Call forth the greens, and wake the rifing flow'rs;
When op'ning buds falute the welcome day,
And earth relenting feels the genial ray;
As balmy sleep had charm'd my cares to reft, 5
And love itself was banish'd from my breast,
(What time the morn mysterious vifions brings,
While purer flumbers spread their golden wings)
VER. 1. In that foft feafon etc.] This Poem is introduced in the manner of the Provencial Poets, whofe works were for the most part Visions, or pieces of imagination and conftantly descriptive. From these, Petrarch and Chaucer frequently borrow the idea of their poems. See the Trionfi of the former and the Dream, Flower and the Leaf, etc. of the latter. The Author of this therefore chose the same sort of Exordium.
A train of phantoms in wild order rose,
And, join'd, this intellectual scene compose.
I ftood, methought, betwixt earth, feas, and skies; The whole creation open to my eyes:
In air self-balanc'd hung the globe below,
Where mountains rife and circling oceans flow;
Here naked rocks, and empty wastes were seen,
There tow'ry cities, and the forefts green:
Here failing fhips delight the wand'ring eyes:
There trees, and intermingled temples rife ;
Now a clear fun the shining scene displays,
The tranfient landscape now in clouds decays. 20
O'er the wide Profpect as I gaz'd around,
Sudden I heard a wild promifcuous found,
Like broken thunders that at distance roar,
Or billows murm'ring on the hollow shore:
Then gazing up, a glorious pile beheld,
Whose tow'ring fummit ambient clouds conceal'd.
VER. II. etc.] These verses are hinted from the following of Chaucer, Book ii.
The beheld I fields and plains,
Now hills, and now mountains,
Now valeis, and now foreftes,
And now unneth great beftes,
Now rivers, now citees,
Now towns, now great trees,
Now hippes fayling in the fee. P.
High on a rock of Ice the structure lay,
Steep its afcent, and flipp'ry was the way;
The wond'rous rock like Parian marble fhone,
And feem'd, to distant fight, of solid stone. 30
Infcriptions here of various Names I view'd,
The greater part by hoftile time fubdu'd;
Yet wide was spread their fame in ages past,
And Poets once had promis'd they should last.
VER. 27. High on a rock of Ice etc.] Chaucer's third book of Fame.
It stood upon fo high a rock,
Higher ftandeth none in Spayne
What manner Stone this rock was,
For it was like a lymed glass,
But that it fhone full more clere ;
But of what congeled matere
It was, I nifte redily;
But at the last efpied I,
And found that it was every dele,
A rock of ife, and not of ftele.
VER. 31. Infcriptions here etc.]
The faw I all the hill y-grave
With famous folkes names fele,
That had been in much wele
And her fames wide y-blow;
But well unneth might I know,
Any letters for to rede
Ther names by, for out of drede
They weren almoft off-thawen fo,
That of the letters one or two
Were molte away of every name,
So unfamous was woxe her fame;
But men faid, what may ever laft. P.
Some fresh engrav'd appear'd of Wits renown'd;
I look'd again, nor could their trace be found. 36
Critics I faw, that other names deface,
And fix their own, with labour, in their place:
Their own, like others, foon their place refign'd,
Or disappear'd, and left the firft behind.
Nor was the work impair'd by storms alone,
But felt th'approaches of too warm a fun;
For Fame, impatient of extremes, decays
Not more by Envy than excess of Praise.
Yet part no injuries of heav'n could feel,
Like crystal faithful to the graving steel:
VER. 41. Nor was the work impair'd etc.]
Tho gan I in myne harte caft,
That they were molte away for heate,
And not away with formes beate.
VER. 45. Yet part no injuries etc.]
For on that other fide I fey
Of that hill which northward ley,
How it was written full of names
Of folke, that had afore great fames,
Of old time, and yet they were
As fresh as men had written hem there
The felf day, or that houre
That I on hem gan to poure:
But well I wifte what it made;
It was conferved with the fhade
(All the writing that I jye)
Of the castle that floode on high,
And flood eke in fo cold a place,
That heate might it not deface. P.
The rock's high fummit, in the temple's fhals
Nor heat could melt, nor beating storm invade,
Their names infcrib'd unnumber'd ages past
From time's first birth, with time itself shall laft; 50
These ever new, nor fubject to decays,
Spread, and grow brighter with the length of days.
So Zembla's rocks (the beauteous work of froft)
Rife white in air, and glitter o'er the coast;
Pale funs, unfelt, at diftance roll away,
And on th'impaffive ice the light'nings play;
Eternal fnows the growing mafs fupply,
Till the bright mountains prop th'incumbent sky:
As Atlas fix'd, each hoary pile appears,
The gather'd winter of a thousand years.
On this foundation Fame's high temple stands;
Stupendous pile! not rear'd by mortal hands.
Whate'er proud Rome or artful Greece beheld,
Or elder Babylon, its frame excell❜d.
Four faces had the dome, and ev'ry face
Of various structure, but of equal grace:
VER. 65. Four faces had the dome, etc.] The Temple is defcribed to be square, the four fronts with open gates facing the different quarters of the world, as an intimation that all nations of the earth may alike be received into it. The western front is of Grecian architecture: the Doric order was peculiarly facred to
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