stranger dame to be her guest that night.
'Tis true, coarse diet, and a short repast,
(She said) were weak inducements to the taste
Of one so nicely bred, and so unused to fast:
But what plain fare her cottage could afford,
A hearty welcome at a homely board,
Was freely hers; and, to supply the rest,
An honest meaning, and an open breast:
Last, with content of mind, the poor man's wealth,
A grace-cup to their common patron's health.
This she desired her to accept, and stay
For fear she might be wilder'd in her way,
Because she wanted an unerring guide;
And then the dew-drops on her silken hide
Her tender constitution did declare,
Too lady-like a long fatigue to bear,
And rough inclemencies of raw nocturnal air.
But most she fear'd that, travelling so late,
Some evil-minded beasts might lie in wait,
And, without witness, wreak their hidden hate.
The Panther, though she lent a listening ear,
Had more of lion in her than to fear:
Yet, wisely weighing, since she had to deal
With many foes, their numbers might prevail,
Return'd her all the thanks she could afford,
And took her friendly hostess at her word:
Who, entering first her lowly roof, a shed
With hoary moss, and winding ivy spread,
Honest enough to hide an humble hermit's head,
Thus graciously bespoke her welcome guest:
So might these walls, with your fair presence blest,
Become your dwelling-place of everlasting rest;
Not for a night, or quick revolving year;
Welcome an owner, not a sojourner.
This peaceful seat my poverty secures;
War seldom enters but where wealth allures:
Nor yet despise it; for this poor abode
Has oft received, and yet receives a God;
A God victorious of the Stygian race
Here laid his sacred limbs, and sanctified the place,
This mean retreat did mighty Pan contain:
Be emulous of him, and pomp disdain,
And dare not to debase your soul to gain.
The silent stranger stood amazed to see
Contempt of wealth, and wilful poverty:
And, though ill habits are not soon controll'd,
A while suspended her desire of gold.
But civilly drew in her sharpen'd paws,
Not violating hospitable laws;
And pacified her tail, and lick'd her frothy jaws.
The Hind did first her country cates provide;
Then couch'd herself securely by her side.
* * * * *
FOOTNOTES:
PART III.
Much malice, mingled with a little wit,
Perhaps may censure this mysterious writ:
Because the Muse has peopled Caledon
With Panthers, Bears, and Wolves, and beasts unknown,
As if we were not stock'd with monsters of our own.
Let 'sop answer, who has set to view
Such kinds as Greece and Phrygia never knew;
And mother Hubbard,[25] in her homely dress,
Has sharply blamed a British Lioness;
That queen, whose feast the factious rabble keep,
Exposed obscenely naked and asleep.
Led by those great examples, may not I
The wanted organs of their words supply?
If men transact like brutes, 'tis equal then
For brutes to claim the privilege of men.
Others our Hind of folly will indite,
To entertain a dangerous guest by night.
Let those remember, that she cannot die
Till rolling time is lost in round eternity;
Nor need she fear the Panther, though untamed,
Because the Lion's peace[26] was now proclaim'd:
The wary savage would not give offence,
To forfeit the protection of her prince;
But watch'd the time her vengeance to complete,
When all her furry sons in frequent senate met;
Meanwhile she quench'd her fury at the flood,
And with a lenten salad cool'd her blood.
Their commons, though but coarse, were nothing scant,
Nor did their minds an equal banquet want.
For now the Hind, whose noble nature strove
To express her plain simplicity of love,
Did all the honours of her house so well,
No sharp debates disturb'd the friendly meal.
She turn'd the talk, avoiding that extreme,
To common dangers past, a sadly-pleasing theme;
Remembering every storm which toss'd the state,
When both were objects of the public hate,
And dropp'd a tear betwixt for her own children's fate.
Nor fail'd she then a full review to make
Of what the Panther suffer'd for her sake:
Her lost esteem, her truth, her loyal care,
Her faith unshaken to an exiled heir,[27]
Her strength to endure, her courage to defy;
Her choice of honourable infamy.
On these, prolixly thankful, she enlarged;
Then with acknowledgment herself she charged;
For friendship, of itself an holy tie,
Is made more sacred by adversity.
Now should they part, malicious tongues would say,
They met like chance companions on the way,
Whom mutual fear of robbers had possess'd;
While danger lasted, kindness was profess'd;
But that once o'er, the short-lived union ends;
The road divides, and there divide the friends.
The Panther nodded when her speech was done,
And thank'd her coldly in a hollow tone:
But said her gratitude had gone too far
For common offices of Christian care.
If to the lawful heir she had been true,
She paid but C'sar what was C'sar's due.
I might, she added, with like praise describe
Your suffering sons, and so return your bribe:
But incense from my hands is poorly prized;
For gifts are scorn'd where givers are despised.
I served a turn, and then was cast away;
You, like the gaudy fly, your wings display,
And sip the sweets, and bask in your great patron's day.
This heard, the matron was not slow to find
What sort of malady had seized her mind:
Disdain, with gnawing envy, fell despite,
And canker'd malice stood in open sight:
Ambition, interest, pride without control,
And jealousy, the jaundice of the soul;
Revenge, the bloody minister of ill,
With all the lean tormentors of the will.
'Twas easy now to guess from whence arose
Her new-made union with her ancient foes,
Her forced civilities, her faint embrace,
Affected kindness with an alter'd face:
Yet durst she not too deeply probe the wound,
As hoping still the nobler parts were sound:
But strove with anodynes to assuage the smart,
And mildly thus her medicine did impart.
Complaints of lovers help to ease their pain;
It shows a rest of kindness to complain;
A friendship loath to quit its former hold;
And conscious merit may be justly bold.
But much more just your jealousy would show,
If others' good were injury to you:
Witness, ye heavens, how I rejoice to see
Rewarded worth and rising loyalty!
Your warrior offspring that upheld the crown.
The scarlet honour of your peaceful gown,
Are the most pleasing objects I can find,
Charms to my sight, and cordials to my mind:
When virtue spooms before a prosperous gale,
My heaving wishes help to fill the sail;
And if my prayers for all the brave were heard,
C'sar should still have such, and such should still reward.
The labour'd earth your pains have sow'd and till'd;
'Tis just you reap the product of the field:
Yours be the harvest, 'tis the beggar's gain
To glean the fallings of the loaded wain.
Such scatter'd ears as are not worth your care,
Your charity, for alms, may safely spare,
For alms are but the vehicles of prayer.
My daily bread is literally implored;
I have no barns nor granaries to hoard.
If C'sar to his own his hand extends,
Say which of yours his charity offends:
You know he largely gives to more than are his friends.
Are you defrauded when he feeds the poor?
Our mite decreases nothing of your store.
I am but few, and by your fare you see
My crying sins are not of luxury.
Some juster motive sure your mind withdraws,
And makes you break our friendship's holy laws;
For barefaced envy is too base a cause.
Show more occasion for your discontent;
Your love, the Wolf, would help you to invent:
Some German quarrel, or, as times go now,
Some French, where force is uppermost, will do.
When at the fountain's head, as merit ought
To claim the place, you take a swilling draught,
How easy 'tis an envious eye to throw,
And tax the sheep for troubling streams below;
Or call her (when no farther cause you find)
An enemy possess'd of all your kind!
But then, perhaps, the wicked world would think,
The Wolf design'd to eat as well as drink.
This last allusion gall'd the Panther more,
Because indeed it rubb'd upon the sore.
Yet seem'd she not to wince, though shrewdly pain'd:
But thus her passive character maintain'd.
I never grudged, whate'er my foes report,
Your flaunting fortune in the Lion's court.
You have your day, or you are much belied,
But I am always on the suffering side:
You know my doctrine, and I need not say,
I will not, but I cannot disobey.
On this firm principle I ever stood;
He of my sons who fails to make it good,
By one rebellious act renounces to my blood.
Ah, said the Hind, how many sons have you,
Who call you mother, whom you never knew!
But most of them who that relation plead,
Are such ungracious youths as wish you dead.
They gape at rich revenues which you hold,
And fain would nibble at your grandame Gold;
Inquire into your years, and laugh to find
Your crazy temper shows you much declined.
Were you not dim and doted, you might see
A pack of cheats that claim a pedigree,
No more of kin to you, than you to me.
Do you not know, that for a little coin,
Heralds can foist a name into the line?
They ask you blessing but for what you have;
But once possess'd of what with care you save,
The wanton boys would piss upon your grave.
Your sons of latitude that court your grace,
Though most resembling you in form and face.
Are far the worst of your pretended race.
And, but I blush your honesty to blot,
Pray God you prove them lawfully begot:
For in some Popish libels I have read,
The Wolf has been too busy in your bed;
At least her hinder parts, the belly-piece,
The paunch, and all that Scorpio claims, are his.
Their malice too a sore suspicion brings;
For though they dare not bark, they snarl at kings:
Nor blame them for intruding in your line;
Fat bishoprics are still of right divine.
Think you your new French proselytes[28] are come
To starve abroad, because they starved at home?
Your benefices twinkled from afar;
They found the new Messiah by the star:
Those Swisses fight on any side for pay,
And 'tis the living that conforms, not they.
Mark with what management their tribes divide,
Some stick to you, and some to the other side,
That many churches may for many mouths provide.
More vacant pulpits would more converts make;
All would have latitude enough to take:
The rest unbeneficed your sects maintain;
For ordinations without cures are vain,
And chamber practice is a silent gain.
Your sons of breadth at home are much like these;
Their soft and yielding metals run with ease:
They melt, and take the figure of the mould;
But harden and preserve it best in gold.
Your Delphic sword, the Panther then replied,
Is double-edged, and cuts on either side.
Some sons of mine, who bear upon their shield
Three steeples argent in a sable field,
Have sharply tax'd your converts, who unfed
Have follow'd you for miracles of bread;
Such who themselves of no religion are,
Allured with gain, for any will declare.
Bare lies with bold assertions they can face;
But dint of argument is out of place.
The grim logician puts them in a fright;
'Tis easier far to flourish than to fight.
Thus our eighth Henry's marriage they defame;
They say the schism of beds began the game,
Divorcing from the Church to wed the dame:
Though largely proved, and by himself profess'd,
That conscience, conscience would not let him rest:
I mean, not till possess'd of her he loved,
And old, uncharming Catherine was removed.
For sundry years before he did complain,
And told his ghostly confessor his pain.
With the same impudence without a ground,
They say, that look the Reformation round,
No Treatise of Humility is found.
But if none were, the gospel does not want;
Our Saviour preach'd it, and I hope you grant,
The Sermon on the Mount was Protestant.
No doubt, replied the Hind, as sure as all
The writings of Saint Peter and Saint Paul:
On that decision let it stand or fall.
Now for my converts, who, you say, unfed,
Have follow'd me for miracles of bread;
Judge not by hearsay, but observe at least,
If since their change their loaves have been increased.
The Lion buys no converts; if he did,
Beasts would be sold as fast as he could bid.
Tax those of interest who conform for gain,
Or stay the market of another reign:
Your broad-way sons would never be too nice
To close with Calvin, if he paid their price;
But, raised three steeples higher, would change their note,
And quit the cassock for the canting-coat.
Now, if you damn this censure, as too bold,
Judge by yourselves, and think not others sold.
Meantime my sons, accused by fame's report,
Pay small attendance at the Lion's court,
Nor rise with early crowds, nor flatter late;
For silently they beg who daily wait.
Preferment is bestow'd, that comes unsought;
Attendance is a bribe, and then 'tis bought.
How they should speed, their fortune is untried;
For not to ask, is not to be denied.
For what they have, their God and king they bless,
And hope they should not murmur, had they less.
But if reduced, subsistence to implore,
In common prudence they should pass your door.
Unpitied Hudibras,[29] your champion friend,
Has shown how far your charities extend.
This lasting verse shall on his tomb be read,
"He shamed you living, and upbraids you dead."
With odious atheist names[30] you load your foes;
Your liberal clergy why did I expose?
It never fails in charities like those.
In climes where true religion is profess'd,
That imputation were no laughing jest.
But imprimatur,[31] with a chaplain's name,
Is here sufficient licence to defame.
What wonder is't that black detraction thrives?
The homicide of names is less than lives;
And yet the perjured murderer survives.
This said, she paused a little, and suppress'd
The boiling indignation of her breast.
She knew the virtue of her blade, nor would
Pollute her satire with ignoble blood:
Her panting foe she saw before her eye,
And back she drew the shining weapon dry.
So when the generous Lion has in sight
His equal match, he rouses for the fight;
But when his foe lies prostrate on the plain,
He sheaths his paws, uncurls his angry mane,
And, pleased with bloodless honours of the day,
Walks over and disdains the inglorious prey.
So James, if great with less we may compare,
Arrests his rolling thunderbolts in air!
And grants ungrateful friends a lengthen'd space,
To implore the remnants of long-suffering grace.
This breathing-time the matron took; and then
Resumed the thread of her discourse again.
Be vengeance wholly left to powers divine,
And let Heaven judge betwixt your sons and mine:
If joys hereafter must be purchased here
With loss of all that mortals hold so dear,
Then welcome infamy and public shame,
And, last, a long farewell to worldly fame.
'Tis said with ease, but, oh, how hardly tried
By haughty souls to human honour tied!
O sharp convulsive pangs of agonizing pride!
Down then, thou rebel, never more to rise,
And what thou didst, and dost, so dearly prize,
That fame, that darling fame, make that thy sacrifice.
'Tis nothing thou hast given, then add thy tears
For a long race of unrepenting years:
'Tis nothing yet, yet all thou hast to give:
Then add those may-be years thou hast to live:
Yet nothing still; then poor, and naked come:
Thy father will receive his unthrift home,
And thy blest Saviour's blood discharge the mighty sum.
Thus (she pursued) I discipline a son,
Whose uncheck'd fury to revenge would run:
He champs the bit, impatient of his loss,
And starts aside, and flounders at the Cross.
Instruct him better, gracious God, to know,
As thine is vengeance, so forgiveness too:
That, suffering from ill tongues, he bears no more
Than what his sovereign bears, and what his Saviour bore.
It now remains for you to school your child,
And ask why God's anointed he reviled;
A king and princess dead! did Shimei worse?
The cursor's punishment should fright the curse:
Your son was warn'd, and wisely gave it o'er,
But he who counsell'd him has paid the score:
The heavy malice could no higher tend,
But woe to him on whom the weights descend.
So to permitted ills the Demon flies;
His rage is aim'd at him who rules the skies:
Constrain'd to quit his cause, no succour found,
The foe discharges every tire around,
In clouds of smoke abandoning the fight;
But his own thundering peals proclaim his flight.
In Henry's change his charge as ill succeeds;
To that long story little answer needs:
Confront but Henry's words with Henry's deeds.
Were space allow'd, with ease it might be proved,
What springs his blessed Reformation moved.
The dire effects appear'd in open sight,
Which from the cause he calls a distant flight,
And yet no larger leap than from the sun to light.
Now let your sons a double p'an sound,
A Treatise of Humility is found.
'Tis found, but better it had ne'er been sought,
Than thus in Protestant procession brought.
The famed original through Spain is known,
Rodriguez' work, my celebrated son,
Which yours, by ill-translating, made his own;
Conceal'd its author, and usurp'd the name,
The basest and ignoblest theft of fame.
My altars kindled first that living coal;
Restore, or practice better, what you stole:
That virtue could this humble verse inspire,
'Tis all the restitution I require.
Glad was the Panther that the charge was closed,
And none of all her favourite sons exposed.
For laws of arms permit each injured man,
To make himself a saver where he can.
Perhaps the plunder'd merchant cannot tell
The names of pirates in whose hands he fell;
But at the den of thieves he justly flies,
And every Algerine is lawful prize.
No private person in the foe's estate
Can plead exemption from the public fate.
Yet Christian laws allow not such redress;
Then let the greater supersede the less.
But let the abettors of the Panther's crime
Learn to make fairer wars another time.
Some characters may sure be found to write
Among her sons; for 'tis no common sight,
A spotted dam, and all her offspring white.
The savage, though she saw her plea controll'd,
Yet would not wholly seem to quit her hold,
But offer'd fairly to compound the strife,
And judge conversion by the convert's life.
'Tis true, she said, I think it somewhat strange,
So few should follow profitable change:
For present joys are more to flesh and blood,
Than a dull prospect of a distant good.
'Twas well alluded by a son of mine
(I hope to quote him is not to purloin),
Two magnets, heaven and earth, allure to bliss;
The larger loadstone that, the nearer this:
The weak attraction of the greater fails;
We nod a while, but neighbourhood prevails:
But when the greater proves the nearer too,
I wonder more your converts come so slow.
Methinks in those who firm with me remain,
It shows a nobler principle than gain.
Your inference would be strong, the Hind replied,
If yours were in effect the suffering side:
Your clergy's sons their own in peace possess,
Nor are their prospects in reversion less.
My proselytes are struck with awful dread;
Your bloody comet-laws hang blazing o'er their head;
The respite they enjoy but only lent,
The best they have to hope, protracted punishment.
Be judge yourself, if interest may prevail,
Which motives, yours or mine, will turn the scale.
While pride and pomp allure, and plenteous ease,
That is, till man's predominant passions cease,
Admire no longer at my slow increase.
By education most have been misled;
So they believe, because they so were bred.
The priest continues what the nurse began,
And thus the child imposes on the man.
The rest I named before, nor need repeat:
But interest is the most prevailing cheat,
The sly seducer both of age and youth;
They study that, and think they study truth.
When interest fortifies an argument,
Weak reason serves to gain the will's assent;
For souls, already warp'd, receive an easy bent.
Add long prescription of establish'd laws,
And pique of honour to maintain a cause,
And shame of change, and fear of future ill,
And zeal, the blind conductor of the will;
And chief among the still-mistaking crowd,
The fame of teachers obstinate and proud,
And, more than all, the private judge allow'd;
Disdain of Fathers which the dance began,
And last, uncertain whose the narrower span,
The clown unread, and half-read gentleman.
To this the Panther, with a scornful smile:
Yet still you travel with unwearied toil,
And range around the realm without control,
Among my sons for proselytes to prowl,
And here and there you snap some silly soul.
You hinted fears of future change in state;
Pray heaven you did not prophesy your fate!
Perhaps you think your time of triumph near,
But may mistake the season of the year;
The Swallow's[32] fortune gives you cause to fear.
For charity, replied the matron, tell
What sad mischance those pretty birds befell.
Nay, no mischance, the savage dame replied,
But want of wit in their unerring guide,
And eager haste, and gaudy hopes, and giddy pride.
Yet, wishing timely warning may prevail,
Make you the moral, and I'll tell the tale.
The Swallow, privileged above the rest
Of all the birds, as man's familiar guest,
Pursues the sun in summer, brisk and bold,
But wisely shuns the persecuting cold:
Is well to chancels and to chimneys known,
Though 'tis not thought she feeds on smoke alone.
From hence she has been held of heavenly line,
Endued with particles of soul divine.
This merry chorister had long possess'd
Her summer seat, and feather'd well her nest:
Till frowning skies began to change their cheer,
And time turn'd up the wrong side of the year;
The shedding trees began the ground to strow
With yellow leaves, and bitter blasts to blow.
Sad auguries of winter thence she drew,
Which by instinct, or prophecy, she knew:
When prudence warn'd her to remove betimes,
And seek a better heaven, and warmer climes.
Her sons were summon'd on a steeple's height,
And, call'd in common council, vote a flight;
The day was named, the next that should be fair:
All to the general rendezvous repair,
They try their fluttering wings, and trust themselves in air.
But whether upward to the moon they go,
Or dream the winter out in caves below,
Or hawk at flies elsewhere, concerns us not to know.
Southwards, you may be sure, they bent their flight,
And harbour'd in a hollow rock at night:
Next morn they rose, and set up every sail;
The wind was fair, but blew a mackerel gale:
The sickly young sat shivering on the shore,
Abhorr'd salt water never seen before,
And pray'd their tender mothers to delay
The passage, and expect a fairer day.
With these the Martin readily concurr'd,
A church-begot, and church-believing bird;
Of little body, but of lofty mind,
Round-bellied, for a dignity design'd,
And much a dunce, as Martins are by kind.
Yet often quoted Canon-laws, and Code,
And Fathers which he never understood;
But little learning needs in noble blood.
For, sooth to say, the Swallow brought him in,
Her household chaplain, and her next of kin:
In superstition silly to excess,
And casting schemes by planetary guess:
In fine, short-wing'd, unfit himself to fly,
His fears foretold foul weather in the sky.
Besides, a Raven from a wither'd oak,
Left of their lodging, was observed to croak.
That omen liked him not; so his advice
Was present safety, bought at any price;
A seeming pious care, that cover'd cowardice.
To strengthen this, he told a boding dream
Of rising waters, and a troubled stream,
Sure signs of anguish, dangers, and distress,
With something more, not lawful to express:
By which he slily seem'd to intimate
Some secret revelation of their fate.
For he concluded, once upon a time,
He found a leaf inscribed with sacred rhyme,
Whose antique characters did well denote
The Sibyl's hand of the Cum'an grot:
The mad divineress had plainly writ,
A time should come (but many ages yet),
In which, sinister destinies ordain,
A dame should drown with all her feather'd train,
And seas from thence be call'd the Chelidonian main.
At this, some shook for fear, the more devout
Arose, and bless'd themselves from head to foot.
'Tis true, some stagers of the wiser sort
Made all these idle wonderments their sport:
They said, their only danger was delay,
And he, who heard what every fool could say,
Would never fix his thought, but trim his time away.
The passage yet was good; the wind, 'tis true,
Was somewhat high, but that was nothing new,
No more than usual equinoxes blew.
The sun, already from the Scales declined,
Gave little hopes of better days behind,
But change, from bad to worse, of weather and of wind.
Nor need they fear the dampness of the sky
Should flag their wings, and hinder them to fly
'Twas only water thrown on sails too dry.
But, least of all, philosophy presumes
Of truth in dreams, from melancholy fumes:
Perhaps the Martin, housed in holy ground,
Might think of ghosts that walk their midnight round,
Till grosser atoms, tumbling in the stream
Of fancy, madly met, and clubb'd into a dream:
As little weight his vain presages bear,
Of ill effect to such alone who fear:
Most prophecies are of a piece with these,
Each Nostradamus can foretell with ease:
Not naming persons, and confounding times,
One casual truth supports a thousand lying rhymes.
The advice was true; but fear had seized the most,
And all good counsel is on cowards lost.
The question crudely put to shun delay,
'Twas carried by the major part to stay.
His point thus gain'd, Sir Martin dated thence
His power, and from a priest became a prince.
He order'd all things with a busy care,
And cells and refectories did prepare,
And large provisions laid of winter fare:
But now and then let fall a word or two
Of hope, that Heaven some miracle might show,
And for their sakes the sun should backward go;
Against the laws of nature upward climb, 535
And, mounted on the Ram, renew the prime:
For which two proofs in sacred story lay,
Of Ahaz' dial, and of Joshua's day.
In expectation of such times as these,
A chapel housed them, truly call'd of ease:
For Martin much devotion did not ask:
They pray'd sometimes, and that was all their task.
It happen'd, as beyond the reach of wit
Blind prophecies may have a lucky hit,
That this accomplish'd, or at least in part,
Gave great repute to their new Merlin's art.
Some Swifts, the giants of the Swallow kind,
Large-limb'd, stout-hearted, but of stupid mind
(For Swisses, or for Gibeonites design'd),
These lubbers, peeping through a broken pane,
To suck fresh air, survey'd the neighbouring plain;
And saw (but scarcely could believe their eyes)
New blossoms flourish, and new flowers arise;
As God had been abroad, and, walking there,
Had left his footsteps, and reform'd the year:
The sunny hills from far were seen to glow
With glittering beams, and in the meads below
The burnish'd brooks appear'd with liquid gold to flow.
At last they heard the foolish Cuckoo sing,
Whose note proclaim'd the holiday of spring.
No longer doubting, all prepare to fly,
And repossess their patrimonial sky.
The priest before them did his wings display;
And that good omens might attend their way,
As luck would have it, 'twas St Martin's day.
Who but the Swallow triumphs now alone?
The canopy of heaven is all her own:
Her youthful offspring to their haunts repair,
And glide along in glades, and skim in air,
And dip for insects in the purling springs,
And stoop on rivers to refresh their wings.
Their mothers think a fair provision made,
That every son can live upon his trade:
And, now the careful charge is off their hands,
Look out for husbands, and new nuptial bands:
The youthful widow longs to be supplied;
But first the lover is by lawyers tied
To settle jointure-chimneys on the bride.
So thick they couple, in so short a space,
That Martin's marriage-offerings rise apace.
Their ancient houses running to decay,
Are furbish'd up, and cemented with clay;
They teem already; store of eggs are laid,
And brooding mothers call Lucina's aid.
Fame spreads the news, and foreign fowls appear
In flocks to greet the new returning year,
To bless the founder, and partake the cheer.
And now 'twas time (so fast their numbers rise)
To plant abroad, and people colonies.
The youth drawn forth, as Martin had desired
(For so their cruel destiny required),
Were sent far off on an ill-fated day;
The rest would needs conduct them on their way,
And Martin went, because he fear'd alone to stay.
So long they flew with inconsiderate haste,
That now their afternoon began to waste;
And, what was ominous, that very morn
The sun was enter'd into Capricorn;
Which, by their bad astronomer's account,
That week the Virgin balance should remount.
An infant moon eclipsed him in his way,
And hid the small remainders of his day.
The crowd, amazed, pursued no certain mark;
But birds met birds, and jostled in the dark:
Few mind the public in a panic fright;
And fear increased the horror of the night.
Night came, but unattended with repose;
Alone she came, no sleep their eyes to close:
Alone, and black she came; no friendly stars arose.
What should they do, beset with dangers round,
No neighbouring dorp,[33] no lodging to be found,
But bleaky plains, and bare unhospitable ground.
The latter brood, who just began to fly,
Sick-feather'd, and unpractised in the sky,
For succour to their helpless mother call:
She spread her wings; some few beneath them crawl;
She spread them wider yet, but could not cover all.
To augment their woes, the winds began to move,
Debate in air, for empty fields above,
Till Boreas got the skies, and pour'd amain
His rattling hailstones mix'd with snow and rain.
The joyless morning late arose, and found
A dreadful desolation reign around--
Some buried in the snow, some frozen to the ground.
The rest were struggling still with death, and lay
The Crows' and Ravens' rights, an undefended prey:
Excepting Martin's race; for they and he
Had gain'd the shelter of a hollow tree:
But soon discover'd by a sturdy clown,
He headed all the rabble of a town,
And finish'd them with bats, or poll'd them down.
Martin himself was caught alive, and tried
For treasonous crimes, because the laws provide
No Martin there in winter shall abide.
High on an oak, which never leaf shall bear,
He breathed his last, exposed to open air;
And there his corpse, unbless'd, is hanging still,
To show the change of winds with his prophetic bill.
The patience of the Hind did almost fail;
For well she mark'd the malice of the tale;[34]
Which ribald art their Church to Luther owes;
In malice it began, by malice grows;
He sow'd the Serpent's teeth, an iron-harvest rose.
But most in Martin's character and fate,
She saw her slander'd sons, the Panther's hate,
The people's rage, the persecuting state:
Then said, I take the advice in friendly part;
You clear your conscience, or at least your heart:
Perhaps you fail'd in your foreseeing skill,
For Swallows are unlucky birds to kill:
As for my sons, the family is bless'd,
Whose every child is equal to the rest;
No Church reform'd can boast a blameless line;
Such Martins build in yours, and more than mine:
Or else an old fanatic[35] author lies,
Who summ'd their scandals up by centuries.
But through your parable I plainly see
The bloody laws, the crowd's barbarity;
The sunshine that offends the purblind sight:
Had some their wishes, it would soon be night.
Mistake me not; the charge concerns not you:
Your sons are malcontents, but yet are true,
As far as non-resistance makes them so;
But that's a word of neutral sense, you know,
A passive term, which no relief will bring,
But trims betwixt a rebel and a king.
Rest well assured, the Pardelis replied,
My sons would all support the regal side,
Though Heaven forbid the cause by battle should be tried.
The matron answer'd with a loud Amen,
And thus pursued her argument again.
If, as you say, and as I hope no less,
Your sons will practise what yourselves profess,
What angry power prevents our present peace?
The Lion, studious of our common good,
Desires (and kings' desires are ill withstood)
To join our nations in a lasting love;
The bars betwixt are easy to remove;
For sanguinary laws were never made above.
If you condemn that prince of tyranny,
Whose mandate forced your Gallic friends to fly,
Make not a worse example of your own;
Or cease to rail at causeless rigour shown,
And let the guiltless person throw the stone.
His blunted sword your suffering brotherhood
Have seldom felt; he stops it short of blood:
But you have ground the persecuting knife,
And set it to a razor edge on life.
Cursed be the wit, which cruelty refines,
Or to his father's rod the scorpion's joins!
Your finger is more gross than the great monarch's loins.
But you, perhaps, remove that bloody note,
And stick it on the first reformer's coat.
Oh, let their crime in long oblivion sleep!
'Twas theirs indeed to make, 'tis yours to keep.
Unjust, or just, is all the question now;
'Tis plain, that not repealing you allow.
To name the Test would put you in a rage;
You charge not that on any former age,
But smile to think how innocent you stand,
Arm'd by a weapon put into your hand,
Yet still remember that you wield a sword
Forged by your foes against your sovereign lord;
Design'd to hew the imperial cedar down,
Defraud succession, and dis-heir the crown.
To abhor the makers, and their laws approve,
Is to hate traitors, and the treason love.
What means it else, which now your children say,
We made it not, nor will we take away?
Suppose some great oppressor had by slight
Of law, disseised your brother of his right,
Your common sire surrendering in a fright;
Would you to that unrighteous title stand,
Left by the villain's will to heir the land?
More just was Judas, who his Saviour sold;
The sacrilegious bribe he could not hold,
Nor hang in peace, before he render'd back the gold.
What more could you have done, than now you do,
Had Oates and Bedlow, and their plot been true?
Some specious reasons for those wrongs were found;
Their dire magicians threw their mists around,
And wise men walk'd as on enchanted ground.
But now when time has made the imposture plain
(Late though he follow'd truth, and limping held her train),
What new delusion charms your cheated eyes again?
The painted harlot might a while bewitch,
But why the hag uncased, and all obscene with itch?
The first Reformers were a modest race;
Our peers possess'd in peace their native place;
And when rebellious arms o'erturn'd the state,
They suffer'd only in the common fate:
But now the Sovereign mounts the regal chair,
And mitred seats are full, yet David's bench is bare.
Your answer is, they were not dispossess'd;
They need but rub their metal on the test
To prove their ore: 'twere well if gold alone
Were touch'd and tried on your discerning stone;
But that unfaithful Test unsound will pass
The dross of atheists, and sectarian brass:
As if the experiment were made to hold
For base production, and reject the gold.
Thus men ungodded may to places rise,
And sects may be preferr'd without disguise:
No danger to the Church or State from these;
The Papist only has his writ of ease.
No gainful office gives him the pretence
To grind the subject, or defraud the prince.
Wrong conscience, or no conscience, may deserve
To thrive, but ours alone is privileged to starve.
Still thank yourselves, you cry; your noble race
We banish not, but they forsake the place;
Our doors are open: true, but ere they come,
You toss your 'censing Test, and fume the room;
As if 'twere Toby's[36] rival to expel,
And fright the fiend who could not bear the smell.
To this the Panther sharply had replied;
But having gain'd a verdict on her side,
She wisely gave the loser leave to chide;
Well satisfied to have the But and Peace,
And for the plaintiff's cause she cared the less,
Because she sued in _forma pauperis_;
Yet thought it decent something should be said;
For secret guilt by silence is betray'd.
So neither granted all, nor much denied,
But answer'd with a yawning kind of pride:
Methinks such terms of proffer'd peace you bring,
As once 'neas to the Italian king:
By long possession all the land is mine;
You strangers come with your intruding line,
To share my sceptre, which you call to join.
You plead, like him, an ancient pedigree,
And claim a peaceful seat by fate's decree.
In ready pomp your sacrificer stands,
To unite the Trojan and the Latin bands,
And, that the league more firmly may be tied,
Demand the fair Lavinia for your bride.
Thus plausibly you veil the intended wrong,
But still you bring your exiled gods along;
And will endeavour, in succeeding space,
Those household puppets on our hearths to place.
Perhaps some barbarous laws have been preferr'd;
I spake against the Test, but was not heard;
These to rescind, and peerage to restore,
My gracious Sovereign would my vote implore:
I owe him much, but owe my conscience more.
Conscience is then your plea, replied the dame,
Which, well inform'd, will ever be the same.
But yours is much of the chameleon hue,
To change the dye with every distant view.
When first the Lion sat with awful sway,
Your conscience taught your duty to obey:
He might have had your Statutes and your Test;
No conscience but of subjects was profess'd.
He found your temper, and no farther tried,
But on that broken reed, your Church, relied.
In vain the sects assay'd their utmost art,
With offer'd treasure to espouse their part;
Their treasures were a bribe too mean to move his heart.
But when, by long experience, you had proved,
How far he could forgive, how well he loved;
A goodness that excell'd his godlike race,
And only short of Heaven's unbounded grace;
A flood of mercy that o'erflow'd our isle,
Calm in the rise, and fruitful as the Nile;
Forgetting whence our Egypt was supplied,
You thought your sovereign bound to send the tide:
Nor upward look'd on that immortal spring,
But vainly deem'd, he durst not be a king:
Then Conscience, unrestrain'd by fear, began
To stretch her limits, and extend the span;
Did his indulgence as her gift dispose,
And made a wise alliance with her foes.
Can Conscience own the associating name,
And raise no blushes to conceal her shame?
For sure she has been thought a bashful dame.
But if the cause by battle should be tried,
You grant she must espouse the regal side:
O Proteous Conscience, never to be tied!
What Phoebus from the Tripod shall disclose,
Which are, in last resort, your friends or foes?
Homer, who learn'd the language of the sky,
The seeming Gordian knot would soon untie;
Immortal powers the term of Conscience know,
But Interest is her name with men below.
Conscience or Interest be 't, or both in one,
The Panther answer'd in a surly tone,
The first commands me to maintain the crown,
The last forbids to throw my barriers down.
Our penal laws no sons of yours admit,
Our Test excludes your tribe from benefit.
These are my banks your ocean to withstand,
Which, proudly rising, overlooks the land;
And, once let in, with unresisted sway,
Would sweep the pastors and their flocks away.
Think not my judgment leads me to comply
With laws unjust, but hard necessity;
Imperious need, which cannot be withstood,
Makes ill authentic, for a greater good.
Possess your soul with patience, and attend:
A more auspicious planet may ascend;
Good fortune may present some happier time,
With means to cancel my unwilling crime;
(Unwilling, witness all ye Powers above!)
To mend my errors, and redeem your love:
That little space you safely may allow;
Your all-dispensing power protects you now.
Hold, said the Hind, 'tis needless to explain;
You would postpone me to another reign;
Till when you are content to be unjust:
Your part is to possess, and mine to trust.
A fair exchange proposed of future chance,
For present profit and inheritance.
Few words will serve to finish our dispute;
Who will not now repeal, would persecute.
To ripen green revenge your hopes attend,
Wishing that happier planet would ascend.
For shame let Conscience be your plea no more:
To will hereafter, proves she might before;
But she's a bawd to gain, and holds the door.
Your care about your banks infers a fear
Of threatening floods and inundations near;
If so, a just reprise would only be
Of what the land usurp'd upon the sea;
And all your jealousies but serve to show
Your ground is, like your neighbour-nation, low.
To intrench in what you grant unrighteous laws,
Is to distrust the justice of your cause;
And argues that the true religion lies
In those weak adversaries you despise.
Tyrannic force is that which least you fear;
The sound is frightful in a Christian's ear:
Avert it, Heaven! nor let that plague be sent
To us from the dispeopled continent.
But piety commands me to refrain;
Those prayers are needless in this monarch's reign.
Behold! how he protects your friends oppress'd,
Receives the banish'd, succours the distress'd:
Behold, for you may read an honest open breast.
He stands in day-light, and disdains to hide
An act, to which by honour he is tied,
A generous, laudable, and kingly pride.
Your Test he would repeal, his peers restore;
This when he says he means, he means no more.
Well, said the Panther, I believe him just,
And yet----
And yet, 'tis but because you must;
You would be trusted, but you would not trust.
The Hind thus briefly; and disdain'd to enlarge
On power of kings, and their superior charge,
As Heaven's trustees before the people's choice:
Though sure the Panther did not much rejoice
To hear those echoes given of her once loyal voice.
The matron woo'd her kindness to the last,
But could not win; her hour of grace was past.
Whom, thus persisting, when she could not bring
To leave the Wolf, and to believe her king,
She gave her up, and fairly wish'd her joy
Of her late treaty with her new ally:
Which well she hoped would more successful prove,
Than was the Pigeon's and the Buzzard's love.
The Panther ask'd what concord there could be
Betwixt two kinds whose natures disagree?
The dame replied: 'Tis sung in every street,
The common chat of gossips when they meet;
But, since unheard by you, 'tis worth your while
To take a wholesome tale, though told in homely style.
A plain good man,[37] whose name is understood
(So few deserve the name of plain and good),
Of three fair lineal lordships stood possess'd,
And lived, as reason was, upon the best.
Inured to hardships from his early youth,
Much had he done, and suffer'd for his truth:
At land and sea, in many a doubtful fight,
Was never known a more adventurous knight,
Who oftener drew his sword, and always for the right.
As fortune would (his fortune came, though late)
He took possession of his just estate:
Nor rack'd his tenants with increase of rent;
Nor lived too sparing, nor too largely spent;
But overlook'd his hinds; their pay was just,
And ready, for he scorn'd to go on trust:
Slow to resolve, but in performance quick;
So true, that he was awkward at a trick.
For little souls on little shifts rely,
And coward arts of mean expedients try;
The noble mind will dare do anything but lie.
False friends, his deadliest foes, could find no way
But shows of honest bluntness, to betray:
That unsuspected plainness he believed;
He looked into himself, and was deceived.
Some lucky planet sure attends his birth,
Or Heaven would make a miracle on earth;
For prosperous honesty is seldom seen
To bear so dead a weight, and yet to win.
It looks as fate with nature's law would strive,
To show plain-dealing once an age may thrive:
And, when so tough a frame she could not bend,
Exceeded her commission to befriend.
This grateful man, as Heaven increased his store.
Gave God again, and daily fed his poor.
His house with all convenience was purvey'd;
The rest he found, but raised the fabric where he pray'd;
And in that sacred place his beauteous wife
Employ'd her happiest hours of holy life.
Nor did their alms extend to those alone,
Whom common faith more strictly made their own;
A sort of Doves[38] were housed too near their hall,
Who cross the proverb, and abound with gall.
Though some, 'tis true, are passively inclined,
The greater part degenerate from their kind;
Voracious birds, that hotly bill and breed,
And largely drink, because on salt they feed.
Small gain from them their bounteous owner draws;
Yet, bound by promise, he supports their cause,
As corporations privileged by laws.
That house which harbour to their kind affords,
Was built, long since, God knows for better birds;
But fluttering there, they nestle near the throne,
And lodge in habitations not their own,
By their high crops and corny gizzards known.
Like Harpies, they could scent a plenteous board,
Then to be sure they never fail'd their lord:
The rest was form, and bare attendance paid;
They drank, and ate, and grudgingly obey'd.
The more they fed, they raven'd still for more;
They drain'd from Dan, and left Beersheba poor.
All this they had by law, and none repined;
The preference was but due to Levi's kind;
But when some lay-preferment fell by chance,
The gourmands made it their inheritance.
When once possess'd, they never quit their claim;
For then 'tis sanctified to Heaven's high name;
And, hallow'd thus, they cannot give consent,
The gift should be profaned by worldly management.
Their flesh was never to the table served;
Though 'tis not thence inferr'd the birds were starved;
But that their master did not like the food,
As rank, and breeding melancholy blood.
Nor did it with his gracious nature suit,
Even though they were not Doves, to persecute:
Yet he refused (nor could they take offence)
Their glutton kind should teach him abstinence.
Nor consecrated grain their wheat he thought,
Which, new from treading, in their bills they brought:
But left his hinds each in his private power,
That those who like the bran might leave the flour.
He for himself, and not for others, chose,
Nor would he be imposed on, nor impose;
But in their faces his devotion paid,
And sacrifice with solemn rites was made,
And sacred incense on his altars laid.
Besides these jolly birds, whose corpse impure
Repaid their commons with their salt-manure;
Another farm[39] he had behind his house,
Not overstock'd, but barely for his use:
Wherein his poor domestic poultry fed,
And from his pious hands received their bread.
Our pamper'd Pigeons, with malignant eyes,
Beheld these inmates, and their nurseries:
Though hard their fare, at evening, and at morn,
A cruise of water and an ear of corn;
Yet still they grudged that modicum, and thought
A sheaf in every single grain was brought.
Fain would they filch that little food away,
While unrestrain'd those happy gluttons prey.
And much they grieved to see so nigh their hall,
The bird that warn'd St Peter of his fall;
That he should raise his mitred crest on high,
And clap his wings, and call his family
To sacred rites; and vex the ethereal powers
With midnight matins at uncivil hours:
Nay more, his quiet neighbours should molest,
Just in the sweetness of their morning rest.
Beast of a bird, supinely when he might
Lie snug and sleep, to rise before the light!
What if his dull forefathers used that cry,
Could he not let a bad example die?
The world was fallen into an easier way;
This age knew better than to fast and pray.
Good sense in sacred worship would appear
So to begin, as they might end the year.
Such feats in former times had wrought the falls
Of crowing Chanticleers[40] in cloister'd walls.
Expell'd for this, and for their lands, they fled;
And sister Partlet,[41] with her hooded head,
Was hooted hence, because she would not pray a-bed.
The way to win the restive world to God,
Was to lay by the disciplining rod,
Unnatural fasts, and foreign forms of prayer:
Religion frights us with a mien severe.
'Tis prudence to reform her into ease,
And put her in undress to make her please;
A lively faith will bear aloft the mind,
And leave the luggage of good works behind.
Such doctrines in the Pigeon-house were taught:
You need not ask how wondrously they wrought:
But sure the common cry was all for these,
Whose life and precepts both encouraged ease.
Yet fearing those alluring baits might fail,
And holy deeds o'er all their arts prevail;
(For vice, though frontless, and of harden'd face,
Is daunted at the sight of awful grace;)
An hideous figure of their foes they drew,
Nor lines, nor looks, nor shades, nor colours true;
And this grotesque design exposed to public view.
One would have thought it some Egyptian piece,
With garden-gods, and barking deities,
More thick than Ptolemy has stuck the skies.
All so perverse a draught, so far unlike,
It was no libel where it meant to strike.
Yet still the daubing pleased, and great and small,
To view the monster, crowded Pigeon Hall.
There Chanticleer was drawn upon his knees
Adoring shrines, and stocks of sainted trees:
And by him, a misshapen, ugly race;
The curse of God was seen on every face:
No Holland emblem could that malice mend,
But still the worse the look, the fitter for a fiend.
The master of the farm, displeased to find
So much of rancour in so mild a kind,
Enquired into the cause, and came to know,
The passive Church had struck the foremost blow;
With groundless fears and jealousies possess'd,
As if this troublesome intruding guest
Would drive the birds of Venus from their nest;
A deed his inborn equity abhorr'd;
But Interest will not trust, though God should plight his word.
A law,[42] the source of many future harms,
Had banish'd all the poultry from the farms;
With loss of life, if any should be found
To crow or peck on this forbidden ground.
That bloody statute chiefly was design'd
For Chanticleer the white, of clergy kind;
But after-malice did not long forget
The lay that wore the robe and coronet.
For them, for their inferiors and allies,
Their foes a deadly Shibboleth devise:
By which unrighteously it was decreed,
That none to trust or profit should succeed,
Who would not swallow first a poisonous wicked weed:[43]
Or that, to which old Socrates was cursed,
Or henbane juice to swell them till they burst.
The patron (as in reason) thought it hard
To see this inquisition in his yard,
By which the Sovereign was of subjects' use debarr'd.
All gentle means he tried, which might withdraw
The effects of so unnatural a law:
But still the Dove-house obstinately stood
Deaf to their own and to their neighbours' good;
And which was worse, if any worse could be,
Repented of their boasted loyalty:
Now made the champions of a cruel cause.
And drunk with fumes of popular applause;
For those whom God to ruin has design'd,
He fits for fate, and first destroys their mind.
New doubts indeed they daily strove to raise,
Suggested dangers, interposed delays;
And emissary Pigeons had in store,
Such as the Meccan prophet used of yore,
To whisper counsels in their patron's ear;
And veil'd their false advice with zealous fear.
The master smiled to see them work in vain,
To wear him out, and make an idle reign:
He saw, but suffer'd their protractive arts,
And strove by mildness to reduce their hearts:
But they abused that grace to make allies,
And fondly closed with former enemies;
For fools are doubly fools, endeavouring to be wise.
After a grave consult what course were best,
One, more mature in folly than the rest,
Stood up, and told them, with his head aside,
That desperate cures must be to desperate ills applied:
And therefore, since their main impending fear
Was from the increasing race of Chanticleer,
Some potent bird of prey they ought to find,
A foe profess'd to him, and all his kind:
Some haggard Hawk, who had her eyrie nigh,
Well pounced to fasten, and well wing'd to fly;
One they might trust, their common wrongs to wreak:
The Musquet and the Coystrel were too weak,
Too fierce the Falcon; but, above the rest,
The noble Buzzard[44] ever pleased me best;
Of small renown, 'tis true; for, not to lie,
We call him but a Hawk by courtesy.
I know he hates the Pigeon-house and Farm,
And more, in time of war has done us harm:
But all his hate on trivial points depends;
Give up our forms, and we shall soon be friends.
For Pigeons' flesh he seems not much to care;
Cramm'd chickens are a more delicious fare.
On this high potentate, without delay,
I wish you would confer the sovereign sway:
Petition him to accept the government,
And let a splendid embassy be sent.
This pithy speech prevail'd, and all agreed,
Old enmities forgot, the Buzzard should succeed.
Their welcome suit was granted soon as heard,
His lodgings furnish'd, and a train prepared,
With B's upon their breast, appointed for his guard.
He came, and crown'd with great solemnity;
God save king Buzzard, was the general cry.
A portly prince, and goodly to the sight,
He seem'd a son of Anak for his height:
Like those whom stature did to crowns prefer:
Black-brow'd, and bluff, like Homer's Jupiter:
Broad-back'd, and brawny-built for love's delight;
A prophet form'd to make a female proselyte.
A theologue more by need than genial bent;
By breeding sharp, by nature confident.
Interest in all his actions was discern'd;
More learn'd than honest, more a wit than learn'd:
Or forced by fear, or by his profit led,
Or both conjoin'd, his native clime he fled:
But brought the virtues of his heaven along;
A fair behaviour, and a fluent tongue.
And yet with all his arts he could not thrive;
The most unlucky parasite alive.
Loud praises to prepare his paths he sent,
And then himself pursued his compliment;
But by reverse of fortune chased away,
His gifts no longer than their author stay:
He shakes the dust against the ungrateful race,
And leaves the stench of ordures in the place.
Oft has he flatter'd and blasphemed the same;
For in his rage he spares no sovereign's name:
The hero and the tyrant change their style
By the same measure that they frown or smile.
When well received by hospitable foes,
The kindness he returns, is to expose:
For courtesies, though undeserved and great,
No gratitude in felon-minds beget;
As tribute to his wit, the churl receives the treat.
His praise of foes is venomously nice;
So touch'd, it turns a virtue to a vice:
"A Greek, and bountiful, forewarns us twice."
Seven sacraments he wisely does disown,
Because he knows Confession stands for one;
Where sins to sacred silence are convey'd,
And not for fear, or love, to be betray'd:
But he, uncall'd, his patron to control,
Divulged the secret whispers of his soul;
Stood forth the accusing Satan of his crimes,
And offer'd to the Moloch of the times.
Prompt to assail, and careless of defence,
Invulnerable in his impudence,
He dares the world; and, eager of a name,
He thrusts about, and jostles into fame.
Frontless, and satire-proof, he scours the streets,
And runs an Indian-muck at all he meets.
So fond of loud report, that not to miss
Of being known (his last and utmost bliss)
He rather would be known for what he is.
Such was, and is, the Captain of the Test,
Though half his virtues are not here express'd;
The modesty of fame conceals the rest.
The spleenful Pigeons never could create
A prince more proper to revenge their hate:
Indeed, more proper to revenge, than save;
A king, whom in his wrath the Almighty gave:
For all the grace the landlord had allow'd,
But made the Buzzard and the Pigeons proud;
Gave time to fix their friends, and to seduce the crowd.
They long their fellow-subjects to enthral,
Their patron's promise into question call,
And vainly think he meant to make them lords of all.
False fears their leaders fail'd not to suggest,
As if the Doves were to be dispossess'd;
Nor sighs, nor groans, nor goggling eyes did want;
For now the Pigeons too had learn'd to cant.
The house of prayer is stock'd with large increase;
Nor doors nor windows can contain the press:
For birds of every feather fill the abode;
Even Atheists out of envy own a God:
And, reeking from the stews, adulterers come,
Like Goths and Vandals to demolish Rome.
That Conscience, which to all their crimes was mute,
Now calls aloud, and cries to persecute:
No rigour of the laws to be released,
And much the less, because it was their Lord's request:
They thought it great their Sovereign to control,
And named their pride, nobility of soul.
'Tis true, the Pigeons, and their prince elect,
Were short of power, their purpose to effect:
But with their quills did all the hurt they could,
And cuff'd the tender Chickens from their food:
And much the Buzzard in their cause did stir,
Though naming not the patron, to infer,
With all respect, he was a gross idolater.
But when the imperial owner did espy,
That thus they turn'd his grace to villany,
Not suffering wrath to discompose his mind,
He strove a temper for the extremes to find,
So to be just, as he might still be kind;
Then, all maturely weigh'd, pronounced a doom
Of sacred strength for every age to come.
By this the Doves their wealth and state possess,
No rights infringed, but licence to oppress:
Such power have they as factious lawyers long
To crowns ascribed, that Kings can do no wrong.
But since his own domestic birds have tried
The dire effects of their destructive pride,
He deems that proof a measure to the rest,
Concluding well within his kingly breast,
His fowls of nature too unjustly were oppress'd.
He therefore makes all birds of every sect
Free of his farm, with promise to respect
Their several kinds alike, and equally protect.
His gracious edict the same franchise yields
To all the wild increase of woods and fields,
And who in rocks aloof, and who in steeples builds:
To Crows the like impartial grace affords,
And Choughs and Daws, and such republic birds:
Secured with ample privilege to feed,
Each has his district, and his bounds decreed;
Combined in common interest with his own,
But not to pass the Pigeon's Rubicon.
Here ends the reign of this pretended Dove;
All prophecies accomplish'd from above,
From Shiloh comes the sceptre to remove.
Reduced from her imperial high abode,
Like Dionysius to a private rod,
The Passive Church, that with pretended grace
Did her distinctive mark in duty place,
Now touch'd, reviles her Maker to his face.
What after happen'd is not hard to guess:
The small beginnings had a large increase,
And arts and wealth succeed, the secret spoils of peace.
'Tis said, the Doves repented, though too late,
Become the smiths of their own foolish fate:
Nor did their owner hasten their ill hour;
But, sunk in credit, they decreased in power:
Like snows in warmth that mildly pass away,
Dissolving in the silence of decay.
The Buzzard, not content with equal place,
Invites the feather'd Nimrods of his race;
To hide the thinness of their flock from sight,
And all together make a seeming goodly flight:
But each have separate interests of their own;
Two Czars are one too many for a throne.
Nor can the usurper long abstain from food;
Already he has tasted Pigeons' blood:
And may be tempted to his former fare,
When this indulgent lord shall late to heaven repair.
Bare benting times, and moulting months may come,
When, lagging late, they cannot reach their home;
Or, rent in schism (for so their fate decrees),
Like the tumultuous college of the bees,[45]
They fight their quarrel, by themselves oppress'd;
The tyrant smiles below, and waits the falling feast.
Thus did the gentle Hind her fable end,
Nor would the Panther blame it, nor commend;
But, with affected yawnings at the close,
Seem'd to require her natural repose:
For now the streaky light began to peep;
And setting stars admonish'd both to sleep.
The dame withdrew, and, wishing to her guest
The peace of heaven, betook herself to rest.
Ten thousand angels on her slumbers wait,
With glorious visions of her future state. |
The Man And His Image.[1] | Jean de La Fontaine | To M. The Duke De La Rochefoucauld.
A man, who had no rivals in the love
Which to himself he bore,
Esteem'd his own dear beauty far above
What earth had seen before.
More than contented in his error,
He lived the foe of every mirror.
Officious fate, resolved our lover
From such an illness should recover,
Presented always to his eyes
The mute advisers which the ladies prize; -
Mirrors in parlours, inns, and shops, -
Mirrors the pocket furniture of fops, -
Mirrors on every lady's zone,[2]
From which his face reflected shone.
What could our dear Narcissus do?
From haunts of men he now withdrew,
On purpose that his precious shape
From every mirror might escape.
But in his forest glen alone,
Apart from human trace,
A watercourse,
Of purest source,
While with unconscious gaze
He pierced its waveless face,
Reflected back his own.
Incensed with mingled rage and fright,
He seeks to shun the odious sight;
But yet that mirror sheet, so clear and still,
He cannot leave, do what he will.
Ere this, my story's drift you plainly see.
From such mistake there is no mortal free.
That obstinate self-lover
The human soul doth cover;
The mirrors follies are of others,
In which, as all are genuine brothers,
Each soul may see to life depicted
Itself with just such faults afflicted;
And by that charming placid brook,
Needless to say, I mean your Maxim Book. |
The Monkey And The Leopard. | Jean de La Fontaine | [1]
A monkey and a leopard were
The rivals at a country fair.
Each advertised his own attractions.
Said one, 'Good sirs, the highest place
My merit knows; for, of his grace,
The king hath seen me face to face;
And, judging by his looks and actions,
I gave the best of satisfactions.
When I am dead, 'tis plain enough,
My skin will make his royal muff.
So richly is it streak'd and spotted,
So delicately waved and dotted,
Its various beauty cannot fail to please.'
And, thus invited, everybody sees;
But soon they see, and soon depart.
The monkey's show-bill to the mart
His merits thus sets forth the while,
All in his own peculiar style: -
'Come, gentlemen, I pray you, come;
In magic arts I am at home.
The whole variety in which
My neighbour boasts himself so rich,
Is to his simple skin confined,
While mine is living in the mind.
Your humble servant, Monsieur Gille,
The son-in-law to Tickleville,
Pope's monkey, and of great renown,
Is now just freshly come to town,
Arrived in three bateaux, express,
Your worships to address;
For he can speak, you understand;
Can dance, and practise sleight-of-hand;
Can jump through hoops, and balance sticks;
In short, can do a thousand tricks;
And all for blancos six - [2]
Not, messieurs, for a sou.
And, if you think the price won't do,
When you have seen, then he'll restore
Each man his money at the door.'
The ape was not to reason blind;
For who in wealth of dress can find
Such charms as dwell in wealth of mind?
One meets our ever-new desires,
The other in a moment tires.
Alas! how many lords there are,
Of mighty sway and lofty mien,
Who, like this leopard at the fair,
Show all their talents on the skin! |
Cito Pede Preterit Aetas - A Philosophical Dissertation | Adam Lindsay Gordon | 'Gillian's dead, God rest her bier,
How I loved her many years syne;
Marion's married, but I sit here,
Alive and merry at three-score year,
Dipping my nose in Gascoigne wine.'
- Wamba's Song, Thackeray.
A mellower light doth Sol afford,
His meridian glare has pass'd,
And the trees on the broad and sloping sward
Their length'ning shadows cast.
'Time flies.' The current will be no joke,
If swollen by recent rain,
To cross in the dark, so I'll have a smoke,
And then I'll be off again.
What's up, old horse? Your ears you prick,
And your eager eyeballs glisten;
'Tis the wild dog's note in the tea-tree thick,
By the river, to which you listen.
With head erect and tail flung out,
For a gallop you seem to beg,
But I feel the qualm of a chilling doubt,
As I glance at your fav'rite leg.
Let the dingo rest, 'tis all for the best;
In this world there's room enough
For him and you and me and the rest,
And the country is awful rough.
We've had our gallop in days of yore,
Now down the hill we must run;
Yet at times we long for one gallop more,
Although it were only one.
Did our spirits quail at a new four-rail,
Could a 'double' double-bank us,
Ere nerve and sinew began to fail
In the consulship of Plancus?
When our blood ran rapidly, and when
Our bones were pliant and limber,
Could we stand a merry cross-counter then,
A slogging fall over timber?
Arcades ambo! Duffers both,
In our best of days, alas!
(I tell the truth, though to tell it loth)
'Tis time we were gone to grass;
The young leaves shoot, the sere leaves fall,
And the old gives way to the new,
While the preacher cries, ''tis vanity all,
And vexation of spirit, too.'
Now over my head the vapours curl
From the bowl of the soothing clay,
In the misty forms that eddy and whirl
My thoughts are flitting away;
Yes, the preacher's right, 'tis vanity all,
But the sweeping rebuke he showers
On vanities all may heaviest fall
On vanities worse than ours.
We have no wish to exaggerate
The worth of the sports we prize,
Some toil for their Church, and some for their State,
And some for their merchandise;
Some traffic and trade in the city's mart,
Some travel by land and sea,
Some follow science, some cleave to art,
And some to scandal and tea;
And some for their country and their queen
Would fight, if the chance they had,
Good sooth, 'twere a sorry world, I ween,
If we all went galloping mad;
Yet if once we efface the joys of the chase
From the land, and outroot the Stud,
Good-bye to the anglo-saxon race!
Farewell to the norman blood!
Where the burn runs down to the uplands brown,
From the heights of the snow-clad range,
What anodyne drawn from the stifling town
Can be reckon'd a fair exchange
For the stalker's stride, on the mountain side,
In the bracing northern weather,
To the slopes where couch, in their antler'd pride,
The deer on the perfum'd heather?
Oh! the vigour with which the air is rife!
The spirit of joyous motion;
The fever, the fulness of animal life,
Can be drain'd from no earthly potion!
The lungs with the living gas grow light,
And the limbs feel the strength of ten,
While the chest expands with its madd'ning might,
God's glorious oxygen.
Thus the measur'd stroke, on elastic sward,
Of the steed three parts extended
, Hard held, the breath of his nostrils broad,
With the golden ether blended;
Then the leap, the rise from the springy turf,
The rush through the buoyant air,
And the light shock landing, the veriest serf
Is an emperor then and there!
Such scenes! sensation and sound and sight!
To some undiscover'd shore
On the current of Time's remorseless flight
Have they swept to return no more?
While, like phantoms bright of the fever'd night,
That have vex'd our slumbers of yore,
You follow us still in your ghostly might,
Dead days that have gone before.
Vain dreams, again and again re-told,
Must you crowd on the weary brain,
Till the fingers are cold that entwin'd of old
Round foil and trigger and rein,
Till stay'd for aye are the roving feet,
Till the restless hands are quiet,
Till the stubborn heart has forgotten to beat,
Till the hot blood has ceas'd to riot?
In Exeter Hall the saint may chide,
The sinner may scoff outright,
The Bacchanal steep'd in the flagon's tide,
Or the sensual Sybarite;
But Nolan's name will flourish in fame,
When our galloping days are past,
When we go to the place from whence we came,
Perchance to find rest at last.
Thy riddles grow dark, oh! drifting cloud,
And thy misty shapes grow drear,
Thou hang'st in the air like a shadowy shroud,
But I am of lighter cheer;
Though our future lot is a sable blot,
Though the wise ones of earth will blame us,
Though our saddles will rot, and our rides be forgot,
'Dum Vivimus, Vivamus!' |
A Modest Lot, A Fame Petite, | Emily Elizabeth Dickinson | A modest lot, a fame petite,
A brief campaign of sting and sweet
Is plenty! Is enough!
A sailor's business is the shore,
A soldier's -- balls. Who asketh more
Must seek the neighboring life! |
Assumption | Madison Julius Cawein | I
A mile of moonlight and the whispering wood:
A mile of shadow and the odorous lane:
One large, white star above the solitude,
Like one sweet wish: and, laughter after pain,
Wild-roses wistful in a web of rain.
II
No star, no rose, to lesson him and lead;
No woodsman compass of the skies and rocks, -
Tattooed of stars and lichens, - doth love need
To guide him where, among the hollyhocks,
A blur of moonlight, gleam his sweetheart's locks.
III
We name it beauty - that permitted part,
The love-elected apotheosis
Of Nature, which the god within the heart,
Just touching, makes immortal, but by this -
A star, a rose, the memory of a kiss. |
A Monument For The Soldiers. | James Whitcomb Riley | A monument for the Soldiers!
And what will ye build it of?
Can ye build it of marble, or brass, or bronze,
Outlasting the Soldiers' love?
Can ye glorify it with legends
As grand as their blood hath writ
From the inmost shrine of this land of thine
To the outermost verge of it?
And the answer came: We would build it
Out of our hopes made sure,
And out of our purest prayers and tears,
And out of our faith secure:
We would build it out of the great white truths
Their death hath sanctified,
And the sculptured forms of the men in arms,
And their faces ere they died.
And what heroic figures
Can the sculptor carve in stone?
Can the marble breast be made to bleed,
And the marble lips to moan?
Can the marble brow be fevered?
And the marble eyes be graved
To look their last, as the flag floats past,
On the country they have saved?
And the answer came: The figures
Shall all be fair and brave,
And, as befitting, as pure and white
As the stars above their grave!
The marble lips, and breast and brow
Whereon the laurel lies,
Bequeath us right to guard the flight
Of the old flag in the skies!
A monument for the Soldiers!
Built of a people's love,
And blazoned and decked and panoplied
With the hearts ye build it oft
And see that ye build it stately,
In pillar and niche and gate,
And high in pose as the souls of those
It would commemorate! |
Mount Erebus (A Fragment) | Henry Kendall | A mighty theatre of snow and fire,
Girt with perpetual Winter, and sublime
By reason of that lordly solitude
Which dwells for ever at the world's white ends;
And in that weird-faced wilderness of ice,
There is no human foot, nor any paw
Or hoof of beast, but where the shrill winds drive
The famished birds of storm across the tracts
Whose centre is the dim mysterious Pole.
Beyond yea far beyond the homes of man,
By water never dark with coming ships,
Near seas that know not feather, scale, or fin,
The grand volcano, like a weird Isaiah,
Set in that utmost region of the Earth,
Doth thunder forth the awful utterance,
Whose syllables are flame; and when the fierce
Antarctic Night doth hold dominionship
Within her fastnessess, then round the cone
Of Erebus a crown of tenfold light
Appears; and shafts of marvellous splendour shoot
Far out to east and west and south and north,
Whereat a gorgeous dome of glory roofs
Wild leagues of mountain and transfigured waves,
And lends all things a beauty terrible.
Far-reaching lands, whereon the hand of Change
Hath never rested since the world began,
Lie here in fearful fellowship with cold
And rain and tempest. Here colossal horns
Of hill start up and take the polar fogs
Shot through with flying stars of fire; and here,
Above the dead-grey crescents topped with spires
Of thunder-smoke, one half the heaven flames
With that supremest light whose glittering life
Is yet a marvel unto all but One
The Entity Almighty, whom we feel
Is nearest us when we are face to face
With Nature's features aboriginal,
And in the hearing of her primal speech
And in the thraldom of her primal power.
While like the old Chaldean king who waxed
Insane with pride, we human beings grow
To think we are the mightiest of the world,
And lords of all terrestrial things, behold
The sea rolls in with a superb disdain
Upon our peopled shores, omnipotent;
And while we set up things of clay and call
Our idols gods; and while we boast or fume
About the petty honours, or the poor,
Pale disappointments of our meagre lives,
Lo, changeless as Eternity itself,
The grand Antarctic mountain looms outside
All breathing life; and, with its awful speech,
Is as an emblem of the Power Supreme,
Whose thunders shake the boundless Universe,
Whose lightnings make a terror of all Space. |
A Thunderstorm | Archibald Lampman | A moment the wild swallows like a flight
Of withered gust-caught leaves, serenely high,
Toss in the windrack up the muttering sky.
The leaves hang still. Above the weird twilight,
The hurrying centres of the storm unite
And spreading with huge trunk and rolling fringe,
Each wheeled upon its own tremendous hinge
Tower darkening on. And now from heaven's height
With the long roar of elm-trees swept and swayed,
And pelted waters, on the vanished plain
Plunges the blast. Behind the wild white flash
That splits abroad the pealing thunder-crash,
Over bleared fields and gardens disarrayed,
Column on column comes the drenching rain. |
Gloucester Moors | William Vaughn Moody | A mile behind is Gloucester town
Where the fishing fleets put in,
A mile ahead the land dips down
And the woods and farms begin.
Here, where the moors stretch free
In the high blue afternoon,
Are the marching sun and talking sea,
And the racing winds that wheel and flee
On the flying heels of June.
Jill-o'er-the-ground is purple blue,
Blue is the quaker-maid,
The wild geranium holds its dew
Long in the boulder's shade.
Wax-red hangs the cup
From the huckleberry boughs,
In barberry bells the grey moths sup,
Or where the choke-cherry lifts high up
Sweet bowls for their carouse.
Over the shelf of the sandy cove
Beach-peas blossom late.
By copse and cliff the swallows rove
Each calling to his mate.
Seaward the sea-gulls go,
And the land-birds all are here;
That green-gold flash was a vireo,
And yonder flame where the marsh-flags grow
Was a scarlet tanager.
This earth is not the steadfast place
We landsmen build upon;
From deep to deep she varies pace,
And while she comes is gone.
Beneath my feet I feel
Her smooth bulk heave and dip;
With velvet plunge and soft upreel
She swings and steadies to her keel
Like a gallant, gallant ship.
These summer clouds she sets for sail,
The sun is her masthead light,
She tows the moon like a pinnace frail
Where her phosphor wake churns bright.
Now hid, now looming clear,
On the face of the dangerous blue
The star fleets tack and wheel and veer,
But on, but on does the old earth steer
As if her port she knew.
God, dear God! Does she know her port,
Though she goes so far about?
Or blind astray, does she make her sport
To brazen and chance it out?
I watched when her captains passed:
She were better captainless.
Men in the cabin, before the mast,
But some were reckless and some aghast,
And some sat gorged at mess.
By her battened hatch I leaned and caught
Sounds from the noisome hold,--
Cursing and sighing of souls distraught
And cries too sad to be told.
Then I strove to go down and see;
But they said, "Thou art not of us!"
I turned to those on the deck with me
And cried, "Give help!" But they said, "Let be:
Our ship sails faster thus."
Jill-o'er-the-ground is purple blue,
Blue is the quaker-maid,
The alder-clump where the brook comes through
Breeds cresses in its shade.
To be out of the moiling street
With its swelter and its sin!
Who has given to me this sweet,
And given my brother dust to eat?
And when will his wage come in?
Scattering wide or blown in ranks,
Yellow and white and brown,
Boats and boats from the fishing banks
Come home to Gloucester town.
There is cash to purse and spend,
There are wives to be embraced,
Hearts to borrow and hearts to lend,
And hearts to take and keep to the end,--
O little sails, make haste!
But thou, vast outbound ship of souls,
What harbor town for thee?
What shapes, when thy arriving tolls,
Shall crowd the banks to see?
Shall all the happy shipmates then
Stand singing brotherly?
Or shall a haggard ruthless few
Warp her over and bring her to,
While the many broken souls of men
Fester down in the slaver's pen,
And nothing to say or do? |
Diurnal. | Madison Julius Cawein | I
A molten ruby clear as wine
Along the east the dawning swims;
The morning-glories swing and shine,
The night dews bead their satin rims;
The bees rob sweets from shrub and vine,
The gold hangs on their limbs.
Sweet morn, the South,
A royal lover,
From his fragrant mouth,
Sweet morn, the South
Breathes on and over
Keen scents of wild honey and rosy clover.
II
Beside the wall the roses blow
Long summer noons the winds forsake;
Beside the wall the poppies glow
So full of fire their hearts do ache;
The dipping butterflies come slow,
Half dreaming, half awake.
Sweet noontide, rest,
A slave-girl weary
With her babe at her breast;
Sweet noontide, rest,
The day grows dreary
As soft limbs that are tired and eyes that are teary.
III
Along lone paths the cricket cries
Sad summer nights that know the dew;
One mad star thwart the heavens flies
Curved glittering on the glassy blue;
Now grows the big moon on the skies.
The stars are faint and few.
Sweet night, breathe thou
With a passion taken
From a Romeo's vow;
Sweet night, breathe thou
Like a beauty shaken
Of amorous dreams that have made her waken.
|
The Monkey Who Had Seen The World. | John Gay | A monkey, to reform the times,
Resolved to visit foreign climes;
For therefore toilsomely we roam
To bring politer manners home.
Misfortunes serve to make us wise:
Poor pug was caught, and made a prize;
Sold was he, and by happy doom
Bought to cheer up a lady's gloom.
Proud as a lover of his chains
His way he wins, his post maintains -
He twirled her knots and cracked her fan,
Like any other gentleman.
When jests grew dull he showed his wit,
And many a lounger hit with it.
When he had fully stored his mind -
As Orpheus once for human kind, -
So he away would homewards steal,
To civilize the monkey weal.
The hirsute sylvans round him pressed,
Astonished to behold him dressed.
They praise his sleeve and coat, and hail
His dapper periwig and tail;
His powdered back, like snow, admired,
And all his shoulder-knot desired.
"Now mark and learn: from foreign skies
I come, to make a people wise.
Weigh your own worth, assert your place, -
The next in rank to human race.
In cities long I passed my days,
Conversed with man and learnt his ways;
Their dress and courtly manners see -
Reform your state and be like me.
"Ye who to thrive in flattery deal,
Must learn your passions to conceal;
And likewise to regard your friends
As creatures sent to serve your ends.
Be prompt to lie: there is no wit
In telling truth, to lose by it.
And knock down worth, bespatter merit:
Don't stint - all will your scandal credit.
Be bumptious, bully, swear, and fight -
And all will own the man polite."
He grinned and bowed. With muttering jaws
His pugnosed brothers grinned applause,
And, fond to copy human ways,
Practise new mischiefs all their days.
Thus the dull lad too big to rule,
With travel finishes his school;
Soars to the heights of foreign vices,
And copies - reckless what their price is.
|
A Dark Month | Algernon Charles Swinburne | 'La maison sans enfants!' - VICTOR HUGO.
I.
A month without sight of the sun
Rising or reigning or setting
Through days without use of the day,
Who calls it the month of May?
The sense of the name is undone
And the sound of it fit for forgetting.
We shall not feel if the sun rise,
We shall not care when it sets:
If a nightingale make night's air
As noontide, why should we care?
Till a light of delight that is done rise,
Extinguishing grey regrets;
Till a child's face lighten again
On the twilight of older faces;
Till a child's voice fall as the dew
On furrows with heat parched through
And all but hopeless of grain,
Refreshing the desolate places
Fall clear on the ears of us hearkening
And hungering for food of the sound
And thirsting for joy of his voice:
Till the hearts in us hear and rejoice,
And the thoughts of them doubting and darkening
Rejoice with a glad thing found.
When the heart of our gladness is gone,
What comfort is left with us after?
When the light of our eyes is away,
What glory remains upon May,
What blessing of song is thereon
If we drink not the light of his laughter?
No small sweet face with the daytime
To welcome, warmer than noon!
No sweet small voice as a bird's
To bring us the day's first words!
Mid May for us here is not Maytime!
No summer begins with June.
A whole dead month in the dark,
A dawn in the mists that o'ercome her
Stifled and smothered and sad
Swift speed to it, barren and bad!
And return to us, voice of the lark,
And remain with us, sunlight of summer.
II.
Alas, what right has the dawn to glimmer,
What right has the wind to do aught but moan?
All the day should be dimmer
Because we are left alone.
Yestermorn like a sunbeam present
Hither and thither a light step smiled,
And made each place for us pleasant
With the sense or the sight of a child.
But the leaves persist as before, and after
Our parting the dull day still bears flowers
And songs less bright than his laughter
Deride us from birds in the bowers.
Birds, and blossoms, and sunlight only,
As though such folly sufficed for spring!
As though the house were not lonely
For want of the child its king!
III.
Asleep and afar to-night my darling
Lies, and heeds not the night,
If winds be stirring or storms be snarling;
For his sleep is its own sweet light.
I sit where he sat beside me quaffing
The wine of story and song
Poured forth of immortal cups, and laughing
When mirth in the draught grew strong.
I broke the gold of the words, to melt it
For hands but seven years old,
And they caught the tale as a bird, and felt it
More bright than visible gold.
And he drank down deep, with his eyes broad beaming,
Here in this room where I am,
The golden vintage of Shakespeare, gleaming
In the silver vessels of Lamb.
Here by my hearth where he was I listen
For the shade of the sound of a word,
Athirst for the birdlike eyes to glisten,
For the tongue to chirp like a bird.
At the blast of battle, how broad they brightened,
Like fire in the spheres of stars,
And clung to the pictured page, and lightened
As keen as the heart of Mars!
At the touch of laughter, how swift it twittered
The shrillest music on earth;
How the lithe limbs laughed and the whole child glittered
With radiant riot of mirth!
Our Shakespeare now, as a man dumb-stricken,
Stands silent there on the shelf:
And my thoughts, that had song in the heart of them, sicken,
And relish not Shakespeare's self.
And my mood grows moodier than Hamlet's even,
And man delights not me,
But only the face that morn and even
My heart leapt only to see.
That my heart made merry within me seeing,
And sang as his laugh kept time:
But song finds now no pleasure in being,
And love no reason in rhyme.
IV.
Mild May-blossom and proud sweet bay-flower,
What, for shame, would you have with us here?
It is not the month of the May-flower
This, but the fall of the year.
Flowers open only their lips in derision,
Leaves are as fingers that point in scorn:
The shows we see are a vision;
Spring is not verily born.
Yet boughs turn supple and buds grow sappy,
As though the sun were indeed the sun:
And all our woods are happy
With all their birds save one.
But spring is over, but summer is over,
But autumn is over, and winter stands
With his feet sunk deep in the clover
And cowslips cold in his hands.
His hoar grim head has a hawthorn bonnet,
His gnarled gaunt hand has a gay green staff
With new-blown rose-blossom on it:
But his laugh is a dead man's laugh.
The laugh of spring that the heart seeks after,
The hand that the whole world yearns to kiss,
It rings not here in his laughter,
The sign of it is not this.
There is not strength in it left to splinter
Tall oaks, nor frost in his breath to sting:
Yet it is but a breath as of winter,
And it is not the hand of spring.
V.
Thirty-one pale maidens, clad
All in mourning dresses,
Pass, with lips and eyes more sad
That it seems they should be glad,
Heads discrowned of crowns they had,
Grey for golden tresses.
Grey their girdles too for green,
And their veils dishevelled:
None would say, to see their mien,
That the least of these had been
Born no baser than a queen,
Reared where flower-fays revelled.
Dreams that strive to seem awake,
Ghosts that walk by daytime,
Weary winds the way they take,
Since, for one child's absent sake,
May knows well, whate'er things make
Sport, it is not Maytime.
VI.
A hand at the door taps light
As the hand of my heart's delight:
It is but a full-grown hand,
Yet the stroke of it seems to start
Hope like a bird in my heart,
Too feeble to soar or to stand.
To start light hope from her cover
Is to raise but a kite for a plover
If her wings be not fledged to soar.
Desire, but in dreams, cannot ope
The door that was shut upon hope
When love went out at the door.
Well were it if vision could keep
The lids of desire as in sleep
Fast locked, and over his eyes
A dream with the dark soft key
In her hand might hover, and be
Their keeper till morning rise;
The morning that brings after many
Days fled with no light upon any
The small face back which is gone;
When the loved little hands once more
Shall struggle and strain at the door
They beat their summons upon.
VII.
If a soul for but seven days were cast out of heaven and its mirth,
They would seem to her fears like as seventy years upon earth.
Even and morrow should seem to her sorrow as long
As the passage of numberless ages in slumberless song.
Dawn, roused by the lark, would be surely as dark in her sight
As her measureless measure of shadowless pleasure was bright.
Noon, gilt but with glory of gold, would be hoary and grey
In her eyes that had gazed on the depths, unamazed with the day.
Night hardly would seem to make darker her dream never done,
When it could but withhold what a man may behold of the sun.
For dreams would perplex, were the days that should vex her but seven,
The sight of her vision, made dark with division from heaven.
Till the light on my lonely way lighten that only now gleams,
I too am divided from heaven and derided of dreams.
VIII.
A twilight fire-fly may suggest
How flames the fire that feeds the sun:
'A crooked figure may attest
In little space a million.'
But this faint-figured verse, that dresses
With flowers the bones of one bare month,
Of all it would say scarce expresses
In crooked ways a millionth.
A fire-fly tenders to the father
Of fires a tribute something worth:
My verse, a shard-borne beetle rather,
Drones over scarce-illumined earth.
Some inches round me though it brighten
With light of music-making thought,
The dark indeed it may not lighten,
The silence moves not, hearing nought.
Only my heart is eased with hearing,
Only mine eyes are soothed with seeing,
A face brought nigh, a footfall nearing,
Till hopes take form and dreams have being.
IX.
As a poor man hungering stands with insatiate eyes and hands
Void of bread
Right in sight of men that feast while his famine with no least
Crumb is fed,
Here across the garden-wall can I hear strange children call,
Watch them play,
From the windowed seat above, whence the goodlier child I love
Is away.
Here the sights we saw together moved his fancy like a feather
To and fro,
Now to wonder, and thereafter to the sunny storm of laughter
Loud and low
Sights engraven on storied pages where man's tale of seven swift ages
All was told
Seen of eyes yet bright from heaven for the lips that laughed were seven
Sweet years old.
X.
Why should May remember
March, if March forget
The days that began with December,
The nights that a frost could fret?
All their griefs are done with
Now the bright months bless
Fit souls to rejoice in the sun with,
Fit heads for the wind's caress;
Souls of children quickening
With the whole world's mirth,
Heads closelier than field-flowers thickening
That crowd and illuminate earth,
Now that May's call musters
Files of baby bands
To marshal in joyfuller clusters
Than the flowers that encumber their hands.
Yet morose November
Found them no less gay,
With nought to forget or remember
Less bright than a branch of may.
All the seasons moving
Move their minds alike
Applauding, acclaiming, approving
All hours of the year that strike.
So my heart may fret not,
Wondering if my friend
Remember me not or forget not
Or ever the month find end.
Not that love sows lighter
Seed in children sown,
But that life being lit in them brighter
Moves fleeter than even our own.
May nor yet September
Binds their hearts, that yet
Remember, forget, and remember,
Forget, and recall, and forget
XI.
As light on a lake's face moving
Between a cloud and a cloud
Till night reclaim it, reproving
The heart that exults too loud,
The heart that watching rejoices
When soft it swims into sight
Applauded of all the voices
And stars of the windy night,
So brief and unsure, but sweeter
Than ever a moondawn smiled,
Moves, measured of no tune's metre,
The song in the soul of a child;
The song that the sweet soul singing
Half listens, and hardly hears,
Though sweeter than joy-bells ringing
And brighter than joy's own tears;
The song that remembrance of pleasure
Begins, and forgetfulness ends
With a soft swift change in the measure
That rings in remembrance of friends
As the moon on the lake's face flashes,
So haply may gleam at whiles
A dream through the dear deep lashes
Whereunder a child's eye smiles,
And the least of us all that love him
May take for a moment part
With angels around and above him,
And I find place in his heart
XII.
Child, were you kinless and lonely
Dear, were you kin to me
My love were compassionate only
Or such as it needs would be.
But eyes of father and mother
Like sunlight shed on you shine:
What need you have heed of another
Such new strange love as is mine?
It is not meet if unruly
Hands take of the children's bread
And cast it to dogs; but truly
The dogs after all would be fed.
On crumbs from the children's table
That crumble, dropped from above,
Mr heart feeds, fed with unstable
Loose waifs of a child's light love.
Though love in your heart were brittle
As glass that breaks with a touch,
You haply would lend him a little
Who surely would give you much.
XIII.
Here is a rough
Rude sketch of my friend,
Faint-coloured enough
And unworthily penned.
Fearlessly fair
And triumphant he stands,
And holds unaware
Friends' hearts in his hands;
Stalwart and straight
As an oak that should bring
Forth gallant and great
Fresh roses in spring.
On the paths of his pleasure
All graces that wait
What metre shall measure
What rhyme shall relate
Each action, each motion,
Each feature, each limb,
Demands a devotion
In honour of him:
Head that the hand
Of a god might have blest,
Laid lustrous and bland
On the curve of its crest:
Mouth sweeter than cherries
Keen eyes as of Mars
Browner than berries
And brighter than stars.
Nor colour nor wordy
Weak song can declare
The stature how sturdy,
How stalwart his air.
As a king in his bright
Presence-chamber may be,
So seems he in height
Twice higher than your knee.
As a warrior sedate
With reserve of his power,
So seems he in state
As tall as a flower:
As a rose overtowering
The ranks of the rest
That beneath it lie cowering,
Less bright than their best
And his hands are as sunny
As ruddy ripe corn
Or the browner-hued honey
From heather-bells borne.
When summer sits proudest,
Fulfilled with its mirth,
And rapture is loudest
In air and on earth,
The suns of all hours
That have ripened the roots
Bring forth not such flowers
And beget not such fruits.
And well though I know it,
As fain would I write,
Child, never a poet
Could praise you aright.
I bless you? the blessing
Were less than a jest
Too poor for expressing;
I come to be blest,
With humble and dutiful
Heart, from above:
Bless me, O my beautiful
Innocent love!
This rhyme in your praise
With a smile was begun;
But the goal of his ways
Is uncovered to none,
Nor pervious till after
The limit impend;
It is not in laughter
These rhymes of you end.
XIV.
Spring, and fall, and summer, and winter,
Which may Earth love least of them all,
Whose arms embrace as their signs imprint her,
Summer, or winter, or spring, or fall?
The clear-eyed spring with the wood-birds mating,
The rose-red summer with eyes aglow,
The yellow fall with serene eyes waiting,
The wild-eyed winter with hair all snow?
Spring's eyes are soft, but if frosts benumb her
As winter's own will her shrewd breath sting:
Storms may rend the raiment of summer,
And fall grow bitter as harsh-lipped spring.
One sign for summer and winter guides me,
One for spring, and the like for fall:
Whichever from sight of my friend divides me,
That is the worst ill season of all.
XV.
Worse than winter is spring
If I come not to sight of my king:
But then what a spring will it be
When my king takes homage of me!
I send his grace from afar
Homage, as though to a star;
As a shepherd whose flock takes flight
May worship a star by night.
As a flock that a wolf is upon
My songs take flight and are gone:
No heart is in any to sing
Aught but the praise of my king.
Fain would I once and again
Sing deeds and passions of men:
But ever a child's head gleams
Between my work and my dreams.
Between my hand and my eyes
The lines of a small face rise,
And the lines I trace and retrace
Are none but those of the face.
XVI.
Till the tale of all this flock of days alike
All be done,
Weary days of waiting till the month's hand strike
Thirty-one,
Till the clock's hand of the month break off, and end
With the clock,
Till the last and whitest sheep at last be penned
Of the flock,
I their shepherd keep the count of night and day
With my song,
Though my song be, like this month which once was May,
All too long.
XVII.
The incarnate sun, a tall strong youth,
On old Greek eyes in sculpture smiled:
But trulier had it given the truth
To shape him like a child.
No face full-grown of all our dearest
So lightens all our darkness, none
Most loved of all our hearts hold nearest
So far outshines the sun,
As when with sly shy smiles that feign
Doubt if the hour be clear, the time
Fit to break off my work again
Or sport of prose or rhyme,
My friend peers in on me with merry
Wise face, and though the sky stay dim
The very light of day, the very
Sun's self comes in with him.
XVIII.
Out of sight,
Out of mind!
Could the light
Prove unkind?
Can the sun
Quite forget
What was done
Ere he set?
Does the moon
When she wanes
Leave no tune
That remains
In the void
Shell of night
Overcloyed
With her light?
Must the shore
At low tide
Feel no more
Hope or pride,
No intense
Joy to be,
In the sense
Of the sea
In the pulses
Of her shocks
It repulses,
When its rocks
Thrill and ring
As with glee?
Has my king
Cast off me,
Whom no bird
Flying south
Brings one word
From his mouth?
Not the ghost
Of a word
Riding post
Have I heard,
Since the day
When my king
Took away
With him spring,
And the cup
Of each flower
Shrivelled up
That same hour,
With no light
Left behind.
Out of sight,
Out of mind!
XIX.
Because I adore you
And fall
On the knees of my spirit before you
After all,
You need not insult,
My king,
With neglect, though your spirit exult
In the spring,
Even me, though not worth,
God knows,
One word of you sent me in mirth,
Or one rose
Out of all in your garden
That grow
Where the frost and the wind never harden
Flakes of snow,
Nor ever is rain
At all,
But the roses rejoice to remain
Fair and tall
The roses of love,
More sweet
Than blossoms that rain from above
Round our feet,
When under high bowers
We pass,
Where the west wind freckles with flowers
All the grass.
But a child's thoughts bear
More bright
Sweet visions by day, and more fair
Dreams by night,
Than summer's whole treasure
Can be:
What am I that his thought should take pleasure,
Then, in me?
I am only my love's
True lover,
With a nestful of songs, like doves
Under cover,
That I bring in my cap
Fresh caught,
To be laid on my small king's lap
Worth just nought
Yet it haply may hap
That he,
When the mirth in his veins is as sap
In a tree,
Will remember me too
Some day
Ere the transit be thoroughly through
Of this May
Or perchance, if such grace
May be,
Some night when I dream of his face,
Dream of me.
Or if this be too high
A hope
For me to prefigure in my
Horoscope,
He may dream of the place
Where we
Basked once in the light of his face,
Who now see
Nought brighter, not one
Thing bright,
Than the stars and the moon and the sun,
Day nor night
XX.
Day by darkling day,
Overpassing, bears away
Somewhat of the burden of this weary May.
Night by numbered night,
Waning, brings more near in sight
Hope that grows to vision of my heart's delight
Nearer seems to burn
In the dawn's rekindling urn
Flame of fragrant incense, hailing his return.
Louder seems each bird
In the brightening branches heard
Still to speak some ever more delightful word.
All the mists that swim
Round the dawns that grow less dim
Still wax brighter and more bright with hope of him,
All the suns that rise
Bring that day more near our eyes
When the sight of him shall clear our clouded skies.
All the winds that roam
Fruitful fields or fruitless foam
Blow the bright hour near that brings his bright face home,
XXI.
I hear of two far hence
In a garden met,
And the fragrance blown from thence
Fades not yet.
The one is seven years old,
And my friend is he:
But the years of the other have told
Eighty-three.
To hear these twain converse
Or to see them greet
Were sweeter than softest verse
May be sweet.
The hoar old gardener there
With an eye more mild
Perchance than his mild white hair
Meets the child.
I had rather hear the words
That the twain exchange
Than the songs of all the birds
There that range,
Call, chirp, and twitter there
Through the garden-beds
Where the sun alike sees fair
Those two heads,
And which may holier be
Held in heaven of those
Or more worth heart's thanks to see
No man knows.
XXII.
Of such is the kingdom of heaven.
No glory that ever was shed
From the crowning star of the seven
That crown the north world's head,
No word that ever was spoken
Of human or godlike tongue,
Gave ever such godlike token
Since human harps were strung.
No sign that ever was given
To faithful or faithless eyes
Showed ever beyond clouds riven
So clear a Paradise.
Earth's creeds may be seventy times seven
And blood have denied each creed:
If of such be the kingdom of heaven,
It must be heaven indeed
XXIII.
The wind on the downs is bright
As though from the sea:
And morning and night
Take comfort again with me.
He is nearer to-day,
Each night to each morning saith,
Whose return shall revive dead May
With the balm of his breath.
The sunset says to the moon,
He is nearer to-night
Whose coming in June
Is looked for more than the light.
Bird answers to bird,
Hour passes the sign on to hour,
And for joy of the bright news heard
Flower murmurs to flower.
The ways that were glad of his feet
In the woods that he knew
Grow softer to meet
The sense of his footfall anew.
He is near now as day,
Says hope to the new-born light:
He is near now as June is to May,
Says love to the night.
XXIV.
Good things I keep to console me
For lack of the best of all,
A child to command and control me,
Bid come and remain at his call
Sun, wind, and woodland and highland,
Give all that ever they gave:
But my world is a cultureless island,
My spirit a masterless slave.
And friends are about me, and better
At summons of no man stand:
But I pine for the touch of a fetter,
The curb of a strong king's hand.
Each hour of the day in her season
Is mine to be served as I will:
And for no more exquisite reason
Are all served idly and ill
By slavery my sense is corrupted,
My soul not fit to be free:
I would fain be controlled, interrupted,
Compelled as a thrall may be.
For fault of spur and of bridle
I tire of my stall to death:
My sail flaps joyless and idle
For want of a small child's breath.
XXV.
Whiter and whiter
The dark lines grow,
And broader opens and brighter
The sense of the text below.
Nightfall and morrow
Bring nigher the boy
Whom wanting we want not sorrow,
Whom having we want no joy.
Clearer and clearer
The sweet sense grows
Of the word which hath summer for hearer,
The word on the lips of the rose.
Duskily dwindles
Each deathlike day,
Till June realising rekindles
The depth of the darkness of May.
XXVI.
'In his bright radiance and collateral light
Must I be comforted, not in his sphere.'
Stars in heaven are many,
Suns in heaven but one:
Nor for man may any
Star supplant the sun.
Many a child as joyous
As our far-off king
Meets as though to annoy us
In the paths of spring.
Sure as spring gives warning,
All things dance in tune:
Sun on Easter morning,
Cloud and windy moon,
Stars between the tossing
Boughs of tuneful trees.
Sails of ships recrossing
Leagues of dancing seas;
Best, in all this playtime,
Best of all in tune,
Girls more glad than Maytime,
Boys more bright than June;
Mixed with all those dances,
Far through field and street
Sing their silent glances,
Ring their radiant feet.
Flowers wherewith May crowned us
Fall ere June be crowned:
Children blossom round us
All the whole year round.
Is the garland worthless
For one rose the less,
And the feast made mirthless?
Love, at least, says yes.
Strange it were, with many
Stars enkindling air,
Should but one find any
Welcome: strange it were,
Had one star alone won
Praise for light from far:
Nay, love needs his own one
Bright particular star.
Hope and recollection
Only lead him right
In its bright reflection
And collateral light.
Find as yet we may not
Comfort in its sphere:
Yet these days will weigh not
When it warms us here;
When full-orbed it rises,
Now divined afar:
None in all the skies is
Half so good a star;
None that seers importune
Till a sign be won:
Star of our good fortune,
Rise and reign, our sun!
XXVII.
I pass by the small room now forlorn
Where once each night as I passed I knew
A child's bright sleep from even to morn
Made sweet the whole night through.
As a soundless shell, as a songless nest,
Seems now the room that was radiant then
And fragrant with his happier rest
Than that of slumbering men.
The day therein is less than the day,
The night is indeed night now therein:
Heavier the dark seems there to weigh,
And slower the dawns begin.
As a nest fulfilled with birds, as a shell
Fulfilled with breath of a god's own hymn,
Again shall be this bare blank cell,
Made sweet again with him.
XXVIII.
Spring darkens before us,
A flame going down,
With chant from the chorus
Of days without crown
Cloud, rain, and sonorous
Soft wind on the down.
She is wearier not of us
Than we of the dream
That spring was to love us
And joy was to gleam
Through the shadows above us
That shift as they stream.
Half dark and half hoary,
Float far on the loud
Mild wind, as a glory
Half pale and half proud
From the twilight of story,
Her tresses of cloud;
Like phantoms that glimmer
Of glories of old
With ever yet dimmer
Pale circlets of gold
As darkness grows grimmer
And memory more cold.
Like hope growing clearer
With wane of the moon,
Shines toward us the nearer
Gold frontlet of June,
And a face with it dearer
Than midsummer noon.
XXIX.
You send me your love in a letter,
I send you my love in a song:
Ah child, your gift is the better,
Mine does you but wrong.
No fame, were the best less brittle,
No praise, were it wide as earth,
Is worth so much as a little
Child's love may be worth.
We see the children above us
As they might angels above:
Come back to us, child, if you love us,
And bring us your love.
XXX.
No time for books or for letters:
What time should there be?
No room for tasks and their fetters:
Full room to be free.
The wind and the sun and the Maytirne
Had never a guest
More worthy the most that his playtime
Could give of its best.
If rain should come on, peradventure,
(But sunshine forbid!)
Vain hope in us haply might venture
To dream as it did.
But never may come, of all comers
Least welcome, the rain,
To mix with his servant the summer's
Rose-garlanded train!
He would write, but his hours are as busy
As bees in the sun,
And the jubilant whirl of their dizzy
Dance never is done.
The message is more than a letter,
Let love understand,
And the thought of his joys even better
Than sight of his hand.
XXXI.
Wind, high-souled, full-hearted
South-west wind of the spring!
Ere April and earth had parted,
Skies, bright with thy forward wing,
Grew dark in an hour with the shadow behind it, that bade not a bird dare sing.
Wind whose feet are sunny,
Wind whose wings are cloud,
With lips more sweet than honey
Still, speak they low or loud,
Rejoice now again in the strength of thine heart: let the depth of thy soul wax proud.
We hear thee singing or sighing,
Just not given to sight,
All but visibly flying
Between the clouds and the light,
And the light in our hearts is enkindled, the shadow therein of the clouds put to flight.
From the gift of thine hands we gather
The core of the flowers therein,
Keen glad heart of heather,
Hot sweet heart of whin,
Twin breaths in thy godlike breath close blended of wild spring's wildest of kin.
All but visibly beating
We feel thy wings in the far
Clear waste, and the plumes of them fleeting,
Soft as swan's plumes are,
And strong as a wild swan's pinions, and swift as the flash of the flight of a star.
As the flight of a planet enkindled
Seems thy far soft flight
Now May's reign has dwindled
And the crescent of June takes light
And the presence of summer is here, and the hope of a welcomer presence in sight.
Wind, sweet-souled, great-hearted
Southwest wind on the wold!
From us is a glory departed
That now shall return as of old,
Borne back on thy wings as an eagle's expanding, and crowned with the sundawn's gold.
There is not a flower but rejoices,
There is not a leaf but has heard:
All the fields find voices,
All the woods are stirred:
There is not a nest but is brighter because of the coming of one bright bird.
Out of dawn and morning,
Noon and afternoon,
The sun to the world gives warning
Of news that brightens the moon;
And the stars all night exult with us, hearing of joy that shall come with June. |
The Miller, His Son And The Ass. | Jean de La Fontaine | A Miller and Son once set out for the fair,
To sell a fine ass they had brought up with care;
And the way that they started made everyone stare.
To keep the Ass fresh, so the beast would sell dear
On a pole they slung him. It surely seemed queer:
He looked, with heels up, like some huge chandelier.
One person who passed them cried out in great glee.
"Was there anything ever so silly?" said he.
"Can you guess who the greatest Ass is of those three?"
The Miller at once put the brute on the ground;
And the Ass, who had liked to ride t'other way round,
Complained in language of curious sound.
No matter. The Miller now made his Son ride,
While he followed after or walked alongside.
Then up came three merchants. The eldest one cried;
"Get down there, young fellow! I never did see
Such manners: - a gray-beard walks where you should be.
He should ride, you should follow. Just take that from me!"
"Dear Sirs," quoth the Miller, "I'd see you content."
He climbed to the saddle; on foot the boy went...
Three girls passed. Said one: "Do you see that old Gent?
There he sits, like a bishop. I say it's a shame,
While that boy trudging after seems more than half lame."
"Little girl," said the Miller, "go back whence you came."
Yet this young creature so worked on his mind
That he wanted no woman to call him unkind:
And he said to his Son: "Seat yourself here - behind."
With the Ass bearing double they jogged on again,
And once more met a critic, who said: "It is plain
Only dunces would give their poor donkey such pain.
He will die with their weight: it's a shame and a sin.
For their faithful servant they care not a pin.
They'll have nothing to sell at the fair but his skin."
"Dear me!" said the Miller, "what am I to do?
Must I suit the whole world and the world's father, too?
Yet it must end some time - so I'll see the thing through."
Both Father and Son now decided to walk,
While the Ass marched in front with a strut and a stalk;
Yet the people who passed them continued to talk.
Said one to another: "Look there, if you please,
How they wear out their shoes, while their Ass takes his ease.
Were there ever, d'ye think, three such asses as these?"
Said the Miller: "You're right. I'm an Ass! It is true.
Too long have I listened to people like you.
But now I am done with the whole kit and crew.
"Let them blame me or praise me, keep silent or yell,
My goings and comings they cannot compel.
I will do as I please!"...So he did - and did well. |
The Gold-Spinner. | Clara Doty Bates | A miller had a daughter,
And lovely, too, she was;
Her step was light, her smile was bright,
Her eyes were gray as glass.
(So Chaucer loved to write of eyes
In which that nameless azure lies
So like shoal-water in its hue,
Though all too crystal clear for blue.)
As you would suppose, the miller
Was very proud of her,
And would never fail to tell some tale
As to what her graces were.
On the powdery air of his own mill
Floated the whispers of her skill;
At the village inn the loungers knew
All that the pretty girl could do.
Oft in his braggart way
This foolish tale he told,
That his daughter could spin from bits of straw
Continuous threads of gold!
So boastful had he grown, forsooth,
That he cared but little for the truth:
But since this was a curious thing
It came to the knowledge of the king.
He thought it an old wife's fable,
But senseless stuff at best;
Yet, as he had greed, he cried, "Indeed!
I will put her powers to test."
With a wave of his hand, he further said
That to-morrow morning the clever maid
Should come to the castle, and he would see
What truth in the story there might be.
Next day, with a trembling step,
She reached the palace door,
And was shown into a chamber, where
Was straw upon the floor.
They brought her a chair and a spinning-wheel,
A little can of oil, and a reel;
And said that unless the work was done--
All of the straw into the gold-thread spun--
By the time that the sun was an hour high
Next morning, she would have to die.
Down sat she in despair,
Her tears falling like rain:
She had never spun a thread in her life,
Nor ever reeled a skein!
Hark! the door creaked, and through a chink,
With droll wise smile and funny wink,
In stepped a little quaint old man,
All humped, and crooked, and browned with tan.
She looked in fear and amaze
To see what he would do;
He said, "Little maid, what will you give
If I'll spin the straw for you?"
Ah, me, few gifts she had in store--
A trinket or two, and nothing more!
A necklace from her throat so slim
She took, and timidly offered him.
'Twas enough, it seemed; for he sat
At the wheel in front of her,
And turned it three times round and round,
Whirr, and whirr-rr, and whirr-rr-rr--
One of the bobbins was full; and then,
Whirr, and whirr-rr, and whirr-rr-rr again,
Until all the straw that had been spread
Had been deftly spun into golden thread.
At sunrise came the king
To the chamber, and, behold,
Instead of the ugly heaps of straw
Were bobbins full of gold!
This made him greedier than before;
And he led the maiden out at the door
Into a new room, where she saw
Still larger and larger heaps of straw,
A chair to sit in, a spinning-wheel,
A little can of oil, and a reel;
And he said that straw, too, must be spun
To gold before the next day's sun
Was an hour high in the morning sky,
And if 'twas not done, she must die.
Down sank she in despair,
Her tears falling like rain;
She could not spin a single thread,
She could not reel a skein.
But the door swung back, and through the chink,
With the same droll smile and merry wink,
The dwarf peered, saying, "What will you do
If I'll spin the straw once more for you?"
"Ah me, I can give not a single thing,"
She cried, "except my finger-ring."
He took the slender toy,
And slipped it over his thumb;
Then down he sat and whirled the wheel,
Hum, and hum-m, and hum-m-m;
Round and round with a droning sound,
Many a yellow spool he wound,
Many a glistening skein he reeled;
And still, like bees in a clover-field,
The wheel went hum, and hum-m and hum-m-m.
Next morning the king came,
Almost before sunrise,
To the chamber where the maiden was,
And could scarce believe his eyes
To see the straw, to the smallest shreds,
Made into shining amber threads.
And he cried, "When once more I have tried
Your skill like this, you shall be my bride;
For I might search through all my life
Nor find elsewhere so rich a wife."
Then he led her by the hand
Through still another door,
To a room filled twice as full of straw
As either had been before.
There stood the chair and the spinning-wheel,
And there the can of oil and the reel;
And as he gently shut her in
He whispered, "Spin, little maiden, spin."
Again she wept, and again
Did the little dwarf appear;
"What will you give this time," he asked,
"If I spin for you, my dear?"
Alas--poor little maid--alas!
Out of her eyes as gray as glass
Faster and faster tears did fall,
As she moaned, "I've nothing to give at all."
Ah, wicked indeed he looked;
But while she sighed, he smiled!
"Promise, when you are queen," he said,
"To give me your first-born child!"
Little she tho't what that might mean,
Or if ever in truth she should be queen
Anything, so that the work was done--
Anything, so that the gold was spun!
She promised all that he chose to ask;
And blithely he began the task.
Round went the wheel, and round,
Whiz, and whiz-z, and whiz-z-z!
So swift that the thread at the spindle point
Flew off with buzz and hiss.
She dozed--so tired her eyelids were--
To the endless whirr, and whirr, and whirr;
Though not even sleep could overcome
The wheel's revolving hum, hum, hum!
When at last she woke the room was clean,
Not a broken bit of straw was seen;
But in huge high heaps were piled and rolled
Great spools of gold--nothing but gold!
It was just at the earliest peep of dawn,
And she was alone--the dwarf was gone.
It was indeed a marvellous thing
For a miller's daughter to wed a king;
But never was royal lady seen
More fair and sweet than this young queen.
The spinning dwarf she quite forgot
In the ease and pleasure of her lot;
And not until her first-born child
Into her face had looked and smiled
Did she remember the promise made;
Then her heart grew sick, her soul afraid.
One day her chamber door
Pushed open just a chink,
And she saw the well-known crooked dwarf,
His wise smile and his blink.
He claimed at once the promised child;
But she gave a cry so sad and wild
That even his heart was touched to hear;
And, after a little, drawing near,
He whispered and said: "You pledged
The baby, and I came;
But if in three days you can learn
By foul or fair my name--
By foul or fair, by wile or snare,
You can its syllables declare,
Then is the child yours--only then--
And me you shall never see again!"
He vanished from her sight,
And she called her pages in;
She sent one this way, and one that;
She called her kith and kin,
Bade one go here, and one go there,
Despatched them thither, everywhere--
That from each quarter each might bring
The oddest names he could to the king.
Next morning the dwarf appeared,
And the queen began to say,
"Caspar," "Balthassar," "Melchoir"--
But the dwarf cried out, "Nay, nay!"
Shaking his little crooked frame,
"That's not my name, that's not my name!"
The second day 'twas the same;
But the third a messenger
Came in from the mountains to the queen,
And told this tale to her:
That, riding under the forest boughs,
He came to a tiny, curious house;
Before it a feeble fire burned wan,
And about the fire was a little man;
In and out the brands among,
Dancing upon one leg, he sung:
"To-day I'll stew, and then I'll bake,
To-morrow I shall the queen's child take;
How fine that none is the secret in,
That my name is Rumpelstiltskin!"
The queen was overjoyed,
And when, due time next day,
The dwarf returned for the final word,
She made great haste to say:
"Is it Conrade?" "No,"--he shook his head.
"Is it Hans? or Hal?" Still "No," he said.
"Is it Rumpelstiltskin?" then she cried.
"A witch has told you," he replied,
And shrieked and stamped his foot so hard
That the very marble floor was jarred;
And his leg broke off above the knee,
And he hopped off, howling terribly.
He vanished then and there,
And never more was seen!
This much was in his dreadful name--
It saved her child to the queen.
And the little lady grew to be
So very sweet, so fair to see,
That none could her loveliness surpass;
And her eyes--they were as gray as glass! |
Assumption | Madison Julius Cawein | I.
A mile of moonlight and the whispering wood:
A mile of shadow and the odorous lane:
One large, white star above the solitude,
Like one sweet wish: and, laughter after pain,
Wild-roses wistful in a web of rain.
II.
No star, no rose, to lesson him and lead;
No woodsman compass of the skies and rocks,
Tattooed of stars and lichens, doth love need
To guide him where, among the hollyhocks,
A blur of moonlight, gleam his sweetheart's locks.
III.
We name it beauty that permitted part,
The love-elected apotheosis
Of Nature, which the god within the heart,
Just touching, makes immortal, but by this
A star, a rose, the memory of a kiss. |
Buds And Babies. | Christina Georgina Rossetti | A million buds are born that never blow,
That sweet with promise lift a pretty head
To blush and wither on a barren bed
And leave no fruit to show.
Sweet, unfulfilled. Yet have I understood
One joy, by their fragility made plain:
Nothing was ever beautiful in vain,
Or all in vain was good. |
A March In The Ranks, Hard-Prest | Walt Whitman | A march in the ranks hard-prest, and the road unknown;
A route through a heavy wood, with muffled steps in the darkness;
Our army foil'd with loss severe, and the sullen remnant retreating;
Till after midnight glimmer upon us, the lights of a dim-lighted
building;
We come to an open space in the woods, and halt by the dim-lighted
building;
'Tis a large old church at the crossing roads--'tis now an impromptu
hospital;
--Entering but for a minute, I see a sight beyond all the pictures
and poems ever made:
Shadows of deepest, deepest black, just lit by moving candles and
lamps,
And by one great pitchy torch, stationary, with wild red flame, and
clouds of smoke;
By these, crowds, groups of forms, vaguely I see, on the floor, some
in the pews laid down;
At my feet more distinctly, a soldier, a mere lad, in danger of
bleeding to death, (he is shot in the abdomen;)
I staunch the blood temporarily, (the youngster's face is white as a
lily;)
Then before I depart I sweep my eyes o'er the scene, fain to absorb
it all;
Faces, varieties, postures beyond description, most in obscurity,
some of them dead;
Surgeons operating, attendants holding lights, the smell of ether,
the odor of blood;
The crowd, O the crowd of the bloody forms of soldiers--the yard
outside also fill'd;
Some on the bare ground, some on planks or stretchers, some in the
death-spasm sweating;
An occasional scream or cry, the doctor's shouted orders or calls;
The glisten of the little steel instruments catching the glint of the
torches;
These I resume as I chant--I see again the forms, I smell the
odor;
Then hear outside the orders given, Fall in, my men, Fall in;
But first I bend to the dying lad--his eyes open--a half-smile gives
he me;
Then the eyes close, calmly close, and I speed forth to the darkness,
Resuming, marching, ever in darkness marching, on in the ranks,
The unknown road still marching. |
A Man Young And Old:- The Mermaid | William Butler Yeats | A mermaid found a swimming lad,
Picked him for her own,
Pressed her body to his body,
Laughed; and plunging down
Forgot in cruel happiness
That even lovers drown. |
The Hunter's Carol. | George Pope Morris | A merry life does the hunter lead!
He wakes with the dawn of day;
He whistles his dog--he mounts his steed,
And scuds to he woods away!
The lightsome tramp of the deer he'll mark,
As they troop in herds along;
And his rifle startles the cheerful lark
As he carols his morning song!
The hunter's life is the life for me!--
That is the life for a man!
Let others sing of a home on the sea,
But match me the woods if you can!
Then give me a gun--I've an eye to mark
The deer as they bound along!--
My steed, dog, and gun, and the cheerful lark
To carol my morning song! |
Spinosa. | Friedrich Schiller | A mighty oak here ruined lies,
Its top was wont to kiss the skies,
Why is it now o'erthrown?
The peasants needed, so they said,
Its wood wherewith to build a shed,
And so they've cut it down. |
Mickey Mollynoo | Edward Dyson | A mile-long panto dragon ploddin' 'opeless all the day,
Stuffed out with kits, 'n' spiked with rifles, steamin' in its sweat,
A-heavin' down the misty road, club-footed through the clay,
By waggons bogged 'n' buckin' guns, the wildest welter yet,
Like 'arf creation's tenants shiftin' early in the wet.
We're marchin' out, we dunno where, to meet we dunno who;
But here we lights eventual, 'n' sighs 'n' slips the kit,
'N', 'struth, the first to take us on is Mickie Mollynoo!
A copper of the Port he was, when 'istory was writ.
Sez I : 'We're sent to face the foe, 'n', selp me, this is It.'
A shine John. Hop is Mollynoo. A mix-up with the push
Is all his joy. One evenin' when his baton's flyin' free
I takes a baby brick, 'n' drives it hard agin the cush,
'N' Privit Mick is scattered out fer all the world to see,
But not afore indelible he's put his mark on me.
I got the signs Masonic all inlaid along me lug
Where Molly, P.C., swiped me in them 'appy, careless days.
He's sargin' now, a vet'ran; I'm a newchum and a mug,
'N' when he sorter fixes me there's some- thin' in his gaze
That's pensive like. 'Move on!' sez he. 'Keep movin' there!' he says.
If after this I dreams of scraps promiscuous and crool,
The mills in Butcher's Alley when the watch is on the wine,
Those nights he raided Wylie's shed to break the two-up school,
I takes a screw at Molly. With a grin that ain't divine
He's toyin' with a scar of old I reckernise as mine.
'N' so I'm layin' for it, 'n' I'm wonderin' how 'n' what.
We're signed on with the Germans, 'n' there ain't a vacant date;
But sure it's comin' to me, 'n' it's comin' 'ard 'n' 'ot.
Me lurk is patient waitin', but I'm trimmin' while I wait
A brick to jab or swing with, in a willin' tatertate.
Oh, judge me wonder! There's a scrim that follers on a raid.
I'm roughin' it all-in with Hans. He sock me such a bat
I slides on somethin' narsty, 'n' me little grave is made;
But Molly butts my Hun, 'n' leaves no face beneath his hat,
'N', ''Scuse me, Mister Herr,' sez he, 'I have a lien on that!'
He helps me under cover, 'n' he 'ands me somethin' wet
(I've got a lick or two that leaves me feelin' pretty sick).
'Lor love yeh, ole John Hop,' sez I, 'yiv buried me in debt.'
'Don't minton ut at all,' he sez, 'n' eyes me arf-a-tick.
'N' back there in the trench I sits, 'n' trims another brick.
'Tis all this how a month or more; then Mollynoo sez he:
'Come aisy, Jumm, yeh loafer, little hell 'n' all to view.
A job most illegant is on, cut out fer you 'n' me.
The damnedest, dirtiest fighter on the Continent is you,
Bar one, yeh gougin' thafe, 'n' that is Sargin' Mollynoo!'
I take, with knife 'n' pistol, arf a brick to line me shirt.
We creeps a thousan' yards or so to jigger up a gun
Which seven Huns is workin' on the Irish like a squirt.
We gets across them, me 'n' him. I pots the extra one;
Mick chokes his third in comfort, 'n', be'old, the thing is done!
He stands above me, rakin' sweat from off his gleamin' nut.
'Me dipper's leakin', Mick,' sez I; 'me leg is bit in two.'
Sez he: 'Bleed there in comfort, I'm for bringin' help, ye scut.'
He's back in twenty minutes, with a dillied German crew.
'Three'll carry in the gun,' sez he, 'the rest will carry you.'
I dunno how he got 'em, but he made them barrer me.
They lugged the gun before him, 'n' he yarded them like geese.
Then Mickie s'lutes the Major. 'They're in custody,' sez he,
'Fer conduc' calculated to provoke a breach iv peace,
A-tearin' iv me uniform, 'n' 'saultin' the po-lice.'
Then down he dumped. His wounds would make a 'arf a column list.
When hack to front I chucks me bricks 'n' smiles the best I can.
He grins at me: 'Yer right,' sez he, 'Hold out yer bla'-guard fist,
I couldn't fight yeh, blarst yeh, if yeh dinted in me pan.
This messin' round wid Germans makes a chicken iv a man.' |
A Satisfactory Reform | Ellis Parker Butler | A merry burgomaster
In a burgh upon the Rhine
Said, 'Our burghers all are
Far too fond of drinking wine.'
So the merry burgomaster,
When the burgomasters met,
Bade them look into the matter
Ere the thing went farther yet.
And the merry burgomasters
Did decide the only way
To alleviate the evil
Without worry or delay
Would be just to call a meeting
Of the burghers, great and small,
And then open every wine cask
And proceed to drink it all.
'For,' they said, 'when we have swallowed
Every drop that's in the land,
There can be no more of drinking,
It is plain to understand.'
So they called a monster meeting,
And the burghers, small and great,
Drank and drank until they were too
Tipsy to perambulate.
But there still was wine in plenty,
So, in sooth, the only way
Was to call another meeting;
So they called it for next day.
Thus from day to day the burghers
Met and swallowed seas of wine,
And they vowed the reformation
Was a mission quite divine.
And today the worthy burghers
In that burgh upon the Rhine
Still continue their great mission,
And still swallow seas of wine.
And they vow they will not falter
In their great reforming task
Till the last drop has been emptied
From the very last wine cask.
|
An Oath. (From 'Troy Town'.) | Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch | A month ago Lysander pray'd
To Jove, to Cupid, and to Venus,
That he might die if he betray'd
A single vow that pass'd between us.
Ah, careless gods, to hear so ill
And cheat a maid on you relying!
For false Lysander's thriving still,
And 'tis Corinna lies a-dying. |
The Ass Loaded With Sponges, And The Ass Loaded With Salt. | Jean de La Fontaine | [1]
A man, whom I shall call an ass-eteer,
His sceptre like some Roman emperor bearing,
Drove on two coursers of protracted ear,
The one, with sponges laden, briskly faring;
The other lifting legs
As if he trod on eggs,
With constant need of goading,
And bags of salt for loading.
O'er hill and dale our merry pilgrims pass'd,
Till, coming to a river's ford at last,
They stopp'd quite puzzled on the shore.
Our asseteer had cross'd the stream before;
So, on the lighter beast astride,
He drives the other, spite of dread,
Which, loath indeed to go ahead,
Into a deep hole turns aside,
And, facing right about,
Where he went in, comes out;
For duckings two or three
Had power the salt to melt,
So that the creature felt
His burden'd shoulders free.
The sponger, like a sequent sheep,
Pursuing through the water deep,
Into the same hole plunges
Himself, his rider, and the sponges.
All three drank deeply: asseteer and ass
For boon companions of their load might pass;
Which last became so sore a weight,
The ass fell down,
Belike to drown,
His rider risking equal fate.
A helper came, no matter who.
The moral needs no more ado -
That all can't act alike, -
The point I wish'd to strike. |
The Urban Rat And The Suburban Rat | Guy Wetmore Carryl | A metropolitan rat invited
His country cousin in town to dine:
The country cousin replied, "Delighted."
And signed himself, "Sincerely thine."
The town rat treated the country cousin
To half a dozen
Kinds of wine.
He served him terrapin, kidneys devilled,
And roasted partridge, and candied fruit;
In Little Neck Clams at first they revelled,
And then in Pommery, sec and brut;
The country cousin exclaimed: "Such feeding
Proclaims your breeding
Beyond dispute!"
But just as, another bottle broaching,
They came to chicken en casserole
A ravenous cat was heard approaching,
And, passing his guest a finger-bowl,
The town rat murmured, "The feast is ended."
And then descended
The nearest hole.
His cousin followed him, helter-skelter,
And, pausing beneath the pantry floor,
He glanced around at their dusty shelter
And muttered, "This is a beastly bore.
My place as an epicure resigning,
I'll try this dining
In town no more.
"You must dine some night at my rustic cottage;
I'll warn you now that it's simple fare:
A radish or two, a bowl of pottage,
And the wine that's known as ordinaire,
But for holes I haven't to make a bee-line,
No prowling feline
Molests me there.
"You smile at the lot of a mere commuter,
You think that my life is hard, mayhap,
But I'm sure than you I am far acuter:
I ain't afraid of no cat nor trap."
The city rat could but meekly stammer,
"Don't use such grammar,
My worthy chap."
He dined next night with his poor relation,
And caught dyspepsia, and lost his train,
He waited an hour in the lonely station,
And said some things that were quite profane.
"I'll never," he cried, in tones complaining,
"Try entertaining
That rat again."
It's easy to make a memorandum
About THE MORAL these verses teach:
De gustibus non est dispuiandum;
The meaning of which Etruscan speech
Is wheresoever you're hunger quelling
Pray keep your dwelling
In easy reach.
|
Puss In Boots. | Clara Doty Bates | Versified by Mrs. Clara Doty Bates.
A miller had three sons,
And, on his dying day,
He willed that all he owned should be
Shared by them in this way:
The mill to this, and the donkey to that,
And to the youngest only the cat.
This last, poor fellow, of course
Thought it a bitter fate;
With a cat to feed, he should die, indeed,
Of hunger, sooner or late.
And he stormed, with many a bitter word,
Which Puss, who lay in the cupboard, heard.
She stretched, and began to purr,
Then came to her master's knee,
And, looking slyly up, began:
"Pray be content with me!
Get me a pair of boots ere night,
And a bag, and it will be all right!"
The youth sighed heavy sighs,
And laughed a scornful laugh:
"Of all the silly things I know,
You're the silliest, by half!"
Still, after a space of doubt and thought,
The pair of boots and the bag were bought.
And Puss, at the peep of dawn,
Was out upon the street,
With shreds of parsley in her bag,
And the boots upon her feet.
She was on her way to the woods, for game,
And soon to the rabbit-warren came.
And the simple rabbits cried,
"The parsley smells like spring!"
And into the bag their noses slipped,
And Pussy pulled the string.
Only a kick, and a gasp for breath,
And, one by one, they were choked to death.
So Sly Boots bagged her game,
And gave it an easy swing
Over her shoulder; and, starting off
For the palace of the king,
She found him upon his throne, in state,
While near him his lovely daughter sate.
Puss made a graceful bow
No courtier could surpass,
And said, "I come to your Highness from
The Marquis of Carabas.
His loyal love he sends to you,
With a tender rabbit for a stew."
And the pretty princess smiled,
And the king said, "Many thanks."
And Puss strode off to her master's home,
Purring, and full of pranks.
And cried, "I've a splendid plan for you!
Say nothing, but do as I tell you to!
"To-morrow, at noon, the king
And his beautiful daughter ride;
And you must go, as they draw near,
And bathe at the river side."
The youth said "Pooh!" but still, next day,
Bathed, when the king went by that way.
Puss hid his dingy clothes
In the marshy river-grass.
And screamed, when the king came into sight,
"The Marquis of Carabas--
My master--is drowning close by!
Help! help! good king, or he will die!"
Then servants galloped fast,
And dragged him from the water.
"'Tis the knight who sent the rabbit stew,"
The king said, to his daughter.
And a suit of clothes was brought with speed,
And he rode in their midst, on a royal steed.
Meanwhile Puss, in advance,
To the Ogre's palace fled,
Where he sat, with a great club in his hand,
And a monstrous ugly head.
She mewed politely as she went in,
But he only grinned, with a dreadful grin.
"I have heard it said," she purred,
"That, with the greatest ease,
You change, in the twinkling of an eye,
Into any shape you please!"
"Of course I can!" the Ogre cried,
And a roaring lion stood at her side.
Puss shook like a leaf, in her boots,
But said, "It is very droll!
Now, please, if you can, change into a mouse!"
He did. And she swallowed him whole!
Then, as the king and his suite appeared,
She stood on the palace porch and cheered.
'Twas a grand old palace indeed,
Builded of stone and brass.
"Welcome, most noble ladies and lords,
To the Castle of Carabas!"
Puss said, with a sweeping courtesy;
And they entered, and feasted royally.
And the Marquis lost his heart
At the beautiful princess' smile;
And the very next day the two were wed,
In wonderful state and style.
And Puss in Boots was their favorite page,
And lived with them to a good old age. |
Cold | Madison Julius Cawein | A mist that froze beneath the moon and shook
Minutest frosty fire in the air.
All night the wind was still as lonely Care
Who sighs before her shivering ingle-nook.
The face of Winter wore a crueler look
Than when he shakes the icicles from his hair,
And, in the boisterous pauses, lets his stare
Freeze through the forest, fettering bough and brook.
He is the despot now who sits and dreams
Of Desolation and Despair, and smiles
At Poverty, who hath no place to rest,
Who wanders o'er Life's snow-made pathless miles,
And sees the Home-of-Comfort's window gleams,
And hugs her rag-wrapped baby to her breast.
|
Midwinter Madness. | Edward Shanks | A month or twain to live on honeycomb
Is pleasant, but to eat it for a year
Is simply beastly. Thus the poet spake,
Feeling how sticky all his stomach was
With hivings of ten thousand cheated bees.
O wisdom that could shape immortal words
And frame a diet for dyspeptic man!
But what of turnips? Come, a lyric now
Upon the luscious roots unsung as yet,
(Not roots I know but stalks; still, never mind,
Metre and sauce will suit them just as well)
Or shall we speak of omelettes? Muse, begin!
To feed a fortnight on transmuted eggs
Would doubtless be both comforting and cheap
But oh, the nausea on the fourteenth day!
I'd rather read a book by Ezra Pound
Then choke the seven hundredth omelette down,
Just as I'd rather read some F. S. Flint
Than live a month or twain on honeycomb.
O Ezra Pound! O omelette of the world!
Concocted with strange herbs from dead Provence,
Garlic from Italy and spice from Greece,
Having suffered a rare Pound-change on the way,
How rarely shouldst thou taste, were not the eggs
Laid in America and hither brought
Too late. I don't like omelettes made with fowls.
Take hence this Pound and put him to the test,
Try him with acid, see if he turn black
As will the best old silver, when enraged
At touching fungi of the baser sort.
(Forgive digression. These similitudes
Entrance me and I lose myself in them,
As schoolboys, picking flowers by the way,
Escape the angry usher's vigilance
And then, concealed behind a hedge or shed,
Produce the awesome pipe or thrice-lit fag
And make themselves incredibly unwell.)
My brain is bubbling and the thoughts will out,
But, Ezra Pound! they turn again to thee,
As surely as the lode-stone to the Pole
Or as the dog to what he hath cast up
(A simile of Solomon's, not mine)
And your shock head of damp, unwholesome hay,
Such as, the cunning farmer oft declares,
When stacked, will perish by spontaneous fire,
Frequents my dreams and makes them ludicrous.
Thou most ridiculous sprite! Thou ponderous fairy!
Bourgeois Bohemian! Innocent Verlaine!
I read in The Booksellers' Circular
That, in the University of Pa.
(Or Kans. or Col. or Mass, or Tex. or Ont.
A line of normal pattern, Saintsbury)
You hold a fellowship in (O merciful gods!)
Romanics, which strange word interpreted
Means, I suppose, the Romance languages.
Doubtless they read Italian in Pa.
And some may speak French fluently in Ont.
But German, Ezra! There's the bloody rub,
It's not Romance and it is hard to learn
And Heine, though an easy-going chap,
Would doubtless trounce you soundly if he knew
The sorry hash that you have made of him.
But no! you're not for immortality,
Not even such as that of Freiligrath,
Enshrined, together with his Mohrenfurst,
In unrelenting amber. I hold you here,
In a soap-bubble's iridescent walls,
The whimsy of a long midwinter night,
And give you immortality enough.
Thou sorry brat! Thou transatlantic clown!
That seek'st to ape the treadless Ariel
And out-top Shelley in an aeroplane,
Take the all-obvious padding from your pants
And cut your hair and go to Pa. again
(Or Kans. or Col. or Mass, or Tex. or Ont.
Or even Oomp. if such a place exist)
And take with you the poets you admire,
Both Yeats and Flint to charm the folk of Oomp.
And write again for Munsey's Magazine
Of your good brother Everyone. (Just God!
Am even I of his relationship?)
So end as you began or even worse:
No matter, so 'tis in America.
|
Baby Darling. | James McIntyre | A miner in California mine,
For his distant home he did repine,
In a far off Eastern state,
Where did live his own dear mate.
And one great source of all his joy,
His little darling baby boy,
One night to drive his cares away
To concert hall his footsteps stray.
And loud resounding o'er the hall,
He heard a little boy squall,
The sweetest music he e'er heard,
Sweeter far than singing bird.
For his thoughts it caused to roam,
To his distant eastern home,
Near to the mine there were no trace
Of baby dear or woman's face.
When violinist with his bow
Did make exquisite music flow,
The miner he did loudly bawl
Stop fiddle and let baby squall.
My sad heart his cries doth cheer,
Reminding me of my own dear,
For sooner I would him behold,
Than if I found a mine of gold.
For what are all the joys of life,
So far away from child and wife,
But few more months I will stay here
Then join my wife and baby dear.
|