once $ 132. Happy the Freedom of the Man whom With what he views. The landscape has his praise, r Grace makes free-His relish of the Works of God — Address to the Creator. COWPER. But noi its Author. Unconcern'd who form'd The paradise he sees, he finds it such ; He is the freeman whom the truth makes free, And, such well-pleas'd lo find it, asks no more. And all are slaves beside. There's not a chain Notso the mind thathasbeentouch'dfromHeav'lı, That hellish foes confed'rate for his harm And in the school of sacred wisdom taught Can wind around him, but he casts it off To read his wonders, in whose thought the world, With as much ease as Sainson his green withes. Fair as it is, existed ere it was : He looks abroad into the varied field Not for its own sake merely, but for his Of Nature ; and tho' poor, perhaps, compar'd Much more who fashion'd it, he gives it praise; With those whose mansions glitter in his sight, Praise that, from earth resulting, as it ought, Cails ihe delightful scen'ry all his own. To earth's acknowledg'd Sovereign, finds at His are the mountains, and the valleys his, And the resplendent rivers ; his t' enjoy Its only just proprietor in Him. With a propriety that none can feel, The soul thai sees him, or receives sublim'd But who, with filial confidence inspir'd, New faculties, or learns at least t' employ Can lift to Heaven an unpresumptuous eye, More worthily the pow'rs she own'd before, And smiling say-- My Father made them all : Discerns in all things, what, with stupid gaze Are they noi his by a peculiar right? Of ignorance, till then she overlook’d, And by an emphasis of int'rest his, Array of heavenly light gilding all forins Whose eye they fill with tears of holy joy, Terrestrial, in the vast and the minute, Whose heart with praise, and whoseexalted mind The unambiguous footsteps of the God With worthy thoughts of that unwearied love Who gives its lustre to an insect's wing, That plann'd, and built, and still upholds a world And wheels his throne upon the rolling worlds. So cloath'd with beauty, for rebellious man? Much conversant with Heaven, she often holds Yes - ye may fill your garners ; yc that reap With those fair ininisters of light to man, The loaded soil, and ye may waste much good That fill the skies nightly with silent pomp, In senseless riot; but ye will not find Sweet conference ! 'inquires what strains were In feast or in the chacé, in song or dance, they A liberty like his, who, unimpeach'd With which Heaven rang, when ev'ry star, in' Of usurpation, and to no man's wrong, haste Appropriates nature as his Father's work, To gratulate the new created earth, And has a richer use of yours than you. Sent forth a voice, and all the sons of God He is indeed a freeman ; free by birih Shonted for joy" Tell me ye shining hostes, Of no mean city, plann'd or ere the hills “That navigate a sea that knows no storms, Were built, the fountains open'd, or the sea, “ Beneath a vault unsullied with a cloud, With all his roaring multitude of waves. “If from your elevation, whence ye view His freedom is the same in ev'ry state; “ Distinctly scenes invisible to man, And no condition of this changeful life, “And systems, of whose birth nó tidings yet So manifold in cares, whose ev'ry day, “ Have reach'd this nether world, ye spy a race Brings its own evil with it, makes ii less : Favor'd as ours, transgressors from the womb, For he has wings that neither sickness, pain, “And hasting to a grave, yet doom'd to rise, Nor penary can cripple or coufine ; “ And to possess a brighter Heaven than yours? No nook so narrow but he spreads them there “ As one who, long detain'd on foreign shores, With ease, and is at large. The oppressor holds " Pants to return, and when he sees afar His body bound, but knows not what a range “ His country's weather bleach'd and batter'd His spirit takes, unconscious of a chain; rocks And that to bind him is a vain attempt, “ From the green wave emerging, darts an eye Whom God delights in, and in whom hedwells. “ Radiant with joy towards the happy land ; Acquaint thyself with God, if thou would'st "So I with animated hopes behold, “ And many an aching wish, your beamy fires, His works. Admitted once to his embrace, " That show like beacons in the blue abyss, Thou shalt perceive that thou wast blind before: "Ordain’d to guide th' embodied spirit home Thine eye shall be instructed ; and thine heart, “ Fronı toilsome life to never-ending rest. Made pure, shall relish with divive delight, “ Love kindles as I gaze. I feel desires Tillthen unfelt, what hands divine have wrought. “ That give assurance of their own success, Brutes graze the mountain-top with faces prone, " And that infus'd from Heav'n must thither And eyes intent upon the scanty herb, tend." It yields them; or, recumbent on its brow, So reads he nature, whom the lamp of truth Ruminate, heedless of the scene outspread Illuminates ; thy lamp, mysterious Word! Beneath, berond, and stretching far away Which whoso sees no longer wanders lost, From inland regions to the distant main. With intellects bemaz'd, in endless doubt, Man views it and admires, but repts content But runs the road of wisdom. Thou hast built, With taste With means that were not, till by thee employ'd, Worlds that had never been, hadst thou in '$ 133. That Philosophy which stops at Secure strength dary Causes reprored. Cow PER. Been less, or less benevolent than strong. They are thy witnesses, who speak ohy pow'r Happy the man who sees a God employ'd And goodness infinite, but speak in ears In all the good and ill that cheyuer life! That hear not, or receive not their report. Resolving all events, with their effects In vain thy creatures testify of thee And manifold results, into the will Till thou proclaim thyself. Theirs is indeed And arbitration wise of the Supreme. A teaching voice; but 'tis the praise of thine, Did not his eye rule all things and intend That whom it teaches it makes prompt to learn, The least of our concerns (since from the least And with the boon gives talenis for its use. The greatest oft originate); could chance Till thon art heard, imaginations vain Find place in his dominion, or dispose Possess the heart, and fables false as hell, One lawless particle to thwart his plau ; Yet deem'd oracular, lure lown to death Then God night be surpris'd, and unforesees The uninforind and heedless sons of men. Contingenco might alarm him, and disturb We give to chance, blind chance, ourselves as The smooth and equal course of his affairs, blind, This truth, philosophy, though eagle-eyed The glory of thy work, which yet appears In nature's tendencies, oft overlooks ; Perfect and unimpeachable of blame, And, having found his instruinent, forgets Challenging human scrutiny, and prov'd Or disregards, or, more presumptuous still, Then skilful most when most severely judg'd. Denies the pow'r that weilds it. God proclaims But chance is not, or is nut where thoui reign'st: His hot displeasure against foolish men Tly providence forbids that fickle pow'r That live an atheist life; involves the heaven (If pow'r she be that works but to confound) In tempests; quits his grasp upon the winds, To mix her wild vagarics with thy laws. And gives them all their fury; bids a plague Yet thus we dote, refusing, while we can, Kindle a fiery bile upon the skin, Instruction, and inventing to ourselves And putrefy the breath of blooming health. Gods such as guilt makes welcome, Gods that He calls for famine; and the meagre fiend sleep, Blows mildew from between his shrive!ld lips, Or disregard our follies, or that fit And taints the golden car: he springs liis Amus'd spectators of this bustling stage. mines, Thee we reject, unable to abide And desolates a nation at a blast. Thy purity, till pure as thou art pure, Forth steps the spruce philosopher, and tells Made such by thee, we love thee for that cause Of homogeneal and discordant springs For which we shiurind and hated thee before. And principles ; of causes, how they work Then we are free then liberty, like day, By necessary laws their sure effects, Breaks on the soul, and by a flash froin Hea- Of action, and te-action. He has fonnd The source of the disease that Natuje feels, Fires all the faculties with glorious joy. And bids the world take heart and banish A voice is heard, that mortal ears hear not fear. Till thou hast touch'd themi ; 'tis the voice of Thou fool! will thy discovery of the etuse song, Suspend th' effect, or heal it? Has not God A loud Hosanna sent from all thy works, Still wrought by means since first he made the Which he thrat hears it with a shout repeats, world? And adds his raptute to the gen'ral praise. And did he not of old employ his means In that blest moment, Nature; thirowing wide To drown it? What is his creation less Her veil opake, discloses with a smile Than a capacious reservoir of means The Author of her beautics, who, tetir'd Forni'd for his use, and ready at his will? Behind his own creation, forks unseen Go, dress thithe eyes with eye-salve ; xk of By the impure, and hears his pow'r denied. him; Thou art the source and centre of all minds, Or ask of whoin sever he has taught, Their only point of rest, Eternal Wond! And learn, tho late, the genuine cause of all. From the departing, they are lost, to rove At randomn, without honor, bupe, of peace. $184. Rural Sounds as well as Sights delightfal From thee is all that sooths the life of man, COWER His high endeavour, and his glad suécess, Non rural sights alone, but rural sounds His strength to suffer, and his will to serve. Exhilarate the spitit, and restore But, O! thou bounteous Giver of all good, The tone of languid Nature. Mighty winds, Thou art of all thy gifts thyself the crown! That sweep the skitt of some far 'spreading Give what thou canist, without thee we are wood poor; Of antient growth, make music not nnlike And with the rich, take what thou wilt | The dash of ocean on his winding shore, away. | And Unnumber' ven ine. woe. Unnumber'd branches waving in the blast, They love it, and yet loach it; fear to die, And all their leaves fast flutt'ring all at once. Yet scorn the purposes for which they live. Nor less composure waits upon the roar Then wherefore not renounce them! NoOf distant Aoods, or on the softer voice the dread, Of neighb'ring fountain, or of rills that slip. The slavish dread of solitude, that breeds Through the cleft rock, and chiming as they Reflection and remorse, the fear of shame, fall And their invet'rate habits-all forbid. l'pon loose pebbles, lose themselves at length Whom call we gay? That honor has been In matted grass, that with a livelier green Jong Betrays the secret of their silent course. The boast of mere pretenders to the name. Nature inanimate employs sweet sounds, The innocent are gay — the lark is gay, But animated nature sweeter still, That dries his feathers, saturate with dew, To sooth and satisfy the human ear. Beneath the rosy cloud, while yet the beams Teu thousand warblers cheer the day, and one of day-spring overshoot his humble 114 st. The live-long night: nor these alone, whose The peasant too, a witness of his song, notes Himself a songster, is as gay as he. Nice-finger'd art must emulate in rain, But save me from the gaiety of those But cawing rooks, and kites, that swim sublime Whose head-achs nail them to a noon-day bed; In still repeated circles, screaming lour, And save me too from theirs whose haggard The jage, the pye, and ev'n the boding owl eyes Thai hails the rising moon, have charıns for Flash desperation, and betray their pangs For property stript off' by cruel chance; Sounds in harmonious in themselves and harsh, From gaiety that fills the bones with pain, Yet, heard in scenes where peace for ever. The mouth with blasphemy, the heart with reigns, And only there, please highly for their sake. $ 136. Satirical Review of our Trips to France. Cowper. Ø 135 The Wearisomeness of what is com- Now hoist the sail, and let the streamers float monly called a Life of Pleasure. Cow PER. Upon the wanton breezes. Surew the deck With lavender, and sprinkle liquid sweets, The spleen is seldom felt where Flora reigns ; That no rude favor maritime invade The low'ring eye, the petulance, the frown, And sullen saclness, that o'ershade, distort The noise of nice nobility. Breathe soft Ye clarioncts, and softer still ye Autes, That winds and waters, lull'd by magic sounds, These Flora banishes, and gives the fair May bare us smoothly to the Gallic shore. Sweet smiles and bloom, less transient than her True, we may thank the perfidy of France, True, we have lost an empire- let it pass. own. That pick'd the jewel out of England's crown, It is the constant revolution, stale With all the cunning of an envious shrew : And lasteless, of the same repeated joys, And let that pass - iwas but a trick of state. That palls and satiates, and makes languid brave man knows no malice, but at once life Forgets in peace the injuries of war, A pedlar's pack, that bows the bearer down. And gives liis distrest foe a friend's embrace. Health suffers, and the spirits ebb; the heart And, sham'd as we have been, to the very Recoils from its own choice--at the full feast beard Is famishd-finds no music in the song, Bravid and defied, and in our own sea prov'd No smartness in the jest, and wonders why. Too weak for those decisive blows that once Yet thousands still desire to journey on, Insur'd us mast'ry there, we yet retain Though halt, and weary of the path they Some small pre-eininence: we justly boast tread. The paralytic, who can hold her cards, At least superior jockeyship, and claim But cannot play them, borrows a friend's hand Go then, well worthy of the praise ye seek, The honors of the turf as all our own. To deal and shuftie, to divide and sort And show the shame ye night conceal, at Her mingled suits and sequences, and sits, home, Spectatress both and spectacle, a sad And silent cypher, while her proxy plars. In foreign eyes! — be grooms, and win the plate, Others are dragg’d into the crowded rooin Between Where once your nobler fathers won a crown! supporters ; and, once seated, sit, Throngh downright inability to rise, Till the stout bearers lift the corpse again, $ 137. The Pulpit the Engine of Reformation. These speak a loud memento. Yet even these COWPER. Themselves love life, and cling to it; as he The Pulpit therefore (and I name it, fillid Tlust overhangs a torrent, to a twig With solemn awe, that bids ane wall beware With say With what intent I touch the holy thing) If haply from his guarded breast the Pulpit (in the sober use Of its legitimate peculiar pow'rs) Then pious hope and duty prais d The wisdoni of ih' unerring sway Must stand acknowlerly'd while the world shall stand And while his eye to heaven he rais'd, Its silent waters suuk away. Suffice it, when the scene was o'er, “ What tho' the joys I lov'd so well, lis thunders, and by him in strains as sweet “ The charıns," he cry'd, that youth hes As angels use, the Gospel whispers peace. known, He stablishes the strong, restores the weak, Fly from the hermit's lonely cell ! Reclaims the wand'rer, binds the broken “ Yet is not Armine still my own? “ Yes, Armine, yes, thou valued youth ! " Tho' from the world and worldly care The sacramental host of God's clect. My wearied mind I mean to free, " Yet ev'ry hour that heaven can spare, $ 138. The Petit-Maitre Clergyman. Cow PER. My Armine, I devote to thee. " And sure that heaven my hopes shall bless, I venerate the man whose heart is warm, “ And make thee fam'd for virtues fais, Depend upon a parent's pray'r : " In whom its future scenes I sce! Thus, to his humble fate resign'd, His breast cach anxious care foregoes : All but the care of Armine's mind, The dearest task a parent knows ! lu Armine's breast each virtue grew, Of ladyship’s, a stranger to the poor; In full maturity display'd To fond Affection 's anxious view. Nor yet neglected were the charms To polish'd life that grace impart : To his own pleasures, and his patrons pride Virtue, he knew, but feebly warnis From such apostles, Oye mitred heads, Till science humanize the heart. Preserve the chich! and lay not careless And, when he saw the lawless train hands Of passions in the youthful breast, On seulls that cannot teach, and will not He curbid them not with rigid rein, learn. But strove to sooth thein into rest. “ Think not, my son, in this," he cry'à, $ 139. Armine und Elvira, a Legendary Tale. “ A father's precept shall displease ; CARTWRIGHT. “ No-be each passion gratify'd “That tends to happiness or ease. A HERMIT on the banks of Trent, “ Nor shall th' ungrateful task be mine Far from the world's bewildering maze, “ Their natire gen'rous warnıth to blame, To hunibler scenes of calm content " That warmth if reason's suffrage join Had fled, from brighter, busier days. To point the object and the ajm. PART 1. " This suffragt wanting, know, fond boy, Ah then, his anguish to remove, " That every passion proves a foe Depriv'd of all his heart holds dear, " Tho' much it deal in promisd joy, How sweet the still surviving, lore It pays, alas ! in certain woe. Of Friendship's smile, of Piry's tear! “ Complete Ambitiou's wildest acheme : This knew the sire: he oft would cry, “ To Power's most brilliant robes appear; “ From these, my son, O ne'er depari! Indulge in Fortune's golden dream; “ These tender charities that tie " Then ask thy breast if Peace be there. “ Ia mutual league the human heart. “ No: it shall tell thee, Peace retires “ Be thine those feelings of the mind, • If once of her lov'd friends deprivd; “ That wake at llonor's, Friendship's call " Contentınént ralm, subdu'd desires, “ Benevolence, that unconfia't "And happiness that 's self-deriv'd," • Extends her liberal hand to all. To temper thus the stronger fires " By Sympathy's untutord voice “ And weep'if human eye shall weep. And oft revolving in his breast • The heart that bleeds for others' woes Th'insatiate lust of wealth or fame, • Shall feel cách selfish sorrow less; He, with no coinmon care opprest, “ His breast, who happiness bestows, To fortune thus would oft exclaim: " Reflected happiness shall bless. “ O Fortune ! 'at elsy' crowded shrine “ Each ruder passion still withstood " What wretched worlds of suppliảnts bow! “ That breaks o'er virtue's sober line, " For ever hail'd thy power divine, " The tender, noble, and the good, “ For ever breath'd the serious vow. “ To cherish and indulge be thine. “ With toitering pace and feeble knee, “ And yet, my Armine, might 1 name “ See age advance in shameless haste, “ One passion as a dangerous guest, “ The palsy'd hand is stretch'd to thee “ Well may'st thou wonder when I blame “ For wealth he wants the power to taste. “ The tenderest, noblest, and the best. "Sce, led by Hope, the youthfal train, “ Nature, 'cis true, with love design'd "Her fairy dreams their hearts have won ;, “ To sinooth the race our fathers ran; She points to what they ne'er shall gaini, “ The savage of the human kind Or dearly gain-to be undone. By love was soften'd into man. “ Must I too form the votivé prayer, “ As feels the ore the searching fire, " And wilt thou hear one suppliant more ? Expanding and refining too, “ His prayer, O Fortune! deign to hear, “ So fairer glow'd cach fair desire, “ To thee who never pray'd before. “ Each gentle thought so gentler grew. O may one dear, one favor'd youth, “ How chang'd, alas ! those happy days ! May Armine still thy power disclaim; “ A train how different now succeeds! * Kneel only at the shrine of truth, “ While sordid Avarice betrays, “ Count freedom wealth, and virtue' fame !" “ Or empty Vanity misleads. Lo! to his utmost wishes blest, « Fled from the heart each pobler guest, The prayer was heard ; and freedom's Aame, “ Each genuine feeling we forego ; And truth the sunshine of the breast, “ What natiire plaisted in the breast Were Armine's wealth, were Armine's fanje. “ The flowers of love, are weeds of woe. Ilis heart no selfish cares 'confin'd, “ Hence all the pangs the heart must feel He felt for all that feel distress, ; “ Between contending passions tost, And, still benevolent and kind, “ Wild Jealousy's avengirig steel, Ile bless'd them, or he wish'd' to bless. “ And life, and fame, and virtue lost ! For what tho' Fortune's frown deny “ Yet falling life, yet fading fame,, With wealth to bid the sufferer live, “ Compar'd to what his heart annoy, Yet Pity's hand can oft supply “ Who cherishes a hopeless flame, A balın. she never knew to give : • Are terms of happiness and joy. Can oft with lenient drops assuage “ Ah, then, the soft contagion Ay! L13 16 PART |
