fR 
 
 GORNELIi 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 UNDERGRADUATE LIBRARY . 
 
Cornell University Library 
 PR3730.A5R6 1908 
 
 The complete poetical works of James Tho 
 
 3 1924 014 168 219 
 
The original of tliis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31 9240141 6821 9 
 
THE COMPLETE 
 
 POETICAL WORKS 
 
 OF 
 
 JAMES THOMSON 
 
 Edited, with notes by 
 J. LOGIE ROBERTSON 
 
 Geoffrey Cumberlege 
 OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS 
 
 LONDON NEW YORK TOHONTO 
 
 • <■■ * 
 
 c 
 
James Thomson 
 
 Born, Ednam, Roxburghshire 27 September 1700 
 Died, Richmond, Surrey . 27 August 1748 
 
 Thomson's Complete Poetical Works were first 
 
 included in the series of Oxford Standard Authors 
 
 in 1908 and reprinted in 1951 
 
 / ^ oB^^'^^ 
 
 ^' 
 
 PEIKTED IN GREAT BKlTAir 
 O.S.A. 
 
 ^-' 
 
PREFACE 
 
 The chief want hitherto felt by students of the 
 poetry of Thomson has been a variorum edition of 
 The Seasons. This I have endeavoured to supply 
 in the present edition. 
 
 The first edition of Winter appeared in March, 
 1726, and consisted of only 405 lines. The second, 
 published in the following June, contained many 
 variations, and increased the original text by 58 lines. 
 I give a reprint of the first Winter, accompanying 
 t with the variations of the second. Three other 
 editions prior to 1730 were reprints of the second. 
 
 Summer was published in 1727 ; and consisted of 
 1,146 lines. A second edition, which appeared in the 
 same year, was a reprint. 
 
 Spring came out in 1728, and consisted of 1,082 
 lines : it was followed in 1729 by a reprint. 
 
 Autumn appeared in 1730 as part of the first 
 edition of the collected Seasons, and consisted 
 of 1,269 lines. The Hymn, numbering 121 lines, 
 appeared at the same time. 
 
 But in this first edition of the whole Seasons, 
 which was issued in two forms, quarto and octavo, 
 Winter was augmented to 787 lines (781 in the 
 quarto), Summer to 1,206, Spring to 1 087 ; and 
 there were numerous changes besides in the previous 
 texts which are not indicated by mere increment in 
 the number of lines. 
 
 Between 1730 and 1738 no change was made in 
 
iv - PREFACE 
 
 the separate or collected texts of The, Seasons. 
 Thomson was busy at other work. 
 
 In the edition of 1744 great changes were made — 
 more especially in Summer and Winter — not merely 
 by addition, but in other ways. 
 
 Thomson revised the text of The Seasons for the 
 last time in 1746, making a few alterations, and 
 increasing the length of the poem as a whole by 
 10 lines. The final result was a poem of 5,541 lines, 
 made up in the following way : — 
 
 Spring . 
 
 . 1,176 lines 
 
 Summer 
 
 . 1.805 „ 
 
 Autumn 
 
 . 1,373 „ 
 
 Winter 
 
 . 1,069 „ 
 
 Hymn . 
 
 118 „ 
 
 The textual changes which The Seasons in their 
 various parts underwent between 1726 and 1746 
 were of every conceivable kind. The author, it 
 might almost be said, cherished a passion for correct- 
 ing and improving. As long as he lived, and had 
 the leisure (he never wanted the inclination), he was 
 revising and altering. He added and he modified, 
 withdrew and restored, condensed and expanded, 
 substituted and inverted, distributed and trans- 
 ferred. The final text is faithfully reproduced, word 
 for word, in the present edition. I have modernized 
 the punctuation, and also the spelling — retaining, 
 however, a few characteristic forms. All changes and 
 variations in the text from the first appearance of 
 each part down to the last collected edition have been 
 carefully and, it is hoped, fully and accurately noted. 
 The labour of doing this, though mostly mechanical, 
 has been neither short nor easy. 
 
 Some idea of the way in which The Seasons grew 
 
PREFACE V 
 
 may be gathered from a study of the history of 
 Winter. On a comparison of the first draft (as 
 I may call it) with the completed poem, not more 
 than three-fourths of it, short though it is (405 lines), 
 will be found in the finished work. Nearly 100 lines 
 of it were transferred to Autumn, and thus it is upon 
 an addition of some 760 lines that the reader looks 
 who knows the poem only in its final form. Con- 
 spicuous by their absence from the first text are the 
 now well-known passages that describe the winter 
 visit of the redbreast, the shepherd perishing in a 
 snowstorm on the Cheviots, the goblin story at the 
 village hearth, the descent of the wolf-pack, skating 
 in Holland, the surly, bear ' with dangling ice all 
 horrid ', and some others ; while there is merely 
 a suggestion, which the poet developed later, of the 
 windstorm at sea, the calm freezing moonlight night, 
 and the student in his snug retreat ' between the 
 groaning forest and the shore'. It is hardly an 
 exaggeration to say that the last edition of the 
 text of Winter as put forth by its author in 1746 
 presents, when compared with the first text of 
 twenty years previous, what is substantially a new 
 poem. It excites no small degree of wonder that 
 from such a small and unpretentious beginning 
 Thomson's Winter made its way, to become the 
 epoch-making work which we now know it to have 
 been in the poetical literature not only of our own 
 country but. of Germany and Prance as well. 
 
 The many changes which Thomson made in the 
 text of The Seasons were mostly improvements, but, 
 I think, not wholly so. I wish he had retained 
 ' a weeping thaw ', and I much prefer the single line 
 that informs us how Cincinnatus seized 
 
 The plough, and greatly independent lived 
 
vi PREFACE 
 
 to the two in which we are told that 
 
 he greatly independent scorned 
 All the vile stores Corruption can bestow. 
 
 The various readings show that kind of development 
 in which refinement and repose are gained, but not 
 without some expense of vitality and vigour. There 
 is sound criticism in the judgement of Johnson that 
 in the process of improvement The Seasons lost 
 somewhat of their original race or flavour. The 
 Scotticisms, too, were expressive. And the keenness 
 of his colour-sense, which he had inherited from his 
 country's ballads, became dulled in deference to the 
 taste of Pope and Lyttelton. But the loss of raciness 
 is chiefly seen in the substitution, for example, of 
 so comparatively tame a line as — 
 
 Then scale the mountains to their woody tops 
 
 for 
 
 Then snatch the mountains by their woody tops, 
 in the description of the fox-hunt ; or in the exchange 
 of ' Shook from the corn ' for ' Scared from the corn ', 
 in the hare-hunt ; or by the entire omission of the 
 robust lines — 
 
 While, tempted vigorous o'er the marble waste, 
 On sleds reclined the furry Russian sits, 
 And, by his reindeer drawn, behind him throws 
 A shining kingdom in a winter's day. 
 
 It is an error to suppose that when Thomson was 
 writing Winter at East Barnet in the autumn and 
 winter of 1725 he was at the same time contem- 
 plating a poem on each of the other seasons. The 
 error has arisen from a misunderstanding of Thomson's 
 promise to sing of autumn, a promise which un- 
 doubtedly appears in the first text of Winter. But 
 the fulfilment also appears, immediately after the 
 
PREFACE vii 
 
 promise. It is contained in the 100 transferred lines 
 to which reference has already been made. The 
 necessity for their transference shows that the 
 scheme of a series of poems on the seasons had not 
 yet occurred to him when, in the autumn of 1725, 
 he was engaged upon Winter. The lines have 
 autumn, or ' departing summer ', for their theme. 
 They were appropriately incorporated with the poem 
 on Autumn when, the turn of autumn came to be 
 treated in the afterthought of The Seasons. His 
 intention of describing ' the various appearances of 
 nature ' in the other seasons was first announced in the 
 prose preface which he wrote for the second edition 
 of Winter : he had done so well with the winter 
 theme that, doubtless, friends wishing to be com- 
 plimentary hoped he would favour them with poems 
 on the other seasons too. But till he took Autumn 
 in hand — and Autumn was taken last — he did not 
 seek to withdraw the lines from Winter. They 
 served as an approach to the main theme. Winter 
 sullen and sad, and all his rising train of vapours, 
 and clouds, and storms — these are his theme. At 
 the same time he cannot choose but consecrate to 
 ' Autumn ' ' one pitying line ' — ^f or so it read when the 
 poem was still on the anvil. But in the published 
 text of March, 1726, it runs — 
 
 Thee, too, inspirer of the toiling swain. 
 Fair Autumn, yellow-robed, I'll sing of thee, 
 Of thy last tempered days and sunny calms. 
 When all the golden hours are on the wing. 
 
 And so he does, fulfilling the promise there and 
 then, and having at the moment of so writing no 
 separate ulterior poem in view. Commencing with 
 the hovering hornet poised threateningly in the 
 genial blaze of September, he sings on through 
 
viii PREFACE 
 
 falling leaves and sobbing winds and withering 
 flowers, for nearly 100 lines, till he arrives at his 
 ' theme in view ' — 
 
 For see where Winter comes himself, confessed. 
 Striding the gloomy blast ! 
 
 It was not till after March, 1726, when his first 
 venture in the poetical arena was beginning to win 
 popular favour, that the joy of successful authorship 
 inspired him with, the idea of ' rounding the revolving 
 year ' in separate flights on the other seasons ; but 
 before that, in the shadow of obscurity, bereavement, 
 and comparative poverty, he wrote of himself as 
 ' one whom the gay season suited not, and who 
 shunned the summer's glare '. To him, as he was 
 then situated, they were uncongenial both as seasons 
 and as subjects for poetry. His personal mood when 
 he chose winter was very much the mood of Burns 
 when he sang, dolefully enough, more than half 
 a century later — 
 
 Come, Winter, with thine angry howl, 
 And, raging, bend the naked tree ; 
 
 Thy gloom will soothe my cheerless soul 
 When Nature all is sad like me ! 
 
 Thomson's great merit lies in his restoration of 
 nature to the domain of poetry from which it had 
 been banished by Pope and his school. He dared to 
 dispute, and he disproved by his own practice and 
 the astonishing success which at once accompanied 
 it, the dictum of Pope that in matters poetic ' the 
 proper study of mankind is man '. His wonderful 
 observing power and his enthusiasm for his subject 
 went far to make his treatment of nature a success. 
 He was sincerely and healthily enamoured of nature. 
 The wild romantic country was his delight. ' I know 
 
PREFACE ix 
 
 no subject more elevating, more amusing, more 
 ready to awake the poetical enthusiasm, the philo- 
 sophical reflection, and the moral sentiment than 
 the works of nature. Where can we meet with such 
 variety, such beauty, such magnificence — all that 
 enlarges and transports the soul ? . . . But there is 
 no thinking of these things without breaking out into 
 poetry.' Thus he wrote, with much more of the same 
 tenor, in his prose preface to the second edition of 
 Winter ; from which it appears that, in his view 
 of the question, nature was not only a fit and proper 
 subject for direct poetical treatment, but the greatest 
 and grandest of all subjects. With the whole 
 domain of nature before him he chose winter as the 
 particular subject of his ' first essay '. It is by no 
 means the most inviting of the seasons. The aspect 
 of nature in winter is in general a forbidding aspect. 
 Yet under his guidance we may discover the poetry 
 of winter. Let us look where he points, and listen 
 as he directs, and some share of his own enthusiasm 
 for nature ' in all her shows and forms ' will enter 
 our soul like the dawning of a new sense. His first 
 great scene is a rainstorm. The skies are foul with 
 mingled mist and rain, the plain lies a brown deluge ; 
 hill-tops and woods are dimly seen in the dreary 
 landscape ; the cattle droop in the sodden fields, 
 the poultry crowd motionless and dripping in comers 
 of the farmyard. It is a world of squalor and 
 wretchedness. Yet there is the bright contrast of 
 the ploughman rejoicing by the red fire of his cottage 
 hearth, talking and laughing, and reckless of the 
 storm that rattles on his humble roof. Meanwhile 
 streams swell to rivers, and rivers rise in sfate ; 
 the current carries every obstacle before it- — stacks 
 and bridges and mills : nothing can stop its 
 
X PREFACE 
 
 progress ; dams are burst, rocks are surmountedi 
 glens and gullies are choked with the mad, plunging 
 water. 
 
 It boils, and wheels, and foams, and thunders through ! 
 
 A recent critic has limited Thomson's love of 
 nature to nature in her gentle and even her homely 
 moods. Thomson's description of the river in flood 
 is one of many passages in his poetry that con- 
 tradict the criticism. The description of the 
 windstorm is another. A third is the poetic 
 realization of the Deluge, ending with the magnifi- 
 cent line — 
 
 A shoreless ocean tumbles round the globe. 
 
 Applied to Cowper or Goldsmith, the criticism 
 would fit, but it shows a strange misconception of 
 the genius of Thomson. 
 
 His presentation of a snowstorm is Thomson's 
 highest achievement in natural description. The 
 approach is well led up to. As we read we recall 
 what we have often seen. The whole description is 
 a splendid specimen of Thomson's peculiar art in 
 the realization of a scene. It is rather a narrative 
 of successive events set before us with dramatic 
 vividness. The air grows colder, the sky saddens, 
 there is a preternatural hush, and then the first 
 flakes make their miraculous appearance, thin- 
 wavering at first, but by and by falling broad and 
 wide and fast, dimming the day. It is, as if by 
 magical transformation, a world of purity and peace. 
 It is now, by way of episode, that we have the charm- 
 ing vignette of the redbreast at the parlour window. 
 It is a perfect picture of its kind, unmatched for 
 clearness and delicate accuracy of detail. We hear 
 the soft beat of the breast on the frosted pane ; we 
 
PREFACE xi 
 
 see the slender feet on the warm floor, and the eye 
 looking askance with mingled boldness and shyness 
 at the smiling and amused children. But we are 
 soon summoned away to the sheep-walks on the 
 Cheviots. All winter is driving along the darkened 
 air. The snow is falling, and drifting. It is the 
 drifting that the shepherd fears. Its effect is not 
 only to hide but to alter the landmarks. Scenes 
 familiar become foreign ; the landscape wears a 
 strange look ; valleys are exalted, and rough places 
 are made plain. At last the shepherd is completely 
 bewildered, and he stands disastered in the midst of 
 drift and snowfall. The whole moor seems to be 
 revolving around him, as gusts of wind lift the 
 surface-snow like a blanket and whirl it around. 
 The first realization of his danger — his destiny ! — is 
 finely suggested. Few scenes are more pathetic than 
 Thomson's lost shepherd perishing in the snow. 
 The pathos is heightened by that little crowd of curly 
 heads at the cottage door or window, not many 
 furlongs distant, where 
 
 his little children, peeping out 
 Into the mingling storm, demand their sire 
 With tears of artless innocence. Alas ! 
 Nor wife nor children more shall he behold, 
 Nor friends, nor sacred home. 
 
 Joyous winter days of clear frost are described 
 with no less effective touches, among which one 
 remembers the swain on the frozen upland stepping 
 on solid crystal, and looking down curiously into the 
 sullen deeps of the river. But enough has been said 
 or suggested to show Thomson's fidelity to nature, 
 and the art with which he discloses the poetry of 
 nature. A love for nature is synonymous with 
 a lov^e for Thomson. 
 
xii PREFACE 
 
 It is scarcely possible now, at an interval of two 
 centuries, to identify distinctly any single scene in 
 his native Teviotdale which directly iired the heart 
 or captivated the eye of the young poet. Neither 
 his poems nor his letters help us much. We have 
 a panorama of airy mountains, forests huge, and 
 fertile valleys ' winding, deep, and green ', with 
 a more specific but still general view of Tweed — 
 
 Pure parent stream ! 
 Whose pastoral banks first heard my Doric reed, 
 With, sylvan Jed, thy tributary brook. 
 
 We see him, already a young Druid — the part for 
 which, as Collins happily noted, his genius was cast — 
 in the alleys of Marlefleld woods. 
 
 Where spreading trees a checkered scene display, 
 Partly admitting and excluding day. 
 
 We have a glimpse of his boyish face at the parlour 
 window of Southdean Manse, turned now to the 
 bursting passage of the torrent at the side of the 
 garden, and now to the deep-fermenting tempest 
 brewing in the red evening sky. There is also, in 
 a letter to a friend in Scotland, a special reference 
 to the beloved gloom of embowering trees in some 
 unidentified haugh near Ancram. References such 
 as these furnish our distinctest glimpse of Thomson 
 in Teviotdale. But, if we seldom surprise him 
 alighted in the vaUey, we feel his presence over- 
 flying the entire scene from the kaims of Ednam 
 to the cleughs of Sou'den. This is the land of 
 Thomson. 
 
 For the text of The Castle of Indolence I have 
 followed that of the second edition, which was the 
 last to receive the poet's revision. 
 
 I have included, with the desire of presenting 
 
PREFACE xiii 
 
 a complete edition, several pieces which have been 
 attributed to Thomson, though the evidence for 
 their admission is by no means satisfjdng. I cannot 
 think he wrote the memorial verses on Congreve ; 
 and the doggerel stanzas in the Scottish dialect are 
 surely not Thomson's. 
 
 The Juvenilia wiU at least serve to show the early 
 bent of Thomson's genius to descriptions of nature, 
 and the unpromising character of his youthful 
 attempts at versification. ' The accomplishment of 
 verse ' was to him a hard, and at last an incomplete, 
 attainment ; but his enthusiasm for his great subject, 
 and his glowing imagination, carried him to a success 
 which, within obvious limits, is unique of its kind. 
 In his peculiar method of developing a scene while 
 describing it, in the astonishing felicity of his phrases, 
 in his happy invention of picturesque and melodious 
 compounds, he is a master ; but his construc- 
 tive skill in the use of language is sometimes 
 unequal to the task of fitly expressing his ideas. 
 Hence his resort to exclamations, involutions, in- 
 versions, and forced constructions which are often 
 puzzling and occasionally ludicrous. Pages of 
 Liberty — though it contains isolated passages of great 
 force and beauty — ^read hke a mere catalogue of 
 notes. 
 
 It does not fall within the scheme of this edition 
 to include the Dramas. 
 
 I do not think it necessary to adduce evidence in 
 proof of Thomson's authorship of the national ode, 
 which is now generally accepted as incontrovertible. 
 The patriotic feeling was strong in his heart, and 
 shines out in his poetry on many occasions. He 
 was by no means an aggressive Scot. His patriotism 
 was for Britain. It was Britannia that received 
 
xiv PREFACE 
 
 Heaven's commission to rule the waves. And he offers 
 in Summer a.s generoasly sincere a tribute to the English 
 character as Goldsmith does in The Traveller. Yet 
 one likes to remember that, as he wrote to a feUow- 
 countryman, ' Britannia includes our native kingdom 
 of Scotland, too.' 
 
 J. L. R. 
 Oct., 1908. 
 
A CHRONOLOGY 
 
 TO ELUCIDATE AND ILLUSTRATE THE LIFE AND 
 TIMES OF THOMSON 
 
 1666. Birth of Thomas Thomson, the poet's father. 
 
 1674. Death of Milton. 
 
 1683. Execution of Algernon Sidney (' the British Brutus '). 
 
 ie85. Death of Otway. 
 
 1686. Birth of Allan Ramsay. 
 
 1688. Birth of Pope. 
 
 1692. ReT. Thomas Thomson, the poet's father, appointed 
 Minister of Ednam, Roxburghshire. 
 
 1693. Marries Beatrix, daughter of Alexander Trotter, of 
 Widehope (a small lairdship in Roxburghshire). 
 
 1694. Birth of Voltaire. 
 
 1700. Birth, at Ednam or Widehope, of James Thomson, the 
 poet — fourth child (third son) of his parents ; born (probably) 
 on the 7th, baptized on the 15th of September. In the November 
 following, his father inducted into the parish of Southdean, 
 Roxburghshire. Birth of David Malloch (or Mallet). Birth 
 of Dryden. 
 
 1709. Birth of Johnson. 
 
 1712. Young Thomson attends a Grammar School in Jedburgh, 
 some eight miles or so from Southdean. His acquaintance 
 with Mr. (afterwards the Rev.) Robert Riccaltoun, farmer 
 at Earlshaugh, begins about this time. First attempts at 
 versifying, a year or two later. 
 
 1715. Young Thomson enters Edinburgh University. 
 
 1716. Death of his father, in February, while exorcizing a ghost. 
 Home transferred to Edinburgh. 
 
 1719. Death of Addison. 
 
 1720. Thomson now a student of Divinity. Continues versi- 
 fying, chiefly on rural subjects in the heroic couplet ; con- 
 tributes to The Edinburgh Miscellany Of a Country lAfe, &c. 
 
xvi CHRONOLOGY 
 
 1721. Birth of Collins. Walpole Prime Minister (till 1742). 
 
 1724. Thomson still at the University. Adverse criticism, by 
 the Professor of Divinity, of one of his college exercises (a dis- 
 course on the 10th portion of Psalm cxix). The turning-point 
 of his life. 
 
 1725. End of February, Thomson sets out to seek his fortune 
 in London : embarks at Leith, not again to see Scotland. 
 Visits Drury Lane Theatre, and sees Cato acted. Death of 
 his mother, in May. In July, acting as tutor to Lord Binning's 
 son, at Barnet, near London. Composition of Winter in the 
 following autumn and winter. Publication of Allan Ramsay's 
 The Gentle Shepherd. 
 
 1726. In March, Winter, a thin folio of 16 pp., 405 11., price 1«., 
 John Millan, publisher. Dyer's Grongar Hill published. 
 Thomson acting as tutor in an academy in London. Acquain- 
 tance with Aaron Hill. Second edition of Winter, in June. 
 
 1727. Death of Sir Isaac Newton : in June, Thomson publishes 
 a. poem To the Memory of Newton. Summer published ; a 
 second edition the same year. Thomson now relying on 
 literature for his support. Britannia written (not published 
 till 1729), in opposition to the peace-a1>any-price policy of 
 Walpole. The poet spends part of the summer at Marlborough 
 Castle (the guest of the Countess of Hertford). 
 
 1728. Spring published by Andrew Millar. Goldsmith born. 
 
 1729. Death of Congreve : anonymous poem To the Memory 
 of Congreve published ; attributed to Thomson on very un- 
 satisfactory evidence. In September, Thomson the guest of 
 Bubb Dodington at Eastbury. The poet busy in various 
 ways — with the tragedy of Sophonisha, the completion of 
 The Seasons, the publication of Britannia, and contributions 
 to Ralph's Miscellany; among the last a Hymn on Solitvde, 
 The Happy Man, and a metrical version of a passage of St. 
 Matthew's Gospel. 
 
 1730. Publication of the first collected edition of The Seasons 
 (including Autumn and the Hymn for the first time) : two 
 editions, one in quarto at a guinea, published by subscription ; 
 the other in octavo. Sophonisha produced at Drury Lane, 
 February 28th, Mrs. Oldfield taking the part of the heroine : 
 a success on the stage, despite one weak line, and selling well 
 when printed. Travelling tutor to young Charles Talbot, 
 son of Mr. Charles Talbot, then Solicitor-General (soon after- 
 
CHRONOLOGY xvii 
 
 wards Lord Chancellor) ; in Paris in December, ■where (pro- 
 bably) he visits Voltaire. 
 
 1731. Visits ■ most of the courts and capital cities of Europe ' 
 (Murdoch) ; in Paris in October. Visits Italy — ' I long to 
 see the fields where Virgil gathered his immortal honey,' &c. 
 Collecting material for his poem on Liberty. Correspondence 
 with Dodington — ' Should you inquire after my muse, I believe 
 she did not cross the Channel with me.' Probably wrote, 
 however, the lines on the death of Aikman, the painter. Returns 
 to England in December. Birth of Cowper. The OenUeman' s 
 Magazine established. 
 
 1733. Death of young Talbot in September ; the elder becomes 
 Lord Chancellor in November ; soon after, Thomson appointed 
 Secretary of Briefs in the Court of Chancery — the post a 
 sinecure with about 3001. a year. Some personal stanzas of 
 The CasUe of Indolence written about this time. 
 
 1735. Publication of Liberty ; Parts I, II, and III, at intervals. 
 
 1736. lAberty ; Parts IV and V at intervals. Thomson goes 
 to live in Kew Lane, Richmond — his residence for the rest of 
 his life. Intimacy with Pope, whose house was only a mile 
 off, at Twickenham. Busy with the drama — ' whipping 
 and spurring to finish a tragedy this winter.' Sends pecuniary 
 assistance to his sisters in Edinburgh. Becomes acquainted 
 with ' Amanda '. 
 
 1737. Death of Lord Chancellor Talbot, in February ; Thom- 
 son's memorial verses (panegyric and elegy) in June. Writing 
 Agamemnon. Loss of Secretaryship. Acquaintance with 
 George Lyttelton. Pension of lOOZ. a year from the Prince 
 of Wales, to whom Liberty had been dedicated. Shenstone's 
 Schoolmistress published. 
 
 1738. Thomson's Preface to Hilton's Areopagitica appears. 
 Agamemnon produced in April, Quin in the title role. A new 
 edition (a reprint of octavo edition of 1730) of The Seasons 
 brought out. 
 
 1739. Thomson's tragedy of Edward and Meonora prohibited 
 by the censorship. 
 
 1740. Conjointly with Malloch, The Masque o' Alfred, con- 
 taining the ode ' Rule, Britannia ', performed August 1, in 
 CUfden Gardens, before the Prince of Wales. 
 
 1742. Young's Night Thoughts (Books I-III). 
 
 1743. Visits the Lytteltons, at HagleyPark, in August — ' I am 
 
 THOMSON \f 
 
xviii CHRONOLOGY 
 
 come to the most agreeable place and company in the world.' 
 Correspondence with ' Amanda '. — ' But wherever I am . . . 
 I never cease to think of my loveliest Miss Young. You are 
 part of my being ; you mix with all my thoughts.' His song, 
 ' For ever, Fortune, wilt thou prove,' about this time. Pre- 
 paring, at Hagley, a revised edition of The Seasons with 
 Lyttelton 's assistance. 
 
 1744. New edition of TTie Seasons, with many alterations and 
 additions. Lyttelton in oiEoe : he appoints Thomson Surveyor- 
 General of the Leeward Islands — a sinecure post, worth 300i. 
 a year clear. Death of Pope. 
 
 1745. His best drama Tancred and Sigismunda produced at 
 Drury Lane, with Garrick as Tancred. At Hagley in the 
 summer. 
 
 1746. Thomson makes way for his friend (and deputy), William 
 Paterson, in the office of Surveyor-General. At Hagley in 
 the autumn. Last edition of The Seasons published in the 
 poet's lifetime. Collins'^ Odes published. 
 
 1747. At Hagley in the autumn. Visits Shenstone at the 
 Leasowes. Busy at Coriolamis (nearly finished in March). 
 
 1748. Prince of Wales's displeasure with Lyttelton visited on 
 Lyttelton's friends — Thomson's name struck off pension list. 
 The Castle of Indolence, in May. Death of Thomson, after 
 short illness, at Richmond, August 27th. Buried in Richmond 
 churchyard. Collins's Ode in memory of Thomson — a lasting 
 memorial. 
 
 1749. Ooriolanus produced, in January — the Prologue by 
 Lyttelton. 
 
 1753. Shiels's Life of Thomson (Cibber's lAves of the Poets). 
 
 1758. Death of Allan Ramsay. 
 
 1759. Birth of Burns. 
 
 1762. Murdoch's Memoir of Thomson (prefixed to an edition 
 of Thomson's Works). Monument to Thomson in West- 
 minster Abbey. 
 
 1781. Johnson's Life of Thomson {Lives of the Poets). 
 
 1791. Burns's Address to the Shade of Thomson. 
 
 1792. The Earl of Buohan's Essay on the Life of the Poet Thomson 
 1831. Biography of Thomson by Sir Harris Nicholas (prefixed 
 
 to the Aldine Edition of Thomson's Works : annotated by 
 P. Cunningham, 1860). 
 
CHRONOLOGY xix 
 
 1842. An edition of The Seasons, with notes by Bolton Corney. 
 1891, Clarendon Press edition of The Seasons and The Castle 
 
 of Indolence, with a biographical notice and full notes by 
 
 J. Logie Robertson. 
 
 1894. Furth in Field (Part IV— Of the poet of The Seasons), by 
 Hugh Hahburton. 
 
 1895. James Thomson : Sa Vie et ses (Euvres (678 pp.), by Leon 
 Morel. 
 
 1898. James Thomson (in Famoim Scols Series), by W. Bayne. 
 1908. Jam£s Thomson (in English Men of Letter s Series), by 
 G. C. Maoaulay. 
 
 THOMSON'S FAMILY CONNEXIONS 
 
 I. — On the Father's side 
 
 [? Andrew] Thomson, a gardener, in 
 the service of Mr. Edmonston, at 
 Ednam, in Roxburghshire. 
 
 Thuiiias Thomson, born 1666, graduated 
 M.A. 1686, licensed 1691, ordained mini- 
 ster of Ednam 1692 ; married Beatrix, 
 daughter of Alexander Trotter, of Wide- 
 hope, October 6, 1693 : 
 
 Andrew Alexander Issobel James (the poet) 
 
 (b. 1695) (b. 1697) (b. 1699) (b. Sep., 1700) 
 
 These four children were born while their father was minister 
 of Ednam. In the November following the birth of James, the 
 Rev Thomas Thomson was translated to the parish of Southdean, 
 in the same county as Ednam but on the English border, and five 
 more children were born to him there, viz., a son, John, and 
 four daughters, Jean, Elizabeth, Margaret, and Mary. 
 
 b2 
 
FAMILY CONNEXIONS 
 
 II. — On the Mother's side 
 
 Sir John Home of Coldingknowles 
 (Fourth in descent from the first Baron Home, 1473) 
 
 I 
 
 \ 
 Sir James Home 
 
 •Tohn Home 
 
 Sir James Home 
 
 Sir James Home, 
 who succeeded his 
 cousin as third Earl 
 of Home in 1635. 
 
 William Home 
 
 (of Bassenden) 
 
 I 
 Margaret Home 
 
 married Mr. Trotter, of Fogo, 
 
 author of Polwarth on the Green : 
 
 (Fogo part of her dowry) 
 
 Beatrix Trotter 
 married the Rev. Thomas Thom- 
 son, Minister of Ednam, October 
 6, 1693 
 
 I 
 
 James Thomson 
 (the poet) 
 
 Elizabeth Thomson 
 (Lisy), married the 
 Rev. Robert BeD 
 
 Rev. James Bell 
 
 I 
 Miss Ehzabeth Bell 
 b. circa 1785, died 
 a nonagenarian, the 
 last of the Thom- 
 son family. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 eAQB 
 
 Preface . . . . . iii 
 Chronology to eltjcidate the Life and Times of 
 
 Thomson xv 
 
 Thomson's Family Connexions ... xix 
 
 THE SEASONS 1 
 
 Spring 3 
 
 Notes 46 
 
 Summer 52 
 
 Notes . 120 
 
 Autumn 133 
 
 Notes . . 181 
 
 Winter ... . . 184 
 
 Text of the First Edition . 227 
 
 Notes (including Preface to the Second Edition) 239 
 
 A Hymn on the Seasons . . 245 
 
 THE CASTLE OP INDOLENCE : AN ALLEGORI- 
 CAL POEM . . . .251 
 
 Canto I . . 253 
 
 Canto II . . . 279 
 
 Notes .... ... 306 
 
 Explanation of Obsolete Words . . . 308 
 
 LIBERTY . . 309 
 
 Part I : Ancient and Modem Italy compared 311 
 
 Part II : Greece . ... 324 
 
 Part III: Rome . 339 
 
 Part IV : Britain . 356 
 
 Part V^ The Prospect 392 
 
 Notes . 413 
 
xxii CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 LYRICAL PIECES. 
 
 Rule, Britannia! 422 
 
 Ode : ' Tell me, thou soul of her I love ' . . 423 
 Come, gentle god . . . . • 424 
 
 Song : ' One day the god of fond desire ' . 424 
 
 Song : ' Hard is the fate of him who loves ' . 425 
 
 To Amanda. I 
 To Amanda. II 
 
 To Myra 
 
 To Fortune . 
 
 The Bashful Lover 
 
 To the Nightingale 
 
 Hymn on Solitude 
 
 A Nuptial Song 
 
 An Ode on Aeolus's Harp 
 
 425 
 426 
 426 
 427 
 428 
 428 
 429 
 431 
 432 
 
 MEMORIAL VERSES. 
 
 On the Death of his Mother . . . 434 
 
 To the Memory of Sir Isaac Newton . . 436 
 On the Death of Mr. William Aikman, the painter 443 
 To the Memory of the Right Honourable the Lord 
 
 Talbot . . .444 
 
 Epitaph on Miss Elizabeth Stanley 456 
 
 A Poem to the Memory of Mr. Congreve 457 
 
 EPISTLES. 
 
 To Dodington: The Happy Man . . 463 
 
 To His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales . 464 
 
 To the Rev. Patrick Murdoch . 465 
 Lines sent to George Lyttelton, Esq., soon after 
 
 the death of his wife . . 466 
 
 To Mrs. Mendez' Birthday 466 
 
 To the incomparable Soporific Doctor 467 
 
 To Seraphina . . 4GS 
 
 To Amanda. I 463 
 
 To Amanda,. II 470 
 
 To Amanda. Ill .... 470 
 
CONTENTS xxiii 
 
 PAGE 
 
 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 
 
 Britannia ... ... 471 
 
 A Paraphiase of the latter part of the sixth chapter 
 
 of St. Matthew . .... 480 
 On the report of a Wooden Bridge to be built at 
 
 Westminster . 481 
 
 JUVENILIA. 
 
 The Works and Wonders of Almighty Power . 483 
 
 A Paraphrase of Psalm civ . . . . 484 
 
 A Complaint on the Miseries of Life 488 
 
 Hymn on the Power of God . . 489 
 A Pastoral betwixt David, Thirsis, and the Angel 
 
 Gabriel, upon the Birth of Our Saviour . . 490 
 A Pastoral between Thirsis and Corydon upon the 
 
 Death of Damon . . 492 
 Of a Country Life . . .494 
 
 Upon Happiness 497 
 
 Verses on receiving a Flower from a Lady . 502 
 
 On Beauty . . .... 502 
 
 A Pastoral Entertainment . . 505 
 
 An Elegy upon James Therburn . 507 
 
 On the Hoop .508 
 
 An Elegy on Parting 509 
 
 The Month of May . . ... 610 
 
 Morning in the Country . 510 
 
 Lisy's Parting with her Cat .... 511 
 
 Lines on Marlefield . ... 513 
 
 A Poetical Epistle to Sir William Bennet . . 514 
 
 INDEX OP FIRST LINES 
 
 515 
 
THE SEASONS : A POEM 
 
1,206 
 1,269 
 
 787 (the Quarto 781) 
 
 121. 
 
 [First published in collected form in 1730, and then consisting 
 of 4,470 11., made up in the following way : — 
 
 Spring . . . 1,087 11. 
 
 Summer 
 
 Autumn 
 
 Winter 
 
 The Hymn 
 
 The poem as a whole was much altered for the edition of 1744, 
 and the additions then made greatly increased the size of it, the 
 increase being chiefly in Summer and Winter. The last edition 
 of The Seasons published in the author's Ufetime, in 1746, shows 
 some further slight alterations ; with the result that the final 
 form of The Seasons (including the Hymn) consists in all of 
 5,541 lines. The poem was inscribed to H.R.H. Frederic, Prince 
 of Wales, in 1744.] 
 
SPRING 
 
 [Dedicated, 1728, to the Rt. Hon. the Countess of Hertford, 
 in a letter in which the poet writes — ' As this poem grew up 
 under your encouragement, it has therefore a natural claim to 
 your patronage.' First published early in 1728 (1,082 11.) ; last 
 edition in author's lifetime published 1746 (1,176 11.).] 
 
 THE ARGUMENT 
 
 The subject proposed. Inscribed to the Countess of Hartford. 
 The Season is described as it affects the various parts of nature, 
 ascending from the lower to the higher ; and mixed with 
 digressions arising from the subject. Its influence on inanimate 
 matter, on vegetables, on brute animals, and last on Man ; 
 concluding with a dissuasive from the wild and irregular 
 passion of Love, opposed to that of a pure and happy kind.* 
 
 Come, gentle Spring, ethereal mildness, come ; 
 And from the bosom of yon dropping cloud, 
 While music wakes around, veiled in a shower 
 Of shadowing roses, on our plains descend. 
 
 Hartford, fitted or to shine in courts 
 With unaffected grace, or walk the plain 
 
 * The above is the Argument prefixed to the last edition (1746) 
 published in the author's lifetime. It is the same as the Argument 
 of 1730, except that in the earlier edition the Countess of Hartford 
 is designated ' Lady Hertford ' ; ' This Season ' appears for 
 ' The Season ' ; and instead of ' pure and happy ' in the con- 
 cluding note we have ' purer and more reasonable ' in the original 
 form of the Argument. 
 
 5 Hertford 1728, 1729, 1730, 1738; Hartford 1744, 1746. 
 The second edition (1729) is an exact' reprint of the first (1728). 
 b2 
 
4 THE SEASONS 
 
 With innocence and meditation joined 
 
 In soft assemblage, listen to my song, 
 
 Which thy own season paints — when nature all 
 
 Is blooming and benevolent, like thee. lo 
 
 And see where surly Winter passes o£f 
 Far to the north, and calls his ruffian blasts : 
 His blasts obey, and quit the howhng hiU, 
 The shattered forest, and the ravaged vale ; 
 While softer gales succeed, at whose kind touch, 
 Dissolving snows in livid torrents lost. 
 The mountains lift their green heads to the sky. 
 
 As yet the trembling year is unconfirmed, 
 And Winter oft at eve resumes the breeze, 
 Chills the pale morn, and bids his driving sleets 20 
 Deform the day delightless ; so that scarce 
 The bittern knows his time with bill engulfed 
 To shake the sounding marsh ; or from the shore 
 The plovers when to scatter o'er the heath. 
 And sing their wild notes to the listening waste. 
 
 At last from Aries rolls the bounteous sun, 
 And the bright Bull receives him. Then no more 
 The expansive atmosphere is cramped with cold ; 
 But, fuU of life and vivifying soul. 
 Lifts the light clouds sublime, and spreads them 
 thin, 30 
 
 Fleecy, and white o'er all-surrounding heaven. 
 
 Forth fly the tepid airs ; and unconfined. 
 Unbinding earth, the moving softness strays. 
 Joyous the impatient husbandman perceives 
 Relenting Nature, and his lusty steers 
 Drives from their stalls to where the well-used plough 
 Lies in the furrow loosened from the frost. 
 There, unrefusing, to the harnessed yoke 
 9 Which] That 1730-38. 
 
SPRING 5 
 
 They lend their shoulder, and begin their toil, 
 Cheered by the simple song and soaring lark. 40 
 Meanwhile incumbent o'er the shining share 
 The master leans, removes the obstructing clay. 
 Winds the whole work, and sidelong lays the glebe. 
 
 White through the neighbouring fields the sower 
 stalks 
 With measured step, and liberal throws the grain 
 Into the faithful bosom of the ground : 
 The harrow follows harsh, and shuts the scene. 
 
 Be gracious, Heaven, for now laborious man 
 Has done his part. Ye fostering breezes, blow ; 
 Ye softening dews, ye tender showers, descend ; 50 
 And temper all, thou world-reviving sun. 
 Into the perfect year. Nor, ye who live \ 
 
 In luxury and ease, in pomp and pride, 
 Think these lost themes unworthy of your ear : / 
 Such themes as these the rural Marc sung 
 To wide-imperial Rome, in the full height 
 Of elegance and taste, by Greece refined. 
 In ancient times the sacred plough employed 
 The kings and awful fathers of mankind ; 
 And some, with whom compared your insect-tribes 60 
 Are but the beings of a summer's day, 
 Have held the scale of empire, ruled the storm 
 Of mighty war ; then, with victorious hand, 
 
 49 part] due 1728-38. 51 world-reviving] influential 
 
 1728, and 30 till 1730. 55 'Twas such as these 1728-38. 
 
 56 wide-imperial Kome] the full Roman Court 1728-38 ; in all 
 its height 1728-38. 57 by Greece refined added in 1744. 
 
 58-62 The sacred plow Employed the kings and fathers of 
 mankind In ancient times. And some, with whom compared 
 You're but the beings of a summer's day. Have held the scale of 
 justice, shook the lance 1728-38. 
 
 63 victorious] descending 1728, 1730, 1738. 
 
6 THE SEASONS 
 
 Disdaining little delicacies, seized 
 
 The plough, and greatly independent scorned 
 
 All the vile stores corruption can bestow. 
 
 Ye generous Britons, venerate the plough ; 
 And o'er your hills and long withdrawing vales 
 Let Autumn spread his treasures to the sun. 
 Luxuriant and unbounded. As the sea 70 
 
 Par through his azure turbulent domain 
 Your empire owns, and from a thousand shores 
 Wafts all the pomp of life into your ports ; 
 So with superior boon may your rich soil. 
 Exuberant, Nature's better blessings pour 
 O'er every land, the naked nations clothe. 
 And be the exhaustless granary of a world ! 
 
 Nor only through the lenient air this change 
 Delicious breathes : the penetrative sun, 
 His force deep-darting to the dark retreat 80 
 
 Of vegetation, sets the steaming power 
 At large, to wander o'er the vernant earth 
 In various hues ; but chiefly thee, gay green ! 
 Thou smiling Nature's universal robe ! 
 United light and shade ! where the sight dwells 
 With growing strength and ever-new delight. 
 
 From the moist meadow to the withered hill. 
 Led by the breeze, the vivid verdure runs, 
 And swells and deepens to the cherished eye. 
 The hawthorn whitens ; and the juicy groves 90 
 Put forth their buds, unfolding by degrees, 
 
 64 Disdaining] Unused to 1728, 1730, 1738. 65, 66 scorned 
 All the vile stores corruption can bestow] lived 1728, 1730, 1738. 
 67 venerate] cultivate 1728-38. 71 domain] extent 1728-38. 
 
 78 Nor thro' the lenient air alone, this change 1 728-38. 8 1 
 
 steaming] streaming (a misprint) 1730-38. 82 verdant 1730- 
 38. 87 withered] brown-browed 1728-38. 
 
SPRING 7 
 
 Till the whole leafy forest stands display'd 
 
 In fuU luxuriance to the sighing gales — 
 
 Where the deer rustle through the twining brake. 
 
 And the birds sing concealed. At once arrayed 
 
 In all the colours of the flushing year 
 
 By Nature's swift and secret-working hand, 
 
 The garden glows, and fills the liberal air 
 
 With lavish fragrance ; while the promised fruit 
 
 Lies yet a Uttle embryo, unperceived, loo 
 
 Within its crimson folds. Now from the town, 
 
 Buried in smoke and sleep and noisome damps. 
 
 Oft let me wander o'er the dewy fields 
 
 Where freshness breathes, and dash the trembling 
 
 drops 
 From the bent bush, as through the verdant maze 
 Of sweet-briar hedges I pursue my walk ; 
 Or taste the smell of dairy ; or ascend 
 Some eminence, Augusta, in thy plains, 
 And see the country, far-diffused around, 
 One boundless blush, one white-empurpled shower no 
 Of mingled blossoms ; where the raptured eye 
 Hurries from joy to joy, and, hid beneath 
 The fair profusion, yellow Autumn spies. 
 
 If, brushed from Russian wilds, a cutting gale 
 Rise not, and scatter from his humid wings 
 The clammy mildew ; or, dry-blowing, breathe 
 Untimely frost — before whose baleful blast 
 The full-blown Spring through all her foliage shrinks. 
 Joyless and dead, a wide-dejected waste. 
 For oft, engendered by the hazy north, 120 
 
 Myriads on myriads, insect armies waft 
 
 104 trembling] lucid 1728-38. 105 verdant] fuming 1728- 
 38. 107 diary (o misprint) 1730-38. no snow-empurpled 
 
 1728, <an730. 112 Hurries] Travels 1728-38. 115 humid] 
 
 foggy 1728-38. 116 clammy] bitter 1728-38. 119 Joyless 
 and dead, a] Into a smutty 1728-38. 
 
8 THE SEASONS 
 
 Keen in the poisoned breeze, and wasteful eat 
 
 Through buds and bark into the blackened core 
 
 Their eager way. A feeble race, yet oft 
 
 The sacred sons of vengeance, on whose course 
 
 Corrosive famine waits, and kills the year. 
 
 To check this plague, the skilful farmer chaff 
 
 And blazing straw before his orchard burns ; 
 
 Till, all involved in smoke, the latent foe 
 
 From every cranny suffocated falls ; 130 
 
 Or scatters o'er the blooms the pungent dust 
 
 Of pepper, fatal to the frosty tribe ; 
 
 Or, when the envenomed leaf begins to curl, 
 
 With sprinkled water drowns them in their nest : 
 
 Nor, while they pick them up with busy bill. 
 
 The Uttle trooping birds unwisely scares. 
 
 Be patient, swains ; these cruel-seeming winds 
 Blow not in vain. Far hence they keep repressed 
 Those deepening clouds on clouds, surcharged with 
 
 rain. 
 That o'er the vast Atlantic hither borne 140 
 
 In endless train would quench the Summer blaze, 
 And cheerless drown the crude unripened year. 
 
 124-7 y^t °ft • • • this plague] scarce seen Save to the 
 prying eye ; yet famine waits On their corrosive couise and 
 starves the year. Sometimes o'er cities as they steer their flight. 
 Where rising vapour melts their wings away. Gazed by the 
 astonished crowd the horrid shower Descends ; and hence 1728- 
 38. Note, however, that editions 1730-38 give ' hy ' for ' to the 
 prying eye ', and ' kills ' for ' starves '. 
 
 131, 132 Or onions, steaming hot, beneath his trees Exposes 
 1728-38. 133, 134 Not in the first editions (1728-38). 135 
 while they pick them up with] from their friendly task the 1728- 
 38. 136 The] Of 1728-38; unwisely] instinctive 1728-38. 
 
 136 Here in the first and subsequent editions followed a passage 
 of 33 U., transferred (in 1744) with alterations to Summer, 11. 287- 
 317, — which see. 
 
 137-42 Not in the first editions (1728-38) 
 
SPRING 9 
 
 The North-east spends his rage, and, now shut up 
 Within his iron caves, the effusive South 
 Warms the wide air, and o'er the void of heaven 
 Breathes the big clouds with vernal showers distent. 
 At first a dusky wreath they seem to rise. 
 Scarce staining ether ; but by fast degrees, 
 In heaps on heaps the doubling vapour sails 
 Along the loaded sky, and mingling deep 150 
 
 Sits on the horizon round a settled gloom ; 
 Not such as wintry storms on mortals shed, 
 Oppressing life ; but lovely, gentle, kind. 
 And full of every hope and every joy. 
 The wish of Nature. Gradual sinks the breeze 
 Into a perfect calm ; that not a breath 
 Is heard to quiver through the closing woods, 
 Or rustling turn the many-twinkling leaves 
 Of aspen tall. The uncurling floods, diffused 
 In glassy breadth, seem through delusive lapse 160 
 Forgetful of their course. 'Tis silence all. 
 And pleasing expectation. Herds and flocks 
 Drop the dry sprig, and mute-imploring eye 
 The falling verdure. Hushed in short suspense. 
 The plumy people streak their wings with oil 
 To throw the lucid moisture trickling off. 
 And wait the approaching sign to strike at once 
 Into the general choir. Even mountains, vales, 
 And forests seem, impatient, to demand 
 The promised sweetness. Man- superior walks 170 
 Amid the glad creation, musing praise 
 And looking lively gratitude. At last 
 The clouds consign their treasures to the flelds. 
 And, softly shaking on the dimpled pool 
 
 150 deep] thick 1728-38. 166 Not in the first editions 
 
 (1728-38). 169 impatient] expansive 1728-38. 174 
 
 dimpled] dimply 1728-38. 
 
10 THE SEASONS 
 
 Prelusive drops, let all their moisture flow 
 
 In large effusion o'er the freshened world. 
 
 'The stealing shower is scarce to patter heard 
 
 By such as wander through the forest-walks, 
 
 Beneath the umbrageous multitude of leaves. 
 
 But who can hold the shade while Heaven descends 
 
 In universal bounty, shedding herbs i8i 
 
 And fruits and flowers on Nature's ample lap ? 
 
 Swift fancy fired anticipates their growth ; 
 
 And, while the milky nutriment distils, 
 
 Beholds the kindhng country colour round. 
 
 Thus all day long the full-distended clouds 
 Indulge their genial stores, and weU-showered earth 
 Is deep enriched with vegetable life ; 
 Till, in the western sky, the downward sun 
 Looks out effulgent from amid the flush 190 
 
 Of broken clouds, gay-shifting to his beam. 
 The rapid radiance instantaneous strikes 
 The illumined mountain, through the forest streams. 
 Shakes on the floods, and in a yellow mist, 
 Par smoking o'er the interminable plain, 
 In twinkling myriads lights the dewy gems. 
 Moist, bright, and green, the landscape laughs around. 
 Full swell the woods ; their every music wakes, 
 Mixed in wild concert, with the warbhng brooks 
 Increased, the distant bleatings of the hills, 200 
 
 The hollow lows responsive from the vales. 
 Whence, blending all, the sweetened zephyr springs. 
 Meantime, refracted from yon eastern cloud. 
 Bestriding dearth, the grand ethereal bow 
 Shoots up immense ; and every hue unfolds, 
 
 177 'Tis Boarce to patter heard, the stealing shower 1728-38 
 180 can] would 1728. 183 Imagination fired prevents 1728- 
 
 38. 184 milky] verdant 1728-38. 190 effulgent] il- 
 
 lustrious 1728-38. 198 swells 1730-38. 199 consort 
 
 1728-38. 200 distant] unnumbered 1728-38. 
 
SPRING 11 
 
 In fair proportion running from the red 
 To where the violet fades into the sky. 
 Here, awful Newton, the dissolving clouds 
 Form, fronting on the sun, thy showery prism ; 
 And to the sage-instructed eye unfold 210 
 
 "The^arious twine of light, by thee disclosed 
 From the white mingling maze. Not so the swain; 
 He wondering views the bright enchantment bend 
 Delightful o'er the radiant fields, and runs 
 To catch the falling glory ; but amazed 
 Beholds the amusive arch before him fly, 
 Then vanish quite away. Still night succeeds, 
 A softened shade, and saturated earth 
 Awaits the morning beam, to give to light, 
 
 VRaised through ten thousand different plastic tubes,) 
 The balmy treasures of the former day. 221 
 
 Then spring the living herbs, profusely wild. 
 O'er all the deep-green earth, beyond the power 
 Of botanist tp _number up their tribes : 
 Whether he steals along the lonely dale 
 In silent search ; or through the forest, rank 
 With what the dull incurious weeds account, 
 Bursts his bhnd way ; or climbs the mountain-rock. 
 Fired by the nodding verdure of its brow. 
 With such a liberal hand has Nature flung 230 
 
 Their seeds abroad, blown them about in winds. 
 
 208 awful] mighty 1728-38. 209 fronting on the sun] as 
 
 they scatter round 1744. 209, 210 Are, as they scatter 
 
 round, thy numerous prism, Untwisting to the philosophic eye 
 1728-38. 211 disclosed] pursued 1728. 212 From the 
 
 white] Through all the 1728 ; Through the white 1730-38. 219 
 to light] again 1728-38. 220 Transmuted soon by Nature's 
 
 ehymistry 1728-38. 221 blooming blessings 1728-38. 227 
 ' incurious ' is printed in some editions in Thomson's lifetime 
 with a capital initial. It does not, probably, refer to weeds. 
 
12 THE SEASONS 
 
 Innumerous mixed them with the nursing mould, 
 The moistening current, and prolific rain. 
 
 But who their virtues can declare ? who pierce 
 With vision pure into these secret stores 
 Of-, health and life and joy ? the food of man 
 While yet he Hved in innocence, and told , 
 A length of golden years, I unfleshed in blood,' 
 A stranger to the savage arts of life, 
 Death, rapine, carnage, surfeit, and disease — 240 
 The lord and not the tyrant of the world. 
 
 The first fresh dawn then waked the gladdened race 
 Of uncorrupted man, nor blushed to see 
 The sluggard sleep beneath its sacred beam ; 
 For their light slumbers gently fumed away. 
 And up they rose as vigorous as the sun. 
 Or to the culture of the wilhng glebe, 
 Or to the cheerful tendance of the flock. 
 Meantime the song went round ; and dance and sport. 
 Wisdom and friendly talk successive stole 250 
 
 Their hours away ; while in the rosy vale 
 Love breathed his infant sighs, from anguish free, 
 And full replete with bliss — save the sweet pain 
 That, inly thrilling, but exalts it more. 
 Nor yet injurious act nor surly deed 
 Was known among these happy sons of heaven ; 
 For reason and benevolence were law. 
 Harmonious Nature too looked smihng on. 
 Clear shone the skies, cooled with eternal gales. 
 And balmy spirit all. The youthful sun 260 
 
 Shot his best rays, and still the gracious clouds 
 Dropped fatness down ; as o'er the swelling mead 
 
 236 life and health 1728-38. 242 Then the glad morning 
 
 1728-38. 243 man] men 1728-38. 244 its] her 1728-38. 
 
 253, 254 Fragrant with bliss and only wept for joy 1728 ; 
 Replete with &o. 1730-38. 
 
SPRING 13 
 
 The herds and flocks commixing played secure. 
 
 This when, emergent from the gloomy wood, 
 
 The glaring lion saw, his horrid heart 
 
 Was meekened, and he joined his sullen joy. 
 
 For music held the whole in perfect peace : v 
 
 Soft sighed the^ulel the tender voice was heard. 
 
 Warbling the varied heart ; the woodlands round 
 
 Applied their quire ; and winds and waters flowed 270 
 
 In consonance. Such were those prime of days. 
 
 But now those white unblemished minutes, whence 
 The fabling poets took their golden age, 
 Are found no more amid these iron times. 
 These dregs of life ! Now the distempered mind 
 Has lost that concord of harmonious powers 
 Which forms the soul of happiness ; and all 
 Is off the poise^ within : the passions all 
 Have burst their bounds ; and Reason, half extinct, 
 Or impotent, or else approving, sees 280 
 
 The foul disorder. Senseless and deformed, 
 
 264 This] Which 1728-38. 269 varied] joyous 1728-38. 
 
 271 those] these 1728-38. 
 
 271 Here in the first and subsequent editions down to (and 
 including) that of 1738 followed a passage of twenty-eight luxuri- 
 antly wild and even grotesque lines, which the reader will find 
 in the Notes at the end of the poem. 
 
 272, 273 But now whate'er these gaudy fables meant And 
 the white minutes that (which) they shadowed out 1728-38. 
 
 274, 275 these . . These] those . . Those 1730-38. 
 
 275, 276 Now the . . powers] in which the human mind 
 Has lost that harmony ineffable 1728-38. 
 
 277 forms] warms 1730-38. 
 
 281-93 Senseless and deformed .... object of its flame.] 
 This passage stood originally (1728-38) : 
 Anger storms at large 
 Without an equal cause ; and fell Revenge 
 Supports the falling Rage. Close Envy bites 
 With venomed tooth ; while weak unmanly Fear, 
 Full of frail fancies, loosens every power. 
 Even Love itself is bitterness of soul, 
 A pleasing anguish pining at the heart. 
 
14 THE SEASONS 
 
 Convulsive Anger storms at large ; or, pale 
 And silent, settles into fell revenge. 
 Base Envy withers at another's joy. 
 And hates that excellence it cannot reach. 
 Desponding Fear, of feeble fancies full. 
 Weak and unmanly, loosens every power. 
 Even Love itself is bitterness of soul, 
 A pensive anguish pining at the heart ; 
 Or, sunk to sordid interest, feels no more 290 
 
 That noble wish, that never-cloyed desire, 
 Which, selfish joy disdaining, seeks alone 
 l^To bless the dearer object of its flame. 
 Hope sickens with extravagance ; and Grief, 
 Of life impatient, into madness swells. 
 Or in dead silence wastes the weeping hours. 
 These, and a thousand mixt emotions more. 
 From ever-changing views of good and ill, 
 Formed infinitely various, vex the mind 
 With endless storm : whence, deeply rankling, grows 
 The partial thought, a Hstless unconcern, 301 
 
 Cold, and averting from our neighbour's good ; 
 Then dark disgust and hatred, winding wiles. 
 Coward deceit, and ruffian violence. 
 At last, extinct each social feeling, fell 
 
 285 that excellence it cannot reach] whate'er is excellent and 
 good 1744. 291 noble] restless 1744; never-cloyed] infinite 
 
 1744. 297 mixt] new 1728. 298, 299 That from their 
 
 mixture spring, distract the mind 1728. 300 storm] tumult 
 
 1728 ; deeply rankling grows] resulting rise 1728. 300 
 
 deeply] inly 1730-44. 301 partial] selfish 1728-38. 303 
 
 hatred] malice 1728-38. 304 coward] sneaking 1728-38 ; 
 
 ruffian violence] coward villainy 1728-38. 
 
 305-7 At last unruly Hatred, lewd Reproach, Convulsive Wrath 
 and thoughtless Fury quick To every evil deed. Even Nature's 
 self 1728. Editions 1730-38 give this (the first text) also, except 
 that ' deep-rooted ' takes the place of ' unruly ', and ' quick to 
 deeds of vUest aim ' the place of ' quick to every evil deed '. 
 
SPRING 15 
 
 And joyless inhumanity pervades 
 
 And petrifies the heart. Nature disturbed 
 
 Is deemed, vindictive, to have changed her course. 
 
 Hence, in old dusky time, a deluge came : 
 When the deep-cleft disparting orb, that arched 310 
 The central waters round, impetuous rushed 
 With universal burst into the gulf, 
 And o'er the high-piled hills of fractured earth 
 Wide-dashed the waves in undulation vast, 
 Till, from the centre to the streaming clouds, 
 A shoreless ocean tumbled round the globe. 
 
 The Seasons since have, with severer sway. 
 Oppressed a broken world : the Winter keen 
 Shook forth his waste of snows ; and Summer shot 
 His pestilential heats. Great Spring before 320 
 
 Greened all the year ; and fruits and blossoms blushed 
 In social sweetness on the~seli-same bough. 
 Pure was the temperate air ; an even calm 
 Perpetual reigned, save what the zephyrs bland 
 Breathed o'er the blue expanse : for then nor storms 
 Were taught to blow, nor hurricanes to rage ; 
 Sound slept the waters ; no sulphureous glooms 
 Swelled in the sky and sent the lightning forth ; 
 While sickly damps and cold autumnal fogs 
 Hung not relaxing on the springs of life. 330 
 
 But now, of turbid elements the sport, 
 
 309 dusky time] time, they say, 1728-38. 310 dry- 
 
 crumbling Orb of Earth which 1728 ; disparting orb of earth 
 that 1730-38. 311 imprisoned deep around 1728-38. 312, 
 313 With Ruin inconceivable, at once Into the gulf, and o'er 
 the highest hills 1728-38. 317, 318 The Seasons since, as 
 
 hoar tradition tells, Have kept their constant chase 1728, 1729, 
 1730, 1738, 1744. 319 Shook forth] Poured out 1728-38. 
 
 323 Pure] Clear 1728-38. 330 Hung not relaxing] Sat not 
 
 pernicious 1728-38 ; Oppressive sat not 1744. 
 
 331-3 But now from clear to cloudy, moist to dry. And hot 
 to cold, in restless change revolved 1728-38. 
 
16 THE SEASONS 
 
 From clear to cloudy tossed, from hot to cold, 
 And dry to moist, with inward-eating change, 
 Our drooping days are dwindled down to naught, 
 Their period finished ere 'tis weU begun. 
 
 And yet the wholesome herb neglected dies ; 
 Though with the pure exhilarating soul 
 Of nutriment and health, and vital powers. 
 Beyond the search of art, 'tis copious blest. 
 For, with hot ravine fired, ensanguined man 340 
 V Is now become the lion of the plain. 
 
 And worse. The wolf, who from the nightly fold 
 Fierce drags the bleating prey, ne'er drunk her milk. 
 Nor wore her warming fleece : nor has the steer, 
 At whose strong chest the deadly tiger hangs, 
 E'er ploughed for him. They too are tempered high, 
 With hunger stung and wild necessity, 
 Nor lodges pity in their shaggy breast. 
 But man, whom Nature formed of milder clay, 
 With every kind emotion in his heart, 350 
 
 And taught alone to weep, — while from her lap 
 She pours ten thousand delicacies, herbs 
 And fruits, as numerous as the drops of rain 
 Or beams that gave them birth, — shall he, fair form ! 
 .- Who wears sweet smiles, and looks erect on Heaven, 
 E'er stoop to mingle with the prowling herd, 
 
 335 The fleeting shadow of a Winter's sun 1728-38. 
 337-9 In the first edition (1728), and subsequent editions (to 
 1738), the original of these lines stood : — 
 
 In lone obscurity, unprized for good, 
 Although the pure exhilarating soul 
 Of nutriment and health salubrious breathes. 
 By heaven infused, along its secret tubes. 
 338, 339 and vital powers .... blest] salubrious, blest, And 
 deeply stored with wondrous vital powers 1744. 
 
 348 breasts 1728-1738. 354 And beams which gave 1728; 
 And beams that give 1730-38. 
 
SPRING 17 
 
 And dip his tongue in gore ? The beast of prey, 
 Blood-stained, deserves to bleed : but you, ye flocks. 
 What have ye done ? ye peaceful people, what, 
 To merit death ? you, who have given us milk 360 
 In luscious streams, and lent us your own coat 
 Against the Winter's cold ? And the plain ox, 
 That harmless, honest, guileless animal, 
 In what has he offended ? he, whose toil. 
 Patient and ever ready, clothes the land 
 With all the pomp of harvest ; shall he bleed. 
 And struggling groan beneath the cruel hands 
 Even of the clowns he feeds ? And that, perhaps, 
 To swell the riot of the autumnal feast. 
 Won by his labour ? This the feeling heart 370 
 Would tenderly suggest : but 'tis enough. 
 In this late age, adventurous to have touched 
 Light on the numbers of the Samian Sage. 
 High Heaven forbids the bold presumptuous strain. 
 Whose wisest will has fixed us in a state 
 That must not yet to pure perfection rise : 
 BesideSvJzhQ_knowSj_how, raised to higher life, ' •, 
 Frorn stage_J;£Lstage, Jtlje_jvitel„scaj£_ ascends ? 
 
 Now, when the first foul torrent of the brooks, 
 
 357. gore] blood 1728-38. 
 
 358 Blood-stained, deserves to bleed] 'Tis true, deserves the 
 fate in which he deals : Him from the thicket let the hardy 
 youth Provoke, and foaming through the awakened woods 
 With every nerve pursue 1728-38. 362 After ' the Winter's 
 
 cold 'in the earlier edition (1728-38) appeared— ' Whose useful- 
 ness In living only hes ' : the words were dropped in edition 1744. 
 
 365 land] fields 1728. 367 struggling] wrestling 1728- 
 
 38. 369 autumnal] gathering 1728-38. 370 This] 
 
 Thus 1728-38. 374 High Heaven] Heaven too 1744; forbids 
 
 the bold presumptuous] beside forbids the daring 1728-38. 
 
 7, 378 These lines first appear in edition 1746. 
 
 379-466 These lines, a happy afterthought, first appeared 
 in edition 1744 almost exactly as they stand here. A few altera- 
 
 THOMSON C 
 
18 THE SEASONS 
 
 Swelled with the vernal rains, is ebbed away, 380 
 And whitening down their mossy- tinctured stream 
 Descends the billowy foam ; now is the time, 
 While yet the dark-brown water aids the guile, 
 To tempt the trout. The well-dissembled fly. 
 The rod fine-tapering with elastic spring, 
 Snatched from the hoary steed the floating line, 
 And all thy slender watery stores prepare. 
 But let not on thy hook the tortured worm 
 Convulsive twist in agonizing folds ; 
 Which, by rapacious hunger swallowed deep, 390 
 Gives, as you tear it from the bleeding breast 
 Of the weak helpless uncomplaining wretch. 
 Harsh pain and horror to the tender hand. 
 When with his lively ray the potent sun 
 Has pierced the streams and roused the finny race, 
 Then, issuing cheerful, to thy sport repair ; 
 Chief should the western breezes curling play, 
 And light o'er ether bear the shadowy clouds. 
 High to their fount, this day, amid the hills 
 And woodlands warbling round, trace up the brooks ; 
 The next, pursue their rocky-channelled maze, 401 
 Down to the river, in whose ample wave 
 Their little naiads love to sport at large. 
 Just in the dubious point where with the pool 
 Is mixed the trembling stream, or where it boils 
 Around the stone, or from the hollowed bank 
 Reverted plays in undulating flow. 
 There throw, nice- judging, the delusive fly ; 
 And, as you lead it round in artful curve. 
 With eye attentive mark the springing game. 410 
 Straight as above the surface of the flood 
 
 tions were made by the author in preparing the text for the 
 edition of 1746 — the last to receive his attention. He died in 
 1748. 380 with] hy 1744. 
 
SPRING 19 
 
 They wanton rise, or urged by hunger leap, 
 
 Then fix with gentle twitch the barbed hook — 
 
 Some lightly tossing to the grassy bank. 
 
 And to the shelving shore slow-dragging some. 
 
 With various hand proportioned to their force. 
 
 If, yet too young and easily deceived, 
 
 A worthless prey scarce bends your pliant rod, 
 
 Him, piteous of his youth and the short space 
 
 He has enjoyed the vital light of heaven, 42b 
 
 Soft disengage, and back into the stream 
 
 The speckled infant throw. But, should you lure 
 
 From his dark haunt beneath the tangled roots 
 
 Of pendent trees the monarch of the brook, 
 
 Behoves you then to ply your finest art. 
 
 Long time he, following cautious, scans the fly, 
 
 And oft attempts to seize it, but as oft 
 
 The dimpled water speaks his jealous fear. 
 
 At last, while haply o'er the shaded sun 
 
 Passes a cloud, he desperate takes the death 430 
 
 With sullen plunge. At once he darts along. 
 
 Deep-struck, and runs out all the lengthened line ; 
 
 Then seeks the farthest ooze, the sheltering weed. 
 
 The caverned bank, his old secure abode ; 
 
 And flies aloft, and flounces round the pool. 
 
 Indignant of the guile. With yielding hand. 
 
 That feels him still, yet to his furious course 
 
 Gives way, you, now retiring, following now 
 
 Across the stream, exhaust his idle rage ; 
 
 Till floating broad upon his breathless side, 440 
 
 And to his fate abandoned, to the shore 
 
 You gaily drag your unresisting prize. 
 
 Thus pass the temperate hours : but when the sun 
 Shakes from his noon-day throne the scattering clouds, 
 
 422 infant] captive 1744. 425 you . . your] thee . . 
 
 thy 1744. 
 
 C 2 
 
20 THE SEASONS 
 
 Even shooting listless languor through the deeps, 
 Then seek the bank where flowering elders crowd. 
 Where scattered wild the hly of the vale 
 Its balmy essence breathes, where cowslips hang 
 The dewy head, where purple violets lurk, 
 With all the lowly children of the shade ; 45° 
 
 Or lie reclined beneath yon spreading ash 
 Hung o'er the steep, whence, borne on hquid wing. 
 The sounding culver shoots, or where the hawk. 
 High in the beetling cliff, his eyry builds. 
 There let the classic page thy fancy lead 
 Through rural scenes, such as the Mantuan swain 
 Paints in the matchless harmony of song ; 
 Or catch thyself the landscape, gliding swift 
 Athwart imagination's vivid eye ; 
 Or, by the vocal woods and waters lulled, , 460 
 And lost in lonely musing, in a dream . 
 Confused of careless solitude where mix , 
 Ten thousand wandering images of things. 
 Soothe every gust of passion into peace- 
 All but the swellings of the softened heart. 
 That waken, not disturb, the tranquil mind. 
 
 Behold yon breathing prospect bids the Muse 
 Throw all her beauty forth. But who can paint 
 Like Nature ? Can imagination Tioait^ ~ 
 
 Amid its gay creation, hues like hers ? 470 
 
 Or can it mix them with that matchless skill, 
 
 457 the matchless harmony of] immortal verse and matchless 
 1744. 467 Behold yon] But yonder 1728-38. 
 
 468 In the earlier edd. (1728-38) we find here— 
 
 Throw all her beauty forth, that daubing all 
 Will be to what I gaze ; for who can paint &c. 
 
 470 its] his 1728-38. 
 
 471 Here followed in the original text (1728-38) the hne— 
 
 And lay them on so delicately sweet (fine) — 
 dropped in the later edd., 1744, 1746. 471 it] he 1728-38. 
 
SPRING 21 
 
 And lose them in each other, as appears 
 In every bud that blows ? If fancy then 
 Unequal fails beneath the pleasing task, 
 Ah, what shall language do ? ah, where find words 
 Tinged with so many colours and whose power. 
 To life approaching, may perfume my lays 
 With that fine oil, those aromatic gales 
 That inexhaustive flow continual round ? 
 
 Yet, though successless, will the toil delight. 480 
 Come then, ye virgins and ye youths, whose hearts 
 Have felt the raptures of refining love ; 
 And thou, Amanda, come, pride of my song ! 
 Formed by the Graces, loveliness itself ! 
 Come with those downcast eyes, sedate and sweet. 
 Those looks demure that deeply pierce the soul, 
 Where, with the light of thoughtful reason mixed. 
 Shines lively fancy and the feeling heart : 
 Oh, come ! and, while the rosy-footed May 
 Steals blushing on, together let us tread 490 
 
 The morning dews, and gather in their prime 
 Fresh-blooming flowers to grace thy braided hair 
 And thy loved bosom, that improves their sweets. 
 
 See where the winding vale its lavish stores, 
 Jrriguous, spreads. See how the lily drinks 
 The latent rill, scarce oozing through the grass 
 Of growth luxuriant, or the humid bank 
 In fair profusion decks. Long let us walk 
 
 474 pleasing] lovely 1728-38. 478 those] these 1728-38. 
 
 483-8 These lines first appear in the edition of 1744. See 
 Note at the end of the poem. 490 tread] walk 1728-38. 
 
 492 thy hraided] the flowing 1728; the braided 1730-38. 493 
 Originally (1728) — ^And for a hreast which can improve their 
 sweets ; afterwards (1730-38) — And the white bosom that 
 improves &o. 494 its] her 1728-38. 
 
 498 In fair profusion decks] Profusely climbs 1728-38 ; 
 followed by : — 
 
22 THE SEASONS 
 
 Where the breeze blows from yon extended field 
 
 Of blossomed beans. Arabia cannot boast 500 
 
 A fuller gale of joy than liberal thence 
 
 Breathes through the sense, and takes the ravished soul. 
 
 Nor is the mead unworthy of thy foot, 
 
 Full of fresh verdure and unnumbered flowers, 
 
 The negligence of nature wide and wild. 
 
 Where, undisguised by miniic art, she spreads 
 
 Unbounded beauty to the roving eye. 
 
 Here their delicious task the fervent bees 
 
 In swarming millions tend. Around, athwart. 
 
 Through the soft air, the busy nations fly, 510 
 
 Cling to the bud, and with inserted tube 
 
 Suck its pure essence, its ethereal soul. 
 
 And oft with bolder wing they soaring dare 
 
 The purple heath, or where the wild thyme grows, 
 
 And yellow load them with the luscious spoil. 
 
 At length the finished garden to the view 
 Its vistas opens and its alleys green. 
 Snatched through the verdant maze, the hurried eye 
 Distracted wanders ; now the bowery walk 
 Of covert close, where scarce a speck of day 520 
 
 Turgent in every pore 
 The gummy moisture shines, new lustre lends, 
 And feeds the spirit that diffusive round 
 Refreshes all the dale. 
 These lines were dropped in the edition of 1744. 
 
 503 mead unworthy of thy] meadow worthless of oiir 1728- 
 38. 508 Originally (1728-38)— 
 
 'Tis here that their delicious task the bees &c. 
 510 Through the soft air] This way and that 1728-38. 
 
 512 Originally (1728-38)— 
 
 Its soul, its sweetness, and its manna suck. 
 And followed by — 
 
 The little chymist thus all-moving Heaven 
 Has taught. 
 
 513 with . . they soaring dare] of . . he dares 1728-38. 
 515 load them] loads him 1728-38. 
 
SPRING 23 
 
 Falls on the lengthened gloom, protracted sweeps ; 
 
 Now meets the beiiding sky, the river now 
 
 Dimpling along, the breezy ruffled lake, 
 
 The forest darkening round, the glittering spire, 
 
 The ethereal mountain, and the distant main. 
 
 But why so far excursive ? when at hand, 
 
 Along these blushing borders bright with dew, 
 
 And in yon mingled wilderness of flowers. 
 
 Fair-handed Spring unbosoms every grace — 
 
 Throws out the snow-drop and the crocus first, 530 
 
 The daisy, primrose, violet darkly blue. 
 
 And polyanthus of unnumbered dyes ; 
 
 The yellow wall-flower, stained with iron brown, 
 
 And lavish stock, that scents the garden round : 
 
 From the soft wing of vernal breezes shed, 
 
 Anemones ; auriculas, enriched 
 
 With shining meal o'er all their velvet leaves ; 
 
 And full ranunculus of glowing red. 
 
 Then comes the tulip-race, where beauty plays 
 
 Her idle freaks : from family diffused 540 
 
 To family, as flies the father-dust. 
 
 The varied colours run ; and, while they break 
 
 On the charmed eye, the exulting florist marks 
 
 With secret pride the wonders of his hand. 
 
 521 sweeps] darts 1728-38. 524 darkening . . glittering] 
 
 running . . rising 1728-38. 527 these . . bright with dew] 
 
 the . . dewy-bright 1728-38. 
 
 532-8 For this passage, which first appeared in the 1744 
 edition, there stood in the original edition (1728) and subsequent 
 editions (to 1738)— 
 
 Soft-bending (dew-bending) cowslips, and of nameless dyes 
 Anemonies, auriculas, a tribe 
 Peculiar powdered with a shining sand, 
 Renunoulas, and iris many-hued. 
 540 idle] gayest 1728-38. 543, 544 Originally (1728-38)— 
 On the charmed florist's eye, he wondering (curious) stands, 
 And new-flushed glories all ecstatic marks. 
 
24 THE SEASONS 
 
 No gradual bloom is wanting — from the bud 
 
 First-born of Spring to Summer's musky tribes ; 
 
 Nor hyacinths, of purest virgin white, 
 
 Low bent and blushing inward ; nor jonquils, 
 
 Of potent fragrance ; nor narcissus fair, 
 
 As o'er the fabled fountain hanging still; 55° 
 
 Nor broad carnations, nor gay-spotted pinks ; 
 
 Nor, showered from every bush, the damask-rose : 
 
 Infinite numbers, delicacies, smells. 
 
 With hues on hues expression cannot paint, 
 
 The breath of Nature, and her endless bloom. 
 
 Hail, Source of Being ! Universal Soul 
 Of heaven and earth ! EssentialJPresence, hail! 
 To thee I bend the knee"; to thee my thoughts 
 Continual climb, who with a master-hand 
 Hast the great whole into perfection touched. 56a 
 By thee the various vegetative tribes, 
 Wrapt in a filmy net and clad with leaves. 
 Draw the Uve ether and imbibe the dew. 
 By thee disposed into congenial soils. 
 Stands each attractive plant, and sucks, and swells 
 The juicy tide, a, twining mass of tubes. 
 At thy command the vernal sun awakes 
 The torpid sap, detruded to the root 
 By wintry winds, that now in fluent dance 
 And lively fermentation mounting spreads 570 
 
 All this innumerous-coloured scene of things. 
 
 As rising from the vegetable world 
 
 545, 546 First addedTn"ffie^ition of 1744. 
 
 547, 548 Expanded (1744 edition) from the line — 'Nor hya- 
 cinths are wanting nor junquils ' — the reading of the early edition 
 (1728-38); Nor hyacinths deep-purpled, nor jonquils 1744. 
 
 549 fair] white 1728-38. 550 Added in 1744. 551 
 
 broad . . gay-spotted] deep (striped ) . . enamelled 1728-38. 552 
 Nor] And 1728. 556 Source of Be ng] Mighty Being 1728-38; 
 Source of Beings 1744. 572 As rising] Ascending 1728-38. 
 
SPRING 25 
 
 My theme ascends, with equal wing ascend, 
 
 My panting muse ; and hark, how loud the woods 
 
 Invite you forth in all your gayest trim. 
 
 Lend me your song, ye nightingales ! oh, pour 
 
 The mazy-running soul of melody 
 
 Into my varied verse ! while I deduce, 
 
 From the first note the hoUow cuckoo sings, 
 
 The symphony of Spring, and touch a theme 580 
 
 Unknown to fame — the passion of the groves. 
 
 When first the soul of love is sent abroad 
 Warm through the vital air, and on the heart 
 Harmonious seizes, the gay troops begin 
 In gallant thought to plume the painted wing ; 
 And try again the long-forgotten strain. 
 At first faint-warbled. But no sooner grows 
 The soft infusion prevalent and wide 
 Than aU alive at once their joy o'erflows 
 In music unconfined. Up springs the lark, 59c 
 
 ShriU-voiced and loud, the messenger of morn : 
 Ere yet the shadows fly, he mounted sings 
 Amid the dawning clouds, and from their haunts 
 Calls up the tuneful nations. Every cops e v 
 
 Deep- tangled, tree irregular, and bush 
 ^endmg with dewy moliture o'er the heads 
 Of the coy quiristers that lodge within. 
 Are prodigal of harmony. The thrush 
 And wood-lark, o'er the kind-contending throng 
 Superior heard, run through the sweetest length 
 Of notes, when listening Philomela deigns 601 
 
 To let them joy, and purposes, in thought 
 Elate, to make her night excel their day. 
 
 573 My theme ascends] To higher life 1728-38. 582 
 
 When first the soul] Just as the spirit 1728-38. 585 the . . 
 
 wing] their . . wings 1728. 595 Deep-tangled] Thick- 
 wove and 1728, 1729, 1730, 1738, 1744. 
 
26 THE SEASONS 
 
 The blackbird whistles from the thorny brake, 
 The mellow bullfinch answers from the grove ; 
 Nor are the linnets, o'er the flowering furze 
 Poured out profusely, silent. Joined to these 
 Innumerous songsters, in the freshening shade 
 Of new-sprung leaves, their modulations mix 
 Mellifluous. The jay, the rook, the daw, 6io 
 
 / And each harsh pipe, discordant Jieardjlone, 
 ■ Aid the f ullconcert ; while the stock-dove breathes 
 A melancholy murmur through the whole. 
 
 'Tis love creates their melody, and all 
 This waste of music is the voice of love, 
 That even to birds and beasts the tender arts 
 Of pleasing teaches. Hence the glossy kind 
 Try every winning way inventive love 
 Can dictate, and in courtship to their mates 
 Pour forth their little souls. First, wide around, 620 
 With distant awe, in airy rings they rove. 
 Endeavouring by a thousand tricks to catch 
 The cunning, conscious, half-averted glance 
 Of their regardless charmer. Should she seem 
 Softening the least approvance to bestow, 
 
 608, 609 Condensed (1744 edition) from the original text 
 (1728-38)— 
 Thousands beside, thick as the covering leaves 
 They warble under, or the nitid (nited 1730) hues 
 Which (That 1730) speck them o'er, their modulations mix. 
 611, 612 Originally (1728)— 
 And all these jangling pipes, when heard alone. 
 Here aid the consort (sic) ; while the wood-dove breathes. 
 Altered (in 1730, and retained on to and including 1 738) as follows — 
 And each harsh pipe, discordant heard alone. 
 Here aid the consort; while the stock-dove breathes. 
 614 melody] gaiety 1728-38. 616 That] Which 1728-38. 
 
 619, 620 Originally (1728-38)— 
 
 In fluttering courtship pour 
 Their little souls before her. Wide around. 
 621 With distant awe] Respectful, first 1728-38. 
 
SPRING 27 
 
 Their colours burnish, and, by hope inspired, 
 
 They brisk advance ; then, on a sudden struck, 
 
 Retire disordered ; then again approach. 
 
 In fond rotation spread the spotted wing, 
 
 And shiver every feather with desire. 630 
 
 Connubial leagues agreed, to the deep woods 
 They haste away, all as their fancy leads. 
 Pleasure, or food, or secret safety prompts ; 
 That Nature's great command may be obeyed, 
 Nor all the sweet sensations they perceive 
 Indulged in vain. . Some to the holly-hedge 
 Nesthng repair, and to the thicket some ; 
 Some to the rude protection of the thorn 
 Commit their feeble offspring. The cleft tree 
 Offers its kind concealment to a few, 640 
 
 Their food its insects, and its moss their nests. 
 Others apart far in the grassy dale, 
 Or roughening waste, their humble texture weave 
 But most in woodland solitudes delight, 
 In unfrequented glooms, or shaggy banks, 
 Steep, and divided by a babbling brook 
 Whose murmurs soothe them all the Hve-long day 
 When by kind duty fixed. Among the roots 
 Of hazel, pendent o'er the plaintive stream. 
 They frame the first foundation of their domes — 650 
 Dry sprigs of trees, in artful fabric laid, 
 And bound with clay together. Now 'tis nought 
 
 629 Preceding this line, appeared in the early texts ( 1728-38 J : 
 And throwing out the last efforts of love. 
 First dropped in the edition of 1744. 632 all] each 1728-38. 
 
 633 secret] latent 1728-38. 639 Resolve to trust their 
 
 young. The clefted tree 1728. 643, 644 Expanded from — 
 
 Their humble texture weave. But most delight — 
 the reading of the early text (1728-38). 648 by kind duty] 
 
 for a season 1728-44. 651 fabric] manner 1728-38. 
 
28 THE SEASONS 
 
 But restless hurry through the busy air, 
 Beat by unnumbered wings. The swallow sweeps 
 The sUmy pool, to build his hanging house 
 Intent. And often, from the careless back 
 Of herds and flocks, a thousand tugging bills 
 Pluck hair and wool ; and oft, when unobserved. 
 Steal from the barn a straw — till soft and warm, 
 Clean and complete, their habitation grows. 660 
 
 As thus the patient dam assiduous sits, 
 Not to be tempted from her tender task 
 Or by sharp hunger or by smooth delight, 
 Though the whole loosened Spring around her blows. 
 Her sympathizing lover takes his stand 
 High on the opponent bank, and ceaseless sings 
 The tedious time away ; or else supplies 
 Her place a moment, while she sudden flits 
 To pick the scanty meal. The appointed time 
 With pio^s toil fulfilled, the callow young, 670 
 
 Warmed and expanded into perfect life. 
 Their brittle bondage break, and come to light, 
 A helpless family demanding food 
 With constant clamour. Oh, what passions then. 
 What melting sentiments of kindly care. 
 On the new parents seize ! Away they fly 
 Affectionate, and undesiring bear 
 The most delicious morsel to their young ; 
 Which equally distributed, again 
 The search begins. Even so a gentle pair, 680 
 
 653 restless hurry] hurry hurry 1728-38. 
 
 656 Originally (1728-38)— 
 
 Ingeniously intent. Oft from the back. 
 Dropped in 1744. 
 
 659 a straw] the straw 1728-38. 661 As thus] Meantime 
 
 1728. 676 Seize the new parents' hearts, &e. 1728-38. 
 
 680-85 Even so a gentle pair . . Oft] Expanded from the 
 original text (1728-38)— 
 
SPRING 29 
 
 By fortune sunk, but formed of generous mould, 
 And charmed with cares beyond the vulgar breast, 
 In some lone cot amid the distant woods, 
 Sustain'd alone by providential Heaven, 
 Oft, as they weeping eye their infant train. 
 Check their own appetites, and give them aU. 
 
 Nor toil alone they scorn : exalting love, 
 By the great Father of the Spring inspired. 
 Gives instant courage to the fearful race, 
 And to the simple art. With stealthy wing, 690 
 Should some rude foot their woody haunts molest, 
 Amid a neighbouring bush they silent drop, 
 And whirring thence, as if alarmed, deceive 
 The unfeeUng schoolboy. Hence, around the head 
 Of wandering swain, the white-winged plover wheels 
 Her sounding flight, and then directly on 
 In long excursion skims the level lawn 
 To tempt him from her nest. The wild-duck, hence. 
 O'er the rough moss, and o'er the trackless waste 
 The heath-hen flutters, pious fraud ! to lead 700 
 The hot pursuing spaniel far astray. 
 
 Be not the muse ashamed here to bemoan 
 
 So pitiful and poor 
 A gentle pair on providential Heaven 
 Cast. 
 682 charmed] pierced 1744. 685 infant] clamant 1728-38. 
 
 687 toil] pain 1744. 
 
 687-94 Nor toil alone . . . The unfeeling schoolboy. These 
 lines, which first appeared in the edition of 1744, are an expansion 
 of the original text (1728-38)— 
 
 Nor is the courage of the fearful kind. 
 Nor is their cunning less should some rude foot 
 Their woody haunts molest : stealthy aside 
 Into the centre of a neighbouring bush 
 They drop, and whirring thence alarmed deceive 
 The rambling schoolboy. 
 695 wandering swain] traveller 1728-38. 700 pious fraud !] 
 as if hurt 1728-38. 
 
30 THE SEASONS 
 
 Her brothers of the grove by tyrant man 
 Inhuman caught, and in the narrow cage 
 from liberty confined, and boundless air. 
 Dull are the pretty slaves, their plumage dull, 
 Ragged, and aU its brightening lustre lost ; 
 Nor is that sprightly wildness in their notes, 
 Which, clear and vigorous, warbles from the beech. 
 Oh then, ye friends of love and love-taught song, 710 
 Spare the soft tribes, this barbarous art forbear ! 
 If on your bosom innocence can win. 
 Music engage, or piety persuade. 
 
 But let not chief the nightingale lament 
 Her ruined care, too dehcately framed 
 To brook the harsh confinement of the cage. 
 Oft when, returning with her loaded biU, 
 The astonished mother finds a vacant nest, 
 By the hard hand of unrelenting clowns 
 Robbed, to the ground the vain provision falls ; 720 
 Her pinions rufile, and, low-drooping, scarce 
 Can bear the mourner to the poplar shade ; 
 Where, all abandoned to despair, she sings 
 Her sorrows through the night, and, on the bough 
 Sole-sitting, still at every dying fall 
 Takes up again her lamentable strain 
 Of winding woe, till wide around the woods 
 Sigh to her song and with her wail resound. 
 
 But now the feathered youth their former bounds. 
 Ardent, disdain ; and, weighing oft their wings, 730 
 
 708 sprightly] luscious 1728-38. 709-13 Originally (1728- 
 38)— 
 
 That warbles from the beech. Oh, then, desist ! 
 
 Ye friends of harmony ; this barbarous art 
 
 Forbear, if innocence and music can 
 
 Win on your hearts, or piety persuade. 
 725 Sad-sitting 1728-38. 728 Sigh to] Sigh at 1728-38. 
 
 729 But] And 1728-38. 
 
SPRING 31 
 
 Demand the free possession of the sky. 
 This one glad office more, and then dissolves 
 Parental love at once, now needless grown : 
 Unlavish Wisdom never works in vain. 
 Tis on some evening, sunny, grateful, mild, 
 When nought but balm is breathing through the 
 
 woods 
 With yellow lustre bright, that the new tribes 
 Visit the spacious heavens, and look abroad 
 On Nature's common, far as they can see 
 Or wing, their range and pasture. O'er the boughs 740 
 Dancing about, still at the giddy verge 
 Their resolution fails ; their pinions still. 
 In loose libration stretched, to trust the void 
 Trembling refuse — tiU down before them fly 
 The parent-guides, and chide, exhort, command. 
 Or push them off. The surging air receives 
 The plumy burden ; and their self-taught wings 
 Winnow the waving element. On ground 
 Alighted, bolder up again they lead, 
 Farther and farther on, the lengthening flight ; 750 
 Till, vanished every fear, and every power 
 Roused into life and action, light in air 
 The acquitted parents see their soaring race, 
 And, once rejoicing, never know them more. 
 
 High from the summit of a craggy cliff. 
 Hung o'er the deep, such as amazing frowns 
 On utmost Kilda's shore, whose lonely race 
 
 732 This one] But this 1728-38. 733 now needless grown :] 
 for needless grown, 1728-38. 
 
 743 to trust the void] the void abrupt 1728-38. 752 light 
 in air] in the void 1728-38. 
 
 753 acquitted] exoner'd 1728-38. 
 
 755-65 These lines are an expansion of a vigorous and 
 picturesque passage which remained in the original text till 
 altered in 1744. See Note at the end of the poem. 
 
32 THE SEASONS 
 
 Resign the setting sun to Indian worlds, 
 The royal eagle draws his vigorous young, 
 Strong-pounced, and ardent with paternal fire. 760 
 Now fit to raise a kingdom of their own, 
 He drives thera from his fort, the towering seat 
 For ages of his empire — which in peace 
 Unstained he holds, while many a league to sea 
 He wings his course, and preys in distant isles. 
 
 Should I my steps turn to the rural seat 
 Whose lofty elms and venerable oaks 
 Invite the rook, who high amid the boughs 
 In early Spring his airy city builds, 
 And ceaseless caws amusive ; there, well-pleased, 770 
 I might the various polity survey 
 Of the mixed household-kind. The careful hen 
 CaUs all her chirping family around, 
 Fed and defended by the fearless cock, 
 Whose breast with ardour flames, as on he walks 
 Graceful, and crows defiance. In the pond 
 The finely-checkered duck before her train 
 Rows garrulous. The stately- sailing swan 
 Gives out his snowy plumage to the gale. 
 And, arching proud his neck, with oary feet 780 
 Bears forward fierce, and guards his osier-isle. 
 Protective of his young. The turkey nigh. 
 Loud-threatening, reddens ; while the peacock 
 
 spreads 
 His every-coloured glory to the sun. 
 And swims in radiant majesty along. 
 
 766 And should I wander 1728-38. 767 lofty elms . . oaks] 
 aged oaks . . gloom 1728-38. 768-70 Originally (1728-38)— 
 
 Invite the noisy rook, with pleasure there — 
 A single line. 
 
 781 forward] onward 1728; guards his osier isle] beats you 
 from the bank 1728-38. 785 radiant] floating 1728-38. 
 
SPRING 33 
 
 O'er the whole homely scene the cooing dove 
 Flies thick in amorous chase, and wanton rolls 
 The glancing eye, and turns the changeful neck. 
 
 While thus the gentle tenants of the shade 
 Indulge their purer loves, the rougher world 790 
 Of brutes below rush furious into flame 
 And fierce desircT Through all his lusty veins 
 The bull, deep-scorched, the raging passion feels. 
 Of pasture sick, and neghgent of food, 
 Scarce seen he wades among the yellow broom, 
 While o'er his ample sides the rambling sprays 
 Luxuriant shoot ; or through the mazy wood 
 Dejected wanders, nor the enticing bud 
 Crops, though it presses on his careless sense. 
 And oft, in jealous maddening fancy wrapt, 800 
 
 He seeks the fight ; and, idly-butting, feigns 
 His rival gored in every knotty trunk. 
 Him should he meet, the bellowing war begins : 
 Their eyes flash fury ; to the hollowed earth. 
 Whence the sand flies, they mutter bloody deeds, 
 And, groaning deep, the impetuous battle mix : 
 While the fair heifer, balmy-breathing near, 
 Stands kindling up their rage. The trembling steed, 
 With this hot impulse seized in every nerve, 
 Nor heeds the rein, nor hears the sounding thong ; 810 
 Blows are not felt ; but, tossing high his head, 
 And by the well-known joy to distant plains 
 
 793 the raging passion feels] receives the raging fire 1728-38. 
 
 796 ample sides] brawny back 1728-38. 
 
 800, 801 Originally (editions 1728-38)— 
 
 For, wrapt in mad imagination, he 
 Roars for the fight. 
 
 802 His] A 1728-38. 806 deep] vast 1728-38. 807 
 
 balmy-breathing near] redolent in view 1728-38. 810 thong] 
 whip 1728-38. In all editions (1728-46) the line is obviously 
 misprinted — ' Nor hears the rein, nor heeds the sounding whip 
 (thong)'. 
 
 THOMSON D 
 
34 THE SEASONS 
 
 Attracted strong, all wild he bursts away ; 
 
 O'er rocks, and woods, and craggy mountains flies ; 
 
 And, neighing, on the aerial summit takes 
 
 The exciting gale ; then, steep-descending, cleaves 
 
 The headlong torrents foaming down the hills, 
 
 Even where the madness of the straitened stream 
 
 Turns in black eddies round : such is the force 
 
 With which his frantic heart and sinews swell. 820 
 
 Nor undelighted by the boundless Spring 
 Are the broad monsters of the foaming deep : 
 From the deep ooze and gelid cavern roused, 
 They flounce and tumble in unwieldy joy. 
 Dire were the strain and dissonant to sing 
 The cruel raptures of the savage kind : 
 How, by this flame their native wrath sublimed, 
 They roam, amid the fury of their heart, 
 The far-resounding waste in fiercer bands, 
 And growl their horrid loves. But this the theme 830 
 I sing enraptured to the British fair 
 Forbids, and leads me to the mountain-brow 
 Where sits the shepherd on the grassy turf. 
 Inhaling healthful the descending sun. 
 Around him feeds his many- bleating flock. 
 Of various cadence ; and his sportive lambs. 
 This way and that convolved in friskful glee. 
 Their frolics play. And now the sprightly race 
 Invites them forth ; when swift, the signal given, 
 
 816 exciting] informing 1728-38; cleaves] stems 1728. 
 822, 823 Originally (1728)— 
 
 Are the broad monsters of the deep : through all 
 Their oozy caves and gelid kingdoms roused. 
 822 foaming] boiling 1730-44. 827-9 For the original 
 
 passage of seven lines see Note at end of the poem. 831 
 
 enraptured] transported 1728-38. 
 838 Originally (1728-38)— 
 
 Their little frolics play. And now the race. 
 
SPRING 35 
 
 They start away, and sweep the massy mound 840 
 
 That runs around the hill — the rampart once 
 
 Of iron war, in ancient barbarous times, 
 
 When disunited Britain ever bled, 
 
 Lost in eternal broil, ere yet she grew 
 
 To this deep-laid indissoluble state 
 
 Where wealth and commerce lift the golden head. 
 
 And o'er our labours liberty and law 
 
 Impartial watch, the wonder of a world ! 
 
 What is this mighty breath, ye curious, say. 
 That in a powerful language, felt, not heard, 850 
 Instructs the fowls of heaven, and through their 
 
 breast 
 These arts of love diffuses ? What, but God ? 
 Inspiring God ! who, boundless spirit aU 
 And unremitting energy,^ pervades, , 
 
 Adjusts, sustains, and agitates^the whole. 
 He ceaseless works alone, and yet alone 
 Seems not to work ; with such perfection framed 
 Is this complex, stupendous scheme of things. 
 But, though concealed, to every purer eye 
 The informing Au thor iji his works appears : 860 
 Chief, lovely Spring, in thee and thy soft scenes 
 The smiling God is seen — while water, earth. 
 And air attest his bounty, which exalts 
 
 840 massy] circly 1728. 846 the golden head] theu: 
 
 golden head 1728-38. 848 Impartial] Illustrious 1728-38. 
 
 850 Which in a language rather felt than heard 1728-38 ; That 
 in a language rather felt than heard 1744. 851 breast] 
 
 breasts 1728-38. 855 Adjusts, sustains] Subsists, adjusts 1728. 
 857 with such perfection] So exquisitely 1728. 858 Stupen- 
 
 dous scheme] amazing scene 1728; amazing scheme 1730-38 
 860 works] work 1730-38. 
 
 861-6 In place of these six lines the earlier editions (1728-38) 
 give a passage of twenty-one Unes, for which the curious reader 
 is referred to a Note at the end of the poem. 
 
 862 is seen] appears 1728-38. 863 exalts] instils 1728-38. 
 
 D 2 
 
36 THE SEASONS 
 
 The brute-creation to this finer thought, 
 And annual melts their undesigning hearts 
 Profusely thus in tenderness and joy. 
 
 Still let my song a nobler note assume, 
 And sing the infusive force of Spring on man ; 
 When heaven and earth, as if contending, vie 
 To raise his being and serene his soul. 870 
 
 Can he forbear to join the general smile 
 Of Nature ? Can fierce passions vex his breast, 
 While every gale is peace, and every grove 
 Is melody ? Hence ! from the bounteous walks 
 Of flowing Spring, ye sordid sons of earth. 
 Hard, and unfeeling of another's woe, 
 Or only lavish to yourselves — away ! 
 But come, ye generous minds, in whose wide thought, 
 Of all his works. Creative Bounty burns 
 With warmest beam, and on your open front 880 
 And liberal eye sits, from his dark retreat 
 Inviting modest Want. Nor till invoked 
 Can restless Goodness wait ; your active searcii 
 Leaves no cold wintry corner unexplored ; 
 Like silent-working Heaven, surprising oft 
 The lonely heart with unexpected good. 
 For you the roving spirit of the wind 
 Blows Spring abroad ; for you the teeming clouds 
 Descend in gladsome plenty o'er the world ; 
 And the Sun sheds his kindest rays for you, 890 
 Ye flower of human race ! In these green days, 
 
 864 Into the brutes this temporary thought 1728-38. 
 
 871, 872 join the general smile, &c.] smile with Nature ? Can 
 The stormy passions in his bosom roll 1728-38. 87S minds] 
 
 breasts 1728-38. 879, 880 burns With warmest beam] most 
 
 Divinely burns 1728-38. 882, 883 till invoked Can restless 
 
 Goodness wait] only fair And easy of approach 1728-38. 889 
 gladsome] buxom 1728-38. 890 sheds] spreads 1728-38 ; 
 
 kindest rays] genial blaze 1728-38. 
 
SPRING 37 
 
 Reviving Sickness lifts her languid head ; 
 
 Life flows afresh ; and young-eyed Health exalts 
 
 The whole creation round. Contentment walks 
 
 The sunny glade, and feels an inward bliss 
 
 Spring o'er his mind, beyond the power of kings 
 
 To purchase. Pure Serenity apace 
 
 Induces thought, and contemplation still. 
 
 By swift degrees the love of nature works, 
 
 And warms the bosom ; till at last, sublimed 900 
 
 To rapture and enthusiastic heat, 
 
 We feel the present Deity, and taste 
 
 The joy of God to see a happy world ! 
 
 These are the sacred feelings of thy heart. 
 Thy heart informed by reason's purer ray, 
 Lyttelton, the friend ! Thy passions thus 
 And meditations vary, as at large, 
 Courting the muse, through Hagley Park you stray — 
 Thy British Tempe ! There along the dale 909 
 
 With woods o'erhung, and shagged with mossy rocks 
 Whence on each hand the gushing waters play. 
 And down the rough cascade white-dashing fall 
 Or gleam in lengthened vista through the trees, 
 You silent steal ; or sit beneath the shade 
 Of solemn oaks, that tuft the swelling mounts 
 Thrown graceful round by Nature's careless hand, 
 And pensive listen to the various voice 
 Of rural peace — the herds, the flocks, the birds, 
 
 892 Reviving] Sad pining 1728-38. 896 power] pride 
 
 1728. 897 To purchase. Pure] E'er to bestow. 1728. 899 
 swift] small 1728-38. 900 sublimed] arrived 1728-38. 
 
 903 After this line in the earlier text (1728-38) came a 
 notable passage of twelve lines, which anticipates something of 
 the teaching of Wordsworth. For this dropped passage see Note 
 at the end of the poem. 
 
 904-62 were first inserted in the edition of 1744. 
 
 905 purer] purest 1744. 
 
38 THE SEASONS 
 
 The hollow-whispering breeze, the plaint of rills, 
 
 That, purling down amid the twisted roots 920 
 
 Which creep around, their dewy murmurs shake 
 
 On the soothed ear. From these abstracted oft, 
 
 You wander through the philosophic world ; 
 
 Where in bright train continual wonders rise 
 
 Or to the curious or the pious eye. 
 
 And oft, conducted by historic truth. 
 
 You tread the long extent of backward time. 
 
 Planning with warm benevolence of mind 
 
 And honest zeal, unwarped by party-rage, 
 
 Britannia's weal, — how from the venal gulf 930 
 
 To raise her virtue and her arts revive. 
 
 Or, turning thence thy view, these graver thoughts 
 
 The muses charm — while, with sure taste refined. 
 
 You draw the inspiring breath of ancient song. 
 
 Till nobly rises emulous thy own. 
 
 Perhaps thy loved Lucinda shares thy walk. 
 
 With soul to thine attuned. Then Nature all 
 
 Wears to the lover's eye a look of love ; 
 
 And aU the tumult of a guilty world, 
 
 Tost by ungenerous passions, sinks away. 940 
 
 The tender heart is animated peace ; 
 
 And, as it pours its copious treasures forth 
 
 In varied converse, softening every theme, 
 
 You, frequent pausing, turn, and from her eyes, 
 
 Where meekened sense and amiable grace 
 
 And lively sweetness dwell, enraptured drink 
 
 That nameless spirit of ethereal joy. 
 
 Inimitable happiness ! which love 
 
 Alone bestows, and on a favoured few. 
 
 Meantime you gain the height, from whose fair brow 
 
 The bursting prospect spreads immense around; 951 
 
 And, snatched o'er hill and dale, and wood and lawn, 
 
 And verdant field, and darkening heath between. 
 
SPRING 39 
 
 And villages embosomed soft in trees, 
 
 And spiry towns by surging columns marked 
 
 Of household smoke, your eye excursive roams — 
 
 Wide-stretching from the Hall in whose kind haunt 
 
 The hospitable Genius Ungers still. 
 
 To where the broken landscape, by degrees 
 
 Ascending, roughens into rigid hills 960 
 
 O'er which the Cambrian mountains, like far clouds 
 
 That skirt the blue horizon, dusky rise. 
 
 Flushed by the spirit of the genial year. 
 Now from the virgin's cheek a fresher bloom 
 Shoots less and less the live carnation round ; 
 Her lips blush deeper sweets ; she breathes of youth ; 
 The shining moisture swells into her eyes 
 In brighter flow ; her wishing bosom heaves 
 With palpitations wild ; kind tumults seize 
 Her veins, and all her yielding soul is love. 970 
 
 From the keen gaze her lover turns away, 
 Pull of the dear ecstatic power, and sick 
 With sighing languishment. Ah then, ye fair ! 
 Be greatly cautious of your sliding hearts : 
 Dare not the infectious sigh ; the pleading look, 
 Downcast and low, in meek submission dressed, 
 But full of guile. Let not the fervent tongue. 
 Prompt to deceive with adulation smooth, 
 Gain on your purposed will. Nor in the bower 
 Where woodbines flaunt and roses shed a couch. 
 While evening draws her crimson curtains round. 
 Trust your soft minutes with betraying man. 982 
 
 955 surging] dusky 1744. 956 household] rising 1744. 
 
 958 linger."!] harbours 1744. 960 rigid] ridgy 1744. 962 
 
 dusky] doubtful 1744. 963 Added edition 1744. 964 
 
 Now] Hence 1728-38. 975 look] eye 1728-38. 976 In 
 
 meek submission drest deject, and low 1728-38. 977 The 
 
 earUer text (172^38) inserts ' tempting ' before ' guile ', and omits 
 ' fervent ' before 'tongue '. 979 will] wills 1728-38. 
 
40 THE SEASONS 
 
 And let the aspiring youth beware of love, 
 Of the smooth glance beware ; for 'tis too late, 
 When on his heart the torrent-softness pours. 
 Then wisdom prostrate lies, and fading fame 
 Dissolves in air away ; while the fond soul. 
 Wrapt in gay visions of unreal bUss, 
 Still paints the illusive form, the kindling grace. 
 The enticing smile, the modest- seeming eye, 990 
 Beneath whose beauteous beams, belying Heaven, 
 Lurk searchless cunning, cruelty, and death : 
 And stiU, false-warbhng in his cheated ear. 
 Her siren voice enchanting draws him on 
 To guileful shores and meads of fatal joy. 
 
 Even present, in the very lap of love 
 Inglorious laid — while music flows around. 
 Perfumes, and oils, and wine, and wanton hours — 
 Amid the roses fierce repentance rears 
 Her snaky crest : a quick-returning pang 1000 
 
 Shoots through the conscious heart, where honour 
 
 still 
 And great design, against the oppressive load 
 Of luxury, by fits, impatient heave. 
 
 But absent, what fantastic woes, aroused, 
 Rage in each thought, by restless musing fed, 
 ChiU the warm cheek, and blast the bloom of life ! 
 Neglected fortune flies ; and, sliding swift. 
 Prone into ruin fall his scorned affairs. 
 'Tis nought but gloom around : the darkened sun 
 
 984 Of the smooth glance beware] And shun the enchanting 
 glance 1728. 986 Then interest sinks to dirt and distant 
 
 fame 1728. 988 Is wrapt in dreams of ecstasy and bliss 
 
 1728-38. 990 enticing . . modest seeming] alluring . . full 
 
 ethereal 1728. 
 
 991-1008 For the original text (1728), which was dropped in 
 1 730 to make way for these lines, see Note at the end of the poem. 
 
 1000 pang] twinge 1730-38. 
 
SPRING 41 
 
 Loses his light. The rosy-bosomed Spring loio 
 
 To weeping fancy pines ; and yon bright arch, 
 Contracted, bends into a dusky vault. 
 All Nature fades extinct ; and she alone 
 Heard, felt, and seen, possesses every thought. 
 Fills every sense, and pants in every vein. 
 Books are but formal dulness, tedious friends ; 
 And sad amid the social band he sits, 
 Lonely and unattentive. From the tongue 
 The unfinish'd period falls : while, borne away 
 On swelling thought, his wafted spirit flies 1020 
 
 To the vain bosom of his distant fair ; 
 And leaves the semblance of a lover, fixed 
 In melancholy site, with head declined. 
 And love-dejected eyes. Sudden he starts, 
 Shook from his tender trance, and restless runs 
 To glimmering shades and sympathetic glooms. 
 Where the dun umbrage o'er the falling stream 
 Romantic hangs ; there through the pensive dusk 
 Strays, in heart-thrilUng meditation lost, 
 Indulging all to love — or on the bank 1030 
 
 Thrown, amid drooping UUes, swells the breeze 
 With sighs unceasing, and the brook with tears. 
 Thus in soft anguish he consumes the day, 
 Nor quits his deep retirement till the moon 
 Peeps through the chambers of the fleecy east. 
 Enlightened by degrees, and in her train 
 Leads on the gentle hours ; then forth he walks. 
 Beneath the trembUng languish of her beam. 
 With softened soul, and woos the bird of eve 
 To mingle woes with his ; or, while the world 1040 
 And all the sons of care lie hushed in sleep, 
 
 1012 Of heaven low-bends into a dusky vault 1728-38. 
 1018 inattentive 1728-38. 1021 vain] dear 1728; distant] 
 
 absent 1728. 1038 beam] beams 1728-38. 
 
42 THE SEASONS 
 
 Associates with the midnight shadows drear, 
 
 And, sighing to the lonely taper, pours 
 
 His idly-tortured heart into the page ^' 
 
 Meant for the moving messenger of love, 
 
 Where rapture burns on rapture, every line 
 
 With rising frenzy fired. But if on bed 
 
 Delirious flung, sleep from his pillow flies. 
 
 All night he tosses, nor the balmy power 
 
 In any posture finds ; till the grey morn 1050 
 
 Lifts her pale lustre on the paler wretch, 
 
 Exanimate by love — and then perhaps 
 
 Exhausted nature sinks a while to rest. 
 
 Still interrupted by distracted dreams 
 
 That o'er the sick imagination rise 
 
 And in black colours paint the mimic scene. 
 
 Oft with the enchantress of his soul he talks ; 
 
 Sometimes in crowds distressed ; or, if retired 
 
 To secret-winding flower-enwoven bowers. 
 
 Far from the dull impertinence of man, 1060 
 
 Just as he, credulous, his endless cares 
 
 Begins to lose in blind oblivious love. 
 
 Snatched from her yielded hand, he knows not how. 
 
 Through forests huge, and long untravelled heaths 
 
 1044 idly] sweetly 1728. 1046, 1047 Where rapture . . 
 
 frenzy fired.] Instead of this short passage, the earlier editions 
 
 (1728, 1729) give- 
 But ah ! how faint, how meaningless and poor 
 To what his passion swells ! which bursts the bounds 
 Of every eloquence, and asks for looks, 
 Where fondness flows on fondness, love on love, 
 Entwisting beams with hers, and speaking more 
 Than ever charmed ecstatic poet sighed 
 To listening beauty, bright with conscious smiles 
 And graceful vanity. 
 
 1061 credulous, his endless] kneeling, all his former 1728 ; 
 credulous, his thousand 1730-38. 
 
 1062 blind] vast 1728. 1063 yielded] yielding 1730-38. 
 
SPRING 43 
 
 With desolation brown, he wanders waste, 
 
 In night and tempest wrapt ; or shrinks aghast 
 
 Back from the bending precipice ; or wades 
 
 The turbid stream below, and strives to reach 
 
 The farther shore where, succourless and sad. 
 
 She with extended arms his aid implores, 1070 
 
 But strives in vain : borne by the outrageous flood 
 
 To distance down, he rides the ridgy wave, 
 
 Or whelmed beneath the boiling eddy sinks. 
 
 These are the charming agonies of love, 
 Whose misery delights. But through the heart 
 Should jealousy its venom once diffuse, 
 'Tis then delightful misery no more. 
 But agony unmixed, "incessant gall. 
 Corroding every thought, and blasting all 
 Love's Paradise. Ye fairy prospects, then, 1080 
 
 Ye bed of roses and ye bowers of joy. 
 Farewell ! Ye gleamings of departed peace, 
 Shine out your last ! The yellow-tinging plague 
 Internal vision taints, and in a night 
 Of livid gloom imagination wraps. 
 Ah then ! instead of love-enlivened cheeks. 
 Of sunny features, and of ardent eyes 
 With flowing rapture bright, dark looks succeed, 
 Suffused, and glaring with untender fire, 
 A clouded aspect, and a burning cheek 1090 
 
 Where the whole poisoned soul malignant sits, 
 
 1070 His dearer life extends her beckoning arms 1728; Wild 
 as a Bacchanal she spreads her arms 1730-38. 1073 The three 
 following lines were omitted from the original text in 1744 — 
 Then a weak, wailing, lamentable cry 
 Is heard, and all in tears he wakes, again 
 To tread the circle of revolving woe. 
 1078 gall] rage 1728-38. 1080 The Paradise of Love 1728; 
 the line thus consisting of six feet. 1082 departed] departing 
 
 1728-44. 1086 Ah] Ay 1728-38. 1088 rapture] raptures 
 
 1730-38. 
 
44 THE SEASONS 
 
 And frightens love away. Ten thousand fears 
 
 Invented wild, ten thousand frantic views 
 
 Of horrid rivals hanging on the charms 
 
 Eor which he melts in fondness, eat him up 
 
 With fervent anguish and consuming rage. 
 
 In vain reproaches lend their id'e aid. 
 
 Deceitful pride, and resolution frail, 
 
 Giving false peace a moment. Fancy pours 
 
 Afresh her beauties on his busy thought, "oo 
 
 Her first endearments twining round the soul 
 
 With all the witchcraft of ensnaring love. 
 
 Straight the fierce storm involves his mind anew, 
 
 Flames through the nerves, and boils along the veins ; 
 
 While anxious doubt distracts the tortured heart : 
 
 For even the sad assurance of his fears 
 
 Were peace to what he feels. Thus the warm youth. 
 
 Whom love deludes into his thorny wilds 
 
 Through flowery-tempting paths, or leads a life 
 
 Of fevered rapture or of cruel care — mo 
 
 His brightest aims extinguished all, and all 
 
 His lively moments running down to waste. 
 
 But happy they ! the happiest of their kind ! 
 Whom gentler stars unite, and in one fate 
 Their hearts, their fortunes, and their beings blend. 
 'Tis not the coarser tie of human laws, 
 i Unnatural oft, and foreign to the mind, 
 I That binds their peace, but harmony itself, 
 ^Attuning all their passions into~love ; 
 Where friendship full-exerts her softest power, 1120 
 Perfect~esleem enlivened by desire 
 Ineffable and sympathy of soul, 
 Thought meeting thought, and will preventing will, 
 
 1096 rage] pine 1728-38. 1099 Giving a moment's ease. 
 
 Reflection pours 1728-38. 1107 peace] heaven 1728. 1120 
 her] his 1728-38. 
 
SPRING 45 
 
 With boundless confidence : for nought but love 
 
 Can answer love, and render bliss secure. 
 
 Let him, ungenerous, who, alone intent 
 
 To bless himself, from sordid parents buys 
 
 The loathing virgin, in eternal care 
 
 Well-merited consume his nights and days ; 
 
 Let barbarous nations, whose inhuman love 1130 
 
 Is wild desire, fierce as the suns they feel ; 
 
 Let eastern tyrants from the light of heaven 
 
 Seclude their bosom-slaves, meanly possessed 
 
 Of a mere lifeless, violated form : 
 
 While those whom love cements in holy faith 
 
 And equal transport free as nature live. 
 
 Disdaining fear. What is the world to them, 
 
 Its pomp, its pleasure, and its nonsense all. 
 
 Who in each other clasp whatever fair 
 
 High fancy forms, and lavish hearts can wish ? 1140 
 
 Something than beauty dearer, should they look 
 
 Or on the mind or mind-illumined face ; 
 
 Truth, goodness, honour, harmony, and love. 
 
 The richest bounty of indulgent Heaven 1 
 
 Meantime a smiling offspring rises round. 
 
 And mingles both their graces. By degrees 
 
 The human blossom blows ; and every day. 
 
 Soft as it rolls along, shows some new charm. 
 
 The father's lustre and the mother's bloom. 
 
 Then infant reason grows apace, and calls 1150 
 
 For the kind hand of an assiduous care. 
 
 Delightful task ! to rear the tender thought. 
 
 To teach the young idea how to shoot. 
 
 To pour the fresh instruction o'er the mind. 
 
 To breathe the enlivening spirit, and to fix 
 
 The generous purpose in the glowing breast. 
 
 1 1 37 What is] for what's 1728-38. 11 55 enlivening] in- 
 
 spiring 1728-38; fix] plant 1728-38. 
 
46 THE SEASONS 
 
 Oh, speak the joy ! ye, whom the sudden tear 
 Surprises often, while you look around. 
 And nothing strikes your eye but sights of bliss. 
 All various Nature pressing on the heart — n6o 
 An elegant sufficiency, content. 
 Retirement, rural quiet, friendship, books. 
 Ease and alternate labour, useful life. 
 Progressive virtue, and approving Heaven ! 
 These are the matchless joys of virtuous love ; 
 And thus their moments fly. The Seasons thus. 
 As ceaseless round a jarring world they roll. 
 Still find them happy ; and consenting Spring 
 Sheds her own rosy garland on their heads : 
 Till evening comes at last, serene and mild ; 1170 
 When after the long vernal day of life. 
 Enamoured more, as more remembrance swells 
 With many a proof of recollected love, 
 Together down they sink in social sleep ; 
 Together freed, their gentle spiritsTy 
 To scenes where love and bhss immortal reign. 
 
 1 1 57 ye] you 1728-38. 1161-5 Instead of these lines, which 
 first appeared in edition 1744, the first text (1728-38) gives — 
 Obedient fortune and approving Heaven. 
 These are the blessings of diviner love. 
 1 169 heads] head 1728-38. 1170 serene and mild] cool, 
 
 gentle, calm 1728-38. 1172 as more remembrance swells] as 
 
 soul approaches soul 1728-38. 1 173 Added in 1744. 1175, 
 1 1 76 These concluding lines were added in 1744. 
 
 NOTES TO SPRING 
 
 There is no Argument prefixed to the earlier editions. But 
 the following interesting table of Contents appears in the second 
 edition (1729) :— 
 
 The Contents. 
 The subject — Spring. Described as a, personage descending 
 on Earth. 
 
 Address to Lady Hartford. 
 
SPRING 47 
 
 Winter described as a personage resigning the dominion of 
 the year. 
 
 Spring, yet unconfirmed. 
 
 The sun in Taurus fixes the Spring quarter. 
 
 First effects of the Spring, in softening Nature. 
 
 Plowing. 
 
 Sowing and Harrowing. 
 
 The praise of Agriculture. 
 
 Particularly appUed to Britons. 
 
 Effects of the Spring in colouring the fields and unfolding the 
 leaves. 
 
 The country in blossom. 
 
 A blight. 
 
 A philosophical account of insects producing the blight. 
 
 A Spring-shower. 
 
 The sun breaking out in the evening after the rain. 
 
 The Rainbow. 
 
 Herbs produced — the food of man in the first ages of the world. 
 
 Then, the Golden Age. 
 
 As described by the poets. 
 
 The degeneracy of mankind from that state. 
 
 On this, the Deluge and effects thereof, particularly in shorten- 
 ing the life of man. 
 
 Hence, h, vegetable diet recommended. 
 
 The cruelty of feeding on animals. 
 
 Flowers in prospect : The difficulty of describing that delicate 
 part of the Season. 
 
 A wildflower-piece. 
 
 A gardenfiower-pieoe. 
 
 An apostrophe to the Supreme Being as the soul of vegetation. 
 
 Influence of the Spring on birds ; and first, of their singing. 
 
 Their courtship. 
 
 Building their nests. 
 
 Brooding, and care of their young. 
 
 Arts to secure them. 
 
 Against confining them in cages, and particularly the night- 
 ingale : her lamentation for her young. 
 
 Teaching their young to fly. 
 
 The eagle trying his at the sun. 
 
 A piece of household-fowl. 
 
 Influence of the Spring on other animals, the bull, horse, &c. 
 
 A landskip of the shepherd tend Jig his flock with lambs frisking 
 around him ; and a transition in praise of our present happy 
 Constitution. 
 
4:8 THE SEASONS 
 
 This various instinct in brutes ascribed to the continual and 
 unbounded energy of Divine Providence. 
 
 Influence of the Spring on man, inspiring a miiversal benevo- 
 lence, the love of mankind, and of nature. 
 
 Accounted for from that general harmony which then attunes 
 the world. 
 
 Effects of the Spring in woman, with a caution to the fair sex. 
 
 Hence a dissuasive from the feverish, extravagant, and un- 
 chastised passion of love, in an account of its false raptures, 
 pangs, and jealousies. 
 
 The whole concludes with the happiness of a pure mutual love, 
 founded on friendship, conducted with honour, and confirmed 
 by children. 
 
 Line 5. The Countess of Hertford was a woman of some 
 poetical taste, as shown by her own verses and by her patronage 
 of poets. Horace Walpole accredited her with ' as much taste 
 for the writings of others as modesty about her own ' — though 
 Johnson speaks rather contemptuously of her 'poetical operations'. 
 It was her habit, he says, ' to invite every summer some poet 
 into the country to hear her verses and assist her studies ; ' and 
 he goes on to relate that when the invitation came to Thomson, 
 in 1727, the poet disappointed her expectations by finding more 
 delight in carousing with the Earl than in poetizing with the 
 Countess, and therefore never received another invitation. It 
 is extremely probable, however, that Thomson wrote part of 
 Spring at Marlborough Castle, in Wiltshire, the seat of the Earl 
 of Hertford ; and it is certain that as a poet he retained the respect 
 and regard of the Countess as long as he Uved. In 1748 we find 
 her generously recommending to one of her friends the poem of 
 that year — ' Mr. Thomson's GasUe of Indolence,' She died. 
 Duchess of Somerset, in 1754. 
 
 108. Augusta ; London— so designated from the time of Con- 
 stantine, early in the fourth century. 
 
 271. Here followed, in all editions from the first (in 1728) to 
 that of 1738, the following passage of 28 11. (withdrawn in 1744) ; — 
 This to the Poets gave the Golden Age ; 
 When, as they sung in allegoric phrase. 
 The sailor-pine had not the nations yet 
 In commerce mixed ; for every country teemed 
 With every thing. Spontaneous harvests waved 
 Still in a sea of yellcw plenty round. 
 The forest was the vineyard, where, untaught 
 To climb, unpruned and wild, the juicy grape 
 
SPRING 49 
 
 Burst into floods of wine. The knotted oak 
 Shook from hi3 boughs the long, transparent streams 
 Of honey, creeping through the matted grass. 
 The uncultivated thorn a ruddy shower 
 Of fruitage shed on such as sat below 
 In blooming ease and from brown labour free. 
 Save what the copious gathering grateful gave. 
 The rivers foamed with nectar ; or diffuse. 
 Silent and soft, the milky maze devolved. 
 Nor had the spongy fuU-expanded fleece 
 Yet drunk the Tyrian dye. The stately ram 
 Shone through the mead in native purple clad, 
 Or milder saffron ; and the dancing lamb 
 The vivid crimson to the sun disclosed. 
 Nothing had power to hurt ; the savage soul. 
 Yet untranstused into the tyger's heart. 
 Burned not his bowels, nor his gamesome paw 
 Drove on the fleecy partners of his play : 
 While from the flowery brake the serpent rolled 
 His fairer spires, and played his pointless tongue. 
 In the second of these lines, for ' allegoric ', which is given in 
 the earlier editions (beginning in 1728), the editions 1730-38 
 substitute ' elevated '. 
 
 340. 'Ravine.' This form of 'rapine' (a Middle EngUsh 
 form) occurs in all editions, from 1728 to 1746. 
 
 483-7. These lines were introduced into the poem in 1744. 
 Amanda was a Miss Elizabeth Young, one of the daughters of 
 Captain Gilbert Young, a gentleman belonging to Dumfriesshire. 
 The sincerity and constancy of Thomson's affection for Miss 
 Young, from 1736 to 1744, are evidenced in various ways — by 
 contemporary report, his own correspondence and verse, and 
 certain lyrics which appear among his miscellaneous poems. 
 Mrs. Young ' constantly opposed his pretensions to her daughter ', 
 says Bamsay of Ochtertyre, ' saying to her one day " What ! 
 worUd you marry Thomson ? He will make hallads and you will 
 sing them " ' — from which one may infer that the poet was not 
 in a, pecuniary position to maintain a wife. Amanda became 
 the wife of Admiral Campbell. We have some glimpse of her 
 appearance as she showed to her lover in these lines of his : — 
 thou, whose tender, serious eyes 
 
 Expressive speak the mind I love, 
 The gentle azure of the skies. 
 
 The pensive shadows of the grove; 
 as well as in the passage in Spring 1. 483. 
 
 TWOTWRON E 
 
50 THE SEASONS 
 
 755-65. The original text which remained in the earlier 
 
 editions (1728-38) waB as follows : — 
 
 High from the summit of a craggy cliff, 
 Hung o'er the green sea grudging at its base. 
 The royal eagle draws his young, resolved 
 To try them at the sun. Strong-pounced, and bright 
 As burnished day, they up the blue sky wind. 
 Leaving dull sight below, and with fixed gaze 
 Drink in their native noon : the father-king 
 Claps his glad pinions, and approves the birth. 
 
 The alteration was made for edition 1744. 
 
 827-9. This short passage is a condensation of the original 
 
 text of seven lines which stood as follows from 1728 to 
 
 1738 :— 
 
 How the red lioness, her whelps forgot 
 Amid the thoughtless fury of her heart ; 
 The lank rapacious wolf ; the unshapely bear ; 
 The spotted tyger, fellest of the fell ; 
 And all the terrors of the Libyan (Lybian) swain. 
 By this new flame their native wrath sublimed, 
 Roam the surrounding waste in fiercer bands, &c. 
 861-6. Instead of these six lines the earlier editions (1728-38) 
 
 give the following : — 
 
 His grandeur in the heavens : the sun and moon. 
 Whether that fires the day, or, falling, this 
 Pours out a lucid softness o'er the night. 
 Are but a beam from him. The glittering stars. 
 By the deep ear of meditation heard. 
 Still in their midnight watches sing of him. 
 He nods a calm. The tempest blows his wrath. 
 Boots up the forest, and o'erturns the main. 
 The thunder is his voice, and the red flash 
 His speedy sword of justice. At his touch 
 The mountains flame. He takes the solid earth 
 And rocks the nations. Nor in these alone. 
 In every common instance God is seen ; 
 And to the man, who casts his mental eye 
 Abroad, unnoticed wonders rise. But chief 
 In thee, boon Spring, and in thy softer scenes 
 The smiling God appears ; while water, earth. 
 And air attest his bounty, which instils 
 Into the brutes this temporary thought, &c. {two lines). 
 903. This line was followed in the original text (1728-38) by 
 
 the following passage of twelve lines, dropped in 1744 : — 
 
SPRING > 51 
 
 'Tis harmony, that world-attuning power \ 
 
 By wTiioh all beings are adjusted, each 
 To all around, impelling and impelled ' 
 
 In endless circulation, that iHBpires / 
 
 This universal smile. Thus the glad skies, 
 The wide-rejoioing earth, the woods, the streams 
 With every life they hold, down to the flower 
 That paints the lowly vale, or insect-wing 
 Waved o'er the shepherd's slumber, touch the mind. 
 To nature tuned, with a light-flying hand 
 Invisible, quick-urging through the nerves 
 The glittering spirits in a flood of day. 
 In the first of these lines the first and second editions (1728 
 and 1729 respectively) give ' world-embracing ' for ' world- 
 attuning ' — the latter being the reading from 1730 to 1738. 
 
 906. George, eldest son of Sir Thomas Lyttelton, of Hagley 
 Park, in Worcestershire. Born in 1709, died 1773. He wrote 
 Dialogues of the Dead, &c. As a politician he opposed the policy 
 of Walpole, and in 1744 became one of the lords of the Treasury. 
 Previously he had been secretary to the Prince of Wales. In 
 1755 he was Chancellor of the Exchequer, and was raised to the 
 peerage in 1757. Thomson's first visit to Hagley Park was in 
 1743. 'Luoinda,' 1. 936, refers to Mrs. Lyttelton (Lucy For- 
 tesoue), whose death was lamented by her husband in a monody, 
 the tenderest and most touching of his verses. He was a true 
 friend to Thomson in many ways. In the preparation of a new 
 edition of The Seasons for 1744 the poet was indebted to him 
 for some suggestions. 
 
 991-1008. The original text (editions 1728, 1729) was as 
 follows : — 
 
 Effusing heaven ; and listens ardent still 
 To the small voice, where harmony and wit, 
 A modest, melting, mingled sweetness flow. 
 No sooner is the fair idea formed. 
 And contemplation fixes on the theme, 
 Than from his own creation wild he flies, 
 Sick of a shadow. Absence comes apace. 
 And shoots his every pang into his breast. 
 'Tis nought, &o. 
 
 E 2 
 
SUMMER 
 
 [Inscribed to the Right Honourable Mr. Dodington. First pub- 
 lished in 1727 (1,146 11.); last edition in author's lifetime 
 published in 1746 (1,805 11.).] 
 
 THE ARGUMENT 
 
 Thk subject proposed. Invocation. Address to Mr. Dod- 
 ington. An introductory reflection on the motion of the heavenly 
 bodies ; whence the succession of the Seasons. As the face of 
 nature in this season is almost uniform, the progress of the poem 
 is a description of a Summer's day. The dawn. Sun-rising. 
 Hymn to the sun. Forenoon. Summer insects described. 
 Hay-making. Sheep-shearing. Noonday. A woodland retreat. 
 Group of herds and flocks. A solemn grove : how it affects 
 a contemplative mind. A cataract, and rnde scene. View of 
 Summer in the torrid zone. Storm of thunder and lightning. A tale. 
 The storm over. A serene afternoon. Bathing. Howr of walking. 
 Transition to the prospect of a rich, well-cultivated country ; 
 which introduces a panegyric on Great Britain. Sunset. Evening. 
 Night. Summer meteors. A comet. The whole concluding with 
 the praise of philosophy.'* 
 
 * The above is substantially the Argument of the poem in 
 the first collected edition of The Seasons (1730). The notes 
 in italics were added in 1744 — all except ' A comet ', which was 
 added in 1746. In the Argument for 1730, for ' Sun-rising ', 
 appears ' A view of the sun rising ' ; for ' Hay-making ', appears 
 ' Rural Prospects ' ; f or ' View of Summer in the Torrid Zone ', 
 appears ' A Digression on Foreign Summers ' ; and the note 
 ' Rural Prospects ', of 1730, is withdrawn in 1744, as is also the 
 note ' The Morning ' — superseded by ' The Dawn '. For ' Group 
 of herds and flocks', the 1730 edition gives 'A Group of Flocks and 
 Herds '. The order in which the notes of the Argument come in 
 1730 differs considerably from the order in which they are pre- 
 sented above — that is, from their order in edd. 1744 and 1746. 
 
SUMMER 53 
 
 From brightening fields of ether fair-disclosed, 
 
 Child of the sun, refulgent Summer comes 
 
 In pride of youth, and felt through nature's 
 
 depth : 
 He comes, attended by the sultry hours 
 And ever-fanning breezes on his way ; 
 While from his ardent look the turning Spring 
 Averts her blushful face, and earth and skies 
 All-smiling to his hot dominion leaves. jJ . c 
 
 Hence let 'me)haste into the mid-wood shade, ./:'' 
 
 Where scarce^ a sunbeam wanders through the 
 gloom, lo 
 
 And on the dark-green grass, beside the brink 
 Of haunted stream that by the roots of oak 
 Rolls o'er the rocky channel, lie at large 
 And sing the glories of the circling year. 
 
 Come, Inspiration ! from thy hermit-seat, 
 By mortal seldom found : may fancy dare, 
 Prom thy fixed serious eye and raptured glance 
 Shot on surrounding Heaven, to steal one look 
 Creative of the poet, every power 
 Exalting to an ecstasy of soul. 20 
 
 And thou, my youthful Muse's early friend. 
 In whom the human graces all unite — 
 Pure light of mind and tenderness of heart, 
 J-enius and wisdom, the gay social sense 
 By decency chastised, goodness and wit 
 
 I, 2 From southern climes, where tmremitting day 
 Burns overhead, illustrious Summer comes — 
 is the reading of the first ed. (1727). 
 
 I brightening] yonder 1730-38. 2 refulgent] illustrious 
 
 1727-38. 12 oak] oaks 1727. 16 fancy dare] I presume 
 
 1727. 17 eye] muse 1727-38; glance] eye 1730-38. 21-31 
 These lines are not found in the first ed. (1727). They first 
 appear in 1730. 21 my youthful Muse's early] the Muse's 
 
 honour and her 1730-38. 
 
54 THE SEASONS 
 
 In seldom-meeting harmony combined, 
 
 Unblemished honour, and an active zeal 
 
 For Britain's glory, liberty, and man : 
 
 Dodington ! attend my rural song, 
 
 Stoop to my theme, inspirit every line, 3° 
 
 And teach me to deserve thy just applause. 
 
 With what an awful world-revolving power 
 Were first the unwieldy planets launched along 
 The illimitable void ! — thus to remain, 
 Amid the flux of many thousand years 
 That oft has swept the toiling race of men, 
 And all their laboured monuments away, 
 Firm, unremitting, matchless in their course ; 
 To the kind-tempered change of night and day, 
 And of the seasons ever stealing round, 4° 
 
 Minutely faithful : such the all-perfect Hand 
 That poised, impels, andT rules the steady whole ! 
 
 When now no more the alternate Twins are fired, 
 And Cancer reddens with the solar blaze, 
 Short is the doubtful empire of the night ; 
 And soon, observant of approaching day. 
 The meek-eyed morn appears, mother of dews, 
 At first faint-gleaming in the dappled east ; 
 
 31 just] best 1730-38. . 32 an awful] a perfect 1727-38. 
 
 36 toiling] busy 1727-38. 38 Firm, unremitting] Unresisting, 
 changeless 1727-38. 
 
 39-42 Instead of these lines, the first ed. (1727) gives — 
 To day and night, and (with 1730-38) the delightful round 
 Of seasons faithful ; not eccentric once : 
 So poised and perfect is the vast machine ! 
 The change was made in 1744, except that ' aU ' was omitted 
 from 1. 41. 
 
 45 doubtful] uncertain 1727. 46 Edd. 1730-38 insert ' th' ' 
 before ' approaching '. 48 Mildly elucent in the streaky 
 
 east 1727. The change was made in 1730. 
 
SUMMER 55 
 
 Till far o'er ether spreads the widening glow, 
 And, from before the lustre of her face, so 
 
 White break the clouds away. With quickened 
 
 step. 
 Brown night retires. Young day pours in apace, 
 And opens all the lawny prospect wide. 
 The dripping rock, the mountain's misty top 
 Swell on the sight and brighten with the dawn. 
 Blue through the dusk the smoking currents 
 
 shine ; 
 And from the bladed field the fearful hare 
 Limps awkward ; while a,long the forest glade 
 The wild deer trip, and often turning gaze 
 At early passenger. Music awakes, 60 
 
 The native voice of undissembled joy ; 
 And thick around the woodland hymns arise. 
 Roused by the cock, the soon-clad shepherd 
 
 leaves 
 His mossy cottage, where with peace he dwells, 
 And from the crowded fold in order drives 
 His flock to taste the verdure of the morn. 
 
 Falsely luxurious, will not man awake. 
 And, springing from the bed of sloth, enjoy 
 The cool, the fragrant, and the silent hour. 
 To meditation due and sacred song ? 70 
 
 For is there aught in sleep can charm the wise ? 
 To lie in dead oblivion, losing half 
 The fleeting moments of too short a life — 
 Total extinction of the enUghtened soul ! 
 
 49 So in 1744. The line, added in 1730, reads — 
 Till far o'er ether shoots the trembling glow. 
 
 51 quickened] tardy 1727, 1730-38. 55 sight] eye 1727, 
 
 1730-38. 61 undissembling 1727. 68 starting 1727-38. 
 
 71 For] And 1727-38. 72 losing half] lost to all 1727. 73 
 Our natures boast of noble and divine 1727, 
 
56 THE SEASONS 
 
 Or else, to feverish vanity alive, 
 
 Wildered, and tossing through distempered dreams ! 
 
 Who would in such a gloomy state remain 
 
 Longer than nature craves ; when every muse 
 
 And every blooming pleasure wait without 
 
 To bless the wildly-devious morning walk ? 80 
 
 But yonder comes the powerful king of day 
 Rejoicing in the east. The lessening cloud, 
 The kindling azure, and the mountain's brow 
 Illumed with fluid gold, his near approach 
 Betoken glad. Lo ! now, apparent all. 
 Aslant the dew-bright earth and coloured air. 
 He looks in boundless majesty abroad, 
 
 rAnd sheds the shining day, that burnished plays 
 On rocks, and hUls, and towers, and wandering 
 
 streams 
 High-gleaming from afar. Pr ime ch eergi^_Light '. 90 
 Of all material beings first and best ! 
 Efflux divine! Nature's resplendent robe, 
 Without whose vesting beauty aU were wrapt 
 In unessential gloom ; and thou, Sun ! 
 Soul of surrounding worlds ! in whom best seen 
 Shines out thy Maker ! may I sing of thee ? 
 'Tis by thy secret, strong, attractive force, 
 
 cAs with a chain indissoluble bound. 
 Thy system rolls entire — ^from the far bourne 
 Of utmost Saturn, wheeling wide his round 100 
 
 83 brow] brim 1727-38. 84 Illumed] Tipt ; fluid] ethereal 
 
 1727-38. 85 Lo !] And 1727-38. 94 0] red 1727-38. 
 
 95, 96 In whose wide circle worlds of radiance lie, Exhaustless 
 Brightness ! ma,y I sing of thee ! 1727-38. 
 
 96 Following this line came in the first edd. (1727-38) a pas- 
 sage of five lines, which was dropped in 1744. The reader will 
 find it in a Note at the end of the poem. 
 - 100-103 For these four lines the first ed. (1727) and subse- 
 quent edd. (1730-38) give— 
 
SUMMER 57 
 
 Of thirty years, to Mercury, whose disk 
 Can scarce be caught by philosophic eye, 
 Lost in the near effulgence of thy blaze. 
 
 Informer of the planetary train ! 
 Without whose quickening glance their cumbrous orbs 
 Were brute unlovely mass, inert and dead. 
 And not, as now, the green abodes of life ! 
 How many forms of being wait on thee, 
 Inhaling spirit, from the unfettered mind. 
 By thee sublimed, down to the daily race, no 
 
 The mixing myriads of thy setting beam ! 
 
 The vegetable world is also thine. 
 Parent of Seasons ! who the pomp precede 
 That waits thy throne, as through thy vast domain, 
 Annual, along the bright ecliptic road 
 In world-rejoicing state it moves sublime. 
 Meantime the expecting nations, circled gay 
 With all the various tribes of foodful earth. 
 Implore thy bounty, or send grateful up 119 
 
 A common hymn : while, round thy beaming car. 
 High-seen, the Seasons lead, in sprightly dance 
 Harmonious knit, the rosy-fingered hours, 
 The zephyrs floating loose, the timely rains. 
 Of bloom ethereal the light-footed dews. 
 And, softened into joy, the surly storms. 
 These, in successive turn, with lavish hand 
 
 Of slow-paced Saturn to the scarce-seen disk 
 Of Mercury lost in excessive blaze. 
 The change was made in 1744. 
 
 105, 106 Without whose vital and effectual glance They'd be 
 but (They would be) brute, uncomfortable mass 1727-38. 
 
 109 spirit] gladness 1727-38. no down to the daily] to 
 
 that day-living 1727-38. 1 1 1 setting] evening 1727. 
 
 1 1 3- 1 3 S The original text differed from this. It will be found 
 (with the alterations and additions made in 1730) in a Note at 
 the end of the poem. 
 
58 THE SEASONS 
 
 Shower every beauty, every fragrance shower, 
 Herbs, flowers, and fruits ; till, kindling at thy touch, 
 Prom land to land is flushed the vernal year. 
 
 Nor to the surface of enlivened earth, 130 
 
 Graceful with hills and dales, and leafy woods. 
 Her liberal tresses, is thy force confined ; 
 But, to the bowelled cavern darting deep. 
 The mineral kinds confess thy mighty power. 
 Effulgent hence the veiny marble shines ; 
 Hence labour draws his tools ; hence burnished war 
 Gleams on the day ; the nobler works of peace 
 Hence bless mankind ; and generous commerce binds 
 The round of nations in a golden chain. 
 
 The unfruitful rock itself, impregned by thee, 
 In dark retirement forms the lucid stone. 141 
 
 The lively diamond drinks thy purest rays, 
 Collected hght compact ; that, polished bright. 
 And all its native lustre let abroad. 
 Dares, as it sparkles on the fair one's breast, 
 With vain ambition emulate her eyes. 
 At thee the ruby lights its deepening glow. 
 And with a waving radiance inward flames. 
 From thee the sapphire, solid ether, takes 
 
 136-9 These lines had no place in the first ed. (1727). In 
 the ed. of 1730, when the addition was made, they read — 
 Hence labour draws his tools ; hence waving war 
 Flames on the day ; hence busy commerce binds 
 The round of nations in a golden chain ; 
 And hence the sculptured palace sumptuous shines 
 With glittering silver and refulgent gold. 
 142 Not in the first edd. (1727-38) ; added in 1744. 
 145, 146 Instead of these two lines the first ed. (1727) gives 
 only — ' Shines proudly on the bosoms of the Fair ! ' This 
 remained the reading till 1744. 
 
 147 its] his 1727-38. 148 A bleeding radiance grateful 
 
 to the view 1727-38. The change was made in 1744. 
 
SUMMER 59 
 
 Its hue cerulean; and, of evening tinct, 150 
 
 The purple-streaming amethyst is thine 
 With thy own smile the yellow topaz burns ; 
 Nor deeper verdure dyes the robe of Spring, 
 When first she gives it to the southern gale, 
 Than the green emerald shows. But, all combined, 
 Thick through the whitening opal play thy beams ; 
 Or, flying several from its surface, form 
 A trembling variance of revolving hues 
 As the site varies in the gazer's hand. 
 
 The very dead creation from thy touch 160 
 
 Assumes a mimic life. By thee refined, 
 In brighter mazes the relucent stream 
 Plays o'er the mead. The precipice abrupt. 
 Projecting horror on the blackened flood. 
 Softens at thy return. The desert joys 
 Wildly through all his melancholy bounds. 
 Rude ruins glitter ; and the briny deep, 
 Seen from some pointed promontory's top 
 Far to the blue horizon's utmost verge, 
 Restless reflects a floating gleam. But this, 170 
 And all the much-transported Muse can sing. 
 Are to thy beauty, dignity, and use 
 Unequal far, great delegated Source 
 Of light and life and grace and joy below ! 
 
 How shall I then attempt to sing of Him 
 Who, Light Himself, in uncreated light 
 Invested deep, dwells awfully retired 
 From mortal eye or angel's purer ken ; 
 Whose single smile has, from the first of time, 
 
 150 Its] His 1727-38. 159 varies] changes 1727. 162 
 
 brisker measures 1727-38. 163 Frisks 1727-38. 169, 170 
 For these lines the original text from 1727 to 1738 gives — 
 Reflects from every fluctuating wave 
 A glance extensive as the day. But these. 
 
60 THE SEASONS 
 
 Filled overflowing all those lamps of heaven i8o 
 That beam for ever through the boundless sky ; 
 But, should He hide his face, the astonished sun 
 And all the extinguished stars would, loosening, reel 
 Wide from their spheres, and chaos come again. 
 
 And yet, was every faltering tongue of man. 
 Almighty Father ! silent in thy praise. 
 Thy works themselves would raise a general voice ; 
 Even in the depth of solitary woods. 
 By human foot untrod, proclaim thy power ; 
 And to the quire celestial Thee resound, 190 
 
 The eternal cause, support, and end of all ! 
 
 To me be Nature's volume broad displayed ; 
 And to peruse its all-instructing page. 
 Or, haply catching inspiration thence. 
 Some easy passage, raptured, to translate, 
 My sole delight ; as through the falling glooms 
 Pensive I stray, or with the rising dawn 
 On fancy's eagle-wing excursive soar. 
 
 Now, flaming up the heavens, the potent sun 
 Melts into limpid air the high-raised clouds 200 
 And morning fogs that hovered round the hills 
 
 181 boundless] immeasured 1727. 183 reel] start 1744. 
 
 186 Father] Poet 1727-38; Maker 1744. 187-91 The 
 
 original text (1727) reads— 
 
 Thy matchless works in each exalted line. 
 And all the full harmonic universe, 
 Would, tuneful or expressive, Thee attest, 
 The cause, the glory, and the end of all. 
 
 The edd. 1730-38 give the original text except that ' tuneful ' is 
 
 changed to ' vocal '. 
 
 192 broad] wide 1727-38 193 its all-instructing] the broad 
 
 illumined 1727-38. 197 stray . . dawn] muse . . day 1727- 
 
 38. 199 Now . . potent] Fierce . . piercing 1727-38. 
 
 200 Melts into limpid] Attenuates to 1727. 201 fogs] mists 
 
 1727-44; round] o'er 1744. 
 
SUMMER 61 
 
 In parti-coloured bands ; till wide unveiled 
 
 The face of nature shines from where earth seems, 
 
 Far-stretched around, to meet the bending sphere. 
 
 Half in a blush of clustering roses lost, 
 Dew-dropping Coolness to the shade retires ; 
 There, on the verdant turf or flowery bed. 
 By gelid founts and careless rills to muse ; 
 While tyrant Heat, dispreading through the sky 
 With rapid sway, his burning influence darts 210 
 On man and beast and herb and tepid stream. 
 
 Who can unpitying see the flowery race. 
 Shed by the morn, their new-flushed bloom resign 
 Before the parching beam ? So fade the fair. 
 When fevers revel through their azure veins. 
 But one, the lofty follower of the sun. 
 Sad when he sets, shuts up her yellow leaves, 
 Drooping all night ; and, when he warm returns. 
 Points her enamoured bosom to his ray. 
 
 Home from his morning task the swain retreats, 
 His flock before him stepping to the fold; 221 
 
 While the full-uddered mother lows around 
 The cheerful cottage then expecting food. 
 The food of innocence and health ! The daw. 
 The rook, and magpie, to the grey-grown oaks 
 (That the calm village in their verdant arms, 
 Sheltering, embrace) direct their lazy flight ; 
 Where on the mingling boughs they sit embowered 
 All the hot noon, tiU cooler hours arise. 
 Faint underneath the household fowls convene ; 230 
 And, in a corner of the buzzing shade, 
 
 202 wide] all 1727-38. 207, 208 Added in 1744. 209 
 
 While] And 1727-38. 210 With rapid sway] By sharp 
 
 degrees 1727-38; darts] rains 1727-38. 216 Edd. 1727 and 
 
 1 730-38 omit ' lofty ' and after ' sun ' insert ' they say '. 218 
 
 Drooping] Weeping 1727-38. 230 household] homely 1727-38. 
 
62 THE SEASONS 
 
 The house-dog with the vacant greyhound lies 
 Out-stretched and sleepy. In his slumbers one 
 Attacks the nightly thief, and one exults 
 O'er hill and dale ; till, wakened by the wasp, 
 They starting snap. Nor shall the muse disdain 
 To let the little noisy summer-race 
 Live in her lay and flutter through her song : 
 Not mean though simple — to the sun allied, 
 From him they draw their animating fire. 240 
 
 Waked by his warmer ray, the reptile young 
 Come winged abroad, by the light air upborne. 
 Lighter, and full of soul. From every chink 
 And secret corner, where they slept away 
 The wintry storms, or rising from their tombs 
 To higher life, by myriads forth at once 
 Swarming they pour, of all the varied hues 
 Their beauty-beaming parent can disclose. 
 Ten thousand forms, ten thousand different tribes 
 People the blaze. To sunny waters some 250 
 
 By fatal instinct fly ; where on the pool 
 They sportive wheel, or, sailing down the stream. 
 Are snatched immediate by the quick-eyed trout 
 Or darting salmon. Through the green-wood glade 
 Some love to stray ; there lodged, amused, and fed 
 In the fresh leaf. Luxurious, others make 
 
 232 vacant] employless 1727-38. 236 starting] bootless 
 
 1727-38. 240 they draw their animating fire] their high 
 
 descent direct they draw 1727-38. 243 soul] life 1727-38. 
 
 245-8 The original text (1727-38) reads— 
 The wintry glooms, by myriads all at once 
 Swarming they pour, green, speckled, yellow, grey. 
 Black, azure, brown, more than the assisted eye 
 Of poring virtuoso can discern. 
 The change was made in 1744. 
 
 253 quick-eyed] springing 1727-38. 254 Or darting salmon] 
 Often beguiled. Some 1727-38. 255 Some love] DeUght 
 
 1727-38. 
 
SUMMER 63 
 
 The meads their choice, and visit every flower 
 
 And every latent herb : for the sweet task 
 
 To propagate their kinds, and where to wrap 
 
 In what soft beds their young, yet undisclosed, 260 
 
 Employs their tender care. Some to the house, 
 
 The fold, and dairy hungry bend their flight ; 
 
 Sip round the pail, or taste the curdling cheese : 
 
 Oft, inadvertent, from the milky stream 
 
 They meet their fate ; or, weltering in the bowl, 
 
 With powerless wings around them wrapt, expire. 
 
 But chief to heedless flies the window proves > , 
 A constant death ; where, gloomily retired. 
 The villain spider lives, cunning and fierce. 
 Mixture abhorred ! Amid a mangled heap 270 
 
 Of carcases in eager watch he sits, 
 O'erlooking all his waving snares around. 
 Near the dire cell the dreadless wanderer oft 
 Passes ; as oft the ruffian shows his front. 
 The prey at last ensnared, he dreadful darts 
 With rapid glide along the leaning line ; 
 And, fixing in the wretch his cruel fangs, 
 Strikes backward grimly pleased : the fluttering wing 
 And shriller sound declare extreme distress. 
 And ask the helping hospitable hand. 280 
 
 Resounds the living surface of the ground : 
 Nor undelightful is the ceaseless hum 
 To him who muses through the woods at noon, 
 
 258-61 The original text (1727-38) reads— 
 But careful stiU 
 To shun the mazes of the sounding bee 
 As o'er the blooms he sweeps. 
 264 from the milky] by the boiling 1727-38. 265 They 
 
 meet their fate] They're (Are) pierced to death 1727-38. 272 
 
 O'er-looking] Surveying 1727. 273 Near the dire cell] Within 
 an inch 1727-38. 277 -wretch] fly 1727-38. 281 Resounds] 
 Echoes 1727-38. 282 ceaseless hum] humming sound 1727 
 
64 THE SEASONS 
 
 Or drowsy shepherd as he lies reclined, 
 
 With half-shut eyes, beneath the floating shade 
 
 Of willows grey, close-crowding o'er the brook. 
 
 Gradual from these what numerous kinds descend, 
 Evading even the microscopic~eye ! 
 Full Nature swarms with life; one wondrous mass 
 Of animals, or atoms organized 290 
 
 Waiting the vital breath when Parent-Heaven 
 ShaU bid his spirit blow. The hoary fen 
 Tii~putfidr streams emits the living cloud 
 Of pestilence. Through subterranean cells, 
 Where searching sunbeams scarce can find a way. 
 Earth animated heaves. The flowery leaf 
 Wants not its soft inhabitants. Secure 
 Within its winding citadel the stone 
 Holds multitudes. But chief the forest boughs, 
 That dance unnumbered to the playful breeze, 300 
 The downy orchard, and the melting pulp 
 Of mellow fruit the nameless nations feed 
 Of evanescent insects. Where the pool 
 Stands mantled o'er with green, invisible 
 Amid the floating verdure millions stray. 
 Each liquid too, whether it pierces, soothes. 
 Inflames, refreshes, or exalts the taste. 
 With various forms abounds. Nor is the stream 
 Of purest crystal, nor the lucid air, 
 Though one transparent vacancy it seems, 310 
 
 Void of their unseen people. These, concealed 
 By the kind art of forming Heaven, escape 
 The grosser eye of man : for, if the worlds 
 In worlds inclosed should on his senses burst, 
 
 287-317 This passage (with alterations) was transferred in 
 1744" from its original place in Spring (1727-38). See note to 
 I. 136 in Spring. The original form of the passage, before its 
 transference, will be found in a Note at the end of the poem. 
 
SUMMER 65 
 
 From cates ambrosial and the nectared bowl 
 He would abhorrent turn ; and in dead night, 
 When Silence sleeps o'er all, be stunned with noise. . 
 
 Let no presuming impious railer tax 
 Creative Wisdom, as if aught was formed 
 In vain, or not for admirable ends. 320 
 
 Shall little haughty Ignorance pronounce 
 His works unwise, of which the smallest part 
 Exceeds the narrow vision of her mind ? 
 As if upon a full-proportioned dome. 
 On swelling columns heaved, the pride of art ' 
 A critic fly, whose feeble ray scarce spreads 
 An inch around, with blind presumption bold 
 Should dare to tax the structure of the whole. 
 And lives the man whose universal eye 329 
 
 Has sweptat once^the unbounded scheme of things, ^j,J^- 
 Marked their dependence so and firm accord, ,j 
 As with unfaltering^ accent to conclude 
 TEFthis availeth nought ? Has any seen 
 The mighty chain of beings, lessening, down 
 From infinite perfiection to the brink 
 Of dreary nothing, desolate abyss ! 
 From which astonished thought recoiling turns ? 
 Till then, alone let zealous praise ascend 
 
 323 her] his 1727-38. 324-8 Originally (1727)— 
 
 So on the concave of a sounding dome, 
 
 On swelling columns heaved, the pride of Art, 
 
 Wanders a critic fly : his feeble ray 
 
 Extends an inch around, yet, blindly bold, 
 
 He dares dislike the structure of the whole. 
 The text of edd. 1730-38 is exactly the same as the text of 
 1727, excepting only that the passage begins with ' Thus ' in 
 place of ' So '. 
 337 Instead of this line the original text (1727-38) gives — 
 
 Eeooiling giddy thought : or with sharp glanos, 
 
 Such as remotely wafting spirits use, 
 
 Surveyed (Beheld) the glories of the little world ? 
 
 THOMSON JT 
 
68 THE SEASONS 
 
 And hymns of holy wonder to that Power 
 
 Whose wisdom shines as lovely on our minds 340 
 
 As on our smiling eyes his servant-sun. 
 
 Thick in yon stream of light, a thousand ways, 
 Upward and downward, thwarting and convolved, 
 The quivering nations sport ; till, tempest-winged, 
 Fierce Winter sweeps them from the face of day. 
 Even so luxurious men, unheeding, pass 
 An idle summer life in fortune's shine, 
 Xh A season's glitter ! Thus they flutter on 
 From toy to toy, from vanity to vice ; 
 Till, blown away by death, oblivion comes 350 
 
 Behind and strikes them from the book of Hfe. 
 
 Now swarms the village o'er the jovial mead — 
 The rustic youth, brown with meridian toil, 
 Healthful and strong ; full as the summer rose 
 Blown by prevailing suns, the ruddy maid. 
 Half naked, swelling on the sight, and all 
 Her kindled graces burning o'er her cheek. 
 Even stooping age is here ; and infant hands 
 Trail the long rake, or, with the fragrant load 
 O'ercharged, amid the kind oppression roll. 360 
 
 Wide flies the tedded grain ; all in a row 
 
 339 holy] heavenly 1727-38. 344 nations] Kingdoms 1727- 
 38; till, tempest- winged] with tempest- wing 1727-38. 345 Fierce] 
 Till 1727-38. 348 After ' A season's glitter ! ' the original 
 
 text (1727-38) gives— 
 
 In soft-circling robes. 
 Which the hard hand of Industry has wrought. 
 The human insects glow, by Hunger fed, 
 And cheered by toiling Thirst, they roll about. 
 349 toy, from] trifle 1730-38. 
 
 352-70 This description of hay-making did not appear in 
 the first ed. (1727) : it will be found in edd. 1730-38, with a few 
 variations, noted below. 
 
 355 ruddy] blooming 1730-38. 360 kind] soft 1730-38. 
 
SUMMER 67 
 
 Advancing broad, or wheeling round the field, 
 
 They spread their breathing harvest to the sun, 
 
 That throws refreshful round a rural smell ; 
 
 Or, as they rake the green-appearing ground. 
 
 And drive the dusky wave along the mead. 
 
 The russet hay-cock rises thick behind 
 
 In order gay : while heard from dale to dale. 
 
 Waking the breeze, resounds the blended voice 
 
 Of happy labour, love, and social glee. 370 
 
 Or, rushing thence, in one diffusive band 
 They drive the troubled flocks, by many a dog 
 Compelled, to where the mazy-running brook 
 Forms a deep pool, this bank abrupt and high. 
 And that fair-spreading in a pebbled shore. 
 Urged to the giddy brink, much is the toil, 
 The clamour much of men and boys and dogs 
 Ere the soft, fearful people to the flood 
 Commit their woolly sides. And oft the swain. 
 On some impatient seizing, hurls them in : 380 
 
 Emboldened then, nor hesitating more, 
 Fast, fast they plunge amid the flashing wave. 
 And, panting, labour to the farther shore. 
 Repeated this, till deep the well-washed fleece 
 Has drunk the flood, and from his lively haunt 
 The trout is banished by the sordid stream. 
 Heavy and dripping, to the breezy brow 
 Slow move the harmless race ; where, as they spread 
 Their swelling treasures to the sunny ray. 
 Inly disturbed, and wondering what this wild 390 
 Outrageous tumult means, their loud complaints 
 The country flU ; and, tossed from rock to rock, 
 
 363 their breathing] the breathing 1744; the tawny 1730-38. 
 364 throws] casts 1730-38. 367 Rises the russet hay-cock 
 
 1730-38. 371-431 This long passage, descriptive of sheep- 
 
 shearing, was added in ed. 1744. 377 dogs 1746 ; dog 1744. 
 
 V2 
 
V V 
 
 68 THE SEASONS 
 
 Incessant bleatings run around the hills. 
 At last, of snowy white the gathered flocks 
 Are in the wattled pen innumerous pressed, 
 Head above head ; and, ranged in lusty rows, 
 The shepherds sit, and whet the sounding shears. 
 The housewife waits to roll her fleecy stores, 
 With all her gay-drest maids attending round. 
 One, chief, in gracious dignity enthroned, 4°° 
 
 Shines o'er the rest, the pastoral queen, and rays 
 Her smiles sweet-beaming on her shepherd-king ; 
 While the glad circle round them yield their souls 
 To festive mirth, and wit that knows no gaU. 
 Meantime, their joyous task goes on apace : 
 Some mingling stir the melted tar, and some, 
 Deep on the new-shorn vagrant's heaving side 
 To stamp his master's cipher ready stand ; 
 Others the unwilling wether drag along ; 
 And, glorying in his might, the sturdy boy 410 
 
 Holds by the twisted horns the indignant ram. 
 Behold where bound, and of its robe bereft 
 By needy man, that all-depending lord. 
 How meek, how patient, the mild creature lies ! 
 What softness in its melancholy face, 
 What dumb complaining innocence appears ! 
 Fear not, ye gentle tribes ! 'tis not the knife 
 Of horrid slaughter that is o'er you waved ; 
 No, 'tis the tender swain's well-guided shears. 
 Who having now, to pay his annual care, 420 
 
 Borrowed your fleece, to you a cumbrous load. 
 Will send you bounding to your hills again. 
 / A simple scene! yet hence Britannia sees 
 (_Her s51Idr grandeur rise : hence she commands 
 The exalted stores of every brighter clime. 
 The treasures of the sun without his rage : 
 Hence, fervent all with culture, toil, and arts, 
 
SUMMER 69 
 
 Wide glows her land : her dreadful thunder hence 
 Rides o'er the waves sublime, and now, even now. 
 Impending hangs o'er Gallia's humbled coast ; 430 
 Hence rules the circhng deep, and awes the world. 
 
 'Tis raging noon ; and, vertical, the sun 
 Darts on the head direct his forceful rays. 
 O'er heaven and earth, far as the ranging eye 
 Can sweep, a dazzling deluge reigns ; and aU 
 From pole to pole is undistinguished blaze. 
 In vain the sight dejected to the ground 
 Stoops for relief ; thence hot ascending steams 
 And keen reflection pain. Deep to the root 
 Of vegetation parched, the cleaving fields 440 
 
 And slippery lawn an arid hue disclose. 
 Blast fancy's blooms, and wither even the soul. 
 Echo no more returns the cheerful sound 
 Of sharpening scythe : the mower, sinking, heaps 
 O'er him the humid hay, with flowers perfumed ; 
 And scarce a chirping grasshopper is heard 
 
 433 Originally (1727-38)— 
 
 Shoots through the expanding air a torrid gleam. 
 
 434 ranging] darted 1727-38. 435 sweep] pierce 1727-38. 
 
 437 Originally (1727-38)— 
 
 Down to the dusty earth the sight o'erpowered. 
 
 438 Edd. 1727-38 insert 'but' before 'thence' and omit 
 ' hot '- The change was made in 1744. Edd. 1730-38 give 
 ' streams ' — a misprint for ' steams '. 
 
 439 After 'reflection pain the original text (1727-38) gives 
 the following Unes, struck out or altered in 1744 : — 
 
 Burnt to the heart 
 Are the refreshless fields : their arid hue 
 Adds a new fever to the sickening soul : 
 And o'er their slippery surface wary treads 
 The foot of thirsty pilgrim, often dipt 
 In a cross rill presenting to his wish 
 A living draught : he feels before he drinks. 
 443 No more the woods return the sandy sound 1727; Echo no 
 more returns the sandy sound 1730-38. 445 humid] tedded 1727. 
 
70 THE SEASONS 
 
 Through the dumb mead. Distressful nature pants. 
 The very streams look languid from afar, 
 Or, through the unsheltered glade, impatient seem 
 To hurl into the covert of the grove. 45° 
 
 All-conquering heat, oh, intermit thy wrath ! 
 And on my throbbing temples potent thus 
 Beam not so fierce ! Incessant still you flow, 
 And still another fervent flood succeeds. 
 Poured on the head profuse. In vain I sigh. 
 And restless turn, and look around for night : 
 Night is far ofi ; and hotter hours approach. 
 Thrice happy he, who on the sunless side 
 Of a romantic mountain, forest-crowned, 
 Beneath the whole collected shade reclines ; 460 
 Or in the gelid caverns, woodbine-wrought 
 And fresh bedewed with ever-spouting streams, 
 Sits coolly calm ; while all the world without, 
 Unsatisfied and sick, tosses in noon. 
 Emblem instructive of the virtuous man. 
 Who keeps his tempered mind serene and pure. 
 And every passion aptly harmonized 
 Amid a jarring world with vice inflamed. 
 
 447 the dumb] all the 1727. 447 After this line came in 
 
 ed. 1727— 
 
 The desert singes ; and the stubborn rock. 
 Split to the centre, sweats at every pore — 
 repeated with 'singes' altered to 'reddens', in edd. 1730-38; 
 and struck out in edd. 1744-46. 
 449, 450 Originally (1727-38)— 
 
 Or through the fervid glade impetuous hurl 
 Into the shelter of the crackling grove. 
 45 1 All-conquering] Prevailing 1727. 452 throbbing] aching 
 1727. 453 aerce] hard 1727-38. 455 sigh] groan 1727. 
 
 457 After this line a passage of seven lines appeared in the 
 first ed. (1727), and with slight alterations was continued in 
 edd. 1730-38. It is given (with the alterations) in a Note 
 at the end of the poem. 458 who] that 1744. 467 every 
 
 passion] all his passions 1727-38. 
 
SUMMER 71 
 
 Welcome, ye shades ! ye bowery thickets, hail ! 
 Ye lofty pines ! ye venerable oaks ! 470 
 
 Ye ashes wild, resounding o'er the steep ! 
 Delicious is your shelter to the soul 
 As to the hunted hart the sallying spring 
 Or stream full-flowing, that his swelling sides 
 Laves as he floats along the herbaged brink. 
 Cool through the nerves your pleasing comfort 
 
 glides ; 
 The heart beats glad ; the fresh- expanded eye 
 And ear resume their watch ; the sinews knit ; 
 And life shoots swift through all the lightened 
 limbs 
 
 Around the adjoining brook, that purls along 480 
 The vocal grove, now fretting o'er a rock. 
 Now scarcely moving through a reedy pool. 
 Now starting to a sudden stream, and now 
 Gently diffused into a hmpid plain, 
 A various group the herds and flocks compose, 
 Rural confusion ! On the grassy bank 
 Some ruminating lie, while others stand 
 Half in the flood and, often bending, sip 
 The circling surface. In the middle droops 
 The strong laborious ox, of honest front, 490 
 
 Which incomposed he shakes ; and from his sides 
 The troublous insects lashes with his tail, 
 Returning still. Amid his subjects safe 
 Slumbers the monarch-swain, his careless arm 
 Thrown round his head on downy moss sustained ; 
 
 471 Ye] With 1727. 476 Cool] Cold 1727-38; comfort 
 
 glides] comforts glide 1727. 477 fresh-expanded eye] misty 
 
 eyes refulge 1727. 478 And ear] The ears 1727. 479 all 
 
 the lightened limbs] every active limb 1727 ; every lightened 
 limb 1730-38. 480 Around . . purls] All in . . shrills 
 
 1727-38. 492 troublous] busy 1727. 
 
/ 
 
 72 THE SEASONS 
 
 Here laid his scrip with wholesome viands filled, 
 There, listening every noise, his watchful dog. 
 
 Light fly his slumbers, if perchance a flight 
 Of angry gad-flies fasten on the herd, 
 That startling scatters from the shallow brook 500 
 In search of lavish stream. Tossing the foam, 
 They scorn the keeper's voice, and scour the plain 
 Through all the bright severity of noon ; 
 While from their labouring breasts a hollow moan 
 Proceeding runs low-bellowing round the hills. 
 
 Oft in this season too, the horse, provoked, 
 While his big sinews full of spirits swell. 
 Trembling with vigour, in the heat of blood 
 Springs the high fence, and, o'er the field effused. 
 Darts on the gloomy flood with steadfast eye 510 
 And heart estranged to fear : his nervous chest, 
 Luxuriant and erect, the seat of strength. 
 Bears down the opposing stream ; quenchless his 
 
 thirst. 
 He takes the river at redoubled draughts. 
 And with wide nostrils, snorting, skims the wave. 
 
 Still let me pierce into the midnight depth 
 Of yonder grove, of wildest largest growth. 
 That, forming high in air a woodland quire. 
 Nods o'er the mount beneath. At every step, 
 Solemn and slow the shadows blacker fall, 520 
 
 And all is awful listening gloom around. 
 
 These are the haunts of meditation, these 
 The scenes where ancient bards the inspiring breath 
 Ecstatic felt, and, from this world retired, 
 Conversed with angels and immortal forms, 
 
 497 And there his sceptre-crook and watchful dog 1727-38. 
 499 gad-flies] hornets 1727-38. 5:8 That high embower- 
 
 ing in the middle air 1727-38. 521 listening] silsnt 
 
 1727-38. 
 
SUMMER 73 
 
 On gracious errands bent — to save the fall 
 
 Of virtue struggling on the brink of vice ; 
 
 In waking whispers and repeated dreams 
 
 To hint pure thought, and warn the favoured soul, 
 
 For future trials fated, to prepare ; 530 
 
 To prompt the poet, who devoted gives 
 
 His muse to better themes ; to soothe the pangs 
 
 Of dying worth, and from the patriot's breast 
 
 (Backward to mingle in detested war, 
 
 But foremost when engaged) to turn the death ; 
 
 And numberless such offices of love. 
 
 Daily and nightly, zealous to perform. 
 
 Shook sudden from the bosom of the sky, 
 A thousand shapes or gUde athwart the dusk 
 Or stalk majestic on. Deep-roused, I feel 540 
 
 A sacred terro r, a severe delight. 
 Creep through my mortal frame ; and thus, methinks, 
 A voice, than human more, the abstracted ear 
 Of fancy strikes — ' Be not of us afraid, 
 Poor kindred man ! thy fellow-creatures, we 
 From the same Parent-Power our beings drew. 
 The same our Lord and laws and great pursuit. 
 Once some of us, hke thee, through stormy Ufe 
 Toiled tempest-beaten ere we could attain 
 This holy calm, this harmony of mind, 550 
 
 Where purity and peace immingle charms. 
 
 526 gracious] heavenly 1727-38. 533 worth] saints 1727- 
 
 38. 538 sky] air 1727. 540 Deep-roused] harrowed 
 
 1727 ; Aroused 1730-38. 541 a severe] and severe 1727, 
 
 1744. 543, 544 In the first ed. (1727)— 
 
 Those hollow accents, floating on my ear, 
 
 Pronounce distinct ; 
 and in edd. 1730-38— 
 
 Those accents murmured in the abstracted ear 
 
 Pronounce distinct. 
 546 Parent] bounteous 1727. 
 
74 THE SEASONS 
 
 Then fear not us ; but with responsive song, 
 
 Amid these dim recesses, undisturbed 
 
 By noisy folly and discordant vice, 
 
 Of Nature sing with us, and Nature's God. 
 
 Here frequent, at the visionary hour. 
 
 When musing midnight reigns or silent noon, 
 
 Angelic harps are in full concert heard. 
 
 And voices chaunting from the wood-crown'd hill. 
 
 The deepening dale, or inmost sylvan glade : 560 
 
 A privilege bestow'd by us alone 
 
 On contemplation, or the hallow'd ear 
 
 Of poet swelling to seraphic strain.' 
 
 And art thou, Stanley, of that sacred band ? 
 Alas ! for us too soon ! Though raised above 
 The reach of human pain, above the flight 
 Of human joy, yet with a mingled ray 
 Of sadly pleased remembrance, must thou feel 
 A mother's love, a mother's tender woe — 
 Who seeks thee still in many a former scene, 570 
 Seeks thy fair form, thy lovely beaming eyes, 
 Thy pleasing converse, by gay lively sense 
 Inspired, where moral wisdom mildly shone 
 Without the toil of art, and virtue glowed 
 In all her smiles without forbidding pride. 
 But, thou best of parents ! wipe thy tears ; 
 
 552 not us] us not 1730-38; responsive] commutual 1727. 
 
 553 Amid] Oft in 1727-38. 556-61 Instead of these lines 
 the original text (1727-38) gives — 
 
 And frequent at the middle waste of night, 
 Or all day long, in deserts still, are heard. 
 Now here, now there, now wheeling in mid-sky 
 Around or underneath, aerial sounds 
 Sent from angelic harps and voices joined — 
 A happiness bestowed by us alone &c. 
 564-84 This address to the shade of Miss Stanley (a young 
 
 lady of Thomson's acquaintance, who died at the age of eighteen, 
 
 in 1738) first appeared in the ed. of 1744. 
 
SUMMER 75 
 
 Or rather to parental Nature pay 
 
 The tears of grateful joy, who for a while 
 
 Lent thee this younger self, this opening bloom 
 
 Of thy enlightened mind and gentle worth. 580 
 
 Beheve the muse — the wintry blast of death 
 
 KiUs not the buds of virtue ; no, they spread 
 
 Beneath the heavenly beam of brighter suns 
 
 Through endless ages into higher powers. 
 
 Thus up the mount, in airy vision rapt, 
 I stray, regardless whither ; tiU the sound 
 Of a near fall of water every sense 
 Wakes from the charm of thought : swift-shrinking 
 
 back, 
 I check my steps and view the broken scene. 
 
 Smooth to the shelving brink a copious flood 590 
 Rolls fair and placid ; where, collected all 
 In one impetuous torrent, down the steep 
 It thundering shoots, and shakes the country round. 
 At first, an azure sheet, it rushes broad ; J ' ' 
 
 Then, whitening by degrees as prone it falls. 
 And from the loud-resounding rocks below i^''' 
 
 Dashed in a cloud of foam, it sends aloft 
 A hoary mist and forms a ceaseless shower. 
 Nor can the tortured wave here find repose ; 
 But, raging stiU amid the shaggy rocks, 600 
 
 Now flashes o'er the scattered fragments, now 
 
 585 airy vision rapt] visionary muse 1727-38. 586 sound] 
 
 stun 1727-38. 589 check my steps] stand aghast 1727-38. 
 
 590 shelving . . copious flood] giddy . lucid stream 1727; 
 shaggy . . spreading flood 1730-38. This line was preceded in 
 the first ed. (1727) by the lines — 
 
 Like one who flows in joy, when all at once 
 Misfortune hurls him down the hill of life. 
 
 591-606 The earlier edd. — both the ed. of 1727 and those of 
 1730-38 — present something very different from this. See Note 
 at the end of the poem. 
 
 v 
 
 
76 THE SEASONS 
 
 Aslant the hollow channel rapid darts ; 
 And, falling fast from gradual slope to slope, 
 With wild infracted course and lessened roar 
 It gains a safer bed, and steals at last 
 Along the mazes of the quiet vale. 
 
 Invited from the chff, to whose dark brow 
 He chngs, the steep-ascending eagle soars 
 With upward pinions through the flood of day, 
 And, giving full his bosom to the blaze, 6io 
 
 Gains on the Siin ; while aU the tuneftil race, 
 Smit by afflictive noon, disordered droop 
 Deep in the thicket, or, from bower to bower 
 Responsive, force an interrupted strain. 
 The stock-dove only through the forest coos, 
 Mournfully hoarse ; oft ceasing from his plaint, 
 Short interval of weary woe ! again 
 The sad idea of his murdered mate, 
 Struck from his side by savage fowler's guile. 
 Across his fancy comes ; and then resounds 620 
 A louder song of sorrow through the grove. 
 
 Beside the dewy border let me sit. 
 All in the freshness of the humid air, 
 
 607 The following five lines introduced in the first ed. (1727) 
 the passage beginning here : — • 
 
 With the rough prospect tired I turn my eyes 
 Where in long visto the soft-murmuring main 
 Darts a green lustre trembling through the trees ; 
 Or to yon silver-streaming threads of light, 
 A showery beauty beaming through the boughs. 
 They appear in edd. 1730-38 also, but with the following alter- 
 ations : for ' eyes ' in 1. 1, ' gaze ' ; for ' visto ', ' vista ', ; and, 
 in the last line, for ' beauty ', ' radiance '. They were dropped 
 in 1744. 
 
 607 olifE . . brow] rock . . cliff 1727-38. 609 flood of 
 
 day] attractive gleam 1727-38. 611 tuneful] feathery 1727- 
 
 38. 612 Smit by] Smote by 1727 ; Smote with 1730-38. 
 
 615 stock] wood 1727 ; through the forest] in the centre 1727. 
 
SUMMER 77 
 
 There on that hollowed rock, grotesque and wild, 
 An ample chair moss-lined, and over head 
 By flowering umbrage shaded ; where the bee 
 Strays diUgent, and with the extracted balm 
 Of fragrant woodbine loads his httle thigh. 
 
 Now, while I taste the sweetness of the shade. 
 While Nature Ues around deep-lulled in noon, 630 
 Now come, bold fancy, spread a daring flight 
 And view the wonders of the torrid zone : 
 Climes unrelenting ! with whose rage compared. 
 Yon blaze is feeble and yon skies are cool. 
 
 See how at once the bright effulgent sun. 
 Rising direct, swift chases from the sky 
 The short-lived twilight, and with ardent blaze 
 Looks gaily fierce o'er all the dazzling air ! 
 He mounts his throne ; but kind before him sends. 
 Issuing from out the portals of the morn, 640 
 
 The general breeze to mitigate his fire 
 And breathe refreshment on a fainting world. 
 Great are the scenes, with dreadful beauty crowned 
 And barbarous wealth, that see, each circling year, 
 Returning suns and double seasons pass ; 
 Rocks rich in gems, and mountains big with mines, 
 That on the high equator ridgy rise, 
 Whence many a bursting stream auriferous plays ; 
 Majestic woods of every vigorous green. 
 Stage above stage high waving o'er the hills, 650 
 Or to the far horizon wide-diffused, 
 A boundless deep immensity of shade. 
 
 624 There, on that rock, by nature's chisel carved 1727-38. 
 636 flowering . . shaded, where] weaving . . hung, through which 
 1727. 627 balm] sweet 1727-38. 628 fragrant wood- 
 
 bine] honeysuckle 1727-38. 629-897 These lines appear for 
 
 the first time in ed. 1744, or in ed. 1746. The later additions 
 are pointed out below. 
 
78 THE SEASONS 
 
 Here lofty trees, to ancient song unknown, 
 The noble sons of potent heat and floods 
 Prone-rushing from the clouds, rear high to heaven 
 Their thorny stems, and broad around them throw 
 Meridian gloom. Here, in eternal prime, 
 Unnumbered fruits of keen dehcious taste 
 And vital spirit drink, amid the chfis 659 
 
 And burning sands that bank the shrubby vales. 
 Redoubled day, yet in their rugged coats 
 A friendly juice to cool its rage contain. 
 
 Bear me, Pomona ! to thy citron groves ; 
 To where the lemon and the piercing Ume, 
 With the deep orange glowing through the green. 
 Their Ughter glories blend. Lay me reclined 
 Beneath the spreading tamarind, that shakes. 
 Fanned by the breeze, its fever-cooling fruit. 
 Deep in the night the massy locust sheds 669 
 
 Quench my hot limbs ; or lead me through the maze, 
 Embowering endless, of the Indian fig ; 
 Or, thrown at gayer ease on some fair brow, 
 Let me behold, by breezy murmurs cooled. 
 Broad o'er my head the verdant cedar wave, 
 And high palmettos lift their graceful shade. 
 Oh, stretched amid these orchards of the sun, 
 Give me to drain the cocoa's milky bowl, 
 And from the palm to draw its freshening wine ! 
 More bounteous far than all the frantic juice 
 Which Bacchus pours. Nor, on its slender twigs 680 
 Low-bending, be the full pomegranate scorned ; 
 Nor, creeping through the woods, the gelid race 
 Of berries. Oft in humble station dwells 
 
 669-75 These seven lines were added in 1746. 676 Oh] Or 
 1744. 677 Give me to] let me 1744. 678 Added in 
 
 1746. 
 
SUMMER 79 
 
 UnboastEul worth, above fastidious pomp. 
 
 Witness, thou best Anana, tllou the pride 
 
 Of vegetable hfe, beyond whate'er 
 
 The poets imaged in the golden age : 
 
 Quick let me strip thee of thy tufty coat, 
 
 Spread thy ambrosial stores, and feast with Jove ! 
 
 From these the prospect varies. Plains immense 
 Lie stretched below, interminable meads 691 
 
 And vast savannas, where the wandering eye, 
 Unfixt, is in a verdant ocean lost. 
 Another Mora there, of bolder hues 
 And richer sweets beyond our garden's pride, 
 Plays o'er the fields, and showers with sudden hand 
 Exuberant spring — for oft these valleys shift 
 Their green-embroidered robe, to fiery brown, 
 And swift to green again, as scorching suns 
 Or streaming dews and torrent rains prevail. 700 
 Along these lonely regions, where, retired 
 From little scenes of art, great Nature dwells 
 In awful solitude, and naught is seen 
 But the wild herds that own no master's stall. 
 Prodigious rivers roll their fattening seas ; 
 On whose luxuriant herbage, half-concealed. 
 Like a fallen cedar, far diffused his train. 
 Cased in green scales, the crocodile extends. 
 The flood disparts : behold ! in plaited mail 
 Behemoth rears his head. Glanced from his side. 
 The darted steel in idle shivers flies : 711 
 
 He fearless walks the plain, or seeks the hills, 
 Where, as he crops his varied fare, the herds, 
 In widening circle round, forget their food 
 And at the harmless stranger wondering gaze. 
 
 Peaceful beneath primeval trees that cast 
 
 688 tufty] spiny 1744. 
 
80 THE SEASONS 
 
 Their ample shade o'er Niger's yellow stream, 
 And where the Ganged rolls his sacred wave, 
 Or mid the central depth of blackening woods, 
 High-raised in solemn theatre around, 720 
 
 Leans the huge elephant — wisest of brutes ! 
 Oh, truly wise ! with gentle might endowed. 
 Though powerful not destructive ! Here he sees 
 Revolving ages sweep the changeful earth, ^ 
 And empires rise and fall ; regardless he 
 Of what the never-resting race of men 
 Project : thrice happy, could he 'scape their guile 
 Who mine, from cruel avarice, his steps, 
 Or with his towery grandeur swell their state, 
 The pride of kings ! or else his strength pervert, 730 
 And bid him rage amid the mortal fray. 
 Astonished at the madness of mankind. 
 
 Wide o'er the winding umbrage of the floods, 
 Like yivid blossoms glowing from afar. 
 Thick-swarm the brighter birds. For nature's hand. 
 That with a sportive vanity has decked 
 The plumy nations, there her gayest hues 
 Profusely pours But, if she bids them shine 
 Arrayed in aU the beauteous beams of day. 
 Yet, frugal still, she humbles them in song. 740 
 Nor envy we the gaudy robes they lent 
 Proud Montezuma's realm, whose legions cast 
 A boundless radiance waving on the sun. 
 While Philomel is ours, while in our shades. 
 Through the soft silence of the listening night. 
 The sober-suited songstress trills her lay. 
 
 But come, my muse, the desert-barrier burst, 
 A wild expanse of lifeless sand and sky ; 
 And, swifter than the toiUng caravan, 
 Shoot o'er the vale of Sennar ; ardent climb 750 
 The Nubian mountains, and the secret bounds 
 
SUMMER . 81 
 
 Of jealous Abyssinia boldly pierce. 
 
 Thou art no ruffian, who beneath the mask 
 
 Of social commerce com'st to rob their wealth ; 
 
 No holy fury thou, blaspheming Heaven, 
 
 With consecrated steel to stab their peace. 
 
 And through the land, yet red from civil wounds, 
 
 To spread the purple tyranny of Rome. 
 
 Thou, like the harmless bee, mayst freely range 
 
 From mead to mead bright with exalted flowers, 760 
 
 From jasmine grove to grove ; may'st wander gay 
 
 Through palmy shades and aromatic woods 
 
 That grace the plains, invest the peopled hills. 
 
 And up the more than Alpine mountains wave. 
 
 There on the breezy summit, spreading fair 
 
 For many a league, or on stupendous rocks. 
 
 That from the sun-redoubling valley lift, 
 
 Cool to the middle air, their lawny tops, 
 
 Where palaces and fanes and villas rise, 
 
 And gardens smile around and cultured fields, 770 
 
 And fountains gush, and careless herds and flocks 
 
 Securely stray — a world within itself, 
 
 Disdaining all assault : there let me draw 
 
 Ethereal soul, there drink reviving gales 
 
 Profusely breathing from the spicy groves 
 
 And vales of fragrance, there at distance hear 
 
 The roaring floods and cataracts that sweep 
 
 From disembowelled earth the virgin gold, 
 
 And o'er the varied landscape restless rove. 
 
 Fervent with life of every fairer kind. 780 
 
 A land of wonders ! which the sun still eyes 
 
 With ray direct, as of the lovely realm 
 
 Enamoured, and delighting there to dwell. 
 
 How changed the scene ! In blazing height of noon. 
 The sun, oppressed, is plunged in thickest gloom. 
 Still horror reigns, a dreary twilight round, 
 
 THOMSON Q 
 
82 THE SEASONS 
 
 Of struggling night and day malignant mixed. 
 For to the hot equator crowding fast, . 
 'Where, highly rarefied, the jdelding air 
 Admits their stream, incessant vapours roU, 790 
 
 Amazing clouds on clouds continual heaped ; 
 Or whirled tempestuous by the gusty wind, 
 Or silent borne along, heavy and slow. 
 With the big stores of steaming oceans charged. 
 Meantime, amid these upper seas, condensed 
 Around the cold aerial mountain's brow, 
 And by conflicting winds together dashed, 
 The Thunder holds his black tremendous throne ; 
 From cloud to cloud the rending Lightnings rage ; 
 Tin, in the furious elemental war 800 
 
 Dissolved, the whole precipitated mass 
 Unbroken floods and solid torrents pours. 
 
 The treasures these, hid from the bounded search 
 Of ancient knowledge, whence with annual pomp, 
 Rich king of floods ! o'erflows the swelling Nile. 
 From his two springs in Gojam's sunny realm 
 Pure-welling out, he through the lucid lake 
 Of fair Dambea roUs his infant stream. 
 There, by the Naiads nursed, he sports away 
 His playful youth amid the fragrant isles 810 
 
 That with unfading verdure smile around. 
 Ambitious thence the manly river breaks. 
 And, gathering many a flood, and copious fed 
 With all the mellowed treasures of the sky, 
 Winds in progressive majesty along : 
 Through splendid kingdoms now devolves his maze, 
 Now wanders wild o'er sohtary tracts 
 Of Ufe-deserted sand ; till, glad to quit 
 The joyless desert, down the Nubian rocks 
 From thundering steep to steep he pours his urn, 820 
 And Egypt joys beneath the spreading wave. 
 
SUMMER 83 
 
 His brother Niger too, and all the floods 
 In which the full-formed maids of Afric lave 
 Their jetty limbs, and all that from the tract 
 Of woody mountains stretched thro' gorgeous 
 
 Ind 
 Fall on Cormandel's coast or Malabar ; 
 From Menam's orient stream that nightly shines 
 With insect-lamps, to where Aurora sheds 
 On Indus' smiling banks the rosy shower — 
 All, at this bounteous season, ope their urns 830 
 And pour untoiling harvest o'er the land. 
 
 Nor less thy world, Columbus, drinks refreshed 
 The lavish moisture of the melting year. 
 Wide o'er his isles the branching Oronoque 
 Rolls a brown deluge, and the native drives 
 To dwell aloft on life-sufficing trees — 
 At once his dome, his robe, his food, and arms. 
 Swelled by a thousand streams, impetuous hurled 
 From all the roaring Andes, huge descends 
 The mighty Orellana. Scarce the muse 840 
 
 Dares stretch her wing o'er this enormous mass 
 Of rushing water ; scarce she dares attempt 
 The sea-like Plata, to whose dread expanse. 
 Continuous depth, and wondrous length of course 
 Our floods are rills. With unabated force 
 In silent dignity they sweep along. 
 And traverse realms unknown, and blooming wilds, 
 And' fruitful deserts — worlds of soUtude 
 Where the sun smiles and seasons teem in vain. 
 Unseen and unenjoyed. Forsaking these, 850 
 
 O'er peopled plains they fair-diffusive flow 
 And many a nation feed, and circle safe 
 In their soft bosom many a happy isle, 
 The seat of blameless Pan, yet undisturbed 
 By Christian crimes and Europe's cruel sons. ''' 
 
 -;^^:z: G 2 
 
84 THE SEASONS 
 
 Thus pouring on they proudly seek the deep, 
 Whose vanquish'd tide, recoiling from the shock. 
 Yields to this liquid weight of half the globe ; 
 And Ocean trembles for his green domain. 
 
 But what avails this wondrous waste of wealth, 
 This gay profusion of luxurious bliss, 86i 
 
 This pomp of Nature ? what their balmy meads. 
 Their powerful herbs, and Ceres void of pain ? 
 By vagrant birds dispersed and wafting winds, 
 What their unplanted fruits ? what the cool draughts. 
 The ambrosial food, rich gums, and spicy health 
 Their forests yield ? their toihng insects what, 
 Their silky pride and vegetable robes ? 
 Ah ! what avail their fatal treasures, hid 
 Deep in the bowels of the pitying earth, 870 
 
 Golconda's gems, and sad Potosi's mines 
 Where dwelt the gentlest children of the Sun ? 
 What all that Afric's golden rivers roll, 
 Her odorous woods, and shining ivory stores ? 
 Ill-fated race ! the softening arts of peace, 
 Whate'er the humanizing muses teach, 
 The godlike wisdom of the tempered breast, 
 Progressive truth, the patient force of thought. 
 Investigation calm whose silent powers 
 Command the world, the light that leads to Heaven, 
 Kind equal rule, the government of laws, 881 
 
 And all-protecting freedom which alone 
 Sustains the name and dignity of man — 
 These are not theirs. The parent sun himself 
 Seems o'er this world of slaves to tyrannize, 
 And, with oppressive ray the roseate bloom 
 Of beauty blasting, gives the gloomy hue 
 And feature gross — or, worse, to ruthless deeds. 
 Mad jealousy, blind rage, and fell revenge 
 863 herbs] herds 1744. 
 
SUMMER 85 
 
 Their fervid spirit fires. Love dwells not there, 890 
 The soft regards, the tenderness ^f life. 
 The heart-shed tear, the ineffable delight 
 Of sweet humanity : these court the beam 
 Of milder climes;— in selfish fierce desire 
 AndTthe wild fury pf^yflluptuous sense 
 There lost. The very brute creation there 
 This rage partakes, and burns with horrid fire. 
 Lo ! the green serpent, from his dark abode. 
 Which even imagination fears to tread. 
 At noon forth-issuing, gathers up his train 900 
 
 In orbs immense, then, darting out anew. 
 Seeks the refreshing fount, ' by which diffused 
 He throws his folds ; and while, with threatening 
 
 tongue 
 And deathful jaws erect, the monster curls 
 His flaming crest, all other thirst appalled 
 Or shivering flies, or checked at distance stands, 
 Nor dares approach. But still more direful he. 
 The small close-lurking minister of fate. 
 Whose high-concocted venom through the veins 
 A rapid Ughtning darts, arresting swift 910 
 
 The vital current. Formed to humble man. 
 This child of vengeful Nature ! There, sublimed 
 To fearless lust of blood, the savage race 
 
 898-912 This is an expansion of the original text (1727-38), 
 
 which reads as follows : — 
 
 Here the green serpent gathers up his train 
 In orbs immense ; then, darting out anew. 
 Progressive rattles through the withered brake. 
 And, lolling frightful, guards the scanty fount. 
 If fount there be : or, of diminished size. 
 But mighty mischief, on the imguarded swain 
 Steals full of ranco<ir. 
 912-38 This passage, beginning 'There, sublimed', is an 
 
 expansion of the original text (1727-38), which will be found 
 
 in a Note at the end of the poem. 
 
86 THE SEASONS 
 
 Roam, licensed by the shading hour of guilt 
 And foul misdeed, when the pure day has shut 
 His sacred eye. The tiger, darting fierce 
 Impetuous on the prey his glance has doomed ; 
 The lively-shining leopard, speckled o'er 
 With many a spot, the beauty of the waste ; 
 And, scorning all the taming arts of man, 920 
 
 The keen hyena, tellest of the fell — 
 These, rushing from the inhospitable woods 
 Of Mauritania, or the tufted isles 
 That verdant rise amid the Libyan wild. 
 Innumerous glare around their shaggy king 
 Majestic stalking o'er the printed sand ; 
 And with imperious and repeated roars 
 Demand their fated food. The fearful flocks 
 Crowd near the guardian swain ; the nobler herds, 
 Where round their lordly bull in rural ease 930 
 
 They ruminating lie, with horror hear 
 The coming rage. The awakened village starts ; 
 And to her fluttering breast the mother strains 
 Her thoughtless infant. From the pirate's den, 
 Or stern Morocco's tyrant fang escaped, 
 The wretch half wishes for his bonds again ; 
 While, uproar all, the wilderness resounds 
 From Atlas eastward to the frighted Nile. 
 Unhappy he ! who, from the first of joys, 
 ( Society, cut off, is left alone 940 
 
 Amid this world of death ! Day after day, 
 Sad on the jutting eminence he sits. 
 And views the main that ever toils below ; 
 Still fondly forming in the farthest verge, 
 
 936 bonds] bounds 1744. 941 Day after day] Ceaseless 
 
 he sits 1727-38. 942 jutting] rooky 1727 ; he sits] and views 
 
 1727-38. 943 And views the] The rolling 1727-38. 
 
 
SUMMER 87 
 
 Where the round ether mixes with the wave, 
 
 Ships, dim-discovered, dropping from the clouds ; 
 
 At evening, to the setting sun he turns 
 
 A mournful eye, and down his dying heart 
 
 Sinks helpless ; while the wonted roar is up, 
 
 And hiss continual through the tedious night. 950 
 
 Yet here, even here, into these black abodes 
 
 Of monsters, unappalled, from stooping Rome 
 
 And guilty Caesar, Liberty retired. 
 
 Her Cato following through Numidian wilds — 
 
 Disdainful of Campania's gentle plains 
 
 And all the green delights Ausonia pours. 
 
 When for them she must bend the servile knee. 
 
 And, fawning, take the splendid robber's boon. 
 
 Nor stop the terrors of these regions here. 
 Commissioned demons oft, angels of wrath, 960 
 Let loose the raging elements. Breathed hot 
 From all the boundless furnace of the sky. 
 And the wide gUttering waste of burning sand, 
 A sufiocating wind the pilgrim smites 
 With instant death. Patient of thirst and toil. 
 Son of the desert ! even the camel feels. 
 Shot through his withered heart, the fiery blast. 
 Or from the black-red ether, bursting broad. 
 Sallies the sudden whirlwind. Straight the sands, 
 Commoved around, in gathering eddies play ; 970 
 Nearer and nearer still they darkening come ; 
 Till, with the general aU-involving storm 
 
 945 round] blue 1727. 948 mournful] watery 1727. 
 
 954 With Cato leading 1727-38. 955 gentle] fertile 1727-38.^ 
 
 956 Ausonia pours] of Italy 1727-38. 958 splendid robber's 
 
 boon] blessings once her own 1727-38. 
 
 959-1051 This long passage of nearly 100 lines is not found 
 in ed. 1738, or any previous ed. : it was inserted in the poem in 
 1744. A line of it here and there, but in a different connexion, 
 may, however, be found in the first ed. (1727). 
 
88 THE SEASONS 
 
 Swept up, the whole continuous wilds arise ; 
 
 And by their noon-day fount dejected thrown, 
 
 Or sunk at night in sad disastrous sleep, 
 
 Beneath descending hills the caravan 
 
 Is buried deep. In Cairo's crowded streets 
 
 The impatient merchant, wondering, waits in vain, 
 
 And Mecca saddens at the long delay. 
 
 But chief at sea, whose every flexile wave 980 
 Obeys the blast, the aerial tumult swells. 
 In the dread ocean, undulating wide, 
 Beneath the radiant line that girts the globe. 
 The circling typhon, whirled from point to point, 
 Exhausting aU the rage of aU the sky, 
 And dire ecnephia reign. Amid the heavens, 
 Falsely serene, deep in a cloudy speck 
 Compressed, the mighty tempest brooding dwells. 
 Of no regard, save to the skilful eye. 
 Fiery and foul, the small prognostic hangs 990 
 
 Aloft, or on the promontory's brow 
 Musters its force. A faint deceitful calm, 
 A fluttering gale, the demon sends before 
 To tempt the spreading sail. Then down at once 
 Precipitant descends a mingled mass 
 Of roaring winds and flame and rushing floods. 
 In wild amazement fixed the sailor stands. 
 Art is too slow. By rapid fate oppressed. 
 His broad-winged vessel drinks the whelming tide, 
 Hid in the bosom of the black abyss. 1000 
 
 With such mad seas the daring Gama fought. 
 For many a day and many a dreadful night 
 Incessant latjouring round the stormy Cape, — 
 By bold ambition led, and bolder thirst 
 Of gold. For then from ancient gloom emerged 
 The rising world of trade : the genius then 
 Of navigation, that in hopeless sloth 
 
SUMMER 89 
 
 Had slumbered on the vast Atlantic deep 
 
 For idle ages, starting, heard at last 
 
 The Lusitanian Prince, who, heaven-inspired, loio 
 
 To love of useful glory roused mankind. 
 
 And in unbounded commerce mixed the world. 
 
 Increasing still the terrors of these storms, 
 His jaws horrific armed with threefold fate. 
 Here dwells the direful shark. Lured by the scent 
 Of steaming crowds, of rank disease, and death, 
 Behold ! he rushing cuts the briny flood. 
 Swift as the gale can bear the ship along ; 
 And from the partners of that cruel trade 
 Which spoils unhappy Guinea of her sons 1020 
 
 Demands his share of prey — demands themselves. 
 The stormy fates descend : one death involves 
 Tyrants and slaves ; when straight, their mangled 
 
 Umbs 
 Crashing at once, he dyes the purple seas 
 With gore, and riots in the vengeful meal. 
 
 When o'er this world, by equinoctial rains 
 Flooded immense, looks out the joyless sun. 
 And draws the copious steam from swampy fens, 
 Where putrefaction into Ufe ferments 
 And breathes destructive mjrriads, or from woods, 
 Impenetrable shades, recesses foul, 1031 
 
 In vapours rank and blue corruption wrapt. 
 Whose gloomy horrors yet no desperate foot 
 Has ever dared to pierce ; then wasteful forth 
 Walks the dire power of pestilent disease. 
 A thousand hideous fiends her course attend. 
 Sick nature blasting, and to heartless woe 
 And feeble desolation, casting down 
 The towering hopes and all the pride of man: 
 Such as of late at Carthagena quenched 1040 
 
 The British fire. You, gallant Vernon, saw 
 
90 THE SEASONS 
 
 The miserable scene ; you, pitying, saw 
 
 To infant-weakness sunk the warrior's arm ; 
 
 Saw the deep-racking pang, the ghastly form, 
 
 The Up pale-quivering, and the beamless eye 
 
 Xo more with ardour bright ; you heard the groans 
 
 Of agonizing ships from shore to shore. 
 
 Heard, nightly plunged amid the sullen waves. 
 
 The frequent corse, while, on each other fixed 
 
 In sad presage, the blank assistants seemed 1050 
 
 Silent to ask whom fate would next demand. 
 
 What need I mention those inclement skies 
 Where frequent o'er the sickening city, ^lagne , 
 The fiercest chQd of Xemesis divine. 
 Descends ? From Ethiopia's poisoned woods, 
 From stifled Cairo's filth, and fetid fields 
 With locust armies putrefying heaped. 
 This great destroyer sprung. Her awful rage 
 The brutes escape : Man is her destined prey, 
 Intemperate man ! and o'er his guilty domes 1060 
 She draws a close incumbent cloud of death ; 
 Uninterrupted by the living winds. 
 Forbid to blow a wholesome breeze ; and stained 
 With many a mixture by the Sun sufEused 
 Of angry aspect. Princely wisdom^ then 
 Dejects his watchful eye ; and from the hand 
 Of feeble justice ineffectual drop 
 The sword and balance ; mute the voice of joy. 
 And hushed the clamour of the busy world. 
 Empty the streets, with uncouth verdure clad ; 1070 
 
 1055-61 The first ed. (1727) gives only the one line here — 
 Collects a close incumbent night of death — 
 a reading which w?.s continued to 1738. In 1744 the present 
 text was inserted. 
 
 1067 feeble drop] drooping . . falls 1727-38. 1069 
 
 clamoiu'] murmur 1730-38 ; clamour 1727. 
 
SUMMER 91 
 
 Into the worst of deserts sudden turned 
 
 The cheerful haunt of men — unless, escaped 
 
 Prom the doomed house, where matchless horror 
 
 reigns. 
 Shut up by barbarous fear, the smitten wretch 
 With frenzy wild breaks loose, and, loud to Heaven 
 Screaming, the dreadful policy arraigns, 
 Inhuman and unwise. The^.sullen^oor, 
 Yet uninfected, on its cautious hinge 
 Fearing to turn, abhors society: 
 Dependents, friends, relations, Love himself, 1080 
 Savaged by woe, foi^et the tender tie. 
 The sweet engagement of the feeling heart. 
 But vain their selfish care : the circling sky. 
 The wide enlivening air is fuU of fate ; 
 And, struck by turns, in sohtaiy pangs 
 They fall, imblest, untended, and unmourned. 
 Thus o'er the prostrate city black despair 
 Extends her raven wing ; while, to complete 
 The scene of desolation stretched around, 
 The grim guards stand, denying all retreat, loqo 
 And give the flying wretch a better death. 
 
 Much yet remains unsung : the rage intense 
 Of brazen- vaulted skies, of iron fields. 
 Where drought and famine starve the blasted year ; 
 Fired by the torch of noon to tenfold rage, 
 
 1071-88 The original text (1727) is given in a Note at the end 
 of the poem. The text of edd. 1730-38, which differs considerably 
 from the first text, is also given. 1089 stretched] wide 1727-38. 
 
 1090 Denying all retreat, the grim guards stand 1727-38. 
 1091 And] To 1727. 1092-1102 Instead of these lines the 
 
 original text (from 1727 to 1738) gives — 
 
 Much of the force of foreign Summers still. 
 Of growling hills that shoot the pillared flame. 
 Of earthquake, and pale famine could I sing ; 
 But equal scenes of horror call me home. 
 
92 THE SEASONS 
 
 The infuriate hill that shoots the pillared flame ; 
 
 And, roused within the subterranean world, 
 
 The expanding earthquake, that resistless shakes 
 
 Aspiring cities from their solid base. 
 
 And buries mountains in the flaming gulf. noo 
 
 But 'tis enough ; return, my vagrant muse ; 
 
 A nearer scene of horror calls thee home. 
 
 Behold, slow-settUng o'er the lurid grove 
 Unusual darkness broods, and, growing, gains 
 The full possession of the sky, surcharged 
 With wrathful vapour, from the secret beds 
 Where sleep the mineral generations drawn. 
 Thence nitre, sulphur, and the fiery spume 
 Of fat bitumen, steaming on the day, 
 With various-tinctured trains of latent flame, mo 
 Pollute the sky, and in yon baleful cloud, 
 A reddening gloom, a magazine of fate. 
 Ferment ; till, by the touch ethereal roused, 
 The dash of clouds, or irritating war 
 Of fighting winds, while aU is calm below. 
 They furious spring. A boding silence reigns 
 Dread through the dun expanse — save the duU sound 
 That from the mountain, previous to the. storm, 
 RoUs o'er the muttering earth, disturbs the flood, 
 
 1 103 Behold] For now 1727-38. 1105 full] whole 1727 ; 
 
 broad 1730-38. 1106 secret beds] damp abrupt 1727-38. 
 
 1 108-16 The original text (from 1727 to 1738) stood as 
 follows : — 
 
 Thence nitre, sulphur, vitriol on the day 
 Stream, and fermenting in yon baneful cloud 
 Extensive o'er the world, a reddening gloom. 
 In dreadful promptitude to spring await 
 The high command. A boding silence, &c. 
 ' Stream ' in the second hne here is, however, corrected to ' Steam ' 
 in edd. 1730-38. 
 
 H17 Dread through] Through all 1727. 11 19 muttering] 
 
 trembling 1727-38. 
 
SUMMER 93 
 
 And shakes the forest-leaf without a breath 1120 
 Prone to the lowest vale the aerial tribes 
 Descend : the tempest-loving raven scarce 
 Dares wing the dubious dusk. In rueful gaze 
 The cattle stand, and on the scowling heavens 
 Cast a deploring eye — by man forsook, 
 Who to the crowded cottage hies him fast, 
 Or seeks the shelter of the downward cave. 
 
 'Tis hstening fear and dumb amazement all : 
 When to the startled -eye the sudden glance 
 Appears far south, eruptive through the cloud, 1130 
 And, following slower, in explosion vast 
 The thunder raises his tremendous voice. 
 At first, heard solemn o'er the verge of heaven, 
 The tempest growls ; but as it nearer comes. 
 And roUs its awful burden on the wind. 
 The lightnings flash a larger curve, and more 
 The noise astounds, tiU overhead a sheet 
 Of Uvid flame discloses wide, then shuts 
 And opens wider, shuts and opens stiU 
 Expansive, wrapping ether in a blaze. 1140 
 
 EoUows the loosened aggravated roar. 
 Enlarging, deepening, mingling, peal on peal 
 Crushed horrible, convulsing heaven and earth. 
 
 Down comes a deluge oE sonorous hail, 
 
 1 120 shakes] stirs 1727-38. 1128 'Tis dumb amaze and 
 
 listening terror all 1727-38. 11 29 startled .. sudden] quicker . . 
 livid 1727-38. 11 30 eruptive] emissive 1727-38. 11 31 And 
 by the powerful breath of God inflate 1727-38. 1 133-5 l^n 
 
 the original text (from 1727 to 1738) one line only is given : — 
 
 At first low-muttering ; but at each approach. 
 The change was made to the present text in 1744. 
 
 1 138 livid] various 1727-38. 1144 Following this line 
 
 comes in the first text (1727-38) the passage — 
 
 In the white heavenly magazines congealed. 
 
 And often fatal to the unsheltered head 
 
 Of man br rougher beast. 
 
94 THE SEASONS 
 
 Or prone-descending rain. Wide-rent, the clouds 
 
 Pour a whole flood ; and yet, its flame unquenched. 
 
 The unconquerable lightning struggles through. 
 
 Ragged and fierce, or in red whirling balls, 
 
 And fires the mountains with redoubled rage. 1149 
 
 Black from the stroke, above, the smouldering pine 
 
 Stands a sad shattered trunk ; and, stretched below, 
 
 A hfeless group the blasted cattle lie : 
 
 Here the soft flocks, with that same harmless look 
 
 They wore alive, and ruminating stiU 
 
 In fancy's eye ; and there the frowning buU, 
 
 And ox half-raised. Struck on the castled cliff. 
 
 Thereafter follojred in the first ed. (1727)—, 
 The sluicy rain 
 In one unbroken flood descends ; and yet 
 The unconquerable, &c. 
 1 145 ' Or prone-descending rain ' was first added in 1744. 
 ' Wide-rent, the clouds', &c. was added in 1730. 1146 flame] 
 rage 1730-38. 1147 inconquerable 1730-38. 1148 After 
 
 this line came in the first text (1727-38) the passage — 
 And strikes the shepherd as he shuddering sits 
 Presaging ruin in the rocky chft. 
 His inmost marrow feels the gliding flame : 
 He dies ! and, like a statue grimed with age. 
 His live dejected posture still remains. 
 His russet singed and rent his hanging hat. 
 Against his crook his sooty cheek reclined, 
 While, whining at his feet, his half-stunned dog, 
 Importunately kind and fearful, pats 
 On his insensate master for relief. 
 In the second line of this dropped passage, add. 1730-38 give 
 ' mid ' for ' in ' 
 
 1 1 50 smouldering] mountain 1727-38. 
 
 1151 For this hne in edd. 1727 to 1738 we have— 
 
 A leaning shattered trunk stands scathed to heaven. 
 The talk of future ages ! and below. 
 1 1 56-68 Instead of these lines, which first appeared in ed. 
 1744, the first text (1727-38) gives the following :— 
 
 [And ox half-raised.] A little farther burns 
 The guiltless cottage, and the haughty dome 
 
SUMMER 95 
 
 The venerable tower and spiry fane 
 Resign their aged pride. The gloomy woods 
 Start at the flash, and from their deep recess 
 Wide-flaming out, their trembling inmates shake. 1160 
 Amid Carnarvon's mountains rages loud 
 The repercussive roar : with mighty crush. 
 Into the flashing deep, from the rude rocks 
 Of Penmanmaur heaped hideous to the sky, 
 Tumble the smitten chffs ; and Snowdon's peak. 
 Dissolving, instant yields his wintry load. 
 Far seen, the heights of heathy Cheviot blaze, 
 And Thule bellows through her utmost isles. 
 
 Guilt hears appalled, with deeply troubled thought ; 
 And yet not always on the guilty head 1170 
 
 Descends the fated flash. Young Celadon 
 And his Ameha were a matchless pair, 
 With equal virtue formed and equal grace 
 The same, distinguished by their sex alone : 
 Hers the mild lustre of the blooming morn. 
 And his the radiance of the risen day. 
 
 They loved : but such their guileless passion was 
 
 As in the dawn of time informed the heart 
 
 Stoops to the base. The uprooted forest flies 
 Aloft in air, or, ijaming out, displays 
 The savage haunts, by day unpierced before. 
 Scarred is the mountain's brow, and from the cliff 
 Tumbles the smitten rock. The desert shakes. 
 And gleams, and grumbles, through his deepest dens. 
 
 Edd. 1730 to 1738 give, at U. 3, 4 of this passage, the variation, ' In 
 
 one immediate flash The forest falls ', and, atl. 5, ' unpierced by day.' 
 1 169 In place of this line, which first appeared in ed. 1730, 
 
 came in the original text [1727] a long passage of twenty-four 
 
 lines, which the reader will find in a Note at the end of the poem. 
 
 Edd. 1730-38 print ' dubious hears ' for ' hears appalled '. The 
 
 change was made in 1744. 
 
 1 171 Falls the devoted 1727-38. 1172 were a matchless 
 
 pair] an umrivalled twain 1727. 1 175 blooming] unfolding 
 
 1727, 1 178 informed] alarmed 1727-38. 
 
96 THE SEASONS 
 
 Of innocence and undissembling truth. 
 
 'Twas friendship heightened by the mutual wish, 1180 
 
 The enchanting hope and sympathetic glow 
 
 Beamed from the mutual eye. Devoting all 
 
 To love, each was to each a dearer seK, 
 
 Supremely happy in the awakened power 
 
 Of giving joy. Alone amid the shades, 
 
 Still in harmonious intercourse they hved 
 
 The rural day, and talked the flowing heart, 
 
 Or sighed and looked unutterable things. 
 
 So passed their hfe, a clear united stream, 
 
 By care unruffled ; tUl, in evil hour, 1190 
 
 The tempest caught them on the tender walk. 
 
 Heedless how far and where its mazes strayed. 
 
 While with each other blest, creative Love 
 
 StiU bade eternal Eden smile aroimd. 
 
 Heavy with instant fate, her bosom heaved 
 
 Unwonted sighs, and, steahng oft a look 
 
 Of the big gloom, on Celadon her eye 
 
 FeU tearful, wetting her disordered cheek. 
 
 In vain assuring love and confidence 
 
 In Heaven repressed her fear ; it grew, and shook 1200 
 
 Her frame near dissolution. He perceived 
 
 The unequal conflict, and, as angels look 
 
 On dying saints, his eyes compassion shed, 
 
 With love illumined high. ' Fear not,' he said, 
 
 ' Sweet innocence ! thou stranger to offence 
 
 And inward storm ! he, who yon skies involves 
 
 1 1 82 Beamed . . mutual] struck . . oharmful 1727-38. 11 86 
 harmonious] angelic 1727. 11 89 So] Thus 1727-38. 
 
 1192-S For these lines the earlier text (1727-38) gives only — 
 Heedless how far. Her breast, presageful heaved. 
 
 1 198 all her glowing cheek 1727. 1204 Mingled with 
 
 matchless love 1727. 1205 Sweet] Fair 1727. 1206 
 
 enwraps yon skies 1727. 
 
SUMMER 97 
 
 In frowns of darkness, ever smiles on thee 
 With kind regard. O'er thee the secret shaft 
 That wastes at midnight, or the undreaded hour 
 Of noon, flies harmless : and that very voice, '1210 
 Which thunders terror through the guilty heart. 
 With tongues of seraphs whispers peace to thine. 
 'Tis safety to be near thee sure, and thus 
 To clasp perfection ! ' From his void embrace. 
 Mysterious Heaven ! that moment to the ground, 
 A blackened corse, was struck the beauteous maid. 
 But who can paint the lover, as he stood 
 Pierced by severe amazement, hating Ufe, 
 Speechless, and fixed in all the death of woe ? 
 So, faint resemblance ! on the marble tomb 1220 
 
 The weR-dissembled mourner stooping stands, 
 For ever silent and for ever sad. 
 
 As from the face of Heaven the shattered clouds 
 Tumultuous rove, the interminable sky 
 Sublimer swells, and o'er the world expands 
 
 1208 kind] full 1727-38. 121 1 guilty] sinner's 1727; con- 
 scious 1730-38. 121 5 to the ground] in a heap 1727-38. 
 1 216 Of pallid ashes fell 1727-38. 12 18 Pierced] Struck 
 1727-38. 1223 each shattered cloud 1727. 
 
 1223 Immediately preceding this line came, in the first ed. 
 (1727), a passage of eleven lines, which the reader will find in a 
 Note at the end of the poem. 
 
 1224 rove, the interminable sky] roves, the unfathomable 
 blue 1727 ; rove, the interminable blue 1730-38. 
 
 1 225, 1 226 Instead of these two lines the first ed. (1727) gives — 
 
 following ' the unfathomable blue ' — 
 
 That constant joy to every finer eye. 
 That rapture ! swells into the general arch 
 Which copes the nations. — On the lilied bank 
 Where a brook quivers, often, careless thrown. 
 Up the wide scene I've gazed whole hours away 
 With growing wonder, while the sun declined, 
 As now, forth breaking from the blotting storm. 
 
 Edd. 1730-38 give only— 
 
98 THE SEASONS 
 
 A purer azure. Nature from the storm 
 
 Shines out afresh ; and through the Ughtened air 
 
 A higher lustre and a clearer calm 
 
 Diffusive tremble ; while, as if in sign 
 
 Of danger past, a glittering robe of joy, 1230 
 
 Set off abundant by the yellow ray, 
 
 Invests the fields, yet dropping from distress. 
 
 'Tis beauty all, and grateful song around, 
 Joined to the low of kine, and numerous bleat 
 Of flocks thick-nibbling through the clovered vale. 
 And shall the hymn be marred by thankless man. 
 Most-favoured, who with voice articulate 
 Should lead the chorus of this lower world ? 
 Shall he, so soon forgetful of the hand 
 That hushed the thunder, and serenes the sky, 1240 
 Extinguished feel that spark the tempest waked, 
 That sense of powers exceeding far his own. 
 Ere yet his feeble heart has lost its fears ? 
 
 Cheered by the milder beam, the sprightly youth 
 Speeds to the well-known pool, whose crystal depth 
 A sandy bottom shows. Awhile he stands 
 Gazing the inverted landscape, haK afraid 
 
 Delightful swell into the general arch 
 That copes the nations. Nature from the storm &c. 
 1227 Nature shines out, and through, &o. 1727. 1229 
 
 while] and 1727. 1230 robe] face 1727. 1231 yellow] 
 
 level 1727. 1232 fields, yet dropping] Earth yet weeping 
 
 1727. 1239 hand] past 1727. 1240-43 For these four 
 
 lines the first ed. (1727) gives — 
 
 After the tempest, puff his transient vows, 
 And a new dance of vanity begin 
 Scarce ere the pant forsakes his feeble heart ? 
 Edd. 1730 to 1738 give- 
 That hushed the thunder and expands the sky, 
 After the tempest puff his idle vows. 
 And a new dance of vanity begin, 
 Scarce ere the pant forsake the feeble heart ? 
 1244 milder] setting 1727-38. 
 
SUMMER 99 
 
 To meditate the blue profound below ; 
 Then plunges headlong down the circling flood. 
 His ebon tresses and his rosy cheek 1250 
 
 Instant emerge ; and through the obedient wave, 
 At each short breathing by his hp repelled, 
 With arms and legs according well, he makes, 
 As humour leads, an easy- winding path ; 
 While from his polished sides a dewy light 
 Effuses on the pleased spectators round. 
 
 This is the purest exercise of health. 
 The kind refresher of the summer heats ; 
 Nor, when cold winter keens the brightening flood. 
 Would I weak-shivering Unger on the brink. 1260 
 
 Thus life redoubles, and is oft preserved 
 By the bold swimmer, in the swift illapse 
 Of accident disastrous. Hence the hmbs 
 Knit into force ; and the same Roman arm 
 That rose victorious o'er the conquered earth 
 First learned, while tender, to subdue the wave. 
 Even from the body's purity the mind 
 Receives a secret sympathetic aid. 
 
 Close in the covert of an hazel copse, 
 
 1248 After this line in the first ed. (1727) came — 
 
 Till disenchanted by the rulHing gale — 
 which was struck out in 1730. 
 
 1249 Then] He 1727; circling] closing 1727. 1251 
 obedient] glassy 1727 ; flexile 1730-38. 1255 polished . . 
 dewy] snowy . . humid 1727. 1259 Nor when the brook 
 pellucid Winter keens 1727-38. 1264 the] that 1727. 1265 
 That rose] Which stretched 1727. 1 268 Strictly allied 
 receives a secret aid 1727. 
 
 1268 The passage of twelve lines ending here followed the 
 episode of Damon and Musidora, which iirst appeared in the 
 ed. of 1730, and was retained down to 1738. In 1744 the episode 
 underwent a great alteration. 
 
 1269-72 For these lines the first text of the episode of 
 Damon and Musidora (1730-38) gives — 
 
 h2 
 
100 THE SEASONS 
 
 Where, winded into pleasing solitudes, 1270 
 
 Runs out the rambhng dale, young Damon sat 
 Pensive, and pierced with love's delightful pangs. 
 There to the stream that down the distant rocks 
 Hoarse-murmuring fell, and plaintive breeze that 
 
 played 
 Among the bending willows, falsely he 
 Of Musidora's cruelty complained. 
 She felt his flame ; but deep within her breast, 
 In bashful coyness or in maiden pride. 
 The soft return concealed ; save when it stole 
 In side-long glances from her downcast eye, 1280 
 Or from her swelling soul in stifled sighs. 
 Touched by the scene, no stranger to his vows, 
 He framed a melting lay to try her heart ; 
 And, if an infant passion struggled there. 
 To call that passion forth. Thrice happy swain ! 
 A lucky chance, that oft decides the fate 
 Of mighty monarchs, then decided thine ! 
 For, lo ! conducted by the laughing Loves, 
 This cool retreat his Musidora sought : 
 Warm in her cheek the sultry season glowed ; 1290 
 And, robed in loose array, she came to bathe 
 Her fervent Umbs in the refreshing stream. 
 What shall he do ? In sweet confusion lost, 
 
 'Twas then, beneath a secret waving shade 
 Where, winded into lovely solitudes, 
 Runs out the rambling dale, that Damon sat. 
 Thoughtful and fixed in philosophic muse. 
 1273-89 Instead of these lines the original text of this 
 episode (1730-38) gives only seven lines, which are printed 
 in a Note at the end of the poem. 
 
 1290 her! their 1730-38. 1291 she] they 1730-38. 
 
 1292 Her] Their 1730-38. After this line in the original 
 
 version (1730-38) came ten lines (struck out in 1744) which 
 
 the reader will find in a Note at the end of the poem. They were 
 
 superseded by the passage here given, ending ' Of Ida ', 1. 1305. 
 
SUMMER 101 
 
 And dubious flutterings, he a while remained. 
 
 A pure ingenuous elegance of soul, 
 
 A delicate refinement, known to few, 
 
 Perplexed his breast and urged him to retire : 
 
 But love forbade. Ye prudes in virtue, say. 
 
 Say, ye severest, what would you have done ? 
 
 Meantime, this fairer nymph than ever blest 1300 
 
 Arcadian stream, with timid eye around 
 
 The banks surveying, stripped her beauteous limbs 
 
 To taste the lucid coolness of the flood. 
 
 Ah ! then, not Paris on the piny top 
 
 Of Ida panted stronger, when aside 
 
 The rival goddesses the veil divine 
 
 Cast unconfined, and gave him all their charms, 
 
 Than, Damon, thou ; as from the snowy leg 
 
 And slender foot the inverted silk she drew ; 
 
 As the soft touch dissolved the virgin zone ; 1310 
 
 And, through the parting robe, the alternate breast, 
 
 With youth wild-throbbing, on thy lawless gaze 
 
 In fuU luxuriance rose. But, desperate youth. 
 
 How durst thou risk the soul-distracting view 
 
 As from her naked hmbs of glowing white, 
 
 Harmonious swelled by nature's finest hand. 
 
 In folds loose-floating feU the fainter lawn. 
 
 And fair exposed she stood, shrunk from herself. 
 
 With fancy blushing, at the doubtful breeze 
 
 1305 Of Ida] Nor Paris 1730-38 1308 After ' thou ' in 
 
 the original version (1730-38) came — 
 
 ' the stoic now no more. 
 But man deep-felt.' 
 1309 shel they 1730-38. 
 
 1313-16 For these four lines the original version (1730-38) 
 gives the following two — 
 
 Luxuriant rose ; yet more enamoured still 
 When from their naked Umbs of glowing white. 
 1318 she . . herself] they . . themselves 1730-38. 
 
102 THE SEASONS 
 
 Alarmed, and starting like -the fearful fawn ? 1320 
 
 Then to the flood she rushed : the parted flood 
 
 Its lovely guest with closing waves received ; 
 
 And every beauty softening, every grace 
 
 Flushing anew, a mellow lustre shed — 
 
 As shines the lily through the crystal mild, 
 
 Or as the rose amid the morning dew, 
 
 Fresh from Aurora's hand, more sweetly glows. 
 
 While thus she wantoned, now beneath the wave 
 
 But iU-concealed, and now with streaming locks, 
 
 That half-embraced her in a humid veU, 1330 
 
 Rising again, the latent Damon drew 
 
 Such maddening draughts of beauty to the soul 
 
 As for a while o'erwhelmed his raptured thought 
 
 With luxury too daring. Checked, at last, 
 
 By love's respectful modesty, he deemed 
 
 The theft profane, if aught profane to love 
 
 Can e'er be deemed, and, strugghng from the shade. 
 
 With headlong hurry fled : but first these lines, 
 
 Traced by his ready pencil, on the bank 1339 
 
 1320 Alarmed] Aroused 1730-38. After this line in the original 
 version of the episode came the three lines — 
 
 So stands the statue that enchants the world, 
 Her full proportions such, and hashful so 
 Bends ineffectual from the roving eye. 
 See 11. 1347-9 infra. 
 
 1321 she] they 1730-38. 1322 Its lovely guest] The plunging 
 fair 1730-38. 1324 anew] afresh 1730-38. 1327 Puts 
 on a warmer glow. In various play 1730-38. 1328 she] they 
 1730-38. 1330 her] them 1730-38. 1332 maddening 
 draughts of] draughts of love and 1730-38. 1333 The original 
 version (1730-38) ended here as follows : — ■ 
 
 As put his harsh philosophy to flight, 
 The joyless search of long-deluded years ; 
 And Musidora fixing in his heart 
 Informed and humanized him into man. 
 
 Here followed in the original version, ' This is the purest exercise ', 
 
 &c. See 1. 1257 supra. 
 
SUMMER 103 
 
 With trembling hand he threw — ' Bathe on, my fair, 
 
 Yet unbeheld save by the sacred eye 
 
 Of faithful love : I go to guard thy haunt ; 
 
 To keep from thy recess each vagrant foot 
 
 And each licentious eye.' With wild surprise, 
 
 As if to marble struck, devoid of sense, 
 
 A stupid moment motionless she stood : 
 
 So stands the statue that enchants the world ; 
 
 So, bending, tries to veil the matchless boast, 
 
 The mingled beauties of exulting Greece. 
 
 Recovering, swift she flew to find those robes 1350 v'- 
 
 Which blissful Eden knew not ; and, arrayed 
 
 In carele^Tiaste, "tKe alarming paper snatched. 
 
 But, when her Damon's well-known hand she saw. 
 
 Her terrors vanished, and a softer train 
 
 Of mixed emotions, hard to be described. 
 
 Her sudden bosom seized : shame void of guilt, 
 
 The charming blush of innocence, esteem 
 
 And admiration of her lover's flame, 
 
 By modesty exalted, even a sense 
 
 Of self-approving beauty stole across 1360 
 
 Her busy thought. At length, a tender calm 
 
 Hushed by degrees the tumult of her soul ; 
 
 And on the spreading beech, that o'er the stream 
 
 Incumbent hung, she with the sylvan pen 
 
 Of rural lovers this confession carved. 
 
 Which soon her Damon kissed with weeping joy : 
 
 ' Dear youth ! sole judge of what these verses mean, 
 
 By fortune too much favoured, but by love, 
 
 Alas ! not favoured less, be still as now 
 
 Discreet : the time may come you need not fly.' 1370 
 
 The Sun has lost his rage : his downward orb 
 Shoots nothing now but animating warmth 
 
 1 371-1437. This long passage first appeared in 1744. The 
 reference at 1. 1427 is to Pope's last illness. He died in 1744. 
 
104 THE SEASONS 
 
 And vital lustre ; that with various ray, 
 
 Lights up the clouds, those beauteous robes of heaven. 
 
 Incessant rolled into romantic shapes, 
 
 The dream of waking fancy ! Broad below, 
 
 Covered with ripening fruits, and swelUng fast 
 
 Into the perfect year, the pregnant earth 
 
 And all her tribes rejoice. Now the soft hour 
 
 Of walking comes for him who lonely loves 1380 
 
 To seek the distant hills, and there converse 
 
 With nature, there to harmonize his heart, 
 
 And in pathetic song to breathe around 
 
 The harmony to others. Social friends, 
 
 Attuned to happy unison of soul— 
 
 To whose exulting eye a fairer world. 
 
 Of which the vulgar never had a glimpse. 
 
 Displays its charms ; whose minds are richly fraught 
 
 With philosophic stores, superior light ; 
 
 And in whose breast enthusiastic burns 1390 
 
 Virtue, the sons of interest deem romance — 
 
 Now called abroad, enjoy the falling day : 
 
 Now to the verdant portico of woods, 
 
 To nature's vast Lyceum, forth they walk ; 
 
 By that kind school where no proud master reigns, 
 
 The fuU free converse of the friendly heart. 
 
 Improving and improved. Now from the world. 
 
 Sacred to sweet retirement, lovers steal. 
 
 And pour their souls in transport, which the sire 
 
 Of love approving hears, and calls it good. 1400 
 
 Which way, Amanda, shall we bend our course ? 
 
 The choice perplexes. Wherefore should we choose ? 
 
 AH is the same with thee. Say, shall we wind 
 
 Along the streams ? or walk the smiling mead ? 
 
 Or court the forest glades ? or wander wild 
 
 Among the waving harvests ? or ascend. 
 
 While radiant Summer opens all its pride. 
 
SUMMER 105 
 
 Thy hill, delightful Shene ? Here let us sweep 
 
 The boundless landscape ; now the raptured eye, 
 
 Exalting swift, to huge Augusta send, 1410 
 
 Now to the sister hills that skirt her plain. 
 
 To lofty Harrow now, and now to where 
 
 Majestic Windsor lifts his princely brow. 
 
 In lovely contrast to this glorious view. 
 
 Calmly magnificent, then wiU we turn 
 
 To where the silver Thames first rural grows. 
 
 There let the feasted eye unwearied stray ; 
 
 Luxurious, there, rove through the pendent woods 
 
 That nodding hang o'er Harrington's retreat ; 
 
 And, stooping thence to Ham's embowering walks, 1420 
 
 Beneath whose shades, in spotless peace retired. 
 
 With her the pleasing partner of his heart. 
 
 The worthy Queensberry yet laments his Gay, 
 
 And polished Cornbury woos the willing muse. 
 
 Slow let us trace the matchless vale of Thames ; 
 
 Fair-winding up to where the muses haunt 
 
 In Twit'nam's bowers, and for their Pope implore 
 
 The healing god ; to royal Hampton's pile. 
 
 To Clermont's terraced height, and Esher's groves. 
 
 Where in the sweetest solitude, embraced 1430 
 
 By the soft windings of the silent Mole, 
 
 From courts and senates Pelham finds repose. 
 
 Enchanting vale ! beyond whate'er the muse 
 
 Has of Achaia or Hesperia sung ! 
 
 vale of bliss ! softly -swelhng hills ! 
 
 On which the power of cultivation lies, 
 
 And joys to see the wonders of his toil. 
 
 Heavens ! what a goodly prospect spreads around, 
 
 1438 And what a pleasing (various) prospect lies around! 
 1727-38. The passage beginning here followed (in the editions 
 preceding that of 1744) the passage ending at 1. 628 of the 
 present text. 
 
106 THE SEASONS 
 
 Of hills, and dales, and woods, and lawns, and spires, 
 
 And glittering towns, and gilded streams, till all 1440 
 
 The stretching landskip into smoke decays ! 
 
 Happy Britannia ! where the Queen of Arts, 
 
 Inspiring vigour. Liberty, abroad 
 
 Walks unconfined even to thy farthest cots. 
 
 And scatters plenty with unsparing hand. 
 
 Rich is thy soil, and merciful thy clime ; 
 Thy streams unfailing in the Summer's drought ; 
 Unmatched thy guardian-oaks ; thy valleys float 
 With golden waves ; and on thy mountains flocks 
 Bleat numberless ; while, roving round their sides. 
 Bellow the blackening herds in lusty droves. 1451 
 Beneath, thy meadows glow, and rise unquelled 
 Against the mower's scythe. On every hand 
 Thy villas shine. Thy country teems with wealth ; 
 And Property assures it to the swain, 
 Pleased and unwearied in his guarded toil. 
 
 Full are thy cities with the sons of art ; 
 And trade and joy, in every busy street. 
 Mingling are heard : even Drudgery himself. 
 As at the car he sweats, or, dusty, hews 1460 
 
 The palace stone, looks gay. Thy crowded ports, 
 Where rising masts an endless prospect yield, 
 With labour burn, and echo to the shouts 
 Of hurried sailor, as he hearty waves 
 His last adieu, and, loosening every sheet. 
 Resigns the spreading vessel to the wind. 
 
 Bold, firm, and graceful, are thy generous youth. 
 By hardship sinewed, and by danger fired. 
 Scattering the nations where they go ; and first 
 
 1439 dales] vales 1727-38. 1440 glittering towns] towns 
 
 betwixt 1727-38. 1444 Walks through the land of heroes 
 
 unconfined 1727-38. 1446 clime] skies 1727-38. 1452 
 
 glow] flame 1727-38. 1456 guarded] certain 1727. 
 
SUMMER 107 
 
 Or in the listed plain or stormy seas. 1470 
 
 Mild are thy glories too, as o'er the plans 
 
 Of thriving peace thy thoughtful sires preside — 
 
 In genius and substantial learning, high ; 
 
 For every virtue, every worth, renowned ; 
 
 Sincere, plain-hearted, hospitable, kind, 
 
 Yet like the mustering thunder when provoked, 
 
 The dread of tyrants, and the sole resource 
 
 Of those that under grim oppression groan. 
 
 Thy sons of glory many ! AKred thine, 
 In whom the splendour of heroic war, 1480 
 
 And more heroic peace, when governed well, 
 Combine ; whose hallowed name the Virtues saint. 
 And his own muses love ; the best of kings ! 
 With him thy Edwards and thy Henrys shine, 
 Names dear to fame ; the first who deep impressed 
 On haughty Gaul the terror of thy arms. 
 That awes her genius still. In statesmen thou, 
 And patriots, fertile. Thine a steady More, 
 Who, with a generous though mistaken zeal, 
 Withstood a brutal tyrant's useful rage ; 1490 
 
 Like Cato firm, like Aristides just, 
 
 1470 in. . stormy] on (in), .wintry 1727-38. 1471 plans] 
 arts 1727. 1477 dread] scourge 1727. 1478 those that] 
 
 such as 1727-38. 1479 Alfred thine] Thine a More 1730-38. 
 
 1479-1579 This passage of 101 lines, containing a, list of 
 England's worthies, was a gradual growth. The first ed. of 
 Summer (1727) included only nine names. In edd. 1730-38 
 we find two of these nine withdrawn (those of Tillotson and 
 Barrow) and eight other worthies added to the list. The list 
 was still further increased in edd. 1744, 1746. The text of the 
 original ed. (1727), consisting of only 23 lines, followed by a short 
 passage of 13 lines in honour of the worthies of Scotland — after- 
 wards expanded and transferred to Autumn — will be found in 
 a Note at the end of the poem. 
 
 1480-90 Added in 1744. 1491 Like . . like] As . . as 
 
 1730-38. 
 
108 THE SEASONS 
 
 Like rigid Cincinnatus nobly poor — 
 
 A dauntless soul erect, who smil'd on death. 
 
 Frugal and wise, a Walsingham is thine ; 
 
 A Drake, who made thee mistress of the deep, 
 
 And bore thy name in thunder round the world. 
 
 Then flamed thy spirit high. But who can speak 
 
 The numerous worthies of the maiden reign ? 
 
 In Raleigh mark their every glory mixed — 
 
 Raleigh, the scourge of Spain ! whose breast with all 
 
 The sage, the patriot, and the hero burned. 1501 
 
 Nor sunk his vigour when a coward reign 
 
 The warrior fettered, and at last resigned. 
 
 To glut the vengeance of a vanquished foe. 
 
 Then, active stiU and unrestrained, his mind 
 
 Explored the vast extent of ages past, 
 
 And with his prison-hours enriched the world ; 
 
 Yet found no times, in all the long research, 
 
 So glorious, or so base, as those he proved. 
 
 In which he conquered, and in which he bled. 1510 
 
 Nor can the muse the gallant Sidney pass. 
 
 The plume of war ! with early laurels crowned. 
 
 The lover's myrtle and the poet's bay. 
 
 A Hampden too is thine, illustrious land ! 
 
 Wise, strenuous, firm, of unsubmitting soul, 
 
 Who stemmed the torrent of a downward age 
 
 To slavery prone, and bade thee rise again, 
 
 In all thy native pomp of freedom bold. 
 
 1505, 1506 In place of these two lines the text of 1730-38 
 gives only — 
 
 Then deep through fate his mind retorted saw &c. 
 1511-13 These three lines followed in edd. 1730-38 the com- 
 pliment to Hampden which ends in the present text at 1. 1518. 
 
 1512 early laurels] every laurel 1730-38. 1514, 1515 In 
 
 place of these two lines the text of 1730-38 gives only — 
 A Hampden thine, of unsubmitting soul. 
 1518 bold] fierce 1730-38. 
 
SUMMER 109 
 
 Bright at his call thy age of men effulged ; 
 
 Of men on whom late time a kindling eye 1520 
 
 Shall turn, and tyrants tremble whUe they read. 
 
 Bring every sweetest flower, and let me strew 
 
 The grave where Russel hes, whose tempered blood, 
 
 With calmest cheerfulness for thee resigned, 
 
 Stained the sad annals of a giddy reign 
 
 Aiming at lawless power, though meanly sunk 
 
 In loose inglorious luxury. With him 
 
 His friend, the British Cassius, fearless bled ; 
 
 Of high determined spirit, roughly brave. 
 
 By ancient learning to the enlighten'd love 1530 
 
 Of ancient freedom warmed. Fair thy renown 
 
 In awful sages and in noble bards ; 
 
 Soon as the light of dawning Science spread j 
 
 Her orient ray, a nd wakidT the^uses' song. 
 
 Thine^s a Bacon, hapless in his choice. 
 
 Unfit to stand the civil storm of state, 
 
 And, through the smooth barbarity of courts. 
 
 With firm but pUant virtue forward still 
 
 To urge his course : him for the studious shade 
 
 Kind Nature formed, deep, comprehensive, clear, 1540 
 
 1519-24 These six lines, introduced in 1744, took the place ol 
 the following four which will be found in edd. 1730-38 : — 
 Nor him of later name, firm to the cause 
 Of Liberty, her rough determined friend. 
 The British Brutus ; whose united blood 
 With, Russel, thine, thou patriot wise and calm 
 1527 luxury] sloth 1730-38. 
 
 1527-50 Instead of these lines (commencing 'With him') 
 the text of edd. 1730-38 gives only the following ; — 
 High thy renown 
 In sages too. far as the sacred light 
 Of science spreads, and wakes the muse's song. 
 Thine is a Bacon, formed of happy mould 
 When Nature smiled, deep, comprehensive, clear. 
 Exact, and elegant, in one rich soul 
 Plato, the Stagyrite, and TuUy joined. 
 
110 THE SEASONS 
 
 Exact, and elegant ; in one rich soul, 
 Plato, the Stagyrite, and TuUy joined. 
 The great deliverer he, who, from the gloom 
 Of cloistered monks and jargon- teaching schools, 
 Led forth the true philosophy, there long 
 Held in the magic chain of words and forms 
 And definitions void : he led her forth. 
 Daughter of Heaven ! that, slow-ascending stUl, 
 Investigating sure the chain of things, 
 "With Tadiaht finger points to Beaven again. 1550 
 The generous Ashley thine, the friend of man, 
 Who scanned his nature with a brother's eye. 
 His weakness prompt to shade, to raise his aim. 
 To touch the finer movements of the mind, 
 ■And with the moral beauty charm the_ heart. 
 Why need I name thy Boyle, whose pious search, 
 Amid the dark recesses of his works, 
 The great Creator sought ? And why thy Locke, 
 Who made the whole internal world his own ? 
 Let Newton, pure intelligence, whom God 1560 
 
 To mortals lent to trace his boundless works 
 Erom laws subUmely simple, speak thy fame 
 In all philosophy. Eor lofty sense, 
 Creative fancy, and inspection keen 
 Through the deep windings of the human heart, 
 Isjiot^ wild Shakespeare thi ne an d nature's boast ? 
 
 1556-8 What need I name thy Boyle, whose pious search 
 Still sought the great Creator in His works. 
 By sure experience led ? And why thy Locke — 
 1730-38. 
 
 1560-63 In edd. 1727-38 the text reads- 
 Let comprehensive Newton speak thy fame 
 In all philosophy. 
 1563-6 In edd. 1727-38 the text is— 
 
 For solemn song 
 Is not wild Shakespeare nature's boast and thine ? 
 
SUMMER 111 
 
 Is not each great, each amiable muse 
 
 Of classic ages in thy Milton met ? 
 
 A genius universal as his theme, 
 
 Astonishing as chaos, as the bloom 1570 
 
 Of blowing Eden fair, as heaven sublime! 
 
 Nor shall my verse that elder bard forget. 
 
 The gentle Spenser, fancy's pleasing son ; 
 
 Who, like a copious river, poured his song 
 
 O'er aU the mazes of enchanted ground : 
 
 Nor thee, his ancient master, laughing sage, 
 
 Chaucer, whose native manners-painting verse, , 
 
 Well moraUzed, shines through the Gothic cloud ) 
 
 Of time and language o'er thy genius thrown. 
 
 May my song soften as thy daughters I, 1580 
 
 Britannia, hail ! for beauty is their own, 
 The feeling heart" simplicity of life, 
 And elegance, and taste ; the faultless form, 
 Shaped by the hand of harmony ; the cheek, 
 Where the live crimson, through the native white 
 Soft-shooting, o'er the face diffuses bloom 
 And every nameless grace ; the parted lip. 
 Like the red rosebud moist with morning dew, 
 Breathing delight ; and, under flowing jet, 
 Or sunny ringlets, or of circling brown, 1590 
 
 1567-71 The first text of this passage (1727-38), altered 
 
 in 1744, reads as follows : — 
 
 And every greatly amiable muse 
 Of elder ages in thy Milton met ? 
 His was the treasure of two thousand years 
 Seldom indulged to man ; a godlike mind 
 Unlimited and various as his theme. 
 Astonishing as chaos, as the bloom 
 Of blowing Eden fair, soft as the talk 
 Of our grandparents, and as heaven sublime. 
 1572-9 These lines were added in 1744. 1579 thy] his 
 
 1744. 1582 First added in 1730; not in the original text 
 
 of 1727. 
 
112 THE SEASONS 
 
 The neck slight-shaded and the swelling breast ; 
 The look resistless, piercing to the soul, 
 And by the soul informed, when, dressed in love, 
 She sits high-smiling in the conscious eye. 
 
 Island of blissj^ amid the subject seas 
 That thunder round thy rocky coasts, set up, 
 At once the wonder, terror, and dehght. 
 Of distant nations, whose remotest shore 
 'Can "soon be shaken by thy naval arm ; 
 Not to be shook thyself, but all assaults 1600 
 
 Baffling, like thy hoar cliffs the loud sea-wave. 
 
 Thou, by whose almighty nod the scale 
 Of empire rises, or alternate falls. 
 Send forth the saving Virtues round the land 
 In bright patrol — white Peace, and social Love ; 
 The tender-looking Charity, intent 
 On gentle deeds, and shedding tears through smiles ; 
 Undaunted Truth, and Dignity of mind ; 
 Courage, composed and keen ; sound Temperance, 
 Healthful in heart and look ; clear Chastity, 1610 
 With blushes reddening as she moves along. 
 Disordered at the deep regard she draws ; 
 Rough Industry ; Activity untired. 
 With copious Ufe informed, and all awake : 
 While in the radiant front superior shines 
 That first paternal virtue, Public Zeal, 
 Who throws o'er all an equal, wide survey. 
 And, ever musing on the common weal, 
 StiU labours glorious with some great design. 
 
 1594 sweet-smiling in the lovely eye 1727. 
 
 1617 throws] casts 1727-38. 1619 great] brave 1727-38. 
 
 1619 After the passage ending here the first ed. and edd. 1730- 
 38 give a text of many lines (withdrawn in 1744) which the 
 reader will find (with their variations) at the end of the poem, 
 in the Notes, pp. 127, 128. 
 
SUMMER 113 
 
 Low walks the sun, and broadens by degrees, 1620 
 Just o'er the verge of day. The shifting clouds 
 Assembled gay, a richly-gorgeous train. 
 In aU their pomp attend his setting throne. 
 Air, earth, and ocean smile immense. And now, 
 As if his weary chariot sought the bowers 
 Of Amphitrite and her tending nymphs, 
 (So Grecian fable sung) he dips his orb ; 
 Now half -immersed ; and now, a golden curve, 
 Gives one bright glance, then total disappears. 
 
 For ever running an enchanted round, 1630 
 
 Passes the day, deceitful, vain, and void ; 
 As fleets the vision o'er the formful brain. 
 This moment hurrying wild the impassioned soul, 
 The next in nothing lost. 'Tis so to him, 
 The dreamer of this earth, an idle blank — 
 A sight of horror to the cruel wretch. 
 Who, all day long in sordid pleasure rolled, 
 
 1620-29 These lines (with variations] are found in the first 
 
 ed. (1727), about 200 11. from the end. The variations are given 
 
 below. 1 62 1 shifting] rising 1727-38. 
 
 1622 That shift perpetual in his vivid train 1727-38. 
 1623-27 Instead of these lines the original text 1727-38 gives — 
 Their dewy (watery) mirrors numberless opposed. 
 Unfold the . hidden riches of his ray, 
 And chase a change of colours round the sky. 
 'Tis all one blush from east to west ; and now. 
 Behind the dusky earth, he dips his orb. 
 1630 This line is not in the first ed. (1727) ; it first appears in 
 
 ed. 1730. 163 1 deceitful, vain, and void] illusive and perplext 
 
 1727; depeitful, tedious, void 1730-38. 1633 wild] all 1727-38. 
 
 1635 an idle] a cheerless 1727-38. 1636 cruel] ungodly 1727. 
 
 1637-41 For these lines the first text (1727) gives — 
 The hard, the lewd, the cruel, and the false. 
 Who all day long have made the widow weep. 
 And snatched the morsel from her orphan's mouth 
 To give their dogs : but to the harmonious mind, &c. ; 
 
 while edd. 1730-38 give— 
 
114 THE SEASONS 
 
 Himself an useless load, has squandered vile 
 Upon his scoundrel train what might have cheered 
 A drooping family of modest worth. 1640 
 
 But to the generous, still-improving mind 
 That gives the HopeTess heart to sing for joy, 
 DifiEusing kind beneficence around 
 Boastless as now descends the silent dew — 
 To him the long review of ordered life 
 Is inward rapture only to be felt. 
 
 Confessed from yonder slow-extinguished clouds. 
 All ether softening, sober Evening takes 
 Her wonted station in the middle air, 
 A thousand shadows at her beck. First this 1650 
 She sends on earth ; then that of deeper dye 
 Steals soft behind; and then a deeper still. 
 In circle following circle, gathers round 
 To close the face of things. A fresher gale 
 Begins to wave the wood and stir the stream. 
 Sweeping with shadowy gust the fields of corn. 
 While the quail clamours for his running mate. 
 Wide o'er the thistly lawn, as swells the breeze, 
 A whitening shower of vegetable down 
 Amusive floats. The kind impartial care 1660 
 
 Of Nature naught disdains : thoughtful to feed 
 Her lowest sons, and clothe the coming year, 
 From field to field the feathered seeds she wings. 
 
 His folded fiock secure, the shepherd home 
 
 Who, rolling in inhuman pleasure deep, 
 The whole day long has made the widow pine. 
 And snatched the morsel from her orphan's mouth 
 To give his dogs : hut to the tuneful mind, &c. 
 1642 That gives] Who makes 1727-38. 1648 All ether 
 
 softening] The sky begreying 1727; All ether saddening 1730-38. 
 1653 circle following circle] well adjusted circles 1727. 1654 A 
 fresher gale] The expected breeze 1727; A fresher breeze 1730-38. 
 1658-63 A condensation of twelve lines in the first text(of 1727), 
 which the reader will find in a Note at the end of the poem. 
 
SUMMER 115 
 
 Hies, merry-hearted ; and by turns relieves 
 
 The ruddy milk-maid of her brimming pail — 
 
 The beauty whom perhaps his witless heart, 
 
 Unknowing what the joy-mixed anguish mean^, 
 
 Sincerely loves, by that best language shown 
 
 Of cordial glances and obhging deeds. 1670 
 
 Onward they pass, o'er many a panting height 
 
 And valley sunk and unfrequented ; where 
 
 At fall of eve the fairy people throng, 
 
 In various game and revelry to pass 
 
 The summer night, as village stories tell. 
 
 But far about they wander from the grave 
 
 Of him whom his ungentle fortune urged 
 
 Against his own sad breast to lift the hand 
 
 Of impious violence. The lonely tower 
 
 Is also shunned ; whose mournful chambers hold, 1680 
 
 So night-struck fancy dreams, the yeUing ghost. 
 
 Among the crooked lanes, on every hedge, 
 The Glow-worm lights his gem ; and, through the dark, 
 A moving radiance twinkles. Evening yields 
 
 1669 Loves fond, by that sinoerest language shown 1727-38. 
 1675 The] A 1727. 1677 urged] forced 1727. 
 
 1678, 1679 Against himself to lift the hated hand 
 Of violence— 1727-38. 
 There followed here in the original text (from 1727 to 1738) the 
 short passage — 
 
 By man (men) east out from life 
 And, after death, to which they drove his hope. 
 Into the broad way-side — 
 dropped in 1744. 
 
 1679 lonely] ruined 1727-38. 1680 mournful] unblest 
 
 1727; hoary 1730-38. 168 1 So night-struck fancy dreams] 
 
 Nightly, sole habitant 1727. 
 
 168 1 Here in the first ed. (1727) followed a passage of fourteen 
 lines (1007-20) dfecriptive of wild-fire, which will be found in a 
 Note at the end of the poem. 
 
 1683 gem] lamp 1727-38. 1684, 1685 Twinkles a moving 
 
 gem. On Evening's heel Night follows fast 1727-38. 
 
 I2 
 
116 THE SEASONS 
 
 The world to Night ; not in her winter robe 
 Of massy Stygian woof, but loose arrayed 
 In mantle dun. A faint^erroneojas ray, 
 • / Glanced from the imperfect surfaces of things, 
 i^ Flings half an iniage on the straining eye ; 
 "While wavering woods, and villages, and streams, 1690 
 And rocks, and mountain-tops that long retained 
 The ascending gleam are aU one swimming scene. 
 Uncertain if beheld. Sudden to heaven 
 Thence weary vision turns ; where, leading soft 
 The silent hours of love, with purest ray 
 Sweet Venus shines ; and, from her genial rise, 
 When daylight sickens, till it springs afresh. 
 Unrivalled reigns, the fairest lamp of night. 
 As thus the effulgence tremulous I drink, 
 With cherished gaze, the lambent hghtnings shoot 1700 
 Across the sky, or horizontal dart 
 In wondrous shapes — by fearful murmuring crowds 
 
 1687 faint . . ray] few . . rays 1727. 1689 Flings] Fling 
 
 1727. 1693 Doubtful if seen ; whence posting Vision turns 
 
 1727; Sudden Vision turns 1730-38. 1694-8 For these lines 
 the original text (1727-38) gives — 
 
 To heaven, where Venus in the starry front 
 Shines eminent, and from her genial rise. 
 When daylight sickens, till it springs afresh. 
 Sheds influence on earth to love and life 
 And every form of vegetation kind. 
 1700 cherished gaze] fixed peruse 1727 ; glad peruse 1730-38. 
 1702-29 Instead of these twenty-seven lines the text of edd. 
 1730-38 gives only the following eight : — 
 
 O'er half the nations, in a minute's space 
 Conglobed or long. Astonishment succeeds 
 And silence, ere the various talk begin. 
 The vulgar stare : amazement is their joy 
 And mystic faith, — a fond sequacious herd ! 
 But scrutinous Philosophy looks deep 
 With piercing eye into the latent cause. 
 Nor can she swallow what she does not see. 
 
SUMMER 117 
 
 Portentou s deemed. Amid the radiant orbs 
 
 That more than deck, that animate the sky, 
 
 The Ufe-infusing suns of other worlds, 
 
 Lo ! from the dread~immensity of~space 
 
 Returning with accelerated course, 
 
 The rushing comet to the sun descends ; 
 
 And, as he sinks below the shading earth. 
 
 With awful train projected o'er the heavens, 1710 
 
 The guilty nations tremble. But, above 
 
 Those superstitious horrors that enslave 
 
 The fond sequacious herd, to mystic faith 
 
 And blind amazement prone, the enlightened few, 
 
 Whose godlike minds philosophy exalts. 
 
 The glorious stranger hail. They feel a joy 
 
 Divinely great ; they in their powers exult, 
 
 That wondrous force of thought, which mounting spurns 
 
 This dusky spot, and measures aU the sky ; 
 
 While, from his far excursions through the wilds 1720 
 
 Of barren ether, faithful to his time. 
 
 They see the blazing wonder rise anew, 
 
 In seeming terror clad, but kindly bent 
 
 To work the wiU of all-sustaining love — 
 
 From his huge vapoury train perhaps to shake 
 
 Reviving moisture on the numerous orbs 
 
 Through which his long ellipsis winds, perhaps 
 
 To lend new fuel to declining suns, 
 
 To Ught up worlds, and feed the eternal fire. 
 
 With jthee,_serene Philosophy, with thee, 1730 
 
 And thy bright garland, let me crown my song ! 
 EfFusrve^ sourceof evidence and truth ! 
 A lustre shedding o'er the ennobled mind. 
 Stronger than summer-noon, and pure as that 
 
 The first three of these lines appear in the first ed. (1727) and 
 are followed by thirty-two more, which are given in a Note at the 
 end of the poem. 1731 bright garland] high praises 1727-38. 
 
118 THE SEASONS 
 
 Whose mild vibrations soothe the parted soul, 
 New to the dawning of celestial day. 
 Hence through her nourished powers, enlarged by thee, 
 She springs aloft, with elevated pride, 
 Above the tangling mass of low desires, 
 That bind the fluttering crowd ; and, angel- winged , 
 The heights of science and of virtue~gains, 1741 
 
 Where-aft-is- cato-and clear f with Nature round, 
 ^(Jr m the starp^~Tegions or the abyss, 
 To reason's and to fancy's eye displayed — 
 The'"first up-traciiTg,' from the dreary void. 
 The chain of causes and effects to Him, 
 The world-producing Essence, who alone 
 Possesses being ; while the last receives 
 The whole magnificence of heaven and earth, 
 And every beauty, delicate or bold, 1750 
 
 Obvious or more remote, with liveher sense. 
 Diffusive painted on the rapid mind. 
 
 Tutored by thee, hence Poetry exalts 
 Her voice to ages ; and informs the page 
 With music, image, sentiment, and thought. 
 Never to die ; the treasure of mankind. 
 Their highest honour, and their truest joy ! 
 
 Without thee what were unenlightened man ? 
 A savage, roaming through the woods and wilds 
 In quest of prey ; and with the unfashioned fur 1760 
 Rough-clad ; devoid of every finer art 
 And elegance of life. Nor happiness 
 
 1735 Which gently vibrates on the eye of Saint 1727. 1738 
 springs aloft] soaring spurns 1727-38. 1739 The tangling 
 
 mass of cares and 1727-38. 1742 clear] bright 1727. 1745 
 dreary void] vast inane 1727-38. 1747 Who absolutely in 
 
 Himself alone 1727 ; Who, all-sustaining in Himself alone 1730-38. 
 1752 A world swift-painted on the attentive mind 1727-38. 
 1758 unenlightened] unassisted 1727-38. 1761 finer] honest 
 
 1727-38- 1762 happiness] home nor joy 1727-38. 
 
SUMMER 119 
 
 Domeatic, mixed of tenderness and care, 
 
 Nor moral excellence, nor social bliss, 
 
 Nor guardian law were his ; nor various skill 
 
 To turn the furrow, or to guide the tool 
 
 Mechanic ; nor the heaven-conducted prow 
 
 Of Navigation bold, that fearless braves 
 
 The burning line or dares the wintry pole, 
 
 Mother severe of infinite delights ! 1770 
 
 Nothing, save rapine, indolence, and guile, 
 
 And woes on woes, a still-revolving train ! 
 
 Whose horrid circle had made human life 
 
 Than non-existence worse : but, taught by thee, 
 
 Ours are the plans of policy and peace ; 
 
 To live like brothers, and, conjunctive aU, 
 
 Embellish life. While thus laborious crowds 
 
 Ply the tough oar. Philosophy directs 
 
 The ruling helm ; or, like the liberal breath 
 
 Of potent heaven, invisible, the sail 1780 
 
 Swells out, and bears the inferior world along. 
 
 Nor to this evanescent speck of earth 
 Poorly confined : the radiant tracts on high 
 Are her exalted range ; intent to gaze 
 Creation through ; and, from that full complex 
 Of never-ending wonders, to conceive 
 Of the Sole Being right, who spoke the word, 
 
 1765 Nor law were his, nor property, nor swain 1727-38. 
 
 1 766-9 For these four lines the original text ( 1 727) gives only — 
 To turn the furrow, nor mechanic hand 
 Hardened to toil, nor servant prompt, nor trade ; 
 and later edd. (1730-38) follow the first text, substituting only 
 ' sailor bold ' for ' servant prompt '. 
 
 1772 a still-revolving train] to render human life 1727, the next 
 line being omitted. 1772, 1773 So in edd. 1730-38. 1775 
 plans] Arts 1727., 1779 The ruling] Star-led the 1727-38. 
 1780 potent] urgent 1727-38 ; sail] sails 1727-38. 1783 the] 
 
 those 1727. 1785 full] round 1727. 1786 ending] ceasing 1727. 
 
120 THE SEASONS 
 
 And Nature moved complete. With inward view, 
 
 Thence on the ideal kingdom swift she turns 
 
 Her eye ; and instant, at her powerful glance, 790 
 
 The obedient phantoms vanish or appear ; 
 
 Compound, divide, and into order shift, 
 
 Each to his rank, from plain perception up 
 
 To the fair forms of fancy's fleeting train ; 
 
 To reason then, deducing truth from truth. 
 
 And notion quite abstract ; where first begins 
 
 The world of spirits, action all, and life 
 
 Unfettered and unmixed. But here the cloud. 
 
 So wills Eternal Providence, sits deep. 
 
 Enough for us to know that this dark state, 1800 
 
 In wayward passions lost and vain pursuits, 
 
 This infancy of being, cannot prove 
 
 The final issue of the works of God, 
 
 By boundless love and perfect wisdom formed. 
 
 And ever rising with the rising mind. 
 
 1788 moved complete . . inward] circled . . inflected 1727. 
 1790 virtual glance 1727-38. 1791 or] and 1727. 1794, 
 
 1795 These lines were added, the former in ed. 1744, the latter 
 in ed. 1746. They are not in any of the earlier edd. 1796 
 
 And] To 1727-38. 1798 Unfettered] Immediate 1727-38. 1800 
 to know] we know 1727-38. 1804 By love and wisdom inex- 
 pressive formed 1727-38. 
 
 NOTES TO SUMMER 
 
 The general scheme of this part of Tlie Seasons is the description 
 (with digressions) of a typical summer's day from dawn to mid- 
 night. 
 
 Line 29. George Bubb Dodington, bom 1691, entered Parlia- 
 ment 1715, Member for Bridgewater 1722-54; he was a Lord of 
 the Treasury when Thomson first knew him, in 1726 or 1727. 
 He took the name of Dodington with the fine estate of Eastbury 
 in 1720, inherited from his maternal uncle. In 1761 he was 
 raised to the peerage as Lord Melcombe : he died the year after. 
 
SUMMER 121 
 
 He has been called ' the last of the Patrons '. Thomson's eulogy 
 of him is very extravagant ; but there is no doubt that the poet 
 felt honoured by intimacy with him, — ^an intimacy which he long 
 retained. 
 
 96. After this line came in the first ed. (1727) the following 
 passage, dropped in 1730 : — 
 
 Who would the blessings first and la,st recount 
 
 That in a full effusion from thee flow 
 
 As soon might number at the height of noon 
 
 The rays that radiate from thy cloudless sphere. 
 
 An universal glory darting round. 
 113-35. The original text (first ed., 1727) was as follows : — 
 
 Parent of Seasons ! from whose rich-stained rays, 
 
 Eefleoted various, various colours rise : 
 
 The freshening mantle of the youthful year; 
 
 The wild embroidery of the watery vale; 
 
 With all that chears the eye and charms the heart. 
 
 The branching grove thy lusty product stands. 
 To quench the fury of thy noon-career; 
 And crowd a shade for the retreating swain. 
 When on his russet fields you look direct. 
 
 Fruit is thy bounty too, with juice replete, lo 
 
 Acid or mild; and from thy ray receives 
 
 A flavour pleasing to the taste of man; 
 
 By thee concocted, blushes; and, by thee 
 
 Fully matured, into the verdant lap 
 
 Of Industry the mellow plenty falls. 
 
 Extensive harvests wave at thy command. 
 And the bright ear, consolidate by thee. 
 Bends, unwithholding, to the reaper's hand. 
 
 Even Winter speaks thy power, whose every blast 
 O'ercast with tempest, or severely sharp 20 
 
 With breathing frost, is eloquent of thee. 
 And makes us languish for thy vernal gleams. 
 
 Shot to the bowels of the teeming earth. 
 The ripening oar {sic) confesses all thy flame. 
 [The unfruitful rock itself, impregned &c.]. 
 The text of edd. 1730-38 differed only slightly from this : they 
 gave for 1. 7 — 
 
 Diffused and deep, to quench the summer noon ; 
 and for 'flame ' at the end of 1. 24 they substituted ' power '. 
 287-317. The substance of this passage originally appeared in 
 
122 THE SEASONS 
 
 Spring (1728-38), from which it was transferred (with alterations) 
 
 in 1744 : the original text was as follows : — 
 
 These are not idle philosophic dreams ; 
 Full nature swarms with life. The unfaithful fen 
 In putrid steams emits the living cloud 
 0£ pestilence. Through subterranean cells. 
 Where searching sunbeams never found a way. 
 Earth animated heaves. The flowery leaf 
 Wants not its soft inhabitants. The stone. 
 Hard as it is, in every winding pore 
 Holds multitudes. But chief the forest-boughs. 
 Which dance unnumbered to the inspiring breeze. 
 The downy orchard, and the melting pulp 
 Of mellow fruit the nameless nations feed 
 Of evanescent insects. Where the pool 
 Stands mantled o'er with green, invisible 
 Amid the floating verdure millions stray. 
 Each liquid too, whether of acid taste. 
 Milky, or strong, with various forms abounds. 
 Nor is the lucid stream, nor the pure air. 
 Though one transparent vacancy they seem, 
 Devoid of theirs. Even animals subsist 
 On animals, in infinite descent ; 
 And all so fine adjusted that the loss 
 Of the least species would disturb the whole. 
 Stranger than this the inspective glass confirms. 
 And to the curious gives the amazing scenes 
 Of lessening life — by Wisdom kindly hid 
 From eye and ear of man ; for if at once 
 The worlds in worlds enclosed were pushed to light. 
 Seen by his sharpened eye, and by his ear 
 Intensely bended heard, from the choice cate. 
 The freshest viands, and the brightest wines, 
 He'd turn abhorrent, and in dead of night. 
 When silence sleeps o'er all, be stunned with noise. 
 457. Here followed in the first ed. (1727) a passage of seven 
 
 lines, viz. : — 
 
 Who shall endure ! — The too resplendent scene 
 
 Already darkens on the dizzy eye ; 
 
 And double objects dance : unreal sounds 
 
 Sing round the ears : » weight of sultry dew 
 
 Hangs, deathful, on the limbs : shiver the nerves ; 
 
 The supple sinews sink ; and on the heart. 
 
 Misgiving, Horror lays his heavy hand. 
 
SUMMER 123 
 
 This passage was continued in edd. 1730-38 with the following 
 alterations : — lAne 1, shall became can ; line 2, eye hecame sights 
 line 4, round the ears became deep around. The passage was 
 dropped in 1744. 
 
 564. Elizabeth Stanley, died 1738, at the age of eighteen. 
 Thomson wrote the verses for her epitaph, which will be found 
 among his miscellaneous pieces. The prose part of the epitaph, 
 in Holyrood Church, Southampton, informs the reader that she 
 joined to beauty, modesty, and gentleness ' all the fortitude, 
 elevation, and vigour of mind that ever exalted the most heroical 
 man '. Her mother, the daughter of Sir Hans Sloane, was an 
 early friend of Thomson's. 
 591-606. The text of the earliest ed. (1727) is as follows :— 
 EoIIs unsuspecting, till surprised 'tis thrown 
 In loose meanders through the trackless air ; 
 Now a blue watery sheet, anon dispersed 
 A hoary mist, then gathered in again 
 A darted stream aslant the hollow rock. 
 This way and that tormented, dashing thick 
 From steep to steep with wild infracted course. 
 And restless roaring to the humble vale. 
 The following alterations appear in edd. 1730-38 : — 
 In line 1, Bolls fair and placid ; till collected all. 
 For line 2, the following : — 
 
 In one big glut, as sinks the shelving ground. 
 The impetuous torrent, tumbling down the steep. 
 Thunders, and shakes the astonished country round. 
 641. The general breeze. Which blows constantly between the 
 tropics from the east, or the collateral points, the north-east and 
 south-east ; caused by the pressure of the rarefied air on that 
 before it, according to the diurnal motion of the sun from east 
 to west. — T. 
 
 645. Returning suns and double seasons. In all places between 
 the tropics the sun, as he passes and repasses in his armual 
 motion, is twice a year perpendicular, which produces this 
 effect.— T. 
 
 710. Behemoth. The hippopotamus, or river-horse. — T. 
 738. But, if she bids them shine. In all the regions of the torrid 
 zone the birds, though more beautiful in their plumage, are 
 observed to be less melodious than ours. — T. 
 
 827. Menam's orient stream. The river that runs through Siam : 
 on whose banks a vast multitude of those insects called fireflies 
 make a beautiful appearance in the night. — ^T. 
 
 840. The mighty OreUana. The river of the Amazons. — T. 
 
124 THE SEASONS 
 
 912-38. This passage, beginning ' There sublimed ', is an 
 expansion of the original (1727) text, which stood as follows : — 
 Here the savage race 
 Roam, licensed by the shading hour of blood 
 And foul misdeed, when the pure day has shut 
 His sacred eye. The rabid tiger, then. 
 The fiery panther, and the whiskered pard, 
 Bespeckled fair, the beauty of the waste. 
 In dire divan surround their shaggy king 
 Majestic stalking o'er the burning sand 
 With planted step, while an obsequious crowd 
 Of grinning forms at humble distance wait. 
 These, all together joined, from darksome caves 
 Where o'er gnawed bones they slumbered out the day. 
 By supreme hunger smit, and thirst intense. 
 At once their mingling voices raise to heaven ; 
 And, with imperious and repeated roars 
 Demanding food, the wilderness resounds 
 From Atlas eastward to the frighted Nile. 
 The alteration of this text (which remained verbally unchanged 
 from 1727 down to 1738) was made for the ed. of 1744. 
 
 984. The circling typhon ; 986 And dire ecnephia. Terms for par- 
 ticular storms or hurricanes known only between the tropics. — T. 
 987. a cloudy specie. Called by sailors the ox-eye, being in 
 appearance at first no bigger. — T. 
 
 1001. the daring Gama. Vasco de Gama, the first that sailed 
 round Africa, by the Cape of Good Hope, to the East Indies. — T. 
 1010. The iMsitanian Prince. Don Henry, third son to John 
 the First, King of Portugal. His strong genius to the discovery 
 of new countries was the source of all the modern improvements 
 in navigation. — T. 
 
 1055. Ethiopians poisoned iwods. These are the causes sup- 
 posed to be the first origin of the Plague, in Doctor Mead's elegant 
 book on that subject. — T. 
 
 1071-88. The original text (1727) was as follows :— 
 And ranged at open noon by beasts of prey 
 And birds of bloody beak : while, all night long. 
 In spotted troops the recent ghosts complain. 
 Demanding but the covering grave. Meantime 
 Locked is the deaf door to distress ; even friends, 
 And relatives endeared for many a year. 
 Savaged by woe, forget the social tie. 
 The blest engagement of the yearning heart. 
 And sick in solitude successive die 
 Untended and unmourned. And to complete, &o. 
 
SUMMER 125 
 
 The text of 1730-38 was as follows :— 
 
 And ranged at open noon by beasts of prey 
 And birds of bloody beak. The sullen door 
 No visit knows, nor hears the wailing voice 
 Of fervent want. Even soul-attracted friends 
 And relatives endeared for many a year, 
 Savaged by woe, forget the social tie, 
 The close engagement of the kindred heart. 
 And sick in solitude successive die 
 Untended and unmoumed. While to complete, &o. 
 1169. For this line, which (with a slight variation) first appeared 
 
 in 1730, came, in the original text (1727), the following passage of 
 
 twenty-four lines :^ 
 
 Now swells the triumph of the virtuous man ; 
 And this outrageous elemental fray 
 To him a dread magnificence appears. 
 The glory of that Power he calls his friend. 
 Sole honourable name ! — but woe to him 
 Who, of infuriate malice, and confirmed 
 In vice long-practised, is a foe to man. 
 His brother, and at variance with his God. 
 He thinks the tempest weaves around his head ; 
 Loudens the roar to him, and in his eye 
 The bluest vengeance glares. The oppressor who 
 Dnpitying heard the wailings of distress. 
 Galled by the scourge, now shrinks at other sounds. 
 Hid are the Neros of the earth — in vain 
 Like children hid in sport. Chief in the breast 
 Of solitary atheist wildness reigns 
 Licentious, — vanished every quaint conceit 
 And impious jest with which he used to pelt 
 .^Superior reason — anguish in his look — 
 And supplication lifts his hand. He'd pray 
 If his hard heart would flow. At last he runs. 
 Precipitant, and entering just the cave. 
 The messenger-of-justice glancing comes 
 With swifter sweep behind, and trips his heel. 
 1223. Preceding this line a passage of eleven lines appears in 
 
 the first ed. (1727) :— 
 
 Heard indistinct the far-off thunder peals, — 
 From suffering earth commissioned o'er the main 
 Where the black tempest, pressing on the pool. 
 Heaves the dead billows to the bursting clouds. 
 Dire is the fate of those who, reeling high 
 
 
126 THE SEASONS 
 
 From wave to ware, even at the very source 
 Of lightning feel the undissipated flame ; 
 Or, should they in a watery vale escape, 
 If on their heads the forceful spout descends 
 And drives the dizzy vessel down the deep 
 Till in the oozy bottom stuck profound ! 
 
 This passage was dropped in 1730. 
 
 1273-89. For these lines the original text of this episode of 
 
 Damon and Musidora gives only the following seven lines : — 
 Damon ! who still amid the savage woods 
 And lonely lawns the force of beauty scorned, 
 Firm and to false philosophy devote. 
 The brook ran babbling by, and, sighing weak. 
 The breeze among the bending willows played. 
 When Sacharissa to the cool retreat 
 With Amoret and Musidora stole. 
 1292. After this line, came in the original version (1730-38) 
 
 the following ten lines — superseded in 1744 by the passage of the 
 
 final text ending ' Of Ida ', at 1. 1305 : — 
 Tall and majestic Sacharissa rose, 
 Superior trading {sic), as on Ida's top 
 (So Grecian bards in wanton fable sung)' 
 High shone the sister and the wife of Jove. 
 Another Pallas Musidora seemed. 
 Meek-eyed, sedate, and gaining every look 
 A surer conquest of the sliding heart ; 
 While, like the Cyprian goddess, Amoret, 
 Delicious dressed in rosy-dimpled smiles. 
 And all one softness, melted on the sense. ' 
 1347. the slattie that enchants the world. The Venus of Medici. 
 
 — T. 
 
 1408. delightjvl Skene. The old name of Richmond, signify- 
 ing in Saxon shining or splendour. — T. 
 
 1411. the sister hills. Highgate and Hampstead. — T. 
 1479-1579. This passage of 101 lines was gradually expanded 
 
 from the original text (1727) of twenty-three lines : — 
 Hence mayst thou boast a Bacon and a More ; 
 Nor cease to vie them with the noblest names 
 Of ancient times, or patriot or sage. 
 And for the strength and elegance of truth 
 A Barrow and a Tillotson are thine ; 
 A Locke inspective into human minds 
 And all the unnoticed world that passes there. 
 Nor be thy Boyle forgot, who, while he lived. 
 
SUMMER 127 
 
 Seraphic sought the Eternal through his works 
 By sure experience led, and, when he died, < 
 
 Still bid his bounty argue for his God — 
 Worthy of riches he ! But what needs more 1 
 Let comprehensive Newton speak thy fame 
 In all philosophy. For solemn song 
 Is not wild Shakespear Nature's boast and thine ? 
 And every greatly amiable muse 
 Of elder ages in thy Milton met ? 
 His was the treasure of two thousand years. 
 Seldom indulged to man, a god-like mind — 
 Unlimited and various as his theme, 
 Astonishing as Chaos, as the bloom 
 Of blowing Eden fair, soft as the talk 
 Of our grandparents, and as Heaven sublime. 
 This was followed (1727) by a short passage of thirteen lines 
 in honour of the worthies of Scotland — afterwards (1730) ex- 
 panded and transferred to Autumn : — 
 
 And should I northward turn my filial eye 
 Beyond the Tweed, pure parent-stream ! to where 
 The Hyperborean ocean furious foams 
 O'er Orca or Betubium's highest peak, 
 Bapt I might sing thy Caledonian sons, 
 A gallant, warlike, unsubmitting race ! 
 Nor less in learning versed, soon as he took 
 Before the Gothic rage his western flight; 
 Wise in the council, at the banquet gay; 
 The pride of honour burning in their breasts. 
 And glory, not to their own realms confined 
 But into foreign countries shooting far. 
 As over Europe bursts the Boreal Morn. 
 1528. the British Cassius. Algernon Sidney. — T. 
 1551. The generous Ashley. Anthony Ashley Cooper, Earl of 
 Shaftesbury.— T. 
 
 1619. Here followed in edd. 1727-38 a passage of many lines 
 (considerably increased in 1730, and with some alterations on the 
 original version of 1727) — withdrawn from the poem in 1744. 
 The passage with its addition and alterations is here reproduced : — 
 Thus far transported by my country's love. 
 Nobly digiressive from my theme, I've aimed 
 To sing her praises in ambitious verse, — 
 While slightly to recount I simply meant 
 The various summer-horrors which infest 
 Kingdoms that scorch below severer suns : 
 
128 THE SEASONS 
 
 Kingdoms on which direct the flood of day 
 
 Oppressive falls, and gives the gloomy hue 
 
 And feature gross; or, worse, to ruthless deeds 
 
 Wan jealousy, red rage, and fell revenge 
 
 Their hasty spirit prompts. Ill-fated race ! 
 
 Although the treasures of the sun be theirs. 
 
 Bocks rich in gems, and mountains big with mines, 
 
 Whence over sands of gold the Niger rolls 
 
 His amber wave, — while on his balmy banks. 
 
 Or in the spicy Abyssinian vales. 
 
 The citron, orange and pomegranate drink 
 
 Intolerable day, yet in their coats 
 
 A cooling juice contain. Peaceful beneath 
 
 Leans the huge elephant, and in his shade 
 
 A multitude of beauteous creatures play. 
 
 And birds of bolder note rejoice around. 
 
 And oft amid their aromatic groves. 
 
 Touched by the torch of noon, the gummy bark 
 
 Smouldering begins to roll the dusky wreath. 
 
 Instant, so swift the ruddy ruin spreads, 
 
 A cloud of incense shadows all the land, 
 
 And o'er a thousand thundering trees at once 
 
 Riots with lawless rage the running blaze — 
 
 But chiefly if fomenting winds assist 
 
 And doubling blend the circulating waves 
 
 Of flames tempestuous, or directly on 
 
 Far-streaming drives them through the forest's leneth. 
 
 But other views await — where heaven above 
 Glows like an arch of brass, and all below. 
 The earth a mass of rusty iron lies — 
 Of fruits and flowers and every verdure spoilt — ■ 
 Barren and bare, a joyless weary waste, 
 Thin-cottaged, and in time of trying need 
 Abandoned by the vanished brook, like one 
 Of fading fortune by his treacherous friend. 
 
 Such are thy horrid deserts, Barca ; such, 
 Zaara, thy hot interminable sands, 
 Continuous, rising often with the blast 
 Till the sun sees no more, and unknit earth, 
 Shook by the south into the darkened air. 
 Falls in new hilly kingdoms o'er the waste. 
 The above lines are the text of the first ed., reproduced in 
 1730-38 with ' mine ' for ' mines ' at 1. 13, ' should ' for ' if ' at 
 
SUMMER 129 
 
 1. 30, ' The brown-burnt earth a mass of iron ' for ' The earth 
 a mass of rusty iron ' at 1. 36, and ' inhospitable ' for ' interminable ' 
 at 1. 43. The following lines, enclosed within square brackets, 
 were added in 1730 : — 
 
 [Hence, late exposed, if distant fame says true, 
 A smothered city from the sandy wave 
 Emergent rose ; with olive-fields around. 
 Fresh woods, reclining herds, and silent flocks, 
 Amusing all, and incorrupted seen. 
 For by the nitrous penetrating salts. 
 Mixed copious with the sand, pierced and preserved, 
 Each object hardens gradual into stone, 
 Its posture fixes, and its colour keeps. 
 The statue-folk within unnumbered crowd 
 The streets, in various attitudes surprised 
 By sudden fate, and live on every face 
 The passions caught beyond the sculptor's art. 
 Here leaning soft the marble-lovers stand, 
 Delighted even in death, and each for each 
 Feeling alone, with that expressive look 
 Which perfect nature only knows to give. 
 And there the father agonizing bends 
 Fond o'er his weeping wife and infant train — 
 Aghast and trembling though they know not why. 
 The stiffened vulgar stretch their arms to heaven, 
 With horror staring ; while, in council deep 
 Assembled full, the hoary-headed sires 
 Sit sadly thoughtful of the public fate ; — 
 As when old Rome, beneath the raging Gaul 
 Sunk her proud turrets, resolute on death. 
 Around the forum sat the grey divan 
 Of senators majestic, motionless, 
 With ivory staves, and in their awful robes 
 Dressed like the falling fathers of mankind : 
 Amazed and shivering from the solemn sight 
 The red barbarians shrunk, and deemed them gods.] 
 The concluding part of this long, dropped passage appears in all 
 the early edd. (from 1727 to 1738) :— 
 
 'Tis here that Thirst has fixed his dry domain. 
 
 And walks his wide malignant round in search 
 
 Of pilgrim lost ; or on the Merchant's tomb 
 
 Triumphant sits, who for a single cruse 
 
 Of unavailing water paid so dear : 
 
 Nor could the gold his hard associate save. 
 
 THOMSON K 
 
130 THE SEASONS 
 
 Thomson appended the following note to ' the Merchant's 
 tomb ' : — In the desert of Araoan are two tombs with inscriptions 
 on them importing that the persons there interred were a rich 
 merchant and a poor carrier who had died of thirst, and that the 
 former had given to the latter ten thousand ducats for one cruse 
 of water. [Thomson's form of ' cruse ', in both text and note, is 
 ' cruise '.] 
 
 1658-63. This passage is a condensation of twelve lines which 
 appeared in the earlier edd. (1727 and 1728), were dropped 
 altogether in 1730, and — in a condensed form — restored in 1744. 
 It was an unhappy restoration : the poet had already described 
 the face of things as closed by the deepening darkness ; now he 
 introduces what must have been invisible — a whitening shower 
 of thistle-down. The twelve lines of 1727 are given here : — 
 Wide-wafting o'er the lawn, the thistly down 
 Plays in the fickle air ; now seems to fall. 
 And now, high-soaring over head, an arch 
 Amusive forms ; then, slanting down, eludes 
 The grasp of idle swain. But, should the west 
 A little swell the breeze, the woolly shower. 
 Blown in a white confusion through the dusk. 
 Falls o'er the face unfelt, and, settling slow. 
 Mantles the twilight plain. And yet even here, 
 As through all nature in her lowest forms, 
 A fine contrivance lies, to wing the seed 
 By this light plumage into distant vales. 
 1681. Here followed a passage of fourteen lines in the first ed. 
 (1727), — transferred, with alterations, in 1730 to Aviumn. Its 
 original form was as follows : — 
 
 Struck from the roots of slimy rushes, blue 
 The wildfire scatters round ; or, gathered, trails 
 A length of flame deceitful o'er the moss ; 
 Whither, entangled in the maze of night. 
 While the damp desert breathes his fogs around, 
 The traveller decoyed is quite absorpt, 
 Kider and horse, into the miry gulf. 
 Leaving his wife and family involved 
 In sorrowful conjecture. Other times. 
 Sent by the quick-eyed angel of the night, 
 Innoxious on the unstartling horse's mane. 
 The meteor sits, and shows the narrow path 
 That winding leads through pits of death, or else 
 Directs him how to take the dangerous ford. 
 For 11. 4-6 of the above the edd. of 1730-38 give— 
 
SUMMEE 131 
 
 Whither decoyed by the fantastic blaze. 
 Now sunk and now renewed, he's quite absorpt ; 
 for 11. 8, 9, they give- 
 While still from day to day his pining wife 
 And plaintive children his return await 
 In wild conjecture lost. At other times ; 
 in 1. 10, for ' quick-eyed angel ' they give ' better genius ' ; in 
 1. 11, for ' on the unstartling ', they give ' gleaming on the ' 
 and in 1. 14, for ' Directs ' they give ' Instructs '. It may also 
 be noted that they give ' root ' for ' roots ' in the first Une. 
 
 The final form of this passage on wildfire appeared in 1744, and 
 differs only from the form of 1730-38 in giving ' lost ' for ' sunk ' 
 and ' amid ' for ' into ' at the lines descriptive of the traveller's 
 absorption in the mire. 
 
 1700-29. The first ed. (1727) gives the following long passage, 
 which was afterwards (1730) transferred, with variations, to 
 Avtumn : — 
 
 [The lambent lightnings shoot 
 Across the sky, or horizontal dart 
 O'er half the nations in a minute's space, 
 Conglobed or long. Astonishment succeeds. 
 And silence, ere the various talk begins.] 
 
 That instant, flashing noiseless from the north, 
 
 A thousand meteors stream, ensweeping first 
 
 The lower skies, then all at once converge 
 
 High to the crown of heaven, and, all at once 
 
 Relapsing quick, as quickly reascend lO 
 
 And mix and thwart, extinguish and renew, 
 
 AH ether coursing in a maze of light. 
 
 From eye to eye contagious through the crowd 
 
 The panic runs, and into wondrous shapes 
 
 The appearance throws : armies in meet array 
 
 Throng with aerial spears and steeds of fire. 
 
 Till, the long lines of full-extended war 
 
 In bleeding fight commixed, the sanguine flood 
 
 Rolls a broad slaughter o'er the plains of heaven. 
 
 As the mad people scan the fancied scene, 20 
 
 On all sides swells the superstitious din 
 
 Incontinent, and busy frenzy talks 
 
 Of blood and battle, cities overturned 
 
 And late at night in swallowing earthquake sunk 
 
 Or painted hideous with ascending flame, 
 
 k2 
 
132 THE SEASONS 
 
 Of blights that blacken the -white-bosomed spring, 
 
 And tempest shaking autumn into chaff 
 
 Till famine empty-handed starves the year. 
 
 Of pestilence and every great distress. 
 
 Empires subversed when ruling fate has struck 30 
 
 The unalterable hour : even Nature's self 
 
 Is deemed to totter on the brink of time. 
 
 Not so the man of philosophic eye 
 
 And inspect sage ; the waving brightness he 
 
 Curious surveys, inquisitive to know 
 
 The causes and materials yet unfixed 
 
 Of this appearance beautiful and new. 
 
 (First ed. of Summer, 11. 1044-75.) 
 The above passage (except the first five lines) was transferred 
 to Autumn in the edition of 1730, and remained in the text up 
 to 1738, where it will be found as numbered from 1. 1005 to 1. 1034 : 
 the transferred passage shows the following variations : — 
 1. 6 Oft in this season, silent from the north 
 1. 7 A blaze of meteors shoots, &c. 
 1. 13 Prom look to look, &c. 
 
 I. 20 As thus they scan the visionary scene, 
 
 II. 26, 27 {omitted). 
 
 1. 28 Of sallow famine, inundation, storm ; 
 
 The ed. of 1744 repeats the text of 1730-38 with one variation 
 at 1. 25, viz. — Or hideous wrapt in fierce ascending flame ; also 
 at 1. 8 ' they ' for ' then ', and at 1. 16 ' Thronged ' for ' Throng '. 
 
AUTUMN 
 
 [Inscribed to the Rt. Hon. Arthur Onslow, Esq., Speaker of the 
 House of Commons. First published in 1730 (1,269 11.) ; last 
 edition in author's lifetime published 1746 (1373 11.).] 
 
 THE ARGUMENT 
 
 The subject proposed. Addressed to Mr. Onslow. A prospect of 
 the fields ready for harvest. Beflections in 'praise of industry 
 raised by that view. Reaping. A tale relative to it. A harvest 
 storm. Shooting and hunting ; their barbarity. A ludicrous 
 account of foxhunting. A view of an orchard. Wall fruit. 
 A vineyard. A description of fogs, frequent in the latter part 
 of Autumn ; whence a digression, inquiring into the rise of 
 fountains and rivers. Birds of season considered, that now 
 shift their habitation. The prodigious number of them that 
 cover the northern and western isles of Scotland. Hence a 
 view of the country. A prospect of the discoloured, fading 
 woods. After a gentle dusky day, moonlight. Autumnal 
 meteors. Morning ; to which succeeds a calm, pure, sunshiny 
 day, such as usually shuts up the season. The harvest being 
 gathered in, the country dissolved in joy. The whole concludes 
 with a panegyric on a philosophical country life.* 
 
 Ceownbd with the sickle and the wheaten sheaf 
 While Autumn nodding o'er the yellow plain 
 Comes jovial on, the Doric reed once more 
 WeU-pleased I tune. Whate'er the Wintry frost 
 Nitrous prepared, the various- blossomed Spring 
 Put in white promise forth, and Summer-suns 
 Concocted strong, rush boundless now to view, 
 FuU, perfect all, and swell my glorious theme. 
 
 * The above is the original Argument (1730) enlarged for the 
 ed. of 1744. The additions to the original are in italics. For 
 ' sunshiny ' the original Argument gives ' sunshine '. 
 
134 THE SEASONS 
 
 Onslow ! the muse, ambitious of thy name 
 To grace, inspire, and dignity her song, lo 
 
 Would from the pubUc voice thy gentle ear 
 A while engage. Thy noble cares she knows. 
 The patriot-virtues that distend thy thought. 
 Spread on thy front, and in thy bosom glow ; 
 While listening senates hang upon thy tongue, 
 Devolving through the maze of eloquence 
 A roll of periods, sweeter than her song. 
 But she too pants for public virtue; she, 
 Though weak of power, yet strong in ardent will, 
 Whene'er her country rushes on her heart, 20 
 
 Assumes a bolder note, and fondly tries 
 To mix the patriot's with the poet's flame. 
 
 When the bright Virgin gives the beauteous days, 
 And Libra weighs in equal scales the year. 
 From heaven's high cope the fierce effulgence shook 
 Of parting Summer, a serener blue, 
 With golden light enlivened, wide invests 
 The happy world. Attempered suns arise 
 Sweet- beamed, and shedding oft through lucid 
 
 clouds 
 A pleasing calm ; while broad and brown, below, 30 
 Extensive harvests hang the heavy head. 
 Rich, silent, deep they stand ; for not a gale 
 Rolls its light billows o'er the bending plain ; 
 A ca lm of plent y ! till the ruffled air 
 Falls from its poise, and gives the breeze to blow. 
 Rent is the fleecy mantle of the sky ; 
 The clouds fly different ; and the sudden sun 
 By fits effulgent gilds the illumined field, 
 
 14 bosom] conduct 1730-38. 27 enlivened] irradiate 1730- 
 
 38. 31 Extensive] Unbounded 1730-38. 
 
AUTUMN 135 
 
 And black by fits the shadows sweep along — 
 A gaily chequered, heart-expanding view, 40 
 
 Far as the circling eye can shoot around, 
 Unbounded tossing in a flood of corn. 
 
 These are thy blessings. Industry, rough power ! 
 Whom labour still attends, and sweat, and pain ; 
 Yet the kind source of every gentle art 
 And all the soft civiUty of life : 
 Raiser of human kind ! by nature cast 
 Naked and helpless out amid the woods 
 And wUds to rude inclement elements ; 
 With various seeds of art deep in the mind 50 
 
 Implanted, and profusely poured around 
 Materials infinite ; but idle all, 
 Still unexerted, in the unconscious breast 
 Slept the lethargic powers ; Corruption still 
 Voracious swallowed what the liberal hand 
 Of Bounty scattered o'er the savage year. 
 And still the sad barbarian roving mixed 
 With beasts of prey ; or for his acorn meal 
 Fought the fierce tusky boar — a shivering wretch ! 
 Aghast and comfortless when the bleak north, 60 
 With winter charged, let the mixed tempest fly, 
 Hail, rain, and snow, and bitter-breathing frost. 
 Then to the shelter of the hut he fled. 
 And the wild season, sordid, pined away ;. 
 For home he had not : home is the resort 
 Of love, of joy, of peace and plenty, where. 
 Supporting and supported, polished friends 
 And dear relations mingle into bliss. 
 But this the rugged savage never felt, 
 
 40 heart-expanding] wide-extended 1730-38 42 Un- 
 
 bounded] Convorved and 1730-38. 50 With various powers 
 
 of deep efficiency 1730-38 60 bleak] red 1730-38. 
 
136 THE SEASONS 
 
 Even desolate in crowds ; and thus his days 7° 
 
 Rolled heavy, dark, and unenjoyed along — 
 
 A waste of time ! till Industry approached, 
 
 And roused him from his miserable sloth ; 
 
 His faculties unfolded ; pointed out 
 
 Where lavish Nature the directing hand 
 
 Of Art demanded ; showed him how to raise 
 
 His feeble force by the mechanic powers. 
 
 To dig the mineral from the vaulted earth, 
 
 On what to turn the piercing rage of fire, 
 
 On what the torrent, and the gathered blast ; 80 
 
 Gave the tall ancient forest to his axe ; 
 
 Taught him to chip the wood, and hew the stone, 
 
 TiU by degrees the finished fabric rose ; 
 
 Tore from his limbs the blood-poUuted fur, 
 
 And wrapt them in the wooUy vestment warm. 
 
 Or bright in glossy silk, and flowing lawn ; 
 
 With wholesome viands filled his table, poured 
 
 The generous glass around, inspired to wake 
 
 The life-refining soul of decent wit ; 
 
 Nor stopped at barren bare necessity ; go 
 
 But, stiU advancing bolder, led him on 
 
 To pomp, to pleasure, elegance, and grace ; 
 
 And, breathing high ambition through his soul, 
 
 Set science, wisdom, glory in his view. 
 
 And bade. him be the lord of all below. 
 
 Then gathering men their natural powers combined. 
 And formed a public ; to the general good 
 Submitting, aiming, and conducting all. 
 For this the patriot-council met, the fuU, 
 The free, and fairly represented whole ; 100 
 
 91 Following this line in the original text (1730-38) came — 
 By hardy patience and experience slow — 
 dropped in 1744. 
 
AUTUMN 137 
 
 For this they planned the holy guardian laws, 
 
 Distinguished orders, animated arts, 
 
 And, with joint force Oppression chaining, set 
 
 Imperial Justice at the helm, yet still 
 
 To them accountable : nor slavish dreamed 
 
 That toiling millions must resign their weal 
 
 And all the honey of their search to such 
 
 As for themselves alone themselves have raised. 
 
 Hence every form of cultivated life 
 Jn order set, protected, and inspired no 
 
 Into perfection wrought. Uniting all, 
 Society grew numerous, high, polite, 
 And happy. Nurse of art,_the city reared '' 
 
 In beauteous pride her tower-encircled head ; 
 And, stretching street on street, by thousands drew. 
 From twining woody haunts, or the tough yew 
 To bows strong-straining, her aspiring sons. 
 
 Then commerce brought into the public walk 
 The busy merchant ; the big warehouse built ; 
 Raised the strong crane ; choked up the loaded street 
 With foreign plenty ; and thy stream, Thames, 121 
 Large, gentle, deep, majestic, king of floods ! 
 
 loi they planned] devised 1730-38. 113 reared] rose 
 
 1730-38. 1 14 This line does not appear in the original text. 
 
 It was added in 1744. 115 drew] led 1730-38. 118 Here 
 
 followed in the original text (1730-38) a passage of six lines, 
 dropped in 1744 : — 
 
 'Twas nought but labour — the whole dusky group 
 
 Of clustering houses and of mingling men — 
 
 Restless design and execution strong ; 
 
 In every street the sounding hammer plied 
 
 His massy task, while the corrosive file 
 
 In flying touches formed the fine machine. 
 121 on thee, thou Thames 1730-38. 122 After this line 
 
 came in the original text (1730-44) — ■ 
 
 Than whom no river heaves a fuller tide — 
 dropped in 1746. 
 
138 THE SEASONS 
 
 Chose for his grand resort. On either hand, 
 
 Like a long wintry forest, groves of masts 
 
 Shot up their spires ; the bellying sheet between 
 
 Possessed the breezy void ; the sooty hulk 
 
 Steered sluggish on ; the splendid barge along 
 
 Rowed regular to harmony ; around. 
 
 The boat light-skimming stretched its oary wings ; 
 
 While deep the various voice of fervent toil 130 
 
 Prom bank to bank increased ; whence, ribbed with 
 
 oak 
 To bear the British thunder, black, and bold. 
 The roaring vessel rushed into the main. 
 
 Then too the pillared dome magnific heaved 
 Its ample roof ; and luxury within 
 Poured out her glittering stores. The canvas smooth, 
 With glowing life protuberant, to the view 
 Embodied rose ; the statue seemed to breathe 
 And soften into flesh beneath the touch 
 Of forming art, imagination-flushed. 140 
 
 AU isjthe gift of i ndustry, — whate'er 
 Exalts, embellishes, and renders life 
 Delightful. Pensive Winter7 cheered by him, 
 Sits at the social flre, and happy hears 
 The excluded tempest idly rave along ; 
 His hardened fingers deck the gaudy Spring ; 
 Without him Summer were an arid waste ; 
 Nor to the Autumnal months could thus transmit 
 Those full, mature, immeasurable stores 
 That, waving round, recall my wandering song. 150 
 
 Soon as the morning trembles o'er the sky, 
 And unperceived unfolds the spreading day. 
 Before the ripened field the reapers stand 
 
 123 Chose] Seized 1730-38. 135 Its] His 1730-38. 
 
AUTUMN 139 
 
 In fair array, each by the lass he loves, 
 
 To bear the rougher part and mitigate 
 
 By nameless gentle offices her toil. 
 
 At once they stoop, and swell the lusty sheaves ; 
 
 While through their cheerful band the rural talk, 
 
 The rural scandal, and the rural jest 
 
 Fly harmless, to deceive the tedious time i6o 
 
 And steal unfelt the sultry hours away. 
 
 Behind the master walks, builds up the shocks, 
 
 And, conscious, glancing oft on every side 
 
 His sated eye, feels his heart heave with joy. 
 
 The gleaners spread around, and here and there. 
 
 Spike after spike, their sparing harvest pick. 
 
 Be not too narrow, husbandmen ! but fling 
 
 From the full sheaf with charitable stealth 
 
 The liberal handful. Think, oh ! grateful think 
 
 How good the God of harvest is to you, 170 
 
 Who pours abundance o'er your flowing fields. 
 
 While these unhappy partners of your kind 
 
 Wide-hover round you, like the fowls of heaven. 
 
 And ask their humble dole. The various turns 
 
 Of fortune ponder ; that your sons may want 
 
 What now with hard reluctance faint ye give. 
 
 ■v 0-"^ 
 
 The lovely young Lavinia once had friends ; 
 And fortune smiled deceitful on her birth. 
 For, in her helpless years deprived of all. 
 Of every stay save innocence and Heaven, 180 
 
 She, with her widowed mother, feeble, old, 
 And poor, Uved in a cottage far retired 
 
 158 through their cheerful band] bandied round and round 
 1730-38. 160 harmless] hearty 1730-38. 161 steal 
 
 unfelt] cheerly steal 1730-38. 163 on every side] this way 
 
 and that 1730-38. 182 far retired] lost far up 1730-38. 
 
140 THE SEASONS 
 
 Among the windings of a woody vale ; 
 By solitude and deep surrounding shades, 
 But more by bashful modesty, concealed. 
 Together thus they shunned the cruel scorn 
 Which virtue, sunk to poverty, would meet 
 From giddy fashion and low-minded pride ; 
 Almost on nature's common bounty 'fed. 
 Like the gay birds that sung them to repose, 190 
 Content, and careless of to-morrow's fare. 
 Her form was fresher than the morning-rose 
 When the dew wets its leaves ; unstained and pure 
 As is the hly or the mountain-snow. 
 The modest virtues mingled in her eyes. 
 Still on the ground dejected, darting aU 
 Their humid beams into the blooming flowers : 
 Or when the mournful tale her mother told, 
 Of what her faithless fortune promised once. 
 Thrilled in her thought, they, like the dewy star 200 
 Of evening, shone in tears. A native grace 
 Sat fair-proportioned on her poUshed limbs. 
 Veiled in a simple robe, their best attire, 
 Beyond the pomp of dress ; for loveliness 
 Needs not the foreign aid of ornament. 
 But is when unadorned adorneJ the most. 
 Thoughtless of beauty, she was beauty's self. 
 Recluse amid the close-embowering woods. 
 
 184-8 For these five lines, added in 1744, the original text 
 (1730-38) gives only- 
 Safe from the cruel blasting arts of man. 
 
 196 dejected] deject and second ed. 1730. 198 mournful 
 
 tale] stories that 1730-38. 199 promised] flattered 1730-38. 
 
 203 After ' simple robe ' came in the first text (1730-38) the 
 words ' for lovehness Needs not &c.' The addition, ' their best 
 attire, Beyond the pomp of dress ', was made in 1744. 
 
 208-16 For these lines, introduced in 1744, the original text 
 gives only — 
 
AUTUMN 141 
 
 As in the hollow breast of Apennine, 
 
 Beneath the shelter of encircling hills, 210 
 
 A myrtle rises, far from human eye, 
 
 And breathes its balmy fragrance o'er the wild — 
 
 So flourished blooming, and unseen by all, 
 
 The sweet Lavinia ; till at length, compelled 
 
 By strong necessity's supreme command. 
 
 With smiling patience in her looks she went 
 
 To glean Palemon's fields. The pride of swains 
 
 Palemon was, the generous and the rich. 
 
 Who led the rural life in all its joy 
 
 And elegance, such as Arcadian song 220 
 
 Transmits from ancient uncorrupted times. 
 
 When tyrant custom had not shackled man. 
 
 But free to follow nature was the mode. 
 
 He then, his fancy with autumnal scenes 
 
 -Amusing, chanced beside his reaper-train 
 
 To walk, when poor Lavinia drew his eye ; 
 
 Unconscious of her power, and turning quick 
 
 With unaffected blushes from his gaze — 
 
 He saw her charming, but he saw not half 
 
 The charms her downcast modesty concealed. 230 
 
 That very moment love and chaste desire 
 
 Sprung in his bosom, to himself unknown ; 
 
 For still the world prevailed, and its dread laugh, 
 
 Which scarce the firm philosopher can scorn. 
 
 Should his heart own a gleaner in the field ; 
 
 And thus in secret to his soul he sighed : 
 
 Recluse among the -syoods, — if city-dames 
 Will deign their faith. And thus she went compelled 
 By strong necessity with as serene 
 And pleased a look as patience can put on. 
 210 encircling] embowering 1744. 221 incorrupted 
 
 1730-38. 
 
142 THE SEASONS 
 
 ' What pity that so delicate a form, 
 
 By beauty kindled, where enlivening sense 
 
 And more than vulgar goodness seem to dwell, 
 
 Should be devoted to the rude embrace 240 
 
 Of some indecent clown ! She looks, methinks. 
 
 Of old Acasto's line ; and to my mind 
 
 Recalls that patron of my happy life. 
 
 From whom my Uberal fortune took its rise, — 
 
 Now to the dust gone down, his houses, lands. 
 
 And onoe fair-spreading family dissolved. 
 
 'Tis said that in some lone, obscure retreat. 
 
 Urged by remembrance sad and decent pride, 
 
 Far from those scenes which knew their better 
 
 days. 
 His aged widow and his daughter live; 250 
 
 Whom yet my fruitless search could never find. 
 Romantic wish, would this the daughter were ! ' 
 When, strict inquiring, from herself he found 
 She was the same, the daughter of his friend, 
 Of bountiful Acasto, who can speak 
 The mingled passions that surprised his heart 
 And through his nerves in shivering transport ran ? 
 Then blazed his smothered flame, avowed and bold 
 And, as he viewed her ardent o'er and o'er. 
 Love, gratitude, and pity wept at once. 260 
 
 Confused and frightened at his sudden tears, 
 Her rising beauties flushed a higher bloom. 
 As thus Palemon, passionate and just, 
 Poured out the pious rapture of his soul : 
 
 237, 238 For these lines the first text (1730-38) gives— 
 By beauty kindled, and harmonious shaped, 
 Where sense sincere and goodness seemed to dwell. 
 247 'Tis said . . lone] I've heard . . waste 1730-38. 255 
 
 Of] The 1730-38. 256 mingled passions] mingling passion 
 
 1730-38. 259 viewed] run 1730-38. 
 
AUTUMN 143 
 
 ' And art thou then Acasto's dear remains ? 
 
 She whom my restless gratitude has sought 
 
 So long in vain ? yes ! the very same, 
 
 The softened image of my noble friend, 
 
 Alive his every feature, every look, 
 
 More elegantly touched. Sweeter than Spring ! 270 
 
 Thou soul surviving blossom from the root 
 
 That nourished up my fortune ! say, ah where. 
 
 In what sequestered desert, hast thou drawn 
 
 The kindest aspect of delighted Heaven ? 
 
 Into such beauty spread, and blown so fair ? 
 
 Though poverty's cold wind and crushing rain 
 
 Beat keen and heavy on thy tender years. 
 
 Oh, let me now into a richer soil 
 
 Transplant thee safe, where vernal suns and showers 
 
 Diffuse their warmest, largest influence ; 280 
 
 And of my garden be the pride and joy ! 
 
 It ill befits thee, oh, it ill befits 
 
 Acasto's daughter — his, whose open stores, 
 
 Though vast, were little to his ampler heart, 
 
 The father of a country — thus to pick 
 
 The very refuse of those harvest-fields 
 
 Which from his bounteous friendship I enjoy. 
 
 Then throw that shameful pittance from thy hand, 
 
 But iU applied to such a rugged task ; 
 
 The fields, the master, all, my fair, are thine ; 290 
 
 If, to the various blessings which thy house 
 
 270 Sweeter] Fairer 1730-38. 275 fair] white 1730-38. 
 
 287 His bounty taught to gain, and right enjoy 1730-38. 
 
 290-93 For these lines, which first appeared in ed. 1744, the 
 original text (1730-38) gives — 
 
 With harvest shining all these fields are thine ; 
 And, if my wishes may presume so far, 
 Their master too, who then indeed were blest 
 To make the daughter of Acasto so. 
 
144 THE SEASONS 
 
 Has on me lavish'd, thou wilt add that bliss, 
 That dearest bliss, the power of blessing thee ! ' 
 
 Here ceased the youth : yet still his speaking eye 
 Expressed the sacred triumph of his soul, 
 With conscious virtue, gratitude, and love 
 Above the vulgar joy divinely raised. 
 Nor waited he reply. Won by the charm 
 Of goodness irresistible, and all 
 In sweet disorder lost, she blushed consent. 300 
 
 The news immediate to her mother brought. 
 While, pierced with anxious thought, she pined away 
 The lonely moments for Lavinia's fate, 
 Amazed, and scarce beheving what she heard, 
 Joy seized her wither'd veins, and one bright gleam 
 Of setting life shone on her evening hours, — 
 Not less enraptured than the happy pair ; 
 Who flourished long in tender bliss, and reared 
 A numerous offspring, lovely like themselves. 
 And good, the grace of all the country round. 310 
 
 Defeating oft the labours of the year. 
 The sultry south collects a potent blast. 
 At first, the groves are scarcely seen to stir 
 Their trembling tops ; and a still murmur runs 
 Along the soft-inclining fields of corn. 
 But, as the aerial tempest fuller swells. 
 And in one mighty stream, invisible. 
 Immense, the whole excited atmosphere 
 Impetuous rushes o'er the sounding world — 
 Strained to the root, the stooping forest pours 320 
 A rustling shower of yet untimely leaves. 
 High-beat, the circling mountains eddy in, 
 From the bare wild, the dissipated storm, 
 
 292 lavished on me 1744. 308 tender] mutual 1730-38. 
 
AUTUMN 145 
 
 And send it in a torrent down the vale. 
 
 Exposed, and naked to its utmost rage. 
 
 Through all the sea of harvest rolling round, 
 
 The billowy plain floats wide ; nor can evade. 
 
 Though pliant to the blast, its seizing force — 
 
 Or whirled in air or into vacant chafE 
 
 Shook waste. And sometimes too a burst of rain, 330 
 
 Swept from the black horizon, broad descends 
 
 In one continuous flood. Still over head 
 
 The mingling tempest weaves its gloom, and still 
 
 The deluge deepens ; till the fields around 
 
 Lie sunk and flatted in the sordid wave. 
 
 Sudden the ditches swell ; the meadows swim. 
 
 Red from the hills innumerable streams 
 
 Tumultuous roar, and high above its banks 
 
 The river lift — before whose rushing tide 
 
 Herds, flocks, and harvests, cottages, and swains 340 
 
 RoU mingled down; all that the winds had spared 
 
 In one wild moment ruined, the big hopes 
 
 And well-earned treasures of the painful year. 
 
 Pled to some eminence, the husbandman 
 
 Helpless beholds the miserable wreck 
 
 Driving along ; his drowning ox, at once 
 
 Descending with his labours scattered round. 
 
 He sees ; and instant o'er his shivering thought 
 
 Comes winter unprovided, and a train 
 
 Of (clamant > children dear. Ye masters, then 350 
 
 Be mmdfar of the rough laborious hand 
 
 That sinks you soft in elegance and ease ; 
 
 Be mindful of those limbs in russet clad 
 
 Whose toil to yours is warmth and graceful pride ; 
 
 327 floats] boils 1730-38. 333 mingling tempest weaves] 
 
 glomerating tempest grows 1730-38 ; mingling tempest waves 
 1744. 339 rushing tide] weighty rush 1730-38. 
 
 THOMSON L 
 
146 THE SEASONS 
 
 And oh, be mindful of that sparing board 
 Which covers yours with luxury profuse, 
 Makes your glass sparkle, and your sense rejoice ; 
 Nor cruelly demand what the deep rains 
 And all-involving winds have swept away ! 
 
 Here the rude clamour of the sportsman's joy, 360 
 The gun fast-thundering and the winded horn. 
 Would tempt the Muse to sing the rural game, — 
 How, in his mid career, the spaniel, struck 
 Stiff by the tainted gale, with open nose 
 Outstretched and finely sensible, draws full, 
 Fearful, and cautious on the latent prey • 
 As in the sun the circling covey bask 
 Their varied plumes, and, watchful every way, 
 Through the rough stubble turn the secret eye. 
 Caught in the meshy snare, in vain they beat 370 
 Their idle wings, entangled more and more : 
 Nor, on the surges of the boundless air 
 Though borne triumphant, are they safe ; the gun. 
 Glanced just, and sudden, from the fowler's eye, 
 O'ertakes their sounding pinions, and again 
 Immediate brings them from the towering wing 
 Dead to the ground ; or drives them wide- dispersed. 
 Wounded and wheeling various down the wind. 
 
 These are not subjects for the peaceful muse. 
 Nor will she stain with such her spotless song — 380 
 Then most delighted when she social sees 
 The whole mixed animal creation round 
 
 361 fast] thick 1730-38. 362 the rural game] a rural game 
 1730; the rural game second ed. 1730. 368 and, watchful] 
 
 watchful, and 1730-38. 369 turned 1730-38. 371 idle] useless 
 1730-38. 377 wide] else 1730-38 380 her spotless 
 
 theme with such 1730-38. 381 social] smiling 1730-38. 
 
AUTUMN 147 
 
 AUve and happy. 'Tis not joy to her, 
 
 This falsely cheerful barbarous game of death, 
 
 This rage of pleasure which the restless youth 
 
 Awakes, impatient, with the gleaming morn ; 
 
 When beasts of prey retire that all night long. 
 
 Urged by necessity, had ranged the dark. 
 
 As if their conscious ravage shunned the light 
 
 Ashamed. Not so the steady tyrant, man, 390 
 
 Who, with the thoughtless insolence of power 
 
 Inflamed beyond the most infuriate wrath 
 
 Of the worst monster that e'er roamed the waste, 
 
 For sport alone pursues the cruel chase 
 
 Amid the beamings of the gentle days. 
 
 Upbraid, ye ravening tribes, our wanton rage. 
 
 For hunger kindles you, and lawless want ; 
 
 But lavish fed, in Nature's bounty roUed, 
 
 To joy at anguish, and delight in blood. 
 
 Is what your horrid bosoms never knew. 400 
 
 Poor is the triumph o'er the timid hare ! 
 Scared from the corn, and now to some lone seat 
 Retired — the rushy fen, the ragged furze 
 Stretched o'er the stony heath, the stubble chapped. 
 The thistly lawn, the thick entangled broom, 
 Of the same friendly hue the withered fern. 
 The fallow ground laid open to the sun 
 Concoctive, and the nodding sandy bank 
 Hung o'er the mazes of the mountain brook. 
 Vain is her best precaution ; though she sits 410 
 Concealed with folded ears, unsleeping eyes 
 
 388 ranged] roamed 1730-38. 392 wrath] rage 1730-38. 
 
 393 roamed] howled 1730-38. 394 pursues . . chase] takes 
 
 up . . tract 1730-38. 396 Upbraid us not, ye wolves ! ye 
 
 tigers fell ! 1730-38 ; ye ravening tribes, upbraid our wanton 
 rage 1744. 399 joy . . delight] laugh . . rejoice 1730-38. 
 
 402 Scared] Shook 1730-38. 
 
 l2 
 
148 THE SEASONS 
 
 By Nature raised to (take the horizon in, 
 
 And head couched close betwixt her hairy feet 
 
 In act to spring away. The scented dew 
 
 Betrays her early labyrinth ; and deep, 
 
 In scattered sullen openings, far behind. 
 
 With every breeze she hears the coming storm 
 
 But, nearer and more frequent as it loads 
 
 The sighing gale, she springs amazed, and all 
 
 The savage soul of game is up at once— 420 
 
 The pack fuU-opening various, the shrill horn 
 
 Resounded from the hills, the neighing steed 
 
 Wild for the chase, and the loud hunter's shout — 
 
 O'er a weak, harmless, flying creature, aU 
 
 Mixed in mad tumult and discordant joy. 
 
 The stag, too, singled from the herd, where long 
 He ranged the branching monarch of the shades. 
 Before the tempest drives. At first, in speed 
 He sprightly puts his faith, and, roused by fear, 
 Gives all his swift aerial soul to flight. 430 
 
 Against the breeze he darts, that way the more 
 To leave the lessening murderous cry behind. 
 Deception short ! though, fleeter than the winds 
 Blown o'er the keen-aired mountain by the North, 
 He bursts the thickets, glances through the glades, 
 And plunges deep into the wildest wood. 
 If slow, yet sure, adhesive to the track 
 Hot-steaming, up behind him come again 
 The inhuman rout, and from the shady depth 
 Expel him, circling through his every shift. 440 
 
 He sweeps the forest oft ; and sobbing sees 
 The glades, mild opening to the golden day. 
 Where in kind contest with his butting friends 
 He wont to struggle, or his loves enjoy. 
 
 429 fear-aroused 1730-44. 437 tract 1730-38. 438 comes 
 1730-44. 440 Expels 1744. 444 wont] went 1730-38. 
 
AUTUMN 149 
 
 Oft in the full-descending flood he tries 
 
 To lose the scent, and lave his burning sides — 
 
 Oft seeks the herd ; the watchful herd, alarmed, 
 
 With selfish care avoid a brother's woe. 
 
 What shall he do ? His once so vivid nerves, 
 
 So full of buoyant spirit, now no more 450 
 
 Inspire the course ; but fainting, breathless toil 
 
 Sick seizes on his heart : he stands at bay, 
 
 And puts his last weak refuge in despair. 
 
 The big round tears run down his dappled face ; 
 
 He groans in anguish ; whUe the growling pack. 
 
 Blood-happy, hang at his fair jutting chest. 
 
 And mark his beauteous chequered sides with gore. 
 
 Of this enough. But, if the sylvan youth. 
 Whose fervent blood boUs into violence, 
 Must have the chase, behold, despising flight, 460 
 The roused up lion, resolute and slow, 
 Advancing full on the protended spear 
 And coward band that circling wheel aloof. 
 Slunk from the cavern and the troubled wood. 
 See the grim woH ; on him his shaggy foe 
 Vindictive fix, and let the ruffian die : 
 Or, growling horrid, as the brindled boar 
 Grins fell destruction, to the monster's heart 
 Let the dart lighten from the nervous arm. 
 
 These Britain knows not ; give, ye Britons, then 470 
 Your sportive fury pitiless to pour 
 Loose on the nightly robber of the fold. 
 Him, from his craggy winding haunts unearthed, 
 
 448 With quick consent avoid the infectious maze 1730-38. 
 450 spirit, now] soul, inspire 1730-38. 451 The fainting 
 
 course; but wrenching, breathless toil 1730-38. 466 and let 
 
 the ruffian die] for murder is his trade 1730-38. 467 Or] 
 
 And 1730-38. 468 fell] near 1730-38. 
 
 472 nightly robber . .fold] sly destroyer . . flock 1730-38. 
 
150 THE SEASONS 
 
 Let all the thunder of the chase pursue. 
 
 Throw the broad ditch behind you ; o'er the hedge 
 
 High bound resistless ; nor the deep morass 
 
 Refuse, but through the shaking wilderness 
 
 Pick your nice way ; into the perilous flood 
 
 Bear fearless, of the raging instinct fuU ; 
 
 And, as you ride the torrent, to the banks 480 
 
 Your triumph sound sonorous, running round 
 
 From rock to rock, in circhng echo tost ; 
 
 Then scale the mountains to their woody tops ; 
 
 Rush down the dangerous steep ; and o'er the 
 
 lawn. 
 In fancy swallowing up the space between. 
 Pour all your speed into the rapid game. 
 For happy he who tops the wheeling chase ; 
 Has every maze evolved, and every guUe 
 Disclosed ; who knows the merits of the pack ; 
 Who saw the villain seized, and dying hard 490 
 
 Without complaint, though by an hundred mouths 
 Relentless torn : glorious he beyond 
 His daring peers, when the retreating horn 
 Calls them to ghostly halls of grey renown. 
 With woodland honours graced — the fox's fur 
 Depending decent from the roof, and spread 
 Round the drear walls, with antic figures fierce. 
 The stag's large front : he then is loudest heard 
 When the night staggers with severer toils, 
 With feats Thessalian Centaurs never knew, 500 
 
 And their repeated wonders shake the dome 
 But first the fuelled chimney blazes wide ; 
 
 476 High-bound (hyphenated) 1730-46. 483 scale . . to] 
 
 snatch . . by 1730-38. 
 
 492, 493 At once tore merciless. Thrice happy he ! 
 
 At hour of dusk, while &c. 1730-38. 
 500 This line was added in 1744. 
 
AUTUMN 151 
 
 The tankards foam ; and the strong table groans 
 
 Beneath the smoking sirloin, stretched immense 
 
 From side to side, in which with desperate knife 
 
 They deep incision make, and talk the while 
 
 Of England's glory, ne'er to be defaced 
 
 While hence they borrow vigour ; or, amain 
 
 Into the pasty plunged, at intervals, 
 
 If stomach keen can intervals allow, 510 
 
 Relating all the glories of the chase. 
 
 Then sated Hunger bids his brother Thirst 
 
 Produce the mighty bowl : the mighty bowl. 
 
 Swelled high with fiery juice, steams Uberal round 
 
 A potent gale, delicious as the breath 
 
 Of Maia to the love-sick shepherdess 
 
 On violets diffused, while soft she hears 
 
 Her panting shepherd stealing to her arms. 
 
 Nor wanting is the brown October, drawn 
 
 Mature and perfect from his dark retreat 520 
 
 Of thirty years ; and now his honest front 
 
 Flames in the hght refulgent, not afraid 
 
 Even with the vineyard's best produce to vie. 
 
 To cheat the thirsty moments, whist a while 
 
 Walks his grave round beneath a cloud of smoke. 
 
 Wreathed fragrant from the pipe ; or the quick dice, 
 
 In thunder leaping from the box, awake 
 
 The sounding gammon ; while romp-loving miss 
 
 Is hauled about in gallantry robust. 
 
 At last these puling idlenesses laid 550 
 
 505 on which with fell intent 1730-38. 511 Relating how 
 it ran and how it fell 1730-38. 515 delicious] reviving 
 
 1730-38. $ig October {mth a smaUo) n^O-SS. 522 not 
 
 afraid] nor ashamed 1730-38. 523 To vie it with the vine- 
 
 yards best produce 1730-38. 524 whist] whisk 1744; Perhaps 
 a while amusive thoughtful Whisk 1730-38. 525 grave] dull 
 1744; Walks gentle round 1730-38. 
 
152 THE SEASONS 
 
 Aside, frequent and full, the dry divan 
 
 Close in firm circle ; and set ardent in 
 
 Por serious drinking. Nor evasion sly 
 
 Nor sober shift is to the puking wretch 
 
 Indulged apart ; but earnest brimming bowls 
 
 Lave every soul, the table floating round, 
 
 And pavement faithless to the fuddled foot. 
 
 Thus as they swim in mutual swill, the talk, 
 
 Vociferous at once from twenty tongues, 539 
 
 Reels fast from theme to theme — from horses, hounds. 
 
 To church or mistress, politics or ghost — 
 
 In endless mazes, intricate, perplext. 
 
 Meantime, with sudden interruption, loud 
 
 The impatient catch bursts from the joyous heart. 
 
 That moment touched is each congenial soul ; 
 
 And, opening in a full-mouthed cry of joy, 
 
 The laugh, the slap, the jocund curse goes round ; 
 
 While, from their slumbers shook, the kennelled hounds 
 
 Mix in the music of the day again. 
 
 As when the tempest, that has vexed the deep 550 
 
 The dark night long, with fainter murmurs falls ; 
 
 So gradual sinks their mirth. Their feeble tongues, 
 
 Unable to take up the cumbrous word. 
 
 Lie quite dissolved. Before their maudlin eyes. 
 
 Seen dim and blue, the double tapers dance, 
 
 Like the sun wading through the misty sky. 
 
 Then, sliding soft, they drop. Confused above, 
 
 Glasses and bottles, pipes and gazetteers, 
 
 As it the table even itself was drunk, 
 
 535 apart] askew 1730-38. 539 Vociferous . . . from] 
 
 Vociferate . . by 1730-38. 545 each congenial] every kindred 
 
 1730-44. 551 falls murmuring towards morn 1730-38. 552 
 So their mirth gradual sinks 1730-38. 557 soft] sweet 1730- 
 
 38; Confused] O'erturned 1730-38. 558, 559 These two 
 
 lines were added in 1744. 
 
AUTUMN 153 
 
 Lie a wet broken scene : and wide, below, 560 
 
 Is heaped the social slaughter — where astride 
 
 The lubber Power in filthy triumph sits, 
 
 Slumbrous, inchning stOl from side to side, 
 
 And steeps them drenched in potent sleep till morn. 
 
 Perhaps some doctor of tremendous paunch, 
 
 Awful and deep, a black abyss of drink, 
 
 Outlives them aU ; and, from his buried flock 
 
 Retiring, fuU of rumination sad. 
 
 Laments the weakness of these latter times. 
 
 But if the rougher sex by this fierce sport 570 
 Is hurried wild, let not such horrid joy 
 E'er stain the bosom of the British fair. 
 Far be the spirit of the chase from them ! 
 Uncomely courage, unbeseeming skill, 
 To spring the fence, to reign the prancing steed, 
 The cap, the whip, the mascuhne attire 
 In which they roughen to the sense and all 
 The winning softness of their sex is lost. 
 In them 'tis graceful to dissolve at woe ; 
 With every motion, every word, to wave 580 
 
 Quick o'er the kindling cheek the ready blush ; 
 And from the smaUes.t violence to shrink 
 Unequal, then the loveliest in their fears ; 
 And, by this silent adulation soft, 
 To their protection more engaging man. 
 O may their eyes no miserable sight. 
 Save weeping lovers, see ! a nobler game, 
 
 560 Lies the wet broken scene, and stretched below 1730-38. 
 561 Each way the drunken slaughter 1730-38. 562 in filthy 
 
 triumph] himself triumphant 1730-38. 564 drenched in 
 
 potent] silent all, in 1730-88. 569 The five lines ending 
 
 here were added in 1744. 570 fierce] red 1730-38. 571 Is] " 
 Are 1730^4. 579 Before this line, in the original text (1730- 
 38), came a line, dropped in 1744, — 
 
 Made up of blushes, tenderness, and fears. 
 
154 THE SEASONS 
 
 Through love's enchanting wiles pursued, yet fled, 
 
 In chase ambiguous. May their tender iimbs 
 
 Float in the loose simpUcity of dress ! 59o 
 
 And, fashioned aU to harmony, alone 
 
 Know they to seize the captivated soul, 
 
 In rapture warbled from love-breathing lips ; 
 
 To teach the lute to languish ; with smooth step, 
 
 Disclosing motion in its every charm. 
 
 To swim along and swell the mazy dance ; 
 
 To train the foHage o'er the snowy lawn ; 
 
 To guide the pencil, turn the tuneful page ; 
 
 To lend new flavour to the fruitful year, 
 
 And heighten nature's dainties ; in their race 600 
 
 To rear their graces into second life ; 
 
 To give society its highest taste ; 
 
 Well-ordered home man's best delight to make ; 
 
 And, by submissive wisdom, modest skill. 
 
 With every gentle care-eluding art, 
 
 To raise the virtues, animate the bUss, 
 
 Even charm the pains to something more than 'joy, 
 
 And sweeten aU the tofls of human life : 
 
 This be the female dignity and praise. 
 
 Ye swains, now hasten to the hazel-bank, 610 
 
 Where down yon dale the wildly-winding brook 
 Falls hoarse from steep to steep. In close array. 
 Fit for the thickets and the tanghng shrub. 
 Ye virgins, come. For you their latest song 
 The woodlands raise ; the clustering nuts for you 
 The lover finds amid the secret shade ; 
 
 593 the radiant lip 1730-38. 598 guide . . tuneful] play 
 
 . . instructive 1730-38. 599 lend] give 1730-38. 605 
 
 gentle care-eluding] kinder, care-elusive 1730-38. 606 virtues 
 . . bliss] glory . . joys 1730-38. 607 This line was added 
 
 in 1744. 615 the clustered nut 1730-38. 
 
AUTUMN 155 
 
 And, where they burnish on the topmost bough, 
 
 With active vigour crushes down the tree ; 
 
 Or shakes them ripe from the resigning husk, 
 
 A glossy shower and of an ardent brown 620 
 
 As are the ringlets of Mehnda's hair — 
 
 Melinda ! f orm'd with every grace complete, 
 
 Yet these neglecting, above beauty wise, 
 
 And far transcending such a vulgar praise. 
 
 Hence from the busy joy- resounding fields, 
 In cheerful error let us tread the maze 
 Of Autumn unconfined ; and taste, revived, 
 The breath of orchard big with bending fruit. 
 Obedient to the breeze and beating ray, 
 From the deep-loaded bough a mellow shower 630 
 Incessant melts away. The juicy pear 
 Lies in a soft profusion scattered round. 
 A various sweetness swells the gentle race. 
 By Nature's aU-refining hand prepared, 
 Of tempered sun, and water, earth, and air. 
 In ever-changing composition mixed. 
 Such, faUing frequent through the chiUer night. 
 The fragrant stores, the wide-projected heaps 
 Of apples, which the lusty-handed year 
 Innumerous o'er the blushing orchard shakes. 640 
 A various spirit, fresh, deUcious, keen, 
 Dwells in their gehd pores, and active points 
 The piercing cider for the thirsty tongue — 
 
 617 And] Or 1730-38. 627 taste, revived] vital taste 
 
 1730-38. 633 After this line in the original text (1730-44) 
 
 came — 
 
 In species different, but in kind the same — 
 dropped in 174G. 
 
 636 every-changing (a mi«j3n'M() 1744. 637,638 For these 
 
 two lines the first text (1730-38) gives only — 
 
 So fares it with those wide-projected heaps &c. 
 
156 THE SEASONS 
 
 Thy native theme, and boon inspirer too, 
 Phillips, Pomona's bard ! the second thou 
 Who nobly durst in rhyme-unfettered verse 
 With British freedom sing the British song — 
 How from Silurian vats high-sparkling wines 
 Eoam in transparent floods, some strong to cheer 
 The wintry revels of the labouring hind, 650 
 
 And tasteful some to cool the summer hours. 
 
 In this glad season, while his sweetest beams 
 The Sun sheds equal o'er the meekened day. 
 Oh, lose me in the green delightful walks 
 Of, Dodington, thy seat, serene and plain ; 
 Where simple Nature reigns ; and every view 
 Diffusive spreads the pure Dorsetian downs 
 In boundless prospect — yonder shagged with wood. 
 Here rich with harvest, and there white with flocks ! 
 Meantime the grandeur of thy lofty dome 660 
 
 Far-splendid seizes on the ravished eye. 
 New beauties rise with each revolving day ; 
 New columns swell ; and still the fresh Spring finds 
 New plants to quicken, and new groves to green. 
 Full of thy genius all, the Muses' seat ! 
 Where, in the secret bower and winding walk. 
 For virtuous Young and thee they twine the bay. 
 Here wandering oft, fired with the restless thirst 
 Of thy applause, I solitary court 
 The inspiring breeze, and meditate the book 670 
 Of NafureT ever open, aiming thence 
 Warm from the heart to learn the moral song. 
 
 645 Pomona's] facetious 1730-38. 652 sweetest] last, best 
 
 1730-38. 654 delightful] majestic 1730-38. 667-9 For 
 
 these three lines the first text (1730-38) gives the following two: — 
 
 They twine the bay for thee. Here oft alone, 
 
 Fired by the thirst of thy applause, I court Sc. 
 
 672 Warm from the heart] Heart-tapght like thine 1730-38. 
 
AUTXJMN 157 
 
 And, as I steal along the sunny wall, 
 
 Where Autumn basks, with fruit empurpled deep, 
 
 My pleasing theme continual prompts my thought — 
 
 Presents the downy peach, the shining plum 
 
 With a fine bluish mist of animals 
 
 Clouded, the ruddy nectarine, and dark 
 
 Beneath his ample leaf the luscious fig. 
 
 The vine too here her curling tendrils shoots, 680 
 
 Hangs out her clusters glowing to the south, 
 
 And scarcely wishes for a warmer sky. 
 
 Turn we a moment fancy's rapid fiight 
 To vigorous soils and climes of fair extent. 
 Where, by the potent sun elated high, 
 The vineyard swells refulgent on the day. 
 Spreads o'er the vale, or up the mountain climbs 
 Profuse, and drinks amid the sunny rocks, 
 From cliff to chff increased, the heightened blaze. 
 Low bend the weighty boughs. The clusters clear, 690 
 HaK through the foliage seen, or ardent flame 
 Or shine transparent ; while perfection breathes 
 White o'er the turgent film the living dew. 
 As thus they brighten with exalted juice. 
 Touched into flavour by the mingling ray, 
 The rural youth and virgins o'er the field. 
 Each fond for each to cull the autumnal prime, 
 
 673-5 The first text (1730-38) is, punctuation and all, as 
 
 follows : — 
 
 And, as I steal along, the sunny wall, 
 
 Where Autumn basks, with fruit empurpled deep. 
 
 My theme still urges in my vagrant thought ; — 
 
 apparently meaning that the fruit-covered wall reminded him of 
 
 his subject. 
 
 676 shining plum] purple plumb 1730-38. 681 glowing] 
 
 swelling 1730-38. 686 swells] heaves 1730-38. 690 
 
 weighty] gravid 1730-38. 
 
158 THE SEASONS 
 
 Exulting rove, and speak the vintage nigh. 
 Then comes the crushing swain ; the country floats, 
 And foams unbounded with the mashy flood, 7°° 
 That, by degrees fermented, and refined. 
 Round the raised nations pours the cup of joy — 
 The claret smooth, red as the lip we press 
 In sparkling fancy while we drain the bowl, 
 The mellow-tasted burgundy, and, quick 
 As is the wit it gives, the gay champagne. 
 
 Now, by the cool declining year condensed. 
 Descend the copious exhalations, checked 
 As up the middle sky unseen they stole, 
 And roU the doubling fogs around the hiQ. 710 
 
 No more the mountain, horrid, vast, subhme, 
 Who pours a sweep of rivers from his sides. 
 And high between contending kingdoms rears 
 The rooky long division, fills the view 
 With great variety ; but, in a night 
 Of gathering vapour, from the baffled sense 
 Sinks dark and dreary. Thence expanding far. 
 The huge dusk gradual swallows up the plain : 
 Vanish the woods : the dim-seen river seems, 
 SuUen and slow, to roU the misty wave. 720 
 
 Even in the height of noon oppressed, the sun 
 Sheds, weak and blunt, his wide-refracted ray ; 
 Whence glaring oft, with many a broadened orb. 
 He frights the nations. Indistinct on earth, 
 
 703 red] deep 1730-38. 713 high between . . . rears] deep 
 
 betwixt . . . lays 1730-38. 714 Here, after 'long division ', 
 
 the original text (1730-38) gives — 
 
 While aloft 
 His piny top is, lessening, lost in air ; 
 No more his thousand prospects fill the view 
 With great variety &o. 
 717 Sink dark and total. Nor alone immersed 1730-38. 
 
AUTUMN 159 
 
 Seen through the turbid air, beyond the life 
 
 Objects appear, and, Vildered, o'er the waste 
 
 The shepherd stalks gigantic ; till at last, 
 
 Wreathed dun around, in deeper circles stUl 
 
 Successive closing, sits the general fog 
 
 Unbounded o'er the world, and, mingUng thick, 730 
 
 A formless grey confusion covers all. 
 
 As when of o ld (so sung the Hebrew bard) 
 
 Light, uncollected, through the Chaos urged 
 
 Its infant way, nor order yet had drawn 
 
 His lovely train from out the dubious gloom. ' - 
 
 These roving mists, that constant now begin 
 To smoke along the hiUy country, these, 
 With weighty rains and melted Alpine snows. 
 The mountain-cisterns fill — those ample stores 
 Of water, scooped among the hollow rocks, 740 
 
 Whence gush the streams, the ceaseless fountains play. 
 And their unfailing wealth the rivers draw. 
 Some sages say, that, where the numerous wave '^ 
 Por ever lashes the resounding shore, ( 
 
 Drilled through the sandy stratum, every way, 
 The waters with the sandy stratum rise ; 
 Amid whose angles infinitely strained. 
 They joyful leave their jaggy salts behind, 
 
 728 dun] close 1730-38. 729 closing] floating 1730-38. 
 
 735 His endless train forth from &c. 1730-38. 738 With mighty 
 rains, the skilled in nature say 1730-38. 739 ample stores] 
 
 grand reserves 1730-38. 740 rock {erratum) 1744. 
 
 742 wealth] stores 1730-38. Following this line in the original 
 text (1730-38) came a long passage of 17 lines, which the reader 
 will find in a Note at the end of the poem. It was dropped in 1744. 
 743-5 The original text (1730-38) reads — 
 
 And thus some sages deep-exploring teach 
 That where the hoarse innumerable wave 
 Eternal lashes the resounding shore, 
 Sucked through the (fee. 
 748 They leave each saline particle behind 1730-38, 
 
160 THE SEASONS 
 
 And clear and sweeten as they soak along. 
 
 Nor stops the restless fluid, mounting still, 75° 
 
 Though oft amidst the irriguous vale it springs ; 
 
 But, to the mountain courted by the sand. 
 
 That leads it darkling on in faithful maze, 
 
 E9,r from the parent main, it boils again 
 
 Fresh into day, and all the ghttering hill 
 
 Is bright with spouting rills. But hence this vam 
 
 Amusive dream ! why should the waters love 
 
 To take so far a journey to the hills. 
 
 When the sweet valleys ofier to their toil 
 
 Inviting quiet and a nearer bed ? \ 760 
 
 Or if, by blind ambition led astray, 
 
 They must aspire, why should they sudden stop 
 
 Among the broken mountain's rushy deUs, 
 
 And, ere they gain its highest peak, desert 
 
 The attractive sand that charmed their course so long ? 
 
 Besides, the hard agglomerating salts. 
 
 The spoil of ages, would impervious choke 
 
 Their secret channels, or by slow degrees, 
 
 High as the hiUs, protrude the swelling vales : 
 
 Old ocean too, sucked through the porous globe, 770 
 
 Had long ere now forsook his horrid bed, 
 
 And brought Deucalion's watery times again. 
 
 Say, then, where lurk the vast eternal springs 
 That, like creating Nature, lie concealed 
 Erom mortal eye, yet with their lavish stores 
 Refresh the globe and all its joyous tribes ? 
 thou pervading genius, given to man 
 
 751 oft amidst the irriguous vale] here and there in lowly 
 plains 1730-38. 
 
 756-835 This long passage of eighty lines beginning ' But hence 
 this vain ' was introduced into the text in 1744, displacing eleven 
 lines which had appeared in the early edd. (1730-38). The dis- 
 placed lines are given in a Note at the end of the poem. 
 
AUTUMN 161 
 
 To trace the secrets of the dark abyss ! 
 
 Oh ! lay the mountains bare, and wide display- 
 
 Their hidden structure to the astonished view ; 780 
 
 Strip from the branching Alps their piny load, 
 
 The huge incumbrance of horrific woods 
 
 From Asian Taurus, from Imaus stretched 
 
 Athwart the roving Tartar's sullen bounds ; 
 
 Give opening Hemus to my searching eye. 
 
 And high Olympus pouring many a stream ! 
 
 Oh, from the sounding summits of the north, 
 
 The Dofrine Hills, through Scandinavia rolled 
 
 To farthest Lapland and the frozen main ; 
 
 From lofty Caucasus, far seen by those 790 
 
 Who in the Caspian and black Euxine toil ; 
 
 From cold Riphaean rocks, which the wild Russ 
 
 Believes the stony girdle of the world ; 
 
 And all the dreadful mountains wrapt in storm 
 
 ■Whence wide Siberia draws her lonely floods ; 
 
 Oh, sweep the eternal snows ! Hung o'er the deep, 
 
 That ever works beneath his sounding base. 
 
 Bid Atlas, propping heaven, as poets feign. 
 
 His subterranean wonders spread ! Unveil 
 
 The miny caverns, blazing on the day, 800 
 
 Of Abyssinia's cloud-compelling chffs, 
 
 And of the bending Mountains of the Moon ! 
 
 O'ertopping all these giant-sons of earth. 
 
 Let the dire Andes, from the radiant Line 
 
 Stretched to the stormy seas that thunder round 
 
 The Southern Pole, their hideous deeps unfold ! 
 
 Amazing scene ! Behold ! the glooms disclose ! 
 
 I see the rivers in their infant beds ! 
 
 Deep, deep I hear them labouring to get free ! 
 
 I see the leaning strata, artful ranged ; 810 
 
 The gaping fissures, to receive the rains, 
 
 The melting snows, and ever-dripping fogs. 
 
 THOirSOM M 
 
162 THE SEASONS 
 
 Strowed bibulous above I see the sands, 
 
 The -pebbly gravel next, the layers then 
 
 Of mingled moulds, of more retentive earths, 
 
 The guttured rocks and mazy-running clefts, 
 
 That, while the stealing moisture they transmit, 
 
 Retard its motion, and forbid its waste. 
 
 Beneath the incessant weeping of these drains, 
 
 I see the rocky siphons stretched immense, 820 
 
 The mighty reservoirs, of hardened chalk 
 
 Or stiff compacted clay capacious formed : 
 
 O'erflowing thence, the congregated stores. 
 
 The crystal treasures of the liquid world. 
 
 Through the stirred sands a bubbling passage burst. 
 
 And, welling out around the middle steep 
 
 Or from the bottoms of the bosomed hills 
 
 In pure effusion flow. United thus, 
 
 Tae exhaling sun, the vapour-burdened air, 
 
 The gelid mountains, that to rain condensed 830 
 
 These vapours in continual current draw, 
 
 And send them o'er the fair-divided earth 
 
 In bounteous rivers to the deep again, 
 
 A social commerce hold, and firm support 
 
 The full-adjusted harmony of things. 
 
 When Autumn scatters his departing gleams, 
 Warned of approaching Winter, gathered, play 
 The swallow-people ; and, tossed wide around, 
 O'er the calm sky in convolution swift 
 The feathered eddy floats, rejoicing once 840 
 
 Ere to their wintry slumbers they retire. 
 In clusters clung beneath the mouldering bank. 
 And where, unpierced by frost, the cavern sweats ; 
 Or rather, into warmer climes conveyed, 
 
 836 When] While 1730-38. 843 And where the cavem 
 
 sweats,— as sages dream 1730-38. 
 
AUTUMN 163 
 
 With other kindred birds of season, there 
 They twitter cheerful, till the vernal months 
 Invite them welcome back — for thronging now 
 Innumerous wings are in commotion all. 
 
 Where the Rhine loses his majestic force 
 In Belgian plains, won from the raging deep 850 
 By diligence amazing and the strong 
 Unconquerable hand of liberty, 
 The stork-assembly meets, for many a day 
 Consulting deep and various ere they take 
 Their arduous voyage through the liquid sky. 
 And now, their route designed, their leaders chose, 
 Their tribes adjusted, cleaned their vigorous wings. 
 And many a circle, many a short essay, 
 Wheeled round and round, in congregation full 
 The figured flight ascends, and, riding high 860 
 
 The aerial billows, mixes with the clouds. 
 
 Or, where the Northern Ocean in vast whirls 
 Boils round the naked melancholy isles 
 Of farthest Thule, and the Atlantic surge 
 Pours in among the stormy Hebrides, 
 Who can recount what transmigrations there 
 Are annual made ? what nations come and go ? 
 And how the living clouds on clouds arise, 
 Infinite wings ! till all the plume-dark air 
 And rude resounding shore are one wild cry ? 870 
 
 Here the plain harmless native his small flock 
 And herd diminutive of many hues 
 Tends on the little island's verdant swell, 
 The shepherd's sea-girt reign ; or, to the rocks 
 Dire-chnging, gathers his ovarious food ; 
 Or sweeps the fishy shore ; or treasures up 
 The plumage, rising full, to form the bed 
 
 855 arduous] plumy 1730-38. 870 rude] white 1730-38. 
 
 M 2 
 
164 THE SEASONS 
 
 Of luxury. And here a while the muse, 
 High hovering o'er the broad cerulean scene, 
 Sees Caledonia in romantic view — 880 
 
 Her airy mountains from the waving main 
 Invited with aTkeen diffusive sky, 
 ^ Breathing the soul acute ; her forests huge, 
 ~Inoult, roI)usl7 aiad'Tall^ by Nature's hand 
 Planted of old ; her azure lakes between, 
 Poured out extensive, and of watery wealth 
 Full ; winding deep and green, her fertile vales, 
 With many a cool translucent brimming flood 
 Washed lovely, from the Tweed (pure parent-stream, 
 Whose pastoral banks first heard my Doric reed, 890 
 With, silvan Jed, thy tributary brook) 
 To where the north-inflated tempest foams 
 O'er Orca's or Betubium's highest peak — 
 Nurse of a people, in misfortune's school 
 Trained up to hardy deeds, soon visited 
 By Learning, when before the Gothic rage 
 She took her western flight; a manly race 
 Of unsubmitting spirit, wise, and brave, 
 Who still through bleeding ages struggled hard 
 (As well unhappy Wallace can attest, 900 
 
 Great patriot-hero ! ill requited chief !) 
 To hold a generous undiminished state, 
 Too much in vain ! Hence, of unequal bounds 
 
 878-949 This passage is a development of thirteen lines which 
 originally appeared in Summer. See Summer, Note to II. 1479- 
 1579. 
 
 881 waving] gelid 1730-38. 
 
 890, 891 These two lines were added in 1744. The ed. of that 
 year, however, gave ' waked ' altered in 1746 to ' heard ' 
 
 893 Orca's] Orca 1730-38. 
 
 897 manly] generous 1730-38. 900, 901 These two 
 
 bracketed lines were added in 1744. 902 generous] hapless 
 
 1730-38. 903 unequal] ignoble 1730-38. 
 
AUTUMN 165 
 
 Impatient, and by tempting glory borne 
 
 O'er every land, for every land their life 
 
 Has flowed profuse, their piercing genius planned, 
 
 And swelled the pomp of peace their faithful toil : 
 
 As from their own clear north in radiant streams 
 
 Bright over Europe bursts the boreal morn. 
 
 Oh ! is there not some patriot in whose power 910 
 That best, that godlike luxury is placed. 
 Of blessing thousands, thousands yet unborn. 
 Through late posterity ? some, large of soul, 
 To cheer dejected Industry, to give 
 A double harvest to the pining swain. 
 And teach the labouring hand the sweets of toil ? 
 How, by the finest art, the native robe 
 To weave ; how, white as Hyperborean snow. 
 To form the lucid lawn ; with venturous oar 
 How to dash wide the billow ; nor look on, 920 
 Shamefully passive, while Batavian fleets 
 Defraud us of the gUttering fiimy swarms 
 That heave our friths and crowd upon our shores ; 
 How all-enhvening trade to rouse, and wing 
 The prosperous sail from every growing port. 
 Uninjured, round the sea-encircled globe; 
 And thus, in soul united as in name. 
 Bid Britain reign the mistress of the deep ? 
 
 Yes, there are such. And fuU on thee, Argyle, 
 Her hope, her stay, her darling, and her boast, 930 
 From her first patriots and her heroes sprung, 
 Thy fond imploring Country turns her eye ; 
 In thee, with aU a mother's triumph, sees 
 Her every virtue, every grace combined, 
 
 926 Uninjured] Unchallenged 1730-38. 
 
 927, 928 And thus united Britain Britain make 
 
 Entire, the imperial Mistress of the deep 
 second ed. 1730. 
 
166 THE SEASONS 
 
 Her genius, wisdom, her engaging turn, 
 Her pride of honour, and her courage tried, 
 Calm and intrepid, in the very throat 
 Of sulphurous war, on Tenier's dreadful field. 
 Nor less the palm oE peace enwreathes thy brow : 
 For, powerful as thy sword, from thy rich tongue 940 
 Persuasion flows, and wins the high debate ; 
 While mixed in thee combine the charm of youth. 
 The force of manhood, and the depth of age. 
 Thee, Forbes, too, whom every worth attends. 
 As truth sincere, as weeping friendship kind. 
 Thee, truly generous, and in silepce great, 
 Thy country feels through her reviving arts, 
 Planned by thy wisdom, by thy soul informed; 
 And seldom has she felt a friend like thee. 
 
 But see the fading many-coloured woods, gsc 
 
 Shade deepening over shade, the country round 
 Imbrown ; a crowded umbrage, dusk and dun, 
 Of every hue from wan declining green 
 To sooty dark. These now the lonesome muse. 
 Low-whispering, lead into their leaf-strown walks. 
 And give the season in its latest view. 
 
 Meantime, light shadowing all, a sober calm 
 Fleeces unbounded ether ; whose least wave 
 935 engaging] politest 1730-38. 
 
 939 Instead of this line, which first appeared in 1744, the 
 original text (1730-38) gives the following six lines : — 
 While thick around the deadly tempest flew. 
 And when the trumpet, kindling war no more, 
 Pours not the flaming squadrons o'er the field, 
 But, fruitful of fair deeds and mutual faith, 
 Kind peace unites the jarring world again, 
 Let the deep olive through thy laurels twine. 
 949 a] the 1730-38. 95f'-63 These lines are an expansion 
 
 of a passage in the first ed. of Winter, 11. 29-33. (See p. 228 of 
 this book.) 
 
AUTUMN 167 
 
 Stands tremulous, uncertain where to turn 
 The gentle current ; while, illumined wide, 960 
 
 The dewy-skirted clouds imbibe the sun, 
 And through their lucid veil his softened force 
 Shed o'er the peaceful world. Then is the time 
 For those whom wisdom and whom nature charm 
 To steal themselves from the degenerate crowd, 
 And soar above this little scene of things — 
 To tread lo A'-thoughted vice beneath their feet, 
 To soothe the throbbing passions into peace, 
 And woo lone Quiet in her silent walks. 
 
 Thus solitary, and in pensive guise, 970 / 
 
 Oft let rne wander o'er the russet mead, 
 And through the saddened grove, where scarce is heard 
 One dying strain to cheer the woodman's toil. 
 Haply some widowed songster pours his plaint 
 Far in faint warblings through the tawny copse ; 
 While congregated thrushes, linnets, larks. 
 And each wild throat whose artless strains so late 
 Swelled all the music of the swarming shades. 
 Robbed of their tuneful souls, now shivering sit 
 On the dead tree, a dull despondent flock, 980 
 
 With not a brightness waving o'er their plumes, 
 And naught save chattering discord in their note. 
 Oh, let not, aimed from some inhuman eye, 
 
 962 lucid veil his softened] uvid pores his tempered 1730-38. 
 
 963-75 This passage, beginning ' Then is the time ', formed part 
 of the first ed. (1726) of Winter (11. 33-45). With a few slight 
 alterations they were transferred to Autumn, where they appear 
 in the first ed. (1730) of that poem. The variations are indicated 
 below. 
 
 968 To lay their passions in a gentle calm Winter, first ed. 1726. 
 970 Thus] Now Winter, first ed. 1726. 972 And . . saddened] 
 Or . . pining Winter, first ed. 1726. 974 Sad Philomel, per- 
 
 chance, pours forth her plaint Winter, first ed. 1726. 975 
 
 Far through the withering copse Winter, first ed. 1726. 
 
168 THE SEASONS 
 
 The gun the music of the coming year 
 Destroy, and harmless, unsuspecting harm. 
 Lay the weak tribes, a miserable prey! 
 In mingled murder fluttering on the ground ! 
 
 The pale descending year, yet pleasing still, 
 A gentler mood inspires ; for now the leaf 
 Incessant rustles from the mournful grove, 99° 
 
 Oft startling such as studious walk below, 
 And slowly circles through the waving air. 
 But, should a quicker breeze amid the boughs 
 Sob, o'er the sky the leafy deluge streams ; 
 Till, choked and matted with the dreary shower, 
 The forest-walks, at every rising gale, 
 Roll wide the wither'd waste, and whistle bleak. 
 Fled is the blasted verdure of the fields ; 
 And, shrunk into their beds, the flowery race 
 Their sunny robes resign. Even what remained looo 
 Of bolder fruits falls from the naked tree ; 
 And — woods, fields, gardens, orchards, all around — 
 The desolated prospect thrills the soul. 
 
 He comes ! he comes ! iii every breeze the Power 
 Of Philosophic Melancholy comes ! 
 His near approach the sudden-starting tear, 
 The glowing cheek, the mild dejected air. 
 The softened feature, and the beating heart. 
 Pierced deep with many a virtuous pang, declare. 
 O'er all the soul his sacred influence breathes ; loio 
 Inflames imagination ; through the breast 
 Infuses every tenderness ; and far 
 
 994 deluge] ruin 1730-38. looo ' Their sunny robes resign ' 
 occurs in Wimier, first ed., 1. 60. looi holdei in aU edd., from 
 
 1730 to 1746. lOio the] his 1730. loii breast] sense 
 
 1730-38. Preceding this line in the first text (1730-38) came — 
 
 In all the bosom triumphs, all the nerves — 
 dropped in ed. 1744. 
 
J 
 
 AUTUMN 169 
 
 Beyond dim earth exalts the swelling thought. 
 
 Ten thousand thousand fleet ideas, such 
 
 As never mingled with the vulgar dream, 
 
 Crowd fast into the mind's creative eye. 
 
 As fast the correspondent passions rise, ] 
 
 As varied, and as high — devotion raised ) 
 
 To raptu re, an d divine astonishment ; 
 
 The love of nature unconfined, and, chief, 
 
 Df human race ; the large ambitious wish 
 
 To make them blest ; the sigh for suffering worth 
 
 Lost in obscurity ; the noble scorn 
 
 Of tyrant pride ; the fearless great resolve ; 
 
 The wonder which the dying patriot draws. 
 
 Inspiring glory through remotest time ; 
 
 The awakened throb for virtue and for fame ; 
 
 The sympathies of love and friendship dear, 
 
 With all the social offspring of the heart. 
 
 Oh ! bear me then to vast embowering shades, 1030 
 To twilight groves, and visionary vales. 
 To weeping grottoes, and prophetic glooms ; 
 Where angel forms athwart the solemn dusk, 
 Tremendous, sweep, or seem to sweep along ; 
 And voices more than human, through the void 
 Deep-sounding, seize the enthusiastic ear. 
 
 1015 vulgar] Vulgar's 1730-38. 1021 race] kind 1730-38. 
 
 1023 noble] indignant 1730-38. 1024 tyrant] mighty 1730- 
 
 38. 1025 which] that 1730-38. 1027 awakened throb] 
 
 arousing pant 1730-38. 
 
 1030-36 This' passage was (with variations) transferred from 
 the first ed. (1726) of Winter, 11. 74-9. The original form was as 
 follows : — 
 
 Oh ! bear me then to high embowering shades. 
 
 To twilight groves and visionary vales, 
 
 To weeping grottos and to hoary caves [prophetic 
 
 glooms, (second ed.)] 
 Where angel-forms are seen, and voices heard. 
 Sighed in low whispers, that abstract the soul 
 From outward sense far into worlds remote. 
 
170 THE SEASONS . 
 
 Or is tliis gloom too much ? Then lead, ye Powers 
 That o'er the garden and the rural seat 
 Preside, which, shining through the cheerful land 
 In countless numbers, blest Britannia sees — 1040 
 Oh ! lead me to the wide extended walks, 
 The fair majestic paradise of Stowe ! 
 Not Persian Cyrus on Ionia's shore 
 E'er saw such sylvan scenes , such various art 
 By genius fired^such ardent genius tamed 
 ■By cool judic ious art, ^hal iiL-theLstrif e 
 All-beauteous Nature fears to, be outdone. 
 And there, Pitt ! thy country's early boast. 
 There let me sit beneath the sheltered slopes, 
 Or in that Temple where, in future times, 1050 
 
 Thou well shalt merit a distinguished name, 
 And, with thy converse blest, catch the last smiles 
 OE Autumn beaming o'er the yellow woods. 
 While there with thee the enchanted round I walk, 
 The regulated wild, gay fancy then 
 Will tread in thought the groves of Attic land ; 
 WiU from thy standard taste refine her own, 
 Correct her pencil to the purest truth 
 Of nature, or, the unimpassioned shades 
 Forsaking, raise it to the human mind. 1060 
 
 Oh, if hereafter she with juster hand 
 Shall draw the tragic scene, instruct her thou 
 To mark the varied movements of the heart. 
 What every decent character requires. 
 And every passion speaks !■ Oh, through her strain 
 Breathe thy pathetic eloquence, that moulds 
 The attentive senate, charms, persuades, exalts, 
 Of honest zeal the indignant lightning throws, 
 And shakes Corruption on her venal throne ! 
 
 1037-81 These forty-five lines were added in 1744. 1048 
 
 ' Pit ' is Thomson's form of the name, both in 1744 and in 1746. 
 
AUTUMN 171 
 
 While thus we talk, and through Elysian vales 1070 
 Delighted rove, perhaps a sigh escapes — 
 What pity, Cobham ! thou thy verdant files 
 Of ordered trees shouldst here inglorious range. 
 Instead of squadrons flaming o'er the field. 
 And long-embattled hosts ! when the proud foe. 
 The faithless vain disturber of mankind, 
 Insulting Gaul, has roused the world to war ; 
 When keen, once more, within their bounds to press 
 Those polished robbers, those ambitious slaves, 
 The British youth would haU. thy wise command, 1080 
 Thy tempered ardour and thy veteran sIdU. 
 
 The western sun withdraws the shortened day ; 
 And humid evening, gUding o'er the sky, 
 
 1082 And now the western sun withdraws the day 1730-38. 
 
 1 08 2-1 102 These lines are, substantially, a transference from 
 the first ed. (1726) of Winter, 11. 80-96. Their original form was 
 as follows : — 
 
 Now, when the western sun withdraws the day. 
 And humid evening, gliding o'er the sky. 
 In her chill progress checks the straggling beams 
 And robs them of their gathered vapoury prey — 
 [And their moist captives frees ; where waters ooze 
 
 {second ed.y] 
 Where marshes stagnate and where rivers wind 
 Cluster the rolling fogs, and swim along 
 The dusky-mantled lawn ; then slow descend 
 Once more to mingle with their watery friends. 
 The vivid stars shine out in radiant [brightened (second 
 
 ed. )] files, 
 And boundless ether glows, till the fair moon 
 Shows her broad visage in the crimsoned east ; 
 Now, stooping, seems to kiss the passing cloud. 
 Now, o'er the pure cerulean rides sublime ; 
 Wide the pale deluge floats with silver waves 
 O'er the skied mountain to the low-laid vale. 
 Prom the white rocks with dim reflection gleams. 
 And faintly glitters through the waving shades. 
 
 1083 gliding] gilding (a misprint) 1730-38. 
 
172 THE SEASONS 
 
 In her chiU progress, to the ground condensed 
 
 The vapours throws. Where creeping waters ooze. 
 
 Where marshes stagnate, and where rivers wind. 
 
 Cluster the rolling fogs, and swim along 
 
 The dusky-mantled lawn. Meanwhile the moo n, 
 
 Full-orhed and breaking through the scattered cBuds, 
 
 Shows her broad visage in the crimsoned east. 1090 
 
 Turned to the sun direct, her spotted disk 
 
 (Where mountains rise, umbrageous dales descend, 
 
 And caverns deep, as optic tube descries) 
 
 A smaller earth, gives all his blaze again, 
 
 Void of its flame, and sheds a softer day. 
 
 Now through the passing cloud she seems to stoop. 
 
 Now up the pure cerulean rides sublime. 
 
 Wide the pale deluge floats, and streaming mild 
 
 O'er the skied mountain to the shadowy vale. 
 
 While rocks and floods reflect the quivering gleam, 1100 
 
 The whole air whitens with a boundless tide 
 
 Of silver radiance trembling round the world. 
 
 But when, half blotted from the sky, her light 
 Fainting, permits the starry flres to burn 
 With keener lustre through the depth of heaven ; 
 Or quite extinct her deadened orb appears. 
 And scarce appears, of sickly beamless white ; 
 Oft in this season, sflent from the north 
 A_blaze_ofjiieteors shoots — ensweeping first 
 The lower skies, they all at once converge mo 
 
 High to the crown of heaven, and, all at once 
 Relapsing quick, as quickly re-ascend, 
 
 1085 The ascending vapour throws. Where waters ooze 
 1730-38. 1093 caverns deep] oceans roll 1730-44. 1094 
 
 smaller] lesser 1730-38 ; his] its 1744. 
 
 1108-37 The original of these lines first appeared in the first 
 ed. (1727) of Summer. See Note to 11. 1700-29 of Summer,— 
 where(p. 131) the original text is given. 11 10 they] then 1730-38. 
 
AUTUMN 173 
 
 And mix and thwart, extinguish and renew, 
 All ether coursing in a maze of light. 
 
 From look to look, contagious through the crowd, 
 The panic runs, and into wondrous shapes 
 The appearance throws — armies in meet array, 
 Thronged with aerial spears and steeds of fire ; 
 TUl, the long lines of fuU-extended war 
 In bleeding fight commixed, the sanguine flood 1120 
 RoUs a broad slaughter o'er the plains of heaven. 
 As thus they scan the visionary scene, 
 On all sides swells the superstitious din, 
 rncontinentj ^^^d'Tfusy frenzy talks 
 Of blood and battle ; cities overturned. 
 And late at night in swallowing earthquake sunk. 
 Or hideous wrapt in fierce ascending flame ; 
 Of saUow famine, inundation, storm ; 
 Of pestilence, and every great distress ; 
 Empires subversed, when ruling fate has struck 
 The unalterable hour : even nature's self 1131 
 
 Is deemed to totter on the brink of time. 
 Not s o the man of philosophic eye 
 And inspecfsage : the waving brightness he 
 Curious surveys, inquisitive to know 
 TJie_causes and materials, yet unfixed, 
 Qf^this appearance beautiful and new. 
 
 Now black and deep the night begins to fall, 
 A shade immense ! Sunk in the quenching gloom, 
 Magnificent and vast, are heaven and earth. 1140 
 Order confounded lies, all beauty void. 
 Distinction lost, and gay variety 
 One universal blot — such the fair power 
 
 1 1 18 thronged] throng 1730-38. 1127 hideous wrapt in 
 
 fierce] painted hideous with 1730-38. 1139 A solid shade 
 
 immense. Sunk in the gloom 1730-38. 
 
174 THE SEASONS 
 
 Of light to kindle and create the whole. 
 
 Drear is the state of the benighted wretch 
 
 Who then bewildered wanders through the dark 
 
 FuU of pale fancies and chimeras huge ; 
 
 Nor visited by one directive ray 
 
 From cottage streaming or from airy hall. 
 
 Perhaps, impatient as he stumbles on, 115c 
 
 Struck from the root of slimy rushes, blue 
 
 The wild-fire scatters round, or, gathered, trails . 
 
 A length of flame deceitful o'er the moss ; 
 
 Whither decoyed by the fantastic blaze, 
 
 Now lost and now renewed, he sinks absorbed. 
 
 Rider and horse, amid the miry gulf — 
 
 While still, from day to day, his pining wife 
 
 And plaintive children his return await, 
 
 In wild conjecture lost. At other times. 
 
 Sent by the better genius of the night, n6o 
 
 Innoxious, gleaming on the horse's mane. 
 
 The meteor sits, and shows the narrow path 
 
 That winding leads through pits of death, or else 
 
 Instructs him how to take the dangerous ford. 
 
 The lengthened night elapsed, the morning shines 
 
 1150-64 The original of these lines first appeared in the first 
 ed. (1727) of Summer. They are substantially (and almost 
 verbally, but with variations) the same as the original — which 
 the reader will find in a Note to Summer, 1. 1681. 
 
 1 155 lost . . he sinks] sunk . . he's quite 1730-38. 11 56 
 
 amid] into 1730-38. 1 165-71 The original of these lines 
 
 appeared in the first ed. (1726) of Winter, 11. 97-103 :— 
 All night abundant dews unnoted fall 
 And at return of morning silver o'er 
 [That, lighted by the morning's ray, impearl {second ed.)'\ 
 The face of mother Earth. From every branch 
 Depending tremble the translucent gems, 
 And quivering [twinkling (second ed.)] seem to fall away, 
 yet cling, 
 
AUTUMN 175 
 
 Serene, in all her dewy beauty bright, 
 
 Unfolding fair the last autumnal day. 
 
 And now the mounting sun dispels the fog ; 
 
 The rigid hoar-frost melts before his beam ; 
 
 And, hung on every spray, on every blade 1170 
 
 Of grass, the myriad dew-drops twinkle round. 
 
 Ah, see where, robbed and murdered, in that pit 
 Lies the still-heaving/nive !) at evening snatched, ■ . 
 Beneath the cloud orguilt-concealing night, i 
 
 And fixed o'er sulphur — while, not dreaming ill, j ■" 
 The happy people in their waxen cells , 
 
 Sat tending public cares and planning schemes ' ^ 
 Of temperance for Winter poor; rejoiced t 
 
 To mark, full-flowing round, their copious stores. (^ 
 Sudden the dark oppressive steam ascends ; 1180 ^r- 
 
 And, used to milder scents, the tender race 
 By thousands tumbles from their honeyed domes, ^^ 
 Convolved and agonizing in the dust. 
 And was it then for this you roamed the spring. 
 Intent from flower to flower ? for this you toiled 
 Ceaseless the burning summer-heats away ? 
 For this in Autumn searched the blooming waste. 
 Nor lost one sunny gleam ? for this sad fate ? 
 man ! tyrannic lord ! how long, how long 
 Shall prostrate nature groan beneath your rage, 1190 
 Awaiting renovation^? When obliged. 
 Must you destroy ? Of their ambrosial food 
 Can you not borrow, and in just return 
 Afford them shelter from the wintry winds ? 
 Or, as the sharp year pinches, with their own 
 Again regale them on some smiling day ? 
 
 And sparkle in the sun, whose rising eye, 
 With fogs bedimmed, portends a beauteous day. 
 1 175 fixed . . not] whelmed . . un- 1730-38. 1182 tumble 
 1730-38. 
 
176 THE SEASONS 
 
 See where the stony bottom of their town 
 
 Looks desolate and wild, — with here and there 
 
 A helpless number, who the ruined state 
 
 Survive, lamenting weak, cast out to death! 1200 
 
 Thus a proud city, populous and rich. 
 
 Full of the works of peace, and high in joy, 
 
 At theatre or feast, or sunk in sleep 
 
 (As late, Palermo, was thy fate) is seized 
 
 By some dread earthquake, and convulsive hurled 
 
 Sheer from the black foundation, stench-involved, 
 
 Into a gulf of blue sulphureous flame. 
 
 Hence every harsher sight ! for now the day. 
 O'er heaven and earth diiiused, grows warm and high ; 
 Infinite splendour ! wide-investing aU. 1210 
 
 How still the breeze ! save what the filmy threads 
 Of dew evaporate brushes from the plain. 
 How clear the cloudless sky ! how deeply tinged 
 With a peculiar blue ! the ethereal arch 
 How swelled immense ! amid whose azure throned, 
 The radiant sun how gay ! how calm below 
 The gilded earth ! the harvest-treasures aU 
 Now, gathered in, beyond the rage of storms. 
 Sure to the swain ; the circling fence shut up ; 
 And instant Winter's utmost rage defied — 1220 
 
 While, loose to festive joy, the country round 
 Laughs with the loud sincerity of mirth, 
 Shook to the wind their cares. The toil-strung youth. 
 By the quick sense of music taught alone, 
 Leaps wildly graceful in the lively dance. 
 Her every charm abroad, the village-toast, 
 
 1 197 See where] Hard by 1730-38. 
 1220 Winter bid to do his worst 1730-38. 
 1223, 1224 Care shook away. The toil-invigorate youth, 
 Not needing the melodious impulse much 
 1730-38. 
 
AUTUMN 177 
 
 Young, buxom, warm, in native beauty rich. 
 Darts not-unmeaning looks ; and, where her eye 
 Points an approving smile, with double force 
 The cudgel rattles, and the wrestler twines. 1230 
 Age too shines out ; and, garrulous, recounts 
 The feats of youth. Thus they rejoice ; nor think 
 That with to-morrow's sun their annual toil 
 Begins again the never- ceasing round. 
 
 Oh ! knew he but his happiness, of men 
 The happiest he ! who far from pubhc rage 
 Deep in the vale, with a choice few retired. 
 Drinks the pure _pleas,uxesL of the rural life. ^' 
 
 What though the dome be wanting, whose proud gate 
 Each morning vomits out the sneaking crowd 1240 
 Of flatterers false, and in their turn abused ? 
 VUe intercourse ! What though the ghttering robe, 
 Of every hue reflected light can give, 
 Or floating loose or stifi with massy gold. 
 The pride and gaze of fools, oppress him not ? 
 What though, from utmost land and sea purveyed. 
 For him each rarer tributary life 
 Bleeds not, and his insatiate table heaps 
 With luxury and death ? What though his bowl 
 Flames not with costly juice ; nor, sunk in beds 1250 
 Oft of gay care, he tosses out the night, 
 Or melts the thoi^^htless hours in idle state ? 
 What though he knows not those fantastic joys 
 That stiU amuse the wanton, still deceive ; 
 A face of pleasure, but a heart of pain ; 
 Their hoUow moments undehghted aU ? 
 
 1230 wrestler twines] struggle twists 1730-38. 1249 bowl] 
 
 wine 1730-38. 1250 Flows not from brighter gems 1730-38. 
 1252 Or thoughtless sleeps at best in idle state 1730-38. 1253 
 he knows not those] deprived of these 1730-38. 
 
 THOMSON N 
 
178 THE SEASONS 
 
 ' Sure peace is his ; a solid life, estranged 
 To disappointment and fallacious hope — 
 Rich in content, in Nature's bounty rich. 
 In herbs and fruits ; whatever greens the spring 1260 
 When heaven descends in showers, or bends the bough 
 When summer reddens and when autumn beams, 
 Or in the wintry glebe whatever lies 
 Concealed and fattens with the richest sap : 
 These are not wanting ; nor the milky drove. 
 Luxuriant spread o'er all the lowing vale ; 
 Nor bleating mountains ; nor the chide of streams 
 And hum of bees, inviting sleep sincere 
 Into the guiltless breast beneath the shade, 
 Or thrown at large amid the fragrant hay ; 1270 
 
 Nor aught besides of prospect, grove, or song. 
 Dim grottoes, gleaming lakes, and fountain clear. 
 Her e too dwells simple truth, plain innocence, 
 
 , -iCJnsullied beauty, sound unbroken youth 
 Patient of labour — with a little pleased, 
 Health ever-blooming, unambitious toU, 
 Calm contemplation, and poetic ease. 
 ~ Le^bthers brave the flood in quest of gain. 
 And beat for joyless months the gloomy wave. 
 Let such as deem it glory to destroy 1280 
 
 Rush into blood, the sack of cities seek — 
 Unpierced, exulting in the widow's wail, 
 The virgin's shriek, and infant's trembling cry. 
 Let some, far distant from their native soU, 
 Urged or by want or hardened avarice. 
 Find other lands beneath another sun. 
 Let this through cities work his eager way 
 By legal outrage and established guile, 
 The social sense extinct ; and that ferment 
 
 1 271 beside 1730-44. 1273 dwells] lives 1730-38. 1287 
 eager] ardent 1730-38, 
 
AUTUMN 179 
 
 Mad into tumult the seditious herd, 1290 
 
 Or melt them down to slavery. Let these 
 
 Ensnare the wretched in the toUs of law, 
 
 Fomenting discord, and perplexing right. 
 
 An iron race ! and those of fairer front. 
 
 But equal inhumanity, in courts, 
 
 Delusive pomp, and dark cabals delight ; 
 
 Wreathe the deep bow, diffuse the lying smUe, 
 
 And tread the weary labyrinth of state. 
 
 While he, from aU the stormy passions free 
 
 That restless men involve, hears, and but hears, 
 
 At distance safe, the human tempest roar, 1301 
 
 Wrapped close in conscious peace. The fall of kings, 
 
 The rage of nations, and the crush of states 
 
 HoveTibt the man_who, from the jwprid escaped. 
 
 In still retreats and flowery solitudes 
 
 To Nature's voice attends from month to month, 
 
 And day to day, through the revolving year — 
 
 Admiring, sees her in her every shape ; 
 
 Feels all her sweet emotions at his heart ; 
 
 Takes what she liberal gives, nor thinks of more. 1310 
 
 He, when young Spring protrudes the bursting gems, 
 
 ,Marks the first bud, and sucks the healthful gale 
 
 Into his freshened soul ; her genial hours 
 
 He full enjoys ; and not a beauty blows 
 
 And not an opening blossom breathes in vain. 
 
 In Summer he, beneath the Uving shade. 
 
 Such as o'er frigid Tempe wont to wave. 
 
 Or Haemus cool, reads what the muse, of these 
 
 Perhaps, has in immortal numbers sung ; 
 
 Or what she dictates writes ; and oft an eye 1320 
 
 1296 And slippery pomp delight, in dark cabals 1730-38. 
 1306 day to day 1730-38. 1307 month to month 1730-38. 
 
 1309 sweet] fine 1730-38. 1314 full] quite 1730-38. 1317 
 o'er . . . wave] from . . . fall 1730-38. 
 
 n2 
 
180 THE SEASONS 
 
 Shot round, rejoices in the vigorous year. 
 When Autumn's yellow lustre gilds the world 
 And tempts the sickled swain into the field, 
 Seized by the general joy his heart distends. 
 With gentle throes ; and, through the tepid gleams 
 Deep musing, then he best exerts his song. 
 Even Winter wild to him is full of bhss. 
 The mighty tempest, and the hoary waste 
 Abrupt and deep, stretched o'er the buried earth. 
 Awake to solemn thought. At night the skies, 1330 
 Disclosed and kindled by refining frost. 
 Pour every lustre on the exalted eye. 
 A friend, a book the stealing hours secure, 
 
 J And mark them down for wisdom. With swift wing, 
 
 I O'er land and sea imagination roams ; 
 
 1 Or truth, divinely breaking on his mind. 
 Elates his being, and unfolds his powers ; 
 
 I Or in his breast heroic virtue burns. 
 The touch of kindred, too, and love he feels — 
 The modest eye whose beams on his alone 1340 
 
 Ecstatic shine, the little strong embrace 
 Of prattling children, twined around his neck, 
 And emulous to please him, calling forth 
 The fond parental soul. Nor purpose gay, 
 Amusement, dance, or song, he sternly scorns : 
 
 f For happiness and true philosophy 
 
 V^re of the social still and smiling kind. 
 This is the life which those who fret in guilt 
 And guilty cities never knew — the life 
 Led by primeval ages uncorrupt 1350 
 
 .* When angels dwelt, and God himself, with man ! 
 
 1326 he] the 1730. 1332 exalted] astonished 1730-38. 
 
 1339 love and kindred too 1730-38. 1347 Still are and have 
 been of the 1730-38. 1351 When God himself and Angels 
 
 dwelt with men! 1730-38. 
 
AUTUMN 181 
 
 Nature ! all-sufficient ! over all 
 Enrich me with the knnwlgjge of thy works ; ^ 
 
 Snatch me to heaven T~ thy roEing wonders there, ^ 
 
 World beyond world, in infinite extent 
 Profusely scattered o'er the blue immense. 
 Show me ; their motions, pe riods, and their laws 
 Give me to scan ; through the disclosing deep 
 Eight my blind way : the mineral strata there ; 
 Thrust blooming thence the vegetable world ; 1360 
 O'er that the rising system, more complex. 
 Of animals ; and, higher still, the mind. 
 The varied scene of quick-compounded thought, 
 And where the mixing passions endless shift ; 
 These ever open to my ravished eye — 
 A search, the flight of time can ne'er exhaust ! 
 But, if to that unequal — if the blood 
 In sluggish streams about my heart forbid 
 That best ambition — under closing shades 
 Inglorious lay me by the lowly brook, 1370 
 
 And whisper to my dreams. From thee begin, \ 
 
 Dwell all on thee, with thee conclude my song ; ^ 
 Aiid~Iet me never, never stray from thee ! 
 
 1356 blue] void 1730-44. 1361 ' the ' omitted in second 
 
 ed. 1730. 1368 forbids 1730-38. 
 
 NOTES TO AUTUMN 
 
 Line 9. Onslow. Bom 1691 ; chosen Speaker of the House of 
 Commons 1727, and remained Speaker for the long period of 
 thirty-four years ; died 1768. Thomson's eulogy is scarcely 
 OTercharged ; but it was Onslow's integrity that most won the 
 respect of all political parties. 
 
 416. sullen openings. Referring to the barking of dogs in the 
 
 506. and talk the while. The grammar here can be saved only 
 by regarding ' talk ' as a noun. 
 
182 THE SEASONS 
 
 595. Meaning 'disclosing every charm of motion'; otherwise, 
 a mistake for ' disclosing charm in every motion' 
 
 702. raised {nations). Protably a Scotticism for ' excited by 
 wine '. 
 
 742. After this line in the original text (1730-38) came the 
 following seventeen lines, dropped in 1744 : — 
 But is this equal to the vast efiect ? 
 Is thus the Volga filled 7 the rapid Rhine ? 
 The broad Euphrates ? all the unnumbered floods 
 That large refresh the fair-divided earth, 
 And in the rage of summer never cease 
 To send a thundering torrent to the main ? 
 
 What though the sun draws from the steaming deep 
 More than the rivers pour ! How much again 
 O'er the vext surge in bitter-driving showers 
 Frequent returns let the wet sailor say : 
 And on the thirsty down, far from the burst 
 Of springs, how much to their reviving fields 
 And feeding flocks let lonely shepherds sing. 
 But sure 'tis no weak variable cause 
 That keeps at once ten thousand thousand floods 
 Wide- wandering o'er the world, so fresh and clear. 
 For ever flowing and for ever full. 
 756-835. For these eighty lines the original text (1730-38) gives 
 
 only— 
 
 The vital stream 
 Hence, in its subterranean passage, gains 
 From the washed mineral that restoring power 
 And salutary virtue which anew 
 Strings every nerve, calls up the kindling soul 
 Into the healthful cheek and joyous eye : 
 And whence the royal maid, Amelia, blooms 
 With new-flushed graces, — yet reserved to bless 
 Beyond a crown some happy prince, and shine 
 In all her mother's matchless virtues dressed 
 The Carolina of another land. 
 786. high Olympus. The mountain called by that name in the 
 
 lesser Asia. — T. 
 793. the stony girdle of the world. The Moscovites call the 
 
 Riphean mountains Weliki Camenypoys, that is, the great 
 
 stony girdle; because they suppose them to encompass the whole 
 
 Earth.— T, 
 
AUTUMN 183 
 
 802. the bending Mountains of the Moon. A range of mountains 
 in Africa that surround almost all Monomotapa.— T. 
 
 893. Orca's or Betubium's highest peak. Oroa is for Orkney; 
 and Betubium is Duncansbay Head, the Berubium of Ptolemy. 
 
 929. John, Duke of Argyll and Greenwich. He was born in 
 1678, served with distinction under Marlborough in Flanders, and 
 is commonly known in Scotland as ' The Good Duke of Argyll '. 
 It was of him that Pope wrote — 
 
 ' Argyll, the state's whole thunder bom to wield 
 And shake alike the senate and the field ! ' 
 He died in 1743. 
 
 944. Duncan Forbes, of CuUoden, Lord President of the Court 
 of Session, in Scotland. Born 1685; Lord Advocate 1725; 
 Lord President 1737. Died 1747. 
 
 1004-29. Compare Tennyson's unrhymed lyric, ' Tears, idle 
 tears ', in The Princess. 
 
 1050. The Temple of Virtue in Stowe Gardens.— T. 
 
 Stowe was the seat of Lord Cobham (1. 1072), cousin to Lyttelton 
 It was at Lyttelton's seat, Hagley Park, that Thomson first met 
 Pitt (the elder — ^but then only commencing his political career). 
 
WINTER 
 
 [Originally (in 1726) dedicated by letter ' To the Eight 
 Honourable Sir Spencer Compton ' ; in 1730 simply inscribed 
 ' to the Right Honourable the Lord Wilmington '- Compton was 
 created Baron Wilmington in January, 1728, — Earl in May, 1730.] 
 
 THE ARGUMENT 
 
 The subject proposed. Address to the Earl of Wilmington. 
 First approach of Winter. According to the natural course of 
 the season, various storms described. Rain. Wind. Snow. 
 The driving of the snows : a man perishing among them ; whence 
 reflections on the wants and miseries of human life. The wolves 
 descending from the Alps and Apennines. A winter evening 
 described : as spent by philosophers ; by the country people ; 
 in the city. Frost. A view of Winter within the polar circle. 
 A thaw. The whole concluding with moral reflections on a 
 future state.* 
 
 * The above is, substantially, the Argument of the poem in the 
 first collected edition of The Seasons (1730). The words in 
 italics were added in 1744. In the Argument for 1730 appears 
 the note ' A short digression into Russia ', withdrawn in 1744; 
 and the passage on the wolves is noted as ' The wolves in Italy '. 
 Other differences in the Argument of 1730 are merely verbal — 
 ' Lord Wilmington ' for ' the Earl of Wilmington ', ' order ' for 
 ■ course ', ' its effects ' for ' a view of Winter ', and ' philosophical ' 
 for ' moral '- 
 
WINTER . 
 
 [First published in March, 1726 (405 11.) ; second ed. also in 
 1726 (463 11.) ; ed. of 1730— not the Quarto— the first collected 
 ed. of The Seasons (787 11.) ; final ed. in Author's lifetime, in 1746 
 (1,069 11.).] 
 
 See, Winter comes to rule the varied year, 
 Sullen and sad, with all his rising train — 
 Vapours, and clouds, and storms. Be these my theme ; 
 These, that exalt the soul to solemn thought 
 And heavenly musing. Welcome, kindred glooms ! 
 Cogenial horrors, hail ! With frequent foot, 
 Pleased have I, in my cheerful morn of life, 
 When nursed by careless solitude I hved 
 And sung of Nature with unceasing joy, 
 Pleased have I wandered through your rough domain ; 
 Trod the pure virgin-snows, myself as pure ; ii 
 
 Heard the winds roar, and the big torrent burst ; 
 Or seen the deep -fermenting tempest brewed 
 In the grim evening-sky. Thus passed the time, 
 Till through the lucid chambers of the south 
 Looked out the joyous Spring — ^looked out and smiled 
 
 To thee, the patron of this first essay. 
 The Muse, Wilmington ! renews her song. 
 Since has she rounded the revolving year : 
 Skimm'd the gay Spring ; on eagle-pinions borne. 
 Attempted through the Summer-blaze to rise ; 21 
 Then swept o'er Autumn with the shadowy gale. 
 And now among the Wintry clouds again, 
 RoUed in the doubhng storm, she tries to soar, 
 
 6 Cogenial] Wished, wintry first ed. (1726) ; cogenial from 
 1730. 10 domains first ed. (1726) ; domain from 1730. 
 
 14 grim] red first ed. (1726); grim 1744. 15 lucid] opening 
 
 first ed. (1726) ; lucid 1730. 17 this] her 1730-44. 17-40 
 This passage was introduced in 1730 on the publication of the 
 first collected ed. of The Seasons. 
 
186 THE SEASONS 
 
 To swell her note with all the rushing winds, 
 
 To suit her sounding cadence to the floods ; 
 
 As is her theme, her numbers wildly great. 
 
 Thrice happy, could she fill thy judging ear 
 
 With bold description and with manly thought ! 
 
 Nor art thou skilled in awful schemes alone, 30 
 
 And how to make a mighty people thrive ; 
 
 But equal goodness, sound integrity, 
 
 A firm, unshaken, uncorrupted soul 
 
 Amid a sliding age, and burning strong. 
 
 Not vainly blazing, for thy country's weal, 
 
 A steady spirit, regularly free — 
 
 These, each exalting each, the statesman hght 
 
 Into the patriot ; these, the pubUc hope 
 
 And eye to thee converting, bid the Muse 
 
 Record what envy dares not flattery call. 40 
 
 Now, when the cheerless empire of the sky 
 To Capricorn the Centaur- Archer yields, 
 And fierce Aquarius stains the inverted year — 
 Hung o'er the farthest verge of heaven, the sun 
 Scarce spreads o'er ether the dejected day. 
 Faint are his gleams, and ineffectual shoot 
 His struggling rays in horizontal lines 
 Through the thick air ; as clothed in cloudy storm, 
 
 30 For this Kne the original (1730-38) gives — 
 
 For thee the Graces smoothe, thy softer thoughts 
 The Muses tune ; nor art thou skilled alone 
 In awful schemes, the management of States &c. 
 38 these] and 1730-38. 41-4 Edd. 1730 to 1738 read- 
 
 When Scorpio gives to Capricorn the sway. 
 And fierce Aquarius fouls the inverted year, 
 Ketiring to the verge of heaven the sun &o. 
 41-71 For these lines there is in the first text of Winter a 
 long passage of nearly 100 11. that were withdrawn in 1730 and 
 utilized elsewhere in the collected Seasons. Thomson's use of 
 them is noted as it occurs. See the first Winter, p. 228. 
 
 48 clothed in cloudy storm] at dull distance seen 1730-38 
 
WINTER 187 
 
 Weak, wan, and broad, he skirts the southern 
 
 sky; 
 And, soon descending, to the long dark night, 50 
 Wide-shading all, the prostrate world resigns. 
 Nor is the night unwished ; while vital heat. 
 Light, life, and joy the dubious day forsake. 
 Meantime, in sable cincture, shadows vast. 
 Deep-tinged and damp, and congregated clouds. 
 And all the vapoury turbulence of heaven 
 Involve the face of things. Thus Winter falls, 
 A heavy gloom oppressive o'er the world, 
 Through Nature shedding influence malign, 
 And rouses up the seeds of dark disease. 60 
 
 The soul of man dies in him, loathing life. 
 And black with more than melancholy views. 
 The cattle droop ; and o'er the furrowed land, 
 Fresh from the plough, the dun discoloured flocks, 
 Untended spreading, crop the wholesome root. 
 Along the woods, along the moorish fens. 
 Sighs the sad genius of the coming storm ; 
 And up among the loose disjointed cliffs 
 And fractured mountains wild, the brawUng brook 
 And cave, presageful, send a hollow moan, 70 
 
 Resounding long in listening fancy's ear. 
 
 Then comes the father of the tempest forth. 
 Wrapt in black glooms. First, joyless rains obscure 
 Drive through the mingling skies with vapour foul. 
 Dash on the mountain's brow, and shake the woods 
 
 62, 63 And black with horrid views. The cattle droop 
 The conscious head, and o'er &c. 1730-38. 
 
 64 Fresh] Red 1730-38. 72 So from 1730; 
 
 For see ! where Winter comes himself contest first ed. (1726); 
 Winter ! who rides along the darkened air second ed. (1726). 
 
 73 Striding the gloomy blast. First rains obscure 1726-38. 
 74 vapour foul] tempest foul 1726 ; vapour vile 1730-38. 75 
 Dash] Beat 1726 ; daah from 1730. 
 
188 THE SEASONS 
 
 That grumbling wave below. The unsightly plain 
 Lies a brown deluge ; as the low-bent clouds 
 Pour flood on flood, yet unexhausted stiU 
 Combine, and, deepening into night, shut up 
 The day's fair face. The wanderers of heaven, 80 
 Each to his home, retire ; save those that love 
 To take their pastime in the troubled air, 
 Or skimming flutter round the dimply pool. 
 The cattle from the untasted fields return 
 And ask, with meaning low, their wonted stalls. 
 Or ruminate in the contiguous shade. 
 Thither the household feathery people crowd. 
 The crested cock, with all his female train, 
 Pensive and dripping ; while the cottage-hind 
 Hangs o'er the enhvening blaze, and taleful there 90 
 Recounts his simple frohc : much he talks, 
 And much he laughs, nor recks the storm that blows 
 Without, and rattles on his humble roof. 
 
 Wide o'er the brim, with many a torrent swelled. 
 And the mixed ruin of its banks o'erspread, 
 At last the roused-up river pours along : 
 Resistless, roaring, dreadful, down it comes. 
 From the rude mountain and the mossy wild, 
 Tumbling through rocks abrupt, and sounding far ; 
 Then o'er the sanded valley floating spreads, 100 
 
 y6 grumbling . . unsightly] sounding . . dreary first ed. (1726) ; 
 sounding . . unsightly second ed. (1726) ; as above 1730. 
 
 77-9 Lies overwhelmed and lost. The bellying clouds 
 Combine and, deepening into night, shut up 1726 
 as above, 1730. 
 
 83 Or] And first ed. (1726) ; pool] flood 1726, pool from 1730. 
 89 and wet. Meanwhile the cottage-swain 1726-38. 04, 95 
 
 These lines do not appear in the edd. 1726 : they are found (with 
 'ruins' for 'ruin') in 1730. 96 roused-up river] muddy 
 
 deluge 1726. 97 In the firstedd. (1726-3?) a semicolon sepa- 
 rated ' roaring ' from ' dreadful ' 98 rude] ehapt 1726-38. 
 
WINTER 189 
 
 Calm, sluggish, silent ; till again, constrained 
 Between two meeting hiUs, it bursts a way 
 Where rooks and woods o'erhang the turbid stream ; 
 There, gathering triple force, rapid and deep. 
 It boUs, and wheels, and foams, and thunders through. 
 
 Nature ! great parent ! whose unceasing hand 
 Rolls round the Seasons of the changeful year. 
 How mighty, how majestic are thy works ! 
 With what a pleasing dread they swell the soul. 
 That sees astonished, and astonished sings ! no 
 
 Ye too, ye winds ! that now begin to blow 
 With boisterous sweep, I raise my voice to you. 
 Where are your stores, ye powerful beings ! say. 
 Where your aerial magazines reserved 
 To swell the brooding terrors of the storm ? 
 In what far-distant region of the sky, 
 Hushed in deep silence, sleep you when 'tis calm ? 
 
 Whon from the paUid sky the Sun descends. 
 With many a spot, that o'er his glaring orb 
 Uncertain wanders, stained ; red fiery streaks 120 
 Begin to flush around. The reehng clouds 
 Stagger with dizzy poise, as doubting yet 
 Which master to obey ; while, rising slow. 
 Blank in the leaden-coloured east, the moon 
 
 102 Betwixt . . a way first ed. (1726) and 1730; Betwixt. . 
 away second ed. (1726) ; Between . . a way 1744, 1746. 106 
 
 unceasing] directing 1726 ; continual 1730-38. 1 1 1 Ye] You 
 
 1726. 113 powerful] viewless 1726; subtile 1730-38. 115 
 Against the day of tempest perilous 1726-38. 1 16 In what 
 
 untravelled country of the air 1726; as above 1730. 117 
 
 deep] still 1726; dead 1730-44. 118, 119 Added in 1744. 
 
 120 Late in the lowfing sky red fiery streaks 1726-38. Before 
 1744 the paragraph opened with this line. 121 around] about 
 1726-38. 122 poise] aim 1726; poise /rom 1730. 124 Blank] 
 Sad first ed. (1726); Blank second ed. (1726). 
 
190 THE SEASONS 
 
 Wears a wan circle round her blunted horns. 
 Seen through the turbid, fluctuating air, 
 The stars obtuse emit a shivering ray ; 
 Or frequent seem to shoot athwart the gloom, 
 And long behind them trail the whitening blaze. 
 Snatched in short eddies, plays the withered leaf ; 
 And on the flood the dancing feather floats. 13T 
 
 With broadened nostrils to the sky upturned, 
 The conscious heifer snuffs the stormy gale. 
 Even, as the matron, at her nightly task. 
 With pensive labour draws the flaxen thread. 
 The wasted taper and the crackling flame 
 Foretell the blast. But chief the plumy race, 
 The tenants of the sky, its changes speak. 
 Retiring from the downs, where all day long 139 
 They picked their scanty fare, a blackening train 
 Of clamorous rooks thick-urge their weary flight. 
 And seek the closing shelter of the grove. 
 Assiduous, in his bower, the wailing owl 
 Plies his sad song. The cormorant on high 
 Wheels from the deep, and screams along the land. 
 Loud shrieks the soaring hern ; and with wild wing 
 The circling sea-fowl cleave the flaky clouds. 
 Ocean, unequal pressed, with broken tide 
 And blind commotion heaves ; while from the shore. 
 Eat into caverns by the restless wave, 150 
 
 And forest-rustling mountain comes a voice 
 That, solemn- sounding, bids the world prepare. 
 
 125 her blunted horns] her sullied orb 1726-38; wan] black 
 erratum for bleak first ed. (1726). 
 
 126-45 Introduced in 1744 — except 1. 127 and 1. 130, which 
 occur in edd. 1 730-38 ; in the latter line, however, ' flutteriiig 
 straw ' was used for ' withered leaf '. 
 
 146 with wild wing] screaming wild 1730-38. 147 cleave 
 
 the flaky clouds] rise ; while from the shore 1730-38. 148, 149 
 
 From ' Ocean ' to ' heaves ' was added in 1744. 
 
WINTER 191 
 
 Then issues forth the storm with sudden burst, 
 And hurls the whole precipitated air 
 Down in a torrent. On the passive main 
 Descends the ethereal force, and with strong gust 
 Turns from its bottom the discoloured deep. 
 Through the black night that sits immense around, 
 Lashed into foam, the fierce-conflicting brine 
 Seems o'er a thousand raging waves to burn. i6o 
 Meantime the mountain-billows, to the clouds 
 In dreadful tumult swelled, surge above surge. 
 Burst into chaos with tremendous roar. 
 And anchored navies from their stations drive 
 Wild as the winds, across the howling waste 
 Of mighty waters : now the inflated wave 
 Straining they scale, and now impetuous shoot 
 Into the secret chambers of the deep. 
 The wintry Baltic thundering o'er their head. 
 Emerging thence again, before the breath 170 
 
 Of fuU-exerted heaven they wing their course, 
 
 153 sudden burst] loud control first ed., mad control second ed. 
 (1726), and on to 1738. 
 
 IS4> 155 And the thin fabric of the pillared air O'erturns at 
 once. Prone on the uncertain main first ed. (1726) ; also second ed. 
 (1726) and on to 1738, except that ' passive ' takes the place of 
 ' uncertain '. 
 
 156 with strong gust] ploughs its waves 1726. 157 With 
 
 dreadful rift first ed. ; In frightful furrows second ed. (1726). 
 
 157-175 These lines did not appear in the earlier texts. For 
 the original text, which they displaced, see 11. 165-72 of the first 
 ed., given at the end of the poem. For the text of the second ed. 
 (1726) see Note at p. 232. 
 
 158 Through the loud night that bids the waves arise 1730-38. 
 
 160 Seems, as it sparkles, all around to burn 1730-38. 
 
 161-3 Edd. 1730-38 give- 
 Meantime whole oceans, heaving to the clouds. 
 And in broad billows rolling gathered seas, 
 Surge over surge, burst in a general roar &'c. 
 
 166 inflated] hilly 1730-38. 169 wintry] full-blown 1730-38. 
 
192 THE SEASONS 
 
 And dart on distant coasts — if some sharp rock 
 
 Or shoal insidious break not their career, 
 
 And in loose fragments fling them floating round. 
 
 Nor less at land the loosened tempest reigns. 
 The mountain thunders, and its sturdy sons 
 Stoop to the bottom of the rocks they shade. 
 Lone on the midnight steep, and all aghast. 
 The dark wayfaring stranger breathless toils. 
 And, often falling, climbs against the blast. i8o 
 
 Low waves the rooted forest, vexed, and sheds 
 What of its tarnished honours yet remain — 
 Dashed down and scattered, by the tearing vraid's 
 Assiduous fury, its gigantic Hmbs. 
 Thus struggling through the dissipated grove. 
 The whirling tempest raves along the plain ; 
 And, on the cottage thatched or lordly roof 
 Keen-fastening, shakes them to the solid base. 
 Sleep frighted flies ; and round the rocking dome, 
 For entrance eager, howls the savage blast. igo 
 
 Then too, they say, through aU the burdened air 
 Long groans are heard, shriU sounds, and distant sighs, 
 That, uttered by the demon of the night. 
 Warn the devoted wretch of woe and death. 
 
 172 coast 1730-38. 173 shoal] sand 1730-38. 
 
 175 For this line edd. 1 730-38 give the following four lines : — 
 Nor raging here alone unreined at sea. 
 
 To land the tempest bears ; and o'er the cliff, 
 Where screams the seamew, foaming unconfined. 
 Fierce swallows up the long-resounding shore. 
 
 176 thunders and] growls and alll 726-38. 178 the . . steep] 
 its . . side 1726-38. 180 The firstand second edd. (1726) omit 
 ' of ten falling ' — thus giving an imperfect line. 182 tarnished 
 . . remain] leafy . . remains 1726. 183, 184 These lines 
 are not in the early edd. They are found in 1730. 187 roof] 
 dome 1726. 189, 190 and round &o.] the hollow chimney 
 howls. The windows rattle, and the hinges creak. 1726. 193 
 uttered] murmured 1726. 
 
WINTER 193 
 
 Huge uproar lords it wide. The clouds, commixed 
 With stars swift-gliding, sweep along the sky. 
 AU Nature reels : till Nature's King, who oft 
 Amid tempestuous darkness dwells alone. 
 And on the wings of the careering wind 
 Walks dreadfully serene, commands a calm ; 200 
 Then straight air, sea, and earth are hushed at once. 
 
 As yet 'tis midnight deep. The weary clouds. 
 Slow-meeting, mingle into solid gloom. 
 Now, while the drowsy world lies lost in sleep, 
 Let me associate with the serious Night, 
 And Contemplation, her sedate compeer ; 
 Let me shake off the intrusive cares of day, 
 And lay the meddling senses all aside. 
 
 Where now, ye lying vanities of life ! 
 Ye ever-tempting, ever-cheating train ! 210 
 
 Where are you now ? and what is your amount ? 
 Vexation, disappointment, and remorse. 
 Sad, sickening thought ! and yet deluded man, 
 A scene of crude disjointed visions past, 
 And broken slumbers, rises still resolved. 
 With new-fiushed hopes, to run the giddy round. 
 
 Father of light and life ! thou Good Supreme ! 
 teach me what is good ! teach me ThyseK ! 
 Save me from folly, vanity, and vice, 
 From every low pursuit ; and feed my soul 220 
 
 With knowledge, conscious peace, and virtue pure — 
 Sacred, substantial, never-fading bliss ! 
 
 195 Huge] Wide first ed. (1726). 
 
 197-201 This passage first appeared in the second ed. (1726). 
 The text of the first ed. (1726) was as follows : — 
 
 All Nature reels. But hark ! The Almighty speaks : 
 Instant the chidden storm begins to pant 
 And dies at once into a noiseless calm. 
 202 midnight's reign 1726 ; midnight waste second ed. 1726-38. 
 205 serious] low-browed 1726. 209 Where] And 1726-38. 
 
 THOMSON Q 
 
194 THE SEASONS 
 
 The keener tempests come : and, fuming dun 
 Prom all the livid east or piercing north, 
 Thick clouds ascend, in whose capacious womb 
 A vapoury deluge lies, to snow congealed. 
 Heavy they roll their fleecy world along. 
 And the sky saddens with the gathered storm. 
 Through the hushed air the whitening shower descends, 
 At first thin-wavering ; till at last the flakes 230 
 
 Pall broad and wide and fast, dimming the day 
 With a continual flow. The cherished fields 
 Put on their winter-robe of purest white. 
 'Tis brightness all ; save where the new snow melts 
 Along the mazy current. Low the woods 
 Bow their hoar head ; and, ere the languid sun 
 Paint from the west emits his evening ray, 
 Earth's universal face, deep-hid and chUl, 
 Is one wild dazzling waste, that buries wide 
 The works of man. Drooping, the labourer-ox 240 
 Stands covered o'er with snow, and then demands 
 The fruit of all his toil. The fowls of heaven, 
 
 223 This line is not in the earlier text (1726). 224 From 
 
 all] Lo ! from first ed. ; Dun from second ed. (1726). 228 
 
 gathered] impending 1726. 232 The cherished fields] Sudden 
 the fields 1730-38. 232-4 The first ed. gives- 
 
 See ! sudden hoared 
 The woods beneath the stainless burden bow. 
 Blackening along the mazy stream it melts. 
 The second ed. gives — 
 
 Blackening they melt 
 Along the mazy stream. The leafless woods 
 Bow their hoar' heads. And ere &c. 
 235 Low the woods] The leafless woods 1730-38. 236,237 
 First introduced in second ed. (1726) ; ' heads ' to 1744. 
 
 239 wide] deep 1744. 239, 240 For these two lines the 
 
 first and second edd. (1726) give only — 
 
 Is all one dazzling waste. The labourer-ox ; 
 and edd. 1730-38 give— 
 
 Is one wild dazzling waste, &o. 
 
WINTER 195 
 
 Tamed by the cruel season, crowd around 
 The winnowing store, and claim the little boon 
 Which Providence assigns them. One alone, 
 The redbreast, sacred to the household gods, 
 Wisely regardful of the embroiling sky. 
 In joyless fields and thorny thickets leaves 
 His shivering mates, and pays to trusted man 
 His annual visit. Half afraid, he first 250 
 
 Against the window beats ; then brisk alights 
 On the warm hearth ; then, hopping o'er the floor. 
 Eyes all the smiling family askance, 
 And pecks, and starts, and wonders where he is — 
 TUl, more familiar grown, the table-crumbs 
 Attract his slender feet. The foodless wilds 
 Pour forth their brown inhabitants. The hare, 
 Though timorous of heart, and hard beset 
 By death in various forms, dark snares, and dogs. 
 And more unpitying men, the garden seeks, 260 
 Urged on by fearless want. The bleating kind 
 Eye the bleak heaven, and next the glistening earth, 
 With looks of dumb despair ; then, sad-dispersed, 
 Dig for the withered herb through heaps of snow. 
 Now, shepherds, to your helpless charge be kind : 
 
 245 Which . . assigns them.] That . . allows. 1726-38. The 
 lines on the redbreast are not in the first ed. : they were intro- 
 duced in the second ed. (1726), beginning thus : — 
 
 The redbreast sole, 
 Wisely regardful &c. 
 The variations are noted below. In the Quarto ed. of The Seasons 
 (1730), only four of the ten lines on the redbreast appear ; in the 
 octavo of the same year, the whole ten. 
 
 246 sacred to the household gods not in the original (second ed., 
 1726) : added 1744. 249 mates, and pays] fellows, and 
 original (second ed., 1726), to 1738. 250 His annual visit 
 pays : new to the dome original (second ed., 1726) to 1738. 
 252 then] and second ed. (1726) to 1738. 262 Heavens 1726. 
 263 sad-dispersed] sad, dispersed 1726-38. 
 
 o2 
 
196 THE SEASONS 
 
 Baffle the raging year, and fill their pens 
 With food at wiU ; lodge them below the storm, 
 And watch them strict : for, from the bellowing east, 
 In this dire season, oft the whirlwind's wing 
 Sweeps up the burden of whole wintry plains 270 
 In one wide waft, and o'er the hapless flocks, 
 Hid in the hollow of two neighbouring hills. 
 The billowy tempest whelms ; till, upward urged, 
 The valley to a shining mountain swells, 
 Tipt with a wreath high-curhng in the sky. 
 
 As thus the snows arise, and, foul and fierce, 
 All Winter drives along the darkened air. 
 In his own loose-revolving fields the swain 
 Disastered stands ; sees other hills ascend. 
 Of unknown joyless brow ; and other scenes, 280 
 Of horrid prospect, shag the trackless plain ; 
 Nor finds the river nor the forest, hid 
 Beneath the formless wild ; but wanders on 
 From hiU to dale, stiU more and more astray — 
 Impatient flouncing through the drifted heaps. 
 Stung with the thoughts of home : the thoughts of 
 
 home 
 Rush on his nerves and call their vigour forth 
 In many a vain attempt. How sinks his soul ! 
 What black despair, what horror fiUs his heart, 
 
 267 storm] blast first ed. (1726). 271 wide waft] fierce 
 
 blast 1726 ; hapless] unhappy 1726. 272 Hid] Lodged first 
 
 ed. (1726). 273 upwards 1726-38. 275 That curls its 
 
 wreaths amid the freezing sky 1726. 
 
 276-423 These lines do not appear in the first ed. (March, 1726) ; 
 a passage of 39 11., descriptive of the Bear and Wolves, was intro- 
 duced in the second ed. (June, 1726). The passage descriptive 
 of the Bear in Russian wilds will be found in a Note at the end 
 of the poem ; another passage, descriptive of the Bear in Siberian 
 wilds (as given in edd. 1730-38), will also be found at the same 
 place. See also 11. 827-33, and 11. 895-7, infra. 
 
 783 formless wild] white abrupt 1730-38, 
 
WINTER 197 
 
 When, for the dusky spot which fancy feigned 290 
 
 His tufted cottage rising through the snow, 
 
 He meets the roughness of the middle waste, 
 
 Far from the track and blest abode of man ; 
 
 While round him night resistless closes fast, 
 
 And every tempest, howling o'er his head. 
 
 Renders the savage wilderness more wild. 
 
 Then throng the busy shapes into his mind 
 
 Of covered pits, unfathomably deep, 
 
 A dire descent ! beyond the power of frost ; 
 
 Of faithless bogs ; of precipices huge, 300 
 
 Smoothed up with snow ; and (what is land unknown, 
 
 What water) of the still unfrozen spring. 
 
 In the loose marsh or sohtary lake. 
 
 Where the fresh fountain from the bottom boils. 
 
 These check his fearful steps ; and down he sinks 
 
 Beneath the shelter of the shapeless drift. 
 
 Thinking o'er all the bitterness of death. 
 
 Mixed with the tender anguish nature shoots 
 
 Through the wrung bosom of the dying man — 
 
 His wife, his children, and his friends unseen. 310 
 
 In vain for him the officious wife prepares 
 
 The fire fair-blazing and the vestment warm ; 
 
 In vain his little children, peeping out 
 
 Into the mingling storm, demand their sire 
 
 With tears of artless innocence. Alas ! 
 
 Nor wife nor children more shall he behold, 
 
 Nor friends, nor sacred home. On every nerve 
 
 The deadly Winter seizes, shuts up sense, 
 
 And, o'er his inmost vitals creeping cold. 
 
 Lays him along the snows a stiffened corse, 320 
 
 Stretched out, and bleaching in the northern blast. 
 
 290 which] that 1730-38. 293 track] tract 1730-38. 302 
 spring] eye 1730-38. 314 storm] rack 1730-38. 319 inmost] 
 stronger 1730-38. 321 Unstretched 1730-38. 
 
198 THE SEASONS 
 
 Ah ! little think the gay licentious proud, 
 Whom pleasure, power, and afBuence surround- - 
 They, who their thoughtless hours in giddy mirth, 
 And wanton, often cruel, riot waste — 
 Ah ! little think they, while they dance along. 
 How many feel, this very moment, death 
 And all the sad variety of pain ; 
 How many sink in the devouring flood, 
 Or more devouring flame ; how many bleed, 330 
 By shameful variance betwixt man and man ; 
 How many pine in want, and dungeon-glooms. 
 Shut from the common air and common use 
 Of their own limbs ; how many drink the cup 
 Of baleful grief, or eat the bitter bread 
 Of misery ; sore pierced by wintry winds. 
 How many shrink into the sordid hut 
 Of cheerless poverty ; how many shake 
 With all the fiercer tortures of the mind. 
 Unbounded passion, madness, guilt, remorse — 340 
 Whence, tumbled headlong from the height of Hfe, 
 They furnish matter for the tragic muse ; 
 Even in the vale, where wisdom loves to dwell. 
 With friendship, peace, and contemplation joined. 
 How many, racked with honest passions, droop 
 In deep retired distress ; how many stand 
 Around the death-bed of their dearest friends. 
 And point the parting anguish ! Thought fond man 
 Of these, and all the thousand nameless iUs 
 That one incessant struggle render life, 350 
 
 One scene of toil, of suffering, and of fate, 
 
 347 Following this line came (edd. 1730-38) — 
 Like wailing pensiye ghosts awaiting theirs, — 
 
 dropped in 1744. 
 
 348 anguish! Thought] pang ! Thought but 1730-38. 351 
 sufiering] anguish 1730-38. 
 
WINTER 199 
 
 Vice in his high career would stand appalled, 
 And heedless rambling Impulse learn to think ; 
 The conscious heart of Charity would warm, 
 And her wide wish Benevolence dilate ; 
 The social tear would rise, the social sigh ; 
 And, into clear perfection, gradual bliss, 
 Refining still, the social passions work. 
 
 And here can I forget the generous band 
 Who, touched with human woe, redressive searched 360 
 Into the horrors of the gloomy jail? 
 Unpitied and unheard where misery moans. 
 Where sickness pines, where thirst and hunger 
 
 burn. 
 And poor misfortune feels the lash of vice ; 
 While in the land of liberty — the land 
 Whose every street and pubhc meeting glow 
 With open freedom — little tyrants raged, 
 Snatched the lean morsel from the starving mouth. 
 Tore from cold wintry limbs the tattered weed. 
 Even robbed them of the last of comforts, sleep, 370 
 The free-born Briton to the dungeon chained 
 Or, as the lust of cruelty prevailed. 
 At pleasure marked him with inglorious stripes, 
 And crushed out hves, by secret barbarous ways, 
 That for their country would have toiled or bled. 
 great design ! if executed well. 
 With patient care and wisdom-tempered zeal. 
 Ye sons of mercy ! yet resume the search ; 
 Drag forth the legal monsters into light, 
 
 359 band] few 1730-38. 360 searched] sought 1730-38. 
 
 366 glows 1730-38. 369 weed] robe 1730-38. 374 secret 
 
 barbarous] various nameless 1730-38. 
 
 376-8 Hail, patriot band ! who, scorning secret scorn, 
 
 When justice and when mercy led the way, 1730-38 
 
 379 Dragged the detected, &c., 1730-38. 
 
200 THE SEASONS 
 
 Wrench from their hands Oppression's iron rod, 380 
 And bid the cruel feel the pains they give. 
 Much still untouched remains ; in this rank age, 
 Much is the patriot's weeding hand required. 
 The toils of law — what dark insidious men 
 Have cumbrous added to perplex the truth 
 And lengthen simple justice into trade — 
 How glorious were the day that saw these broke. 
 And every man within the reach of right ! 
 
 By wintry famine roused, from all the tract 
 Of horrid mountains which the shining Alps, 390 
 And wavy Apennines, and Pyrenees 
 Branch out stupendous into distant lands, 
 Cruel as death, and hungry as the grave ! 
 Burning for blood, bony, and gaunt, and grim ! 
 Assembling wolves in raging troops descend ; 
 And, pouring o'er the country, bear along, 
 Keen as the north-wind sweeps the glossy snow. 
 AU is their prize. They fasten on the steed. 
 Press him to earth, and pierce his mighty heart. 
 
 380 Wrenched . . hand 1730-38. 381 bid . . give] bade 
 
 . gave 1730-38. 382 Preceding this line add. 1730-38 give 
 
 the following two lines (dropped in 1744) : — 
 
 Yet stop not here ! let all the land rejoice, 
 And make the blessing unconfined as great. 
 388 Following this line, appeared in ed. 1730 a passage of 16 11., 
 given on p. 243. 389-92 For these lines appeared in the original 
 (second ed., June, 1726), and remained on to 1738, the following : — 
 Or from the cloudy Alps and Appenine {sic) 
 Capt with grey mists and everlasting snows. 
 Where nature in stupendous ruin lies, 
 And from the leaning rock on either side 
 Gush out those streams that classic song renowns, &o. 
 391 Appenines 1746. 395 raging] torrent seconded. (1726) 
 
 to 1738. 396 Instead of this line the second ed. (1726) gives — 
 And spread wide-wasting desolation round. 
 Nought may their course withstand. They bear along, &c. 
 
WINTER 201 
 
 Nor can the bull his a-wful front defend, 4°° 
 
 Or shake the murdering savages away. 
 
 Rapacious, at the mother's throat they fly. 
 
 And tear the screaming infant from her breast. 
 
 The godlike face of man avails him naught. 
 
 Even Beauty, force divine ! at whose bright glance 
 
 The generous lion stands in softened gaze, 
 
 Here bleeds, a hapless undistinguished prey. 
 
 But if, apprised of the severe attack, 
 
 The country be shut up, lured by the scent. 
 
 On churchyards drear (inhuman to relate !) 410 
 
 The disappointed prowlers fall, and dig 
 
 The shrouded body from the grave ; o'er which. 
 
 Mixed with foul shades and frighted ghosts, they howl. 
 
 Among those hiUy regions, where, embraced 
 In peaceful vales, the happy Grisons dwell. 
 Oft, rushing sudden from the loaded cliffs. 
 Mountains of snow their gathering terrors roll. 
 From steep to steep, loud thundering, down they come, 
 A wintry waste in dire commotion all ; 
 And herds, and flocks, and travellers, and swains, 420 
 And sometimes whole brigades of marching troops, 
 Or hamlets sleeping in the dead of night. 
 Are deep beneath the smothering ruin whelmed. 
 
 Now, all amid the rigours of the year. 
 In the wild depth of winter, while without 
 The ceaseless winds blow ice, be my retreat. 
 Between the groaning forest and the shore. 
 Beat by the boundless multitude of waves, 
 A rural, sheltered, solitary scene ; 
 
 412 grave] tomb second ed. (1726) to 1738. 414-23 These 
 
 lines were introduced in ed. 1744. 426 ice] keen 1726, both 
 
 first and second edd. 427, 428 These two lines are not in 
 
 the edd. of 1726; they appear in edd. 1730-38, with 'a' for 
 'the' in the second line. 
 
202 THE SEASONS 
 
 Where ruddy fire and beaming tapers join 430 
 
 To cheer the gloom. There studious let me sit, 
 
 And hold high converse with the mighty dead — 
 
 Sages of ancient time, as gods revered, 
 
 As gods beneficent, who blessed mankind 
 
 With arts and arms, and humanized a world. 
 
 Roused at the inspiring thought, I throw aside 
 
 The long-lived volume, and deep-musing hail 
 
 The sacred shades that slowly rising pass 
 
 Before my wondering eyes. First Socrates, 
 
 Who, firmly good in a corrupted state, 440 
 
 Against the rage of tyrants single stood, 
 
 Invincible ! calm reason's holy law, 
 
 That voice of God within the attentive mind, 
 
 Obeying, fearless or in life or death : 
 
 Great moral teacher ! wisest of mankind ! 
 
 Solon the next, who built his commonweal 
 
 On equity's wide base ; by tender laws 
 
 A lively people curbing, yet undamped 
 
 Preserving still that quick peculiar fire. 
 
 Whence in the laurelled field of finer arts, 450 
 
 And of bold freedom, they unequalled shone. 
 
 The pride of smiling Greece and human-kind. 
 
 Lycurgus then, who bowed beneath the force 
 
 431 To chase the cheerless gloom: there let me sit 1726-38. 
 440-45 For these lines the add. of 1726 give only — 
 Truth's early champion, martyr for his God ; 
 the edd. 1730-38 give— 
 
 Whose simple question to the folded heart 
 
 Stole unperceived, and from the maze of thought 
 
 Evolved the secret truth, — a god-like man ! 
 
 446 commonwealth 1730-38. 
 
 447 wide] firm 1726. The passage beginning here ' by tender 
 laws ', and going on to the end of 1. 452, was introduced in 1744. 
 
 453-529 The readings of the first ed., the second, and the edd. 
 of 1730-38 differ from this, and from each other : they are all 
 given in a Note at the end of the poem. 
 
WINTER 203 
 
 Of strictest discipline, severely wise, 
 
 All human passions. Following him I see, 
 
 As at Thermopylae he glorious fell. 
 
 The firm devoted chief, who proved by deeds 
 
 The hardest lesson which the other taught. 
 
 Then Aristides lifts his honest front ; 
 
 Spotless of heart, to whom the unflattering voice 
 
 Of freedom gave the noblest name of Just ; 461 
 
 In pure majestic poverty revered ; 
 
 Who, even his glory to his country's weal 
 
 Submitting, swelled a haughty rival's fame. 
 
 Reared by his care, of softer ray appears 
 
 Cimon, sweet-souled ; whose genius, rising strong, 
 
 Shook off the load of young debauch ; abroad 
 
 The scourge of Persian pride, at home the friend 
 
 Of every worth and every splendid art ; 
 
 Modest and simple in the pomp of wealth. 470 
 
 Then the last worthies of declining Greece, 
 
 Late-called to glory, in unequal times, 
 
 Pensive appear. The fair Corinthian boast, 
 
 Timoleon, tempered happy, mild, and firm, 
 
 Who wept the brother while the tyrant bled; 
 
 And, equal to the best, the Theban pair, 
 
 Whose virtues, in heroic concord joined, 
 
 Their country raised to freedom, empire, fame. 
 
 He too, with whom Athenian honour sunk, 
 
 And left a mass of sordid lees behind, — 480 
 
 Phocion the Good ; in public fife severe, 
 
 To virtue still inexorably firm ; 
 
 But when, beneath his low illustrious roof, 
 
 Sweet peace and happy wisdom smoothed his brow, 
 
 Not friendship softer was, nor love more kind. 
 
 And he, the last of old Lycurgus' sons. 
 
 The generous victim to that vain attempt 
 
 To save a rotten state — Agis, who saw 
 
204 THE SEASONS 
 
 Even Sparta's self to servile avarice sunk. 
 The two Achaian heroes close the train — 49o 
 
 Aratus, who a while relumed the soul 
 Of fondly Ungering liberty in Greece ; 
 And he, her darling, as her latest hope, 
 The gallant Philopoemen, who to arms 
 Turned the luxurious pomp he could not cure, 
 Or toiling in his farm, a simple swain, 
 Or bold and skilful thundering in the field. 
 Of rougher front, a mighty people come, 
 A race of heroes ! in those virtuous times 
 Which knew no stain, save that with partial flame 500 
 Their dearest country they too fondly loved. 
 Her better founder first, the Light of Rome, 
 Numa, who softened her rapacious sons ; 
 Servius, the king who laid the solid base 
 On which o'er earth the vast republic spread. 
 Then the great consuls venerable rise : 
 The public father who the private quelled. 
 As on the dread tribunal, sternly sad ; 
 He, whom his thankless country could not lose, 
 Camillus, only vengeful to her foes ; 510 
 
 Fabricius, scorner of all-conquering gold. 
 And Cincinnatus, awful from the plough ; 
 Thy willing victim, Carthage ! bursting loose 
 Prom all that pleading Nature could oppose, 
 From a whole city's tears, by rigid faith 
 Imperious called, and honour's dire command ; 
 Scipio, the gentle chief, humanely brave, 
 Who soon the race of spotless glory ran. 
 And, warm in youth, to the poetic shade 
 With friendship and philosophy retired ; 520 
 
 Tully, whose powerful eloquence a while 
 Restrained the rapid fate of rushing Rome ; 
 Unconquered Cato, virtuous in extreme ; 
 
WINTER 205 
 
 And thou, unhappy Brutus, kind of heart, 
 Whose steady arm, by awful virtue urged, 
 Lifted the Roman steel against thy friend. 
 Thousands besides the tribute of a verse 
 Demand ; but who can count the stars of heaven ? 
 Who sing their influence on this lower world ? 
 
 Behold, who yonder comes ! in sober state, 530 
 Fair, mild, and strong as is a vernal sun : 
 'Tis Phoebus' self, or else the Mantuan swain ! 
 Great Homer too appears, of daring wing. 
 Parent of song ! and equal by his side. 
 The British Muse ; join'd hand in hand they walk, 
 Darkling, full up the middle steep to fame. 
 Nor absent are those shades, whose skiMul touch 
 Pathetic drew the impassioned heart, and charmed 
 Transported Athens with the moral scene ; 
 Nor those who, tuneful, waked the enchanting lyre. 540 
 
 First of your kind ! society divine ! 
 StiU visit thus my nights, for you reserved, 
 
 530 Behold] But see 1730-38. S30-40 The first ed. (1726) 
 
 gives — 
 
 But see who yonder comes ! nor comes alone. 
 
 With sober state and of majestic mien. 
 
 The sister-muses in his train — 'Tis he ! 
 
 Maro, the best of poets, and of men ! 
 
 Great Homer, too, appears, of daring wing ! 
 
 Parent of Song ! and equal, by his side. 
 
 The British muse : joined hand in hand, they walk 
 
 Darkling, nor miss their way to fame's ascent. 
 For the fourth of these lines the second ed. (June, 1726) gives— 
 
 Maro ! the glory of the poet's art ! 
 537 touch] hand 1744. 537-40 Edd. 1730-38 give— 
 
 Nor absent are those tuneful shades, I ween, 
 
 Taught by the graces, whose enchanting touch 
 
 Shakes every passion from the various string; 
 
 Nor those who solemnize the moral scene. 
 541 Society divine ! immortal minds ! 1726. 
 
206 THE SEASONS 
 
 And mount my soaring soul to thougnts like yours. 
 Silence, thou lonely power ! the door be thine ; 
 See on the hallowed hour that none intrude, 
 Save a few chosen friends, who sometimes deign 
 To bless my humble roof, with sense refined, 
 Learning digested well, exalted faith, 
 Unstudied wit, and humour ever gay. 
 Or from the Muses' hill will Pope descend, 550 
 
 To raise the sacred hour, to bid it smile. 
 And with the social spirit warm the heart ; 
 For, though not sweeter his own Homer sings. 
 Yet is his life the more endearing song. 
 
 Where art thou, Hammond ? thou the darling pride. 
 The friend and lover of the tuneful throng ! 
 Ah ! why, dear youth, in all the blooming prime 
 Of vernal genius, where, disclosing fast. 
 Each active worth, each manly virtue lay, 
 Why wert thou ravished from our hope so soon ? 560 
 What now avails that noble thirst of fame, 
 Which stung thy fervent breast ? that treasured store 
 Of knowledge, early gained ? that eager zeal 
 To serve thy country, glowing in the band 
 Of youthful patriots who sustain her name ? 
 What now, alas ! that life-diffusing charm 
 Of sprightly wit ? that rapture for the muse, 
 That heart of friendship, and that soul of joy, 
 Which bade with softest hght thy virtues smile ? 
 Ah ! only showed to check our fond pursuits, 570 
 And teach our humbled hopes that life is vain. 
 
 543 thoughts] deeds 1726-38. 546 who] that 1744. 
 
 546, 547 Save Lycidas the friend, with sense refined 1726-38. 
 550-54 These hnes are not in the earlier texts. The only varia- 
 tion in the text of edd. 1730-38 is ' make ' for ' bid ', 1. 551. 
 555-71 This passage was added after the death of Hammond in 
 1742 : it first appeared in ed. 1744. 
 
WINTER 207 
 
 Thus in some deep retirement would I pass 
 The winter-glooms with friends of pliant soul, 
 Or blithe or solemn, as the theme inspired : 
 With them would search if nature's boundless frame 
 Was called, late-rising, from the void of night. 
 Or sprung eternal from the Eternal Mind ; 
 Its life, its laws, its progress, and its end. 
 Hence larger prospects of the beauteous whole 
 Would gradual open on our opening minds ; 580 
 
 And each diffusive harmony unite 
 In fuU perfection to the astonished eye. 
 Then would we try to scan the moral world, 
 Which, though to us it seems embroiled, moves on 
 In higher order, fitted and impelled 
 By wisdom's finest hand, and issuing aU 
 In general good. The sage historic muse 
 Should next conduct us through the deeps of time. 
 Show us how empire grew, declined, and fell 
 In scattered states ; what makes the nations smile, 590 
 Improves their soil, and gives them double suns ; 
 And why they pine beneath the brightest skies 
 In nature's richest lap. As thus we talked, 
 Our hearts would burn within us, would inhale 
 That portion of divinity, that ray 
 Of purest heaven, which lights the pubUc soul 
 Of patriots and of heroes. But, if doomed 
 In powerless humble fortune to repress 
 
 572-652 These eighty-one lines are not in the earlier text : they 
 occur in edd. 1730-38. 573 pliant soul] various turn 1730-38. 
 575 nature's boundless] this unbounded 1730-38. 576 0£ 
 
 nature rose from unproductive night 1730-38. 577 Mind] 
 
 Cause 1730-38. 578 life] springs 1730-38. 583 Then . . 
 
 try to scan] Thence . . plunge into 1730-38. 584 to us it 
 
 seems embroiled] more seemingly perplexed 1730-38. 587 
 
 general] universal ; The sage historic muse] Histoiic truth 1730- 
 38. 589 Show . . declined] Point . . revolved 1730-38. 596 
 public soul] glorious flame 1730-38. 
 
208 THE SEASONS 
 
 These ardent risings of the kindling soul, 
 
 Then, even superior to ambition, we 600 
 
 Would learn the private virtues — how to glide 
 
 Through shades and plains along the smoothest stream 
 
 Of rural life : or, snatched away by hope 
 
 Through the dim spaces of futurity, 
 
 With earnest eye anticipate those scenes 
 
 Of happiness and wonder, where the mind, 
 
 In endless growth and infinite ascent. 
 
 Rises from state to state, and world to world. 
 
 But, when with these the serious thought is foiled, 
 
 We, shifting for relief, would play the shapes 610 
 
 Of frohc fancy ; and incessant form 
 
 Those rapid pictures, that assembled train 
 
 Of fleet ideas, never joined before. 
 
 Whence lively wit excites to gay surprise, 
 
 Or foUy-painting humour, grave himself. 
 
 Calls laughter forth, deep-shaking every nerve. 
 
 Meantime the village rouses up the fire ; 
 While, well attested, and as well believed. 
 Heard solemn, goes the goblin-story round. 
 Till superstitious horror creeps o'er aU. 620 
 
 Or frequent in the sounding hall they wake 
 The rural gambol. Rustic mirth goes round — 
 The simple joke that takes the shepherd's heart. 
 Easily pleased ; the long loud laugh sincere ; 
 
 609 thought] soul 1730-38. 612-15 For these four lines 
 
 edd. 1730-38 give the following six : — 
 
 Unnumbered pictures, fleeting o'er the brain. 
 Yet rapid still renewed, and poured immense 
 Into the mind, unbounded without space — 
 The great, the new, the beautiful ; or mixed — 
 Burlesque and odd, the risible and gay ; 
 Whence vivid wit, and humour, droll of face, &c. 
 
 616 Calls] Call 1730-38. 
 
WINTER 209 
 
 The kiss, snatched hasty from the sidelong maid 
 
 On purpose guardless, or pretending sleep ; 
 
 The leap, the slap, the haul ; and, shook to notes 
 
 Of native music, the respondent dance. 
 
 Thus jocund fleets with them the winter-night. 
 
 The city swarms intense. The pubhc haunt, 630 
 Full of each theme and warm with mixed discourse, 
 Hums indistinct. The sons of riot flow 
 Down the loose stream of false enchanted joy 
 To swift destruction. On the rankled soul 
 The gaming fury falls ; and in one gulf 
 Of total ruin, honour, virtue, peace, 
 Friends, families, and fortune headlong sink. 
 Up springs the dance along the lighted dome, 
 Mixed and evolved a thousand sprightly ways. 
 The glittering court effuses every pomp ; 640 
 
 The circle deepens ; beamed from gaudy robes, 
 Tapers, and sparkling gems, and radiant eyes, 
 A soft effulgence o'er the palace waves — 
 While, a gay insect in his summer shine, 
 The fop, hght-fluttering, spreads his mealy wings. 
 
 Dread o'er the scene the ghost of Hamlet stalks ; 
 Othello rages ; poor Monimia mourns ; 
 And Belvidera pours her soul in love. 
 Terror alarms the breast ; the comely tear 
 Steals o'er the cheek : or else the comic muse 650 
 Holds to the world a picture of itself. 
 And raises sly the fair impartial laugh. 
 Sometimes she lifts her strain, and paints the scenes 
 
 638 Up springs] Rises 1730-38. 641, 642 For these two 
 
 lines edd. 1730-38 give only one line — 
 
 The circle deepens ; rained from radiant eyes, &o. 
 644 a gay insect in his] thick as insects in the 1730-38. 
 649 Assenting terror shakes ; the siJent tear 1730-38 ; 
 Deep-thrilling terror shakes ; the comely tear 1744. 
 653-S Added in 1744 to introduce what immediately follows. 
 
 THOMSON p 
 
210 THE SEASONS 
 
 Of beauteous life — whate'er can deck mankind, 
 Or charm the heart, in generous Bevil showed. 
 
 O thou, whose wisdom, solid yet refined. 
 Whose patriot virtues, and consummate skill 
 To touch the finer springs that move the world. 
 Joined to whate'er the graces can bestow. 
 And all Apollo's animating fire 660 
 
 Give thee with pleasing dignity to shine 
 At once the guardian, ornament, and joy 
 Of polished life — permit the rural muse, 
 Chesterfield, to grace with thee her song. 
 Ere to the shades again she humbly flies, 
 Indulge her fond ambition, in thy train 
 (For every muse has in thy train a place) 
 To mark thy various full-accomplished mind — 
 To mark that spirit which with British scorn 
 Rejects the allurements of corrupted power ; 670 
 That elegant pohteness which excels. 
 Even in the judgement of presumptuous France, 
 The boasted manners of her shining court ; 
 That wit, the vivid energy of sense. 
 The truth of nature, which with Attic point. 
 And kind well-tempered satire, smoothly keen, 
 Steals through the soul and without pain corrects. 
 Or, rising thence with yet a brighter flame, 
 let me hail thee on some glorious day. 
 When to the Hstening senate ardent crowd 680 
 
 Britannia's sons to hear her pleaded cause ! 
 Then, dressed by thee, more amiably fair. 
 Truth the soft robe of mild persuasion wears ; 
 Thou to assenting reason giv'st again 
 Her own enlightened thoughts ; called from the heart, 
 
 656-90 These complimentary lines to Chesterfield were added 
 in 1744. Bevil suggests Chesterfield. 
 
WINTER 211 
 
 The obedient passions on thy voice attend ; 
 And even reluctant party feels a while 
 Thy gracious power, as through the varied maze 
 Of eloquence, now smooth, now quick, now strong, 
 Profound and clear, you roll the copious flood. 690 
 
 To thy loved haunt return, my happy muse : 
 For now, behold ! the joyous Winter days, 
 Frosty, succeed ; and through the blue serene, 
 For sight too fine, the ethereal nitre flies, 
 Killing infectious damps, and the spent air 
 Storing afresh with elemental life. 
 Qose crowds the shining atmosphere ; and binds 
 Our strengthened bodies in its cold embrace. 
 Constringent ; feeds, and animates our blood ; 
 Refines our spirits, through the new-strung nerves 700 
 In swifter sallies darting to the brain — 
 \Miere sits the soul, intense, collected, cocL 
 Bright as the skies, and as the season keen. 
 All nature feels the renovating force 
 Of Winter — only to the thoughtless eye 
 In ruin seen. The frost-concocted glebe 
 Draws in abundant vegetable soul. 
 And gathers vigour for the coming year ; 
 A stronger glow sits on the hvely cheek 
 Of ruddy fire ; and luculent along 710 
 
 The purer rivers flow : their suUen deeps. 
 
 691, 692 Added in 1744, to make the transition from Chester- 
 field to the subject proper easier and less abrupt. 693 Clear 
 frost succeeds, and through the blue serene 1726-38. 
 
 695-987 For this long passage of almost 300 lines the original 
 text (first ed. 1726) gives 22 Unes, the second ed. (June, 1726) 
 gives 23. For these early readings see 11. 303-24 of the original 
 text at the end of the poem. 
 
 706 ruin . . frost-concocted] desolation . . vacant 1730-38. 
 P 2 
 
212 THE SEASONS 
 
 Transparent, open to the shepherd's gaze, 
 And murmur hoarser at the fixing frost. 
 
 What art thou, frost ? and whence are thy keen 
 stores 
 Derived, thou secret all-invading power, 
 Whom even the illusive fluid cannot fly ? 
 Is not thy potent energy, unseen, 
 Myriads of little salts, or hooked, or shaped 
 Like double wedges, and diffused immense 
 Through water, earth, and ether ? Hence at eve, 720 
 Steamed eager from the red horizon round. 
 With the fierce rage of Winter deep suffused, 
 An icy gale, oft shifting, o'er the pool 
 Breathes a blue film, and in its mid-career 
 Arrests the bickering stream. The loosened ice, 
 Let down the flood and half dissolved by day. 
 Rustles no more ; but to the sedgy bank 
 Fast grows, or gathers round the pointed stone, 
 A crystal pavement, by the breath of heaven 
 Cemented firm ; till, seized from shore to shore, 730 
 The whole imprisoned river growls below. 
 Loud rings the frozen earth, and hard reflects 
 A double noise ; while, at his evening watch. 
 The viUage-dog deters the nightly thief ; 
 The heifer lows ; the distant waterfall 
 Swells in the breeze ; and with the hasty tread 
 Of traveller the hollow-sounding plain 
 Shakes from afar. The full ethereal round. 
 Infinite worlds disclosing to the view. 
 Shines out intensely keen, and, all one cope 740 
 
 Of starry gUtter, glows from pole to pole. 
 From pole to pole the rigid influence falls 
 
 712 Transparent] Amazing 1730-38. 722 fierce] still 1730 
 
 -38. 731 imprisoned] detruded 1730-38. 737 hollow-] 
 
 many 1730-38. 
 
WINTER 213 
 
 Through the still night incessant, heavy, strong, 
 
 And seizes nature fast. It freezes on, 
 
 Till morn, late -rising o'er the drooping world, 
 
 Lifts her pale eye unjoyous. Then appears 
 
 The various labour of the silent night — 
 
 Prone from the dripping eave, and dumb cascade, 
 
 Whose idle torrents only seem to roar. 
 
 The pendent icicle ; the frost-work fair, 750 
 
 Where transient hues and fancied figures rise ; 
 
 Wide-spouted o'er the hill the frozen brook, 
 
 A livid tract, cold-gleaming on the morn ; 
 
 The forest bent beneath the plumy wave ; 
 
 And by the frost refined the whiter snow 
 
 Incrusted hard, and sounding to the tread 
 
 Of early shepherd, as he pensive seeks 
 
 His pining flock, or from the mountain top, 
 
 Pleased with the slippery surface, swift descends. 
 
 On blithesome frolics bent, the youthful swains, 760 
 While every work of man is laid at rest, 
 Fond o'er the river crowd, in various sport 
 
 750 pendant in all edd. (1726-46). 751 This line was 
 
 followed in edd. 1730-38 by the line— 
 
 The liquid kingdom all to solid turned ; 
 dropped in 1744. 
 
 752 hill . . frozen] brow . . frozed (o misprint ?) 1730-38. 
 762-78 For these seventeen lines the text of edd. 1730-38 gives 
 the following ten : — 
 
 Fond o'er the river rush, and shuddering view 
 The doubtful deeps below. Or where the lake 
 And long canal the cerule plain extend. 
 The city pours her thousands, swarming all. 
 From every quarter : and with him who slides. 
 Or skating sweeps swift as the winds along 
 In circling poise, or else disordered falls — 
 His feet, illuded, sprawling to the sky, 
 While the laugh rages round — from end to end, 
 Increasing still, resounds the crowded scene. 
 
214 THE SEASONS 
 
 And revelry dissolved ; where, mixing glad, 
 Happiest of all the train ! the raptured boy 
 Lashes the whirling top. Or, where the Rhine 
 Branched out in many a long canal extends, 
 From every province swarming, void of care, 
 Batavia rushes forth ; and, as they sweep 
 On sounding skates a thousand different ways 
 In circling poise swift as the winds along, 770 
 
 The then gay land is maddened all to joy. 
 Nor less the northern courts, wide o'er the snow, 
 Pour a new pomp. Eager, on rapid sleds. 
 Their vigorous youth in bold contention wheel 
 The long-resounding course. Meantime, to raise 
 The manly strife, with highly blooming charms. 
 Mushed by the season, Scandinavia's dames 
 Or Russia's buxom daughters glow around. 
 
 Pure, quick, and sportful is the wholesome day ; 
 But soon elapsed. The horizontal sun 780 
 
 Broad o'er the south hangs at his utmost noon ; 
 And ineffectual strikes the gelid cliff. 
 His azure gloss the mountain stiU maintains. 
 Nor feels the feeble touch. Perhaps the vale 
 Relents awhile to the reflected ray ; 
 Or from the forest falls the clustered snow. 
 Myriads of gems, that in the waving gleam 
 Gay-twinkle as they scatter. Thick around 
 Thunders the sport of those who with the gun. 
 And dog impatient bounding at the shot, 790 
 
 Worse than the season desolate the fields. 
 And, adding to the ruins of the year. 
 Distress the footed or the feathered game. 
 
 783 The mountain still his azure gloss maintains 1730-38. 
 
 787 in the waving gleam] by the breeze diffused 1730-38. 
 
 788 as they scatter.] through the gleam. Heard 1730-38 
 
WINTER 215 
 
 But what is this ? Our infant Winter sinks 
 Divested of his grandeur should our eye 
 Astonished shoot into the frigid zone, 
 Where for relentless months continual night 
 Holds o'er the ghttering waste her starry reign. 
 There, through the prison of unbounded wilds, 
 Barred by the hand of nature from escape, 800 
 
 Wide roams the Russian exile. Naught around 
 Strikes his sad eye but deserts lost in snow, 
 And heavy-loaded groves, and solid floods 
 That stretch athwart the solitary vast 
 Their icy horrors to the frozen main, 
 And cheerless towns far distant — never blessed. 
 Save when its annual course the caravan 
 Bends to the golden coast of rich Cathay, 
 With news of human-kind. Yet there hfe glows ; 
 Yet, cherished there, beneath the shining waste 810 
 The furry nations harbour — tipt with jet. 
 Fair ermines spotless as the snows they press ; 
 Sables of glossy black ; and, dark-embrowned, 
 Or beauteous freakt with many a mingled hue. 
 Thousands besides, the costly pride of courts. 
 There, warm together pressed, the trooping deer 
 Sleep on the new-f alien snows ; and, scarce his head 
 Raised o'er the heapy wreath, the branching elk 
 Lies slumbering sullen in the white abyss. 
 The ruthless hunter wants nor dogs nor toils, 820 
 
 794-903 For these 110 lines the text of 1730-38 gives only the 
 following five : — 
 
 But what is this ? these infant tempests what ? 
 The mockery of Winter ! Should our eye 
 Astonished shoot into the frozen zone 
 Where more than half the joyless year is night, 
 And, failing gradual, life at last goes out. 
 820,821 Nor dogs nor toils they want, nor with the dread 
 Of sounding bows the ruthless hunter drives 1744. 
 
216 THE SEASONS 
 
 Nor with the dread of sounding bows he drives 
 The fearful flying race — with ponderous clubs, 
 As weak against the mountain-heaps they push 
 Their beating breast in vain, and piteous bray. 
 He lays them quivering on the ensanguined snows. 
 And with loud shouts rejoicing bears them home. 
 There, through the piny forest half-absorpt. 
 Rough tenant of these shades, the shapeless bear. 
 With dangling ice ah. horrid, stalks forlorn ; 
 Slow-paced, and sourer as the storms increase, 830 
 He makes his bed beneath the inclement drift. 
 And, with stern patience, scorning weak complaint. 
 Hardens his heart against assailing want. 
 
 Wide o'er the spacious regions of the north. 
 That see Bootes urge his tardy wain, 
 A boisterous race, by frosty Caurus pierced. 
 Who little pleasure know and fear no pain. 
 Prolific swarm. They once relumed the flame 
 Of lost mankind in polished slavery sunk ; 
 Drove martial horde on horde, with dreadful sweep 840 
 Resistless rushing o'er the enfeebled south. 
 And gave the vanquished world another form. 
 Not such the sons of Lapland : wisely they 
 Despise the insensate barbarous trade of war ; 
 They ask no more than simple Nature gives ; 
 They love their mountains and enjoy their storms. 
 No false desires, no pride-created wants. 
 Disturb the peaceful current of their time, 
 And through the restless ever-tortured maze 
 
 827-33 The original of these lines will be found in the second ed. 
 (1726). The reader will find it in a Note (to 1. 276 supra) given at 
 the end of the poem. There also is given the reading of edd. 
 1730-38. The final form of the text of this picturesque passage 
 appears for the first time in the ed. of 1744. 
 
 848 time! days 1744. 
 
WINTER 217 
 
 Of pleasure or ambition bid it rage. 850 
 
 Their reindeer form their riches. These their tents, 
 
 Their robes, their beds, and all their homely wealth 
 
 Supply, their wholesome fare, and cheerful cups. 
 
 Obsequious at their call, the docile tribe 
 
 Yield to the sled their necks, and whirl them swift 
 
 O'er hill and dale, heaped into one expanse 
 
 Of marbled snow, or, far as eye can sweep. 
 
 With a blue crust of ice unbounded glazed. 
 
 By dancing meteors then, that ceaseless shake 
 
 A waving blaze refracted o'er the heavens, 860 
 
 And vivid moons, and stars that keener play 
 
 With doubled lustre from the radiant waste, 
 
 Even in the depth of polar night they find 
 
 A wondrous day — enough to hght the chase 
 
 Or guide their daring steps to Finland fairs. 
 
 Wished, spring returns ; and from the hazy south, 
 
 While dim Aurora slowly moves before, 
 
 The welcome sun, just verging up at first, 
 
 By small degrees extends the swelling curve ; 
 
 Till, seen at last for gay rejoicing months, 870 
 
 StiU round and round his spiral course he winds, 
 
 And, as he nearly dips his fiaming orb. 
 
 Wheels up again and re-ascends the sky. 
 
 In that glad season, from the lakes and floods, 
 
 Where pure Niemi's fairy mountains rise. 
 
 And fringed with roses Tengho roUs his stream. 
 
 They draw the copious fry. With these at eve 
 
 They cheerful-loaded to their tents repair, 
 
 Where, all day long in useful cares employed, 
 
 Their kind unblemished wives the fire prepare. 880 
 
 Thrice happy race ! by poverty secured 
 
 From legal plunder and rapacious power. 
 
 In whom fell interest never yet has sown 
 
 The seeds of vice, whose spotless swains ne'er knew 
 
218 THE SEASONS 
 
 Injurious deed, nor, blasted by the breath 
 
 Of faithless love, their blooming daughters woe. 
 
 Still pressing on, beyond Tornea's lake. 
 And Hecla flaming through a waste of snow, 
 And farthest Greenland, to the pole itseH, 
 Where, failing gradual, life at length goes out, 890 
 The muse expands her solitary flight ; 
 And, hovering o'er the wild stupendous scene, 
 Beholds new seas beneath another sky. 
 Throned in his palace of cerulean ice. 
 Here Winter holds his unrejoicing court ; 
 And through his airy hall the loud misrule 
 Of driving tempest is for ever heard : 
 Here the grim tyrant meditates his wrath ; 
 Here arms his winds with aU-subduing frost ; 
 Moulds his fierce hail, and treasures up his snows, 900 
 With which he now oppresses half the globe. 
 
 Thence winding eastward to the Tartar's coast. 
 She sweeps the howhng margin of the main ; 
 Where, undissolving from the first of time, 
 Snows swell on snows amazing to the sky ; 
 And icy mountains high on mountains piled 
 Seem to the shivering sailor from afar. 
 Shapeless and white, an atmosphere of clouds. 
 Projected huge and horrid o'er the surge, 
 Alps frown on Alps ; or, rushing hideous down, 910 
 As if old Chaos was again returned, 
 Wide-rend the deep and shake the solid pole. 
 
 890 The original form of this line will be found in ed. 1730. 
 See footnote to 1. 794 swpra. 
 
 895-7 The original form of these lines occurs in the second ed. 
 (June, 1726). It is repeated in edd. 1730-38. Their present form 
 was taken in 1744. See supra Note to 1. 276. 
 
 904 Where] There 1730-38. 909 surge] main 1730-38. 
 
 512 Shake the firm pole and make an ocean boil. 1730-38. 
 
WINTER 219 
 
 Ocean itself no longer can resist 
 
 The binding fury ; but, in all its rage 
 
 Of tempest taken by the boundless frost, 
 
 Is many a fathom to the bottom chained. 
 
 And bid to roar no more — a bleak expanse 
 
 Shagged o'er with wavy rocks, cheerless, and void 
 
 Of every life, that from the dreary months 
 
 FUes conscious southward. Miserable they ! 920 
 
 Who, here entangled in the gathering ice. 
 
 Take their last look of the descending sun ; 
 
 While, full of death and fierce with tenfold frost, 
 
 The long long night, incumbent o'er their heads, 
 
 Palls horrible ! Such was the Briton's fate. 
 
 As with first prow (what have not Britons dared ?) 
 
 He for the passage sought, attempted since 
 
 So much in vain, and seeming to be shut 
 
 By jealous nature with eternal bars. 
 
 In these fell regions, in Arziaa caught, 930 
 
 And to the stony deep his idle ship 
 
 Immediate sealed, he with his hapless crew, 
 
 Each full exerted at his several task. 
 
 Froze into statues — to the cordage glued 
 
 The sailor, and the pilot to the helm. 
 
 Hard by these shores, where scarce his freezing 
 stream 
 
 After this line came in edd. 1730-38 the following six lines, 
 
 dropped in 1744 : — 
 
 Whence heaped abrupt along the howling shore. 
 And into various shapes (as fancy leans) 
 Worked by the wave, the crystal pillars heave. 
 Swells the blue portico, the Gothic dome 
 Shoots fretted up, and birds and beasts and men 
 Rise into mimic life, and sink by turns. 
 913 The restless deep itself cannot resist 1730-38. 
 936, 937 For these two lines edd. 1730-38 give only one line — 
 Hard by these shores the last of mankind live. 
 
 The change was made in 1744. 
 
220 THE SEASONS 
 
 Rolls the wild Oby, live the last of men ; 
 And, haK enlivened by the distant sun, 
 That rears and ripens man as well as plants, 
 Here human nature wears its rudest form. 94° 
 
 Deep from the piercing Season sunk in caves, 
 Here by dull fires and with unjoyous cheer 
 They waste the tedious gloom: immersed in furs 
 Doze the gross race — nor sprightly jest, nor song. 
 Nor tenderness they know, nor aught of life 
 Beyond the kindred bears that stalk without — 
 Till Morn at length, her roses drooping all, 
 Sheds a long twilight brightening o'er their fields 
 And calls the quivered savage to the chase. 
 
 What cannot active government perform, 950 
 
 New-moulding man ? Wide-stretching from these 
 
 shores, 
 A people savage from remotest time, 
 A huge neglected empire, one vast mind 
 By heaven inspired from Gothic darkness called. 
 Immortal Peter ! first of monarchs ! He 
 His stubborn country tamed, — her rocks, her fens. 
 Her floods, her seas, her ill-submitting sons ; 
 And, while the fierce barbarian he subdued. 
 To more exalted soul he raised the man. 
 Ye shades of ancient heroes, ye who toiled 960 
 
 Through long successive ages to build up 
 A labouring plan of state, behold at once 
 The wonder done ! behold the matchless prince ! 
 Who left his native throne, where reigned tiU then 
 A mighty shadow of unreal power ; 
 
 938 half] scarce 1730-38. 940 wears its rudest form] just 
 
 begins to dawn 1730-38. 944 Doze] Lie 1730-38. 
 
 947, 948 The edd. 1730-38 give- 
 Till long-expected morning looks at length 
 Faint on their fields (where Winter reigns alone). 
 950-87 Added in 1744. 
 
WINTER 221 
 
 Who greatly spurned the slothful pomp of courts ; 
 
 And, roaming every land, in every port 
 
 His sceptre laid aside, with glorious hand 
 
 Unwearied plying the mechanic tool. 
 
 Gathered the seeds of trade, of useful arts, 970 
 
 Of civil wisdom, and of martial skill. 
 
 Charged with the stores of Europe home he goes ! 
 
 Then cities rise amid the illumined waste ; 
 
 O'er joyless deserts smiles the rural reign ; 
 
 Far-distant flood to flood is social joined ; 
 
 The astonished Euxine hears the Baltic roar ; 
 
 Proud navies ride on seas that never foamed 
 
 With daring keel before ; and armies stretch 
 
 Each way their dazzling files, repressing here 
 
 The frantic Alexander of the north, 980 
 
 And awing there stern Othman's shrinking sons. 
 
 Sloth flies the land, and ignorance and vice. 
 
 Of old dishonour proud : it glows around. 
 
 Taught by the royal hand that roused the whole, 
 
 One scene of arts, of arms, of rising trade — 
 
 For, what his wisdom planned and power enforced, 
 
 More potent still his great example showed. 
 
 Muttering, the winds at eve with blunted point 
 Blow hoUow-blustering from the south. Subdued, 
 The frost resolves into a tricHing thaw. 990 
 
 Spotted the mountains shine : loose sleet descends. 
 And floods the country round. The rivers swell, 
 
 988-90 In the first ed. (Marcli, 1726)— 
 
 But hark ! the mighty winds with hollow voice 
 Blow blustering from the south : the frost subdued 
 Gradual resolves into a weeping thaw. 
 988 blunted point] hoarser voice second ed. (June, Vl^&)and all 
 edd. down to 1738. 989 Blow, blustering, from the South. The 
 Frost subdued 1726-38. 990 Gradual resolves into a trickling 
 
 thaw second ed. to ed. of 1738; a weeping th.3,yi first ed. only. 
 
222 THE SEASONS 
 
 Oi bonds impatient. Sudden from the hills, 
 O'er rocks and woods, in broad brown cataracts, 
 A thousand snow-fed torrents shoot at once ; 
 And, where they rush, the wide-resounding plain 
 Is left one slimy waste. Those sullen seas, 
 That wash'd the ungenial pole, will rest no more 
 Beneath the shackles of the mighty north, 
 But, rousing all their waves, resistless heave. looo 
 And, hark ! the lengthening roar continuous runs 
 Athwart the rifted deep : at once it bursts. 
 And piles a thousand mountains to the clouds. 
 Ill fares the bark, with trembling wretches charged. 
 That, tossed amid the floating fragments, moors 
 Beneath the shelter of an icy isle. 
 While night o'erwhelms the sea, and horror looks 
 More horrible. Can human force endure 
 Tha assembled mischiefs that besiege them round ? — 
 Heart-gnawing hunger, fainting weariness, loio 
 
 The roar of winds and waves, the crush of ice. 
 Now ceasing, now renewed with louder rage. 
 And in dire echoes bellowing round the main. 
 
 993-7 For these lines the first ed. (March, 1726) gives only — 
 Impatient for the day. Those sullen seas. 
 The expansion was made in the second ed. (June, 1726), begin- 
 ning- 
 Impatient for the day. Broke from the hills, &o., 
 as in the final text. The reading of the second ed. remained 
 down to 1738. 
 
 1004 with trembling wretches charged] the wretches' last 
 resort 1726-38. 1005 tossed] lost 1726-38. 1008 force] 
 
 hearts 1720; force 1730 onwards. loio Heart>gnawing] 
 
 Unlistening 1726 ; Heart-gnawing 1730 onwards. 
 
 1013 And bellowing round the main : nations, remote ^rs( ond 
 second add. (1726) ; followed by — 
 
 Shook from their midnight slumbers, deem they hear 
 Portentous thunder in the troubled (f,ret ed. ; gelid 
 second ed. ) sky. 
 The final reading was given in 1730. 
 
WINTER 223 
 
 More to embroil the deep, Leviathan 
 
 And his unwieldy train in dreadful sport 
 
 Tempest the loosened brine ; while through the gloom 
 
 Far from the bleak inhospitable shore, 
 
 Loading the winds, is heard the hungry howl 
 
 Of famished monsters, there awaiting wrecks. 
 
 Yet Providence, that ever-waking Eye, 1020 
 
 Looks down with pity on the feeble toil 
 
 Of mortals lost to hope, and lights them safe 
 
 Through all this dreary labyrinth of fate. 
 
 'Tis done ! Dread Winter spreads his latest glooms, 
 And reigns tremendous o'er the conquered year. 
 How dead the vegetable kingdom lies ! 
 How dumb the tuneful ! Horror wide extends 
 His desolate domain. Behold, fond man ! 
 See here thy pictured life ; pass some few years, 
 Thy flowering Spring, thy Summer's ardent strength, 
 Thy sober Autumn fading into age, lo^r 
 
 And pale concluding Winter comes at last 
 And shuts the scene. Ah ! whither now are fled 
 
 C015 dreadful] horrid 1726-38. 1017 bleak] dire 1726 
 
 bleak since 1130. 
 
 1018-19 The lion's rage, the wolf's sad howl is heard 
 And all the fell society of night first ed 
 At once is heard the united hungry howl 
 Of all the fell society of night second ed. 
 The final text since 1730. 
 
 1021 feeble] fruitless 1726-38. 1024 spreads &c.] has 
 
 subdued the year 1726-38. 1025 conquered year] desert 
 
 plains 1726-38. 1028 desolate domain. Behold] solitary 
 
 empire. Now 1726; solitary empire. Here 1730-38; melancholy 
 empire. Here 1744. 1029 See here] Behold 1726—44. 1030 
 Summer's ardent] short-hved summer's 1726. 
 
 1032-3 comes at last And shuts the scene. Ah ! whither] 
 shuts thy scene. And shrouds thee in the grave. Where 1726. 
 The final text was reached in 1730. 
 
224 THE SEASONS 
 
 Those dreams of greatness ? those unsolid hopes 
 Of happiness ? those longings after fame ? 
 Those restless cares ? those busy bustling days ? 
 Those gay-spent festive nights ? those veering 
 
 thoughts, 
 Lost between good and iU, that shared thy hfe ? 
 All now are vanished ! Virtue sole survives — 
 Immortal, never-failing friend of man, 1040 
 
 His guide to happiness on high. And see ! 
 'Tis come, the glorious morn ! the second birth 
 Of heaven and earth ! awakening nature hears 
 The new-creating word, and starts to life 
 In every heightened form, from pain and death 
 For ever free. The great eternal scheme, 
 Involving all, and in a perfect whole 
 Uniting, as the prospect wider spreads, 
 To reason's eye refined clears up apace. 
 Ye vainly wise ! ye blind presumptuous ! now, 1050 
 Confounded in the dust, adore that Power 
 And Wisdom — oft arraigned : see now the cause 
 Why unassuming worth in secret hved 
 
 1037 gay-spent festive nights] nights of secret guilt 1726. 
 1038 Lost between] Fluttering 'twixt 1726. 1040 mankind's 
 never-failing friend 1726-38. 1044 The new-creating word] 
 
 The almighty trumpet's voice 1726. 
 
 :o45-8 So since 1730. The original text (1726) was — 
 Renewed unfading. Now the eternal scheme. 
 That dark perplexity, that mystic maze. 
 Which sight could never trace nor heart conceive. 
 To reason's eye, &c. 
 1050, 1051 For these two Unes the original text (1726) is 
 as follows : — 
 
 Angels and men astonished pause, and dread 
 To travel through the depths of Providence, 
 Untried, unbounded. Ye vain Learned, see, 
 And, prostrate in the dust, adore that power, &c. 
 1053, 1054 conscious worth, oppressed in secret long Mourned 
 unregarded 1726. 
 
WINTER 225 
 
 And died neglected : why the good man's share 
 
 In life was gaU and bitterness of soul : 
 
 Why the lone widow and her orphans pined 
 
 In starving solitude ; while luxury 
 
 In palaces lay straining her low thought 
 
 To form unreal wants : why heaven-born truth 
 
 And moderation fair wore the red marks 1060 
 
 Of superstition's scourge ; why licensed pain, 
 
 That cruel spoiler, that embosomed foe, 
 
 Embittered all our bhss. Ye good distressed ! 
 
 Ye noble few ! who here unbending stand 
 
 Beneath life's pressure, yet bear up a while, 
 
 And what your bounded view, which only saw 
 
 A little part, deemed evU is no more : 
 
 The storms of wintry time will quickly pass. 
 
 And one unbounded Spring encircle all. 
 
 1058 straining] prompting 1726; prompting his 1730-38. 
 1059 truth] faith 1726. 1060 moderation fair] charity, prime 
 grace ! 1726. 1061 persecution's 1726. 1065 pressure] 
 
 pressures 1726; bear up a while] a little while 1726-44. io66, 
 1067 And what you reckon evil is no more 1730-38. 
 
 1068-9 So since 1730. For the reading of the last four lines 
 in edd. of 1726, see the original Winter a.t p. 238. 
 
NOTE BY THE EDITOR. 
 
 I give here a reprint of the text of the first Winter, carefully 
 taken from the folio copy of sixteen pages now in the Advocates' 
 Library, Edinburgh. I have only corrected the four errata to 
 which, on the back of his title-page, Thomson drew his readers' 
 attention. I have also discarded the long ' s '. In other respects 
 — such as peculiarities of spelling, punctuation, use of capitals 
 and italics — I present the text as published in March, 1726. 
 
 The lines are numbered for the sake of reference; and I also 
 accompany the text with the variations which appeared in the 
 second edition, published only a few mouths after the first. 
 
WINTER. 
 
 A 
 
 POEM. 
 
 By JAMES THOMSON, A.M. 
 
 Rapidus Sol 
 
 Nondum Hyemem contingit Equis. yam prceterit cejtas. 
 
 V I R G. 
 
 Glacialis Hyems canos hirfuta Capillos. 
 
 Ovid. 
 
 LONDON: 
 Printed for J. Mill an, at Locke' s-Head, in Shug-Lane, 
 near the Upper End of the Hay-Market ; and Sold by 
 J. Roberts, in Warwick-Lane, and N. Blandford, 
 at the London-Gazette, Charing-Crofs. Mdccxxvi. 
 (Price One Shilling.) 
 
WINTER. 
 
 A POEM 
 
 See ! Winter comes, to rule the varied Year, 
 Sullen, and sad ; with all his rising Train, 
 Vayours, and Clouds, and Storms : Be these my Theme, 
 These, that exalt the Soul to solemn Thought, 
 And heavenly musing. Welcome kindred Glooms ! 
 Wish'd, wint'ry. Horrors, hail ! — With frequent Foot, 
 Pleas'd, have I, in my cheerful Morn of Life, 
 When, nurs'd by careless Solitude, I liv'd. 
 And sung of Nature with unceasing Joy, 
 I o Pleas'd, have I wander'd thro' your rough Domains ; 
 Trod the pure, virgin. Snows, myself as pure : 
 Heard the Winds roar, and the big Torrent burst : 
 Or seen the deep, fermenting, Tempest brew'd, 
 In the red, evening. Sky. — Thus pass'd the Time, 
 Till, thro' the opening Chambers of the South, 
 Look'd out the joyous Spring, look'd out, and smil'd. 
 
 Thee too, Inspirer of the toiling Swain ! 
 Fair Autdmn, yellow rob'd ! I'll sing of thee, ^ 
 
 Of thy last, temper'd,^ Days, and sunny ^ Calms ; .^ ^nwAa 
 20 When all the golden Hours are on the Wing, 
 Attending thy Retreat, and round thy Wain, 
 Slow-rolling, onward to the Southern Sky. 
 
 '' clouded 
 
 Mark 
 how 
 
 Behold ! ' the well-pois'd Hornet, hovering, hangs. 
 With quivering Pinions, in the genial Blaze ; 
 Flys off, in airy Circles : then returns. 
 And hums, and dances to the beating Ray. 
 Nor shall the Man, that, musing, walks alone. 
 And, heedless, strays within his radiant Lists, 
 Go unchastis'd away. — Sometimes, a Fleece 
 30 Of Clouds, wide-scattering, with a lucid Veil, 
 
 Soft,* shadow o'er th' unrufiSed Face of Heaven ; ' Light 
 And, thro' their dewy Sluices, shed the Sun, 
 With temper'd Influence down. Then is the Time, 
 
WINTER 
 
 229 
 
 For those, whom Wisdom, and whom Nature charm. 
 To steal themselves from the degenerate Croud, 
 And soar above this litUe Scene of Things : 
 To tread low-thoughted Vice beneath their Feet : 
 To lay their Passions in a gentle Calm,* ' 
 
 And woo lone Quiet, in her silent Walks. 
 
 40 Now, solitary, and in pensive Guise, 
 Oft, let- me wander o'er the russet Mead, 
 Or thro' the pining Grove ; where scarce is heard 
 One dying Strain, to chear the WoodmaiCs Toil : 
 Sad Philomel, perchance, pours forth her Plaint," ' 
 Far, thro' the withering Copse. Mean while, the Leaves, 
 That, late, the Forest clad with lively Green, 
 Nipt by the drizzly Night, and Sallow-hu'd, 
 Fall, wavering, thro' the Air ; or shower amain, 
 Urg'd by the Breeze, that sobs amid the Boughs. 
 
 50 Then listening Hares forsake the rusling Woods, 
 And, starting at the frequent Noise, escape 
 To the rough Stubble, and the rushy Fen. 
 Then Woodcocks, o'er the fluctuating Main, 
 That glimmers to the Glimpses of the Moon, 
 Stretch their long Voyage to the woodland Glade 
 Where, wheeling with uncertain Flight, they mock 
 The nimble Fowler's Aim. — Now Nature droops ; 
 Languish the living Herbs, with pale Decay : 
 And all the various Family of Flowers 
 
 60 Their eunny Robes resign. The falling Fruits, 
 Thro' the still Night, forsake the Parent-Bough, 
 That, in the first, grey. Glances of the Dawn, 
 Looks wild, and wonders at the wintry Waste. 
 
 To soothe 
 the 
 throb- 
 bing pas- 
 sions in- 
 to peace, 
 
 Haply 
 
 some 
 
 widowed 
 
 songster 
 
 pours his 
 
 plaint. 
 
 The Tear, yet pleasing, but declining fast. 
 Soft, o'er the secret Soul, in gentle Gales, 
 A Philosophic MelanchoUy breathes, 
 And bears the swelling Thought aloft to Heaven. 
 Then forming Fancy rouses to conceive. 
 What never mingled with the Vulgar's Dream : 
 70 Then wake the tender Pang, the pitying Tear, 
 The Sigh for suffering Worth, the Wish prefer'd 
 For Humankind, the Joy to see them bless'd, 
 And all the Social Off-spring of the Heart ! 
 
 Oh ! bear me then to high, embowering. Shades ; 
 
230 THE SEASONS 
 
 To twilight Groves, and visionary Vales ; 
 
 To weeping Grottos, and to hoary Caves ' ; ' prophetic 
 
 Where Angel-Forms are seen, and Voices heard. Glooms 
 
 Sigh'd in low Whispers, that abstract the Soul, 
 
 From outward Sense, far into Worlds remote. 
 
 80 Novr, when the Western Sun withdraws the Day, 
 And humid Evening, gliding o'er the Sky, 
 In her chill Progress, checks the straggling Beams, 
 And robs them of their gather'd, vapoury, Prey," " And their 
 Where Marshes stagnate, and where Rivers wind, moist 
 Cluster the rolling Fogs, and swim along frees - 
 
 The dusky-mantled Lawn : then slow descend, where 
 
 Once more to mingle with their Watry Friends. waters 
 
 ooze, 
 The vivid Stars shine out, in radiant" Files ; 3 brighten- 
 
 And boundless Ether glows, till the fair Moon ing 
 
 90 Shows her broad Visage, in the crimson'd East ; 
 Now, stooping, seems to kiss the passing Cloud : 
 Now, o'er the pure Cerulean, rides sublime. 
 Wide the pale Deluge floats, with silver Waves, 
 O'er the sky'd Mountain, to the low-laid Vale ; 
 From the white Eocks, with dim Reflexion, gleams. 
 And faintly glitters thro' the waving Shades. 
 
 All Night, abundant Dews, unnoted, fall. 
 And, at Return of Morning, silver o'er' ■■ That, 
 
 The Face of Mother-Earth ; from every Branch lighted 
 
 100 Depending, tremble the translucent Gems, P^ ' ® 
 
 And, quivering, seem to fall away, yet cling, ine'srav 
 
 And sparkle in the Sun, whose rising Eye, impearl' 
 With Fogs bedim'd, portends a beauteous Day. 
 
 Now, giddy " Youth, whom headlong Passions fire, ^ roving 
 Rouse the wild Game, and stain the guiltless Grove, 
 With Violence, and Death ; yet call it Sport, 
 To scatter Ruin thro' the Realms of Love, 
 And Peace, that thinks no ill : But These, the Muse, 
 Whose Charity, unlimited, extends 
 110 As wide as Nature works, disdains to sing. 
 Returning to her nobler Theme in view — 
 
 ' Winter! 
 FoK see ! where Winter comes, himself, confest, ° who 
 
 Striding the gloomy Blast. First Rains obscure rides 
 
 Drive thro' the mingling Skies, with Tempest foul; along the 
 Beat on the Mountain's Brow, and shake the Woods, '^/"■''<='i'd 
 
WINTER 231 
 
 That, sounding, wave below. The dreary ' Plain ' unsightly 
 Lies overwhelm'd, and lost. The bellying Clouds 
 Combine, and deepening into Night, shut up 
 The Day's fair Face. The Wanderers of Heaven, 
 
 120 Each to his Home, retire; save those that love 
 To take their Pastime in the troubled Air, 
 And, skimming, flutter round the dimply Flood. 
 The Cattle, from th' untasted Fields, return, 
 And ask, with Meaning low," their wonted Stalls ; ' meaning 
 Or ruminate in the contiguous Shade : ^"^ 
 
 Thither, the houshold, feathery. People croud. 
 The crested Cock, with all his female Train, 
 Pensive, and wet. Mean while, the Cottage-Swain 
 Hangs o'er th' enlivening Blaze, and, taleful, there, 
 
 1 30 Recounts his simple Frolic: Much he talks. 
 
 And much he laughs, nor recks the Storm that blows 
 Without, and rattles on his humble Roof. 
 
 At last, the muddy Deluge pours along. 
 Resistless, roaring ; dreadful down it comes 
 From the chapt Mountain, and the mossy Wild, 
 Tumbling thro' Rocks abrupt, and sounding far : 
 Then o'er the sanded Valley, floating, spreads. 
 Calm, sluggish, silent ; till again constrain'd. 
 Betwixt two meeting Hills, it bursts a Way,' ' away 
 
 140 Where Rocks, and Woods o'erhang the turbid Stream. 
 There gathering triple Force, rapid, and deep. 
 It boils, and wheels, and foams, and thunders thro'. 
 
 Natuke ! great Parent ! whose directing Hand 
 Rolls round the Seasons of the changeful Year, 
 How mighty ! how majestick are thy Works ! 
 With what a pleasing Dread they swell the Soul, 
 That sees, astonish'd ! and, astonish'd sings ! 
 You too, ye Winds ! that now begin to blow. 
 With boisterous Sweep, I raise my Voice to you. 
 1 50 Where are your Stores, ye viewless Beings ! say ? 
 Where your aerial Magazines reserv'd. 
 Against the Day of Tempest perilous ? 
 In what untravel'd Country of the Air, 
 Hush'd in still Silence, sleep you, when 'tis calm ? 
 
 Late, in the louring Sky, red, fiery. Streaks 
 Begin to flush about ; the reeling Clouds 
 Stagger with dizzy Aim, as doubting yet 
 
232 THE SEASONS 
 
 Which Master to obey : while rising, slow 
 
 Sad, in the lieaden-colour'd East, the Moon 
 i6o Wears a bleak Circle round her suUy'd Orb. 
 
 Then issues forth the Storm, with loud Control, 
 
 And the thin Fabriok of the pillar'd Air 
 
 O'erturns, at once. Prone, on th' uncertain' Main, ' passive 
 
 Descends th' Etherial Force, and plows its Waves, 
 
 With dreadful Rift : from the mid-Deep, appears, 
 
 Surge after Surge, the rising, wat'ry. War. 
 
 Whitening, the angry Billows rowl immense, 
 
 And roar their Terrors, through the shuddering Soul 
 
 Of feeble Man, amidst their Fury caught, 
 170 And, dash'd upon his Fate: Then, o'er the Cliff, 
 
 Where dwells the Sea-Mew, unconfin'd, they fly. 
 
 And, hurrying, swallow up the steril Shore. 
 
 The Mountain growls ; and all its sturdy Sons 
 Stoop to the Bottom of the Rocks they shade : 
 Lone, on its Midnight-Side, and all aghast. 
 The dark, way-faring. Stranger, breathless, toils, 
 And climbs against the Blast — 
 Low, waves the rooted Forest, vex'd, and sheds 
 What of its leafy Honours yet remains. 
 I So Thus, struggling thro' the dissipated Grove, 
 The whirling Tempest raves along the Plain ; 
 And, on the Cottage thacht, or lordly Dome, 
 Keen-fastening, shakes 'em to the solid Base. 
 Sleep, frighted, flies ; the hollow Chimney howls. 
 The Windows rattle, and the Hinges creak. 
 
 Then, too, they say, thro' all the burthen'd Air, 
 Long Groans are heard, shrill Sounds, and distant Sighs, 
 That, murmur'd by the Demon of the Night, 
 Warn the devoted Wretch of Woe, and Death ! 
 190 Wild ['proar lords it wide: the Clouds commixt. 
 With Stars, swift-gliding, sweep along the Sky. 
 All Nature reels. — But hark ! The Almighty speaks : 
 
 165-8 For these four lines the second edition gives — 
 
 In frightful furrows : from the brawling Deep, 
 Heav'd to the Clouds, the watry Twmult comes. 
 Rumbling, the wind-swoln Billows rowl immense, 
 And, on th'evanish'd vessel bursting fierce, 
 Their Terrors thunder thro' the prostrate Soul 
 192-4 For these the second edition gives — 
 
 Till Nature's King, who oft 
 Amid tempestuous Darkness dwells alone, 
 
WINTER 233 
 
 Instant, the chidden Storm begins to pant. 
 And dies, at once, into a noiseless Cahn. 
 
 As yet, 'tis Midnight's Reign ; the weary Clouds, 
 Slow-meeting, mingle into solid Gloom: 
 Now, while the drousy World lies lost in Sleep, 
 Let me associate with the low-brow'd NigM, 
 And Contemplation, her sedate Compeer ; 
 200 Let me shake off th' intrusive Cares of Day, 
 And lay the medling Senses all aside. 
 
 And now, ye lying Vanities of Life ! 
 
 You ever-tempting, ever-cheating Train ! 
 
 Where are you now ? and what is your Amount ? 
 
 Vexation, Disappointment, and Remorse. 
 
 Sad, sickening. Thought ! and yet, deluded Man, 
 
 A Scene of wUd,' disjointed. Visions past, * crude 
 
 And broken Slumbers, rises, still resolVd, 
 
 With new-flush'd Hopes, to run your giddy Round 
 
 210 Father of Light, and Life! Thou Oood Supreme! 
 ! teach me what is Good ! teach me thy self ! 
 Save me from Folly, Vanity and Vice, 
 From every low Pursuit ! and feed my Soul, 
 With Knowledge, conscious Peace, and Vertue pure. 
 Sacred, substantial, never-fading Bliss ! 
 
 Lo ! " from the livid East, or piercing North, ' Dun 
 
 Thick Clouds ascend, in whose capacious Womb, 
 A vapoury Deluge lies, to Snow congeal'd : 
 Heavy, they roll their fleecy World along; 
 220 And the Sky saddens with th' impending Storm. 
 
 Thro' the hush'd Air, the whitening Shower descends, 
 At first, thin-wavering ; tUl, at last, the Flakes 
 Fall broad, and wide, and fast, dimming the Day, 
 With a continual Flow. See ! sudden, hoar'd. 
 The Woods beneath the stainless Burden bow, 
 Blackning, along the mazy Stream it melts ; 
 
 And on the Wings of the careering Wind 
 Walks dreadfully serene, commands a Calm: 
 And strait Earfii, Sea, and Air are hush'd at once. 
 224-6 For these the second edition gives — 
 Blackening, they melt 
 Along the mazy Stream. The leafless Woods 
 Bow their hoar Heads. And, ere the languid Sun 
 Faint from the West emit his evening Ray, 
 
234 THE SEASONS 
 
 Earth's universal Face, deep-hid, and chill. 
 Is all one, dazzling. Waste. The Labourer-Ox 
 Stands cover'd o'er with Snow, and then demands 
 
 230 The Fruit of all his Toil. The Fowls of Heaven, 
 Tam'd by the cruel Season, croud around 
 The winnowing Store, and claim the little Boon, 
 That Providence allows. The foodless Wilds 
 Pour forth their brown Inhabitants ; the Hare, 
 Tho' timorous of Heart, and hard beset 
 By Death, in various Forms, dark Snares, and Dogs, 
 And more unpitying Men, the Garden seeks, 
 Urg'd on by fearless Want. The bleating Kind 
 Eye the bleak Heavens, and next, the glistening Earth, 
 
 240 With Looks of dumb Despair ; then sad, dispers'd. 
 Dig, for the wither' d Herb, thro' Heaps of Snow. 
 
 Now, SJiepherds, to your helpless Charge be kind ; 
 Baffle the raging Year, and fill their Penns 
 With Food, at will : lodge them below the Blast,' ' Storm 
 And watch them strict ; for from the bellowing East, 
 In this dire Season, oft the Whirlwind's Wing 
 Sweeps up the Burthen of whole wintry Plains, 
 In one fierce Blast, and o'er th' unhappy Flocks, 
 Lodged in the Hollow of two neighbouring Hills, 
 250 The billowy Tempest whelms ; till, upwards urg'd. 
 The Valley to a shining Mountain swells. 
 That curls its Wreaths amid the freezing Sky. 
 
 Now, all amid the Rigours of the Year, 
 In the wild Depth of Winter, while without 
 The ceaseless Winds blow keen, be my Retreat 
 A rural, shelter'd, solitary. Scene ; 
 Where ruddy Fire, and beaming Tapers join 
 To chase the chearless Gloom : there let me sit. 
 And hold high Converse with the mighty Dead, 
 260 Sages of ancient Time, as Gods rever'd. 
 As Gods beneficent, who blest Mankind, 
 With Arts, and Arms, and humaniz'd a World. 
 Rous'd at th' inspiring Thought — ^I throw aside 
 The long-liv'd Volume, and, deep-musing, hail 
 
 238 After * Providence allows ' the lines on the redbreast were intro- 
 duced. For them, see Note at p. 195. 
 
 252 After this line, came, in the second edition, a passage of twelve 
 lines, given on p. 243 ; followed by another passage, on Wolves, tor 
 which see Notoat p. 200. 
 
WINTER 235 
 
 The sacred Shades, that, slowly-rising, pass 
 
 Before my wondering Eyes — First, Socrates, 
 
 Truth's early Champion, Martyr for his God : 
 
 Solon, the next, who built his Commonweal, 
 
 On Equity's firm Base : Lycurgus, then, 
 270 Severely good, and him of rugged Borne, 
 
 Numa, who soften'd her rapacious Sons. 
 
 Cimon, sweet-soul'd, and Aristides just. 
 
 Unconquter'd Cato, virtuous in Extreme ; 
 
 With that attemper'd *Heroe, mild, and firm, 
 
 Who wept the Brother, while the Tyrant bled. 
 
 Scipio, the humane Warriour, gently brave. 
 
 Fair Learning's Friend ; who early sought the Shade, 
 
 To dwell, with Innocence, and Truth, retir'd. 
 
 And, equal to the best, the Theban, He 
 280 Who, single, rais'd his Country into Fame. 
 
 Thousands behind, the Boast of Greece and Borne, 
 
 Whom Yerlue owns, the Tribute of a Verse 
 
 Demand, but who can count the Stars of Heaven ? 
 
 Who sing their Influence on this lower World ? 
 
 But see who yonder comes ! nor comes alone. 
 
 With sober State, and of majestic Mien, 
 
 The Sister-Muses in his Train — 'Tis He ! 
 
 Maro ! the best of Poets, and of Men ! * ■ the Glory 
 
 Great Homer too appears, of daring Wing ! "f 'he 
 
 290 Parent of Song ! and eqval, by his Side, ^"^ ^ 
 
 The British Muse, join'd Hand in Hand, they walk. 
 
 Darkling, nor miss their Way to Fame's Ascent. 
 
 Society divine ! Immortal Minds ! 
 Still visit thus my Nights, for you reserv'd. 
 And mount my soaring Soul to Deeds like yours. 
 Silence ! thou lonely Power 1 the Door be thine : 
 See, on the hallow'd Hour, that none intrude. 
 Save Jjycidas, the Friend, with Sense refin'd. 
 Learning digested well, exalted Faith, 
 300 Unstudy'd Wit, and Humour ever gay. 
 
 Clear Frost succeeds, and thro' the blew Serene, 
 For Sight too fine, th' ^Etherial Nitre flies. 
 To bake the Glebe, and bind the slip'ry Flood. 
 This of the wintry Season is the Prime ; 
 273 This line is taken two lines lower in the second edition. 
 *Timoleon. 
 
236 THE SEASONS 
 
 Pure are the Days, and lustrous are the Nights, 
 
 Brighten'd' with starry Worlds, till then unseen. ' Radiant 
 
 Mean while, the Orient, darkly red, breathes forth 
 
 An loy Gale, that, in its mid Career, 
 
 Arrests the bickering Stream. The nightly Sky, 
 
 310 And all her glowing Constellations pour 
 Their rigid Influence down : It freezes on 
 Till Morn, late-rising, o'er the drooping World, 
 Lifts her pale Eye, unjoyous : then appears 
 The various Labour of the silent Night, 
 The pendant laicle, the Frost-Work fair, 
 Where thousand" Figures rise, the crusted Snow, ' fancy'd 
 Tho' white, made whiter, by the fining North. 
 On blithsomo Frolic bent, the youthful Swains, 
 While every Work of Man is laid at Rest, 
 
 320 Rush o'er the watry Plains, and, shuddering, view 
 The fearful Deeps below : or with the Gun, 
 And faithful Spaniel, range the ravag'd Fields, 
 And, adding to tho Ruins of tho Year, 
 Distress the Feathery, or tho Footed Game. 
 
 But hark ! the nightly Winds, with hollow Voice, 
 Blow, blustering, from the South — the Frost eubdu'd. 
 Gradual, resolves into a weeping' Thaw. ° trickling 
 
 Spotted, the Mountains shine : loose Sleet descends. 
 And floods the Country round : the Rivers swell, 
 330 Impatient for the Day. — Those sullen Seas, 
 
 That wash th' ungenial Pole, will rest no more, 
 Beneath the Shackles of the mighty North ; 
 But, rousing all their Waves, resistless heave, — 
 And hark ! — the length'ning Roar, continuous, runs 
 Athwart the rifted Main ; at once, it bursts, 
 And piles a thousand Mountains to the Clouds ! 
 Ill fares the Bark, the Wretches' last Resort, 
 That, lost amid the floating Fragments, moors 
 
 317 This line is followed in the .second edilion by — 
 
 And Oom-bcsprinkled in the Mid-Day Beam. 
 325 In the second edition — 
 
 Muttering, the Winds, at Eve, with hoarser voice, 
 ^qo After 'Day', tho following passage was added in the second 
 edition — 
 
 Broke from tlm Hills, 
 O'er Rocltfl and Woods, in broad, brown Cataracts 
 A thousand Snow-fed Torrents shoot at once; 
 And, where they rush, the wide-re.sounding plain 
 Is loft one slimy Waste. 
 
WINTER 237 
 
 Beneath the Shelter of an Icy. Isle ; 
 
 340 While Night o'erwhelms the Sea, and Horror looks 
 More horrible. Can human Hearts endure 
 Th' assembled Mischiefs, that besiege them round: 
 Unlist'ning Hunger, fainting Weariness, 
 The Roar of Winds, and Waves, the Crush at Ice. 
 Now, ceasing, now, renew'd, with louder Rage, 
 And bellowing round the Main : Nations remote. 
 Shook from their Midnight-Slumbers, deem they hear 
 Portentous Thunder, in the troubled ' Sky. ' gelid 
 
 More to embroil the Deep, Leviathan, 
 
 350 And his unweildy Train, in horrid Sport, 
 
 Tempest the loosen'd Brine; while, thro' the Gloom, 
 
 Far, from the dire, unhospitable Shore, 
 
 The Lyon's Rage, the Wolf's sad Howl is heard, 
 
 And all the fell Society of Night. 
 
 Yet, Providence, that ever-waking Eye 
 
 Looks down, with Pity, on the fruitless Toil 
 
 Of Mortals, lost to Hope, and lights them safe. 
 
 Thro' all this dreary Labyrinth of Fate. 
 
 'Tis done ! — Dread Winter has subdued the Year, 
 360 And reigns, tremenduous, o'er the desart Plains ! 
 How dead the Vegetable Kingdom lies ! 
 How dumb the Tuneful ! Horror wide extends 
 His solitary Empire. — Now, fond Man I 
 Behold thy piotur'd life : Pass some few Years, 
 Thy flow'ring Spring, Thy short-Uv'd Summer's Strength, 
 Thy sober Autumn, fading into Age, 
 And pale, concluding. Winter shuts thy Scene, 
 And shrouds Thee, in the Grave — where now, are fled 
 Those Dreams of Greatness 1 those unsohd Hopes 
 370 Of Happiness ? those Longings after Fame ? 
 
 Those restless Cares ? those busy, bustling Days ? 
 Those Nights of secret Guilt ? those veering Thoughts, 
 Flutt'ring 'twixt Good, and 111, that shar'd thy Life ? 
 All, now, are vanish'd ! Yerlue, sole, survives. 
 Immortal, Mankind's never-failing Friend, 
 His Guide to Happiness on high — and see ! 
 'Tis come, the Glorious Morn I the second Birth 
 Of Heaven, and Earth ! — awakening Nature hears 
 
 353 In the second edition — 
 
 At once, is heard th' united, hungry. Howl 
 [Of aU the fell, &c.] 
 
238 THE SEASONS 
 
 Th' Almighty Trumpet's Voice, and starts to Life, 
 380 Renew'd, unfading. Now, th' Eternal Scheme, 
 That Dark Perplexity, that Mystic Maze, 
 Which Sight cou'd never trace, nor Heart conceive. 
 To Season's Eye, refin'd, clears up apace. 
 Angels, and Men, astonish'd, pause — and dread 
 To travel thro' the Depths of Providence, 
 Untry'd, unbounded. Ye vain Learned ! see. 
 And, prostrate in the Dust, adore that Power, 
 And Goodness, oft arraign'd. See now the Cause, 
 Why conscious Worth, oppress'd, in secret long 
 390 Mouru'd, unregarded : Why the Good Man's Sha[re] 
 In Life, was Gall, and Bitterness of Soul : 
 Why the lone Widow, and her Orphans, pin'd. 
 In starving Solitude ; while I/uxury, 
 In Palaces, lay prompting her low Thought, 
 To form unreal Wants : why Heaven-born Faith, 
 And Charity, prime Grace ! wore the red Marks 
 Of Persecution's Scourge : Why licens'd Pain, 
 That cruel Spoiler, that embosom'd Foe, 
 Imbitter'd all our Bliss. Ye Good Distrest I 
 400 Ye Noble Few I that, here, unbending, stand 
 Beneath Life's Pressures — yet a little while, 
 And all your Woes are past. Time, swiftly fleets, 
 And wish'd Eternity, approaching, brings 
 Life undecaying, Love without Allay, 
 Pure ilowing Joy, and Happiness sincere. 
 
WINTER 239 
 
 NOTES TO WIXTER 
 
 The following Preface by Thomson was written for the second 
 edition of Winter, and continued to be printed with separate 
 editions of that poem ; but was dropped In 1730, when the first 
 collected edition of The Seasons appeared : it constitutes Thom- 
 son's apology for poesy, or rather his Tindication of poetry : — 
 
 I am neither ignorant nor concerned how much one may 
 suffer in the opinion of several persons of great gravity and 
 charstcter by the study and pursuit of poetry. 
 
 Although there may seem to be some appearance of reason 
 for the present contempt of it as managed by the most part of 
 our modem writers, yet that any man should seriously declare 
 against that divine art is really amazing. It is declaring against 
 the most charming power of imagination, the most exalting force 
 of thought, the most affecting touch of sentiment — in a word, 
 against the very soul of aU learning and politeness. It is affront- 
 ing the universal taste of mankind, and declaring against what 
 has charmed the listening world from Moses down to Milton. 
 In fine, it is even declaring against the subUmest peissages of the 
 inspired writings themselves, and what seems to be the pecuUai 
 language of heaven. 
 
 The truth of the case is this : These weak-sighted gentlemen 
 cannot bear the strong light of poetry and the finer and more 
 amusing scene of things it displays. But must those therefore 
 whom heaven has blessed with the discerning eye shut it to keep 
 them company ? 
 
 It is pleasant enough, however, to observe frequently in these 
 enemies of poetry an awkwMd imitation of it. They sometimes 
 have their little brightnesses when the opening glooms will 
 permit. Xay, I have seen their heaviness on some occasions 
 deign to turn friskish, and witty, in which they make just such 
 another figure as jEsop's Ass when he began to fawn. To com- 
 plete the absurdity, they would even in their efforts against 
 Poetry fain be poetical ; like those gentlemen that reason with 
 a great deal of zeal and severity against reason. 
 
 That there are frequent and notorious abuses of Poetry is as 
 true as that the best things are most liable to that misfortune ; 
 but is there no end of that clamorous argument against the use 
 of things from the abuse of them ? and yet, I hope, that no man 
 who hsks the least sense of shame in him will fall into it after 
 the present sulphureous attacker of the stage. 
 
240 THE SEASONS 
 
 To insist no further on this head, let poetry once more be 
 restored to her ancient truth and purity ; let her be inspired 
 from heaven, and in return her incense ascend thither ; let her 
 exchange her low, venal, trifling, subjects for such as are fair, 
 useful, and magnificent ; and let her execute these so as at once 
 to please, instruct, surprise, and astonish : and then of necessity 
 the most inveterate ignorance, and prejudice, shall be struck 
 dumb ; and poets yet become the delight and wonder of mankind. 
 
 But this happy period is not to be expected, till some long- 
 wished, illustrious man of equal power and beneficence rise on 
 the wintry world of letters : one of a genuine and unbounded 
 greatness and generosity of mind ; who, far above all the pomp 
 and pride of fortune, scorns the httle addressful flatterer ; pierces 
 through the disgxiised designing villain ; discountenances all the 
 reigning fopperies of a tasteless age : and who, stretching his views 
 into late futurity, has the true interest of virtue, learning, and 
 mankind entirely at heart — a character so nobly desirable that 
 to an honest heart it is almost incredible so few should have the 
 ambition to deserve it. 
 
 Nothing can have a better influence towards the revival of 
 poetry than the choosing of great and serious subjects, such as 
 at once amuse the fancy, enlighten the head, and warm the heart. 
 These give a weight and dignity to the poem ; nor is the pleasure — 
 I should say rapture — both the writer and the reader feels 
 unwarranted by reason or followed by repentant disgust. To 
 be able to write on a dry, barren theme is looked upon by some 
 as the sign of a happy, fruitful genius : — fruitful indeed ! like one 
 of the pendant gardens in Cheapside, watered every morning by 
 the hand of the Alderman himself. And what are we commonly 
 entertained with on these occasions save forced unaffecting 
 fancies, little glittering prettinesses, mixed turns of wit and 
 expression, which are as widely different from native poetry as 
 buffoonery is from the perfection of human thinking ? A genius 
 fired with the charms of truth and nature is tuned to a sublimer 
 pitch, and scorns to associate with such subjects. 
 
 I cannot more emphatically recommend this poetical ambition 
 than by the four following hues from Mr. Hill's poem, called 
 The Judgment Day, which is so singular an instance of it : — 
 
 For me, suffice it to have taught my Muse, 
 The tuneful Triflings of her tribe to shun ; 
 And rais'd her warmth such heavenly themes to chuse. 
 As, in past ages, the best garlands won. 
 I know no subject more elevating, more amusing ; more ready 
 to awake the poetical enthusiasm, the philosophical reflection, and 
 
WINTER 241 
 
 the moral sentiment, than the works of Nature. Where can we 
 meet with such variety, such beauty, such magnificence ? All 
 that enlarges and transports the soul ! What more inspiring than 
 a calm, wide survey of them ? In every dress nature is greatly 
 charming — whether she puts on the crimson robes of the morning, 
 the strong effulgence of noon, the sober suit of the evening, or 
 the deep sables of blackness and tempest ! How gay looks the 
 Spring ! how glorious the Summer ! how pleasing the Autumn ! 
 and how venerable the Winter ! — But there is no thinking of 
 these things without breaking out into poetry ; which is, by-the- 
 by, a plain and undeniable argument of their superior excellence. 
 
 For this reason the best, both ancient, and modern. Poets 
 have been passionately fond of retirement, and solitude. The 
 wild romantic country was their dehght. And they seem never 
 to have been more happy, than when, lost in unfrequented 
 fields, far from the Uttle busy world, they were at leisure, to 
 meditate, and sing the Works of Nature. 
 
 The book of Job, that noble and ancient poem, which, even, 
 strikes so forcibly through a mangling translation, is crowned 
 with a description of the grand works of Nature ; and that, too, 
 from the mouth of their Almighty Author. 
 
 It was this devotion to the works of Nature that, in his Georgics, 
 inspired the rural Virgil to write so inimitably ; and who can 
 forbear joining with him in this declaration of his, which has been 
 the rapture of ages ? 
 
 Me vero primum dulces ante omnia Musae, 
 Quarum sacra fero ingenti perculsus amore, 
 Accipiant ; caelique vias et sidera monstrent, 
 Defectus soUs varios, lunaeque labores : 
 Unde tremor terris : qua vi maria alta tumescant 
 Obicibus ruptis, rursusque in seipsa residant : 
 Quid tantum oceano properent se tingere soles 
 Hybemi : vel quae tardis mora noctibus obstet. 
 Sin, has ne possim naturae accedere partes, 
 Frigidus obstiterit circum praecordia sanguis; 
 Kura mihi et rigui placeant in vallibus amnes, 
 Flumina amem silvasque inglorius. 
 
 Which may be Englished thus : — 
 
 Me may the Muses, my supreme delight! 
 Whose priest I am, smit with immense desire. 
 Snatch to their care ; the starry tracts disclose. 
 The sun's distress, the labours of the moon : 
 Whence the earth quakes : and by what force the deep" 
 Heave at the rocks, then on themselves reflow : 
 Why winter-suns to jplunge in ocean speed : 
 And what retards the lazy summer-night. 
 
242 THE SEASONS 
 
 But, lest I should these mystic-truths attain, 
 If the cold current freezes round my heart. 
 The country me, the brooky vales may please 
 Mid woods and streams unknown. 
 
 I cannot put an end to this Preface without taking the freedom 
 to o£fer my most sincere and grateful acknowledgments to all 
 those gentlemen who have given my first performance so favour- 
 able a reception. 
 
 It is with the blest pleasure, and a rising ambition, that I reflect 
 on the honour Mr. Hill has done me in recommending my poem 
 to the world after a manner so peculiar to himself — than whom 
 none approves and obliges with a nobler and more unreserving 
 promptitude of soul. His favours are the very smiles of humanity, 
 graceful and easy, flowing from and to the heart. This agreeable 
 train of thought awakens naturally in my mind all the other 
 parts of his great and amiable character, which I know not well 
 how to quit, and yet dare not here pursue. 
 
 Every reader who has a heart to be moved must feel the most 
 gentle power of poetry in the lines with which Mira has graced 
 my poem. 
 
 It perhaps might be reckoned vanity in me to say how richly 
 I value the approbation of a gentleman of Mr. Malloch's fine and 
 exact taste, so justly dear and valuable to all those that have the 
 happiness of knowing him, and who — to say no more of him — 
 will abundantly make good to the world the early promise his 
 admired piece of William and Margaret has given. 
 
 I only wish my description of the various appearance of nature in 
 Winter (and, as I purpose, in the other Seasons) may have the good 
 fortune to give the reader some of that true pleasure which they, in 
 their agreeable succession, are always sure to inspire into my heart. 
 
 [Following the above Preface came some lines by Aaron Hill, 
 ' To Mr. Thomson, doubtful to what patron he should address 
 his poem, called Winter ; ' some more by Mira, ' To Mr. Thomson 
 on his blooming Winter ; ' and yet some more by David Malloeh, 
 ' To Mr. Thomson, on his publishing the Second Edition of his 
 poem, called Winter.' They are of no merit.] 
 
 Line 18. Lord Wilmington had been Sir Spencer Compton, 
 Speaker of the House of Commons, when Thomson first inscribed 
 to him in March, 1726. 
 
 276. Following the preceding line — 
 
 Tipt with a wreath high-curling in the sky 
 (originally — i.e. in the second ed. of Winter, 1726 — 
 That curls its wreaths amid the freezing sky), 
 
WINTER 243 
 
 here, in the second ed. (1726), was inserted a passage of twelve 
 lines descriptive of the bear in Russian wilds, viz. : — 
 In Russia's wide immeasurable moors. 
 Where Winter keeps his unrejoicing court. 
 And in his airy hall the loud misrule 
 Of driving tempest is for ever heard — 
 Seen by the wildered traveller who roams 
 Guideless the yew-clad stony wastes, the Bear, 
 Rough tenant of these shades ! shaggy with ice 
 And dangling snow, stalks through the woods forlorn. 
 Slow-paced and sourer as the storms increase. 
 He makes his bed beneath the inclement wreath. 
 And, scorning the complainings of distress. 
 Hardens his heart against assaihng want. 
 See II. 827-33 infra for a condensation of these lines, beginning 
 ' There through the piny forest half-absorpt ', made for the ed. 
 of 1744. But before the final condensation was made, the passage 
 of the second ed., given above, had been thus altered and amplified 
 for the ed. of 1730 :— 
 
 Yet more outrageous is the season still, 
 A deeper horror, in Siberian wUds ; 
 Where Winter keeps his unrejoicing court, 
 And in his airy hall the loud misrule 
 Of driving tempest is for ever heard. 
 There through the ragged woods absorpt in snow, 
 Sole tenant of these shades, the shaggy bear. 
 With dangUug ice all horrid, stalks forlorn. 
 Slow-paced and sourer as the storms increase. 
 He makes his bed beneath the drifted snow. 
 And, scorning the complainings of distress. 
 Hardens his heart against assaihng want. 
 While, tempted vigorous o'er the marble waste. 
 On sleds reclined, the furry Russian sits. 
 And, by his reindeer drawn, behind him throws 
 A shining kingdom in a winter's day. 
 359. The generous hand. The Jail Committee, in the year 
 1729.— T. 
 453-529. This passage appeared in the first ed. (1726) as follows: 
 Lycurgus then. 
 Severely good ; and him of rugged Rome, 
 Numa, who softened her rapacious sons ; 
 Cimon, sweet-souled ; and Aristides, just ; 
 Unconquered Cato, virtuous in extreme ; 
 With that attempered hero, mild and firm, 
 Who wept the brother while the tyrant bled ; 
 Soipio, the humane warrior, gently brave, 
 
 e2 
 
244 THE SEASONS 
 
 Fair learning's friend, who early sought the shade 
 To dwell with innocence and truth retired ; 
 And, equal to the best, the Theban, he 
 Who single raised his country into fame. 
 Thousands behind, the boast of Greece and Eome, 
 Whom virtue owns, the tribute of a verse 
 Demand : but who can count the stars of heaven ? 
 Who sing their influence on this lower world ? 
 
 The text of the second ed. (also 1726) differs only from the above 
 in transferring the line about Cato two lines lower, so as to have the 
 Grecian worthies together : the ' attempered hero ' is Timoleon. 
 
 Edd. 1730-38 follow the text of the second ed. from ' Lycurgus 
 then ' to ' Scipio the humane warrior, gently brave ', except that 
 they give 'human' instead of 'humane'; and here they proceed: 
 Who soon the race of spotless glory ran. 
 And, warm in youth, to the poetic shade 
 With friendship and philosophy retired ; 
 And, equal to the best, the Theban twain 
 Who single raised their country into fame. 
 Thousands behind, (&c., as in ed. 1726). 
 By ' the Theban twain ' are meant Pelopidas and Epaminondas. 
 
 457. The firm devoted chief. Leonidas. — T. 
 
 464. a haughty rival. Themistocles. — T. 
 
 476. the Theban pair. Pelopidas and Epaminondas. — T. 
 
 .507. The public father. Marcus Junius Brutus. — T. 
 
 513. Thy vnUing victim, Carthage. Eegulus. — T. 
 
 655. generous BevU. A character in Th^ Conscious Lovers, 
 written by Sir Richard Steele. — T. 
 
 808. rich Cathay. The old name of China. — T. 
 
 836. frosty Caurus. The north-west wind. — T. 
 
 840. horde on horde. The wandering Scythian clans.— T. 
 
 875. M. de Maupertuis, in his book on the figure of the Earth, 
 after having described the beautiful lake and mountain of 
 Niemi in Lapland, says : ' Prom this height we had occasion 
 several times to see those vapours rise from the lake which the 
 people of the country call Haltios, and which they deem to be the 
 guardian spirits of the mountains. We had been frighted with 
 stories of bears that haunted this place, but saw none. It seemed 
 rather a place of resort for fairies and genii than bears.' — T. 
 
 876. The same author observes : ' I was surprised to see upon 
 the banks of this river (the Tenglio) roses of as lively a red as 
 any that are in our gardens.' — ^T. 
 
 893. beneath another sky. The other hemisphere. — T. 
 925. the Briton's fate. Sir Hugh Willoughby, sent by Queen 
 Elizabeth to discover the north-east passage. — T. 
 
A HYMN 
 
 ON THE SEASONS 
 
 [First published in 1730(121 11.); final edition in author's lifetime, 
 1746 (118 U.).] 
 
 These, as they change, Ahnighty Father ! these 
 Are but the varied God. The rolling year 
 Is full of thee. Forth in the pleasing Spring 
 Thy beauty walks, thy tenderness and love. 
 Wide flush the fields ; the softening air is bahn ; 
 Echo the mountains round ; the forest smiles ; 
 And every sense, and every heart, is joy. 
 Then comes thy glory in the Summer-months, 
 With Ught and heat refulgent. Then thy sun 
 Shoots fuU perfection through the swelling year : lo 
 And oft thy voice in dreadful thunder speaks. 
 And oft, at dawn, deep noon, or falling eve. 
 By brooks and groves, in hoUow-whispering gales. 
 Thy bounty shines in Autumn unconfined. 
 And spreads a common feast for all that hves. 
 In Winter awful thou ! with clouds and storms 
 Around thee thrown, tempest o'er tempest rolled, 
 
 6 the forests live 1730-38. 9 refulgent] severe. Prone 
 
 1730-38. II dreadful] awful 1730-38. 
 
 14, 15 For these two lines the original text (1730-38) gives — 
 A yellow-floating pomp, thy bounty shines 
 In Autumn unconfined. Thrown from thy lap. 
 Profuse o'er nature falls the lucid shower 
 Of beamy fruits, and in a radiant stream 
 Into the stores of sterile Winter pours. 
 
 16 awful] dreadful 1730-38. 
 
246 A HYMN 
 
 Majestic darkness ! On the whirlwind's wing 
 Riding sublime, thou bidst the world adore, 
 And humblest nature with thy northern blast. 20 
 
 Mysterious round ! what skill, what force divine, 
 Deep-felt in these appear ! a simple train, 
 Yet so delightful mixed, with such kind art. 
 Such beauty and beneficence combined, 
 Shade unperceived so softening into shade, 
 And all so forming an harmonious whole 
 That, as they stiU succeed, they ravish still. 
 But, wandering oft with brute unconscious gaze, 
 Man marks not thee, marks not the mighty hand 
 That, ever busy, wheels the silent spheres, 30 
 
 Works in the secret deep, shoots steaming thence 
 The fair profusion that o'erspreads the Spring, 
 Fhngs from the sun direct the flaming day. 
 Feeds every creature, hurls the tempest forth. 
 And, as on earth this grateful change revolves, 
 With transport touches aU. the springs of life. 
 
 Nature, attend ! join, every living soul 
 Beneath the spacious temple of the sky. 
 In adoration join ; and ardent raise 
 One general song ! To him, ye vocal gales, 40 
 
 Breathe soft, whose spirit in your freshness breathes : 
 Oh ! talk of him in sohtary glooms, 
 
 18 Majestic darkness] Horrible blackness 1730-38. 19 
 
 adore] be low 1730-38. 
 
 23-6 The original text (1730-38) gives- 
 Yet so harmonious mixed, so fitly joined, 
 One following one in such enchanting sort. 
 Shade unperceived so softening into shade. 
 And all so forming such a perfect whole, &c. 
 28 wandering] wondering 1730-38. 29 Thee not 1730-38. 
 
 40 An universal hymn ! to him, ye gales 1730-38. 41 in your 
 freshness breathes] teaches you to breathe 1730-38. 
 
A HYMN 247 
 
 Where, o'er the rook, the scarcely-waving pine 
 
 Fills the brown shade with a religious awe. 
 
 And ye, whose bolder note is heard afar. 
 
 Who shake the astonished world, lift high to Heaven 
 
 The impetuous song, and say from whom you rage. 
 
 His praise, ye brooks, attune, ye trembling rills ; 
 
 And let me catch it as I muse along. 
 
 Ye headlong torrents, rapid and profound ; 50 
 
 Ye softer floods, that lead the humid maze 
 
 Along the vale ; and thou, rnajestic main, 
 
 A secret world of wonders in thyseH, 
 
 Sound his stupendous praise, whose greater voice 
 
 Or bids you roar or bids your roarings fall. 
 
 Soft roU your incense, herbs, and fruits, and flowers, 
 
 In mingled clouds to him, whose sun exalts. 
 
 Whose breath perfumes you, and whose pencil paints. 
 
 Ye forests, bend ; ye harvests, wave to him — 
 
 Breathe your still song into the reaper's heart 60 
 
 As home he goes beneath the joyous moon. 
 
 Ye that keep watch in heaven, as earth asleep 
 
 Unconscious lies, effuse your mildest beams, 
 
 Ye constellations ! while your angels strike 
 
 Amid the spangled sky the silver lyre. 
 
 Great source of day ! best image here below 
 
 Of thy Creator, ever pouring wide 
 
 From world to world the vital ocean round ! 
 
 On nature write with every beam his praise. 
 
 The thunder rolls : be hushed the prostrate world, 70 
 
 While cloud to cloud returns the solemn hymn. 
 
 44 shade] void 1730-38. 54 stupendous] tremendous 
 
 1730-38. 56 Soft roll] Roll up 1730-38. 57 exalts] elates 
 
 1730-38. 58 breath] hand 1730-38. 61 As home he goes 
 
 beneath] Homeward rejoicing with 1730-38. 64 angles [a mis- 
 print) 1730. 67 pouring] darting 1730-38. 71 solemn] 
 dreadful 1730-38. 
 
248 A HYMN 
 
 Bleat out afresh, ye hills ; ye mossy rooks, 
 
 Retain the sound ; the broad responsive low, 
 
 Ye valleys, raise ; for the Groat Shepherd reigns. 
 
 And his unsufiering kingdom yet will come. 
 
 Ye woodlands all, awalre : a boundless song 
 
 Burst from the groves ; and, when the restless day. 
 
 Expiring, lays the warbling world asleep, 
 
 Sweetest of birds, sweet Philomela ! charm 
 
 The listening shades, and teach the night his praise ! 80 
 
 Ye, chief, for whom the whole creation smiles. 
 
 At once the head, the heart, the tongue of aU, 
 
 Crown the great hymn ! In swarming cities vast 
 
 Assembled men, to the deep organ join 
 
 The long-resounding voice, oft brealdng clear 
 
 At solemn pauses through the swelling bass ; 
 
 And, as each mingling flame increases each. 
 
 In one united ardour rise to heaven. 
 
 Or, if you rather choose the rural shade. 
 
 And find a fane in every sacred grove, 90 
 
 There let the shepherd's flute, the virgin's lay. 
 
 The prompting seraph, and the poet's lyre 
 
 Still sing the God of Seasons as they roll. 
 
 For me, when I forget the darling theme. 
 
 Whether the blossom blows, the summer-ray 
 
 Russets the plain, inspiring autumn gleams, 
 
 75 And yet again the golden age roturns 1730-38; followed by — 
 
 Wildest of creatures, be not silent hero, 
 But, hymning horrid, let the desert roar ! — 
 struck out in 1744. 
 
 76 boundless] general 1730-38. 80 teach the night his 
 praise] through the midnight hour ; followed by — 
 
 Trilling prolong the wildly-luscious note. 
 That night as well as day may vouch his praise 1730-38. 
 82 the tongue] and mouth 1730-38. 84 Assembled] Con- 
 
 course of 1730-38. 87 frame {a misprint) 1730. 90 And] 
 
 To 1730-38. 91 lay] chant 1730-88. 96 inspiring] delicious 
 1730-38. 
 
A HYMN 249 
 
 Or winter rises in the blackening east, 
 
 Be my tongue mute, may fancy paint no more. 
 
 And, dead to joy, forget my heart to beat ! 99 
 
 Should fate command me to the farthest verge 
 Of the green earth, to distant barbarous climes. 
 Rivers unknown to song, where first the sun 
 Gilds Indian mountains, or his setting beam 
 Flames on the Atlantic isles, 'tis nought to me ; 
 Since God is ever present, ever felt. 
 In the void waste as in the city full. 
 And where he vital spreads there must be joy. 
 When even at last the solemn hour shall come. 
 And wing my mystic flight to future worlds, 
 I cheerful will obey ; there, with new powers, no 
 Will rising wonders sing : I cannot go 
 Where universal love not smiles around. 
 Sustaining all yon orbs and aE. their sons ; 
 From seeming evil still educing good, 
 And better thence again, and better still. 
 In infinite progression. But I lose 
 Myself in him, in light ineffable ! 
 Come then, expressive Silence, muse his praise. 
 
 97 blackening] reddening 1730-38. 98 may fancy 
 
 all edd., 1730-46. loi distant] hostile 1730-38. 
 
 107-13 For these seven lines the original text of the Hymn 
 (1730-38) gives the following three :— 
 
 Rolls the same kindred Seasons round the world, 
 In all apparent, wise and good in all ; 
 Since he sustains and animates the whole. 
 114 educes 1730-38. 
 
THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE: 
 
 AN ALLEGORICAL POEM 
 
 [First published (probably in May) in 1748 ; first ed. in 4to, and 
 second in 8to, both in the same year. Thomson died in the 
 following August, about four months after the appearance of 
 this exquisite poem. The text of the second edition, as being the 
 last to receive the author's revision, is given here.] 
 
ADVERTISEMENT 
 
 This Poem being writ in the manner of Spenser, the obsolete 
 words, and a simplicity of diction in some of the lines which 
 borders on the ludicrous, were necessary to make the imitation 
 more perfect. And the style of that admirable poet, as well as 
 the measure in which he wrote, are as it were appropriated by 
 custom to all allegorical poems writ in our language — ^just as 
 in French the style of Marot, who lived under Francis I, has been 
 used in tales and familiar epistles by the poUtest writers of the 
 age of Louis XIV.— T. 
 
THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 CANTO I 
 
 The Castle hight of Indolence, 
 
 And its false luxury ; 
 Where for a little time, alas I 
 
 We lived right joUUy. 
 
 MOETAii man, who livest here by toil, 
 Do not complain of this thy hard estate ; 
 That like an emmet thou must ever moil 
 Is a sad sentence of an ancient date : 
 And, certes, there is for it reason great ; 
 For, though sometimes it makes thee weep and wail, 
 And curse thy stars, and early drudge and late, 
 Withouten that would come an heavier bale. 
 Loose life, unruly passions, and diseases pale. 
 
 n 
 In lowly dale, fast by a river's side. 
 With woody hiU o'er hiU encompassed round, 
 A most enchanting wizard did abide. 
 Than whom a fiend more fell is nowhere found. 
 It was, I ween, a lovely spot of ground ; 
 And there a season atween June and May, 
 Half prankt with spring, with summer half im- 
 
 browned, 
 A hstless climate made, where, sooth to say. 
 No living wight could work, ne cared even for play. 
 
254 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 m 
 Was nought around but images of rest : 
 Sleep-soothing groves, and quiet lawns betweea ; 
 And flowery beds that slumbrous influence kest, 
 From poppies breathed ; and beds of pleasant green, 
 Where never yet was creeping creature seen. 
 Meantime unnumbered ghttering streamlets played. 
 And hurled everywhere their waters sheen ; 
 That, as they bickered through the sunny glade, 
 Though restless stiQ themselves, a lulling murmur 
 made. 
 
 IV 
 
 Joined to the prattle of the purling riUs, 
 Were heard the lowing herds along the vale, 
 And flocks loud-bleating from the distant hLLLis, 
 And vacant shepherds piping in the dale : 
 And now and then sweet Pliilomel would wai!, 
 Or stock-doves plain amid the forest deep. 
 That drowsy rustled to the sigliing gale ; 
 And still a coil the grashopper did keep : 
 Yet all these sounds yblent inchned all to sleep. 
 
 v 
 Full in the passage of the vale, above, 
 A sable, silent, solemn forest stood ; 
 Where nought but shadowy forms were seen to 
 
 move, 
 As Idless fancied in her dreaming mood. 
 And up the hUls, on either side, a wood 
 Of blackening pines, ay waving to and fro. 
 Sent forth a sleepy horror through the blood ; 
 And where this valley winded out, below, 
 The murmuring main was heard, and scarcely heard, 
 to flow. 
 
CANTO I 255 
 
 VI 
 
 A pleasing land of drowsyhed it was : 
 Of dreams that wave before the half -shut eye ; 
 And of gay castles in the clouds that pass, 
 For ever flushing round a summer sky : 
 There eke the soft delights, that witchingly 
 Instil a wanton sweetness through the breast, 
 And the calm pleasures always hovered nigh ; 
 But whate'er smacked of noyanoe, or unrest. 
 Was far far off expelled from this deUcious nest. 
 
 vn 
 The landskip such, inspiring perfect ease; 
 Where Indolence (for so the wizard hight) 
 Close-hid his castle mid embowering trees. 
 That haK shut out the beams of Phoebus bright, 
 And made a kind of checkered day and night. 
 Meanwhile, unceasing at the massy gate. 
 Beneath a spacious palm, the wicked wight 
 Was placed ; and, to his lute, of cruel fate 
 And labour harsh complained, lamenting man's estate. 
 
 vni 
 Thither continual pilgrims crowded stUl 
 From all the roads of earth that pass there by : 
 For, as they chaunced to breathe on neighbouring 
 
 hiU, 
 The freshness of this valley smote their eye. 
 And drew them ever and anon more nigh. 
 Till clustering round the enchanter false they hung, 
 Ymolten with his syren melody ; 
 While o'er th' enfeebling lute his hand he flung, 
 And to the trembling chord these tempting verses 
 sung : 
 
256 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 IX 
 
 ' Behold ! ye pilgrims of this earth, behold ! 
 See all but man with unearned pleasure gay. 
 See her bright robes the butterfly unfold, 
 Broke from her wintry tomb in prime of May. 
 What youthful bride can equal her array ? 
 Who can with her for easy pleasure vie ? 
 From mead to mead with gentle wing to stray, 
 From flower to flower on balmy gales to fly. 
 Is all she has to do beneath the radiant sky. 
 
 X 
 
 ' Behold the merry minstrels of the morn, 
 The swarming songsters of the careless grove, 
 Ten thousand throats that, from the flowering thorn, 
 Hymn their good God, and carol sweet of love. 
 Such grateful kindly raptures them emove ! 
 They neither plough nor sow ; ne, fit for flaU, 
 E'er to the barn the nodding sheaves they drove • 
 Yet theirs each harvest dancing in the gale. 
 Whatever crowns the hfll, or smiles along the vale. 
 
 XI 
 
 ' Outcast of Nature, man ! the wretched thraU 
 Of bitter- dropping sweat, of sweltry pain. 
 Of cares that eat away thy heart with gall. 
 And of the vices, an inhuman train. 
 That all proceed from savage thirst of gain : 
 For when hard-hearted Interest first began 
 To poison earth, Astraea left the plain ; 
 Guile, Violence, and Murder seized on man. 
 And, for soft milky streams, with blood the rivers ran. 
 
CANTO I 257 
 
 XII 
 
 ' Come, ye, who still the cumbrous load of life 
 Push hard up hill ; but, as the farthest steep 
 You trust to gain, and put an end to strife, 
 Down thunders back the stone with mighty sweep. 
 And hurls your labours to the valley deep. 
 Forever vain : come, and withouten fee 
 I in oblivion will your sorrows steep. 
 Your cares, your toils ; wiU steep you in a sea 
 Of f uH delight : come, ye weary wights, to me ! 
 
 XIII 
 
 ' With me, you need not rise at early dawn, 
 To pass the joyless day in various stounds ; 
 Or, louting low, on upstart fortune fawn, 
 And sell fair honour for some paltry pounds ; 
 Or through the city take your dirty rounds 
 To cheat, and dun, and lie, and visit pay. 
 Now flattering base, now giving secret wounds ; 
 Or prowl in courts of law for human prey. 
 In venal senate thieve, or rob on broad highway. 
 
 XIV 
 
 ' No cocks, with me, to rustic labour call. 
 From village on to village sounding clear ; 
 To tardy swain no shrill- voiced matrons squall ; 
 No dogs, no babes, no wives to stun your ear ; 
 No hammers thump ; no horrid blacksmith sear, 
 Ne noisy tradesman your sweet slumbers start 
 With sounds that are a misery to hear : 
 But all is calm as would delight the heart 
 Of Sybarite of old, all nature, and all art. 
 
 THOMSON g 
 
258 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 XV 
 
 ' Here nought but candour reigns, indulgent ease, 
 Good-natured lounging, sauntering up and down : 
 They who are pleased themselves must always 
 
 please ; 
 On others' ways they never squint a frown. 
 Nor heed what haps in hamlet or in town. 
 Thus, from the source of tender Indolence, 
 With milky blood the heart is overflown, 
 Is soothed and sweetened by the social sense ; 
 For interest, envy, pride, and strife are banished hence. 
 
 XVI 
 
 ' What, what is virtue but repose of mind ? 
 A pure ethereal calm that knows no storm. 
 Above the reach of wild ambition's wind, 
 Above those passions that this world deform, 
 And torture man, a proud mahgnant worm ! 
 But here, instead, soft gales of passion play. 
 And gently stir the heart, thereby to form 
 A quicker sense of joy ; as breezes stray 
 Across the enlivened skies, and make them stiU more 
 
 gay- 
 
 XVII 
 
 ' The best of men have ever loved repose : 
 They hate to mingle in the filthy fray ; 
 Where the soul sours, and gradual rancour grows, 
 Imbittered more from peevish day to day. 
 Even those whom fame has lent her fairest ray. 
 The most renowned of worthy wights of yore. 
 From a base world at last have stolen away : 
 So Scipio, to the soft Cumaean shore 
 Retiring, tasted joy he never knew before. 
 
CANTO I 259 
 
 xvni 
 ' But if a little exercise you chuse, 
 Some zest for ease, 'tis not forbidden here. 
 Amid the groves you may indulge the muse, 
 Or tend the blooms, and deck the vernal year ; 
 Or softly steahng, with your watery gear, 
 Along the brooks, the crimson-spotted fry 
 You may delude : the whilst, amused, you hear 
 Now the hoarse stream, and now the zephyr's sigh. 
 Attuned to the birds, and woodland melody. 
 
 XIX 
 
 ' grievous f oUy ! to heap up estate. 
 Losing the days you see beneath the sun ; 
 When, sudden, comes blind unrelenting fate. 
 And gives the untasted portion you have won 
 With ruthless toil, and many a wretch undone. 
 To those who mock you gone to Pluto's reign. 
 There with sad ghosts to pine, and shadows dun : 
 But sure it is of vanities most vain. 
 To toil for what you here untoiling may obtain.' 
 
 XX 
 
 He ceased. But still their trembUng ears retained 
 The deep vibrations of his witching song ; 
 That, by a kind of magic power, constrained 
 To enter in, pell-mell, the hstening throng. 
 Heaps poured on heaps, and yet they slipt along 
 In silent ease : as when, beneath the beam 
 Of summer moons, the distant woods among. 
 Or by some flood all silvered with the gleam. 
 The soft-embodied fays through airy portal stream. 
 s2 
 
260 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 XXI 
 
 By the smooth demon so it ordered was, 
 And here his baneful bounty first began : 
 Though some there were who would not further pass, 
 And his alluring baits suspected han. 
 The wise distrust the too fair-spoken man. 
 Yet through the gate they cast a wishful eye : 
 Not to move on, perdie, is all they can ; 
 For, do their very best, they cannot fly. 
 But often each way look, and often sorely sigh. 
 
 XXII 
 
 When this the watchful wicked wizard saw. 
 With sudden spring he leaped upon them strait ; 
 And, soon as touched by his unhallowed paw, 
 They found themselves within the cursed gate, 
 FuU hard to be repassed, hke that of Fate. 
 Not stronger were of old the giant-crew. 
 Who sought to pull high Jove from regal state. 
 Though feeble wretch he seemed, of sallow hue : 
 Certes, who bides his grasp, will that encounter rue. 
 
 XXIII 
 
 For whomsoe'er the villain takes in hand. 
 Their joints unknit, their sinews melt apace ; 
 As lithe they grow as any wiUow-wand, 
 And of their vanished force remains no trace : 
 So when a maiden fair, of modest grace, 
 In all her buxom blooming May of charms. 
 Is seized in some losel's hot embrace, 
 She waxeth very weakly as she warms. 
 Then sighing yields her up to love's delicious harms. 
 
CANTO I 261 
 
 XXIV 
 
 Waked by the crowd, slow from his bench arose 
 A comely full-spread porter, swoln with sleep : 
 His calm, broad, thoughtless aspect breathed repose; 
 And in sweet torpor he was plunged deep, 
 Ne could himself from ceaseless yawning keep ; 
 While o'er his eyes the drowsy liquor ran. 
 Through which his halt-waked soul would faintly 
 
 peep. 
 Then, taking his black staff, he called his man. 
 And roused himself as much as rouse himself he can. 
 
 XXV 
 
 The lad leaped lightly at his master's call. 
 He was, to weet, a little roguish page. 
 Save sleep and play who minded nought at all. 
 Like most the untaught striplings of his age. 
 This boy he kept each band to disengage. 
 Garters and buckles, task for him unfit. 
 But iU-becoming his grave personage, 
 And which his portly paunch would not permit. 
 So this same limber page to all performed it. 
 
 XXVI 
 
 Meantime the master-porter wide displayed 
 Great store of caps, of slippers, and of gowns, 
 Wherewith he those who entered in arrayed, 
 Loose as the breeze that plays along the downs, 
 And waves the summer woods when evening frowns. 
 fair undress, best dress ! it checks no vein. 
 But every flowing limb in pleasure drowns. 
 And heightens ease with grace. This done, right fain 
 Sir Porter sat him down, and turned to sleep again. 
 
262 THE CASTLE OP INDOLENCE 
 
 XXVII 
 
 Thus easy robed, they to the fountain sped, 
 That in the middle of the court up-threw 
 A stream, high-spouting from its liquid bed. 
 And falling back again in drizzly dew : 
 There each deep draughts, as deep he thirsted, drew ; 
 It was a fountain of Nepenthe rare : 
 Whence, as Dan Homer sings, huge pleasaunce grew, 
 And sweet obUvion of vile earthly care. 
 Pair gladsome waking thoughts, and joyous dreams 
 more fair. 
 
 xxvm 
 This rite performed, all inly pleased and still, 
 Withouten trump was proclamation made : — 
 ' Ye sons of Indolence, do what you will ; 
 And wander where you list, through hall or glade : 
 Be no man's pleasure for another's staid : 
 Let each as hkes him best his hours employ. 
 And curst be he who minds his neighbour's trade ! 
 Here dwells kind ease, and unreproving joy : 
 He little merits bliss who others can annoy.' 
 
 XXIX 
 
 Strait of these endless numbers, swarming round 
 As thick as idle motes in sunny ray. 
 Not one eftsoons in view was to be found. 
 But every man strolled off his own glad way. 
 Wide o'er this ample court's blank area. 
 With all the lodges that thereto pertained, 
 No living creature could be seen to stray ; 
 While solitude and perfect silence reigned : 
 So that to think you dreamt you almost was con- 
 strained. 
 
CANTO I 263 
 
 XXX 
 
 As when a shepherd of the Hebrid Isles, 
 Placed far amid the melancholy main, 
 (Whether it be lone fancy him beguiles, 
 Or that aerial beings sometimes deign 
 To stand embodied to our senses plain) 
 Sees on the naked hill, or valley low. 
 The whilst in ocean Phoebus dips his wain, 
 A vast assembly moving to and fro ; 
 Then all at once in air dissolves the wondrous show. 
 
 XXXI 
 
 Ye gods of quiet, and of sleep profound. 
 Whose soft dominion o'er this castle sways. 
 And all the widely-silent places round. 
 Forgive me, if my trembling pen displays 
 What never yet was sung in mortal lays. 
 But how shall I attempt such arduous string ? 
 I who have spent my nights and nightly days 
 In this soul-deadening place, loose-loitering — 
 Ah ! how shall I for this uprear my moulted wing ? 
 
 xxxn 
 Come on, my muse, nor stoop to low despair. 
 Thou imp of Jove, touched by celestial fire ! 
 Thou yet shalt sing of war, and actions fair, 
 Which the bold sons of Britain will inspire ; 
 Of ancient bards thou yet shalt sweep the lyre; 
 Thou yet shalt tread in tragic pall the stage. 
 Paint love's enchanting woes, the hero's ire. 
 The sage's calm, the patriot's noble rage. 
 Dashing corruption down through every worthless age. 
 
264 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 XXXIII 
 
 The doors, that knew no shrill alarming bell, 
 Ne cursed knocker plied by villain's hand, 
 Self-opened into halls, where, who can teU 
 What elegance and grandeur wide expand 
 The pride of Turkey and of Persia land ? 
 Soft quilts on quilts, on carpets carpets spread. 
 And couches stretched around in seemly band ; 
 And endless pillows rise to prop the head ; 
 So that each spacious room was one full-sweEing bed. 
 
 XXXIV 
 
 And everywhere huge covered tables stood, 
 With wines high-flavoured and rich viands crowned ; 
 Whatever sprightly juice or tastful food 
 On the green bosom of this Earth are found. 
 And all old Ocean genders in his round — 
 Some hand unseen these silently displayed. 
 Even undemanded by a sign or sound ; 
 You need but wish, and, instantly obeyed. 
 Fair-ranged the dishes rose, and thick the glasses 
 played. 
 
 XXXV 
 
 Here freedom reigned without the least alloy ; 
 Nor gossip's tale, nor ancient maiden's gall, 
 Nor saintly spleen durst murmur at our joy, 
 And with envenomed tongue our pleasures paU. 
 For why ? there was but one great rule for all ; 
 To wit, that each should work his own desire. 
 And eat, drink, study, sleep, as it may fall. 
 Or melt the time in love, or wake the lyre. 
 And carol what, unbid, the Muses might inspire. 
 
CANTO I 265 
 
 XXXVI 
 
 The rooms with costly tapestry were hung, 
 Where was inwoven many a gentle tale, 
 Such as of old the rural poets sung 
 Or of Arcadian or Sicilian vale : 
 Reclining lovers, in the lonely dale. 
 Poured forth at large the sweetly tortured heart ; 
 Or, looking tender passion, swelled the gale, 
 And taught charmed echo to resound their smart ; 
 While flocks, woods, streams around, repose and peace 
 impart. 
 
 xxxvn 
 Those pleased the most, where, by a cuiming hand, 
 Depeinten was the patriarchal age ; 
 What time Dan Abraham left the Chaldee land, 
 And pastured on from verdant stage to stage. 
 Where fields and fountains fresh could best engage. 
 Toil was not then. Of nothing took they heed. 
 But with wild beasts the silvan war to wage, 
 And o'er vast plains their herds and flocks to feed : 
 Blest sons of nature they ! true golden age indeed ! 
 
 xxxvm 
 Sometimes the pencil, in cool airy halls. 
 Bade the gay bloom of vernal landskips rise, 
 Or Autumn's varied shades imbrown the walls : 
 Now the black tempest strikes the astonished eyes ; 
 Now down the steep the flashing torrent flies ; 
 The trembling sun now plays o'er ocean blue, 
 And now rude mountains frown amid the skies ; 
 Whate'er Lorrain light-touched with softening hue, 
 Or savage Rosa dashed, or learned Poussin drew. 
 
266 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 XXXIX 
 
 Each sound too here to languishment inclined, 
 Lulled the weak bosom, and induced ease. 
 Aerial music in the warbling wind, 
 At distance rising oft, by small degrees. 
 Nearer and nearer came, till o'er the trees 
 It hung, and breathed such soul-dissolving airs 
 As did, alas ! with soft perdition please : 
 Entangled deep in its enchanting snares, 
 The listening heart forgot aU duties and aU cares. 
 
 XL 
 
 A certain music, never known before, 
 Here soothed the pensive melancholy mind ; 
 Full easily obtained. Behoves no more, 
 But sidelong to the gently-waving wind 
 To lay the well-tuned instrument rechned ; 
 From which, with airy flying fingers light. 
 Beyond each mortal touch the most refined, 
 The god of winds drew sounds of deep deUght : 
 Whence, with just cause. The Harp of Aeolus it hight. 
 
 XLI 
 
 Ah me ! what hand can touch the strings so fine ? 
 
 Who up the lofty diapasan roU 
 
 Such sweet, such sad, such solemn airs divine, 
 
 Then let them down again into the soul ? 
 
 Now rising love they fanned ; now pleasing dole 
 
 They breathed, in tender musings, through the 
 
 heart ; 
 And now a graver sacred strain they stole, 
 As when seraphic hands an hymn impart : 
 Wild warbling Nature all, above the reach of Art ! 
 
CANTO I 267 
 
 XLII 
 
 Such the gay splendour, the luxurious state, 
 Of Cahphs old, who on the Tygris' shore, 
 In mighty Bagdat, populous and great, 
 Held their bright court, where was of ladies store ; 
 And verse, love, music still the garland wore : 
 When sleep was coy, the bard in waiting there 
 Cheered the lone midnight with the muse's lore ; 
 Composing music bade his dreams be fair. 
 And music lent new gladness to the morning air. 
 
 XLHl 
 
 Near the pavilions where we slept, still ran 
 Soft-tinkling streams, and dashing waters fell, 
 And sobbing breezes sighed, and oft began 
 (So worked the wizard) wintry storms to swell. 
 As heaven and earth they would together meU : 
 At doors and windows, threatening, seemed to call 
 The demons of the tempest, growling fell ; 
 Yet the least entrance found they none at all ; 
 Whence sweeter grew our sleep, secure in massy haU. 
 
 XLIV 
 
 And hither Morpheus sent his kindest dreams. 
 Raising a world of gayer tinct and grace ; 
 O'er which were shadowy cast Elysian gleams. 
 That played in waving lights from place to place, 
 And shed a roseate smile on nature's face. 
 Not Titian's pencil e'er could so array. 
 So fleece with clouds the pure ethereal space ; 
 Ne could it e'er such melting forms display. 
 As loose on flowery beds all languishingly lay. 
 
268 THE CASTLE OP INDOLENCE 
 
 XLV 
 
 No, fair illusions ! artful phantoms, no ! 
 My muse wiU not attempt your fairy-land : 
 She has no colours that Uke you can glow ; 
 To catch your vivid scenes too gross her hand. 
 But sure it is, was ne'er a subtler band 
 Than these same guileful angel-seeming sprights, 
 Who thus in dreams voluptuous, soft, and bland. 
 Poured all the Arabian heaven upon our nights, 
 And blessed them oft besides with more refined 
 dehghts. 
 
 XL VI 
 
 They were in sooth a most enchanting train. 
 Even feigning virtue ; skilful to unite 
 With evil good, and strew with pleasure pain. 
 But, for those fiends whom blood and broils delight, 
 Who hurl the wretch as if to hell outright 
 Down, down black guKs where suUen waters sleep, 
 Or hold him clambering all the fearful night 
 On beetling cliSs, or pent in ruins deep — 
 They, till due time should serve, were bid far hence 
 to keep. 
 
 XLVII 
 
 Ye guardian spirits, to whom man is dear. 
 From these foul demons shield the midnight gloom ! 
 Angels of fancy and of love, be near, 
 And o'er the wilds of sleep diffuse a bloom ; 
 Evoke the sacred shades of Greece and Rome, 
 And let them virtue with a look impart ! 
 But chief, a while ! lend us from the tomb 
 Those long-lost friends for whom in love we smart. 
 And fill with pious awe and joy-mixt woe the heart ! 
 
CANTO I 269 
 
 XLVIII 
 
 Or are you sportive ? — bid the morn of youth 
 Rise to new hght, and beam afresh the days 
 Of innocence, simpUcity, and truth, 
 To cares estranged, and manhood's thorny ways 
 What transport to retrace our boyish plays, 
 Our easy bhss, when each thing joy supplied — 
 The woods, the mountains, and the warbling maze 
 Of the wild brooks ! But, fondly wandering wide, 
 My muse, resume the task that yet doth thee abide. 
 
 XLIX 
 
 One great amusement of our household was — 
 In a huge crystal magic globe to spy, 
 StiU as you turned it, aU things that do pass 
 Upon this ant-hiU earth ; where constantly 
 Of idly-busy men the restless fry 
 Run bustUng to and fro with fooUsh haste 
 In search of pleasures vain, that from them fly. 
 Or which, obtained, the caitiffs dare not taste : 
 When nothing is enjoyed, can there be greater waste ? 
 
 li 
 
 Of Vanity the Mirror this was called. 
 Here you a muckworm of the town might see 
 At his dull desk, amid his legers stalled, 
 Eat up with carking care and penurie, 
 Most like to carcase parched on gallow-tree. 
 ' A penny saved is a penny got ' — 
 Firm .to this scoundrel maxim keepeth he, 
 Ne of its rigour will he bate a jot. 
 Tin it has quenched his fire, and banished his pot. 
 
270 THE CASTLE OP INDOLENCE 
 
 LI 
 
 Strait from the filth of this low grub, behold ! 
 Comes fluttering forth a gaudy spendthrift heir. 
 All glossy gay, enamelled all with gold, 
 The silly tenant of the summer- air. 
 In folly lost, of nothing takes he care ; 
 Pimps, lawyers, stewards, harlots, flatterers vile. 
 And thieving tradesmen him among them share : 
 His father's ghost from Limbo-lake the while 
 Sees this, which more damnation doth upon him pile. 
 
 LH 
 
 This globe pourtrayed the race of learned men, 
 Still at their books, and turning o'er the page, 
 Backwards and forwards : oft they snatch the pen 
 As if inspired, and in a Thespian rage ; 
 Then write, and blot, as would your ruth engage. 
 Why, authors, all this scrawl and scribbling sore ? 
 To lose the present, gain the future age, 
 Praised to be when you can hear no more. 
 And much enriched with fame when useless worldly 
 store ! 
 
 Lin 
 Then would a splendid city rise to view. 
 With carts, and cars, and coaches roaring all : 
 Wide-poured abroad, behold the prowling crew ; 
 See how they dash along from wall to waU ! 
 At every door, hark how they thundering call ! 
 Good Lord ! what can this giddy rout excite ? 
 Why ? each on each to prey, by guile or gall ; 
 With flattery these, with slander those to blight. 
 And make new tiresome parties for the coming night. 
 
CANTO I 271 
 
 MV 
 
 The puzzling sons of party next appeared, 
 In dark cabals and nightly juntos met ; 
 And now they whispered close, now shrugging reared 
 The important shoulder ; then, as if to get 
 New light, their twinkling eyes were inward set. 
 No sooner Lucifer recalls affairs, 
 Than forth they various rush in mighty fret ; 
 When lo ! pushed up to power, and crowned their 
 cares. 
 In comes another set, and kicketh them down stairs. 
 
 LV 
 
 But what most showed the vanity of life 
 Was to behold the nations all on fire, 
 In cruel broils engaged, and deadly strife : 
 Most Christian kings, inflamed by black desire, 
 With honourable ruffians in their hire, 
 Cause war to rage, and blood around to pour. 
 Of this sad work when each begins to tire, 
 , They sit them down just where they were before. 
 Tin for new scenes of woe peace shall their force 
 restore. 
 
 LVI 
 
 To number up the thousands dwelling here. 
 An useless were, and eke an endless task — 
 From kings, and those who at the helm appear, 
 To gipsies brown in summer-glades who bask. 
 Yea, many a man, perdie, I could unmask, 
 Whose desk and table make a solemn show 
 With tape-tied trash, and suits of fools, that ask 
 For place or pension, laid in decent row ; 
 But these I passen by, with nameless numbers moe. 
 
272 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 LVII 
 
 Of all the gentle tenants of the place, 
 There was a man of special grave remark : 
 A certain tender gloom o'erspread his face, 
 Pensive, not sad ; in thought involved, not dark : 
 As soote this man could sing as morning-lark, 
 And teach the noblest morals of the heart ; 
 But these his talents were yburied stark ; 
 Of the fine stores he nothing would impart. 
 Which or boon nature gave or nature-painting art. 
 
 LVIII 
 
 To noontide shades incontinent he ran 
 Where purls the brook with sleep-inviting sound ; 
 Or, when Dan Sol to slope his wheels began. 
 Amid the broom he basked him on the ground, 
 Where the wild thyme and camomil are found : 
 There would he linger till the latest ray 
 Of light sat quivering on the welkin's bound ; 
 Then homeward through the twilight shadows stray, 
 Sauntering and slow. So had he passed many a day. 
 
 LIX 
 
 Yet not in thoughtless slumber were they past : 
 For oft the heavenly fire, that lay concealed 
 Emongst the sleeping embers, mounted fast. 
 And all its native light anew revealed. 
 Oft as he traversed the cerulean field. 
 And marked the clouds that drove before the wind, 
 Ten thousand glorious systems would he build, 
 Ten thousand great ideas filled his mind ; 
 But with the clouds they fled, and left no trace behind. 
 
CANTO I 273 
 
 LX 
 
 With him was sometimes joined in silent walk 
 (Profoundly silent, for they never spoke) 
 One shyer still, who quite detested talk : 
 Oft, stung by spleen, at once away he broke 
 To groves of pine and broad o'ershadowing oak ; 
 There, inly thrilled, he wandered all alone. 
 And on himseK his pensive fury wroke, 
 Ne ever uttered word, save when first shone 
 The glittering star of eve — ' Thank heaven ! the day 
 is done.' 
 
 LXI 
 
 Here lurked a wretch who had not crept abroad 
 For forty years, ne face of mortal seen — 
 In chamber brooding like a loathly toad ; 
 And sure his linen was not very clean. 
 Through secret loophole, that had practised been 
 Near to his bed, his dinner vile he took ; 
 Unkempt, and rough, of squalid face and mien. 
 Our castle's shame ! whence, from his filthy nook, 
 We drove the villain out for fitter lair to look. 
 
 Lxn 
 One day there chanced into these halls to rove 
 A joyous youth, who took you at first sight ; 
 Him the wild wave of pleasure hither drove, 
 Before the sprightly tempest tossing light : 
 Certes, he was a most engaging wight. 
 Of social glee, and wit humane though keen, 
 Turning the night to day and day to night : 
 For him the merry bells had rung, I ween, 
 .If, in this nook of quiet, bells had ever been. 
 
 THOMSON T 
 
274 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 LXIII 
 
 But not even pleasure to excess is good : 
 What most elates then sinks the soul as low : 
 When spring-tide joy pours in with copious flood, 
 The higher still the exulting billows flow, 
 The farther back again they flagging go 
 And leave us groveUing on the dreary shore. 
 Taught by this son of joy, we found it so ; 
 Who, whilst he staid, kept in a gay uproar 
 Our maddened Castle all, the abode of sleep no more. 
 
 LXIV 
 
 As when in prime of June a burnished fly, 
 Sprung from the meads, o'er which he sweeps along. 
 Cheered by the breathing bloom and vital sky. 
 Tunes up amid these airy halls his song. 
 Soothing at first the gay reposing throng : 
 And oft he sips their bowl ; or, nearly drowned, 
 He, thence recovering, drives their beds among. 
 And scares their tender sleep with trump profound ; 
 Then out again he flies, to wing his mazy round. 
 
 LXV 
 
 Another guest there was, of sense refined. 
 Who felt each worth, — ^for every worth he had ; 
 Serene yet warm, humane yet firm his mind, 
 As little touched as any man's with bad : 
 Him through their inmost walks the Muses lad. 
 To him the sacred love of Nature lent ; 
 And sometimes would he make our valley glad. 
 Whenas we found he would not here be pent. 
 To him the better sort this friendly message sent : — 
 
CANTO I 275 
 
 LXVI 
 
 ' Come, dwell with us ! true son of virtue, come ! 
 But if, alas ! we cannot thee persuade 
 To lie content beneath our peaceful dome, 
 Ne ever more to quit our quiet glade ; 
 Yet, when at last thy toils, but ill apaid, 
 Shall dead thy fire, and damp its heavenly spark. 
 Thou wilt be glad to seek the rural shade, 
 There to indulge the muse, and nature mark : 
 We then a lodge for thee will rear in Hagley Park.' 
 
 LXAni 
 
 Here whilom ligged the Esopus of the age ; 
 But, called by fame, in soul ypricked deep, 
 A noble pride restored him to the stage. 
 And roused him like a giant from his sleep. 
 Even from his slumbers we advantage reap : 
 With double force the astonished scene he wakes. 
 Yet quits not nature's bounds. He knows to keep 
 Each due decorum : now the heart he shakes. 
 And now with weU-urged sense the enlightened judge- 
 ment takes. 
 
 Lxvin 
 A bard here dwelt, more fat than bard beseems 
 Who, void of envy, guile, and lust of gain, 
 On virtue still, and nature's pleasing themes, 
 Poured forth his unpremeditated strain, 
 The world forsaking with a calm disdain : 
 Here laughed he careless in his easy seat ; 
 Here quaffed, encircled with the joyous train ; 
 Oft moraUzing sage ; his ditty sweet 
 He loathed much to write, ne cared to repeat. 
 t2 
 
276 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 LXIX 
 
 Full oft by holy feet our ground was trod ; 
 Of clerks good plenty here you mote espy. 
 A little, round, fat, oily man of God 
 Was one I chiefly marked among the fry : 
 He had a roguish twinkle in his eye. 
 And shone all glittering with ungodly dew, 
 If a tight damsel chanced to trippen by ; 
 Which when observed, he shrunk into his mew, 
 And straight would recollect his piety anew. 
 
 LXX 
 
 Nor be forgot a tribe who minded nought 
 (Old inmates of the place) but state affairs : 
 They looked, perdie, as if they deeply thought ; 
 And on their brow sat every nation's cares. 
 The world by them is parcelled out in shares, 
 When in the Hall of Smoke they congress hold, 
 And the sage berry sun-burnt Mocha bears 
 Has cleared their inward eye : then, smoke-enrolled, 
 Their oracles break forth, mysterious as of old. 
 
 LXXI 
 
 Here languid Beauty kept her pale-faced court : 
 Bevies of dainty dames of high degree 
 From every quarter hither made resort ; 
 Where, from gross mortal care and business free. 
 They lay poured out in ease and luxury. 
 Or, should they a vain show of work assume, 
 Alas ! and well-a-day ! what can it be ? 
 To knot, to twist, to range the vernal bloom ; 
 But far is cast the distafi, spinning-wheel, and loom 
 
CANTO I 277 
 
 LXXII 
 
 Their only labour was to kiU the time ; 
 And labour di"e it is, and weary woe. 
 They sit, they loll, turn o'er some idle rhyme ; 
 Then, rising sudden, to the glass they go, 
 Or saunter forth with tottering step and slow : 
 This soon too rude an exercise they find ; 
 ^trait on the couch their limbs again they throw. 
 Where, hours on hours, they sighing lie reclined. 
 And court the vapoury god soft-breathing in the wind. 
 
 Lxxni 
 Now must I mark the villainy we found, 
 But ah ! too late, as shall eftsoons be sh jwn. 
 A place here was, deep, dreary, under ground ; 
 Where still our inmates, when unpleasing grown, 
 Diseased, and loathsome, privily were thrown. 
 Far from the Ught of heaven they languished there, 
 Unpitied, uttering many a bitter groan ; 
 For of these wretches taken was no care : 
 Fierce fiends and hags of hell their only nurses were. 
 
 LXXIV 
 
 Alas the change ! from scenes of joy and rest 
 To this dark den, where sickness tossed alway. 
 , Here Lethargy, with deadly sleep opprest, 
 Stretched on his back a mighty lubbard lay, 
 Heaving his sides, and snored night and day : 
 To stir him from his traunce it was not eath. 
 And his half -opened eyne he shut straitway ; 
 He led, I wot, the softest way to death, 
 And taught withouten pain and strife to yield the 
 breath. 
 
278 THE CASTLE OP INDOLENCE 
 
 LXXV 
 
 Of limbs enormous, but withal unsound, 
 Soft-swoln, and pale, here lay the Hydropsy : 
 Unwieldy man ! with belly monstrous round, 
 For ever fed with watery supply ; 
 For still he drank, and yet he still was dry. 
 And moping here did Hypochondria sit, 
 Mother of Spleen, in robes of various dye, 
 Who vexed was full oft with ugly fit ; 
 And some her frantic deemed, and some her deemed 
 a wit. 
 
 LXXVI 
 
 A lady proud she was, of ancient blood, 
 Yet oft her fear her pride made crouchen low : 
 She felt, or fancied in her fluttering mood. 
 All the diseases which the spittles know. 
 And sought all physic which the shops bestow. 
 And stiU new leaches and new drugs would try. 
 Her humour ever wavering to and fro ; 
 For sometimes she would laugh, and sometimes cry, 
 Then sudden waxed wroth ; and aU she knew not why. 
 
 LXXVII 
 
 Fast by her side a listless maiden pined. 
 With aching head and squeamish heart-burnings ; 
 Pale, bloated, cold, she seemed to hate mankind. 
 Yet loved in secret aU forbidden things. 
 And here the Tertian shakes his chilling wings : 
 The sleepless Gout here counts the crowing cocks — 
 A woK now gnaws him, now a serpent stings : 
 Whilst Apoplexy crammed Intemperance knocks 
 Down to the ground at once, as butcher felleth ox. 
 
CANTO II 
 
 The Knight of Art and Industry, 
 And his atchievementa fair ; 
 
 That, hy this Castle's overthrow. 
 Secured, and crowned were. 
 
 I 
 
 Escaped the castle of the sire of sin, 
 Ah ! where shall I so sweet a dwelling find ? 
 For all around without, and aU within, 
 Nothing save what dehghtful was and kind. 
 Of goodness savouring and a tender mind. 
 E'er rose to view. But now another strain. 
 Of doleful note, alas ! remains behind : 
 I now must sing of pleasure turned to pain. 
 And of the false enchanter, Indolence, complaia. 
 
 n 
 Is there no patron to protect the Muse, 
 And fence for her Parnassus' barren soil ? 
 To every labour its reward accrues, 
 And they are sure of bread who swink and moil ; 
 But a fell tribe the Aonian hive despoil. 
 As ruthless wasps oft rob the painful bee : 
 Thus, while the laws not guard that noblest toU, 
 Ne for the Muses other meed decree. 
 They praised are alone, and starve right merrily. 
 
280 ^ THE CASTLE OP INDOLENCE 
 
 in 
 I care not, fortune, what you me deny : 
 You cannot rob me of free nature's grace ; 
 You cannot shut the windows of the sky, 
 Through which Aurora shows her brightening face ; 
 You cannot bar my constant feet to trace 
 The woods and lawns by hving stream at eve. 
 Let health my nerves and finer fibres brace, 
 And I their toys to the great children leave : 
 Of fancy, reason, virtue, nought can me bereave. 
 
 IV 
 
 Come, then, my muse, and raise a bolder song : 
 Come, lig no more upon the bed of sloth. 
 Dragging the lazy languid line along, 
 Fond to begin, but still to finish loth. 
 Thy half-writ scrolls all eaten by the moth: 
 Arise, and sing that generous imp of fame 
 Who, with the sons of softness nobly wroth. 
 To sweep away this human lumber came, 
 Or in a chosen few to rouse the slumbering flame. 
 
 In Fairy-land there lived a knight of old. 
 Of feature stern, Selvaggio well ycleped, 
 A rough unpohshed man, robust and bold, 
 But wondrous poor : he neither sowed nor reaped, 
 Ne stores in summer for cold winter heaped ; 
 In hunting all his days away he wore ; 
 Now scorched by June, now in November steeped, 
 Now pinched by biting January sore. 
 He stiU in woods pursued the libbard and the boar. 
 
CANTO II 281 
 
 VI 
 
 As he one morning, long before the dawn, 
 Pricked through the forest to dislodge his prey, 
 Deep in the winding bosom of a lawn, 
 With wood wild-fringed, he marked a taper's ray, 
 That from the beating rain and wintry fray 
 Did to a lonely cot his steps decoy : 
 There, up to earn the needments of the day, 
 He found dame Poverty, nor fair nor coy ; 
 Her he compressed, and filled her with a lusty boy. 
 
 vn 
 Amid the greenwood shade this boy was bred, 
 And grow at last a knight of muchel fame, 
 Of active mind and vigorous lustyhed, 
 The Knight of Arts and Industry by name. 
 Earth was his bed, the bougfis his roof did frame ; 
 He knew no beverage but the flowing stream ; 
 His tasteful well-earned food the silvan game. 
 Or the brown fruit with which the woodlands teem : 
 The same to him glad summer or the winter breme. 
 
 vni 
 So passed his youthly morning, void of care. 
 Wild as the colts that through the commons run : 
 For him no tender parents troubled were ; 
 He of the forest seemed to be the son. 
 And certes had been utterly undone 
 But that Minerva pity of him took. 
 With aU the gods that love the rural wonne, 
 That teach to tame the soil and rule the crook ; 
 Ne did the sacred Nine disdain a gentle look. 
 
282 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 Of fertile genius, him they nurtured well 
 In every science and in every art 
 By which mankind the thoughtless brutes excel, 
 That can or use, or joy, or grace impart. 
 Disclosing aU the powers of head and heart : 
 Ne were the goodly exercises spared 
 That brace the nerves or make the limbs alert, 
 And mix elastic force with firmness hard : 
 Was never knight on ground mote be with him 
 compared. 
 
 Sometimes, with early morn, he mounted gay 
 The hunter-steed, exulting o'er the dale, 
 And drew the roseate breath of orient day : 
 Sometimes, retiring to the secret vale, 
 Yclad in steel, and bright with burnished mail, 
 He strained the bow, or tossed the sounding spear. 
 Or, darting on the goal, outstript the gale. 
 Or wheeled the chariot in its mid career. 
 Or strenuous wrestled hard with many a tough com- 
 peer. 
 
 XI 
 
 At other times he pryed through Nature's store, 
 Whate'er she in the ethereal round contains, 
 Whate'er she hides beneath her verdant floor. 
 The vegetable and the mineral reigns ; 
 Or else he scanned the globe, those small domains. 
 Where restless mortals such a turmoil keep, 
 Its seas, its floods, its mountains, and its plains ; 
 But more he searched the mind, and roused from 
 sleep 
 Those moral seeds whence we heroic actions reap. 
 
CANTO II 283 
 
 XII 
 
 Nor would he scorn to stoop from high pursuits 
 Of heavenly Truth, and practise what she taught. 
 Vain is the tree of knowledge without fruits. 
 Sometimes in hand the spade or plough he caught, 
 Forth-calling all with which boon earth is fraught ; 
 Sometimes he plied the strong mechanic tool, 
 Or reared the fabric from the finest draught ; 
 And oft he put himself to Neptune's school. 
 Fighting with winds and waves on the vext ocean 
 pool. 
 
 xni 
 To solace then these rougher toils he tried 
 To touch the kindling canvas into life ; 
 With nature his creating pencil vied, — 
 With nature joyous at the mimic strife : 
 Or to such shapes as graced Pygmalion's wife 
 He hewed the marble ; or with varied fire 
 He roused the trumpet and the martial fife, 
 Or bade the lute sweet tenderness inspire, 
 Or verses framed that well might wake Apollo's lyre. 
 
 XIV 
 
 Accomplished thus he from the woods issued, 
 FuU of great aims and bent on bold emprise ; 
 The work which long he in his breast had brewed 
 Now to perform he ardent did devise, 
 To-wit, a barbarous world to civilize. 
 Earth was till then a boundless forest wild — 
 Nought to be seen but savage wood and skies ; 
 No cities nourished arts, no culture smiled, 
 No government, no laws, no gentle manners mild. 
 
284 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 XV 
 
 A rugged wight, the worst of brutes, was man ; 
 On his own wretched kind he, ruthless, preyed : 
 The strongest still the weakest over-ran ; 
 In every country mighty robbers swayed. 
 And guile and ruffian force were all their trade. 
 Life was not life, but rapine, want, and woe ; 
 Which this brave knight, in noble anger, made 
 To swear he would the rascal rout o'erthrow, 
 For, by the Powers Divine, it should no more be so ! 
 
 XVI 
 
 It would exceed the purport of my song 
 To say how this best sun, from orient climes, 
 Came beaming life and beauty aU along, 
 Before him chasing indolence and crimes. 
 Still, as he passed, the nations he sublimes. 
 And calls forth arts and virtue with his ray : 
 Then Egypt, Greece, and Rome their golden times 
 Successive had ; but now in ruins grey 
 They lie, to slavish sloth and tyranny a prey. 
 
 XVII 
 
 To crown his toils, Sir Industry then spread 
 The swelling sail, and made for Britain's coast. 
 A sylvan life till then the natives led. 
 In the brown shades and greenwood forest lost. 
 All careless rambling where it liked them most — 
 Their wealth the wild- deer bouncing through the 
 
 glade ; 
 They lodged at large, and Uved at Nature's cost ; 
 Save spear and bow withouten other aid ; 
 Yet not the Roman steel their naked breast dismayed. 
 
CANTO II 285 
 
 XVIII 
 
 He liked the soil, he hked the clement skies, 
 He liked the verdant hills and flowerj'^ plains : 
 ' Be this my great, my chosen isle ! (he cries) 
 This — whilst my labours hberty sustains — 
 This Queen of Ocean all assault disdains.' 
 Nor liked he less the genius of the land. 
 To freedom apt and persevering pains, 
 Mild to obey, and generous to command, 
 Tempered by forming Heaven with kindest firmest 
 hand. 
 
 XIX 
 
 Here by degrees his master-work arose, 
 Whatever arts and industry can frame. 
 Whatever finished agriculture knows. 
 Fair Queen of Arts ! from heaven itself who came 
 When Eden flourished in unspotted fame ; 
 And still with her sweet innocence we find. 
 And tender peace, and joys without a name, 
 That, while they rapture, tranquillize the mind ; 
 Nature and Art at once, deUght and use combined. 
 
 XX 
 
 Then towns he quickened by mechanic arts, 
 And bade the fervent city glow with toil ; 
 Bade social commerce raise renowned marts, 
 Join land to land, and marry soil to soU, 
 Unite the poles, and without bloody spoil 
 Bring home of either Ind the gorgeous stores ; 
 Or, should despotic rage the world embroil, 
 Bade tyrants tremble on remotest shores, 
 While o'er the encircling deep Britaimia's thunder 
 roars. 
 
286 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 XXI 
 
 The drooping Muses then he westward called, 
 From the famed city by Propontis Sea, 
 What time the Turk the enfeebled Grecian thralled ; 
 Thence from their cloistered walks he set them free, 
 , And brought them to another Castalie, 
 Where Isis many a famous noursling breeds, 
 Or where old Cam soft paces o'er the lea 
 In pensive mood, and tunes his Doric reeds, 
 The whilst his flocks at large the lonely shepherd feeds. 
 
 xxn 
 Yet the fine arts were what he finished least. 
 For why ? They are the quintessence of all. 
 The growth of labouring time, and slow increast ; 
 Unless, as seldom chances, it should fall 
 That mighty patrons the coy sisters caU 
 Up to the sunshine of uncumbered ease, 
 Where no rude care the mounting thought may 
 
 thrall. 
 And where they nothing have to do but please : 
 Ah ! gracious God ! thou knowst they ask no other 
 
 fees. 
 
 XXIII 
 
 But now, alas ! we five too late in time : 
 Our patrons now even grudge that little claim. 
 Except to such as sleek the soothing rhyme ; 
 And yet, forsooth, they wear Maecenas' name. 
 Poor sons of puffed-up vanity, not fame. 
 Unbroken spirits, cheer ! still, still remains 
 The eternal patron, Liberty ; whose flame, 
 While she protects, inspires the noblest strains. 
 The best and sweetest far are toil-created gains. 
 
CANTO II 287 
 
 XXIV 
 
 Whenas the knight had framed in Britain-land 
 A matchless form of glorious government, 
 In which the sovereign laws alone command, 
 Laws stablished by the pubhc free consent, 
 Whose majesty is to the sceptre lent — 
 When this great plan, with each dependent art, 
 Was settled firm, and to his heart's content, 
 Then sought he from the toilsome scene to part. 
 And let life's vacant eve breathe quiet through the 
 heart. 
 
 XXV 
 
 For this he chose a farm in Deva's vale. 
 Where his long alleys peeped upon the main. 
 In this calm seat he drew the healthful gale. 
 Commixed the chief, the patriot, and the swain, 
 The happy monarch of his sylvan train ! 
 Here, sided by the guardians of the fold, 
 He walked his rounds, and cheered his blest domain ; 
 His days, the days of unstained nature, rolled 
 Replete with peace and joy, hke patriarch's of old. 
 
 XXVI 
 
 Witness, ye lowing herds, who lent him milk ; 
 Witness, ye flocks, whose woolly vestments far 
 Exceed soft India's cotton, or her silk ; 
 Witness, with Autumn charged, the nodding car 
 That homeward came beneath sweet evening's star. 
 Or of September moons the radiance mild. 
 hide thy head, abominable War ! 
 Of crimes and ruffian idleness the child ! 
 From heaven this life ysprung, from heU thy glories 
 vild! 
 
288 THE CASTLE OF. INDOLENCE 
 
 XXVII 
 
 Nor from his deep retirement banished was 
 The amusing cares of rural industry. 
 Still, as with grateful change the seasons pass, 
 New scenes arise, new landskips strike the eye, 
 And all the enlivened country beautify : 
 Gay plains extend where marshes slept before ; 
 O'er recent meads the exulting streamlets fly ; 
 Dark frowning heaths grow bright with Ceres' store ; 
 And woods imbrown the steep, or wave along the shore, 
 
 xxvm 
 As nearer to his farm you made approach. 
 He pohshed nature with a finer hand : 
 Yet on her beauties durst not art encroach ; 
 'Tis art's alone these beauties to expand. 
 In graceful dance immingled, o'er the land 
 Pan, Pales, Flora, and Pomona played : 
 Even here, sometimes, the rude wild common 
 
 fand 
 An happy place ; where, free and unafraid, 
 Amid the flowering brakes each coyer creature strayed. 
 
 XXIX 
 
 But in prime vigour what can last for ay ? 
 That soul-enfeebling wizard, Indolence, 
 I whilom sung, wrought in his works decay : 
 Spread far and wide was his curst influence ; 
 Of pubUc virtue much he dulled the sense. 
 Even much of private ; eat our spirit out, 
 And fed our rank luxurious vices : whence 
 The land was overlaid with many a lout ; 
 !Not, as old fame reports, wise, generous, bold, and 
 stout. 
 
CANTO II 289 
 
 XXX 
 
 A rage of pleasure maddened every breast ; 
 Down to the lowest lees the ferment ran : 
 To his licentious wish each must be blest, 
 With joy be fevered, — snatch it as he can. 
 Thus Vice the standard reared ; her arrier-ban 
 Corruption called, and loud she gave the word : — 
 ' Mind, mind yourselves ! why should the vulgar 
 
 man, 
 The lacquey, be more virtuous than his lord ? 
 Enjoy this span of life ! 'tis all the gods afford.' 
 
 XXXI 
 
 The tidings reached to where in quiet hall 
 The good old knight enjoyed well-earned repose : 
 ' Come, come. Sir Knight! thy children on thee call; 
 Come, save us yet, ere ruin round us close ! 
 The demon Indolence thy toils o'erthrows.' 
 On this the noble colour stained his cheeks, 
 Indignant glowing through the whitening snows 
 Of venerable eld ; his eye full-speaks 
 His ardent soul, and from his couch at once he breaks. 
 
 XXXII 
 
 ' I wiU (he cried), so help me God ! destroy 
 That villain Archimage.' — His page then strait 
 He to him called — a fiery-footed boy 
 Benempt Dispatch. ' My steed be at the gate ; 
 My bard attend ; quick, bring the net of fate.' 
 This net was twisted by the Sisters Three ; 
 Which, when once cast o'er hardened wretch, too 
 
 late 
 Repentance comes : replevy cannot be 
 From the strong iron grasp of vengeful destiny. 
 
290 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 XXXIII 
 
 He came, the bard, a little Druid wight, 
 Of withered aspect ; but his eye was keen. 
 With sweetness mixed. In russet brown bedight. 
 As is his sister of the copses green, 
 He crept along, unpromising of mien. 
 Gross he who judges so. His soul was fair ; 
 Bright as the children of yon azure sheen. 
 True comeliness, which nothing can impair, 
 Dwells in the mind : all else is vanity and glare. 
 
 XXXIV 
 
 ' Come,' quoth the knight; ' a voice has reached mine 
 
 ear : 
 The demon Indolence threats overthrow 
 To all that to mankind is good and dear. 
 Come, Philomelus, let us instant go 
 O'erturn his bowers and lay his castle low. 
 Those men, those wretched men, who will be slaves, 
 Must drink a bitter wrathful cup of woe : 
 But some there be thy song, as from their graves, 
 Shall raise. Thrice happy he who without rigour 
 
 XXXV 
 
 Issuing forth, the knight bestrode his steed 
 
 Of ardent bay, and on whose front a star 
 
 Shone bla,zing bright : sprung from the generous 
 
 breed 
 That whirl of active Day the rapid car. 
 He pranced along, disdaining gate or bar, 
 Meantime, the bard on milk-white palfrey rode ; 
 An honest sober beast, that did not mar 
 His meditations, but full softly trode : 
 And much they moralized as thus yfere they yode. 
 
CANTO II 291 
 
 XXXVT 
 
 They talked of virtue, and of human bliss. 
 What else so fit for man to settle well ? 
 And still their long researches met in this, 
 This truth of truths, which nothing can refel : — 
 ' From virtue's fount the purest joys outweU, 
 Sweet rills of thought that cheer the conscious soul ; 
 While vice pours forth the troubled streams of hell. 
 The which, howe'er disguised, at last with dole 
 Will through the tortured breast their fiery torrent 
 roll.' 
 
 XXXVII 
 
 At length it dawned, that fatal valley gay, 
 
 O'er which high wood-crowned hills their summits 
 
 rear. 
 On the cool height awhile our palmers stay. 
 And spite even of themselves their senses cheer ; 
 Then to the wizard's wonne their steps they steer. 
 Like a green isle it broad beneath them spread, 
 With gardens round, and wandering currents clear. 
 And tufted groves to shade the meadow-bed. 
 Sweet airs and song ; and without hurry all seemed 
 
 glad. 
 
 XXXVIII 
 
 ' As God shall judge me, Knight ! we must forgive 
 (The half-enraptured Philomelas cried) 
 The frail good man deluded here to hve, 
 And in these groves his musing fancy hide. 
 Ah, nought is pure ! It cannot be denied 
 That virtue still some tincture has of vice. 
 And vice of virtue. What should then betide, 
 But that our charity be not too nice ? 
 Come, let us those we can to real bliss entice.' 
 tj2 
 
292 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 XXXIX 
 
 ' Ay, sicker,' quoth the knight, ' all flesh is frail, 
 To pleasant sin and joyous dalliance bent ; 
 But let not brutish vice of this avail. 
 And think to scape deserved punishment. 
 Justice were cruel, weakly to relent ; 
 From Mercy's seK she got her sacred glaive : 
 Grace be to those who can and will repent ; 
 But penance long and dreary to the slave. 
 Who must in floods of fire his gross foul spirit lave.' 
 
 XL 
 
 Thus, holding high discourse, they came to where 
 The cursed carle was at his wonted trade ; 
 StiU tempting heedless men into his snare. 
 In witching wise, as I before have said. 
 But when he saw, in goodly gear arrayed, 
 The grave majestic knight approaching nigh. 
 And by his side the bard so sage and staid, 
 His countenance fell ; yet oft his anxious eye 
 Marked them, like wily fox who roosted cock doth spy. 
 
 XLI 
 
 Nathless, with feigned respect, he bade give back 
 The rabble-rout, and welcomed them full kind ; 
 Struck with the noble twain, they were not slack 
 His orders to obey, and fall behind. 
 Then he resumed his song ; and unconfined 
 Poured all his music, ran through aU his strings : 
 With magic dust their eyne he tries to blind, 
 And virtue's tender airs o'er weakness flings. 
 What pity, base his song who so divinely sings ! 
 
CANTO II 293 
 
 XLII 
 
 Elate in thought, he counted them his own, 
 They hstened so intent with fixed delight : 
 But they instead, as if transmewed to stone, 
 Marvelled he could with such sweet art unite 
 The hghts and shades of manners, wrong and right. 
 Meantime the silly crowd the charm devour, 
 Wide-pressing to the gate. Swift on the Knight 
 He darted fierce to drag him to his bower. 
 Who backening shunned his touch, for well he knew 
 its power. 
 
 XLIII 
 
 As in thronged amphitheatre of old 
 The wary retiarius trapped his foe, 
 Even so the Knight, returning on him bold. 
 At once involved him in the net of woe 
 Whereof I mention made not long ago. 
 Enraged at first, he scorned so weak a jail, 
 And leaped, and fiew, and flounced to and fro ; 
 But, when he found that nothing could avail, 
 He sat him feUy down, and gnawed his bitter nail. 
 
 XLIV 
 
 Alarmed, the inferior demons of the place 
 
 Raised rueful shrieks and hideous yells around ; 
 
 Black ruptured clouds deformed the welkin's face. 
 
 And from beneath was heard a wailing sound, 
 
 As of infernal sprights in cavern bound ; 
 
 A solemn sadness every creature strook. 
 
 And Ughtnings flashed, and horror rocked the 
 
 ground : 
 Huge crowds on crowds outpoured, with blemished 
 
 look. 
 As if on time's last verge this frame of things had 
 
 shook. 
 
294 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 XLV 
 
 Soon as the short-lived tempest was yspent, 
 Steamed from the jaws of vext Avernus' hole, 
 And hushed the hubbub of the rabblement, 
 Sir Industry the first calm moment stole : 
 ' There must,' he cried, ' amid so vast a shoal, 
 Be some who are not tainted at the heart. 
 Not poisoned quite by this same villain's bowl : 
 Come, then, my bard, thy heavenly fire impart ; 
 Touch soul with soul, till forth the latent spirit start.' 
 
 XLVI 
 
 The bard obeyed ; and, taking from his side, 
 Where it in seemly sort depending hung, 
 His British harp, its speaking strings he tried. 
 The which with skilful touch he deftly strung. 
 Till tinkling in clear symphony they rung. 
 Then, as he felt the muses come along. 
 Light o'er the chords his raptured hand he flung, 
 And played a prelude to his rising song : 
 The whilst, like midnight mute, ten thousands round 
 him throng. 
 
 XLVII 
 
 Thus, ardent, burst his strain : — ' Ye hapless race. 
 Dire-labouring here to smother reason's ray 
 That hghts our Maker's image in our face, 
 And gives us wide o'er earth unquestioned sway ; 
 What is the adored Supreme perfection ? say ! 
 What, but eternal never-resting soul. 
 Almighty power, and all-directing day. 
 By whom each atom stirs, the planets roll ; 
 Who fills, surrounds, informs, and agitates the whole ? 
 
CANTO II 295 
 
 XLVIII 
 
 ' Come, to the beaming God your hearts unfold ! 
 Draw from its fountain life ! 'Tis thence alone 
 We can excel. Up from unfeeling mould 
 To seraphs burning round the Almighty's throne, 
 Life rising still on life in higher tone 
 Perfection forms, and with perfection bliss. 
 In universal nature this clear shown 
 Not needeth proof : to prove it were, I wis, 
 To prove the beauteous world excels the brute abyss. 
 
 XLIX 
 
 ' Is not the field, with lively culture green, 
 A sight more joyous than the dead morass ? 
 Do not the skies, with active ether clean 
 And fanned by sprightly zephyrs, far surpass 
 The foul November fogs and slumbrous mass 
 With which sad nature veils her drooping face ? 
 Does not the mountain stream, as clear as glass. 
 Gay-dancing on, the putrid pool disgrace ? 
 The same in all holds true, but chief in human race. 
 
 L 
 
 ' It was not by vile loitering in ease 
 That Greece obtained the brighter palm of art ; 
 That soft yet ardent Athens learned to please. 
 To keen the wit, and to subUme the heart — 
 In all supreme ! complete in every part ! 
 It was not thence majestic Rome arose, 
 And o'er the nations shook her conquering dart : 
 For sluggard's brow the laurel never grows ; 
 Renown is not the child of indolent repose. 
 
296 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 LI 
 
 ' Had unambitious mortals minded nought 
 But in loose joy their time to wear away, 
 Had they alone the lap of dalliance sought, 
 Pleased on her pillow their duU heads to lay, 
 Rude nature's state had been our state to-day ; 
 No cities e'er their towery fronts had raised. 
 No arts had made us opulent and gay. 
 With brother-brutes the human race had graz'd, 
 None e'er had soared to fame, none honoured been, 
 none praised. 
 
 LII 
 
 ' Great Homer's song had never fired the breast 
 To thirst of glory and heroic deeds ; 
 Sweet Maro's muse, sunk in inglorious rest, 
 Had silent slept amid the Mincian reeds : 
 The wits of modern time had told their beads, 
 And monkish legends been their only strains ; 
 Our Milton's Eden had lain wrapt in weeds, 
 Our Shakespeare strolled and laughed with War- 
 wick swains, 
 Ne had my master Spenser charmed his Mulla's plains. 
 
 LIII 
 
 ' Dumb, too, had been the sage historic muse, 
 And perished all the sons of ancient fame ; 
 Those starry lights of virtue, that diffuse 
 Through the dark depth of time their vivid flame. 
 Had all been lost with such as have no name. 
 Who then had scorned his ease for others' good ? 
 Who then had toiled, rapacious men to tame ? 
 Who in the public breach devoted stood. 
 And for his country's cause been prodigal of blood ? 
 
 Lin. 6, other's second ed. (1748). 
 
CANTO II 297 
 
 LIV 
 
 ' But, should to fame your hearts impervious be, 
 H right I read, you pleasure aU require : 
 Then hear how best may be obtained this fee, 
 How best enjoyed this nature's wide desire. 
 Toil, and be glad! let Industry inspire 
 Into your quickened limbs her buoyant breath ! 
 Who does not act is dead ; absorpt entire 
 In miry sloth, no pride, no joy he hath : 
 O leaden-hearted men, to be in love with death ! 
 
 LV 
 
 ' Better the toiling swain, oh happier far ! 
 Perhaps the happiest of the sons of men ! 
 Who vigorous plies the plough, the team, or car. 
 Who houghs the field, or ditches in the glen. 
 Delves in his garden, or secures his pen : 
 The tooth of avarice poisons not his peace ; 
 He tosses not in sloth's abhorred den ; 
 From vanity ho has a f uU release ; 
 And, rich in nature's wealth, he thinks not of increase. 
 
 LVI 
 
 ' Good Lord ! how keen are his sensations all ! 
 His bread is sweeter than the glutton's cates ; 
 The wines of France upon the palate paU 
 Compared with what his simple soul elates. 
 The native cup whose flavour thirst creates ; 
 At one deep draught of sleep he takes the night ; 
 And, for that heart-felt joy which nothing mates. 
 Of the pure nuptial bed the chaste delight. 
 The losel is to him a miserable wight. 
 
298 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 Lvn 
 ' But what avail the largest gifts of Heaven, 
 When drooping health and spirits go amiss ? 
 How tasteless then whatever can be given ! 
 Health is the vital principle of bliss, 
 And exercise of health. In proof of this, 
 Behold the wretch who slugs his life away 
 Soon swallowed in disease's sad abyss ; 
 While he whom toil has braced, or manly play, 
 Has light as air each limb, each thought as clear as day. 
 
 LVIII 
 
 ' O who can speak the vigorous joys of health ? 
 Unclogged the body, unobscured the mind : 
 The morning rises gay ; with pleasing stealth 
 The temperate evening falls serene and kind. 
 In health the wiser brutes true gladness find. 
 See how the younglings frisk along the meads 
 As May comes on and wakes the balmy wind ! 
 Rampant with life, their joy all joy exceeds : 
 Yet what save high-strung health this dancing 
 pleasaunce breeds ? 
 
 LIX 
 
 ' But here, instead, is fostered every ill 
 Which or distempered minds or bodies know. 
 Come, then, my kindred spirits ! do not spill 
 Your talents here. This place is but a show 
 Whose charms delude you to the den of woe : 
 Come, follow me ; I will direct you right. 
 Where pleasure's roses, void of serpents, grow. 
 Sincere as sweet. Come, follow this good knight ; 
 And you will bless the day that brought him to your 
 sight. 
 
CANTO II 299 
 
 LX 
 
 ' Some he will lead to courts, and some to camps ; 
 To senates some, and public sage debates, 
 Where, by the solemn gleam of midnight lamps, 
 The world is poised, and managed mighty states ; 
 To high discovery some, that new creates 
 The face of earth ; some to the thriving mart ; 
 Some to the rural reign, and softer fates ; 
 To the sweet muses some, who raise the heart : 
 All glory shall be yours, all nature, and all art. 
 
 LXI 
 
 ' There are, I see, who listen to my lay. 
 Who wretched sigh for virtue, but despair. 
 " All may be done (methinks I hear them say), 
 Even death despised by generous actions fair ; 
 All: but, for those who to these bowers repair, 
 Their every power dissolved in luxury, 
 To quit of torpid sluggishness the lair 
 And from the powerful arms of sioth get free — 
 'Tis rising from the dead ! Alas, it cannot be ! " 
 
 LXII 
 
 ' Would you then learn to dissipate the band 
 Of these huge threatening difficulties dire 
 That in the weak man's way like lions stand, 
 His soul appal, and damp his rising fire ? 
 Resolve ! resolve ! and to be men aspire ! 
 Exert that noblest privilege, alone 
 Here to mankind indulged ; control desire ; 
 Let godlike reason from her sovereign throne 
 Speak the commanding word / mil ! and it is done. 
 
300 THE CASTLE OE INDOLENCE 
 
 Lxm 
 ' Heavens ! can you, then, thus waste in shameful 
 
 wise 
 Your few important days of trial here ? 
 Heirs of eternity, yborn to rise 
 Through endless states of being, still more near 
 To bliss approaching, and perfection clear — 
 Can you renounce a fortune so sublime, 
 Such glorious hopes, your backward steps to steer. 
 And roll, with vilest brutes, through mud and slime ? 
 No, no ! — your heaven-touched hearts disdain the 
 
 sordid crime ! ' 
 
 LXIV 
 
 ' Enough ! enough ! ' they cried. Strait, from the 
 
 crowd 
 The better sort on wings of transport fly — 
 As, when amid the lifeless summits proud 
 Of Alpine cliffs, where to the gelid sky 
 Snows piled on snows in wintry torpor lie, 
 The rays divine of vernal Phoebus play. 
 The awakened heaps, in streamlets from on high, 
 Roused into action, lively leap away. 
 Glad-warbling through the vales, in their new being 
 gay- 
 
 LXV 
 
 Not less the life, the vivid joy serene. 
 That lighted up these new-created men. 
 Than that which wings the exulting spirit clean. 
 When, just delivered from this fleshly den, 
 It soaring seeks its native skies agen. 
 How light its essence ! how unclogged its powers, 
 Beyond the blazon of my mortal pen ! 
 Even so we glad forsook these sinful bowers ; 
 Even such enraptured life, such energy was ours. 
 
CANTO II 301 
 
 LXVI 
 
 But far the greater part, with rage inflamed, 
 Dire-muttered curses and blasphemed high Jove. 
 ' Ye sons of hate ! (they bitterly exclaimed) 
 What brought you to this seat of peace and love ? 
 WhUe with kind nature here amid the grove 
 We passed the harmless sabbath of our time. 
 What to disturb it could, feU men ! emove 
 Your barbarous hearts ? Is happiness a crime ? 
 Then do the fiends of hell rule in yon Heaven sublime.' 
 
 Lxvn 
 ' Ye impious wretches, (quoth the Knight in wrath) 
 Your happiness behold ! ' Then strait a wand 
 He waved, an anti-magic power that hath 
 Truth from illusive falsehood to command. 
 Sudden the landskip sinks on every hand ; 
 The pure quick streams are marshy puddles found ; 
 On baleful heaths the groves all blackened stand ; 
 And, o'er the weedy foul abhorred ground. 
 Snakes, adders, toads, each loathly creature crawls 
 around. 
 
 LXVIII 
 
 And here and there, on trees by lightning scathed. 
 Unhappy wights who loathed life yhung ; 
 Or in fresh gore and recent murder bathed 
 They weltering lay ; or else, infuriate flung 
 Into the gloomy flood, while ravens sung 
 The funeral dirge, they down the torrent rolled : 
 These, by distempered blood to madness stung. 
 Had doomed themselves ; whence oft, when night 
 controlled 
 The world, returning hither their sad spirits howled. 
 
302 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 LXIX 
 
 Meantime a moving scene was open laid. 
 That lazar-house, I whilom in my lay 
 Depainten have, its horrors deep-displayed, 
 And gave unnumbered wretches to the day, 
 Who tossing there in sijualid misery lay. 
 Soon as of sacred light the unwonted smile 
 Poured on these Uving catacombs its ray. 
 Through the drear caverns stretching many a mile, 
 The sick up-raised their heads, and dropped their 
 woes a while. 
 
 LXX 
 
 * Heaven ! ' they cried, ' and do we once more see 
 Yon blessed sun, and this green earth so fair ? 
 Are we from noisome damps of pest-house free ? 
 And drink our souls the sweet ethereal air ? 
 O thou, or knight or God, who boldest there 
 That fiend, oh keep him in eternal chains ! 
 But what for us, the children of despair, 
 Brought to the brink of hell, what hope remains ? 
 Repentance does itself but aggravate our pains.' 
 
 LXXI 
 
 The gentle knight, who saw their rueful case, 
 Let faU adown his silver beard some tears. 
 ' Certes,' quoth he, ' it is not even in grace 
 To undo the past, and eke your broken years : 
 Nathless, to nobler worlds repentance rears 
 With humble hope her eye ; . to her is given 
 A power the truly contrite heart that cheers ; 
 She quells the brand by which the rocks are riven ; 
 She more than merely softens, she rejoices Heaven. 
 
CANTO II 303 
 
 LXXII 
 
 ' Then patient bear the sufferings you have earned, 
 And by these sufferings purify the mind ; 
 Let wisdom be by past misconduct learned : 
 Or pious die, with penitence resigned ; 
 And to a life more happy and refined 
 Doubt not you shall, new creatures, yet arise. 
 TiU then, you may expect in me to find 
 One who wiU wipe your sorrow from your eyes. 
 One who will soothe your pangs, and wing you to the 
 skies.' 
 
 Lxxiir 
 They silent heard, and poured their thanks in tears. 
 ' For you (resumed the Knight, with sterner tone) 
 Whose hard dry hearts the obdurate demon sears — 
 That villain's gifts will cost you many a groan ; 
 In dolorous mansion long you must bemoan 
 His fatal charms, and weep your stains away ; 
 Till, soft and pure as infant goodness grown. 
 You feel a perfect change : then, who can say 
 What grace may yet shine forth in Heaven's eternal 
 day?' 
 
 LXXIV 
 
 This said, his powerful wand he waved anew : 
 Instant, a glorious angel-train descends. 
 The charities, to-wit, of rosy hue : 
 Sweet love their looks a gentle radiance lends. 
 And with seraphic flame compassion blends. 
 At once delighted to their charge they fly : 
 When lo ! a goodly hospital ascends, 
 In which they bade each human aid be nigh. 
 That could the sick-bed smoothe of that unhappy fry. 
 
304 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 LXXV 
 
 It was a worthy edifying sight, 
 
 And gives to human-kind pecuhar grace, 
 
 To see kind hands attending day and night 
 
 With tender ministry from place to place. 
 
 Some prop the head ; some from the pallid face 
 
 Wipe off the faint cold dews weak nature sheds ; 
 
 Some reach the healing draught : the whilst, to 
 
 chase 
 The fear supreme, around their softened beds, 
 Some holy man by prayer all opening heaven dispreads. 
 
 LXXVI 
 
 Attended by a glad acclaiming train 
 Of those he rescued had from gaping hell. 
 Then turned the knight ; and, to his hall again 
 Soft-pacing, sought of Peace the mossy cell. 
 Yet down his cheeks the gems of pity fell. 
 To see the helpless wretches that remained. 
 There left through delves and deserts dire to yell : 
 Amazed, their looks with pale dismay were stained. 
 And, spreading wide their hands, they meek repen- 
 tance feigned. 
 
 LXXVII 
 
 But ah ! their scorned day of grace was past : 
 
 For (horrible to tell !) a desert wild 
 
 Before them stretched, bare, comfortless, and vast ; 
 
 With gibbets, bones, and carcases defiled. 
 
 There nor trim field nor lively culture smiled ; 
 
 Nor waving shade was seen, nor fountain fair : 
 
 But sands abrupt on sands lay loosely piled. 
 
 Through which they floundering toiled with painful 
 care, 
 Whilst Phoebus smote them sore, and fired the cloud- 
 less air. 
 
CANTO II 305 
 
 LXXVIII 
 
 Then, varying to a joyless land of bogs, 
 
 The saddened country a gray waste appeared, 
 
 Where nought but putrid steams and noisome fogs 
 
 Por ever hung on drizzly Auster's beard ; 
 
 Or else the ground, by piercing Caurus seared. 
 
 Was jagged with frost or heaped with glazed snow : 
 
 Through these extremes a ceaseless round they 
 
 steered, 
 By cruel fiends still hurried to and fro, 
 Gaunt Beggary, and Scorn, with many hell-hounds 
 
 moe. 
 
 LXXIX 
 
 The first was with base dunghill rags yclad. 
 Tainting the gale in which they fluttered light ; 
 Of morbid hue his features, sunk and sad ; 
 His hollow eyne shook forth a sickly light ; 
 And o'er his lank jawbone, in piteous plight. 
 His black rough beard was matted rank and vile ; 
 Direful to see ! a heart-appalling sight ! 
 Meantime foul scurf and blotches him defile ; 
 And dogs, where'er he went, stUl barked all the while. 
 
 LXXX 
 
 The other was a fell despightful fiend — 
 
 Hell holds none worse in baleful bower below ; 
 
 By pride, and wit, and rage, and rancour keened ; 
 
 Of man, alike if good or bad, the foe : 
 • With nose upturned, he always made a show 
 
 As if he smelt some nauseous scent ; his eye 
 
 Was cold and keen, like blast from boreal snow ; 
 
 And taunts he casten forth most bitterly. 
 Such were the twain that ofi drove this ungodly fry. 
 
306 THE CASTLE OP INDOLENCE 
 
 LXXXI 
 
 Even so through Brentford town, a town of mud, 
 An herd of bristly swine is pricked along ; 
 The filthy beasts, that never chew the cud. 
 Still grunt, and squeak, and sing their troublous 
 
 song. 
 And oft they plunge themselves the mire among ; 
 But ay the ruthless driver goads them on. 
 And ay of barking dogs the bitter throng 
 Makes them renew their unmelodious moan ; 
 Ne ever find they rest from their unresting fone. 
 
 NOTES TO THE CASTLE OP INDOLENCE 
 
 ' After fourteen or fifteen years The Castle of Indolence comes 
 abroad in a fortnight ' : so wrote Thomson in the middle of 
 April, 1748, to William Paterson, his friend and successor in the 
 office of Surveyor-General of the Leeward Islands. The slow and 
 leisurely composition of the poem was therefore begun before 
 Thomson went to live at Richmond, in 1736, and covered the whole 
 of his period of residence there. It was probably published early 
 in May. The first edition was in quarto ; the second, published 
 in the same year, in octavo. The text of the latter is followed 
 in the present edition. Thomson died in August of the same 
 year. 
 
 Murdoch, Thomson's first and kindliest biographer, thus 
 describes the origin and growth of The Castle of Indolence : — 
 ' It was at first little more than a few detached stanzas in the 
 way of raillery on himself, and on some of his friends, who would 
 reproach him with indolence, while he thought them at least 
 as indolent as himself. But he saw very soon that the subject 
 deserved to be treated more seriously, and in a form fitted to 
 convey one of the most important moral lessons.' 
 
 The poem is more exquisite and free in point of style than 
 The Seasons, but less poetical and less popular. As Gray hints, 
 it is best enjoyed in detached stanzas. It is for the pocket of 
 poet or artist who loves to linger over its exquisitely presented 
 imagery or sentiment, while The Seasons is for the inn parlour, 
 and the general reader who is pleased with broad general effects. 
 
 The first canto, which sets forth the pleasures of indolence, is 
 
NOTES 307 
 
 at best an apology for an indolent life ; the second is a warning 
 intended to discourage the indulgence of indolence. There is 
 poetry in the first canto : the second is mostly didactic. 
 
 Canto I. stanza xxx. 1. 1. Those islands on the western coast 
 of Scotland, called the Hebrides. — T. 
 
 I. XL. 9. This is not an imagination of the author, there being 
 in fact such an instrument, called Aeolus's harp, which, when 
 placed against a little rushing or current of air, produces the 
 eflEect here described. — T. 
 
 I. XLii. 7. The Arabian Caliphs had poets among the ofBcers 
 of their court whose office it was to do what is here mentioned. — T. 
 
 I. Liv. 6. Lucifer — the Morning Star. — T. 
 
 I. Lvii. 2. a man of special grave remark. Probably William 
 Paterson ; perhaps Collins. 
 
 I. Lx. 3. One skyer stUl. Supposed to be Dr. Armstrong. 
 
 I. Lxr. 1. Here lurked a wretch. Said to have been ' Henry 
 Welby, Esquire, an eccentric solitaire of the period ' 
 
 I. Lxn. 2. A joyous yoidh. John Forbes, son of the Lord 
 President. 
 
 I. Lxv. 1. Another guest. George Lyttelton, of Hagley Park, 
 
 L LXVii. 1. the Esopics of the age. Quin, the actor — temporarily 
 driven from the stage by the success of his young rival, Garrick. 
 
 L Lxviii. 1. A bard here dwelt. Thomson himself. ' The fol- 
 lowing lines of this stanza were writ by a friend of the author ' — 
 says Thomson in a footnote. The friend is supposed to have 
 been Lyttelton. 
 
 1. LXix. 3. A little, round, fat, oily man of God. The Eev. 
 Patrick Murdoch, at one time tutor to John Forbes ; the 
 ' Soporifio doctor ' of the Miscellaneoiis Poems — ^which see. 
 
 I. LXXIV-LXXVII. Written by Dr. Armstrong. 
 
 IL XXI. 2. the famed city by Propontis Sea. Constantinople. — T. 
 
 II. XLin. 2. The wary retiarius. A gladiator who made use 
 of a net which he threw over his adversary, — T. 
 
 X2 
 
308 
 
 THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE 
 
 EXPLANATION OF THE OBSOLETE WORDS 
 USED IN THIS POEM 
 
 [As given in 2nd ed. 1748.] 
 
 Arohimage, the chief, or greatest 
 of magicians or enchanters. 
 
 Atweeu, hetween. 
 
 Bale, sorrow, trovhle, misfortune. 
 
 Benempt, named. 
 
 Blazon, painting, displaying. 
 
 Carol, to sing songs of joy. 
 
 Certea, certainly. 
 
 Eath, easy. 
 
 Eftsoona, immediately, often, 
 afterwards. 
 
 Gear (or Gear), furniture, equip- 
 age, dress. 
 
 Glaive, sword (Fr.). 
 
 Han, have. 
 
 Hight, is named, called. 
 
 Idless, idleness. 
 
 Imp, child, or offspring ; from 
 the Saxon impan, to graft or 
 plant. 
 
 Kest, for cast. 
 
 Lad, for led. 
 
 Lea, a piece of land, or meadow. 
 
 Libbard, leopard. 
 
 Lig, to lie. 
 
 Loael, a loose, idle fellow. 
 
 Louting, howing, hending. 
 
 Mell, mingle. 
 
 Moe, more. 
 
 Moil, labour. 
 
 Muohel (or Moohel), much, 
 great. 
 
 Nathleas, nevertheless. 
 
 Ne, nor. 
 
 Needments, necessaries. 
 
 Noursling, a nurse, or what is 
 nursed. 
 
 Noyanoe, harm. 
 
 Perdie (Fr. par Dieu), an old 
 
 oath. 
 Prick'd through the forest, rode 
 
 through the forest. 
 Sear, dry, burnt up. 
 Sheen, bright, shining. 
 Sicker, sure, surely. 
 Soote, sweet, or sweetly. 
 Sooth, true, or truth. 
 Stound, misfortune, pang. 
 Sweltry, sultry, consuming with 
 
 heat. 
 Swink, to labour. 
 Tranamewed, transformed. 
 Unkempt (Lat. incomptus), urir 
 
 adorned. 
 Vild, vile. 
 
 Ween, to think, be of opinion. 
 Weet, to know ; to weet, to wit. 
 Whilom, ere-while, formerly. 
 Wis (for Wiat), to know, think, 
 
 understand. 
 Wonne (a Noun), dwelling. 
 N.B. — The letter Y is frequently 
 
 placed in the beginning of a 
 
 word, by Spenaer, to lengthen 
 
 it a syllable. 
 Yborn, horn. 
 Yblent (or blent), blended, 
 
 mingled. 
 Yclad, dad. 
 Ycleped, called, named. 
 Yfere, together. 
 Ymolten, melted. 
 Yode (preter tense of yede), 
 
 went. 
 
LIBERTY : A POEM 
 
 IN TTVTE PARTS 
 
 [First published 1735 and 1736. The text here followed bears 
 date 1738.] 
 
TO HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS FREDERICK, 
 PRINCE OF WALES 
 
 Sib, 
 
 When I reflect upon that ready condescension, that pre- 
 venting generosity, with which your Royal Highness received 
 the following poem under your protection, I can alone ascribe 
 it to the recommendation and influence of the subject. In you 
 the cause and concerns of Liberty have so zealous a patron, as 
 entitles whatever may have the least tendency to promote them 
 to the distinction of your favour. And who can entertain this 
 delightful reflection without feeling a pleasure far superior to that 
 of the fondest author, and of which all true lovers of their country 
 must participate ? To behold the noblest dispositions of the 
 prince and of the patriot united — an overflowing benevolence, 
 generosity, and candour of heart joined to an enlightened zeal 
 for Liberty, an intimate persuasion that on it depends the happi- 
 ness and glory both of kings and people — to see these shining out 
 in public virtues, as they have hitherto smiled in all the social 
 lights and private accomplishments of life, is a prospect that 
 cannot but inspire a general sentiment of satisfaction and gladnesis, 
 more easy to be felt than expressed. 
 
 If the following attempt to trace Liberty from the first ages down 
 to her excellent establishment in Great Britain can at all merit 
 your approbation, and prove an entertainment to your Royal 
 Highness ; if it can in any degree answer the dignity of the 
 subject, and of the name under which I presume to shelter it — 
 I have my best reward, particularly as it affords me an opportunity 
 of declaring that I am, with the greatest zeal and respect. 
 
 Sib, 
 Your Royal Highness's 
 most obedient 
 
 and most devoted servant, 
 James Thomson. 
 
THE CONTENTS OF PART I 
 
 The following Poem is thrown into the form of a Poetical Vision. 
 Its scene the ruins of ancient Rome. The Goddess of Liberty, 
 who is supposed to speak through the whole, appears, charac- 
 terized as British Liberty, to verse 44. Gives a view of ancient 
 Italy, and particularly of Republican Rome, in all her mag- 
 nificence and glory, to verse 106. This contrasted by modern 
 Italy, its valleys, mountains, culture, cities, people ; the differ- 
 ence appearing strongest in the capital city, Rome, to verse 227. 
 The ruins of the great works of Liberty more magnificent than 
 the borrowed pomp of Oppression ; and from them revived 
 Sculpture, Painting, and Architecture, to verse 249. The old 
 Romans apostrophized, with regard to the several melancholy 
 changes in Italy : Horace, Tully, and Virgil, with regard to 
 their Tibur, Tusculum, and Naples, to verse 285. That once 
 finest and most ornamented part of Italy, all along the coast 
 of Baiae, how changed, to verse 315. This desolation of Italy 
 applied to Britain, to verse 338. Address to the Goddess of 
 Liberty, that she would deduce from the first ages, her chief 
 establishments, the description of which constitutes the subject 
 of the following parts of this Poem. She assents, and com- 
 mands what she says to be sung in Britain ; whose happiness, 
 arising from freedom and a limited monarchy, she marks, to 
 verse 378. An immediate Vision attends, and paints her words. 
 Invocation. 
 
LIBERTY 
 
 PART I 
 ANCIENT AND MODERN ITALY COMPARED 
 
 [First published early in 1735.] 
 
 MY lamented Talbot ! while with thee 
 
 The muse gay roved the glad Hesperian round, 
 
 And drew the inspiring breath of ancient arts ; 
 
 Ah ! little thought she her returning verse 
 
 Should sing our darling subject to thy shade. 
 
 And does the mystic veil, from mortal beam. 
 
 Involve those eyes where every virtue smiled, 
 
 And all thy father's candid spirit shone ? 
 
 The light of reason, pure, without a cloud ; 
 
 Full of the generous heart, the mild regard ; lo 
 
 Honour disdaining blemish, cordial faith. 
 
 And limpid truth, that looks the very soul. 
 
 But to the death of mighty nations turn 
 
 My strain ; be there absorbed the private tear. 
 
 Musing, I lay ; warm from the sacred walks, 
 Where at each step imagination burns : 
 While scattered wide around, awful, and hoar, 
 Lies, a vast monument, once glorious Rome, 
 The tomb of empire ! ruins ! that efiace 
 Whate'er, of finished, modern pomp can boast. 20 
 
 Snatched by these wonders to that world where 
 thought 
 Unfettered ranges, fancy's magic hand 
 Led me anew o'er all the solemn scene, 
 
PART I 313 
 
 Still in the mind's pure eye more solemn dressed : 
 When straight, methought, the fair majestic power 
 Of Liberty appeared. Not, as of old. 
 Extended in her hand the cap, and rod, 
 Whose slave-enlarging touch gave double life : 
 But her bright temples bound with British oak, 
 And naval honours nodded on her brow. 30 
 
 Sublime of port : loose o'er her shoulder flowed 
 Her sea-green robe, with constellations gay. 
 An island-goddess now ; and her high care 
 The queen of isles, the mistress of the main. 
 My heart beat fihal transport at the sight ; 
 And, as she moved to speak, the awakened muse 
 Listened intense. Awhile she looked around. 
 With mournful eye the well-known ruins marked. 
 And then, her sighs repressing, thus began : 
 
 ' Mine are these wonders, all thou seest is mine ; 40 
 But ah, how changed ! the falling poor remains 
 Of what exalted once the Ausonian shore. 
 Look back through time ; and, rising from the gloom, 
 Mark the dread scene, that paints whate'er I say. 
 
 ' The great repubhc see ! that glowed, sublime, 
 With the mixed freedom of a thousand states ; 
 Raised on the thrones of kings her curule chair, 
 And by her fascos awed the subject world. 
 See busy millions quickening all the land. 
 With cities thronged, and teeming culture high : 
 For nature then smiled on her free-born sons, 51 
 And poured the plenty that belongs to men. 
 Behold, the country cheering, villas rise 
 In lively prospect by the secret lapse 
 Of brooks now lost, and streams renowned in song ; 
 In Umbria's closing vales, or on the brow 
 Of her brown hills that breathe the scented gale; 
 On Baia's viny coast, where peaceful seas, 
 
314 LIBERTY 
 
 Fanned by kind zephyrs, ever kiss the shore, 
 
 And suns unclouded shine, through purest air ; 60 
 
 Or in the spacious neighbourhood of Rome, 
 
 Far shining upward to the Sabine hills. 
 
 To Anio's roar, and Tibur's olive shade, 
 
 To where Preneste lifts her airy brow, 
 
 Or downwards spreading to the sunny shore 
 
 Where Alba breathes the freshness of the main. 
 
 ' See distant mountains leave their valleys dry. 
 And o'er the proud arcade their tribute pour, 
 To lave imperial Rome. For ages laid, 
 Deep, massy, firm, diverging every way, 70 
 
 With tombs of heroes sacred, see her roads — • 
 By various nations trod and suppUant kings. 
 With legions flaming or with triumph gay. 
 
 ' FuU in the centre of these wondrous works, 
 The pride of earth ! Rome in her glory see ! 
 Behold her demigods, in senate met ; 
 AU head to counsel, and aU heart to act : 
 The commonweal inspiring every tongue 
 With fervent eloquence, unbribed, and bold ; 
 Ere tame corruption taught the servile herd 80 
 To rank obedient to a master's voice. 
 
 ' Her forum see, warm, popular, and loud. 
 In trembling wonder hushed, when the two sires. 
 As they the private father greatly queUed, 
 Stood up the public fathers of the state. 
 See justice judging there, in human shape. 
 Hark ! how with freedom's voice it thunders high, 
 Or in soft murmurs sinks to Tully's tongue. 
 
 ' Her tribes, her census, see ; her generous troops. 
 Whose pay was glory, and their best reward 90 
 Free for their country and for me to die ; 
 Ere mercenary murder grew a trade. 
 
 ' Mark, as the purple triumph waves along. 
 
PART I 315 
 
 The highest pomp and lowest faU of life. 
 
 ' Her festive games, the school of heroes, see ; 
 Her circus, ardent with contending youth ; 
 Her streets, her temples, palaces, and baths, 
 Full of fair forms, of beauty's eldest born. 
 And of a people cast in virtue's mould — 
 While sculpture Uves around, and Asian hills loo 
 Lend their best stores to heave the pillared dome ; 
 All that to Roman strength the softer touch 
 Of Grecian art can join. But language fails 
 To paint this sun, this centre of mankind ; 
 Where every virtue, glory, treasure, art. 
 Attracted strong, in heightened lustre met. 
 
 ' Need I the contrast mark ? unjoyous view ! 
 A land in all, in government and arts. 
 In virtue, genius, earth, and heaven, reversed. 
 Who but these far-famed ruins to behold, no 
 
 Proofs of a people, whose heroic aims 
 Soared far above the little selfish sphere 
 Of doubting modern life — who but inflamed 
 With classic zeal, these consecrated scenes 
 Of men and deeds to trace, unhappy land ! 
 Would trust thy wilds and cities loose of sway ? 
 
 ' Are these the vales that once exulting states 
 In their warm bosom fed ? The mountains these. 
 On whose high-blooming sides my sons of old 
 I bred to glory ? These dejected towns, 120 
 
 Where, mean and sordid, life can scarce subsist, 
 The scenes of ancient opulence and pomp ? 
 
 ' Come ! by whatever sacred name disguised, 
 Oppression, come ! and in thy works rejoice ! 
 See nature's richest plains to putrid fens 
 Turned by thy fury. From their cheerful bounds. 
 See razed the enUvening village, farm, and seat. 
 First, Rural Toil, by thy rapacious hand 
 
316 LIBERTY 
 
 Robbed of his poor reward, resigned the plough ; 
 
 And now he dares not turn the noxious glebe. 130 
 
 'Tis thine entire. The lonely swain himself, 
 
 Who loves at large along the grassy downs 
 
 His flocks to pasture, thy drear champaign flies 
 
 Far as the sickening eye can sweep around, 
 
 'Tis all one desert, desolate, and grey, 
 
 Grazed by the sullen buffalo alone ; 
 
 And, where the rank uncultivated growth 
 
 Of rotting ages taints the passing gale, 
 
 Beneath the baleful blast the city pines, 
 
 Or sinks enfeebled, or infected burns. 140 
 
 Beneath it mourns the solitary road, 
 
 Rolled in rude mazes o'er the abandoned waste ; 
 
 While ancient ways, ingulfed, are seen no more. 
 
 ' Such thy dire plains, thou self-destroyer ! foe 
 To humankind ! Thy mountains, too, profuse 
 Where savage nature blooms, seem their sad plaint 
 To raise against thy desolating rod. 
 There on the breezy brow, where thriving states 
 And famous cities once to the pleased sun 
 Far other scenes of rising culture spread, 150 
 
 Pale shine thy ragged towns. Neglected round, 
 Each harvest pines ; the Uvid, lean produce 
 Of heartless labour : while thy hated joys, 
 Not proper pleasure, lift the lazy hand. 
 Better to sink in sloth the woes of lite, 
 Than wake their rage with unavailing toil. 
 Hence drooping art almost to nature leaves 
 The rude unguided year. Thin wave the gifts 
 Of yellow Ceres, thin the radiant blush 
 Of orchard reddens in the warmest ray. 160 
 
 To weedy wildness run, no rural wealth 
 (Such as dictators fed) the garden pours. 
 
 133 champian (misprint for 'ohampain') ed. 1738. 
 
PART I 317 
 
 Crude the wild olive flows, and foul the vine ; 
 Nor juice Caecubian nor Falernian more 
 Streams life and joy, save in the muse's bowl 
 Unseconded by art, the spinning race 
 Draw the bright thread in vain, and idly toil. 
 In vain, forlorn in wQds, the citron blows ; 
 And flowering plants perfume the desert gale. 
 Through the vile thorn the tender myrtle twines. 
 Inglorious droops the laurel, dead to song, 171 
 
 And long a stranger to the hero's brow. 
 
 ' Nor half thy triumph this : cast, from brute fields. 
 Into the haunts of men thy ruthless eye. 
 There buxom plenty never turns her horn ; 
 The grace and virtue of exterior life. 
 No clean convenience reigns ; even sleep itself 
 Least delicate of powers, reluctant there 
 Lays on the bed impure his heavy head. 
 Thy horrid walk ! Dead, empty, unadorned, 180 
 
 See streets whose echoes never know the voice 
 Of cheerful hurry, commerce many-tongued, 
 And art mechanic at his various task 
 Fervent employed. Mark the desponding race. 
 Of occupation void, as void of hope ; 
 Hope, the glad ray, glanced from Eternal Good, 
 That life enlivens, and exalts its powers. 
 With views of fortune — madness all to them ! 
 By thee relentless seized their better joys. 
 To the soft aid of cordial airs they fly, 190 
 
 Breathing a kind obUvion o'er their woes. 
 And love and music melt their souls away. 
 From feeble Justice, see how rash Revenge, 
 Trembling, the balance snatches, and the sword, 
 Fearful himself, to venal ruffians gives. 
 See where God's altar, nursing murder, stands 
 With the red touch of dark assassins stained. 
 
318 LIBERTY 
 
 ' But chief let Rome, the mighty city ! speak 
 The full-exerted genius of thy reign. 
 Behold her rise amid the lifeless waste, 20c 
 
 Expiring nature all corrupted round ; 
 While the lone Tiber, through the desert plain, 
 Winds his waste stores, and sullen sweeps along. 
 Patched from my fragments, in unsolid pomp, 
 Mark how the temple glares ; and, artful dressed, 
 Amusive draws the superstitious train. 
 Mark how the palace hfts a lying front, 
 Concealing often, in magnific jail, 
 Proud want ; a deep unanimated gloom ! 
 And oft adjoining to the drear abode 210 
 
 Of misery, whose melancholy walls 
 Seem its voracious grandeur to reproach. 
 Within the city bounds the desert see ; 
 See the rank vine o'er subterranean roofs 
 Indecent spread ; beneath whose fretted gold 
 It once exulting flowed. The people mark ! 
 Matchless, while fired by me ; to public good 
 Inexorably firm, just, generous, brave. 
 Afraid of nothing but unworthy life, 
 Elate with glory, an heroic soul 220 
 
 Known to the vulgar breast : behold them now 
 A thin despairing number, all-subdued, 
 The slaves of slaves, by superstition fooled, 
 By vice unmanned and a licentious rule. 
 In guile ingenious, and in murder brave. 
 Such in one land, beneath the same fair clime. 
 Thy sons. Oppression, are ; and such were mine. 
 
 ' Even with thy laboured pomp, for whose vain show 
 Deluded thousands starve — all age-begrimed. 
 Torn, robbed, and scattered in unnumbered sacks, 
 And by the tempest of two thousand years 231 
 Continual shaken, let my ruins vie — 
 
PART I 319 
 
 These roads that yet the Roman hand assert, 
 Beyond the weak repair of modern toil ; 
 These fractured arches, that the chiding stream 
 No more delighted hear ; these rich remains 
 Of marbles now unknown, where shines imbibed 
 Each parent ray ; these massy columns, hewed 
 From Afric's farthest shore ; one granite all. 
 These obelisks high-towering to the sky, 240 
 
 Mysterious marked with dark Egyptian lore ; 
 These endless wonders that this sacred way 
 lUumine still, and consecrate to fame ; 
 These fountains, vases, urns, and statues, charged 
 With the fine stores of art-completing Greece; 
 Mine is, besides, thy every later boast — 
 Thy Buonarotis, thy Palladios mine ; 
 And mine the fair designs which Raphael's soul, 
 O'er the Uve canvas emanating, breathed. 
 
 ' What would you say, ye conquerors of earth ! 250 
 Ye Romans ! could you raise the laurelled head ; 
 Could you the country see, by seas of blood 
 And the dread toU of ages won so dear. 
 Your pride, your triumph, your supreme delight ! 
 For whose defence oft, in the doubtful hour, 
 You rush with rapture down the gulf of fate. 
 Of death ambitious ! tUl by awful deeds. 
 Virtues, and courage that amaze mankind 
 The queen of nations rose ; possessed of all 
 Which nature, art, and glory could bestow — 260 
 What would you say, deep in the last abyss 
 Of slavery, vice, and unambitious want. 
 Thus to behold her sunk ? your crowded plains 
 Void of their cities ; unadorned your hiUs ; 
 Ungraced your lakes ; your ports to ships unknown ; 
 Your lawless floods and your abandoned streams — 
 These could you know, these could you love again ? 
 
320 LIBERTY 
 
 Thy Tibur, Horace, could it now inspire 
 
 Content, poetic ease, and rural joy 
 
 Soon bursting into song — while through the groves 
 
 Of headlong Anio, dashing to the vale 271 
 
 In many a tortured stream, you mused along ? 
 
 Yon wild retreat, where superstition dreams. 
 
 Could, TuUy, you your Tusoulum believe ? 
 
 And could you deem yon naked hills, that form, 
 
 Famed in old song, the ship-forsaken bay. 
 
 Your Pormian shore 1 Once the dehght of earth, 
 
 Where art and nature, ever smiling, joined 
 
 On the gay land to lavish aU their stores — 
 
 How changed, how vacant, Virgil, wide around, 280 
 
 Would now your Naples seem ? disastered less 
 
 By black Vesuvius thundering o'er the coast 
 
 His midnight earthquakes and his mining fires 
 
 Than by despotic rage, that inward gnaws, 
 
 A native foe — a foreign, tears without. 
 
 Pirst from your flattered Caesars this began : 
 
 Till, doomed to tyrants an eternal prey, 
 
 Thin peopled spreads at last the syren plain. 
 
 That the dire soul of Hannibal disarmed ; 
 
 And wrapped in weeds the shore of Venus lies. 290 
 
 There Baia sees no more the joyous throng. 
 
 Her banks all beaming with the pride of Rome ; 
 
 No generous vines now bask along the hills. 
 
 Where sport the breezes of the Tyrrhene main ; 
 
 With baths and temples mixed, no villas rise. 
 
 Nor, art-sustained amid reluctant waves. 
 
 Draw the cool murmurs of the breathing deep; 
 
 No spreading ports their sacred arms extend ; 
 
 No mighty moles the big intrusive storm. 
 
 From the calm station, roU resounding back. 300 
 
 An almost total desolation sits, 
 
 A dreary stillness, saddening o'er the coast; • ■ " 
 
PART I 321 
 
 Where, when soft suns and tepid winters rose, 
 
 Rejoicing crowds inhaled the balm of peace. 
 
 Where citied hiU to hill reflected blaze, 
 
 And where with Ceres Bacchus wont to hold 
 
 A genial strife. Her youthful form robust 
 
 Even nature yields, by fire and earthquake rent — 
 
 Whole stately cities in the dark abrupt 
 
 Swallowed at once, or vile in rubbish laid, 310 
 
 A nest for serpents ; from the red abyss 
 
 New hills explosive thrown ; the Lucrine lake 
 
 A reedy pool; and all to Cuma's point 
 
 The sea recovering his usurped domain, 
 
 And poured triumphant o'er the buried dome. 
 
 ' Hence, Britain, learn — my best established, last, 
 And, more than Greece or Rome, my steady reign ; 
 The land where, king and people equal bound 
 By guardian laws, my fullest blessings flow. 
 And where my jealous unsubmitting soul, 320 
 
 The dread of tyrants ! burns in every breast — 
 Learn hence, if such the miserable fate 
 Of an heroic race, the masters once 
 Of humankind, what, when deprived of me. 
 How grievous must be thine ? In spite of chmes, 
 Whose sun-enhvened ether wakes the soul 
 To higher powers ; in spite of happy soils, 
 That, but by labour's slightest aid impelled, 
 With treasures teem, to thy cold clime unknown ; 
 If there desponding fail the common arts 330 
 
 And sustenance of life, could life itself. 
 Far less a thoughtless tyrant's hollow pomp. 
 Subsist with thee ? Against depressing skies. 
 Joined to full-spread oppression's cloudy brow. 
 How could thy spirits hold ? where vigour find 
 Forced fruits to tear from their unnative soU, 
 Or, storing every harvest in thy ports, 
 
 THOMSON Y 
 
322 LIBERTY 
 
 To plough the dreadful all-producing wave ? ' 
 
 Here paused the Goddess. By the pause assured, 
 In trembling accents thus I moved my prayer : 340 
 
 ' Oh first, and most benevolent of powers ! 
 Come from eternal splendours, here on earth. 
 Against despotic pride and rage and lust. 
 To shield mankind ; to raise them to assert 
 The native rights and honour of their race — 
 Teach me, thy lowest subject, but in zeal 
 Yielding to none, the progress of thy reign. 
 And with a strain from thee enrich the muse. 
 As thee alone she serves, her patron, thou. 
 And great inspirer be ! then wiU she joy, 350 
 
 Though narrow life her lot, and private shade : 
 And, when her venal voice she barters vile 
 Or to thy open or thy secret foes, 
 May ne'er those sacred raptures touch her more. 
 By slavish hearts unfelt ! and may her song 
 Sink in oblivion with the nameless crew. 
 Vermin of state! to thy o'erflowing light 
 That owe their being, yet betray thy cause. 
 
 Then, condescending kind, the heavenly Power 
 Returned : — ' What here, suggested by the scene, 360 
 I slight unfold, record and sing at home. 
 In that blest isle, where (so we spirits move) 
 With one quick effort of my will I am. 
 There truth unlicensed walks ; and dares accost 
 Even kings themselves, the monarchs of the free ! 
 Fixed on my rock, there, an indulgent race 
 O'er Britons wield the sceptre of their choice ; 
 And there, to finish what his sires began, 
 A Prince behold ! for me who burns sincere, 
 Even with a subject's zeal. He my great work 370 
 Will parent-like sustain ; and, added, give 
 The touch the graces and the muses owe. 
 
PART 1 323 
 
 For Britain's glory swells his panting breast, 
 And ancient arts he emulous revolves — 
 His pride to let the smiling heart abroad, 
 Through clouds of pomp, that but conceal the man ; 
 To please his pleasure ; bounty his delight ; 
 And all the soul of Titus dwells in him.' 
 
 Hail, glorious theme ! but how, alas ! shall verse. 
 From the crude stores of mortal language drawn, 380 
 How faint and tedious, sing what, piercing deep. 
 The Goddess flashed at once upon my soul ? 
 For, clear precision all, the tongue of gods 
 Is harmony itself ; to every ear 
 Familiar known, like light to every eye. 
 Meantime disclosing ages, as she spoke. 
 In long succession poured their empires forth ; 
 Scene after scene, the human drama spread ; 
 And still the embodied picture rose to sight. 
 
 thou ! to whom the muses owe their flame ; 390 
 Who bidd'st, beneath the pole, Parnassus rise, 
 And Hippocrene flow ; with thy bold ease. 
 The striking force, the Ughtning of thy thought. 
 And thy strong phrase, that roUs profound and clear ; 
 Oh, gracious Goddess ! reinspire my song ; 
 While I, to nobler than poetic fame 
 Aspiring, thy commands to Britons bear. 
 
 Y -^ 
 
324 LIBERTY 
 
 THE CONTENTS OF PART II 
 
 Liberty traced from the pastoral ages, and the first uniting 
 of neighbouring families into civil government, to verse 46. 
 The several establishments of Liberty, in Egypt, Persia, 
 Phoenicia, Palestine, slightly touched upon, down to her great 
 establishment in Greece, to verse 85. Geographical description 
 of Greece, to verse 107. Sparta and Athens, the two principal 
 states of Greece, described, to verse 158. Influence of Liberty 
 over all the Grecian states ; with regard to their government, 
 their politeness, their virtues, their arts, and sciences. The vast 
 superiority it gave them, in point of force and bravery, over 
 the Persians, exemplified by the action of Thermopylae, the 
 battle of Marathon, and the retreat of the Ten Thousand. Its 
 full exertion, and most beautiful effects in Athens, to verse 210. 
 Liberty the source of free philosophy. The various schools 
 which took their rise from Socrates, to verse 242. Enumeration 
 of fine arts : Eloquence, Poetry, Music, Sculpture, Painting, 
 and Architecture ; the effects of Liberty in Greece, and brought 
 to their utmost perfection there, to verse 392. Transition to 
 the modern state of Greece, to verse 420. Why Liberty de- 
 clined, and was at last entirely lost among the Greeks, to 
 verse 481. Concluding Reflection, 
 
 PART II. GREECE 
 
 [First published in 1735.] 
 
 Thus spoke the Goddess of the fearless eye, 
 And at her voice renewed the vision rose : 
 
 ' First, in the dawn of time, with eastern swains 
 In woods, and tents, and cottages I Hved ; 
 While on from plain to plain they led their flocks 
 In search of clearer spring and fresher field. 
 These, as increasing families disclosed 
 The tender state, I taught an equal sway. 
 Few were offences, properties, and laws. 
 Beneath the rural portal, palm-o'erspread, lo 
 
 The father senate met. There justice dealt, 
 With reason then and equity the same, 
 Free as the common air her prompt decree ; 
 
PART II 325 
 
 Nor yet had stained her sword with subjects' blood. 
 The simpler arts were all their simple wants 
 Had urged to light. But instant, these supplied, 
 Another set of fonder wants arose, 
 And other arts with them of finer aim ; 
 Till, from refining want to want impelled, 
 The mind by thinking pushed her latent powers, 20 
 And life began to glow and arts to shine. 
 
 ' At first, on brutes alone the rustic war 
 Launched the rude spear ; swift, as he glared along, 
 On the grim lion, or the robber woH. 
 For then young sportive life was void of toil, 
 Demanding little, and with little pleased. 
 But, when to manhood grown, and endless joys, 
 Led on by equal toils, the bosom fired — 
 Lewd lazy rapine broke primeval peace, 
 And, hid in caves and idle forests drear, 30 
 
 From the lone pilgrim and the wandering swain 
 Seized what he durst not earn. Then brother's blood 
 First horrid smoked on the polluted skies. 
 Awful in justice, then the burning youth. 
 Led by their tempered sires, on lawless men. 
 The last worst monsters of the shaggy wood. 
 Turned the keen arrow, and the sharpened spear. 
 Then war grew glorious. Heroes then arose, 
 Who, scorning coward self, for others hved. 
 Toiled for their ease, and for their safety bled. 40 
 West with the living day to Greece I came : 
 Earth smiled beneath my beam : the muse before 
 Sonorous flew — that low tiU then in woods ■ 
 Had tuned the reed, and sighed the shepherd's pain. 
 But now, to sing heroic deeds, she swelled 
 A nobler note, and bade the banquet burn. 
 
 ' For Greece my sons of Egypt I forsook — 
 A boastful race! that in the vain abyss 
 
326 LIBERTY 
 
 Of fabling ages loved to lose their source, 
 
 And with their river traced it from the skies. 5° 
 
 While there my laws alone despotic reigned, 
 
 And king, as well as people, proud obeyed. 
 
 I taught them science, virtue, wisdom, arts. 
 
 By poets, sages, legislators sought ; 
 
 The school of polished hfe, and human kind. 
 
 But, when mysterious superstition came, 
 
 And, with her civil sister leagued, involved 
 
 In studied darkness the desponding mind — 
 
 Then tyrant power the righteous scourge unloosed : 
 
 For yielded reason speaks the soul a slave. 60 
 
 Instead of useful works, like nature's great, 
 
 Enormous cruel wonders crushed the land ; 
 
 And round a tyrant's tomb, who none deserved, 
 
 For one vile carcass perished countless Uves. 
 
 Then the great dragon couched amid his floods. 
 
 Swelled his fierce heart, and cried, " This flood is mine, 
 
 'Tis I that bid it flow." But, undeceived. 
 
 His frenzy soon the proud blasphemer felt ; 
 
 Felt that, without my fertilizing power. 
 
 Suns lost their force, and Niles o'erflowed in vain. 
 
 Nought could retard me : nor the frugal state 71 
 
 Of rising Persia, sober in extreme 
 
 Beyond the pitch of man, and thence reversed 
 
 Into luxurious waste ; nor yet the ports 
 
 Of old Phoenicia, first for letters famed, 
 
 That paint the voice, and silent speak to sight. 
 
 Of arts prime source, and guardian ! by fair stars 
 
 First tempted out into the lonely deep. 
 
 To whom I first disclosed mechanic arts 
 
 The winds to conquer, to subdue the waves, 80 
 
 With all the peaceful power of ruling trade. 
 
 Earnest of Britain; nor by these retained. 
 
 Nor by the neighbouring land whose palmy shore 
 
PART II 327 
 
 The silver Jordan laves. Before me lay 
 
 The promised land of arts, and urged my flight. 
 
 ' Hail, nature's utmost boast ! unrivalled Greece ! 
 My fairest reign ! where every power benign 
 Conspired to blow the flower of human kind, 
 And lavished all that genius can inspire. 
 Clear sunny climates, by the breezy main, go 
 
 Ionian or Aegean, tempered kind : 
 Light, airy soils : a country rich and gay, 
 Broke into hills with balmy odours crowned, 
 And, bright with purple harvest, joyous vales : 
 Mountains and streams where verse spontaneous flowed. 
 Whence deemed by wondering men the seat of gods, 
 And still the mountains and the streams of song: 
 AU that boon nature could luxuriant pour 
 Of high materials, and my restless arts 
 Frame into finished life. How many states, loo 
 And clustering towns, and monuments of fame, 
 And scenes of glorious deeds in little bounds ! 
 From the rough tract of bending mountains, beat 
 By Adria's here, there by Aegean waves, 
 To where the deep-adorning Cyclad Isles 
 In shining prospect rise, and on the shore 
 Of farthest Crete resounds the Libyan main ! 
 
 ' O'er all two rival cities reared the brow, 
 And balanced all. Spread on Eurotas' bank. 
 Amid a circle of soft-rising hills, no 
 
 The patient Sparta one : the sober, hard. 
 And man-subduing city, which no shape 
 Of pain could conquer, nor of pleasure charm. 
 Lycurgus there built, on the solid base 
 Of equal life, so well a tempered state. 
 Where mixed each government in such just poise, 
 Each power so checking and supporting each, 
 107 Lybian ed. 1738. 
 
328 LIBERTY 
 
 That firm for ages and unmoved it stood, 
 The fort of Greece ! without one giddy hour, 
 One shock of faction or of party rage. 120 
 
 For, drained the springs of wealth, corruption there 
 Lay withered at the root. Thrice happy land ! 
 Had not neglected art, with weedy vice 
 Confounded, sunk. But, if Athenian arts 
 Loved not the soil, yet there the calm abode 
 Of wisdom, virtue, philosophic ease, 
 Of manly sense and wit, in frugal phrase 
 Confined, and pressed into Laconic force. 
 There too, by rooting thence stiU treacherous seK, 
 The public and the private grew the same. 130 
 
 The children of the nursing public all, 
 And at its table fed — ^for that they toiled. 
 For that they lived entire, and even for that 
 The tender mother urged her son to die. 
 ' Of softer genius, but not less intense 
 To seize the palm of empire, Athens strove. 
 Where, with bright marbles big and future pomp, 
 Hymettus spread, amid the scented sky. 
 His thymy treasures to the labouring bee. 
 And to botanic hand the stores of health ; 140 
 
 Wrapt in a soul-attenuating chme. 
 Between lUssus and Cephissus glowed 
 This hive of science, shedding sweets divine 
 Of active arts and animated arms. 
 There, passionate for me, an easy-moved, 
 A quick, refined, a delicate, humane. 
 Enlightened people reigned. Oft on the brink 
 Of ruin, hurried by the charm of speech 
 Enforcing hasty counsel immature, 
 Tottered the rash democracy — unpoised, 150 
 
 And by the rage devoured that ever tears 
 A populace unequal, part too rich 
 
PART II 329 
 
 And part or fierce with want or abject grown. 
 Solon at last, their mild restorer, rose. 
 Allayed the tempest, to the calm of laws 
 Reduced the settling whole, and, with the weight 
 Which the two senates to the public lent. 
 As with an anchor fixed the driving state. 
 
 ' Nor was my forming care to these confined. 
 For emulation through the whole I poured, i6o 
 
 Noble contention ! who should most excel 
 In government well poised, adjusted best 
 To pubhc weal ; in countries cultured high ; 
 In ornamented towns, where order reigns. 
 Free social life, and polished manners fair ; 
 In exercise, and arms — arms only drawn 
 For common Greece to quell the Persian pride ; 
 In moral science and in graceful arts. 
 Hence, as for glory peacefully they strove, 
 The prize grew greater, and the prize of all. 170 
 
 By contest brightened, hence the radiant youth 
 Poured every beam, by generous pride inflamed 
 Felt every ardour burn — their great reward 
 The verdant wreath which sounding Pisa gave. 
 
 ' H^nce flourished Greece ; and hence a race of men. 
 As gods by conscious future times adored, 
 In whom each virtue wore a smiling air, 
 Each science shed o'er life a friendly light, 
 Each art was nature. Spartan valour hence. 
 At the famed pass, firm as an isthmus stood ; 180 
 And the whole eastern ocean, waving far 
 As eye could dart its vision, nobly checked; 
 While in extended battle, at the field 
 Of Marathon, my keen Athenians drove 
 Before their ardent band an host of slaves. 
 
 ' Hence through the continent ten thousand Greeks 
 Urged a retreat, whose glory not the prime 
 
330 LIBEETY 
 
 Of victories can reach. Deserts in vain 
 Opposed their course, and hostile lands unknown, 
 And deep rapacious floods, dire banked with death, 190 
 And mountains in whose jaws destruction grinned, 
 Hunger and toil, Armenian snows and storms, 
 And circling myriads still of barbarous foes. 
 Greece in their view, and glory yet untouched, 
 Their steady column pierced the scattering herds 
 Which a whole empire poured ; and held its way 
 Triumphant, by the sage-exalted chief 
 Kred and sustained. Oh light and force of mind, 
 Almost almighty in severe extremes ! 
 The sea at last from Colchian mountains seen, 200 
 Kind-hearted transport round their captains threw 
 The soldiers' fond embrace ; o'erflowed their eyes 
 With tender floods, and loosed the general voice 
 To cries resounding loud — " The sea ! the sea ! " 
 
 ' In Attic bounds hence heroes, sages, wits. 
 Shone thick as stars, the milky way of Greece ! 
 And, though gay wit and pleasing grace was theirs. 
 All the soft modes of elegance and ease. 
 Yet was not courage less, the patient touch 
 Of toiUng art, and disquisition deep. 210 
 
 ' My spirit pours a vigour through the soul, 
 The unfettered thought with energy inspires, 
 Invincible in arts, in the bright field 
 Of nobler science as in that of arms. 
 Athenians thus not less intrepid burst 
 The bonds of tyrant darkness than they spurned 
 The Persian chains : while through the city, fuU 
 Of mirthful quarrel and of witty war. 
 Incessant struggled taste, refining taste, 
 And friendly free discussion, calling forth 220 
 
 From the fair jewel, truth, its latent ray. 
 O'er all shone out the great Athenian sage, 
 
PART II 331 
 
 And father of philosophy — the sun, 
 
 Prom whose white blaze emerged each various sect 
 
 Took various tints, but with diminished beam. 
 
 Tutor of Athens ! he in every street 
 
 Dealt priceless treasure — goodness his delight, 
 
 Wisdom his wealth, and glory his reward. 
 
 Deep through the human heart with playful art 
 
 His simple question stole, as into truth 230 
 
 And serious deeds he smiled the laughing race. 
 
 Taught moral happy life, whate'er can bless 
 
 Or grace mankind ; and what he taught he was. 
 
 Compounded high, though plain, his doctrine broke 
 
 In different schools — the bold poetic phrase 
 
 Of figured Plato ; Xenophon's pure strain. 
 
 Like the clear brook that steals along the vale ; 
 
 Dissecting truth, the Stagyrite's keen eye ; 
 
 The exalted Stoic pride ; the Cynic sneer ; 
 
 The slow-consenting Academic doubt ; 240 
 
 And, joining bliss to virtue, the glad ease 
 
 Of Epicurus, seldom understood. 
 
 They, ever candid, reason stiU opposed 
 
 To reason ; and, since virtue was their aim, 
 
 Each by sure practice tried to prove his way 
 
 The best. Then stood untouched the solid base 
 
 Of Liberty, the liberty of mind ; 
 
 Eor systems yet, and soul-enslaving creeds. 
 
 Slept with the monsters of succeeding times. 249 
 
 Prom priestly darkness sprung the enlightening arts 
 
 Of fire, and sword, and rage, and horrid names. 
 
 ' Greece ! thou sapient nurse of finer arts 
 Which to bright science blooming fancy bore ! 
 Be this thy praise, that thou, and thou alone, 
 In these hast led the way, in these excelled, 
 Crowned with the laurel of assenting time. 
 
 ' In thy fuU language, speaking mighty things, 
 
332 LIBERTY 
 
 Like a clear torrent close, or else difiused 
 
 A broad majestic stream, and rolling on 
 
 Through all the winding harmony of sound — 260 
 
 In it the power of eloquence at large 
 
 Breathed the persuasive or pathetic soul, 
 
 Stilled by degrees the democratic storm, 
 
 Or bade it threatening rise, and tyrants shook 
 
 Flushed at the head of their victorious troops. 
 
 In it the muse, her fury never quenched 
 
 By mean unyielding phrase or jarring sound, 
 
 Her unconfined divinity displayed, 
 
 And stiU harmonious formed it to her will — ■ 
 
 Or soft depressed it to the shepherd's moan 270 
 
 Or raised it swelling to the tongue of gods. 
 
 ' Heroic song was thine ; the fountain-bard, 
 Whence each poetic stream derives its course ! 
 Thine the dread moral scene, thy chief delight ! 
 Where idle fancy durst not mix her voice 
 When reason spoke august, the fervent heart 
 Or plained or stormed, and in the impassioned man. 
 Concealing art with art, the poet sunk. 
 This potent school of manners, but when left 
 To loose neglect a land-corrupting plague, 280 
 
 Was not unworthy deemed of public care 
 And boundless cost by thee — whose every son. 
 Even last mechanic, the true taste possessed 
 Of what had flavour to the nourished soul. 
 
 ' The sweet enforcer of the poet's strain, 
 Thine was the meaning music of the heart. 
 Not the vain triU, that, void of passion, runs 
 In giddy mazes, tickling idle ears ; 
 But that deep-searching voice, and artful hand, 
 To which respondent shakes the varied soul. 290 
 
 ' Thy fair ideas, thy delightful forms. 
 By love imagined, and the graces touched. 
 
PART II 333 
 
 The boast of well pleased nature ! Sculpture seized, 
 
 And bade them ever smile in Parian stone. 
 
 Selecting beauty's choice, and that again 
 
 Exalting, blending in a perfect whole, 
 
 Thy workmen left even nature's self behind. 
 
 From those far different whose prolific hand 
 
 Peoples a nation, they for years on years, 
 
 By the cool touches of judicious toil, 300 
 
 Their rapid genius curbing, poured it all 
 
 Through the live features of one breathing stone. 
 
 There, beaming fuU, it shone, expressing gods — 
 
 Jove's awful brow, Apollo's air divine, 
 
 The fierce atrocious frown of sinewed Mars, 
 
 Or the sly graces of the Cyprian queen. 
 
 Minutely perfect aU ! Each dimple sunk, 
 
 And every muscle swelled, as nature taught. 
 
 In tresses, braided gay, the marble waved ; 
 
 Flowed in loose robes, or thin transparent veils ; 310 
 
 Sprung into motion ; softened into fiesh ; 
 
 Was fired to passion, or refined to soul. 
 
 ' Nor less thy pencil with creative touch 
 Shed mimic life, when aU thy brightest dames 
 Assembled Zeuxis in his Helen mixed; 
 And when Apelles, who peculiar knew 
 To give a grace that more than mortal smiled. 
 The soul of beauty ! called the queen of love 
 Fresh from the billows blushing orient charms. 
 Even such enchantment then thy pencil poured 320 
 That cruel-thoughted war the impatient torch 
 Dashed to the ground, and, rather than destroy 
 The patriot picture, let the city 'scape. 
 
 ' First, elder Sculpture taught her sister art 
 Correct design ; where great ideas shone. 
 And in the secret trace expression spoke ; 
 Taught her the graceful attitude, the turn 
 
334 LIBERTY 
 
 And beauteous airs of head ; the native act, 
 Or bold or easy ; and, cast free behind, 
 
 , The swelling mantle's well adjusted flow. 33° 
 
 Then the bright muse, their eldest sister, came, 
 
 i And bade her follow where she led the way — 
 Bade earth, and sea, and air in colours rise. 
 And copious action on the canvas glow : 
 Gave her gay fable ; spread invention's store ; 
 Enlarged her view ; taught composition high, 
 And just arrangement, circling round one point 
 That starts to sight, binds and commands the whole. 
 Caught from the heavenly muse a nobler aim. 
 And scorning the soft trade of mere delight, 340 
 O'er all thy temples, porticos, and schools. 
 Heroic deeds she traced, and warm displayed 
 Each moral beauty to the ravished eye. 
 There, as the imagined presence of the god 
 Aroused the mind, or vacant hours induced 
 Calm contemplation, or assembled youth 
 Burned in ambitious circle round the sage, 
 The living lesson stole into the heart 
 With more prevaiUng force than dwells in words. 
 These rouse to glory ; while to rural life 350 
 
 The softer canvas oft reposed the soul. 
 There gaily broke the sun-iUumined cloud ; 
 The lessening prospect, and the mountain blue 
 Vanished in air ; the precipice frowned dire ; 
 White down the rock the rushing torrent dashed ; 
 The sun shone trembhng o'er the distant main ; 
 The tempest foamed immense ; the driving storm 
 Saddened the skies, and, from the doubling gloom, 
 On the scathed oak the ragged lightning feU ; 
 In closing shades, and where the current strays, 360 
 With peace and love and innocence around. 
 Piped the lone shepherd to his feeding flock ; 
 
PART II 335 
 
 Round happy parents smiled their younger selves ; 
 And friends conversed, by death divided long. 
 
 ' To public virtue thus the smUing arts, 
 Unblemished handmaids, served ; the graces they 
 To dress this fairest Venus. Thus revered, 
 And placed beyond the reach of sordid care, 
 The high awarders of immortal fame, 
 Alone for glory thy great masters strove ; 370 
 
 Courted by kings, and by contending states 
 Assumed the boasted honour of their birth. 
 
 ' In architecture too thy rank supreme ! 
 That art where most magnificent appears 
 The Uttle builder man ; by thee refined, 
 And, smiling high, to fuU perfection brought. 
 Such thy sure rules that Goths of every age. 
 Who scorned their aid, have only loaded earth 
 With laboured heavy monuments of shame. 
 Not those gay domes that o'er thy splendid shore 380 
 Shot, aU proportion, up. First, unadorned 
 And nobly plain, the manly Doric rose ; 
 The Ionic then, with decent matron grace. 
 Her airy pillar heaved ; luxuriant, last, 
 The rich Corinthian spread her wanton wreath. 
 The whole so measured true, so lessened off 
 By fine proportion, that the marble pile, 
 Formed to repel the stiU or stormy waste 
 Of rolling ages, light as fabrics looked 
 That from the magic wand aerial rise. 390 
 
 ' These were the wonders that illumined Greece, 
 
 From end to end ' Here interrupting warm, 
 
 ' Where are they now ? (I cried) say, goddess, where ? 
 
 And what the land, thy darling thus of old ? ' 
 
 ' Sunk ! (she resumed), deep in the kindred gloom 
 
 Of superstition and of slavery sunk ! 
 
 No glory now can touch their hearts, benumbed 
 
336 LIBERTY 
 
 By loose dejected sloth and servile fear ; 
 
 No science pierce the darkness of their minds ; 
 
 No nobler art the quick ambitious soul 4°° 
 
 Of .imitation in their breast awake. 
 
 Even to supply the needful arts of life 
 
 Mechanic toil denies the hopeless hand. 
 
 Scarce any trace remaining, vestige grey, 
 
 Or nodding column on the desert shore 
 
 To point where Corinth or where Athens stood. 
 
 A faithless land of violence, and death ! 
 
 Where commerce parleys dubious on the shore ; 
 
 And his viild impulse curious search restrains, 
 
 Afraid to trust the inhospitable clime. 410 
 
 Neglected nature fails ; in sordid want 
 
 Sunk and debased, their beauty beams no more. 
 
 The sun himself seems, angry, to regard 
 
 Of light unworthy the degenerate race. 
 
 And fires them oft with pestilential rays — 
 
 While earth, blue poison steaming on the skies, 
 
 Indignant shakes them from her troubled sides. 
 
 But as from man to man, fate's first decree. 
 
 Impartial death the tide of riches rolls, 
 
 So states must die and Liberty go round. 420 
 
 ' Fierce was the stand ere virtue, valour, arts. 
 And the soul fired by me (that often, stung 
 With thoughts of better times and old renown,, 
 From hydra-tyrants tried to clear the land) 
 Lay quite extinct in Greece, their works effaced, 
 And gross o'er all unfeeling bondage spread. 
 Sooner I moved my much reluctant flight. 
 Poised on the doubtful wing, when Greece with Greece, 
 Embroiled in foul contention, fought no more 
 For common glory and for common weal, 430 
 
 But, false to Freedom, sought to quell the free ; 
 Broke the firm band of peace and sacred love, 
 
PART II 337 
 
 That lent the whole irrefragable force, 
 
 And, as around the partial trophy blushed. 
 
 Prepared the way for total overthrow. 
 
 Then to the Persian power, whose pride they scorned, 
 
 When Xerxes poured his millions o'er the land, 
 
 Sparta, by turns, and Athens vilely sued ; 
 
 Sued to be venal parricides, to spill 
 
 Their country's bravest blood, and on themselves 
 
 To turn their matchless mercenary arms. 441 
 
 Peaceful in Susa, then, sat the great king ; 
 
 And by the trick of treaties, the still waste 
 
 Of sly corruption and barbaric gold. 
 
 Effected what his steel could ne'er perform. 
 
 Profuse he gave them the luxurious draught, 
 
 Inflaming all the land — unbalanced wide 
 
 Their tottering states ; their wild assembUes ruled, 
 
 As the winds turn at every blast the seas — 
 
 And by their listed orators, whose breath 450 
 
 StiU with a factious storm infested Greece, 
 
 Roused them to civil war, or dashed them down 
 
 To sordid peace — peace ! that, when Sparta shook 
 
 Astonished Artaxerxes on his throne. 
 
 Gave up, fair-spread o'er Asia's sunny shore, 
 
 Their kindred cities to perpetual chains. 
 
 What could so base, so infamous a thought 
 
 In Spartan hearts inspire ? Jealous they saw 
 
 Respiring Athens rear again her walls : 
 
 And the pale fury fired them once again 460 
 
 To crush this rival city to the dust. 
 
 For now no more the noble social soul 
 
 Of Liberty my families combined ; . 
 
 But by short views and selfish passions broke, 
 
 Dire as when friends are rankled into foes 
 
 They mixed severe, and waged eternal war ; 
 
 Nor felt they furious their exhausted force ; 
 
338 LIBERTY 
 
 Nor, with false glory, discord, madness blind. 
 
 Saw how the blackening storm from Thracia came. 
 
 Long years roUed on, by many a battle stained, 470 
 
 The blush and boast of fame ! where courage, art, 
 
 And military glory shone supreme : 
 
 But let detesting ages from the scene 
 
 Of Greece self-mangled turn the sickening eye. 
 
 At last, when bleeding from a thousand wounds 
 
 She felt her spirits fail, and in the dust 
 
 Her latest heroes, Nicias, Conon, lay, 
 
 Agesilaus, and the Theban friends — 
 
 The Macedonian vulture marked his time. 
 
 By the dire scent of Cheronaea lured, 480 
 
 And, fierce descending, seized his hapless prey. 
 
 ' Thus tame submitted to the victor's yoke 
 Greece, once the gay, the turbulent, the bold ; 
 For every grace, and muse, and science born ; 
 With arts of war, of government elate ; 
 To tyrants dreadful, dreadful to the best ; 
 Whom I myself could scarcely rule : and thus 
 The Persian fetters, that enthralled the mind, 
 Were turned to formal and apparent chains. 
 
 ' Unless corruption first deject the pride 490 
 
 And guardian vigour of the free-born soul, 
 AU crude attempts of violence are vain ; 
 For, firm within, and while at heart untouched. 
 Ne'er yet by force was freedom overcome. 
 But, soon as Independence stoops the head. 
 To vice enslaved and vice-created wants, 
 Then to some foul corrupting hand, whose waste 
 These heightened wants with fatal bounty feeds — 
 From man to man the slackening ruin runs, 
 Till the whole state unnerved in slavery sinks.' 500 
 
PART III 339 
 
 THE CONTENTS OF PART III 
 
 As this part contains a description of the establishment of 
 Liberty in Rome, it begins with a view of the Grecian Colonies 
 settled in the southern parts of Italy, which with Sicily con- 
 stituted the Great Greece of the Ancients. With these colonies 
 the Spirit of Liberty and of Republics spreads over Italy, 
 to verse 31. Transition to Pythagoras and his philosophy, 
 which he taught through these free states and cities, to verse 70. 
 Amidst the many small Republics in Italy, Rome the destined 
 seat of Liberty. Her establishment there dated from the 
 expulsion of the Tarquins. How differing from that in Greece, 
 to verse 87. Reference to a view of the Roman Republic given 
 in the first part of this Poem : to mark its rise and fall the 
 peculiar purport of this. During its first ages, the greatest 
 force of Liberty and Virtue exerted, to verse 102. The source 
 whence derived the Heroic Virtues of the Romans. Enumeration 
 of these. Virtues. Thence their security at home ; their glory, 
 success, and empire abroad, to verse 225. Bounds of the Roman 
 empire geographically described, to verse 256. The states of 
 Greece restored to Liberty by Titus Quintus Flaminius, the 
 highest instance of public generosity and beneficence, to verse 
 327. The loss of Liberty in Rome, [to verse 360]. Its causes, 
 progress, and completion in the death of Brutus, to verse 483. 
 Rome under the emperors, to verse 511. From Rome the 
 Goddess of Liberty goes among the Northern Nations ; where, 
 by infusing into them her Spirit and general principles, she 
 lays the groundwork of her future establishments ; sends 
 them in vengeance on the Roman Empire, now totally en- 
 slaved ; and then, with Arts and Sciences in her train, quits 
 Earth during the dark ages, to verse 548. The celestial regions, 
 to which Liberty retired, not proper to be opened to the view of 
 mortals. 
 
 z2 
 
PART III. ROME 
 
 [First published in the end of 1735.] 
 
 Here melting mixed with air the ideal forms 
 
 That painted still whate'er the goddess sung. 
 
 Then I, impatient : — ' From extinguished Greece, 
 
 To what new region streamed the human day ? ' 
 
 She softly sighing, as when Zephyr leaves. 
 
 Resigned to Boreas, the declining year. 
 
 Resumed : — ' Indignant, these last scenes I fled ; 
 
 And long ere then, Leucadia's cloudy ch£f 
 
 And the Ceraunian hills behind me thrown, 
 
 AU Latium stood aroused. Ages before, lo 
 
 Great mother of republics ! Greece had poured. 
 
 Swarm after swarm, her ardent youth around. 
 
 On Asia, Afric, Sicily, they stooped, 
 
 But chief on fair Hesperia's winding shore ; 
 
 Where, from Laoinium to Etrurian vales. 
 
 They roUed increasing colonies along. 
 
 And lent materials for my Roman reign. 
 
 With them my spirit spread ; and numerous states 
 
 And cities rose on Grecian models formed, 
 
 As its parental pohcy and arts 20 
 
 Each had imbibed. Besides, to each assigned, 
 
 A guardian genius o'er the public weal 
 
 Kept an unclosing eye ; tried to sustain 
 
 Or more sublime the soul infused by me : 
 
 And strong the battle rose, with various wave. 
 
 Against the tyrant demons of the land. 
 
 Thus they their httle wars and triumphs knew, 
 
 Their flows of fortune and receding times — 
 
 But almost all below the proud regard 
 
 Of story vowed to Rome, on deeds intent 30 
 
 That truth beyond the flight of fable bore. 
 
PART III 341 
 
 ' Not so the Samian sage ; to him belongs 
 The brightest witness of recording fame. 
 For these free states his native isle forsook 
 And a vain tyrant's transitory smile, 
 He sought Crotona's pure salubrious air, 
 And through Great Greece his gentle wisdom taught — 
 Wisdom that calmed for listening years the mind, 
 Nor ever heard amid the storm of zeal. 
 His mental eye first launched into the deeps 40 
 Of boundless ether, where unnumbered orbs, 
 Myriads on myriads, through the pathless sky 
 Unerring roll, and wind their steady way. 
 There he the full consenting choir beheld ; 
 There first discerned the secret band of love. 
 The kind attraction that to central suns 
 Binds circling earths, and world with world unites. 
 Instructed thence, he great ideas formed 
 Of the whole-moving, all-informing God, 
 The Sun of beings ! beaming unconfined 50 
 
 Light, life, and love, and ever active power — 
 Whom nought can image, and who best approves 
 The silent worship of the moral heart, 
 That joys in bounteous Heaven and spreads the joy. 
 Nor scorned the soaring sage to stoop to life. 
 And bound his reason to the sphere of man. 
 He gave the four yet reigning virtues name. 
 Inspired the study of the finer arts. 
 That civUize mankind, and laws devised 
 Where with enlightened justice mercy mixed. 60 
 He even into his tender system took 
 Whatever shares the brotherhood of life : 
 He taught that life's indissoluble flame, 
 From brute to man, and man to brute again, 
 For ever shifting, runs the eternal round ; 
 46 to] no (a misprint) ed. 1738. 
 
342 LIBERTY 
 
 Thence tried against the blood-polluted meal, 
 And limbs yet quivering with some kindred soul, 
 To turn the human heart. Delightful truth ! 
 Had he beheld the living chain ascend. 
 And not a circling form, but rising whole. 7° 
 
 ' Amid these small republics one arose 
 On yellow Tiber's bank, almighty Rome, 
 Fated for me. A nobler spirit warmed 
 Her sons ; and, roused by tyrants, nobler still 
 It burned in Brutus, the proud Tarquins chased 
 With all their crimes, bade radiant eras rise 
 And the long honours of the consul line. 
 
 ' Here from the fairer, not the greater, plan 
 Of Greece I varied ; whose unmixing states, 
 By the keen soul of emulation pierced, 80 
 
 Long waged alone the bloodless war of arts, 
 And their best empire gained. But to diffuse 
 O'er men an empire was my purpose now — 
 To let my martial majesty abroad ; 
 Into the vortex of one state to draw 
 The whole mixed force, and liberty, on earth ; 
 To conquer tyrants, and set nations free. 
 
 ' Already have I given, with flying touch, 
 A broken view of this my amplest reign. 
 Now, while its first, last, periods you survey, 90 
 Mark how it labouring rose, and rapid fell. 
 
 ' When Rome in noon-tide empire grasped the world. 
 And, soon as her resistless legions shone, 
 The nations stooped around, though then appeared 
 Her grandeur most, yet in her dawn of power, 
 By many a jealous equal people pressed. 
 Then was the toU, the mighty struggle then. 
 Then for each Roman I an hero told ; 
 And every passing sun and Latian scene 
 Saw patriot virtues then and awful deeds 100 
 
PART III 343 
 
 That or surpass the faith of modern times 
 Or, if believed, with sacred horror strike. 
 
 ' For then, to prove my most exalted power, 
 I to the point of fuU perfection pushed, 
 To fondness and enthusiastic zeal. 
 The great, the reigning passion of the free. 
 That godlike passion ! which, the bounds of self 
 Divinely bursting, the whole public takes 
 Into the heart, enlarged, and burning high 
 With the mixed ardour of unnumbered selves — no 
 Of aU who safe beneath the voted laws 
 Of the same parent state fraternal live. 
 From this kind sun of moral nature flowed 
 Virtues that shine the light of humankind, 
 And, rayed through story, warm remotest time. 
 These virtues too, reflected to their source. 
 Increased its flame. The social charm went round. 
 The fair idea, more attractive still 
 As more by virtue marked ; till Romans, all 
 One band of friends, unconquerable grew. 120 
 
 'Hence, when their country raised her plaintive voice. 
 The voice of pleading nature was not heard ; 
 And in their hearts the fathers throbbed no more — 
 Stern to themselves, but gentle to the whole. 
 Hence sweetened pain, the luxury of toil; 
 Patience, that baffled fortune's utmost rage ; 
 High-minded hope, which at the lowest ebb, 
 When Brennus conquered and when Cannae bled, 
 The bravest impulse felt and scorned despair. 
 Hence moderation a new conquest gained — 130 
 
 As on the vanquished, like descending heaven, 
 Their dewy mercy dropped, their bounty beamed, 
 And by the labouring hand were crowns bestowed. 
 Fruitful of men, hence hard laborious life. 
 Which no fatigue can quell, no season pierce. 
 
344 LIBERTY 
 
 Hence Independence, with his Uttle pleased, 
 
 Serene and self-sufficient like a god, 
 
 In whom corruption could not lodge one charm; 
 
 While he his honest roots to gold preferred ; 
 
 While truly rich, and by his Sabine field 140 
 
 The man maintained, the Roman's splendour all 
 
 Was in the public wealth and glory placed — 
 
 Or ready, a rough swain, to guide the plough, 
 
 Or else, the purple o'er his shoulder thrown 
 
 In long majestic flow, to rule the state 
 
 With wisdom's purest eye, or, clad in steel. 
 
 To drive the steady battle on the foe. 
 
 Hence every passion, even the proudest, stooped 
 
 To common good — Camillus, thy revenge ; 
 
 Thy glory, Pabius. AH submissive hence, 150 
 
 CJonsuls, dictators, still resigned their rule. 
 
 The very moment that the laws ordained. 
 
 Though conquest o'er them clapped her eagle wings, 
 
 Her laurels wreathed, and yoked her snowy steeds 
 
 To the triumphal car — soon as expired 
 
 The latest hour of sway, taught to submit 
 
 (A harder lesson that than to command). 
 
 Into the private Roman sunk the Chief. 
 
 If Rome was served and glorious, careless they 
 
 By whom. Their country's fame they deemed their own, 
 
 And, above envy, in a rival's train 161 
 
 Sung the loud 16s by themselves deserved. 
 
 Hence matchless courage. On Cremera's bank. 
 
 Hence fell the Fabii ; hence the Decii died ; 
 
 And Curtius plunged into the flaming guH. 
 
 Hence Regulus the wavering fathers firmed 
 
 By dreadful counsel never given before. 
 
 For Roman honour sued, and his own doom. 
 
 Hence he sustained to dare a death prepared 
 
 By Punic rage. On earth his manly look 170 
 
PART III 345 
 
 Relentless fixed, he from a last embrace, 
 
 By chains polluted, put his wife aside. 
 
 His little children climbing for a kiss ; 
 
 Then dumb through rows of weeping, wondering friends, 
 
 A new illustrious exile ! pressed along. 
 
 Nor less impatient did he pierce the crowds 
 
 Opposing his return, than if, escaped 
 
 From long litigious suits, he glad forsook 
 
 The noisy town a while and city cloud 
 
 To breathe Venafrian or Tarentine air. i8o 
 
 Need I these high particulars recount ? 
 
 The meanest bosom felt a thirst for fame ; 
 
 Flight their worst death, and shame their only fear. 
 
 Life had no charms, nor any terrors fate, 
 
 When Rome and glory called. But, in one view, 
 
 Mark the rare boast of these unequalled times. 
 
 Ages revolved unsullied by a crime : 
 
 Astrea reigned, and scarcely needed laws 
 
 To bind a race elated with the pride 
 
 Of virtue, and disdaining to descend 190 
 
 To meanness, mutual violence, and wrongs. 
 
 While war around them raged, in happy Rome 
 
 AU peaceful smiled, all save the passing clouds 
 
 That often hang on Freedom's jealous brow ; 
 
 And fair unblemished centuries elapsed 
 
 When not a Roman bled but in the field. 
 
 Their virtue such that an unbalanced state. 
 
 Still between noble and plebeian tossed. 
 
 As flowed the wave of fluctuating power. 
 
 By that kept firm and with triumphant prow 200 
 
 Rode out the storms. Oft though the native feuds 
 
 That from the first their constitution shook 
 
 (A latent ruin, growing as it grew) 
 
 Stood on the threatening point of civil war 
 
 Ready to rush — yet could the lenient voice 
 
346 LIBERTY 
 
 Of wisdom, soothing the tumultuous soul, 
 
 These sons of virtue calm. Their generous hearts, 
 
 Unpetrified by self, so naked lay 
 
 And sensible to truth that o'er the rage 
 
 Of giddy faction, by oppression swelled, 210 
 
 Prevailed a simple fable, and at once 
 
 To peace recovered the divided state. 
 
 But, if their often-cheated hopes refused 
 
 The soothing touch, still, in the love of Rome, 
 
 The dread dictator found a sure resource. 
 
 Was she assaulted ? was her glory stained ? 
 
 One common quarrel wide inflamed the whole. 
 
 Foes in the forum in the field were friends. 
 
 By social danger bound — each fond for each. 
 
 And for their dearest country all, to die. 220 
 
 ' Thus up the hill of empire slow they toiled. 
 Till, the bold summit gained, the thousand states 
 Of proud Italia blended into one ; 
 Then o'er the nations they resistless rushed. 
 And touched the limits of the faihng world. 
 
 ' Let fancy's eye the distant lines unite. 
 See that which borders wild the western main. 
 Where storms at large resound, and tides immense ; 
 From Caledonia's dim cerulean coast, 
 And moist Hibernia, to where Atlas, lodged 230 
 Amid the restless clouds and leaning heaven, 
 Hangs o'er the deep that borrows thence its name. 
 Mark that opposed, where first the springing morn 
 Her roses sheds, and shakes around her dews — 
 From the dire deserts by the Caspian laved 
 To where the Tigris and Euphrates, joined. 
 Impetuous tear the Babylonian plain, 
 And blest Arabia aromatic breathes. 
 See that dividing far the watery north. 
 Parent of floods ! from the majestic Rhine, 240 
 
PART III 347 
 
 Drunk by Batavian meads, to where, seven-rnouthed, 
 
 In Euxine waves the flashing Danube roars ; 
 
 To where the frozen Tanais scarcely stirs 
 
 The dead Maeotic pool, or the long Rha 
 
 In the black Scythian sea his torrent throws. 
 
 Last, that beneath the burning zone behold. 
 
 See where it runs from the deep-loaded plains 
 
 Of Mauritania to the Libyan sands, 
 
 Where Ammon lifts amid the torrid waste 
 
 A verdant isle with shade and fountain fresh, 250 
 
 And farther to the full Egyptian shore. 
 
 To where the Nile from Ethiopian clouds. 
 
 His never drained ethereal urn, descends. 
 
 In this vast space what various tongues and states ! 
 
 What bounding rocks and mountains, floods and seas ! 
 
 What purple tyrants quelled, and nations freed ! 
 
 ' O'er Greece descended chief, with stealth divine, 
 The Roman bounty in a flood of day : 
 As at her Isthmian games, a fading pomp ! 
 Her full-assembled youth innumerous swarmed. 260 
 On a tribunal raised Flaminius sat : 
 A victor he, from the deep phalanx pierced 
 Of iron-coated Macedon, and back 
 The Grecian tyrant to his bounds repelled. 
 In the high thoughtless gaiety of game. 
 While sport alone their unambitious hearts 
 Possessed, the sudden trumpet, sounding hoarse, 
 Bade silence o'er the bright assembly reign. 
 Then thus a herald : — " To the states of Greece 
 The Roman people unconfined restore 270 
 
 Their countries, cities, liberties, and laws : 
 Taxes remit, and garrisons withdraw." 
 The crowd, astonished haK, and haK informed. 
 Stared dubious round ; some questioned, some 
 exclaimed 
 
348 LIBERTY 
 
 (Like one who dreaming, between hope and fear, 
 
 Is lost in anxious joy) — " Be that again. 
 
 Be that again proclaimed, distinct and loud." 
 
 Loud and distinct it was again proclaimed ; 
 
 And, still as midnight in the rural shade 
 
 When the gale slumbers, they the words devoured. 
 
 A while severe amazement held them mute, 281 
 
 Then, bursting broad, the boundless shout to heaven 
 
 Prom many a thousand hearts ecstatic sprung. 
 
 On every hand rebellowed to their joy 
 
 The swelhng sea, the rocks and vocal hills : 
 
 Through all her turrets stately Corinth shook ; 
 
 And, from the void above of shattered air. 
 
 The flitting bird fell breathless to the ground. 
 
 What piercing bliss, how keen a sense of fame 
 
 Did then, Flaminius, reach thy inmost soul ! 290 
 
 And with what deep-felt glory didst thou then 
 
 Escape the fondness of transported Greece ! 
 
 Mixed in a tempest of superior joy. 
 
 They left the sports ; like Bacchanals they flew, 
 
 Each other straining in a strict embrace. 
 
 Nor strained a slave ; and loud acclaims till night 
 
 Round the Proconsul's tent repeated rung. 
 
 Then, crowned with garlands, came the festive hours ; 
 
 And music, sparkling wine, and converse warm 
 
 Their raptures waked anew. "Ye gods!" they cried, 
 
 " Ye guardian gods of Greece ! and are we free ? 30J 
 
 Was it not madness deemed the very thought ? 
 
 And is it true ? How did we purchase chains ? 
 
 At what a dire expense of kindred blood ? 
 
 And are they now dissolved ? And scarce one drop 
 
 For the fair first of blessings have we paid ? 
 
 Courage and conduct in the doubtful field 
 
 When rages wide the storm of mingling war 
 
 283 hearts] Heart ed. 173R. 
 
PART III 349 
 
 Are rare indeed ; but how to generous ends 
 
 To turn success and conquest, rarer still — 310 
 
 That the great gods and Romans only know. 
 
 Lives there on earth, almost to Greece unknown, 
 
 A people so magnanimous to quit 
 
 Their native soil, traverse the stormy deep, 
 
 And by their blood and treasure, spent for us. 
 
 Redeem our states., our hberties, and laws ! 
 
 There does ! there does ! Oh Saviour Titus ! Rome ! " 
 
 Thus through the happy night they poured their souls. 
 
 And in my last reflected beams rejoiced. 
 
 As when the shepherd, on the mountain brow, 320 
 
 Sits piping to his flocks and gamesome kids ; 
 
 Meantime the sun, beneath the green earth sunk, 
 
 Slants upward o'er the scene a parting gleam : 
 
 Short is the glory that the mountain gilds. 
 
 Plays on the glittering flocks and glads the swain ; 
 
 To western worlds irrevocable rolled, 
 
 Rapid the source of Ught recalls his ray.' 
 
 Here interposing I : — ' Oh, Queen of men ! 
 Beneath whose sceptre in essential rights 
 Equal they live, though placed for common good 330 
 Various, or in subjection or command. 
 And that by common choice — alas ! the scene. 
 With virtue, freedom, and with glory bright. 
 Streams into blood and darkens into woe.' 
 Thus she pursued : — ' Near this great era, Rome 
 Began to feel the swift approach of fate. 
 That now her vitals gained — still more and more 
 Her deep divisions kindling into rage 
 And war, with chains and desolation charged. 
 From an unequal balance of her sons 340 
 
 These fierce contentions sprung : and, as increased 
 This hated inequality, more fierce 
 They flamed to tumult. Independence failed — 
 
350 LIBERTY 
 
 Here by luxurious wants, by real there ; 
 
 And with this virtue every virtue sunk 
 
 As, with the sliding rock, the pile sustained. 
 
 A last attempt, too late, the Gracchi made 
 
 To fix the flying scale and poise the state. 
 
 On one side swelled aristocratic Pride, 
 
 With Usury, the villain ! whose fell gripe 350 
 
 Bends by degrees to baseness the free soul. 
 
 And Luxury rapacious, cruel, mean. 
 
 Mother of vice ! While on the other crept 
 
 A populace in want, with pleasure fired ; 
 
 Fit for proscriptions, for the darkest deeds, 
 
 As the proud feeder bade ; inconstant, blind. 
 
 Deserting friends at need, and duped by foes ; 
 
 Loud and seditious, when a chief inspired 
 
 Their headlong fury, but, of him deprived, 
 
 Already slaves that licked the scourging hand. 360 
 
 ' This firm republic that against the blast 
 Of opposition rose, that (like an oak. 
 Nursed on feracious Algidum, whose boughs 
 Still stronger shoot beneath the rigid axe) 
 By loss, by slaughter, from the steel itself 
 Even force and spirit drew, smit with the calm. 
 The dead serene of prosperous fortune, pined. 
 Nought now her weighty legions could oppose ; 
 Her terror, once, on Afric's tawny shore 
 Now smoked in dust, a stabling now for wolves ; 370 
 And every dreaded power received the yoke. 
 Besides, destructive, from the conquered east 
 In the soft plunder came that worst of plagues. 
 The pestilence of mind, a fevered thirst 
 For the false joys which luxury prepares. 
 Unworthy joys ! that wasteful leave behind 
 No mark of honour in reflecting hour. 
 No secret ray to glad the conscious soul — 
 
PART III 351 
 
 At once involving in one ruin wealth 
 
 And wealth-acquiring powers, while stupid self, 
 
 Of narrow gust, and hebetating sense 381 
 
 Devour the nobler faculties of bliss. 
 
 Hence Roman virtue slackened into sloth, 
 
 Security relaxed the softening state. 
 
 And the broad eye of government lay closed. 
 
 No more the laws inviolable reigned. 
 
 And public weal no more : but party raged. 
 
 And partial power and licence unrestrained 
 
 Let discord through the deathful city loose. 
 
 First, mild Tiberius, on thy sacred head 390 
 
 The fury's vengeance fell ; the first whose blood 
 
 Had, since the consuls, stained contending Rome. 
 
 Of precedent pernicious ! with thee bled 
 
 Three hundred Romans ; with thy brother, next, 
 
 Three thousand more — till, into battles turned 
 
 Debates of peace, and forced the trembling laws, 
 
 The forum and comitia horrid grew, 
 
 A scene of bartered power or reeking gore. 
 
 When, half-ashamed, corruption's thievish arts 
 
 And ruffian force begin to sap the mounds 400 
 
 And majesty of laws ; if not in time 
 
 Repressed severe, for human aid too strong 
 
 The torrent turns, and overbears the whole. 
 
 ' Thus luxury, dissension, a mixed rage 
 Of boundless pleasure and of boundless wealth, 
 Want wishing change, and waste-repairing war, 
 Rapine for ever lost to peaceful toil, 
 Guilt unatoned, profuse of blood revenge. 
 Corruption all avowed, and lawless force, 
 Each heightening each, alternate shook the state. 410. 
 Meantime ambition, at the dazzling head 
 
 395 into] in two (a misprint) ed. 1738. 
 
 406 Want wishing Change and Waste repairing War ed.'173a.. 
 
352 LIBERTY 
 
 Of hardy legions, with the laurels heaped 
 
 And spoil of nations, in one circling blast 
 
 Combined in various storm, and from its base 
 
 The broad repubhc tore. By virtue built 
 
 It touched the skies, and spread o'er sheltered earth 
 
 An ample roof : by virtue too sustained, 
 
 And balanced steady, every tempest sung 
 
 Innoxious by, or bade it firmer stand. 
 
 But when, with sudden and enormous change, 420 
 
 The first of mankind sunk into this last. 
 
 As once in virtue, so in vice extreme, 
 
 This universal fabric yielded loose. 
 
 Before ambition stiU ; and thundering down. 
 
 At last, beneath its ruins crushed a world. 
 
 A conquering people to themselves a prey 
 
 Must ever fall, when their victorious troops. 
 
 In blood and rapine savage grown, can find 
 
 No land to sack and pillage but their own. 
 
 ' By brutal Marius, and keen Sylla, first 430 
 
 Effused the deluge dire of civil blood. 
 Unceasing woes began, and this, or that, 
 (Deep-drenching their revenge) nor virtue spared, 
 Nor sex, nor age, nor quality, nor name ; 
 Till Rome, into an human shambles turned, 
 Made deserts lovely. — Oh, to well-earned chains, 
 Devoted race ! — If no true Roman then, 
 No Scaevola, there was to raise for me 
 A vengeful hand — was there no father, robbed 
 Of blooming youth to prop his withered age ? 440 
 No son, a witness to his hoary sire 
 In dust and gore defiled ? no friend, forlorn ? 
 No wretch that doubtful trembled for himself ? 
 None brave, or wild, to pierce a monster's heart. 
 Who, heaping horror round, no more deserved 
 The sacred shelter of the laws he spumed ? 
 
PART III 353 
 
 No : — Sad o'er all profound dejection sat ; 
 
 And nerveless fear. The slave's asylum theirs — 
 
 Or flight, ill-judging that the timid back 
 
 Turns weak to slaughter, or partaken guilt. 450 
 
 In vain from Sylla's vanity I drew 
 
 An unexampled deed. The power resigned, 
 
 And all unhoped the commonwealth restored, 
 
 Amazed the public, and effaced his crimes. 
 
 Through streets yet streaming from his murderous 
 
 hand 
 Unarmed he strayed, unguarded, unassailed. 
 And on the bed of peace his ashes laid — 
 A grace, which I to his demission gave. 
 But with him died not the despotic soul. 
 Ambition saw that stooping Rome could bear 460 
 A master, nor had virtue to be free. 
 Hence, for succeeding years, my troubled reign 
 No certain peace, no spreading prospect knew. 
 Destruction gathered round. StiU the black soul 
 Or of a Catiline or RuUus swelled 
 With fell designs ; and all the watchful art 
 Of Cicero demanded, all the force, 
 AU the state-wielding magic of his tongue, 
 And all the thunder of my Cato's zeal. 
 With these I lingered ; till the flame anew 47° 
 
 Burst out in blaze immense, and wrapped the world. 
 The shameful contest sprung ; to whom mankind 
 Should yield the neck— to Pompey, who concealed 
 A rage impatient of an equal name. 
 Or to the nobler Caesar, on whose brow 
 O'er daring vice deluding virtue smUed, 
 And who no less a vain superior scorned. 
 Both bled, but bled in vain. New traitors rose. 
 The venal wiU be bought, the base have lords. 
 To these vile wars I left ambitious slaves ; 480 
 
 THOMSON A a 
 
354 LIBERTY 
 
 And from Philippi's field, from where in dust 
 The last of Romans, matchless Brutus ! lay, 
 Spread to the north untamed a rapid wing. 
 
 ' What though the first smooth Caesars arts caressed, 
 Merit, and virtue, simulating me ? 
 Severely tender, cruelly humane 
 The chain to clinch, and make it softer sit 
 On the new-broken still ferocious state ! 
 From the dark third, succeeding, I beheld 
 The imperial monsters all — a race on earth 490 
 
 Vindictive sent, the scourge of humankind ! 
 Whose bhnd profusion drained a bankrupt world ; 
 Whose lust to forming nature seems disgrace ; 
 And whose infernal rage bade every drop 
 Of ancient blood that yet retained my flame. 
 To that of Paetus, in the peaceful bath 
 Or Rome's affrighted streets inglorious flow. 
 But almost just the meanly patient death 
 That waits a tyrant's unprevented stroke. 
 Titus indeed gave one short evening gleam ; 500 
 More cordial felt, as in the midst it spread 
 Of storm and horror. The delight of men ! 
 He who the day when his o'erflowing hand 
 Had made no happy heart concluded lost ; 
 Trajan and he, with the mild sire and son, 
 His son of virtue ! eased awhile mankind ; 
 And arts revived beneath their gentle beam. 
 Then was their last effort : what sculpture raised 
 To Trajan's glory following triumphs stole, 
 And mixed with Gothic forms (the chisel's shame) 
 On that triumphal arch the forms of Greece. 511 
 
 ' Meantime o'er rocky Thrace and the deep vales 
 Of gelid Haemus I pursued my flight ; 
 And, piercing farthest Scythia, westward swept 
 Sarmatia, traversed by a thousand streams, 
 
PART III 355 
 
 A sullen land of lakes, and fens immense, 
 Of rocks, resounding torrents, gloomy heaths, 
 And cruel deserts black with sounding pine, 
 Where nature frowns — though sometimes into smiles 
 She softens, and immediate at the touch 520 
 
 Of southern gales throws from the sudden glebe 
 Luxuriant pasture and a waste of flowers. 
 But, cold-compressed, when the whole-loaded heaven 
 Descends in snow, lost in one white abrupt 
 Lies undistinguished Earth ; and, seized by frost. 
 Lakes, headlong streams, and floods, and oceans sleep. 
 Yet there hfe glows ; the furry millions there 
 Deep-dig their dens beneath the sheltering snows : 
 And there a race of men prolific swarms. 
 To various pain, to little pleasure used, 530 
 
 On whom keen-parching beat Riphaean winds, 
 Hard like their soil, and like their climate fierce, 
 The nursery of nations ! — These I roused. 
 Drove land on land, on people people poured, 
 Till from almost perpetual night they broke 
 As if in search of day, and o'er the banks 
 Of yielding empire, only slave-sustained, 
 Resistless raged — in vengeance urged by me. 
 
 ' Long in the barbarous heart the buried seeds 
 Of freedom lay, for many a wintry age ; 540 
 
 And, though my spirit worked, by slow degrees 
 Nought but its pride and fierceness yet appeared. 
 Then was the night of time, that parted worlds. 
 I quitted earth the while. As when the tribes 
 Aerial, warned of rising winter, ride 
 Autumnal winds, to warmer cUmates borne — 
 So, arts and each good genius in my train, 
 I cut the closing gloom, and soared to heaven. 
 
 ' In the bright regions there of purest day. 
 Far other scenes and palaces arise, 550 
 
 Aa2 
 
356 LIBERTY 
 
 Adorned profuse with other arts divine. 
 
 All beauty here below, to them compared, 
 
 Would, hke a rose before the midday sun, 
 
 Shrink up its blossom— like a bubble break 
 
 The passing poor magnificence of kings. 
 
 For there the king of nature in full blaze 
 
 Calls every splendour forth, and there his court, 
 
 Amid ethereal powers and virtues holds — 
 
 Angel, archangel, tutelary gods. 
 
 Of cities, nations, empires, and of worlds. 560 
 
 But sacred be the veil that kindly clouds 
 
 A light too keen for mortals — wraps a view 
 
 Too softening fair, for those that here in dust 
 
 Must cheerful toil out their appointed _vears. 
 
 A sense of higher life would only damp 
 
 The schoolboy's task, and spoil his plajrful hours. 
 
 Nor could the child of reason, feeble man. 
 
 With vigour through this infant-being drudge, 
 
 Did brighter worlds, their unimagined bliss 
 
 Disclosing, dazzle and dissolve his mind.' 570 
 
 THE CONTENTS OP PART IV 
 
 DlFrEBDNOK betwixt the Ancients and Moderns slightly touched 
 upon, to verse 29. Description of the Dark Ajios. The Goddess 
 of Liberty, who during these is supposed to have left earth, 
 returns, attended with Arts and Science, to verse 99. She 
 first descends on Italy. Sculpture, Painting, and Arohitoclure 
 fix at RoHie, to revive their several arts by (lie great models 
 of antiquity there, which many barbarous invasions had not 
 been able to destroy. The revival of these arts marked out. 
 That sometimes arts may flourish for a white under despotic 
 governments, though never the natural and genuine production 
 of them, to verse 253. Learning begins to dawn. The Muse 
 and Science attend Liberty, who in her progress towards Great 
 Britain raises several free states and I'ities. Those enumerated, 
 to verse 380. Author's exclamation of joy, upon seeing the 
 
PART IV 357 
 
 British seas and coasts rise in the Vision, which painted what- 
 ever the Goddess of Liberty said. She resumes her narration, 
 the Genius of the Deep appears, and addressing Liberty, 
 associates Great Britain into his dominion, to verse 450. Liberty 
 received and congratulated by Britannia, and the native 
 Genii or Virtues of the island. These described. Animated 
 by the presence of Liberty, they begin their operations. Their 
 beneficent influence contrasted with the works and delusions 
 of opposing Demons, to verse 623. Concludes with an abstract 
 of the English history, marking the several advances of Liberty, 
 down to her complete establishment at the Revolution. 
 
 PART IV. BRITAIN 
 
 [First published, 1736.] 
 
 Struck with the rising scene, thus I amazed: — 
 ' Ah, Goddess, what a change ! is Earth the same ? 
 Of the same kind the ruthless race she feeds ? 
 And does the same fair sun and ether spread 
 Round this vile spot their aU-enUvening soul ? 
 Lo ! beauty fails ; lost in unlovely forms 
 Of Uttle pomp, magnificence no more 
 Exalts the mind, and bids the pubUc smile — 
 While to rapacious interest Glory leaves 
 Mankind, and every grace of hfe is gone.' lo 
 
 To this the power, whose vital radiance calls 
 From the brute mass of man an ordered world : 
 
 ' Wait tiU the morning shines, and from the depth f 
 Of Gothic darkness springs another day. ' 
 
 True, genius droops ; the tender ancient taste 
 Of Beauty, then fresh blooming in her prime. 
 But faintly trembles through the callous soul ; 
 And Grandeur, or of morals or of lite, 
 Sinks into safe pursuits and creeping cares. 
 Even cautious virtue seems to stoop her flight, 20 
 And aged life to deem the generous deeds 
 
358 LIBERTY 
 
 Of youth romantic. Yet in cooler thought 
 Well reasoned, in researches piercing deep 
 Through nature's works, in profitable arts. 
 And all that calm experience can disclose, 
 (Slow guide, but sure) behold the world anew 
 Exalted rise, with other honours crowned ; 
 And, where my Spirit wakes the finer powers, 
 Athenian laurels still afresh shall bloom. 
 
 ' Oblivious ages passed ; while earth, forsook 30 . 
 By her best genii, lay to demons foul 
 And unchained furies an abandoned prey. 
 Contention led the van ; first small of size. 
 But soon dilating to the skies she towers : 
 Then, wide as air, the livid fury spread. 
 And high her head above the stormy clouds 
 She blazed in omens, swelled the groaning winds 
 With wild surmises, battlings, sounds of war — 
 From land to land the maddening trumpet blew, 
 And poured her venom through the heart of man. 40 
 Shook to the pole, the north obeyed her call. 
 Forth rushed the bloody power of Gothic war, 
 War against human kind : Rapine, that led 
 Millions of raging robbers in his train : 
 Unlistening, barbarous force, to whom the sword 
 Is reason, honour, law : the foe of arts 
 By monsters followed, hideous to behold. 
 That claimed their place. Outrageous mixed with 
 
 these 
 Another species of tyrannic rule ; 
 Unknown before, whose cankerous shackles seized 
 The envenomed soul ; a wilder Fury, she 51 
 
 Even o'er her Elder Sister tyrannized. 
 Or, if perchance agreed, inflamed her rage. 
 Dire was her train, and loud : the sable band, 
 Thundering — " Submit, ye Laity ! ye profane ! 
 
PART IV 359 
 
 Earth is the Lord's, and therefore ours ; let kings 
 Allow the common claim, and halt be theirs ; 
 If not, behold ! the sacred lightning flies ! " 
 Scholastic Discord, with an hundred tongues, 
 For science uttering jangling words obscure, 60 
 
 Where frighted reason never yet could dwell. 
 Of peremptory feature, cleric pride, 
 Whose reddening cheek no contradiction bears; 
 And holy slander, his associate firm. 
 On whom the lying spirit still descends — 
 Mother of tortures ! persecuting zeal. 
 High flashing in her hand the ready torch. 
 Or poniard bathed in unbeheving blood ; 
 HeU's fiercest fiend ! of saintly brow demure. 
 Assuming a celestial seraph's name, 70 
 
 While she beneath the blasphemous pretence 
 Of pleasing parent Heaven, the source of love ! 
 Has wrought more horrors, more detested deeds 
 Than all the rest combined. Led on by her. 
 And wild of head to work her fell designs. 
 Came idiot Superstition ; round with ears 
 Innumerous strowed, ten thousand monkish forms 
 With legends plied them, and with tenets, meant 
 To charm or scare the simple into slaves, 
 And poison reason ; gross, she swallows all,. 80 
 
 The most absurd believing ever most. 
 Broad o'er the whole her universal night, 
 The gloom still doubling. Ignorance diffused. 
 ' Nought to be seen, but visionary monks 
 To councils strolling and embroiling creeds. 
 Banditti saints disturbing distant lands, 
 And unknown nations wandering for a home. 
 All lay reversed — the sacred arts of rule 
 Turned to flagitious leagues against mankind, 
 And arts of plunder more and more avowed ; 90 
 
360 LIBERTY 
 
 Pure plain devotion to a solemn farce ; 
 To holy dotage virtue, even to guile. 
 To murder, and a mockery of oaths ; 
 Brave ancient freedom to the rage of slaves, 
 Proud of their state and fighting for their chains ; 
 Dishonoured courage to the bravo's trade. 
 To civil broil ; and glory to romance. 
 Thus human life, unhinged, to ruin reeled, 
 And giddy reason tottered on her throne. 
 
 ' At last heaven's best inexplicable scheme, loo 
 Disclosing, bade new brightening eras smile. 
 The high command gone forth. Arts in my train. 
 And azure-mantled Science, swift we spread 
 A sounding pinion. Eager pity, mixed 
 With indignation, urged our downward flight. 
 On Latium first we stooped, for doubtful life 
 That panted, sunk beneath unnumbered woes. 
 Ah, poor Italia ! what a bitter cup 
 Of vengeance hast thou drained ! Goths, Vandals, 
 
 Huns, 
 Lombards, barbarians broke from every land, no 
 How many a ruffian form hast thou beheld ! 
 What horrid jargons heard, where rage alone 
 Was all thy frighted ear could comprehend ! 
 How frequent by the red inhuman hand, 
 Yet warm with brother's, husband's, father's blood. 
 Hast thou thy matrons and thy virgins seen 
 To violation dragged, and mingled death ! 
 What conflagrations, earthquakes, ravage, floods. 
 Have turned thy cities into stony wilds ; 
 And succourless and bare the poor remains 120 
 
 Of wretches forth to nature's common cast ! 
 Added to these the still continual waste 
 Of inbred foes that on thy vitals prey, 
 And, double tyrants, seize the very soul. 
 
PART IV 361 
 
 Where hadst thou treasures for this rapine all ? 
 These hungry myriads that thy bowels tore, 
 Heaped sack on sack, and buried in their rage 
 Wonders of art ; whence this grey scene, a mine 
 Of more than gold becomes and orient gems, 
 Where Egypt, Greece, and Rome united glow. 130 
 
 ' Here Sculpture, Painting, Architecture, bent ' 
 From ancient models to restore their arts, ' 
 
 Remained. A little trace we how they rose. ( 
 
 ' Amid the hoary ruins. Sculpture first, 
 Deep digging, from the cavern dark and damp, 
 Their grave for ages, bade her marble race 
 Spring to new light. Joy sparkled in her eyes. 
 And old remembrance thrilled in every thought, 
 As she the pleasing resurrection saw. 
 In leaning site, respiring from his toils, 140 
 
 The well known hero who dehvered Greece, 
 His ample chest all tempested with force. 
 Unconquerable reared. She saw the head. 
 Breathing the hero, small, of Grecian size. 
 Scarce more extensive than the sinewy neck ; 
 The spreading shoulders, muscular and broad ; 
 The whole a mass of swelling sinews, touched 
 Into harmonious shape ; she saw, and joyed. 
 The yellow hunter, Meleager, raised 
 His beauteous front, and through the finished whole 
 Shows what ideas smiled of old in Greece. 151 
 
 Of raging aspect rushed impetuous forth 
 The Gladiator : pitiless his look. 
 And each keen sinew braced, the storm of war. 
 Ruffling, o'er all his nervous body frowns. 
 The dying other from the gloom she drew. 
 Supported on his shortened arm he leans, 
 Prone, agonizing ; with incumbent fate 
 Heavy declines his head ; yet dark beneath 
 
362 LIBERTY 
 
 The suffering feature sullen vengeance lours, i6o 
 
 Shame, indignation, unaccomplished rage; 
 
 And still the cheated eye expects his fall. 
 
 All conquest-flushed from prostrate Python came 
 
 The quivered God. In graceful act he stands. 
 
 His arm extended with the slackened bow : 
 
 Light flows his easy robe, and fair displays 
 
 A manly-softened form. The bloom of gods 
 
 Seems youthful o'er the beardless cheek to wave : 
 
 His features yet heroic ardour warms ; 
 
 And sweet subsiding to a native smile, 170 
 
 Mixed with the joy elating conquest gives, 
 
 A scattered frown exalts his matchless air. 
 
 On Flora moved ; her full proportioned limbs 
 
 Rise through the mantle fluttering in the breeze. 
 
 The queen of love arose, as from the deep 
 
 She sprung in all the melting pomp of charms. 
 
 Bashful she bends, her well-taught look aside 
 
 Turns in enchanting guise, where dubious mix 
 
 Vain conscious beauty, a dissembled sense 
 
 Of modest shame, and slippery looks of love. 180 
 
 The gazer grows enamoured, and the stone. 
 
 As if exulting in its conquest, smiles. 
 
 So turned each limb, so swelled with softening art. 
 
 That the deluded eye the marble doubts. 
 
 At last her utmost masterpiece she found 
 
 That Maro fired — the miserable sire. 
 
 Wrapt with his sons in fate's severest grasp . 
 
 The serpents, twisting round, their stringent folds 
 
 Inextricable tie. Such passion here. 
 
 Such agonies, such bitterness of pain 190 
 
 Seem so to tremble through the tortured stone 
 
 That the touched heart engrosses all the view. 
 
 Almost unmarked the best proportions pass 
 
 That ever Greece beheld ; and, seen alone, 
 
PART IV 363 
 
 On the rapt eye the imperious passions seize — 
 
 The father's double pangs, both for himself 
 
 And sons convulsed ; to heaven his rueful look, 
 
 Imploring aid, and half accusing, cast ; 
 
 His fell despair with indignation mixed, 
 
 As the strong curling monsters from his side 2cx3 
 
 His full extended fury cannot tear. 
 
 More tender touched, with varied art, his sons 
 
 AU the soft rage of younger passions show. 
 
 In a boy's helpless fate one sinks oppressed ; 
 
 While, yet unpierced, the frighted other tries 
 
 His foot to steal out of the horrid twine. 
 
 ' She bore no more, but straight from Gothic rust 
 Her chisel cleared, and dust and fragments drove 
 Impetuous round. Successive as it went 
 From son to son, with more enlivening touch, 210 
 From the brute rock it called the breathing form ; 
 Till, in a legislator's awful grace 
 Dressed, Buonaroti bade a Moses rise, 
 And, looking love immense, a Saviour God. 
 
 ' Of these observant. Painting felt the fire 
 Burn inward. Then ecstatic she diffused 
 The canvas, seized the pallet, with quick hand 
 The colours brewed ; and on the void expanse 
 Her gay creation poured, her mimic world. 
 Poor was the manner of her eldest race, 220 
 
 Barren, and dry ; just struggling from the taste 
 That had for ages scared in cloisters dim 
 The superstitious herd : yet glorious then 
 Were deemed their works ; where undeveloped lay 
 The future wonders that enriched mankind. 
 And a new light and grace o'er Europe cast. 
 Arts gradual gather streams. Enlarging this. 
 To each his portion of her various gifts 
 The Goddess dealt, to none indulging aU ; 
 
364 LIBERTY 
 
 No, not to Raphael. At kind distance still 230 
 
 Perfection stands, like happiness, to tempt 
 
 The eternal chase. In elegant design. 
 
 Improving nature : in ideas, fair 
 
 Or great, extracted from the fine antique ; 
 
 In attitude, expression, airs divine — • 
 
 Her sons of Rome and Florence bore the prize. 
 
 To those of Venice she the magic art 
 
 Of colours melting into colours gave. 
 
 Theirs too it was by one embracing mass 
 
 Of light and shade, that settles round the whole. 
 
 Or varies tremulous from part to part, 241 
 
 O'er all a binding harmony to throw, 
 
 To raise the picture, and repose the sight. 
 
 The Lombard school, succeeding, mingled both. 
 
 ' Meantime dread fanes and palaces around 
 Reared the magnific front. Music again 
 Her universal language of the heart 
 Renewed ; and, rising from the plaintive vale. 
 To the fuU concert spread, and solemn quire. 249 
 
 ' Even bigots smiled ; to their protection took 
 Arts not their own, and from them borrowed pomp — 
 For in a tyrant's garden these awhile 
 May bloom, though freedom be their parent soil. 
 
 ' And, now confessed, with gently -growing gleam 
 The morning shone, and westward streamed its Ught, 
 The muse awoke. Not sooner on the wing 
 Is the gay bird of dawn. Artless her voice. 
 Untaught and wild, yet warbled through the woods 
 Romantic lays. But as her northern course 
 She, with her tutor Science, in my train, 260 
 
 Ardent pursued, her strains more noble grew — 
 While reason drew the plan, the heart informed 
 The moral page, and fancy lent it grace. 
 
 ' Rome and her circling deserts cast behind, 
 
PART IV 365 
 
 I passed not idle to my great sojourn. 
 
 ■ ' On Arno's fertile plain, where the rich vine 
 
 Luxuriant o'er Etrurian mountains roves, 
 
 Safe in the lap reposed of private bliss, 
 
 I small republics raised. Thrice happy they ! 
 
 Had social freedom bound their peace, and arts. 
 
 Instead of ruUng power, ne'er meant for them, 271 
 
 Employed their little cares, and saved their fate. 
 
 ' Beyond the rugged Apennines, that roll 
 Far through Italian bounds their wavy tops. 
 My path too I with public blessings strowed : 
 Pree states and cities, where the Lombard plain, 
 In spite of culture negligent and gross. 
 From her deep bosom pours unbidden joys, 
 And green o'er aU the land a garden spreads. 
 
 ' The barren rocks themselves beneath my foot 
 Relenting bloomed on the Ligurian shore. 281 
 
 Thick-swarming people there, like emmets, seized 
 Amid surrounding chffs the scattered spots 
 Which nature left in her destroying rage, 
 Made their own fields, nor sighed for other lands. 
 There, in white prospect from the rocky hill 
 Gradual descending to the sheltered shore, 
 By me proud Genoa's marble turrets rose. 
 And, while my genuine spirit warmed her sons. 
 Beneath her Dorias, not unworthy, she 290 
 
 Vied for the trident of the narrow seas. 
 Ere Britain yet had opened all the main. 
 
 ' Nor be the then triumphant state forgot. 
 Where, pushed from plundered earth, a remnant still, 
 Inspired by me, through the dark ages kept 
 Of my old Roman flame some sparks alive — 
 The seeming god-built city ! which my hand 
 Deep in the bosom fixed of wondering seas. 
 Astonished mortals sailed with pleasing awe 
 
366 LIBERTY 
 
 Around the sea-girt walls, by Neptune fenced, 300 
 
 And down the briny street, where on each hand, 
 
 Amazing seen amid unstable waves. 
 
 The splendid palace shines, and rising tides. 
 
 The green steps marking, murmur at the door. 
 
 To this fair queen of Adria's stormy gulf, 
 
 The mart of nations ! long obedient seas 
 
 Rolled all the treasure of the radiant East. 
 
 But now no more. Than one great tyrant worse 
 
 (Whose shared oppression lightens, as diffused). 
 
 Each subject tearing, many tyrants rose. 310 
 
 The least the proudest. Joined in dark cabal, 
 
 They, jealous, watchful, silent, and severe. 
 
 Cast o'er the whole indissoluble chains : 
 
 The softer shackles of luxurious ease 
 
 They likewise added, to secure their sway. 
 
 Thus Venice fainter shines ; and Commerce thus, 
 
 Of toil impatient, flags the drooping sail. 
 
 Bursting, besides, his ancient bounds, he took 
 
 A larger circle ; found another seat. 
 
 Opening a thousand ports, and charmed with toil 320 
 
 Whom nothing can dismay far other sons. 
 
 ' The mountains then, clad with eternal snow. 
 Confessed my power. Deep as the rampart rocks 
 By nature thrown insuperable round, 
 I planted there a league of friendly states. 
 And bade plain freedom their ambition be. 
 There in the vale, where rural plenty fills 
 From lakes and meads and furrowed fields her horn. 
 Chief where the Leman pure emits the Rhone, 
 Rare to be seen ! unguilty cities rise, 330 
 
 Cities of brothers formed — while equal life, 
 Accorded gracious with revolving power. 
 Maintains them free ; and, in their happy streets, 
 323 rampant (a misprint) ed. 1738. 
 
PART IV 367 
 
 Nor cruel deed nor misery is known. 
 
 For valour, faith, and innocence of life 
 
 Renowned, a rough laborious people there 
 
 Not only give the dreadful Alps to smile, 
 
 And press their culture on retiring snows ; 
 
 But, to firm order trained and patient war, 
 
 They Ukewise know, beyond the nerve remiss 340 
 
 Of mercenary force, how to defend 
 
 The tasteful little their hard toil has earned. 
 
 And the proud arm of Bourbon to defy. 
 
 ' Even, cheered by me, their shaggy mountains 
 charm 
 More than or Gallic or Italian plains ; 
 And -sickening fancy oft, when absent long. 
 Pines to behold their Alpine views again — 
 The hollow-winding stream : the vale, fair-spread 
 Amid an amphitheatre of hiUs, 
 Whence, vapour- winged, the sudden tempest springs ; 
 From steep to steep ascending, the gay train 351 
 Of fogs thick-roUed into romantic shapes ; 
 The flitting cloud, against the summit dashed ; 
 And, by the sun illumined, pouring bright 
 A gemmy shower — hung o'er amazing rocks. 
 The mountain ash, and solemn sounding pine ; 
 The snow-fed torrent, in white mazes tossed 
 Down to the clear ethereal lake below ; 
 And, high o'ertopping aU the broken scene, 
 The mountain fading into sky, where shines 360 
 On winter winter shivering, and whose top 
 Licks from their cloudy magazine the snows. 
 
 ' From these descending, as I waved my course 
 O'er vast Germania, the ferocious nurse 
 Of hardy men, and hearts affronting death, 
 I gave some favoured cities there to lift 
 A nobler brow, and through their swarming streets. 
 
368 LIBERTY 
 
 More busy, wealthy, cheerful, and alive. 
 In each contented face to look my soul. 
 
 ' Thence the loud Baltic passing, black with storm, 
 To wintry Scandinavia's utmost bound — 371 
 
 There I the manly race, the parent hive 
 Of the mixed kingdoms, formed into a state 
 More regularly free. By keener air 
 Their genius purged, and tempered hard by frost, 
 Tempest and toil their nerves, the sons of those 
 Whose only terror was a bloodless death. 
 They, wise and dauntless, still sustain my cause. 
 Yet there I fixed not. Turning to the south, 
 The whispering zephyrs sighed at my delay.' 380 
 
 Here, with the shifted vision, burst my joy : 
 ' O the dear prospect ! majestic view ! 
 See Britain's empire ! lo ! the watery vast 
 Wide-waves, diffusing the cerulean plain. 
 And now, methinks, Uke clouds at distance seen, 
 Emerging white from deeps of ether, dawn 
 My kindred chffs ; whence, wafted in the gale. 
 Ineffable, a secret sweetness breathes. 
 Goddess, forgive ! — My heart, surprised, o'erflows 
 With filial fondness for the land you bless.' 390 
 
 As parents to a child complacent deign 
 Approvance, the celestial Brightness smiled; 
 Then thus — ' As o'er the wave-resounding deep 
 To my near reign, the happy isle, I steered 
 With easy wing — behold ! from surge to surge 
 Stalked the tremendous Genius of the Deep. 
 Around him clouds in mingled tempest hung ; 
 Thick flashing meteors crowned his starry head ; 
 And ready thunder reddened in his hand. 
 Or from it streamed compressed the gloomy cloud. 400 
 Where'er he looked, the trembling waves recoiled. 
 He needs but strike the conscious flood, and shook 
 
?ART IV 369 
 
 From shore to shore, in agitation dire, 
 
 It works his dreadful will. To me his voice 
 
 (Like that hoarse blast that round the cavern howls, 
 
 Mixed with the murmurs of the falling main). 
 
 Addressed, began — " By fate commissioned, go, 
 
 My sister-goddess now, to yon blest isle, 
 
 Henceforth the partner of my rough domain. 
 
 All my dread walks to Britons open lie. 410 
 
 Those that refulgent, or with rosy morn 
 
 Or yellow evening, flame ; those that, profuse 
 
 Drunk by equator suns, severely shine ; 
 
 Or those that, to the poles approaching, rise 
 
 In billows rolling into Alps of ice. 
 
 Even, yet untouched by daring keel, be theirs 
 
 The vast Pacific — that on other worlds. 
 
 Their future conquest, roUs resounding tides. 
 
 Long I maintained inviolate my reign ; 
 
 Nor Alexanders me, nor Caesars braved. 420 
 
 Still in the crook of shore the coward sail 
 
 TiU now low crept ; and peddling commerce plied 
 
 Between near joining lands. Por Britons, chief. 
 
 It was reserved, with star-directed prow. 
 
 To dare the middle deep, and drive assured 
 
 To distant nations through the pathless main. 
 
 Chief, for their fearless hearts the glory waits. 
 
 Long months from land, while the black stormy night 
 
 Around them rages, on the groaning mast 
 
 With unshook knee to know their giddy way ; 430 
 
 To sing, unqueUed, amid the lashing wave ; 
 
 To laugh at danger. Theirs the triumph be. 
 
 By deep invention's keen pervading eye. 
 
 The heart of courage, and the hand of toil, 
 
 Each conquered ocean staining with their blood, 
 
 Instead of treasure robbed by ruffian war, 
 
 Round social earth to circle fair exchange 
 
 THOMSON B b 
 
370 LIBERTY 
 
 And bind the nations in a golden chain. 
 To these I honoured stoop. Rushing to Hght 
 A race of men behold ! whose daring deeds 440 
 
 Will in renown exalt my nameless plains 
 O'er those of fabling earth, as hers to mine 
 In terror yield. Nay, could my savage heart 
 Such glories check, their unsubmitting soul 
 Would all my fury brave, my tempest climb. 
 And might in spite of me my kingdom force." 
 Here, waiting no reply, the shadowy Power 
 Eased the dark sky, and to the deeps returned — 
 While the loud thunder rattling from his hand, 
 Auspicious, shook opponent Gallia's shore. 450 
 
 ' Of this encounter glad, my way to land 
 I quick pursued, that from the smiling sea 
 Received me joyous. Loud acclaims were heard ; 
 And music, more than mortal, warbling, filled 
 With pleased astonishment the labouring hind. 
 Who for a while the unfinished furrow left, 
 And let the listening steer forget his toil. 
 Unseen by grosser eye, Britannia breathed. 
 And her aerial train, these sounds of joy. 
 For of old time, since first the rushing flood, 460 
 Urged by almighty power, this favoured isle 
 Turned flashing from the continent aside. 
 Indented shore to shore responsive still. 
 Its guardian she — the Goddess, whose staid eye 
 Beams the dark azure of the doubtful dawn. 
 Her tresses, like a flood of softened hght 
 Through clouds imbrowned, in waving circles play. 
 Warm on her cheek sits beauty's brightest rose. 
 Of high demeanour, stately, shedding grace 
 With every motion. Full her rising chest ; 470 
 
 And new ideas from her finished shape 
 Charmed Sculpture taking might improve her art. 
 
PART IV 371 
 
 Such the fair guardian of an isle that boasts, 
 Profuse as vernal blooms, the fairest dames. 
 High shining on the promontory's brow, 
 Awaiting me, she stood with hope inflamed. 
 By my mixed spirit burning in her sons, 
 To firm, to polish, and exalt the state. 
 
 ' The native genii round her radiant smiled. 
 Courage, of soft deportment, aspect calm, 480 
 
 Unboastful, suffering long, and, till provoked. 
 As mild and harmless as the sporting child ; 
 But, on just reason, once his fury roused. 
 No lion springs more eager to his prey — 
 Blood is a pastirhe ; and his heart, elate. 
 Knows no depressing fear. That Virtue known 
 By the relenting look, whose equal heart 
 For others feels as for another self — 
 Of various name, as various objects wake. 
 Warm into action, the kind sense within : 490 
 
 Whether the blameless poor, the nobly maimed. 
 The lost to reason, the decUned in life. 
 The helpless young that kiss no mother's hand. 
 And the grey second infancy of age 
 She gives in public families to live, 
 A sight to gladden heaven ! whether she stands 
 Fair-beckonin'g at the hospitable gate, 
 And bids the stranger take repose and joy ; 
 Whether, to solace honest labour, she 
 Rejoices those that make the land rejoice ; 500 
 
 Or whether to philosophy and arts 
 (At once the basis and the finished pride 
 Of government and life) she spreads her hand, 
 Nor knows her gift profuse, nor seems to know. 
 Doubling her bounty, that she gives at all. 
 Justice to these her awful presence joined. 
 The mother of the state ! No low revenge, 
 Bb2 
 
372 LIBERTY 
 
 No turbid passions in her breast ferment : 
 Tender, serene, compassionate of vice. 
 As the last woe that can afflict mankind, S'o 
 
 She punishment awards ; yet of tiic good 
 More piteous still, and of the suffering whole. 
 Awards it firm. So fair her just decrco, 
 That, in his judging peers, each on hims(^lf 
 Pronounces his own doom. happy land ! 
 
 Where reigns alone this justice of the free ! 
 
 Mid the bright group, Sincerity his front, 
 
 Diffusive, reared ; his pure untroubled eye 
 
 The fount of truth. The Thoughtful Power, apart. 
 
 Now pensive cast on earth his fixed regard, 520 
 
 Now, touched celestial, launched it on the sky. 
 
 The genius he whence Britain shines supreme. 
 
 The land of light and rectitude of mind. 
 
 He, too, the firo of fancy feeds intense. 
 
 With all the train of passions thonce derived— 
 
 Not kindling quick, a noisy transient blaze. 
 
 But gradual, silent, lasting, and profound. 
 
 Near him Retirement, pointing to the shade. 
 
 And Independence stood — the generous pair 
 
 That simple life, tho quiet-whispering grove, 530 
 
 And the still raptures of the free-born soul 
 
 To cates prefer by virtue bought, not earned. 
 
 Proudly prefer them to the servile pomp 
 
 And to the heart-enibitterod joys of slaves. 
 
 Or should the latter, to the public Hccno 
 
 Demanded, quit bin silvan friend awhile — 
 
 Nought can his firmness shake, nothing seduce 
 
 His zeal, still active for the commonweal ; 
 
 Nor stormy tyrants, nor corruption's tools, 
 
 Foul ministers, dark-working by llie force 540 
 
 Of secret-sapping gold. All their vile arts. 
 
 Their shameful honours, their perfidious gifts. 
 
PART IV 373 
 
 He greatly scorns ; and, if he must betray 
 
 His plundered country or his power resign, 
 
 A moment's parley were eternal shame : 
 
 lUustricus into private life again. 
 
 From dirty levees he unstained ascends, 
 
 And firm in senates stands the patriot's ground. 
 
 Or draws new vigour in the peaceful shade. 
 
 Aloof the Bashful Virtue hovered coy, 550 
 
 Proving by sweet distrust distrusted worth. 
 
 Rough Labour closed the train : and in his hand 
 
 Rude, callous, sinew-swelled, and black with toil, 
 
 Came manly Indignation. Sour he seems. 
 
 And more than seems, by lawless pride assailed ; 
 
 Yet kind at heart, and just, and generous ; there 
 
 No vengeance lurks, no pale insidious gall ; 
 
 Even in the very luxury of rage, 
 
 He softening can forgive a gallant foe ; 
 
 The nerve, support, and glory of the land ! 560 
 
 Nor be Religion, rational and free, 
 
 Here passed in silence ; whose enraptured eye 
 
 Sees heaven with earth connected, human things 
 
 Linked to divine : who not from servile fear, 
 
 By rites for some weak tyrant incense fit. 
 
 The God of love adores, but from a heart 
 
 Effusing gladness, into pleasing awe 
 
 That now astonished swells, now in a calm 
 
 Of fearless confidence that smiles serene ; 
 
 That lives devotion, one continual hymn, 570 
 
 And then most grateful when heaven's bounty most 
 
 Is right enjoyed. This ever cheerful power 
 
 O'er the raised circle rayed superior day. 
 
 ' I joyed to join the virtues, whence my reign 
 O'er Albion was to rise. Each cheering each. 
 And, like the circling planets from the sun. 
 All borrowing beams from me, a heightened zeal 
 
374 LIBERTY 
 
 Impatient fired us to commence our toils, 
 Or pleasures rather. Long the pungent time 
 Passed not in mutual hails ; but, through the land 
 Darting our light, we shone the fogs away. 581 
 
 ' The virtues conquer with a single look. 
 Such grace, such beauty, such victorious light, 
 Live in their presence, stream in every glance. 
 That the soul won, enamoured, and refined. 
 Grows their own image, pure ethereal flame. 
 Hence the foul demons that oppose our reign 
 Would still from us deluded mortals wrap ; 
 Or in gross shades they drown the visual ray, 
 Or by the fogs of prejudice, where mix 590 
 
 Falsehood and truth confounded, foil the sense 
 With vain refracted images of bliss. 
 But chief around the court of flattered kings 
 They roll the dusky rampart, waU o'er wall 
 Of darkness pile, and with their thickest shade 
 Secure the throne. No savage Alp, the den 
 Of wolves and bears and monstrous things obscene, 
 That vex the swain and waste the country round, 
 Protected lies beneath a deeper cloud : 
 Yet there we sometimes send a searching ray. 600 
 As, at the sacred opening of the morn, 
 The prowling race retire ; so, pierced severe. 
 Before our potent blaze these demons fly. 
 And all their works dissolve — the whispered tale. 
 That, like the fabhng Nile, no fountain knows ; 
 Fair-faced deceit, whose wily conscious eye 
 Ne'er looks direct ; the tongue that hcks the dust. 
 But, when it safely dares, as prompt to sting ; 
 Smooth crocodile destruction, whose fell tears 
 Ensnare ; the Janus-face of courtly pride — 610 
 
 One to superiors heaves submissive eyes, 
 On hapless worth the other scowls disdain ; 
 
PART IV 375 
 
 Cheeks that for some weak tenderness, alone, 
 
 Some virtuous slip, can wear a blush ; the laugh 
 
 Profane, when midnight bowls disclose the heart, 
 
 At starving virtue and at virtue's fools ; 
 
 Determined to be broke, the plighted faith ; 
 
 Nay more, the godless oath, that knows no ties : 
 
 Soft-buzzing slander — silky moths, that eat 
 
 An honest name : the harpy hand and maw 620 
 
 Of avaricious luxury, who makes 
 
 The throne his shelter, venal laws his fort. 
 
 And, by his service, who betrays his king. 
 
 'Now turn your view, and mark from Celtic night 
 To present grandeur how my Britain rose. 
 
 ' Bold were those Britons, who, the careless sons 
 Of nature, roamed the forest-bounds, at once 
 Their verdant city, high-embowering fane, 
 And the gay circle of their woodland wars : 
 For by the Druid taught, that death but shifts 
 The vital scene, they that prime fear despised ; 631 
 And, prone to rush on steel, disdained to spare 
 An ill-saved life that must again return. 
 Erect from nature's hand, by tyrant force 
 And still more tyrant custom unsubdued, 
 Man knows no master save creating heaven. 
 Or such as choice and common good ordain. 
 This general sense, with which the nations I 
 Promiscuous fire, in Britons burned intense, 
 Of future times prophetic. Witness, Rome, 640 
 
 Who saw'st thy Caesar from the naked land. 
 Whose only fort was British hearts, repelled, 
 To seek Pharsalian wreaths. Witness the toil. 
 The blood of ages, bootless to secure 
 Beneath an empire's yoke a stubborn isle. 
 Disputed hard and never quite subdued. 
 
376 LIBERTY 
 
 The north remained untouched, where those who 
 
 scorned 
 To stoop retired ; and, to their keen eSort 
 Yielding at last, recoiled the Roman power. 
 In vain, unable to sustain the shock, 650 
 
 From sea to sea desponding legions raised 
 The wall immense — and yet, on summer's eve, 
 While sport his lambkins round, the shepherd's gaze. 
 Continual o'er it burst the northern storm; 
 As often, checked, receded— threatening hoarse 
 A swift return. But the devouring flood 
 No more endured control, when, to support 
 The last remains of empire, was recalled 
 The weary Roman, and the Briton lay 
 Unnerved, exhausted, spiritless, and sunk. 660 
 
 Great proof ! how men enfeeble into slaves. 
 The sword behind him flashed ; before him roared. 
 Deaf to his woes, the deep. Forlorn, around 
 He rolled his eye — not sparkling ardent flame 
 As when Caractacus to battle led 
 Silurian swains, and Boadicea taught 
 Her raging troops the miseries of slaves. 
 
 ' Then (sad relief !) from the bleak coast that hears 
 The German Ocean roar, deep-blooming, strong. 
 And yellow-haired, the blue-eyed Saxon came. 
 He came implored, but came with other aim 671 
 Than to protect. For conquest and defence 
 Sufiices the same arm. With the fierce race 
 Poured in a fresh invigorating stream, 
 Blood, where unqueUed a mighty spirit glowed. 
 Rash war and perilous battle their delight ; 
 And immature, and red with glorious wounds, 
 Unpeaceful death their choice — deriving thence 
 A right to feast and drain immortal bowls 
 In Odin's hall, whose blazing roof resounds 680 
 
PART IV 377 
 
 The genial uproar of those shades who fall 
 
 In desperate fight or by some brave attempt ; 
 
 And, though more polished times the martial creed 
 
 Disown, yet still the fearless habit lives. 
 
 Nor were the surly gifts of war their aU. 
 
 Wisdom was likewise theirs, indulgent laws, 
 
 The calm gradations of art-nursing peace, 
 
 And matchless orders, the deep basis stiU 
 
 On which ascends my British reign. Untamed 
 
 To the refining subtleties of slaves, 690 
 
 They brought a happy government along ; 
 
 Formed by that freedom which, with secret voice. 
 
 Impartial nature teaches all her sons. 
 
 And which of old through the whole Scythian mass 
 
 I strong inspired. Monarchical their state, 
 
 But prudently confined, and mingled wise 
 
 Of each harmonious power : only, too much, 
 
 Imperious war into their rule infused, 
 
 Prevailed their general-king and chieftain-thanes. 
 
 ' In many a field, by civil fury stained, 700 
 
 Bled the discordant Heptarchy ; and long 
 (Educing good from ill) the battle groaned 
 Ere, blood-cemented, Anglo-Saxons saw 
 Egbert and peace on one united throne. 
 
 ' No sooner dawned the fair disclosing calm 
 Of brighter days, when lo ! the north anew. 
 With stormy nations black, on England poured 
 Woes the severest e'er a people felt. 
 The Danish raven, lured by annual prey, 
 Hung o'er the land incessant. Fleet on fleet 710 
 Of barbarous pirates, unremitting tore 
 The miserable coast. Before them stalked. 
 Par seen, the demon of devouring flame ; 
 Rapine, and murder, all with blood besmeared. 
 Without or ear or eye or feeling heart : 
 
378 LIBERTY 
 
 While close behind them marched the sallow power 
 
 Of desolating famine, who delights 
 
 In grass-grown cities and in desert fields ; 
 
 And purple-spotted pestilence, by whom 
 
 Even friendship scared, in sickening horror sinks 
 
 Each social sense and tenderness of life. 721 
 
 Fixing at last, the sanguinary race 
 
 Spread, from the Humber's loud resounding shore 
 
 To where the Thames devolves his gentle maze, 
 
 And with superior arm the Saxon awed. 
 
 But superstition first, and monkish dreams 
 
 And monk-directed cloister-seeking kings 
 
 Had eat away his vigour, eat away 
 
 His edge of courage, and depressed the soul 
 
 Of conquering freedom which he once respired. 730 
 
 Thus cruel ages passed ; and rare appeared 
 
 White-mantled Peace, exulting o'er the valo ; 
 
 As when, with Alfred, from the wilds she came 
 
 To policed cities and protected plains. 
 
 Thus by degrees the Saxon empire sunk. 
 
 Then set entire in Hastings' bloody field. 
 
 ' Compendious war ! (on Britain's glory bent. 
 So fate ordained) in that decisive day. 
 The haughty Norman seized at once an isle 
 For which through many a century in vain 740 
 
 The Roman, Saxon, Dane had toiled and bled. 
 Of Gothic nations this the final burst ; 
 And, mixed the genius of these people all, 
 Their virtues mixed in one exalted stream, 
 Here the rich tide of English blood grew full. 
 
 ' Awhile my spirit slept ; the land awhile. 
 Affrighted, drooped beneath despotic rage. 
 Instead of Edward's equal gentle laws. 
 The furious victor's partial will prevailed. 
 All prostrate lay i and, in the secret shade, 750 
 
PART IV 379 
 
 Deep-stung but fearful, Indignation gnashed 
 
 His teeth. Of freedom, property, despoiled, 
 
 And of their bulwark, arms ; with castles crushed. 
 
 With ruffians quartered o'er the bridled land — 
 
 The shivering wretches, at the curfew sound, 
 
 Dejected shrunk into their sordid beds. 
 
 And, through the mournful gloom, of ancient times 
 
 Mused sad, or dreamt of better. Even to feed 
 
 A tyrant's idle sport the peasant starved : 
 
 To the wild herd the pasture of the tame, 760 
 
 The cheerful hamlet, spiry town was given. 
 
 And the brown forest roughened wide around. 
 
 ' But this so dead, so vile submission long 
 Endured not. Gathering force, my gradual flame 
 Shook off the mountain of tyrannic sway. 
 Unused to bend, impatient of control, 
 Tyrants themselves the common tyrant checked. 
 The church, by kings intractable and fierce, 
 Denied her portion of the plundered state, 
 Or, tempted by the timorous and weak, 770 
 
 To gain new ground first taught their rapine law. 
 The Barons next a nobler league began. 
 Both those of English and of Norman race, 
 In one fraternal nation blended now, 
 The nation of the free ! Pressed by a band 
 Of Patriots, ardent as the summer's noon 
 That looks delighted on, the tyrant see ! 
 Mark ! how with feigned alacrity he bears 
 His strong reluctance down, his dark revenge. 
 And gives the charter by which life indeed 780 
 
 Becomes of price, a glory to be man. 
 
 ' Through this, and through succeeding reigns 
 affirmed 
 These long-contested rights, the wholesome winds 
 Of opposition hence began to blow; 
 
380 LIBERTY 
 
 And often since have lent the country life. 
 Before their breath corruption's insect-blights. 
 The darkening clouds of evil counsel, fly ; 
 Or, should they sounding swell, a putrid court, 
 A pestilential ministry, they purge. 
 And ventilated states renew their bloom. 79° 
 
 ' Though with the tempered monarchy here mixed 
 Aristocratic sway, the people still. 
 Flattered by this or that, as interest leaned, 
 No full protection knew. For me reserved. 
 And for my commons, was that glorious turn. 
 They crowned my first attempt — in senates rose. 
 The fort of freedom ! Slow till then, alone 
 Had worked that general liberty, that soul 
 Which generous nature breathes, and which, when left 
 By me to bondage was corrupted Rome, 800 
 
 I through the northern nations wide diffused. 
 Hence many a people, fierce with freedom, rushed 
 From the rude iron regions of the north. 
 To Libyan deserts swarm protruding swarm. 
 And poured new spirit through a slavish world. 
 Yet, o'er these Gothic states, the king and chiefs 
 Retained the high prerogative of war. 
 And with enormous property engrossed 
 The mingled power. But on Britannia's shore 
 Now present, I to raise my reign began 810 
 
 By raising the democracy, the third 
 And broadest bulwark of the guarded state. 
 Then was the full the perfect plan disclosed 
 Of Britain's matchless constitution, mixed 
 Of mutual checking and supporting powers. 
 King, lords, and commons ; nor the name of free 
 Deserving, while the vassal-many drooped : 
 For, since the moment of the whole they form. 
 So, as depressed or raised, the balance they 
 
PART IV 381 
 
 Of public weKare and of glory cast. 820 
 
 Mark from this period the continual proof. 
 
 ' When kings of narrow genius, minion-rid, 
 Neglecting faithful worth for fawning slaves ; 
 Proudly regardless of their people's plaints. 
 And poorly passive of insulting foes ; 
 Double, not prudent, obstinate, not firm. 
 Their mercy fear, necessity their faith ; 
 Instead of generous fire, presumptuous, hot. 
 Rash to resolve, and slothful to perform ; 
 Tyrants at once and slaves, imperious, mean, 830 
 To want rapacious joining shameful waste ; 
 By counsels weak and wicked, easy roused 
 To paltry schemes of absolute command, 
 To seek their splendour in their sure disgrace, 
 And in a broken ruined people wealth — 
 When such o'ercast the state, no bond of love, 
 No heart, no soul, no unity, no nerve 
 Combined the loose disjointed public, lost 
 To fame abroad, to happiness at home. 
 
 ' But when an Edward, and a Henry breathed 840 
 Through the charmed whole one all-exerting soul ; 
 Drawn sympathetic from his dark retreat. 
 When wide-attracted merit round them glowed ; 
 When counsels just, extensive, generous, firm. 
 Amid the maze of state, determined kept 
 Some ruling point in view ; when, on the stock 
 Of public good and glory grafted, spread 
 Their palms, their laurels — or, if thence they strayed, 
 Swift to return, and patient of restraint ; 
 When regal state, pre-eminence of place, 850 
 
 They scorned to deem pre-eminence of ease. 
 To be luxurious drones, that only rob 
 The busy hive ; as in distinction, power, 
 
 840 a Henry] an Henry ed. 1738 
 
382 LIBERTY 
 
 Indulgence, honour, and advantage first — 
 When they too claimed in virtue, danger, toil 
 Superior rank, with equal hand prepared 
 To guard the subject and to quell the foe : 
 When such with me their vital influence shed. 
 No muttered grievance, hopeless sigh was heard ; 
 No foul distrust through wary senates ran, 860 
 
 Confined their bounty, and their ardour quenched ; 
 On aid, unquestioned, liberal aid was given ; 
 Safe in their conduct, by their valour fired, 
 Fond where they led victorious armies rushed ; 
 And Cressy, Poitiers, Agincourt proclaim 
 What kings supported by almighty love 
 And people fired with liberty can do. 
 
 ' Be veiled the savage reigns, when kindred rage 
 The numerous once Plantagenets devoured, 
 A race to vengeance vowed ! and when, oppressed 
 By private feuds, almost extinguished lay 871 
 
 My quivering flame. But, in the next, behold ! 
 A cautious tyrant lend it oil anew. 
 
 ' Proud, dark, suspicious, brooding o'er his gold. 
 As how to fix his throne he jealous cast 
 His crafty views around ; pierced with a ray, 
 Which on his timid mind I darted full. 
 He marked the barons of excessive sway, 
 At pleasure making and unmaking kings ; 
 And hence, to crush these petty tyrants, planned 
 A law, that let them, by the silent waste 881 
 
 Of luxury, their landed wealth diffuse. 
 And with that wealth their implicated power. 
 By soft degrees a mighty change ensued, 
 Even working to this day. With streams, deduced 
 From these diminished floods, the country smiled. 
 As, when impetuous from the snow-heaped Alps, 
 To vernal suns relenting, pours the Rhine, 
 
PART IV 383 
 
 While undivided, oft with wasteful sweep 
 He foams along ; but through Batavian meads, 
 Branched into fair canals, indulgent flows, 891 
 
 Waters a thousand fields, and culture, trade. 
 Towns, meadows, gliding ships, and viUas mixed, 
 A rich, a wondrous landscape rises round. 
 
 ' His furious son the soul-enslaving chain, 
 Which many a doting venerable age 
 Had link by link strong twisted round the land. 
 Shook off. No longer could be borne a power, 
 From heaven pretended, to deceive, to void 
 Each solemn tie, to plunder without bounds, 900 
 To curb the generous soul, to fool mankind ; 
 And, wild at last, to plunge into a sea 
 Of blood and horror. The returning Ught, 
 That first through Wickliff streaked the priestly gloom. 
 Now burst in open day. Bared to the blaze. 
 Forth from the haunts of superstition crawled 
 Her motley sons, fantastic figures all ; 
 And, wide dispersed, their useless fetid wealth 
 In graceful labour bloomed, and fruits of peace. 
 
 ' Trade, joined to these, on every sea displayed 
 A daring canvas, poured with every tide 911 
 
 A golden flood. From other worlds were rolled 
 The guilty gUttering stores, whose fatal charms. 
 By the plain Indian happily despised. 
 Yet worked his woe ; and to the blissful groves. 
 Where nature lived herself among her sons, 
 And innocence and joy for ever dwelt, 
 Drew rage unknown to pagan chmes before, 
 The worst the zeal-inflamed barbarian drew. 
 Be no such horrid commerce, Britain, thine ! 920. 
 But want for want with mutual aid supply. 
 
 'The commons thus enriched, and powerful. grown. 
 Against the barons weighed. Eliza then. 
 
384 LIBERTY 
 
 Amid these doubtful motions steady, gave 
 
 The beam to fix. She, hke the secret eye 
 
 That never closes on a guarded world, 
 
 So sought, so marked, so seized the public good 
 
 That, self-supported, without one ally, 
 
 She awed her inward, quelled her circling foes. 
 
 Inspired by me, beneath her sheltering arm, 930 
 
 In spite of raging universal sway 
 
 And raging seas repressed, the Belgic states. 
 
 My bulwark on the continent, arose. 
 
 Matchless in all the spirit of her days ! 
 
 With confidence unbounded, fearless love 
 
 Elate, her fervent people waited gay, 
 
 Cheerful demanded the long threatened fleet. 
 
 And dashed the pride of Spain around their isle. 
 
 Nor ceased the British thunder here to rage : 
 
 The deep, reclaimed, obeyed its awful call ; 940 
 
 In fire and smoke Iberian ports involved. 
 
 The trembling foe even to the centre shook 
 
 Of their new conquered world, and, skulking, stole 
 
 By veering winds their Indian treasure home. 
 
 Meantime, peace, plenty, justice, science, arts. 
 
 With softer laurels crowned her happy reign. 
 
 ' As yet uncircumscribed the regal power. 
 And wild and vague prerogative remained — 
 A wide voracious gulf, where swallowed oft 
 The helpless subject lay. This to reduce 950 
 
 To the just limit was my great effort. 
 
 ' By means that evil seem to narrow man 
 Superior beings work their mystic will : 
 From storm and trouble thus a settled calm, 
 At last, effulgent, o'er Britannia smiled. 
 
 ' The gathering tempest, heaven - commissioned, 
 came. 
 Came in the prince, who, drunk with flattery, dreamt 
 
PART IV 385 
 
 His vain pacific counsels ruled the world ; 
 
 Though scorned abroad, bewildered in a maze 
 
 Of fruitless treaties ; while at home enslaved, 960 
 
 And by a worthless crew insatiate drained. 
 
 He lost his people's confidence and love : 
 
 Irreparable loss ! whence crowns become 
 
 An anxious burden. Years inglorious passed : 
 
 Triumphant Spain the vengeful draught enjoyed — 
 
 Abandoned Frederick pined, and Raleigh bled. 
 
 But nothing that to these internal broils. 
 
 That rancour, he began ; while lawless sway 
 
 He, with his slavish doctors, tried to rear 
 
 On metaphysic, on enchanted ground, 970 
 
 And all the mazy quibbles of the schools : 
 
 As if for one, and sometimes for the worst, 
 
 Heaven had mankind in vengeance only made. 
 
 Vain the pretence ! not so the dire effect. 
 
 The fierce, the foolish discord thence derived. 
 
 That tears the country still, by party rage 
 
 And ministerial clamour kept alive. 
 
 In action weak, and for the wordy war 
 
 Best fitted, faint this prince pursued his claim — 
 
 Content to teach the subject herd, how great, 980 
 
 How sacred he ! how despicable they ! 
 
 ' But his unyielding son these doctrines drank 
 With all a bigot's rage (who never damps 
 By reasoning his fire) ; and what they taught. 
 Warm and tenacious, into practice pushed. 
 Senates, in vain, their kind restraint applied : 
 The more they struggled to support the laws. 
 His justice-dreading ministers the more 
 Drove him beyond their bounds. Tired with the check 
 Of faithful love, and with the flattery pleased 990 
 Of false designing guilt, the fountain he 
 Of pubUc wisdom and of justice shut. 
 
 THOMSON C C 
 
386 LIBERTY 
 
 Wide mourned the land. Straight to the voted aid 
 
 Free, cordial, large, of never-failing source, 
 
 The illegal imposition followed harsh. 
 
 With execration given, or ruthless squeezed 
 
 From an insulted people by a band 
 
 Of the worst ruffians, those of tyrant power. 
 
 Oppression walked at large, and poured abroad 
 
 Her unrelenting train — informers, spies, looo 
 
 Bloodhounds, that sturdy freedom to the grave 
 
 Pursue ; projectors of aggrieving schemes. 
 
 Commerce to load for unprotected seas. 
 
 To sell the starving many to the few, 
 
 And drain a thousand ways the exhausted land. 
 
 Even from that place whence healing peace should 
 
 flow. 
 And gospel truth, inhuman bigots shed 
 Their poison round ; and on the venal bench, 
 Instead of justice, party held the scale, 
 And violence the sword. Afflicted years, loio 
 
 Too patient, felt at last their vengeance full. 
 ' Mid the low murmurs of submissive fear 
 And mingled rage my Hampden raised his voice, 
 And to the laws appealed ; the laws no more 
 In judgement sat, behoved some other ear. 
 When instant from the keen resentive north. 
 By long oppression by religion roused. 
 The guardian army came. Beneath its wing 
 Was called, though meant to furnish hostile aid, 
 The more than Roman senate. There a flame 1020 
 Broke out that cleared, consumed, renewed the land. 
 In deep emotion hurled, nor Greece nor Rome 
 Indignant bursting from a tyrant's chain. 
 While, full of me, each agitated soul 
 Strung every nerve and flamed in every eye. 
 Had e'er beheld such Ught and heat combined ! 
 
PART IV 387 
 
 Such heads and hearts ! such dreadful zeal, led on 
 By calm majestic wisdom, taught its course 
 What nuisance to devour ; such wisdom fired 
 With unabating zeal, and aimed sincere 1030 
 
 To clear the weedy state, restore the laws, 
 And for the future to secure their sway. 
 
 ' This then the purpose of my mildest sons. 
 But man is blind. A nation once inflamed 
 (Chief, should the breath of factious fury blow. 
 With the wild rage of mad enthusiast swelled) 
 Not easy cools again. From breast to breast, 
 From eye to eye, the kindling passions mix 
 In heightened blaze ; and, ever wise and just, 
 High heaven to gracious ends directs the storm. 1040 
 Thus in one conflagration Britain wrapt, 
 And by confusion's lawless sons despoiled. 
 King, lords, and commons, thundering to the ground, 
 Successive, rushed — Lo ! from their ashes rose, 
 Gay-beaming radiant youth, the phoenix State. 
 
 ' The grievous yoke of vassalage, the yoke 
 Of private life, lay by those flames dissolved ; 
 And, from the wasteful, the luxurious king. 
 Was purchased that which taught the young to bend. 
 Stronger restored, the commons taxed the whole, 1050 
 And built on that eternal rock their power. 
 The crown, of its hereditary wealth 
 Despoiled, on senates more dependent grew, 
 And they more frequent, more assured. Yet lived, 
 And in fuU vigour spread, that bitter root. 
 The passive doctrines — by their patrons first 
 Opposed ferocious, when they touch themselves. 
 
 ' This wild delusive cant ; the rash cabal 
 Of hungry courtiers, ravenous for prey ; 
 The bigot, restless in a double chain 1060 
 
 To bind anew the land ; the constant need 
 cc 2 
 
388 LIBERTY 
 
 Of finding faithless means, of shifting forms, 
 And flattering senates to supply his waste ; 
 These tore some moments from the careless prince, 
 And in his breast awaked the kindred plan. 
 By dangerous softness long he mined his way — 
 By subtle arts, dissimulation deep. 
 By sharing what corruption showered profuse. 
 By breathing wide the gay licentious plague. 
 And pleasing manners, fitted to deceive. 1070 
 
 ■ ' At last subsided the delirious joy. 
 On whose high billow, from the saintly reign. 
 The nation drove too far. A pensioned king, 
 Against his country bribed by Gallic gold ; 
 The port pernicious sold, the Soylla since 
 And fell Charybdis of the British seas ; 
 Freedom attacked abroad, with surer blow 
 To cut it off at home ; the saviour-league 
 Of Europe broke ; the progress even advanced 
 Of universal swaj' which to reduce 1080 
 
 Such seas of blood and treasure Britain cost ; 
 The millions, by a generous people given. 
 Or squandered vile, or to corrupt, disgrace. 
 And awe the land with "forces not their own 
 Employed ; the darling church herself betrayed — 
 All these, broad glaring, oped the general eye. 
 And waked my spirit, the resisting soul. 
 
 ' Mild was, at first, and half ashamed the check 
 Of senates, shook from the fantastic dream 
 Of absolute submission, tenets vile ! logo 
 
 Which slaves would blush to own, and which, reduced 
 To practise, always honest nature shock. 
 Not even the mask removed, and the fierce front 
 Of tyranny disclosed ; nor trampled laws ; 
 Nor seized each badge of freedom through the land ; 
 Nor Sidney bleeding for the unpublished page ; 
 
PART IV 389 
 
 Nor on the bench avowed corruption placed, 
 
 And murderous rage itself, in Jefferies' form ; 
 
 Nor endless acts of arbitrary power, 
 
 Cruel, and false, could raise the pubhc arm. iioo 
 
 Distrustful, scattered, of combining chiefs 
 
 Devoid, and dreading blind rapacious war. 
 
 The patient public turns not till impelled 
 
 To the near verge of ruin. Hence I roused 
 
 The bigot king, and hurried fated on 
 
 His measures immature. But chief his zeal. 
 
 Out-flaming Rome herseK, portentous scared 
 
 The troubled nation : Mary's horrid days 
 
 To fancy bleeding rose, and the dire glare 
 
 Of Smithfield lightened in its eyes anew. mo 
 
 Yet silence reigned. Each on another scowled 
 
 Rueful amazement, pressing down his rage — 
 
 As, mustering vengeance, the deep thunder frowns. 
 
 Awfully still, waiting the high command 
 
 To spring. Straight from his country, Europe, saved 
 
 To save Britannia, lo ! my darling son. 
 
 Than hero more ! the patriot of mankind ! 
 
 Immortal Nassau came. I hushed the deep 
 
 By demons roused, and bade the listed winds, 
 
 StiU shifting as behoved, with various breath 1120 
 
 Waft the deliverer to the longing shore. 
 
 See, wide alive, the foaming channel bright 
 
 With swelling sails and aU the pride of war ! 
 
 Delightful view when justice draws the sword ! 
 
 And mark, diffusing ardent soul around 
 
 And sweet contempt of death, my streaming flag ! 
 
 Even adverse navies blessed the binding gale. 
 
 Kept down the glad acclaim, and silent joyed. 
 
 Arrived, the pomp and not the waste of arms 
 
 His progress marked. The faint opposing host 113c 
 
 For once, in yielding their best victory found, 
 
390 LIBERTY 
 
 And by desertion proved exalted faith : 
 While his the bloodless conquest of the heart, 
 Shouts without groan, and triumph without war. 
 
 ' Then dawned the period destined to confine 
 The surge of wild prerogative, to raise 
 A mound restraining its imperious rage, 
 And bid the raving deep no farther flow. 
 Nor were, without that fence, the swallowed state 
 Better than Belgian plains without their dykes, 
 Sustaining weighty seas. This, often saved 1141 
 
 By more than human hand, the public saw, 
 And seized the white-winged moment. Pleased to 
 
 yield 
 Destructive power, a wise heroic prince 
 Even lent his aid. Thrice happy ! did they know 
 Their happiness, Britannia's bounded kings. 
 What though not theirs the boast in dungeon glooms 
 To plunge bold freedom ; or to cheerless wilds 
 To drive him from the cordial face of friend ; 
 Or fierce to strike him at the midnight hour 1150 
 By mandate blind — not justice, that dehghts 
 To dare the keenest eye of open day ? 
 What though no glory to control the laws 
 And make injurious will their only rule 
 They deem it ? What though, tools of wanton power. 
 Pestiferous armies swarm not at their call ? 
 What though they give not a relentless crew 
 Of civil furies, proud oppression's fangs ! 
 To tear at pleasure the dejected land. 
 With starving labour pampering idle waste ? 1160 
 To clothe the naked, feed the hungry, wipe 
 The guiltless tear from lone affliction's eye, 
 To raise hid merit, set the alluring hght 
 Of virtue high to view, to nourish arts. 
 Direct the thunder of an injured state, 
 
PART IV 391 
 
 Make a whole glorious people sing for joy, 
 
 Bless humankind, and through the downward depth 
 
 Of future times to spread that better sun 
 
 Which lights up British soul — ^for deeds like these, 
 
 The dazzling fair career unbounded lies ; 1170 
 
 While (still superior bliss !) the dark abrupt 
 
 Is kindly barred, the precipice of iU. 
 
 luxury divine ! poor to this. 
 
 Ye giddy glories of despotic thrones ! 
 
 By this, by this indeed, is imaged heaven, 
 
 By boundless good without the power of ill. 
 
 ' And now behold ! exalted as the cope 
 That swells immense o'er many-peopled earth. 
 And Uke it free, my fabric stands complete, 
 The palace of the laws. To the four heavens 1180 
 Four gates impartial thrown, unceasing crowds, 
 With kings themselves the hearty peasant mixed. 
 Pour urgent in. And though to different ranks 
 Responsive place belongs, yet equal spreads 
 The sheltering roof o'er all ; while plenty flows. 
 And glad contentment echoes round the whole. 
 Ye floods, descend ! Ye winds, confirming, blow ! 
 Nor outward tempest, nor corrosive time. 
 Nought but the felon undermining hand 
 Of dark corruption, can its frame dissolve, 1190 
 
 And lay the toil of ages in the dust.' 
 
392 LIBERTY 
 
 THE CONTENTS OF PART V 
 
 The author addresses the Goddess of Liberty, marking the happi- 
 ness and grandeur of Great Britain, as arising from her influence, 
 to verse 87. She resumes her discourse, and points out the chief 
 Virtues which are necessary to maintain her establishment there, 
 to verse 373. Recommends, as its last ornament and finishing. 
 Sciences, Fine Arts, and Public works ; the encouragement of 
 these urged from the example of France, though under a despotic 
 government, to verse 548. The whole concludes with a prospect 
 of future times, given by the Goddess of Liberty : this described 
 by the author as it passes in vision before him. 
 
 PART V. THE PROSPECT 
 
 [Published, 1736.] 
 
 Herb interposing, as the Goddess paused ; — 
 
 ' blest Britannia ! in thy presence blest, 
 
 Thou guardian of mankind ! whence spring alone 
 
 All human grandeur, happiness, and fame ; 
 
 For toil, by thee protected, feels no pain, 
 
 The poor man's lot with milk and honey flows, 
 
 And, gilded with thy rays, even death looks gay. 
 
 Let other lands the potent blessings boast 
 
 Of more exalting suns. Let Asia's woods, 
 
 Untended, yield the vegetable fleece : r 
 
 And let the httle insect-artist form, 
 
 On higher life intent, its silken tomb. 
 
 Let wondering rocks, in radiant birth, disclose 
 
 The various tinctured children of the sun. 
 
 From the prone beam let more dehcious fruits 
 
 A flavour drink that in one piercing taste 
 
 Bids each combine. Let Gallic vineyards burst 
 
 With floods of joy ; with mild balsamic juice 
 
PART V 393 
 
 The Tuscan olive. Let Arabia breathe 
 
 Her spicy gales, her vital gums distil. 20 
 
 Turbid with gold, let southern rivers flow, 
 
 And orient floods draw soft, o'er pearls, their maze. 
 
 Let Afric vaunt her treasures ; let Peru 
 
 Deep in her bowels her own ruin breed, 
 
 The yellow traitor that her bliss betraj-ed— 
 
 Unequalled bhss ! — and to unequalled rage ! 
 
 Yet nor the gorgeous east, nor golden south, 
 
 Nor, in full prime, that new discovered world 
 
 Where flames the falling day, in wealth and praise 
 
 Shall with Britannia vie while, Goddess, she 30 
 
 Derives her praise from thee, her matchless charms. 
 
 Her hearty fruits the hand of freedom own ; 
 
 And warm with culture, her thick clustering fieldSi 
 
 Prolific teem. Eternal verdure crowns 
 
 Her meads ; her gardens smile eternal spring. 
 
 She gives the hunter-horse, unquelled by toil. 
 
 Ardent to rush into the rapid chase ; 
 
 She, whitening o'er her downs, diffusive pours 
 
 Unnumbered flocks ; she weaves the fleecy robe. 
 
 That wraps the nations ; she to lusty droves 40 
 
 The richest pasture spreads ; and, hers, deep-wave 
 
 Autumnal seas of pleasing plenty round. 
 
 These her dehghts — and by no baneful herb, 
 
 No darting tiger, no grim lion's glare. 
 
 No fierce-descending wolf, no serpent rolled 
 
 In spires immense progressive o'er the land 
 
 Disturbed. EnUvening these, add cities fuU 
 
 Of wealth, of trade, of cheerful toiling crowds ; 
 
 Add thriving towns ; add villages and farms, 
 
 Innumerous sowed along the Uvely vale, 50 
 
 Where bold unrivalled peasants happy dwell ; 
 
 Add ancient seats, with venerable oaks 
 
 Embosomed high, while kindred floods below 
 
394 LIBERTY 
 
 Wind through the mead ; and those of modern hand 
 
 More pompous add, that splendid shine afar. 
 
 Need I her hmpid lakes, her rivers name. 
 
 Where swarm the finny race ? Thee, chief, Thames ! 
 
 On whose each tide, glad with returning sails. 
 
 Flows in the mingled harvest of mankind ? 
 
 And thee, thou Severn, whose prodigious swell 60 
 
 And waves resounding imitate the main ? 
 
 Why need I riame her deep capacious ports, 
 
 That point around the world ? and why her seas ? 
 
 All ocean is her own, and every land 
 
 To whom her ruling-thunder ocean bears. 
 
 She too the mineral feeds — the obedient lead ; 
 
 The warlike iron, nor the peaceful less, 
 
 Forming of life art-civilized the bond ; 
 
 And that the Tyrian merchant sought of old. 
 
 Not dreaming then of Britain's brighter fame. 70 
 
 She rears to freedom an undaunted race : 
 
 Compatriot zealous, hospitable, kind, 
 
 Hers the warm Cambrian ; hers the lofty Scot, 
 
 To hardship tamed, active in arts and arms, 
 
 Fired with a restless, an impatient flame. 
 
 That leads him raptured where ambition calls ; 
 
 And English merit hers — where meet combined 
 
 Whate'er high fancy, sound judicious thought. 
 
 An ample generous heart, undrooping soul. 
 
 And firm tenacious valour can bestow. 80 
 
 Great nurse of fruits, of flocks, of commerce, she ! 
 
 Great nurse of men ! by thee, Goddess, taught. 
 
 Her old renown I trace, disclose her source 
 
 Of wealth, of grandeur, and to Britons sing 
 
 A strain the muses never touched before. 
 
 ' But how shall this thy mighty kingdom stand ? 
 On what unyielding base ? how finished shine ? ' 
 
 At this her eye, collecting all its fire. 
 
PART V 395 
 
 Beamed more than human ; and her awful voice 
 Majestic thus she raised : ' To Britons bear 90 
 
 This closing strain, and with intenser note 
 Loud let it sound in their awakened ear : — 
 
 ' On virtue can alone my kingdom stand, 
 On public virtue, every virtue joined. 
 For, lost this social cement of mankind, 
 Tho greatest empires by scarce-felt degrees 
 Will moulder soft away, till, tottering loose, 
 They prone at last to total ruin rush. 
 Unblessed by virtue, government a league 
 Becomes, a circling junto of the great, 100 
 
 To rob by law ; religion mild, a yoke 
 To tame the stooping soul, a trick of state 
 To mask their rapine, and to share the prey. 
 What are without it senates, save a face 
 Of consultation deep and reason free, 
 While the determined voice and heart are sold ? 
 What boasted freedom, save a sounding name ? 
 And what election, but a market vile 
 Of slaves self -bartered ? Virtue ! without thee, 
 There is no ruling eye, no nerve, in states ; no 
 
 War has no vigour, and no safety peace : 
 Even justice warps to party, laws oppress. 
 Wide through the land their weak protection fails. 
 First broke the balance, and then scorned the sword. 
 Thus nations sink, society dissolves ; 
 Rapine and guile and violence break loose, 
 Everting life, and turning love to gaU ; 
 Man hates the face of man, and Indian woods 
 And Libya's hissing sands to him are tame. 
 
 ' By those three virtues be the frame sustained 120 
 Of British freedom — independent life ; 
 Integrity in office ; and, o'er aU 
 Supreme, a passion for the commonweal. 
 
396 LIBERTY 
 
 ' Hail ! independence, hail ! heaven's next best gift 
 To that of Ufe and an immortal soul ! 
 The hfe of life ! that to the banquet high 
 And sober meal gives taste ; to the bowed roof 
 Fair-dreamed repose, and to the cottage charms. 
 Of pubUc freedom, hail, thou secret source ! 
 Whose streams, from every quarter confluent, form 130 
 My better Nile, that nurses human hfe. 
 By rills from thee deduced, irriguous, fed. 
 The private field looks gay, with nature's wealth 
 Abundant flows, and blooms with each dehght 
 That nature craves. Its happy master there, 
 The only freeman, walks his pleasing round — 
 Sweet-featured peace attending ; fearless truth ; 
 Firm resolution ; goodness, blessing all 
 That can rejoice ; contentment, surest friend ; 
 And, stiU fresh stores from nature's book derived. 
 Philosophy, companion ever new. 141 
 
 These cheer his rural, and sustain or fire. 
 When into action called, his busy hours. 
 Meantime true- judging moderate desires. 
 Economy and taste, combined, direct 
 His clear affairs, and from debauching fiends 
 Secure his little kingdom. Nor can those 
 Whom fortune heaps, without these virtues, reach 
 That truce with pain, that animated ease. 
 That self-enjoyment springing from within, 150 
 
 That independence, active or retired. 
 Which tnake the soundest bUss of man below : 
 But, lost beneath the rubbish of their means. 
 And drained by wants to nature all unknown, 
 A wandering, tasteless, gaily wretched train. 
 Though rich, are beggars, and though noble, slaves. 
 
 ' Lo ! damned to wealth, at what a gross expense 
 They purchase disappointment, pain, and shame. 
 
PART V 397 
 
 Instead of hearty hospitable cheer, 
 
 See how the hall with brutal riot flows ; i6o 
 
 While, in the foaming flood fermenting steeped. 
 
 The country maddens into party rage. 
 
 Mark those disgraceful piles of wood and stone ; 
 
 Those parks andgardens, where, his hauntsbetrimmed, 
 
 And nature by presumptuous art oppressed, 
 
 The woodland genius mourns. See the full board 
 
 That steams disgust, and bowls that give no joy ! 
 
 No truth invited there to feed the mind, 
 
 Nor wit the wine-rejoicing reason quaffs. 
 
 Hark how the dome with insolence resounds! 170 
 
 With those retained by vanity to scare 
 
 Repose and friends. To tyrant fashion, mark 
 
 The costly worship paid, to the broad gaze 
 
 Of fools ! From still delusive day to day, 
 
 Led an eternal round of lying hope. 
 
 See, seK-abandoned, how they roam adrift 
 
 Dashed o'er the town, a miserable wreck ! 
 
 Then to adore some warbUng eunuch turned. 
 
 With Midas' ears they crowd ; or to the buzz 
 
 Of masquerade unblushing ; or, to show 180 
 
 Their scorn of nature, at the tragic scene 
 
 They mirthful sit, or prove the comic true. 
 
 But, chief, behold around the rattling board. 
 
 The civil robbers ranged ! and even the fair. 
 
 The tender fair, each sweetness laid aside. 
 
 As fierce for plunder as aU-hcensed troops 
 
 In some sacked city. Thus dissolved their wealth, 
 
 Without one generous luxury dissolved, 
 
 Or quartered on it many a needless want. 
 
 At the thronged levee bends the venal tribe ; igc 
 
 With fair but faithless smiles each varnished o'er, 
 
 Each smooth as those that mutually deceive. 
 
 And for their falsehood each despising each ; 
 
398 LIBERTY 
 
 Till, shook their patron by the wintry winds, 
 
 Wide flies the withered shower, and leaves him bare. 
 
 far superior Afric's sable sons 
 
 By merchant pilfered to these wiUing slaves ! 
 
 And rich as unsqueezed favourite to them 
 
 Is he who can his virtue boast alone ! 
 
 ' Britons ! be firm ; nor let corruption sly 200 
 Twine round your heart indissoluble chains. 
 The steel of Brutus burst the grosser bonds 
 By Caesar cast o'er Rome ; but stiU remained 
 The soft enchanting fetters of the mind, 
 And other Caesars rose. Determined, hold 
 Your independence ; for, that once destroyed. 
 Unfounded, freedom is a morning dream 
 That flits aerial from the spreading eye. 
 
 ' Forbid it. Heaven ! that ever I need urge 
 Integrity in office on my sons ; 210 
 
 Inculcate common honour — not to rob ; 
 And whom ? the gracious, the confiding hand. 
 That lavishly rewards ; the toiling poor, 
 Whose cup with many a bitter drop is mixed. 
 The guardan public, every face they see, 
 And every friend, — nay, in effect themselves. 
 As in famihar life the villain's fate 
 Admits no cure ; so, when a desperate age 
 At this arrives, I the devoted race 
 Indignant spurn, and hopeless soar away. 220 
 
 ' But, ah, too little known to modern times ! 
 Be not the noblest passion passed unsung, 
 That ray pecuhar, from unbounded love 
 Effused, which kindles the heroic soul — 
 Devotion to the public. Glorious flame ! 
 Celestial ardour ! in what unknown worlds, 
 Profusely scattered through the blue immense. 
 Hast thou been blessing myriads, since in Rome, 
 
PART V 399 
 
 Old virtuous Rome, so many deathless names 
 From thee their lustre drew ? since, taught by thee. 
 Their poverty put splendour to the blush, 231 
 
 Pain grew luxurious, and even death delight ? 
 wilt thou ne'er, in thy long period, look, 
 With blaze direct, on this my last retreat ? 
 
 ' 'Tis not enough, from self right-understood 
 Reflected, that thy rays inflame the heart : 
 Though virtue not disdains appeals to self. 
 Dreads not the trial ; all her joys are true. 
 Nor is there any real joy save hers. 
 Far less the tepid, the declaiming race, 240 
 
 Foes to corruption, to its wages friends. 
 Or those whom private passions, for a while. 
 Beneath my standard list, can they suffice 
 To raise and fix the glory of my reign ! 
 
 ' An active flood of universal love 
 Must swell the breast. First, in effusion wide, 
 The restless spirit roves creation round. 
 And seizes every being ; stronger then 
 It tends to life, whate'er the kindred search 
 Of bliss allies ; then, more collected still, 250 
 
 It urges human kind ; a passion grown. 
 At last the central parent public calls 
 Its utmost effort forth, awakes each sense, 
 The comely, grand, and tender. Without this, 
 This awful pant, shook from sublimer powers 
 Than those of seM, this heaven-infused delight. 
 This moral gravitation, rushing prone 
 To press the public good, my system soon, 
 Traverse, to several selfish centres drawn, 
 WiU reel to ruin — while for ever shut 260 
 
 Stand the bright portals of desponding fame. 
 
 ' From sordid seM shoot up no shining deeds. 
 None of those ancient Ughts that gladden earth, 
 
400 LIBERTY 
 
 Give grace to being, and arouse the brave 
 
 To just ambition, virtue's quickening fire ! 
 
 Life tedious grows, an idly bustling round, 
 
 Filled up with actions animal and mean, 
 
 A dull gazette ! The impatient reader scorns 
 
 The poor historic page ; till kindly comes 
 
 Oblivion, and redeems a people's shame. 270 
 
 Not so the times when, emulation-stung, 
 
 Greece shone in genius, science, and in arts, 
 
 And Rome in virtues dreadful to be told ! 
 
 To live was glory then ! and charmed mankind. 
 
 Through the deep periods of devolving time. 
 
 Those, raptured, copy ; these, astonished, read. 
 
 ' True, a corrupted state, with every vice 
 And every meanness foul, this passion damps. 
 Who can unshocked behold the cruel eye ? 
 The pale inveigling smile ? the ruffian front ? 280 
 The wretch abandoned to relentless self. 
 Equally vile if miser or profuse ? 
 Powers not of God, assiduous to corrupt ? 
 The fell deputed tyrant, who devours 
 The poor and weak, at distance from redress ? 
 Dehrious faction bellowing loud my name ? 
 The false fair-seeming patriot's hoUow boast ? 
 A race resolved on bondage, fierce for chains, 
 My sacred rights a merchandise alone 
 Esteeming, and to work their feeder's will 290 
 
 By deeds, a. horror to mankind, prepared. 
 As were the d",?gs of Romulus of old ? 
 Who these indeed can undetesting see ? — 
 But who unpitying ? to the generous eye 
 Distress is virtue ; and, though seU-betrayed, 
 A people struggling with their fate must rouse 
 The hero's throb. Nor can a land at once 
 Be lost to virtue quite. How glorious then ! 
 
PART V 401 
 
 Tit luxury for gods ! to save the good, 
 Protect the feeble, dash bold vice aside, 300 
 
 Depress the wicked, and restore the frail. 
 Posterity, besides — the young are pure. 
 And sons may tinge their father's cheek with shame. 
 ' Should then the times arrive(which Heaven avert!) 
 That Britons bend unnerved, not by the force 
 Of arms, more generous and more manly, quelled. 
 But by corruption's soul-dejecting arts. 
 Arts impudent and gross ! by their own gold. 
 In part bestowed to bribe them to give all ; 
 With party raging, or immersed in sloth, 310 
 
 Should they Britannia's well fought laurels yield 
 To slily conquering Gaul, even from her brow 
 Let her own naval oak be basely torn 
 By such as tremble at the stiffening gale. 
 And nerveless sink while others sing rejoiced; 
 Or (darker prospect ! scarce one gleam behind 
 Disclosing) should the broad corruptive plague 
 Breathe from the city to the farthest hut 
 That sits serene within the forest shade. 
 The fevered people fire, inflame their wants 320 
 
 And their luxurious thirst, so gathering rage 
 That, were a buyer found, they stand prepared 
 To seU their birthright for a coohng draught; 
 Should shameless pens for plain corruption plead. 
 The hired assassins of the commonweal ! 
 Deemed the declaiming rant of Greece and Rome; 
 Should public virtue grow the public scoff, 
 TiU private, failing, staggers through the land — 
 Till round the city loose mechanic want, 
 Dire-prowhng nightly, makes the cheerful haunts 
 Of men more hideous than Numidian wilds, 331 
 
 Nor from, its fury sleeps the vale in peace. 
 And murders, horrors, perjuries abound— 
 
 THOMSO»r D d 
 
402 LIBERTY 
 
 Nay, till to lowest deeds the highest stoop, 
 
 The rich, like starving wretches, thirst for gold. 
 
 And those on whom the vernal showers of heaven 
 
 All-bounteous fall and that prime lot bestow, 
 
 A power to hve to nature and themselves, 
 
 In sick attendance wear their anxious days 
 
 With fortune joyless, and with honours mean: 340 
 
 Meantime, perhaps, profusion flows around. 
 
 The waste of war without the works of peace, 
 
 No mark of millions in the guH absorbed 
 
 Of uncreating vice, none but the rage 
 
 Of roused corruption still demanding more: 
 
 That very portion which (by faithful skill 
 
 Employed) might make the smiUng public rear 
 
 Her ornamented head, drilled through the hands 
 
 Of mercenary tools, serves but to nurse 
 
 A locust band within, and in the bud 350 
 
 Leaves starved each work of dignity and use : 
 
 ' I paint the worst ; but should these times arrive, 
 If any nobler passion yet remain. 
 Let all my sons aU parties fling aside. 
 Despise their nonsense, and together join ; 
 Let worth and virtue scorning low despair, 
 Exerted full, from every quarter shine 
 Commixed in heightened blaze. Light flashed to Ught, 
 Moral or inteUectual, more intense 
 By giving glows — as, on pure winter's eve, 360 
 
 Gradual the stars effulge ; fainter, at first, 
 They straggling rise, but, when the radiant host. 
 In thick profusion poured, shine out immense. 
 Each casting vivid influence on each. 
 From pole to pole a glittering deluge plays 
 And worlds above rejoice and men below. 
 
 ' But why to Britons this superfluous strain ?■ — 
 360 pure] poor (a misprint) ed. 1738. 
 
PART V 403 
 
 Good nature, honest truth even somewhat blunt, 
 
 Of crooked baseness an indignant scorn, 
 
 A zeal unyielding in their country's cause, 370 
 
 And ready bounty, wont to dwell with them : 
 
 Nor only wont — wide o'er the land diffused, 
 
 In many a blest retirement still they dwell. 
 
 ' To softer prospect turn we now the view, 
 To laurelled science, arts, and public works, 
 That lend my finished fabric comely pride, 
 Grandeur and grace. Of sullen genius he ! 
 Cursed by the muses ! by the graces loathed ! 
 Who deems beneath the public's high regard 
 These last enlivening touches of my reign. 380 
 
 However puffed with power and gorged with wealth 
 A nation be ; let trade enormous rise. 
 Let East and South their mingled treasure pour 
 Till, swelled impetuous, the corrupting flood 
 Burst o'er the city and devour the land — 
 Yet, these neglected, these recording arts. 
 Wealth rots, a nuisance ; and, obUvious sunk, 
 That nation must another Carthage lie. 
 If not by them, on monumental brass. 
 On sculptured marble, on the deathless page 390 
 Impressed, renown had left no trace behind : 
 In vain, to future times, the sage had thought. 
 The legislator planned, the hero found 
 A beauteous death, the patriot toUed in vain. 
 The awarders they of fame's immortal wreath! 
 They rouse ambition, they the mind exalt. 
 Give great ideas, lovely forms infuse. 
 Delight the general eye, and, dressed by them, 
 The moral Venus glows with double charms. 
 
 ' Science, my close associate, stiU attends 400 
 
 Where'er I go. Sometimes, in simple guise. 
 She walks the furrow with the consul-swain. 
 Dd2 
 
404 LIBERTY 
 
 Whispering unlettered wisdom to the heart 
 
 Direct ; or sometimes, in the pompous robe 
 
 Of fancy dressed, she charms Athenian wits, 
 
 And a whole sapient city round her burns. 
 
 Then o'er her brow Minerva's terrors nod : 
 
 With Xenophon, sometimes, in dire extremes 
 
 She breathes dehberate soul, and makes retreat 
 
 Unequalled glory : with the Theban sage, 410 
 
 Epaminondas, first and best of men ! 
 
 Sometimes she bids the deep-embattled host. 
 
 Above the vulgar reach resistless formed, 
 
 March to sure conquest — never gained before ! 
 
 Nor on the treacherous seas of giddy state 
 
 UnskiKul she : when the triumphant tide 
 
 Of high-swoln empire wears one boundless smile. 
 
 And the gale tempts to new pursuits of fame. 
 
 Sometimes, with Scipio, she collects her sail, 
 
 And seeks the blissful shore of rural ease 420 
 
 Where, but the Aonian maids, no sirens sing ; 
 
 Or, should the deep-brewed tempest muttering rise. 
 
 While rocks and shoals perfidious lurk around. 
 
 With Tully she her wide-reviving light 
 
 To senates holds, a Catiline confounds, 
 
 And saves awhile from Caesar sinking Rome. 
 
 Such the kind power whose piercing eye dissolves 
 
 Each mental fetter and sets reason free ; 
 
 For me inspiring an enlightened zeal. 
 
 The more tenacious as the more convinced 430 
 
 How happy freemen, and how wretched slaves. 
 
 To Britons not unknown, to Britons full 
 
 The Goddess spreads her stores, the secret soul 
 
 That quickens trade, the breath unseen that wafts 
 
 To them the treasures of a balanced world. 
 
 But finer arts (save what the muse has sung 
 
 In daring flight, above aU modern wing) 
 
PART V 405 
 
 Neglected droop the head ; and public works, 
 
 Broke by corruption into private gain, 
 
 Not ornament, disgrace — not serve, destroy. 440 
 
 ' Shall Britons, by their own joint wisdom ruled 
 Beneath one royal head, whose vital power 
 Connects, enlivens, and exerts the whole ; 
 In finer arts, and public works, shall they 
 To Gallia yield ? yield to a land that bends. 
 Depressed and broke, beneath the will of one ? 
 Of one who, should the unkingly thirst of gold, 
 Or tyrant passions, or ambition prompt, 
 CaUs locust-armies o'er the blasted land, 
 Drains from its thirsty bounds the springs of wealth 
 His own insatiate reservoir to fiU, 451 
 
 To the lone desert patriot-merit frowns. 
 Or into dungeons arts, when they, their chains 
 Indignant bursting, for their nobler works 
 All other licence scorn but truth's and mine. 
 Oh shame to think ! shall Britons, in the field 
 Unconquered still, the better laurel lose ? 
 Even in that monarch's reign who vainly dreamt, 
 By giddy power betrayed and flattered pride, 
 To grasp unbounded sway ; while, swarming round, 
 His armies dared aU Europe to the field ; 461 
 
 To hostile hands while treasure flowed profuse. 
 And, that great source of treasure, subjects' blood. 
 Inhuman squandered, sickened every land ; 
 Prom Britain, chief, while my superior sons. 
 In vengeance rushing, dashed his idle hopes. 
 And bade his agonizing heart be low : 
 Even then, as in the golden calm of peace. 
 What public works, at home, what arts arose ! 
 What various science shone ! what genius glowed ! 
 
 ' 'Tis not for me to paint, diffusive shot 471 
 
 O'er fair extents of land, the shining road ; 
 
406 LIBERTY 
 
 The flood-compelling arch ; the long canal, 
 
 Through mountains piercing and uniting seas ; 
 
 The dome resounding sweet with infant joy^ 
 
 From famine saved, or cruel-handed shame ; 
 
 And that where valour counts his noble scars ; 
 
 The land where social pleasure loves to dwell. 
 
 Of the fierce demon, Gothic duel, freed ; 
 
 The robber from his farthest forest chased ; 480 
 
 The turbid city cleared and by degrees 
 
 Into sure peace, the best police, refined. 
 
 Magnificence, and grace, and decent joy. 
 
 Let Gallic bards record how honoured arts 
 
 And science, by despotic bounty blessed, 
 
 At distance flourished from my parent-eye ; 
 
 Restoring ancient taste how Boileau rose ; 
 
 How the big Roman soul shook in Corneille 
 
 The trembling stage; in elegant Racine 
 
 How the more powerful though more humble voice 
 
 Of nature-painting Greece resistless breathed 491 
 
 The whole awakened heart; how Moliere's scene, 
 
 Chastised and regular, with well judged wit, 
 
 Not scattered wild, and native humour graced. 
 
 Was life itself ; to public honours raised, 
 
 How learning in warm seminaries spread. 
 
 And, more for glory than the small reward. 
 
 How emulation strove ; how their pure tongue 
 
 Almost obtained what was denied their arms; 
 
 From Rome, awhile, how painting, courted long, 500 
 
 With Poussin came — ancient design, that lifts 
 
 A fairer front and looks another soul ; 
 
 How the kind art, that, of unvalued price, 
 
 The famed and only picture easy gives. 
 
 Refined her touch, and through the shadowed piece 
 
 All the live spirit of the painter poured; 
 
 Coyest of arts, how sculpture northward deigned 
 
PART V 407 
 
 A look, and bade ner Girardon arise ; 
 
 How lavish grandeur blazed, the barren waste 
 
 Astonished saw the sudden palace swell, 510 
 
 And fountains spout amid its arid shades ; 
 
 For leagues, bright vistas opening to the view, 
 
 How forests in majestic gardens smiled ; 
 
 How menial arts, by their gay sisters taught. 
 
 Wove the deep flower, the blooming foliage trained 
 
 In joyous figures o'er the silky lawn. 
 
 The palace cheered, illumed the storied wall, 
 
 And with the pencil vied the glowing loom. 
 
 ' These laurels, Louis, by the droppings raised 
 Of thy profusion, its dishonour shade, 520 
 
 And green through future times shall bind thy brow ; 
 While the vain honours of perfidious war 
 Wither, abhorred or in obUvion lost. 
 With what prevailing vigour had they shot, 
 And stole a deeper root, by the full tide 
 Of war-sunk millions fed ? Superior still. 
 How had they branched luxuriant to the skies 
 In Britain planted, by the potent juice 
 Of freedom swelled ? Forced is the bloom of arts, 
 A false uncertain spring, when bounty gives, 530 
 Weak, without me, a transitory gleam. 
 Fair shine the slippery days, enticing skies 
 Of favour smile, and courtly breezes blow ; 
 TiU arts, betrayed, trust to the flattering air 
 Their tender blossom : then malignant rise 
 The blights of envy, of those insect clouds. 
 That, blasting merit, often cover courts. 
 Nay, should, perchance, some kind Maecenas aid 
 The doubtful beamings of his prince's soul, 
 His wavering ardour fix, and unconfined 540 
 
 Diffuse his warm beneficence around ; 
 Yet death, at last, and wintry tyrants come. 
 
408 LIBERTY 
 
 Each sprig of genius killing at the root. 
 But, when with me imperial bounty joins, 
 Wide o'er the public blows eternal spring ; 
 While mingled autumn every harvest pours 
 Of every land, whate'er invention, art, 
 Creating toil, and nature can produce.' 
 
 Here ceased the Goddess ; and her ardent wings, 
 Dipped in the colours of the heavenly bow, 550 
 
 Stood waving radiance round, for sudden flight 
 Prepared, when thus impatient burst my prayer : 
 
 ' O forming light of life ! better sun ! 
 Sun of mankind ! by whom the cloudy north. 
 Sublimed, not envies Languedocian skies 
 That, unstained ether aU, diffusive smile — • 
 When shall we call these ancient laurels ours ? 
 Andwhen thy work complete ?' Straight withher band. 
 Celestial red, she touched my darkened eyes. 
 As at the touch of day the shades dissolve, 560 
 
 So quick, methought, the misty circle cleared 
 That dims the dawn of being here below ; 
 The future shone disclosed, and, in long view, 
 Bright rising eras instant rushed to hght. 
 
 ' They come ! great Goddess ! I the times behold ! 
 The times our fathers in the bloody field 
 Have earned so dear, and, not with less renown. 
 In the warm struggles of the senate-fight. 
 The times I see whose glory to supply, 
 Eor toihng ages, commerce round the world 570 
 Has winged unnumbered sails and from each land 
 Materials heaped that, well employed, with Rome 
 Might vie our grandeur, and with Greece our art! 
 
 ' Lo ! princes I behold ! contriving stiU, 
 And still conducting firm some brave design ; 
 Kings ! that the narrow joyless circle scorn, 
 
PART V 409 
 
 Burst the blockade of false designing men, 
 
 Of treacherous smiles, of adulation fell. 
 
 And of the bUnding clouds around them thrown : 
 
 Their court rejoicing milUons ; worth, alone, 580 
 
 And virtue dear to them ; their best deUght, 
 
 In just proportion, to give general joy ; 
 
 Their jealous care thy kingdom to maintain ; 
 
 The pubhc glory theirs ; unsparing love 
 
 Their endless treasure, and their deeds their praise. 
 
 With thee they work. Nought can resist your force : 
 
 Lite feels it quickening in her dark retreats : 
 
 Strong spread the blooms of genius, science, art ; 
 
 His bashful bounds disclosing merit breaks ; 
 
 And, big with fruits of glory, virtue blows 590 
 
 Expansive o'er the land. Another race 
 
 Of generous youth, of patriot sires, I see ! 
 
 Not those vain insects fluttering in the blaze 
 
 Of court, and ball, and play — those venal souls. 
 
 Corruption's veteran unrelenting bands. 
 
 That, to their vices slaves, can ne'er be free. 
 
 ' I see the fountains purged ! whence hfe derives 
 A clear or turbid flow ; see the young mind 
 Not fed impure by chance, by flattery fooled, 
 Or by scholastic jargon bloated proud, 600 
 
 But fiUed and nourished by the light of truth. 
 Then, beamed through fancy the refining ray. 
 And, pouring on the heart, the passions feel 
 At once informing light and moving flame ; 
 Till moral, pubhc, graceful action crowns 
 The whole. Behold ! the fair contention glows 
 In aU that mind or body can adorn 
 And form to life. Instead of barren heads, 
 Barbarian pedants, wrangling sons of pride. 
 And truth-perplexing metaphysic wits, 610 
 
 Men, patriots, chiefs, and citizens are formed. 
 
410 LIBERTY 
 
 ' Lo ! justice, like the liberal light of heaven, 
 Unpurchased shines on all ; and from her beam, 
 Appalling guilt, retire the savage crew 
 That prowl amid the darkness they themselves 
 Have thrown around the laws. Oppression grieves: 
 See how her legal furies bite the lip 
 While Yorks and Talbots their deep snares detect, 
 And seize swift justice through the clouds they 
 raise. 
 
 ' See ! social labour lifts his guarded head, 620 
 And men not yield to government in vain. 
 From the sure land is rooted ruffian force, 
 And the lewd nurse of villains, idle waste ; 
 Lo ! razed their haunts, down dashed their maddening 
 
 bowl, 
 A nation's poison, oeauteous order reigns ! 
 Manly submission, unimposing toil. 
 Trade without giiile, civility that marks 
 From the foul herd of brutal slaves thy sons. 
 And fearless peace. Or, should affronting war 
 To slow but dreadful vengeance rouse the just, 630 
 Unfailing fields of freemen I behold 
 That know with their own proper arm to guard 
 Their own blest isle against a leaguing world. 
 Despairing Gaul her boiling youth restrains. 
 Dissolved her dream of universal sway : 
 The winds and seas are Britain's wide domain. 
 And not a sail but by permission spreads. 
 
 ' Lo ! swarming southward on rejoicing suns 
 Gay colonies extend — the calm retreat 
 Of undeserved distress, the better home 640 
 
 Of those whom bigots chase from foreign lands; 
 Not built on rapine, servitude, and woe. 
 And in their turn some petty tyrant's prey. 
 But, bound by social freedom, firm they rise ; 
 
PART V 411 
 
 Such as, of late, an Oglethorpe has formed, 
 
 And, crowding round, the charmed Savannah sees. 
 
 ' Horrid with want and misery, no more 
 Our streets the tender passenger afflict. 
 Nor shivering age, nor sickness without friend 
 Or home or bed to bear his burning load, 650 
 
 Nor agonizing infant, that ne'er earned 
 Its guiltless pangs, I see ! The stores profuse 
 Which British bounty has to these assigned 
 No more the sacrilegious riot swell 
 Of cannibal devourers ! right applied, 
 No starving wretch the land of freedom stains — 
 If poor, employment finds ; if old, demands, 
 If sick, if maimed, his miserable due ; 
 And will, if young, repay the fondest care. 
 Sweet sets the sun of stormy life ; and sweet 660 
 The morning shines, in mercy's dews arrayed. 
 Lo ! how they rise ! these families of heaven ! 
 That, chief, (but why, ye bigots I why so late ?) 
 Where blooms and warbles glad a rising age ; 
 What smUes of praise ! And, while their song ascends. 
 The hstening seraph lays his lute aside. 
 
 ' Hark ! the gay muses raise a nobler strain, 
 With active nature, warm impassioned truth. 
 Engaging fable, lucid order, notes 
 Of various string, and heart-felt image filled. 670 
 Behold ! I see the dread delightful school 
 Of tempered passions and of polished life 
 Restored : behold ! the well dissembled scene 
 Calls from embellished eyes the lovely tear. 
 Or lights up mirth in modest cheeks again. 
 Lo ! vanished monster-land. Lo ! driven away 
 Those that Apollo's sacred walks profane — 
 Their wild creation scattered, where a world 
 Unknown to nature, Chaos more confused, 
 
412 LIBERTY 
 
 O'er the brute scene its ouran-outangs pours ; 
 Detested forms ! that, on the mind impressed, 68i 
 Corrupt, confound, and barbarize an age. 
 
 ' Behold ! all thine again the sister-arts, 
 Thy graces they, knit in harmonious dance. 
 Nursed by the treasure from a nation drained 
 Their works to purchase, they to nobler rouse 
 Their untamed genius, their unfettered thought; 
 Of pompous tyrants and of dreaming monks 
 The gaudy tools and prisoners no more. 
 
 ' Lo ! numerous domes a Burlington confess — 690 
 For kings and senates fit ; the palace see ! 
 The temple breathing a religious awe ; 
 Even framed with elegance the plain retreat. 
 The private dwelling. Certain in his aim. 
 Taste, never idly working, saves expense. 
 
 ' See ! sylvan scenes, where art alone pretends 
 To dress her mistress and disclose her charms — 
 Such as a Pope in miniature has shown, 
 A Bathurst o'er the widening forest spreads, 
 And such as form a Richmond, Chiswick, Stowe. 
 
 ' August around what pubhc works I see ! 701 
 Lo ! stately streets, lo ! squares that court the breeze ; 
 In spite of those to whom pertains the care 
 Ingulfing more than founded Roman ways, 
 Lo ! rayed from cities o'er the brightened land. 
 Connecting sea to sea, the solid road. 
 Lo ! the proud arch (no vile exactor's stand) 
 With easy sweep bestrides the chasing flood. 
 See ! long canals, and deepened rivers join 
 Each part with each, and with the circling main 
 The whole enlivened isle. Lo ! ports expand, 711 
 Free as the winds and waves, their sheltering arms. 
 Lo ! streaming comfort o'er the troubled deep, 
 On every pointed coast the lighthouse towers ; 
 
PART V 413 
 
 And, by the broad imperious mole repelled, 
 Hark ! how the baffled storm indignant roars.' 
 
 As thick to view these varied wonders rose. 
 Shook all my soul with transport, unassured 
 The Vision broke ; and on my waking eye 
 Rushed the still ruins of dejected Rome. 720 
 
 NOTES TO LIBERTY 
 
 The poem was the result of Thomson's tour on the Continent, 
 taken, in 1730-31, in company with young Charles Talbot. It 
 may have been suggested by Addison's Letter from Italy. Thom- 
 son intended it to be, and even regarded it as, his greatest work. 
 But it was unpopular from the first, and it has remained unread 
 since Johnson gave up the attempt. That critic had hardly begun 
 to read it when he laid it aside, because he did not think Liberty 
 to be in need of either praise or defence ; and for that reason he 
 hazarded neither commendation nor censure. He noticed, how- 
 ever, that the public laid it on a high shelf to ' harbour spiders 
 and to gather dust '- Yet the fact remains that Liberty, though 
 on the whole tedious, contains learning, eloquence, imagination, 
 and rises at times to altitudes of true poetic vision, more especially 
 in the fourth and fifth parts. Thomson would doubtless have 
 done better if he had kept to his original plan of presenting ' a 
 poetical landscape of various countries, mixed with moral obser- 
 vations on their government ' — much as Goldsmith afterwards 
 did in The Traveller. Nature was his theme rather than the his- 
 tory of civilization. 
 
 Liberty was published in separate parts in 1735 and 1736. Of 
 Part I, 3,000 copies were printed ; of Parts II and III, 2,000 ; and 
 of Parts IV and V, only 1,000 — a gradual reduction which shows 
 the comparative and unexpected failure of the work with the 
 reading public. 
 
 Part I, line I Omy lamented Talbot. Charles Richard Talbot, 
 only son of the Solicitor-General. On the recommendation of 
 Dr. Bundle, Thomson had been selected as young Talbot's travel- 
 ling tutor on the Continent, in 1730-31. They visited Italy 
 together. In September, 1733, young Talbot died, and Thomson 
 here laments his early death. He was a few years afterwards 
 
414 LIBERTY 
 
 to lament the death of the father, Lord Chancellor Talbot, in 
 ' Memorial Verses ', which are placed among the MiscellaneoiiS 
 Poems. 
 
 I. 83 the two sired. L. J. Brutus and Virginius. — T. 
 
 I. 242 Via Sacra.— T. 
 
 I. 247, 248 M. Angelo Buonaroti, Palladio, and Eaphael 
 D'Urbino — the three great modern masters in sculpture, archi- 
 tecture, and painting. — T. 
 
 I. 273 Yon wild retreat. Tusoulum is reckoned to have stood 
 at a place now called Grotta Ferrata, a convent of monks. — T. 
 
 I. 276 the ship-forsaken bay. The Bay of Mola (anciently 
 Formiae) into which Homer brings Ulysses and his companions. 
 Near Formiae Cicero had a villa. — T. 
 
 I. 288 Campagna Felice, adjoining to Capua. — T. 
 
 I. 290 The coast of Baiae, which was formerly adorned with the 
 works mentioned in the following lines ; and where, amidst many 
 magnificent ruins, those of a temple erected to Venus are still to 
 be seen. — T. 
 
 I. 303 All along this coast the ancient Eomans had their winter 
 retreats ; and several populous cities stood. — T. 
 
 Part II, line 57 Civil Tyranny.— T. 
 
 II. 63 The Pyramids.— T. 
 
 II. 65 The Tyrants of Egypt.— T. 
 
 II. 138 A mountain near Athens. — T. 
 
 II. 142 Two rivers between which Athens was situated.^T. 
 
 II. 157 The Areopagus, or Supreme Court of Judicature, which 
 Solon reformed and improved : and the council of Four Hundred, 
 by him instituted. In this council all affairs of state were dplib- 
 erated, before they came to be voted in the assembly of the 
 people. — T. 
 
 II. 174 Pisa, or Olympia, the city where the Olympic games 
 were celebrated. — T. 
 
 II. 180 The Straits of Thermopylae.— T. 
 
 II. 197 Xenophon.— T. 
 
 II. 222 Socrates.— T. 
 
 II. 272 Homer.— T. 
 
 II. 323 When Demetrius besieged Rhodes, and could have 
 reduced the city by setting fire to that quarter of it where stood 
 the house of the celebrated Protogenes, he chose rather to raise 
 the siege than hazard the burning of a famous picture called 
 Jasylus, the masterpiece of that painter. — T. 
 
 II. 442 So the Kings of Persia were called by the Greeks. — T. 
 
 II. 453 The peace made by Antalcidas, the Lacedemonian ad- 
 
NOTES 415 
 
 miral, with the Persians ; by which the Lacedemonians abandoned 
 all the Greeks established in the lesser Asia, to the dominion of 
 the King of Persia. — T. 
 
 II. 459 Athens had been dismantled by the Lacedemoniios, at 
 the end of the first Peloponnesian war, and was at this time 
 restored by Conon to its former splendour. — T. 
 
 II. 470 The Peloponnesian war. — T. 
 
 II. 478 Pelopidas and Epaminoudas. — T. 
 
 II. 480 The battle of Cheronaea, in which Philip of Macedon 
 utterly defeated the Greeks. — T. 
 
 , Part III, line 7 The last struggles of liberty in Greece. — T. 
 
 III. 15 Lacinium, a promontory in Calabria. — T. 
 III. 32 Pythagoras.— T. 
 
 III. 34 Samos, over which then reigned the tyrant Polycrates. 
 — T. 
 
 III. 37 The southern parts of Italy and Sicily, so called because 
 of the Grecian colonies there settled. — T. 
 
 III. 38 His scholars were enjoined silence for five years. — T. 
 
 III. 57 The four cardinal virtues. — T. 
 
 III. 244 Rha, the ancient name of the Volga. — T. 
 
 III. 245 The Caspian Sea.— T. 
 
 III. 264 The King of Macedonia.— T. 
 
 III. 286 The Isthmian games were celebrated at Corinth. — T. 
 
 III. 369 Carthage.— T. 
 
 III. 390 Tib. Gracchus.— T. 
 
 m. 465 Publius Servilius KuUus, tribune of the people, pro- 
 posed an Agrarian Law, in appearance very advantageous for 
 the people, but destructive of their liberty : and which was 
 defeated by the eloquence of Cicero in his speech against KuUus. 
 — T. 
 
 IIL 489 the dark third. Tiberius.— T. 
 
 in. 496 Thrasea Paetus, put to death by Nero. Tacitus intro- 
 duces the account he gives of his death, thus : — ' After having 
 inhumanly slaughtered so many illustrious men, he (Nero) burned 
 at last with a desire of cutting off virtue itself in the person of 
 Thrasea,' &c.— T. 
 
 m. 505 Antoninus Pius, and his adopted son Marcus Aurelius, 
 afterwards called Antoninus Philosophus. — T. 
 
 III. 511 Constantine's arch, to build which that of Trajan was 
 destroyed, sculpture having been then almost entirely lost. — T. 
 
 III. 515 The ancient Sarmatia contained a vast tract of country 
 running all along the north of Europe and Asia. — T. 
 
 III. 527, 528 See Winter, 809 sejj. 
 
416 LIBERTY 
 
 Paet IV, line 49 Church Power, or Ecclesiastical Tyrannjr; — T. 
 
 IV. 52 her elder sister. Civil Tyranny. — T. 
 
 IV. 86 Banditti saints. Crusaders. 
 
 IV. 91 The corruptions of the Church of Borne. — T. 
 
 IV. 94 the rage of slaves. Vassalage, whence the attachment 
 of clans to their chief. — T. 
 
 IV. 96 the bravo's trade. Duelling. — T. 
 
 IV. 123 inbred foes. The Hierarchy.— T. 
 
 IV. 141 The Hercules of Farnese. — T. The passage which 
 describes the Greek statues is, says Mr. G. C. Maca'ulay {English 
 Men of Letters — James Thomson), ' perhaps the first of the kind in 
 English poetry.' 
 
 IV. 153 The Fighting Gladiator.— T. 
 
 IV. 156 The Dying Gladiator.- T. The description that 
 follows is not unworthy to be read even after Byron's. 
 
 IV. 164 The Apollo of Belvidere.— T. 
 
 IV. 175 The Venus of Medici.— T. 
 
 IV. 185 The group of Laocoon and his two sons destroyed by 
 two serpents. See Aeneid II, ver. 199-227. — T. 
 
 IV. 213, 214 Esteemed the two finest pieces of modern sculpture. 
 It is reported of Michael Angelo Buonaroti, the most celebrated 
 master in modern sculpture, that he wrought with a kind of 
 inspiration or enthusiastical fury, which produced the effect here 
 mentioned. — T. 
 
 IV. 244 The Lombard school. The school of the Caracci. — T. 
 
 IV. 266 The river Arno runs through Florence. — T. 
 
 IV. 269 The republics of Florence, Pisa, Lucca, and Sienna. 
 They formerly have had very cruel wars together, but are now all 
 peaceably subject to the Great Duke of Tuscany, except it be 
 Lucca, which still maintains the form of a republic. — T. 
 
 IV. 282 The Genoese Territory is reckoned very populous, but 
 the towns and villages for the most part lie hid among the Apen- 
 nine rooks and mountains. — T. 
 
 IV. 284 According to Dr. Burnet's system of the Deluge. — T. 
 
 IV. 293 Venice was the most flourishing city in Europe, with 
 regard to trade, before the passage to the East Indies by the Cape 
 of Good Hope and America was discovered. — T. 
 
 IV. 294 Those who fled to some marshes in the Adriatic gulf, 
 from the desolation spread over Italy by an irruption of the Huns, 
 first founded there this famous city, about the beginning of the 
 fifth century. — T. 
 
 IV. 319 A larger circle. The main ocean. another seat. 
 Great Britain. — T. 
 
NOTES 417 
 
 IV^325 The Swiss Cantons.— T. 
 
 IV. 329 Geneva, situated on the Laous Lemanus, a small state, 
 but noble example of the blessings of civil and religious liberty. 
 It is remarkable that since the founding of this Republic not one 
 citizen has been so much as suspected to have been guilty of 
 corruption or public rapine. A virtue this ! meriting the atten- 
 tion of every Briton. — T. 
 
 IV. 347 It is reported of the Swiss that, after having been long 
 absent from their native country, they are seized with such a 
 violent desire of seeing it again as affects them with a kind of lan- 
 guishing indisposition, called ' the Swiss sickness '. — T. 
 
 IV. 366 The Hanse Towns.— T. 
 
 IV. 372 the manly race. The Swedes.— T. 
 
 IV. 377 Hero Thomson, in a footnote, refers the reader to a 
 passage from Sir William Temple's Essay on Heroic Virtue, 
 with which he illustrates lines 678-84 infra. 
 
 IV. 624 Great Britain was peopled by the Celtae or Gauls. — T. 
 
 IV. 630 The Druids among the ancient Gauls and Britons had 
 the care and direction of all religious matters. — T. 
 
 IV. 645 The Roman Empire.— T. 
 
 IV. 647 Caledonia, inhabited by the Scots and Picts ; whither 
 a great many Britons, who would not submit to the Romans, 
 retired. — T. 
 
 IV. 652 The wall of Severus, built upon Adrian's rampart, which 
 ran for eighty miles quite across the country, from the mouth of 
 the Tyne to Solway Frith.— T. 
 
 IV. 654 Irruptions of the Scots and Picts. — T. 
 
 IV. 658 The Roman empire being miserably torn by the 
 northern nations, Britain was for ever abandoned by the Romans 
 in the year 426 or 427.— T. 
 
 IV. 662 The Britons applying to Aetius, the Roman general, for 
 assistance, thus expressed their miserable condition : — ' We know 
 not which way to turn us. The Barbarians drive us to sea, and 
 the sea forces us back to the Barbarians ; between which we have 
 only the choice of two deaths, either to be swallowed up by the 
 waves, or butchered by the sword.' — T. 
 
 IV. 665 King of the Silures, famous for his great exploits, and 
 accounted the best general Great Britain had ever produced. 
 The Silures were esteemed the bravest and most powerful of all 
 the Britons ; they inhabited Herefordshire, Radnorshire, Breck- 
 nockshire, Monmouthshire, and Glamorganshire. — T. 
 
 IV. 666 Queen of the Iceni : her story is well known. — T. 
 
 IV. 678 It is certain, that an opinion was fixed and general 
 
 THOMSON B e 
 
418 LIBERTY 
 
 among them (the Goths) that death was but the entrance into 
 another life ; that all men who lived lazy and unactive Uves, and 
 died natural deaths, by sickness or by age, went into vast caves 
 under ground, all dark and miry, full of noisome creatures usual to 
 such places, and there for ever grovelled in endless stench and 
 misery. On the contrary, all who gave themselves to warlike 
 actions and enterprises, to the conquest of their neighbours and 
 the slaughter of their enemies, and died in battle, or of violent 
 deaths upon bold adventures or resolutions, went immediately to 
 the vast hall or palace of Odin, their god of war, who eternally kept 
 open house for all such guests, where they were entertained at 
 infinite tables, in perpetual feasts and mirth, carousing in bowLs 
 made of the skulls of their enemies they had slain ; according to 
 the number of whom, every one in these mansions of pleasure was 
 the most honoured and best entertained. — Sir William Temple's 
 Essay on Heroic Virtue. — T. 
 
 IV. 701 The seven kingdoms of the Anglo-Saxons, considered 
 as being united into one common government, under a general in 
 chief or monarch, and by the means of an assembly general, or 
 wittenagemot. — T. 
 
 IV. 704 Egbert, King of Wessex, who, after having reduced all 
 the other kingdoms of the Heptarchy under his dominion, was 
 the first king of England. — T. 
 
 IV. 709 A famous Danish standard was called Beaf an, or Kaven. 
 The Danes imagined that, before a battle, the Raven wrought 
 upon this standard clapped its wings or hung down its head, in 
 token of victory or defeat. — T. 
 
 IV. 733 Alfred the Great, renowned in war, and no less famous 
 in peace for his many excellent institutions, particularly that of 
 juries. — T. 
 
 IV. 736 The battle of Hastings, in which Harold II, the last of 
 the Saxon kings, was slain, and William the Conqueror made 
 himself master of England. — T. 
 
 IV. 748 Edward the Confessor, who reduced the West Saxon, 
 Mercian, and Danish laws into one body ; which from that time 
 became common to all England, under the name of ' The Laws 
 of Edward '.— T. 
 
 IV. 755 The Curfew- Bell (from the French Couvrefeu) which 
 was rung every night at eight of the clock, to warn the English 
 to put out their fires and candles, under the penalty of a severe 
 fine.— T. 
 
 IV. 762 The New Forest in Hampshire ; to make which, the 
 country for above thirty miles in compass was laid waste. — T. 
 
NOTES 419 
 
 IV. 775 On June 5, 1215, King John, met by the Barons on 
 Runnemede, signed the Great Charter of Liberties, or Magna 
 Charta.— T. 
 
 IV. 784 The league formed by the Barons, during the reign of 
 John, in the year 1213, was the first confederacy made, in England 
 in defence of the nation's interest against the King.— T. 
 
 IV. 796 The commons are generally thought to have been first 
 represented in parliament towards the end of Henry Ill's reign. 
 To a parliament called in the year 1264, each county was ordered 
 to send four knights, as representatives of their respective shires : 
 and to a parliament called in the year following, each county was 
 ordered to send, as their representatives, two knights, and each 
 city and borough as many citizens and burgesses. Till then, 
 history makes no mention of them ; whence a very strong argu- 
 ment may be drawn, to fix the original of the House of Commons 
 to that era. — T. 
 
 IV. 840 Edward III, and Henry V.— T. 
 
 IV. 865 Three famous battles, gained by the English over the 
 French.— T. 
 
 IV. 867 During the civil wars, betwixt the families of York and 
 Lancaster. — T. 
 
 IV. 872 Henry VIL— T. 
 
 IV. 879 The famous Earl of Warwick, during the reigns of 
 Henry VI and Edward IV was called the ' King Maker '. — T. 
 
 IV. 881 Permitting the Barons to alienate their lands. — T. 
 
 IV. 895 Henry VIII. Of papal dominion.— T. 
 
 IV. 904 John Wickliff, doctor of divinity, who, towards the 
 close of the fourteenth century, published doctrines very contrary 
 to those of the church of Rome, and particularly denying the papal 
 authority. His followers grew very numerous, and were called 
 Lollards.— T. 
 
 IV. 906 Suppression of monasteries. — T. 
 
 IV. 912 other worlds. The Spanish West Indies.— T. 
 
 IV. 931 The dominion of the house of Austria. — T. 
 
 IV. 937 The Spanish Armada. Rapin says that after proper 
 measures had been taken the enemy was expected with uncommon 
 alacrity. — T. 
 
 IV. 957 the prince. James I. 
 
 IV. 966 Abandoned Frederick. Elector Palatine, who had been 
 chosen king of Bohemia, but was stripped of all his dominions 
 and dignities by the Emperor Ferdinand, whilst James I, his 
 father-in-law, being amused from time to time, endeavoured to 
 mediate a peace. — T. 
 
 E e 2 
 
420 LIBERTY 
 
 IV. 970 The monstrous and till then unheard-of doctrines of 
 divine indefeasible hereditary right, passive obedience, &c. — T. 
 
 IV. 975 The parties of Whig and Tory.— T. 
 
 IV. 982 Charles I.— T. 
 
 IV. 991 the. fountain [of public wisdom and of justice]. Parlia- 
 ment.— T, 
 
 IV. 1003 Ship-money— T. 
 
 IV. 1004 Monopolies.— T. 
 
 IV. 1008 Their poison. The raging High-Church sermons of 
 those times, inspiring at once a spirit of slavish submission to the 
 Court and of bitter persecution against those whom they call 
 Church and State Puritans. — T. 
 
 IV. 1045 the phoenix State. At the Restoration. — T. 
 
 IV. 1048 the luxurious king. Charles 11. — T. 
 
 IV. 1049 that which taught the young to bend. Court of Wards. 
 — T. 
 
 IV. X075 Dunkirk.— T. 
 
 IV. 1077 The war in conjunction with France against the Dutch. 
 — T. 
 
 IV. 1078 the Saviour- League. The Triple Alliance.— T. 
 
 IV. 1080 universal sway. Under Lewis XIV. — T. 
 
 IV. 1084 A standing army, raised without the consent of Par- 
 liament. — T. 
 
 IV. 1095 each badge of freedom. The Charters of Corporations. 
 — T. 
 
 IV. 1105 The bigot king. James II.— T. 
 
 IV. U18 The Prince of Orange, in his passage to England, 
 though his fleet had been at first dispersed by a storm, was after- 
 wards extremely favoured by several changes of wind. — T. 
 
 IV. 1122 Rapin, in his History of England. — The third of Novem- 
 ber the fleet entered the Channel, and lay by between Calais and 
 Dover, to stay for the ships that were behind. Here the Prince 
 called a council of war. It is easy to imagine what a glorious show 
 the fleet made. Five or six hundred ships in so narrow a channel, 
 and both the English and French shores covered with numberless 
 spectators, are no common sight. For my part, who was then on 
 board the fleet, I own it struck me extremely. — T. 
 
 IV. 1126 my streaming flag. The Prince placed himself in the 
 main body, carrjdng a flag with English colours, and their high- 
 nesses' arms surrounded with this motto, ' The Protestant Religion 
 and the Liberties of England ; ' and underneath the motto of the 
 house of Nassau, ' Je maintiendrai,' I will maintain — Rapin. — T. 
 
 IV. 1127 The English fleet.— T. 
 
NOTES 421 
 
 IV. 1130 The king's army.— T. 
 
 IV. 1 143 Pleaded to yield. By the Bill of Rights and the Act of 
 Succession. — T. 
 
 IV. 1144 William III.— T. 
 
 Paet V, line 69 that the Tyrian merchant sought of old. Tin. 
 — T. 
 
 V. 285 The poor and weak. Lord Molesworth, in his account of 
 Denmark, says, ' It is observed, that in limited monarchies and 
 commonwealths, a neighbourhood to the seat of the government 
 is advantageous to the subjects ; whilst the distant provinces are 
 less thriving, and more liable to oppression.' — T. 
 
 V. 409 The famous Retreat of the Ten Thousand was chiefly 
 conducted by Xenophon. — T. 
 
 V. 41 1 Epaminondas, after having beat the Lacedemonians and 
 their allies, in the battle of Leuctra, made an incursion at the 
 head of a powerful army into Laconia. It was now six hundred 
 years since the Dorians had possessed this country, and in all that 
 time the face of an enemy had not been seen within their terri- 
 tories. — PhUnrch in Agesilaus. — T. 
 
 V. 458 Louis XIV.— T. 
 
 V. 473 the long canal. The canal of Languedoc. — T. 
 
 V. 475, 477 The Hospitals for Foundlings and Invalids.— T. 
 
 V. 496 warm seminaries. The Academies of Sciences, the 
 Belles Leltres, and Painting. — T. 
 
 V. 503 the kind art of unvalued price. Engraving. — T. 
 
 V. 518 the glowing loom. The tapestry of the Gobelins. — T. The 
 Gobelins were originally a family of dyers, who (in the sixteenth 
 century) added to their business as dyers the manufacture of 
 tapestry, with which their name has ever since been associated. 
 
 V. 645 The reference is to the colonization of the State of 
 Georgia. 
 
 V. 662 A Hospital for Foundlings.— T. 
 
 V. 680 ouran-outangs. Creatures which, of all brutes, most 
 resemble man. See Dr. Tyson's Treatise on this animal. — T. 
 
 V. 690 Richard Boyle, Earl of Burlington, architect of Chiswiok 
 House, Burlington House, &c. 
 
 V. 698 At Twickenham. 
 
 V. 699 Okely Woods, near Cirencester. — ^T. 
 
LYRICAL PIECES 
 
 EULE, BRITANNIA! 
 
 [This famous ode, which appeared in the last scene (Act n. So. v) 
 of Alfred : A Masque, a dramatic piece in which Mallet collabor- 
 ated with Thomson, was published in 1740. It has sometimes 
 been attributed to Mallet. The evidence is in favour of Thomson's 
 authorship.] 
 
 When Britain first, at Heaven's command, 
 
 Arose from out the azure main, 
 This was the charter of the land. 
 
 And guardian angels sung this strain — 
 ' Rule, Britanniaj rule the waves ; 
 Britons never will be slaves.' 
 
 The nations, not so blest as thee, 
 Must in their turns to tyrants fall ; 
 
 While thou shalt flourish great and free, 
 
 The dread and envy of them all. lo 
 
 'Rule,' &c. 
 
 Still more majestic shalt thou rise, 
 
 More dreadful from each foreign stroke ; 
 
 As the loud blast that tears the skies 
 Serves but to root thy native oak. 
 'Rule,' &c. 
 
 Thee haughty tyrants ne'er shall tame ; 
 
 All their attempts to bend thee down 
 Will but arouse thy generous flame. 
 
 But work their woe and thy renown. 20 
 
 'Rule,' &c. 
 
RULE, BRITANNIA! 423 
 
 To thee belongs the rural reign ; 
 
 Thy cities shall with commerce shine ; 
 All thine shall be the subject main, 
 
 And every shore it circles thine. 
 'Rule,' &c. 
 
 The Muses, stiU with freedom found, 
 
 Shall to thy happy coast repair : 
 Blest isle ! with matchless beauty crowned, 
 And manly hearts to guard the fair. 30 
 
 ' Rule, Britannia, rule the waves ; 
 Britons never will be slaves.' 
 
 ODE 
 
 Tell me, thou soul of her I love. 
 Ah ! tell me, whither art thou fled ? 
 
 To what delightful world above. 
 Appointed for the happy dead ? 
 
 Or dost thou free at pleasure roam, 
 And sometimes share thy lover's woe 
 
 Where, void of thee, his cheerless home 
 Can now, alas ! no comfort know ? 
 
 Oh ! if thou hoverest round my walk. 
 While, under every well-known tree, 
 
 I to thy fancied shadow talk. 
 And every tear is fuU of thee — 
 
 Should then the weary eye of grief 
 Beside some sympathetic stream 
 
 In slumber find a short relief. 
 
 Oh, visit thou my soothing dream ! 
 [Cp. Bums's To Mary in Heaven.'] 
 
424 LYRICAL PIECES 
 
 COME, GENTLE GOD 
 
 [Published in The Oentleman's Magazine, February, 1736.] 
 
 Come, gentle god of soft desire, 
 
 Come and possess my happy breast ; 
 
 Not fury-like in flames and fire, 
 Or frantic folly's wildness drest. 
 
 But come in friendship's angel-guise ; 
 
 Yet dearer thou than friendship art. 
 More tender spirit in thy eyes. 
 
 More sweet emotions at the heart. 
 
 0, come with goodness in thy train, 
 
 With peace and pleasure void of storm ; i 
 
 And, wouldst thou me for ever gain, 
 Put on Amanda's winning form. 
 
 [For Amanda, see note on line 483 of Spring.'] 
 
 SONG 
 
 One day the god of fond desire, 
 On mischief bent, to Damon said, 
 
 ' Why not disclose your tender fire ? 
 Not own it to the lovely maid ? ' 
 
 The shepherd marked his treacherous art, 
 And, softly sighing, thus replied : 
 
 ' 'Tis true, you have subdued my heart, 
 But shall not triumph o'er my pride. 
 
 ' The slave in private only bears 
 
 Your bondage, who his love conceals ; 
 
 But, when his passion he declares. 
 
 You drag him at your chariot-wheels.' 
 
425 
 
 SONG 
 
 Hard is the fate of him who loves 
 Yet dares not tell his trembling pain 
 
 But to the sympathetic groves, 
 But to the lonely Ustening plain. 
 
 Oh ! when she blesses next your shade, 
 Oh ! when her footsteps next are seen 
 
 In flowery tracts along the mead, 
 In fresher mazes o'er the green, 
 
 Ye gentle spirits of the vale, 
 
 To whom the tears of love are dear. 
 
 From dying lilies waft a gale 
 And sigh my sorrows in her ear. 
 
 Oh ! tell her what she cannot blame. 
 
 Though fear my tongue must ever bind ; 
 
 Oh ! tell her that my virtuous flame 
 Is as her spotless soul refined. 
 
 Not her own guardian angel eyes 
 With chaster tenderness his care ; 
 
 Not purer her own wishes rise. 
 
 Not holier her own sighs in prayer. 
 
 But, if at first her virgin fear 
 
 Should start at love's suspected name, 
 
 With that of friendship soothe her ear — 
 True love and friendship are the same. 
 
 TO AMANDA 
 
 Comb, dear Amanda, quit the town, 
 And to the rural hamlets fly ; 
 
 Behold ! the wintry storms are gone, 
 A gentle radiance glads the sky ; 
 
426 LYRICAL PIECES 
 
 The birds awake, the flowers appear, 
 
 Earth spreads a verdant couch for thee ; 
 
 'Tis joy and music all we hear, 
 'Tis love and beauty all we see. 
 
 Come, let us mark the gradual spring, 
 How peeps the bud, the blossom blows ; 
 
 Till Philomel begins to sing, 
 
 And perfect May to swell the rose. 
 
 Even so thy rising charms improve, 
 
 As life's warm season grows more bright ; 
 
 And, opening to the sighs of love. 
 Thy beauties glow with full delight. 
 
 TO AMANDA 
 
 Unless with my Amanda blest, 
 
 In vain I twine the woodbine bower ; 
 
 Unless to deck her sweeter breast. 
 In vain I rear the breathing flower. 
 
 Awakened by the genial year. 
 
 In vain the birds around me sing ; 
 
 In vain the freshening fields appear : 
 Without my love there is no Spring 
 
 TO MYRA 
 
 O THOtr whose tender serious eyes 
 Expressive speak the mind I love — 
 
 The gentle azure of the skies, 
 
 The pensive shadows of the grove — 
 
TO MYRA 427 
 
 mix their beauteous beams with mine, 
 And let us interchange our hearts ; 
 
 Let all their sweetness on me shine, 
 
 Poured through my soul be all their darts. 
 
 Ah, 'tis too much ! I cannot bear 
 
 At once so soft, so keen a ray : :o 
 
 In pity then, my lovely fair, 
 turn those killing eyes away ! 
 
 But what avails it to conceal 
 
 One charm where nought but charms I see ? 
 Their lustre then again reveal, 
 
 And let me, Myra, die of thee ! 
 
 [Myra is Amanda. The poem was enclosed in a letter to 
 Mrs. Robertson (Amanda's sister), in 1742, and was first printed 
 in the Earl of Buchan's Essay,] 
 
 TO FORTUNE 
 
 Fob ever, Fortune, wilt thou prove 
 An unrelenting foe to love. 
 And, when we meet a mutual heart. 
 Come in between and bid us part ; 
 
 Bid us sigh on from day to day. 
 And wish, and wish the soul away ; 
 Till youth and genial years are iiown. 
 And all the life of life is gone ? 
 
 But busy, busy still art thou, 
 To bind the loveless joyless vow. 
 The heart from pleasure to delude. 
 And join the gentle to the rude. 
 
428 LYRICAL PIECES 
 
 For once, Fortune ! hear my prayer, 
 And I absolve thy future care — 
 All other blessings I resign ; 
 Make but the dear Amanda mine ! 
 
 THE BASHFUL LOVER 
 
 [From a MS. believed to be in Thomson's handwriting.] 
 
 Sweet tyrant Love, but hear me now ! 
 
 And cure while young this pleasing smart ; 
 Or rather, aid my trembling vow, 
 
 And teach me to reveal my heart. 
 
 Tell her whose goodness is my bane. 
 
 Whose looks have smiled my peace away, 
 
 Oh ! whisper now she gives me pain. 
 Whilst undesigning, frank, and gay. 
 
 'Tis not for common charms I sigh, 
 
 Eor what the vulgar beauty call ; i 
 
 'Tis not a cheek, a lip, an eye ; 
 
 But 'tis the soul that lights them all. 
 
 For that I drop the tender tear, 
 For that I make this artless moan. 
 
 Oh, sigh it. Love ! into her ear, 
 
 And make the bashful lover known. 
 
 TO THE NIGHTINGALE 
 
 Nightingale, best poet of the grove, 
 
 That plaintive strain can ne'er belong to thee. 
 
 Blest in the full possession of thy love : 
 
 lend that strain, sweet nightingale, to me ! 
 
TO THE NIGHTINGALE 429 
 
 'Tis mine, alas ! to mourn my wretched fate : 
 I love a maid who all my bosom charms, 
 
 Yet lose my days without this lovely mate ; 
 Inhuman fortune keeps her from my arms. 
 
 You, happy birds ! by nature's simple laws 
 Lead your soft lives, sustained by nature's fare ; 
 
 You dwell wherever roving fancy draws, ii 
 
 And love and song is aU your pleasing care : 
 
 But we, vain slaves of interest and of pride. 
 Dare not be blest lest envious tongues should 
 blame : 
 
 And hence in vain I languish for my bride — 
 mourn with me, sweet bird, my hapless flame. 
 
 HYMN ON SOLITUDE 
 
 [Drafted in 1725 ; published in Ralph's Miscellany, 1729.] i 
 
 Hail, mildly pleasing Solitude, 
 Companion of the wise and good ; 
 But from whose holy piercing eye 
 The herd of fools and villains fly. 
 Oh ! how I love with thee to walk, 
 And listen to thy whispered talk. 
 Which innocence and truth imparts. 
 And melts the most obdurate hearts. 
 
 A thousand shapes you wear with ease, 
 And stiU in every shape you please. lo 
 
 Now wrapt in some mysterious dream, 
 A lone philosopher you seem ; 
 Now quick from hill to vale you fly, 
 And now you sweep the vaulted sky ; 
 A shepherd next, you haunt the plain. 
 And warble forth your oaten strain ; 
 
430 LYRICAL PIECES 
 
 A lover now, with all the grace 
 Of that sweet passion in your face ; 
 Then, calmed to friendship, you assume 
 The gentle looking Harford's bloom, 20 
 
 As, with her Musidora, she 
 (Her Musidora fond of thee) 
 Amid the long-withdrawing vale 
 Awakes the rivalled nightingale. 
 
 Thine is the balmy breath of mom, 
 Just as the dew-bent rose is born ; 
 And, while meridian fervours beat, 
 Thine is the woodland dumb retreat ; 
 But chief, when evening scenes decay 
 And the faint landskip swims away, 30 
 
 Thine is the doubtful soft decline, 
 And that best hour of musing thine. 
 
 Descending angels bless thy train. 
 The virtues of the sage, and swain — 
 Plain Innocence in white arrayed 
 Before thee lifts her fearless head ; 
 Rehgion's beams around thee shine 
 And cheer thy glooms with light divine ; 
 About thee sports sweet Liberty ; 
 And wrapt Urania sings to thee. 40 
 
 Oh, let me pierce thy secret cell, 
 And in thy deep recesses dwell ! 
 Perhaps from Norwood's oak-clad hill, 
 When meditation has her fiU, 
 I just may cast my careless eyes 
 Where London's spiry turrets rise, 
 Think of its crimes, its cares, its pain. 
 Then shield me in the woods again. 
 
431 
 
 A NUPTIAL SONG 
 
 [Intended to have been inserted in the fourth act of Sophonisba, 
 Thomson's first play, acted at Drury Lane, February 28, 1730.] 
 
 Comb, gentle Venus ! and assuage 
 
 A warring world, a bleeding age. 
 
 For nature lives beneath thy ray : 
 
 The wintry tempests haste away, 
 
 A lucid calm invests the sea, 
 
 Thy native deep is full of thee ; 
 
 And flowering earth, where'er you fly. 
 
 Is all o'er spring, aU sun the sky; 
 
 A genial spirit warms the breeze ; 
 
 Unseen, among the blooming trees, ic 
 
 The feathered lovers tune their throat. 
 
 The desert growls a softened note, 
 
 Grlad o'er the meads the cattle bound. 
 
 And love and harmony go round. 
 
 But chief into the human heart 
 You strike the dear delicious dart ; 
 You teach us pleasing pangs to know. 
 To languish in luxurious woe, 
 To feel the generous passions rise, 
 Grow good by gazing, mild by sighs ; 20 
 Each happy moment to improve. 
 And iiU the perfect year with love. 
 
 Come, thou delight of heaven and earth ! 
 To whom aU creatures owe their birth ; 
 Oh, come ! red-smiling, tender, come ! 
 And yet prevent our final doom. 
 For long the furious god of war 
 Has crushed us with his iron car, 
 Has raged along our ruined plains, 
 Has cursed them with his cruel stains, 30 
 
432 LYRICAL PIECES 
 
 Has sunk our youth in endless sleep. 
 And made the widowed virgin weep. 
 Now let him feel thy wonted charms, 
 Oh, take him to thy twining arms ! 
 And, while thy bosom heaves on his, 
 While deep he prints the humid kiss. 
 Ah, then ! his stormy heart control, 
 And sigh thyself into his soul. 
 
 Thy son too, Cupid, we implore 
 To leave the green Idalian shore. 40 
 
 Be he, sweet god ! our only foe : 
 Long let him draw the twanging bow, 
 Transfix us with his golden darts, 
 Pour all his quiver on our hearts, 
 With gentler anguish make us sigh, 
 And teach us sweeter deaths to die. 
 
 AN ODE ON AEOLUS'S HARP 
 
 [First printed in 1748, in Dodsley's Collection of Poems, vol. iv, 
 p. 129.] 
 
 Ethereal race, inhabitants of air, 
 
 Who hymn your God amid the secret grove, 
 
 Ye unseen beings, to my harp repair. 
 And raise majestic strains, or melt in love. 
 
 Those tender notes, how kindly they upbraid ! 
 
 With what soft woe they thriU the lover's heart ! 
 Sure from the hand of some unhappy maid 
 
 Who died of love these sweet complainings part. 
 
 But hark ! that strain was of a graver tone, 
 
 On the deep strings his hand some hermit throws ; 
 
 Or he, the sacred Bard, who sat alone 11 
 
 In the drear waste and wept his people's woes. 
 
AN ODE ON AEOLUS'S HARP 433 
 
 Such was the song which Zion's children sung 
 When by Euphrates' stream they made their plaint ; 
 
 And to such sadly solemn notes are strung 
 Angelic harps to soothe a dying saint. 
 
 Methinks I hear the full celestial choir 
 
 Through Heaven's high dome their awful anthem 
 raise ; 
 
 Now chanting clear, and now they all conspire 
 To swell the lofty hymn from praise to praise. 20 
 
 Let me, ye wandering spirits of the wind. 
 
 Who, as wild fancy prompts you, touch the string, 
 
 Smit with your theme, be in your chorus joined. 
 For till you cease my muse forgets to sing. 
 
 [The ■ sacred bard ' of the third stanza is Jeremiah — as Thomson 
 himself notes.] 
 
 rf 
 
MEMORIAL VERSES 
 
 ON THE DEATH OF HIS MOTHER 
 
 [Written in 1725.] 
 
 Ye fabled muses, I your aid disclaim, 
 Your airy raptures, and your fancied flame : 
 True genuine woe my throbbing breast inspires, 
 Love prompts my lays, and filial duty fires ; 
 The soul springs instant at the warm design 
 And the heart dictates every flowing line. 
 
 See ! where the kindest, best of mothers lies. 
 And death has shut her ever weeping eyes ; 
 Has lodged at last in peace her weary breast. 
 And luUed her many piercing cares to rest. lo 
 
 No more the orphan train around her stands, 
 While her full heart upbraids her needy hands ! 
 No more the widow's lonely fate she feels. 
 The shock severe that modest wants conceals, 
 The oppressor's scourge, the scorn of wealthy pride, 
 And poverty's unnumbered ills beside. 
 For see ! attended by the angelic throng. 
 Through yonder worlds of light she glides along. 
 And claims the well-earned raptures of the sky. 
 Yet fond concern recalls the mother's eye ; 20 
 
 She seeks the helpless orphans left behind — 
 So hardly left ! so bitterly resigned ! 
 Still, stiU is she my soul's divinest theme. 
 The waking vision, and the wailing dream : 
 
ON THE DEATH OP HIS MOTHER 435 
 
 Amid the ruddy sun's enlivening blaze 
 
 O'er my dark eyes her dewy image plays, 
 
 And in the dread dominion of the night 
 
 Shines out again the sadly pleasing sight. 
 
 Triumphant virtue all around her darts, 
 
 And more than volumes every look imparts — 30 
 
 Looks soft, yet awful ; melting, yet serene ; 
 
 Where both the mother and the saint are seen. 
 
 But ah ! that night, that torturing night remains — 
 
 May darkness dye it with its deepest stains. 
 
 May joy on it forsake her rosy bowers, 
 
 And screaming sorrow blast its baleful hours ! 
 
 When on the margin of the briny flood, 
 
 Chilled with a sad presaging damp I stood. 
 
 Took the last look, ne'er to behold her more. 
 
 And mixed our murmurs with the wavy roar, 40 
 
 Heard the last words fall from her pious tongue. 
 
 Then wild into the bulging vessel flung — 
 
 Which soon, too soon, conveyed me from her 
 
 sight, 
 Dearer than life, and liberty, and light ! 
 Why was I then, ye powers, reserved for this, 
 Nor sunk that moment in the vast abyss ? 
 Devoured at once by the relentless wave, 
 And whelmed for ever in a watery grave ? 
 Down, ye wild wishes of unruly woe ! 
 I see her with immortal beauty glow ; 50 
 
 The early wrinkle, care-contracted, gone. 
 Her tears all wiped, and all her sorrows flown ; 
 The exalting voice of Heaven I hear her breathe. 
 To soothe her soul in agonies of death. 
 I see her through the mansions blest above, 
 And now she meets her dear expecting love. 
 Heart-cheering sight ! but yet, alas ! o'erspread 
 By the damp gloom of grief's uncheerful shade, 
 rf 2 
 
J 
 
 436 MEMORIAL VERSES 
 
 Come, then, of reason the reflecting hour, 
 And let me trust the kind o'erruling power 60 
 
 Who from the night commands the shining day. 
 The poor man's portion, and the orphan's stay. 
 
 [The death of his mother took place in May, 1725. In the 
 previous February he had sailed from Leith for London. His 
 mother, then a widow, was at that time resident in Edinburgh. 
 Thomson never published these memorial lines. They first 
 appeared in 1792.] 
 
 53-4. The meaning here is vague: he probably means, by 
 repeating consolatory texts of Scripture. 
 
 TO THE MEMORY OF SIR ISAAC 
 NEWTON 
 
 [Written in 1727.] 
 
 Shall the great soul of Newton quit this earth 
 
 To mingle with his stars, and every Muse, 
 
 Astonished into silence, shun the weight 
 
 Of honours due to his illustrious name ? 
 
 But what can man ? Even now the sons of light. 
 
 In strains high warbled to seraphic lyre, 
 
 Hail his arrival on the coast of bhss. 
 
 Yet am not I deterred, though high the theme, 
 
 And sung to harps of angels, for with you, 
 
 Ethereal flames ! ambitious, I aspire 10 
 
 In Nature's general symphony to join. 
 
 And what new wonders can ye show your guest ! 
 Who, while on this dim spot where mortals toil 
 Clouded in dust, from motion's simple laws 
 Could trace the secret hand of Providence, 
 Wide-working through this universal frame. 
 
 Have ye not listened while he bound the suns 
 And planets to their spheres ! the unequal task 
 Of humankind till then. Oft had they roUed 
 O'er erring man the year, and oft disgraced 20 
 
TO THE MEMORY OF SIR ISAAC NEWTON 437 
 
 The pride of schools, before their course was known 
 Full in its causes and effects to him, 
 All-piercing sage ! who sat not down and dreamed 
 Romantic schemes, defended by the din 
 Of specious words, and tyranny of names ; 
 But, bidding his amazing mind attend, 
 And with heroic patience years on years 
 Deep-searching, saw at last the system dawn, 
 And shine, of all his race, on him alone. 
 
 What were his raptures then ! how pure ! how 
 strong ! 30 
 
 And what the triumphs of old Greece and Rome, 
 By his diminished, but the pride of boys 
 In some small fray victorious ! when instead 
 Of shattered parcels of this earth usurped 
 By violence unmanly, and sore deeds 
 Of cruelty and blood. Nature herself 
 Stood all subdued by him, and open laid 
 Her every latent glory to his view. 
 
 All intellectual eye, our solar round 
 First gazing through, he, by the blended power 40 
 Of gravitation and projection, saw 
 The whole in silent harmony revolve. 
 From unassisted vision hid, the moons 
 To cheer remoter planets numerous formed. 
 By him in all their mingled tracts were seen. 
 He also fixed our wandering Queen of Night, 
 Whether she wanes into a scanty orb, 
 Or, waxing broad, with her pale shadowy light. 
 In a soft deluge overflows the sky. 
 Her every motion clear-discerning, he 50 
 
 Adjusted to the mutual main and taught 
 Why now the mighty mass of waters swells 
 Resistless, heaving on the broken rocks, 
 And the full river turning — tiU again 
 
f 
 
 438 MEMORIAL VERSES 
 
 The tide revertive, unattracted, leaves 
 A yellow waste of idle sands behind. 
 
 Then, breaking hence, he took his ardent flight 
 Through the blue infinite ; and every star, 
 Which the clear concave of a winter's night 
 Pours on the eye, or astronomic tube, 60 
 
 Far stretching, snatches from the dark abyss, 
 Or such as further in successive skies 
 To fancy shine alone, at his approach 
 Blazed into suns, the living centre each 
 Of an harmonious system — all combined, 
 And ruled unerring by that single power 
 Which draws the stone projected to the ground. 
 
 unprofuse magnificence divine ! 
 O wisdom truly perfect ! thus to call 
 From a few causes such a scheme of things, 70 
 
 Effects so various, beautiful, and great. 
 An universe complete ! And beloved 
 Of Heaven ! whose well purged penetrating eye 
 The mystic veil transpiercing, inly scanned 
 The rismg, moving, wrde-established frame. 
 
 He, first of men, with awful wing pursued 
 The comet through the long elliptic curve, 
 As round innumerous worlds he wound his way, 
 TUl, to the forehead of our evening sky 
 Returned, the blazing wonder glares anew, 80 
 
 And o'er the trembhng nations shakes dismay. 
 
 The heavens are all his own, from the wide 
 rule 
 Of whirling vortices and circling spheres 
 To their first great simpUcity restored. 
 The schools astonished stood ; but found it vain 
 To combat still with demonstration strong, 
 And, unawakened, dream beneath the blaze 
 Of truth. At once their pleasing visions fled. 
 
TO THE MEMORY OF SIR ISAAC NEWTON 439 
 
 With the gay shadows of the morning mixed, 
 When Newton rose, our philosophic sun ! 90 
 
 The aerial flow of sound was known to him, 
 From whence it first in wavy circles breaks, 
 TiU the touched organ takes the message in. 
 Nor could the darting beam of speed immense 
 Escape his swift pursuit and measuring eye. 
 Even Light itself, which every thing displays, 
 Shone undiscovered, till his brighter mind 
 Untwisted all the shining robe of day ; \ 
 
 And, from the whitening undistinguished blaze, 
 Collecting every ray into his kind, 100 
 
 To the charmed eye educed the gorgeous train 
 Of parent colours. First the flaming red 
 Sprung vivid forth ; the tawny orange next ; 
 And next delicious yeUow ; by whose side 
 Fell the kind beams of aU-refreshing green. 
 Then the pure blue, that swells autumnal skies. 
 Ethereal played ; and then, of sadder hue. 
 Emerged the deepened indigo, as when 
 The heavy-skirted evening droops with frost; 
 While the last gleamings of refracted hght no 
 
 Died in the fainting violet away. 
 These, when the clouds distil the rosy shower. 
 Shine out distinct adown the watery bow ; 
 While o'er our heads the dewy vision bends 
 Delightful, melting on the fields beneath. 
 Myriads of mingling dyes from these result. 
 And myriads still remain — infinite source / 
 
 Of beauty^ ever_flu§hingi_ever new. 
 
 Did ever poet image aught so fair. 
 Dreaming in whispering groves by the hoarse 
 
 brook ? 
 Or prophet, to whose rapture heaven descends ? 121 
 Even now the setting sun and shifting clouds, 
 
440 MEMORIAL VERSES 
 
 Seen, Greenwich, from thy lovely heights, declare 
 How just, how beauteous the refractive law. 
 
 The noiseless tide of time, all bearing down 
 To vast eternity's unbounded sea, 
 Where the green islands of the happy shine, 
 He stemmed alone ; and, to the source (involved 
 Deep in primeval gloom) ascending, raised 
 His lights at equal distances, to guide 130 
 
 Historian wildered on his darksome way. 
 
 But who can number up his labours ? who 
 His high discoveries sing ? Wheri but a few 
 Of the deep-studying race can stretch their minds 
 To what he knew — in fancy's lighter thought 
 How shall the muse then grasp the mighty theme ? 
 
 What wonder thence that his devotion swelled 
 Responsive to his knowledge ? For could he 
 Whose piercing mental eye diffusive saw 
 The finished university of things 140 
 
 In all its order, magnitude, and parts 
 Eorbear incessant to adore that Power 
 Who fills, sustains, and actuates the whole ? 
 
 Say, ye who best can tell, ye happy few. 
 Who saw him in the softest lights of life. 
 All unwithheld, indulging to his friends 
 The vast unborrowed treasures of his mind, 
 Oh, speak the wondrous man ! how mild, how calm, 
 How greatly humble, how divinely good, 
 How firmly stablished on eternal truth ; 150 
 
 Fervent in doing well, with every nerve 
 Still pressing on, forgetful of the past. 
 And panting for perfection ; far above 
 Those little cares and visionary joys 
 That so perplex the fond impassioned heart 
 Of ever cheated, ever trusting man. 
 This, Coiiduitt, from thy rural hours we hope, 
 
TO THE MEMORY OF SIR ISAAC NEWTON 441 
 
 As through the pleasing shade where nature pours 
 Her every sweet in studious ease you walk, 
 The social passions smiling at thy heart i6o 
 
 That glows with all the recollected sage. 
 
 And you, ye hopeless gloomy-minded tribe, 
 You who, unconscious of those nobler flights 
 That reach impatient at immortal life, 
 Against the prime endearing privilege 
 Of being dare contend, — say, can a soul 
 Of such extensive, deep, tremendous powers, 
 Enlarging still, be but a finer breath 
 Of spirits dancing through their tubes awhile, 
 And then for ever lost in vacant air ? 170 
 
 But hark ! methinks I hear a warning voice, 
 Solemn as when some awful change is come, 
 Sound through the world — ' 'Tis done ! — the measure's 
 
 full; 
 And I resign my charge.' — Ye mouldering stones 
 That build the towering pyramid, the proud 
 Triumphal arch, the monument effaced 
 By ruthless ruin, and whate'er supports 
 The worshipped name of hoar antiquity — 
 Down to the dust ! What grandeur can 3-e boast 
 While Newton lifts his column to the skies, 180 
 Beyond the waste of time. Let no weak drop 
 Be shed for him. The virgin in her bloom 
 Cut off, the joyous youth, and darling child — 
 These are the tombs that claim the tender tear 
 And elegiac song. But Newton calls 
 For other notes of gratulation high. 
 That now he wanders through those endless worlds 
 He here so well descried, and wondering talks. 
 And hymns their Author with his glad compeers. 
 Britain's boast ! whether with angels thou igo 
 Sittest in dread discourse, or fellow-blessed. 
 
442 MEMORIAL VERSES 
 
 Who joy to see the honour of their kind ; 
 
 Or whether, mounted on cherubic wing, 
 
 Thy swift career is with the whirhng orbs, 
 
 Comparing things with things, in rapture lost, 
 
 And grateful adoration for that light 
 
 So plenteous rayed into thy mind below 
 
 From Light Himself ; oh, look with pity down 
 
 On humankind, a frail erroneous race ! 
 
 Exalt the spirit of a downward world ! 200 
 
 O'er thy dejected country chief preside, 
 
 And be her Genius called ! her studies raise, 
 
 Correct her manners, and inspire her youth ; 
 
 For, though depraved and sunk, she brought thee 
 
 forth, 
 And glories in thy name ! she points thee out 
 To all her sons, and bids them eye thy star : 
 While, in expectance of the second life 
 When time shall be no more, thy sacred dust 
 Sleeps with her kings, and dignifies the scene. 
 
 [Newton died March 20, 1727. These lines to his memory 
 were first published, in folio, in the following June, with a dedica- 
 tion to Sir Robert Walpole, then Prime Minister. 
 
 At line 157 the reference is to an expected (but never written) 
 Life of Newton, by Mr. Conduitt, who had married Newton's 
 niece.] 
 
443 
 
 ON THE DEATH OF MR. WILLIAM 
 AIKMAN, THE PAINTER 
 
 [Probably written on the Continent in 1731.] 
 
 Oh, could I draw, my friend, thy genuine mind 
 Just as the living forms by thee designed, 
 Of Raphael's figures none should fairer shine, 
 Nor Titian's colours longer last than mine. 
 
 A mind in wisdom old, in lenience young. 
 From fervent truth where every virtue sprung ; 
 Where aU was real, modest, plain, sincere ; 
 Worth above show, and goodness unsevere : 
 Viewed round and round, as lucid diamonds throw 
 Still as you turn them a revolving glow, lo 
 
 So did his mind reflect with secret ray 
 In various virtues heaven's internal day ; 
 Whether in high discourse it soared sublime 
 And sprung impatient o'er the bounds of time. 
 Or, wandering nature through with raptured eye, 
 Adored the hand that turned yon azure sky : 
 Whether to social life he bent his thought, 
 And the right poise of mingling passions sought, 
 Gay converse blest ; or in the thoughtful grove 
 Bid the heart open every source of love : 20 
 
 New varying lights still set before your eyes 
 The just, the good, the social, or the wise. 
 For such a death who can, who would refuse 
 The friend a tear, a verse the mournful muse ? 
 
 Yet pay we just acknowledgement to heaven. 
 Though snatched so soon, that Aikman e'er was given. 
 A friend, when dead, is but removed from sight. 
 Hid in the lustre of eternal light : 
 Oft with the mind he wonted converse keeps 
 
444 MEMORIAL VERSES 
 
 In the lone walk, or when the body sleeps 3° 
 
 Lets in a wandering ray, and all elate 
 Wings and attracts her to another state ; 
 And, when the parting storms of life are o'er, 
 May yet rejoin him in a happier shore. 
 
 As those we love decay, we die in part, 
 String after string is severed from the heart ; 
 Till loosened life, at last but breathing clay, 
 Without one pang is glad to fall away. 
 Unhappy he who latest feels the blow. 
 Whose eyes have wept o'er every friend laid low, 40 
 Dragged lingering on from partial death to death, 
 Till, dying, all he can resign is breath. 
 
 [Only the last eight lines were printed in Thomson's Poems on 
 Several Occasions, published by A. Millar (price sixpence) in 1750. 
 The whole piece was first printed in 1 792 from a MS. in the poB- 
 session of the Earl of Buchan. — William Aikman, only son of 
 the Sheriff of Forfarshire, is best known as the painter of Gay's 
 portrait, but he also painted the portrait of Thomson (age circa 26) 
 now in the Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh. He died in 1731.] 
 
 5-24. I leave the punctuation here as I find it, though it shows 
 a construction by no means clear. 
 
 TO THE MEMORY OF THE 
 RIGHT HONOURABLE THE LORD TALBOT 
 
 LATE CHANCELLOR OF GREAT BRITAIN 
 
 [First printed in June, 1737, with a dedication to the Rt. Hon. 
 the Lord Talbot.] 
 
 While with the public, you, my Lord, lament 
 A friend and father lost ; permit the muse, 
 The muse assigned of old a double theme. 
 To praise dead worth and humble living pride. 
 Whose generous task begins where interest ends ; 
 Permit her on a Talbot's tomb to lay 
 This cordial verse sincere, by truth inspired, 
 
TO THE MEMORY OF LORD TALBOT 445 
 
 Which means not to bestow but borrow fame. 
 Yes, she may sing his matchless virtues now — 
 Unhappy that she may ! But where begin ? lo 
 
 How from the diamond single out each ray, 
 That, though they tremble with ten thousand hues, 
 Effuse one poignant undivided light ? 
 
 Let the low-minded of these narrow days 
 No more presume to deem the lofty tale 
 Of ancient times, in pity to their own, 
 Romance. In Talbot we united saw 
 The piercing eye, the quick enlightened soul. 
 The graceful ease, the flowing tongue of Greece, 
 Joined to the virtues and the force of Rome. 20 
 
 Eternal Wisdom, that all-quickening sun. 
 Whence every life ui just proportion draws 
 Directing light and actuating flame, 
 Ne'er with a larger portion of its beams 
 Awakened mortal clay. Hence steady, calm. 
 Diffusive, deep, and clear his reason saw 
 With instantaneous view the truth of things ; 
 Chief what to human life and human bhss 
 Pertains, that kindest science, fit for man : 
 And hence, responsive to his knowledge, glowed 30 
 His ai-dent virtue. Ignorance and vice 
 III consort foul agree, each heightening each ; 
 While virtue draws from knowledge nobler fixe, 
 Is knowledge of true pleasure, proved by deeds. 
 
 What grand, what comely, and what tender sense, 
 \Miat talent, and what virtue was not his ? 
 All that can render man or great or good. 
 Give useful worth, or amiable grace ? 
 Xor could he brook in studious shade to lie 
 In soft retirement indolently pleased 40 
 
 With selfisJi peace. The Syren of the wise 
 
446 MEMORIAL VERSES 
 
 (Who steals the Aonian song, and in the shape 
 
 Of Virtue woos them from a worthless world) 
 
 Though deep he felt her charms, could never melt 
 
 His strenuous spirit, recollected, calm 
 
 As silent night, yet active as the day. 
 
 The more the bold, the bustling, and the bad 
 
 Usurp the reins of power, the more behoves, 
 
 Becomes it virtue with indignant zeal 
 
 To check their conjuration. Shall low views 50 
 
 Of sneaking interest or luxurious vice. 
 
 The villain's passions, quicken more to toil. 
 
 And dart a hvelier vigour through the soul, 
 
 Than those that, mingled with our truest good. 
 
 With present honour and immortal fame, 
 
 Involve the good of aU ? An empty form. 
 
 Vain is the virtue that amid the shade 
 
 Lamenting lies, with future schemes amused, 
 
 While wickedness and folly, kindred powers, 
 
 Confound the world. A Talbot's, different far, 60 
 
 Sprung into action — action, that disdained 
 
 To lose in Uving death one pulse of life. 
 
 That might be saved ; disdained, for coward ease 
 
 And her insipid pleasures, to resign 
 
 The prize of glory, the keen sweets of toil. 
 
 And those high joys that teach the truly great 
 
 To live for others, and for others die. 
 
 Early, behold ! he breaks benign on life. 
 Not breathing more beneficence, the spring 
 Leads in her swelling train the gentle airs : 70 
 
 WhUe gay behind her smiles the kindling waste 
 Of ruffian storms and Winter's lawless rage. 
 In him Astrea, to this dim abode 
 Of ever-wandering men, returned again — 
 To bless them his delight, to bring them back 
 From thorny error, from unjoyous wrong. 
 
TO THE MEMORY OF LORD TALBOT 447 
 
 Into the paths of kind primeval faith, 
 
 Of happiness and justice. All his parts, 
 
 His virtues aU collected sought the good 
 
 Of humankind. For that he fervent felt 8c 
 
 The throb of patriots, when they model states : 
 
 Anxious for that, nor needful sleep could hold 
 
 His stiU-awakened soul ; -nor friends had charms 
 
 To steal with pleasing guile an healing hour ; 
 
 Toil knew no languor, no attraction joy. 
 
 The common father such of erring men ! 
 
 A froward race ! incessant in pursuit 
 
 Of flying good or of fallacious bliss ; 
 
 StiU as they thwart and mingle in the chace. 
 
 Now fraud, now force, now cruelty and crimes, go 
 
 Attempting aU to seize a brother's prize ; 
 
 He sits superior to the little fray. 
 
 Detects the legal snares of mazy guile. 
 
 With the proud mighty bids the feeble cope, 
 
 And into social life the villain daunts. 
 
 Be named, victorious ravagers, no more ! 
 
 Vanish, ye human comets ! shrink your blaze ! 
 
 Ye that your glory to your terrors owe. 
 
 As, o'er the gazing desolated earth. 
 
 You scatter famine, pestilence, and war ; loo 
 
 Vanish ! before this vernal sun of fame. 
 
 Effulgent sweetness ! beaming life and joy. 
 
 How the heart listened while he pleading spoke ! 
 While on the enlightened mind, with winning art. 
 His gentle reason so persuasive stole 
 That the charmed hearer thought it was his own. 
 Ah ! when, ye studious of the laws, again 
 Shall such enchanting lessons bless your ear ? 
 When shall again the darkest truths, perplexed, 
 Be set in ample day ? Again the harsh no 
 
 And arduous open into smiling ease ? 
 
448 MEMORIAL VERSES 
 
 The solid mix with elegant delight ? 
 
 To him the purest eloquence indulged 
 
 Eternal treasure, light and heat combined, 
 
 At once to pour conviction on the soul. 
 
 And mould with lawful flame the impassioned heart. 
 
 That dangerous gift, which to the strictly just 
 
 And good alone belongs, lay safe with him 
 
 Reposed. He sacred to his country's cause, 
 
 To trampled want and worth, to suffering right, 120 
 
 To the lone widow's and her orphan's woes. 
 
 Reserved the mighty charm With equal brow, 
 
 Despising then the smiles or frowns of power, 
 
 He all that noblest eloquence effused 
 
 Which wakes the tender or exalting tear, 
 
 When generous passions, taught by reason, speak. 
 
 Then spoke the man, and over barren art 
 
 Prevailed abundant nature. Freedom then 
 
 His client was, humanity and truth. 
 
 Placed on the seat of justice, there he reigned 
 In a superior sphere of cloudless day, 131 
 
 A pure intelligence. No tumult there. 
 No dark emotion, no intemperate heat. 
 No passion e'er disturbed the clear serene 
 That round him spread. A zeal for right alone. 
 The love of justice, like the steady sun 
 Unbating ardour lent ; and now and then. 
 Against the sons of violence, of pride. 
 And bold deceit his indignation gleamed. 
 As intuition quick, he snatched the truth, 140 
 
 Yet with progressive patience, step by step. 
 Self-diffident, or to the slower kind. 
 He through the maze of falsehood traced it on. 
 Till, at the last evolved, it full appeared. 
 And e'en the loser owned the just decree. 
 
 But, when in senates he, to freedom firm. 
 
TO THE MEMORY OF LORD TALBOT 449 
 
 Enlightened freedom, planned salubrious laws, 
 His various learning, his wide knowledge then 
 His insight deep into Britannia's weal. 
 Spontaneous seemed from simple sense to flow, 150 
 And the plain patriot smoothed the brow of law. 
 No specious swell, no frothy pomp of words 
 Fell on the cheated ear ; no studied maze 
 Of declamation to perplex the right 
 He darkening threw around : safe in itself, 
 In its own force, almighty Reason spoke ; 
 While on the great, the ruling point, at once 
 He streamed decisive day, and showed it vain 
 To lengthen farther out the clear debate. 
 Conviction breathes conviction ; to the heart, 160 
 Poured ardent forth in eloquence unbid, 
 The heart attends : for, let the venal try 
 Their every hardening stupefying art, 
 Truth must prevail, zeal will enkindle zeal, 
 And Nature, skilful touched, is honest still. 
 Behold him in the councils of his prince. 
 What faithful light he lends ! How rare in courts 
 Such wisdom ! such abilities ! and, joined 
 To virtue so determined, public zeal. 
 And honour of such adamantine proof 170 
 
 As even corruption, hopeless and o'erawed. 
 Durst not have tempted ! Yet of manners mild. 
 And winning every heart, he knew to please, 
 Nobly to please ; while equally he scorned 
 Or adulation to receive or give. 
 Happy the state where wakes a ruling eye 
 Of such inspection keen and general care 
 Beneath a guard so vigilant, so pure. 
 All-trusted, all-revered, and all-beloved, 
 Toil may resign his careless head to rest, 180 
 
 And ever-jealous freedom sleep in peace, 
 
 THOMSON G g 
 
450 MEMORIAL VERSES 
 
 Ah ! lost untimely ! lost in downward days ! 
 And many a patriot counsel with him lost ! 
 Counsels, that might have humbled Britain's foe, 
 Her native foe, from eldest time by fate 
 Appointed, as did once a Talbot's arms. 
 
 Let learning, arts, let universal worth 
 Lament a patron lost, a friend and judge — 
 Unlike the sons of vanity, that, veiled 
 Beneath the patron's prostituted name, 190 
 
 Dare sacrifice a worthy man to pride. 
 And flush confusion o'er an honest cheek. 
 Obliged when he obliged, it seemed a debt 
 Which he to merit, to the public, paid, 
 That can alone by virtue stationed high 
 Recover fame ; to his own heart a debt. 
 And to the great all-bounteous Source of good ! 
 The gracious flood that cheers the lettered world 
 Is not the noisy gift of summer's noon, 
 Whose sudden current from the naked root 200 
 
 Washes the little soil which yet remained. 
 And only more dejects the blushing flowers : 
 No, 'tis the soft-descending dews at eve. 
 The silent treasures of the vernal year 
 Indulging deep their stores the still night long — 
 Till with returning morn the freshened world 
 Is fragrance all, all beauty, joy, and song. 
 
 Still let me view him in the pleasing hght 
 Of private life, where pomp forgets to glare, 
 And where the plain unguarded soul is seen. 210 
 Not only there most amiable, best. 
 But with that truest greatness he appeared, 
 Which thinks not of appearing ; kindly veiled 
 In the soft graces of the friendly scene, 
 Inspiring social confidence and ease. 
 As free the converse of the wise and good, 
 
TO THE MEMORY OF LORD TALBOT 451 
 
 As joyous, disentangling every power, 
 And breathing mixed improvement with delight, 
 As when amid the various-blossomed spring, 
 Or gentle beaming autumn's pensive shade, 220 
 
 The philosophic mind with nature talks. 
 Say ye, his sons, his dear remains, with whom 
 The father laid superfluous state aside. 
 Yet swelled your filial duty thence the more, 
 With friendship swelled it, with esteem, with love, 
 Beyond the ties of blood, oh ! speak the joy, 
 The pure serene, the cheerful wisdom mild. 
 The virtuous spirit, which his vacant hours 
 In semblance of amusement through the breast 
 Infused. And thou, Rundle ! lend thy strain, 230 
 Thou darling friend ! thou brother of his soul ! 
 In whom the head and heart their stores unite — 
 Whatever fancy paints, invention pours. 
 Judgement digests, the well-tuned bosom feels, 
 Truth natural, moral, or divine has taught. 
 The virtues dictate, or the Muses sing. 
 Lend me the plaint, which, to the lonely main, 
 With memory conversing, you will pour. 
 As on the pebbled shore you pensive stray 
 Where Derry's mountains a bleak crescent form, 240 
 And mid their ample round receive the waves 
 That from the frozen pole, resounding, rush 
 Impetuous. Though from native sunshine driven. 
 Driven from your friends, the sunshine of the soul, 
 By slanderous zeal and pohtics infirm. 
 Jealous of worth ; yet will you bless your lot. 
 Yet will you triumph in your glorious fate. 
 Whence Talbot's friendship glows to future times. 
 Intrepid, warm ; of kindred tempers born ; 
 Nursed by experience into slow esteem, 25c 
 
 Calm confidence unbounded love not blind, 
 Gg2 
 
452 MEMORIAL VERSES 
 
 And the sweet light from mingled minds disclosed. 
 From mingled chymic oils as bursts the fire. 
 
 I too remember well that mental bowl 
 Which round his table flowed. The serious there 
 Mixed with the sportive, with the learned the plain ; 
 Mirth softened wisdom, candour tempered mirth, 
 And wit its honey lent without the sting. 
 Not simple nature's unaffected sons. 
 The blameless Indians, round their forest cheer, 260 
 In sunny lawn or shady covert set, 
 Hold more unspotted converse ; nor, of old, 
 Rome's awful consuls, her dictator-swains, 
 As on the product of their Sabine farms 
 They fared, with stricter virtue fed the soul : 
 Nor yet in Athens, at an Attic meal. 
 Where Socrates presided, fairer truth. 
 More elegant humanity, more grace. 
 Wit more refined, or deeper science reigned. 
 
 But far beyond the little vulgar bounds 270 
 
 Of family, of friends, of country kind. 
 By just degrees and with proportioned flame 
 Extended his benevolence : a friend 
 To humankind, to parent nature's works. 
 Of free access, and of engaging grace. 
 Such as a brother to a brother owes, 
 He kept an open judging ear for all. 
 And spread an open countenance where smiled 
 The fair effulgence of an open heart ; 
 While on the rich, the poor, the high, the low 280 
 With equal ray his ready goodness shone : 
 For nothing human foreign was to him. 
 
 Thus to a dread inheritance, my Lord, 
 And hard to be supported, you succeed : 
 But, kept by virtue, as by virtue gained. 
 
TO THE MEMORY OF LORD TALBOT 453 
 
 It will through latest time enrich your race, 
 When grosser wealth shall moulder into dust, 
 And with their authors in oblivion sunk 
 Vain titles lie, the servile badges oft 
 Of mean submission, not the meed of worth 290 
 True genuine honour its large patent holds 
 Of all mankind, through every land and age. 
 Of universal reason's various sons. 
 And even of God himself, sole perfect Judge ! 
 Who sees with other eyes than flattering men. 
 Meantime these noblest honours of the mind 
 On rigid terms descend : the high-placed heir, 
 Scanned by the public eye, that with keen gaze 
 Malignant seeks out faults, cannot through life 
 Amid the nameless insects of a court, 300 
 
 If such to life belong, unheeded steal : 
 He must be glorious, or he must be base. 
 This truth to you, who merit well to bear 
 A name to Britons dear, the officious muse 
 May safely sing, and sing without reserve. 
 
 Vain were the plaint, and ignorant the tear 
 That should a Talbot mourn. Ourselves, indeed, 
 Our sinking country, humankind enslaved. 
 We may lament. But let us, grateful, joy 
 That ere such virtues gave our days to shine, 310 
 Above the dark abyss of modern time. 
 That we such virtues knew, such virtues felt. 
 And feel them still, teaching our views to rise 
 Through ever-brightening scenes of future worlds. 
 Be dumb, ye worst of zealots ! ye that, prone 
 To thoughtless dust, renounce that generous hope. 
 Whence every joy below its spirit draws. 
 And every pain its balm : a Talbot's light, 
 A Talbot's virtues claim another source 
 Than the blind maze of undesigning blood ; 320 
 
454 MEMORIAL VERSES 
 
 Nor, when that vital fountain plays no more, 
 Can they be quenched amid the gelid stream. 
 
 Methnks I see his mounting spirit, freed 
 From tangling earth, regain the realms of day 
 Its native country ; whence to bless mankind 
 Eternal goodness on this darksome spot 
 Had rayed it down a while. Behold ! approved 
 By the tremendous Judge of heaven and earth. 
 And to the Almighty Father's presence joined. 
 Whose smile creative beams superior Ufe, 33° 
 
 He takes his rank in glory and in bliss 
 Amid the human worthies. Glad around 
 Crowd his compatriot shades, and point him out 
 With noble pride Britannia's blameless boast. 
 Ah ! who is he that with a fonder eye 
 Meets thine enraptured ? — 'Tis the best of sons ! 
 The best of friends ! Too soon is realized 
 That hope which once forbad thy tears to flow ! 
 Meanwhile the kindred souls of every land 
 (Howe'er divided in the fretful days 340 
 
 Of prejudice and error), mingled now. 
 In one selected never- jarring state, 
 Where God himself their only monarch reigns, 
 Partake the joy ; yet, such the sense that still 
 Remains of earthly woes, for us below 
 And for our loss they drop a pitying tear. 
 But cease, presumptuous muse, nor vainly strive 
 To quit this cloudy sphere that binds tlu^o down : 
 'Tis not for mortal hand to trace those hccuch — 
 Scenes, that our gross ideas grovelling cast 350 
 
 Behind, and strike our boldest language dumi). 
 
 Forgive, immortal shade ! if aught from earth. 
 From dust low-warbled, to those groves can rise 
 
TO THE MEMORY OF LORD TALBOT 455 
 
 Where flows unbidden harmony, forgive 
 
 This fond superfluous verse. With deep-felt voice, 
 
 On every heart impressed, thy deeds themselves 
 
 Attest thy praise. Thy praise the widow's sighs 
 
 And orphan's tears embalm. The good, the bad, 
 
 The sons of justice and the sons of strife, 
 
 AU that or freedom or that interest prize, 360 
 
 A deep-divided nation's parties all 
 
 Conspire to swell thy spotless praise to heaven. 
 
 They catch it there ; and to seraphic lyre 
 
 Celestial voices thy arrival hail. 
 
 How vain this tribute then ! this lowly lay ! 
 
 Yet nothing vain which gratitude inspires. 
 
 The muse, besides, her duty thus approves 
 
 To virtue, to her country, to mankind, 
 
 To forming nature, that in glorious charge, 
 
 As to her priestess, has it given to hymn 370 
 
 Whatever good and excellent she forms. 
 
 [The Lord Chancellor died in February, 1737. The text of 
 the memorial poem given above is that of 1738, as it appears in 
 Thomson's Works, 8vo, vol. ii, pp. 217-38, following lAherty : 
 the date on the title-page of vol. i is given 1744. Talbot, when 
 Thomson first knew him, was Solicitor-General ; he became Lord 
 Chancellor in 1733. It was in the end of 1730 that Thomson was 
 appointed tutor and travelling companion to young Charles Talbot, 
 eldest and name-son of the Solicitor-General. Young Talbot died 
 before his father's elevation to the Chancellorship. — Line 230; 
 Dr. Rundle, Bishop of Derry.] 
 
456 MEMORIAL VERSES 
 
 EPITAPH ON MISS ELIZABETH STANLEY, 
 
 IN HOLYEOOD CHUECH, SOUTHAMPTON 
 
 Heee, Stanley, rest ! escaped this mortal strife, 
 Above the joys, beyond the woes of life, 
 Fierce pangs no more thy lively beauties stain, 
 And sternly try thee with a year of pain ; 
 No more sweet patience, feigning oft relief. 
 Lights thy sick eye to cheat a parent's grief : 
 With tender art to save her anxious groan. 
 No more thy bosom presses down its own : 
 Now well-earned peace is thine, and bliss sincere : 
 Ours be the lenient, not unpleasing tear ! lo 
 
 born to bloom, then sink beneath the storm ; 
 To show us virtue in her fairest form ; 
 To show us artless reason's moral reign, 
 What boastful science arrogates in vain ; 
 The obedient passions knowing each their part ; 
 Calm light the head, and harmony the heart ! 
 
 Yes, we must follow soon, will glad obey ; 
 When a few suns have roUed their cares away. 
 Tired with vain life, will close the willing eye : 
 'Tis the great birthright of mankind to die. 20 
 
 Blest be the bark that wafts us to the shore 
 Where death-divided friends shall part no more : 
 To join thee there, here with thy dust repose, 
 Is all the hope thjr hapless mother knows. 
 
 [' A young lady well known to the author, who died at the age 
 of eighteen, in the year 1738. — T.' See note on lines 564 seqq. of 
 Summer.'\ 
 
457 
 
 A POEM TO THE MEMORY OP 
 MR. CONGREVE 
 
 ADVERTISEMENT 
 
 The author of the following poem, not having had the happiness 
 of a personal acquaintance with Mr. Congreve, is sensible that 
 he has drawn his private character very imperfectly. This all 
 his friends will readily discover : and, therefore, if any one of 
 them had thought fit to do justice to those amiable qualifica- 
 tions, which made him the love and admiration of all that knew 
 him, these verses had never seen the hght. 
 [Assigned to Thomson, on unsatisfactory evidence, by H. R 
 
 Gary. First published in 1729, anonymously. Congreve died 
 
 in January, 1729.] 
 
 Oft has the muse, with mean attempt, employed 
 Her heaven-born voice to flatter prosperous guilt 
 Or trivial greatness — often stooped her song 
 To soothe ambition in his frantic rage, 
 The dire destroyer ! while a bleeding world 
 Wept o'er his crimes. Of this pernicious skill 
 Unknowing, I these voluntary lays 
 To genuine worth devote — to worth by all 
 Confessed and mourned — to Congreve now no more. 
 
 First of the fairer kind ! by heaven adorned lo 
 With every nobler praise, whose smile can lift 
 The muse unknown to fame, indulgent now 
 Permit her strain, ennobled by a name. 
 To all the better few, and chief to thee, 
 Bright Marlborough, ever sacred, ever dear. 
 
 Lamented shade ! in him the comic muse, 
 Parent of gay instruction, lost her loved, 
 Her last remaining hope ; and pensive now 
 Resigns to folly and his mimic rout 
 Her throne usurped — presage of darker times, 20 
 And deeper woes to come ! with taste declined 
 
458 MEMORIAL VERSES 
 
 Fallen virtue droops ; and o'er the ill-omened age, 
 
 Unseen, unfeared, impend the thousand ills 
 
 That wait on ignorance : no Congreve now 
 
 To scourge our crimes, or laugh to scorn our fools, 
 
 A new and nameless herd. Nature was his, 
 
 Bold, sprightly, various ; and superior art, 
 
 Curious to choose each better grace, unseen 
 
 Of vulgar eyes ; with delicacy free. 
 
 Though laboured happy, and though strong refined. 
 
 Judgement, severely cool, o'erlooked his toil, 31 
 
 And patient finished all ; each fair design 
 
 With freedom regular, correctly great, 
 
 A master's skilful daring. Closely wrought 
 
 His meaning fable, with deep art perplexed. 
 
 With striking ease unravelled ; no thin plot 
 
 Seen through at once and scorned ; or ill-concealed 
 
 By borrowed aids of mimicry and farce. 
 
 His characters strong-featured, equal, just, 
 
 From finer nature drawn ; and all the mind 40 
 
 Through all her mazes traced ; each darker vice. 
 
 And darling folly, under each disguise. 
 
 By either sex assumed, of studied ease. 
 
 False friendship, loose severity, vain wit. 
 
 Dull briskness, shallow depth, or coward rage. 
 
 Of the whole muse possessed, his piercing eye 
 
 Discerned each richer vein of genuine mirth. 
 
 Humour or wit ; where differing, where agreed ; 
 
 How counterfeited, or by folly's grin 
 
 Or affectation's air ; and what their force 50 
 
 To please, to move, to shake the ravished scene 
 
 With laughter unreproved. To him the soul, 
 
 In all her higher workings, too, was known ; 
 
 What passions' tumult there ; whence their prompt 
 
 spring. 
 Their sudden flood of rage, and gradual fall ; 
 
TO THE MEMORY OP MR. CONGREVE 459 
 
 Infinite motion ! source supreme of bliss 
 Or woe to man ; our heaven or hell below ! 
 
 Such was his pubUc name ; nor less allowed 
 His private worth ; by nature made for praise. 
 A pleasing form ; a soul sincere and clear, 60 
 
 Where all the human graces mixed their charms, 
 Pure candour, easy goodness, open truth. 
 Spontaneous all : where strength and beauty joined, 
 With wit indulgent ; humble in the height 
 Of envied honours ; and, but rarely found, 
 The unjealous friend of every rival worth. 
 Adorned for social life, each talent his 
 To win each heart ; the charm of happy ease, 
 Free mirth, gay earning, ever smiling wit. 
 To all endeared, a pleasure without pain ; 70 
 
 What Halifax approved, and Marlborough mourns. 
 
 Not so the ilhberal mind, where knowledge dwells 
 Uncouth and harsh, with her attendant, pride, 
 Impatient of attention, prone to blame, 
 Disdaining to be pleased ; condemning all. 
 By all condemned ; for social joys unfit, 
 In soUtude seH-cursed, the child of spleen. 
 Obliged, ungrateful ; unobhged, a foe. 
 Poor, vicious, old ; such fierce-eyed Asper was. 
 Now meaner Genus, trivial with design, 80 
 
 Courts poor applause by levity of face, 
 And scorn of serious thought ; to mischief prompt. 
 Though impotent to wound ; profuse of wealth 
 Yet friendless and unloved ; vain, fluttering, false, 
 A vacant head, and an ungenerous heart. 
 
 But slighting these ignoble names, the muse 
 Pursues her favourite son, and sees him now, 
 Erom this dim spot enlarged, triumphant soar 
 Beyond the walk of time to better worlds. 
 Where all is new, all wondrous, and all blest ! 90 
 
460 MEMORIAL VERSES 
 
 What art thou, death ! by mankind poorly feared, 
 
 Yet period of their ills. On thy near shore, 
 
 Trembling they stand, and see through dreaded mists 
 
 The eternal port, irresolute to leave 
 
 This various misery, these air-fed dreams 
 
 Which men call life and fame. Mistaken minds ! 
 
 'Tis reason's prime aspiring, greatly just ; 
 
 'Tis happiness supreme, to venture forth 
 
 In quest of nobler worlds ; to try the deeps 
 
 Of dark futurity, with Heaven our guide, loo 
 
 The unerring hand that led us safe through time ; 
 
 That planted in the soul this powerful hope. 
 
 This infinite ambition of new life 
 
 And endless joys, still rising, ever new. 
 
 These Congreve tastes, safe on the ethereal coast, 
 Joined to the numberless immortal quire 
 Of spirits blest. High-seated among these. 
 He sees the public fathers of mankind. 
 The greatly good, those universal minds 
 Who drew the sword, or planned the holy scheme, 
 For liberty and right, to check the rage m 
 
 Of blood-stained tyranny and save a world. 
 Such, high-born Marlborough, be thy sire divine 
 With wonder named ; fair freedom's champion he, 
 By Heaven approved, a conqueror without guilt, 
 And such, on earth his friend, and joined on high 
 By deathless love, Godolphin's patriot worth, 
 Just to his country's fame, yet of her wealth 
 With honour frugal ; above interest great. 
 Hail men immortal ! social virtues hail ! 120 
 
 First heirs of praise ! — But I, with weak essay. 
 Wrong the superior theme ; while heavenly quires. 
 In strains high-warbled to celestial-harps. 
 Resound your names ; and Congreve' s added voice 
 In Heaven exalts what he admired below. 
 
TO THE MEMORY OF MR. CONGREVE 461 
 
 With these he mixes, now no more to swerve 
 From reason's purest law ; no more to please, 
 Borne by the torrent down, a sensual age. 
 Pardon, loved shade, that I with friendly blame 
 Slight note thy error ; not to wrong thy worth 130 
 Or shade thy memory (far from my soul 
 Be that base aim !), but haply to deter 
 From flattering the gross vulgar future pens 
 Powerful like thine in every grace, and skilled 
 To win the listening soul with virtuous charms. 
 
 If manly thought and wit refined may hope 
 To please an age in aimless folly sunk. 
 And sliding swift into the depth of vice ! 
 Consuming pleasure leads the gay and young 
 Through their vain round, and venal faith the old, 
 Or avarice mean of soul ; instructive arts 141 
 
 Pursued no more ; the general taste extinct, 
 Or all debased ; even sacred liberty 
 The great man's jest, and Britain's welfare named. 
 By her degenerate sons, the poet's dream. 
 Or fancy's air-built vision, gaily vain. 
 Such the lost age ; yet still the muse can find, 
 Superior and apart, a sacred band. 
 Heroic virtues, who ne'er bowed the knee 
 To sordid interest ; who dare greatly claim 150 
 The privilege of men, unfearing truth. 
 And freedom, heaven's first gift ; the ennobhng bhss 
 That renders life of price, and cheaply saved 
 At life's expense ; our sum of happiness. 
 On these the drooping muses fix their eyes ; 
 From these expect their ancient fame restored. 
 Nor will the hope be vain ; the public weal 
 With theirs fast linked ; a generous truth concealed 
 From narrow-thoughted power, and known alone 
 To souls of highest rank. With these, the fair 160 
 
462 MEMORIAL VERSES 
 
 Be joined in just applause ; the brighter few, 
 Who, raised above gay folly, and the whirl 
 Of fond amusements, emulate thy praise. 
 Illustrious Marlborough! pleased, like thee, to shine 
 Propitious on the muse ; whose charms inspire 
 Her noblest raptures, and whose goodness crowns. 
 
 [The piece is forced and rhetorical throughout, the composition 
 stiff, the j udgement often erroneous or insincere, and the flattery 
 fulsome. Mallet may have -written it — never Thomson. The 
 verses were dedicated to ' Her Grace, Henrietta, Duchess of 
 Marlborough,' eldest surviving daughter of the great Duke. 
 J. Millan was the publisher. — At line 71, the reference is to Charles 
 Montagu, Earl of Halifax. — Lines 79, 80: Asper and Cenus have 
 not been identified. — Line 117 : the Duchess of Marlborough had 
 married the son of Godolphin, the great statesman.] 
 
EPISTLES 
 
 TO DODINGTON 
 
 THE HAPPy MAN 
 
 [Printed in Ralph's Miscellany in 1729. It was to Dodington 
 Thomson dedicated Summer.'] 
 
 He's not the happy man to whom is given 
 
 A plenteous fortune by indulgent Heaven ; 
 
 Whose gilded roofs on shining columns rise, 
 
 And painted walls enchant the gazer's eyes ; 
 
 Whose table flows with hospitable cheer, 
 
 And all the various bounty of the year ; 
 
 Whose valleys smile, whose gardens breathe the 
 
 Spring, 
 Whose curved mountains bleat, and forests sing ; 
 For whom the cooling shade in Summer twines, 
 While his full cellars give their generous wines ; lo 
 From whose wide fields unbounded Autumn pours 
 A golden tide into his swelling stores : 
 Whose Winter laughs ; for whom the liberal gales 
 Stretch the big sheet, and toiling commerce sails ; 
 Whom yielding crowds attend, and pleasure serves. 
 While youth, and health, and vigour string his nerves ; 
 Even not all these, in one rich lot combined. 
 Can make the happy man, without the mind ; 
 Where judgement sits clear-sighted, and surveys 
 The chain of reason with unerring gaze ; 20 
 
 Where fancy lives, and to the brightening eyes 
 Bids fairer scenes and bolder figures rise ; 
 
464 EPISTLES 
 
 Where social love exerts her soft command 
 And lays the passions with a tender hand, 
 Whence every virtue flows, in rival strife, 
 And all the moral harmony of life. 
 
 Nor canst thou, Dodington, this truth decline. 
 Thine is the fortune, and the mind is thine. 
 
 [The opening lines of this short piece remind one of the opening 
 lines of Horace's 18th Ode, Lib. II — 
 
 ' Non ebur neque aureum 
 
 Mea renidet in domo lacunar,' &c.] 
 
 TO HIS KOYAL HIGHNESS THE PRINCE 
 OF WALES 
 
 [On the birth of the Princess Augusta, July 31, 1737.] 
 
 While secret-leaguing nations frown around, 
 Ready to pour the long-expected storm — 
 
 While she who wont the restless Gaul to bound, 
 Britannia, drooping, grows an empty form — 
 
 While on our vitals selfish parties prey 
 
 And deep corruption eats our soul away — 
 
 Yet in the goddess of the main appears 
 A gleam of joy, gay-flushing every grace, 
 
 As she the cordial voice of millions hears. 
 
 Rejoicing zealous o'er thy rising race. lo 
 
 Straight her rekindling eyes resume their fire, 
 
 The virtues smile, the muses tune the lyre. 
 
 But more enchanting than the muse's song. 
 United Britons thy dear offspring hail : 
 
 The city triumphs through her glowing throng. 
 The shepherd tells his transport to the dale ; 
 
 The sons of roughest toil forget their pain, 
 
 And the glad sailor cheers the midnight main. 
 
TO THE PRINCE OP WALES 465 
 
 Can aught from fair Augusta's gentle blood, 
 
 And thine, thou friend of liberty ! be born — 20 
 
 Can aught save what is lovely, generous, good — 
 What will at once defend us and adorn ? 
 
 From thence prophetic joy new Edwards eyes; 
 
 New Henries, Annas, and Elizas rise. 
 
 May fate my fond devoted days extend 
 To sing the promised glories of thy reign ! 
 
 What though, by years depressed, my muse might 
 bend ? 
 My heart will teach her stiU a nobler strain : 
 
 How with recovered Britain wiU she soar. 
 
 When Prance insults, and Spain shall rob no more. 30 
 
 [These lines (which have been attributed to Thomson) appeared 
 in The Gentleman's Magazine in September, 1737.] 
 
 TO THE REV. PATRICK MURDOCH 
 
 Tntrs safely low, my friend, thou canst not fall : 
 
 Here reigns a deep tranquillity o'er all ; 
 
 No noise, no care, no vanity, no strife ; 
 
 Men, woods, and fields, all breathe untroubled life. 
 
 Then keep each passion down, however dear ; 
 
 Trust me, the tender are the most severe. 
 
 Guard, while 'tis thine, thy philosophic ease. 
 
 And ask no joy but that of virtuous peace ; 
 
 That bids defiance to the storms of fate : 
 
 High bliss is only for a higher state ! 10 
 
 [These lines were probably written shortly after Murdoch's 
 appointment as Rector of Stradishall, Suffolk, in 1738. See Note 
 to The Incomparable Soporific Doctor, p. 467.] 
 
 Hh 
 
466 EPISTLES 
 
 LINES SENT TO 
 GEORGE LYTTELTON, ESQ. 
 
 SOON AFTER THE DEATH OF HIS WIFE: 
 
 WRITTEN IN A COPY OF ' THE SEASONS '. 
 
 Go, little book, and find our friend, 
 Who nature and the muses loves. 
 
 Whose cares the public virtues blend 
 With all the softness of the groves. 
 
 A fitter time thou canst not choose 
 His fostering friendship to repay ; 
 
 Go then, and try, my rural muse, 
 To steal his widowed hours away. 
 
 [See Note to line 906 of Spring.] 
 
 TO MRS. MENDEZ' BIRTHDAY 
 
 Who was born on Valentine's Day. 
 
 TmNB is the gentle day of love 
 
 When youths and virgins try their fate ; 
 When, deep retiring to the grove. 
 
 Each feathered songster weds his mate. 
 
 With tempered beams the skies are bright, 
 Earth decks in smiles her pleasing face ; 
 
 Such is the day that gave thee light. 
 And speaks as such thy every grace. 
 
467 
 
 TO THE INCOMPARABLE SOPORIFIC 
 DOCTOR 
 
 [The Rev. Dr. Patrick Murdoch, Thomson's old and intimate 
 friend and countryman— afterwards his kindly biographer. 
 He was presented to the living of Stradishall in Suffolk in 1737-8 
 by Admiral Vernon, of Great Thurlow, to whose sou he had 
 been tutor. In 1760 he became vicar of Great Thurlow, where 
 he wrote his memoir of the poet. See Note to Stanza LXIX, 
 Canto I, of The Castle of Indolence.] 
 
 Sweet, sleeky Doctor ! dear pacific soul ! 
 Lay at the beef, and suck the vital bowl ! 
 Still let the involving smoke around thee fly, 
 And broad-looked dullness settle in thine eye. 
 Ah ! soft in down those dainty limbs repose, 
 And in the very lap of slumber doze ; 
 But chiefly on the lazy day of grace, 
 Call forth the lambent glories of thy face ; 
 If aught the thoughts of dinner can prevail — 
 And sure the Sunday's dinner cannot fail. lo 
 
 To the thin church in sleepy pomp proceed, 
 And lean on the lethargic book thy head. 
 Those eyes wipe often with the hallowed lawn, 
 Profoundly nod, immeasurably yawn. 
 Slow let the prayers by thy meek lips be sung. 
 Nor let thy thoughts be distanced by thy tongue 
 If e'er the lingerers are within a caU, 
 Or if on prayers thou deign'st to think at aU. 
 Yet — only yet — the swimming head we bend ; 
 But when serene, the pulpit you ascend, so 
 
 Through every joint a gentle horror creeps, 
 And round you the consenting audience sleeps. 
 So when an ass with sluggish front appears. 
 The horses start, and prick their quivering ears ; 
 But soon as e'er the sage is heard to bray, 
 The fields aU thunder, and they bound away. 
 Hh 2 
 
468 EPISTLES 
 
 TO SERAPHINA 
 
 The wanton's charms, however bright, 
 Are like the false illusive light 
 Whose flattering unauspicious blaze 
 To precipices oft betrays. 
 
 But that sweet ray your beauties dart. 
 
 Which clears the mind and cleans the heart, 
 
 Is like the sacred queen of night 
 
 Who pours a lovely gentle light 
 
 Wide o'er the dark — by wanderers blest, 
 
 Conducting them to peace and rest. lo 
 
 A vicious love depraves the mind ; 
 'Tis anguish, guilt, and folly joined ; 
 But Seraphina's eyes dispense 
 A mild and gracious influence. 
 Such as in visions angels shed 
 Around the heaven-iUumined head. 
 
 To love thee, Seraphina, sure 
 
 Is to be tender, happy, pure ; 
 
 'Tis from low passions to escape, 
 
 And woo bright virtue's fairest shape ; 20 
 
 'Tis ecstasy with wisdom joined. 
 
 And heaven infused into the mind. 
 
469 
 TO AMANDA 
 
 IN IMITATION OF TIBULLTTS 
 
 Hue ades, et tenerae morbos expelle puellae, 
 Hue ades, intonsa Phoebe superbe coma, &c. 
 
 TibuUi Lib. IV, Car. iv. 
 
 Come, healing god ! Apollo, come and aid. 
 Moved by the tears of love, my tender maid ! 
 No more let sickness dim those radiant eyes 
 Which never know to cheat or to disguise. 
 If e'er my verse has pleased thy hstening ear, 
 now be friendly, now propitious hear ! 
 Bring every virtuous herb, each root and flower 
 Of coohng juice and salutary power. 
 Light is the task : to touch a hand so fair, 
 Divine physician, will repay thy care. lo 
 
 My tears are fled ; the god my suit approves ; 
 He can't be wretched who sincerely loves. 
 Protecting Heaven, with more than common care. 
 Smiles on his hopes and guards him from despair. 
 
 Raise from the pillow, raise thy languid head ; 
 Come forth, my love, and quit thy sickly bed ! 
 Come forth, my love ! for thee the balmy Spring 
 Breathes every sweet ; for thee the zephyrs bring 
 Their healing gales ; for thee the graces lead 
 The smiling hours, and paint the flowery mead. 2c 
 As nature, drooping long beneath the reign 
 Of dreary winter, now revives again, 
 Calls aU her beauties out, and charms us more 
 From what we suffered in their loss before ; 
 So from thy tedious iUness shalt thou rise 
 More sweetly fair ; and in those languid eyes 
 And faded cheeks returning health shall place 
 A fresher bloom and more attractive grace. 
 
470 EPISTLES 
 
 Then shall my bounding heart forget its woe, 
 And think it never more a pain can know ; 3° 
 
 Then shall my muse thy charms more gaily sing, 
 And hail thee as the nightingale the spring. 
 
 TO AMANDA 
 
 Ah ! urged too late, from beauty's bondage free, 
 Why did I trust my liberty with thee ? 
 And thou, why didst thou with inhuman art, 
 If not resolved to take, seduce my heart ? 
 Yes, yes ! you said — for lovers' eyes speak true ; 
 You must have seen how fast my passion grew : 
 And, when your glances chanced on me to shine, 
 How my fond soul ecstatic sprung to thine ! 
 
 But mark me, fair one ! what I now declare 
 Thy deep attention claims and serious care : lo 
 It is no common passion fires my breast — 
 I must be wretched, or I must be blest ! 
 My woes all other remedy deny — 
 Or pitying give me hope, or bid me die ! 
 
 [These lines were first printed in Lord Buchan's Essay on 
 Thomson.] 
 
 TO AMANDA, 
 
 WITH A COPY OF 'THE SEASONS' 
 
 Accept, loved Nymph, this tribute due 
 
 To tender friendship, love, and you ; 
 
 But with it take what breathed the whole, 
 
 take to thine the poet's soul. 
 
 If fancy here her power displays, 
 
 And if a heart exalts these lays. 
 
 You fairest in that fancy shine. 
 
 And aU that heart is fondly thine. 
 
MISCELLANEOUS POEMS 
 
 BRITANNIA : 
 
 A POEM 
 
 [Written in 1727, published in January, 1729.] 
 
 Et tantas audetis tollere moles ? 
 
 Quos ego — sed motes praestat componere fluctus. 
 
 Post mihi non simiU poena commissa luetis. 
 
 Maturate fugam, regique haeo dicite vestro : 
 
 Non illi imperium pelagi, saevumque tridentem, 
 
 Sed mihi sorte datum. Virgil, Aeneid, i. 134. 
 
 As on the sea-beat shore Britannia sat, 
 Of her degenerate sons the faded fame 
 Deep in her anxious heart revolving sad- 
 Bare was her throbbing bosom to the gale, 
 That, hoarse and hollow, from the bleak surge blew ; 
 Loose flowed her tresses ; rent her azure robe. 
 Hung o'er the deep from her majestic brow 
 She tore the laurel, and she tore the bay. 
 Nor ceased the copious grief to bathe her cheek ; 
 Nor ceased her sobs to murmur to the main. lo 
 Peace discontented, nigh departing, stretched 
 Her dove-like wings ; and War, though greatly roused, 
 Yet mourns his fettered hands ; while thus the queen 
 Of nations spoke ; and what she said the muse 
 Recorded faithful in unbidden verse : — 
 
 ' Even not yon sail, that from the sky-mixed wave 
 Dawns on the sight, and wafts the royal youth, 
 A freight of future glory, to my shore ; 
 Even not the flattering view of golden days, 
 
472 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS 
 
 And rising periods yet of bright renown, 20 
 
 Beneath the Parents, and their endless hne 
 
 Through late revolving time, can soothe my rage ; 
 
 While, unchastised, the insulting Spaniard dares 
 
 Infest the trading flood, full of vain war 
 
 Despise my navies, and my merchants seize ; 
 
 As, trusting to false peace, they fearless roam 
 
 The world of waters wild ; made, by the toil. 
 
 And liberal blood of glorious ages, mine : 
 
 Nor bursts my sleeping thunder on their head. 
 
 Whence this unwonted patience ? this weak doubt ? 
 
 This tame beseeching of rejected peace ? 31 
 
 This meek forbearance ? this unnative fear. 
 
 To generous Britons never known before ? 
 
 And sailed my fleets for this — on Indian tides 
 
 To float, inactive, with the veering winds ? 
 
 The mockery of war ! while hot disease 
 
 And sloth distempered swept off burning crowds, 
 
 For action ardent ; and amid the deep. 
 
 Inglorious, sunk them in a watery grave. 
 
 There now they lie beneath the rolling flood, 40 
 
 Far from their friends, and country, unavenged ; 
 
 And back the drooping warship comes again. 
 
 Dispirited and thin ; her sons ashamed 
 
 Thus idly to review their native shore ; 
 
 With not one glory sparkling in their eye. 
 
 One triumph on their tongue. A passenger, 
 
 The violated merchant comes along — 
 
 That far sought wealth, for which the noxious gale 
 
 He drew, and sweat beneath equator suns — ' 
 
 By lawless force detained, a force that soon 50 
 
 Would melt away, and every spoil resign. 
 
 Were once the British hon heard to roar. 
 
 Whence is it that the proud Iberian thus 
 
 In their own well asserted element 
 
BRITANNIA 473 
 
 Dares rouse to wrath the masters of the main ? 
 
 Who told him that the big incumbent war 
 
 Would not, ere this, have rolled his trembling ports 
 
 In smoky ruin ? and his guilty stores, 
 
 Won by the ravage of a butchered world. 
 
 Yet unatoned, sunk in the swallowing deep, 60 
 
 Or led the glittering prize into the Thames ? 
 
 ' There was a time (oh, let my languid sons 
 Resume their spirit at the rousing thought !) 
 When all the pride of Spain, in one dread fleet, 
 Swelled o'er the labouring surge like a whole heaven 
 Of clouds wide-roUed before the boundless breeze. 
 Gaily the splendid armament along 
 Exultant ploughed, reflecting a red gleam. 
 As sunk the sun, o'er all the flaming vast ; 
 Tall, gorgeous, and elate ; drunk with the dream 70 
 Of easy conquest ; while their bloated war. 
 Stretched out from sky to sky, the gathered force 
 Of ages held in its capacious womb. 
 But soon, regardless of the cumbrous pomp, 
 My dauntless Britons came, a gloomy few. 
 With tempests black, the goodly scene deformed, 
 And laid their glory waste. The bolts of fate 
 Resistless thundered through their yielding sides ; 
 Fierce o'er their beauty blazed the lurid flame ; 
 And seized in horrid grasp, or shattered wide 80 
 Amid the mighty waters, deep they sunk. 
 Then too from every promontory chill. 
 Rank fen, and cavern where the wild wave works, 
 I swept confederate winds, and swelled a storm. 
 Round the glad isle, snatched by the vengeful blast,. 
 The scattered remnants drove ; on the blind shelve. 
 And pointed rock that marks the indented shore. 
 Relentless dashed, where loud the northern main 
 Howls through the fractured Caledonian isles. 
 
474 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS 
 
 ' Such were the dawnings of my liquid reign ; 
 But since, how vast it grew, how absolute, 91 
 
 Even in those troubled times when dreadful Blake 
 Awed angry nations with the British name. 
 Let every humbled state, let Europe say. 
 Sustained and balanced by my naval arm. 
 Ah, what must those immortal spirits think 
 Of your poor shifts ? Those, for their country's good. 
 Who faced the blackest danger, knew no fear. 
 No mean submission, but commanded peace — 
 Ah, how with indignation must they burn ! 100 
 (If aught but joy can touch ethereal breasts) 
 With shame ! with grief ! to see their feeble sons 
 Shrink from that empire o'er the conquered seas 
 For which their wisdom planned, their councils 
 
 glowed, 
 And their veins bled through many a toiling age. 
 
 ' Oh, first of human blessings, and supreme ! 
 Fair Peace ! how lovely, how delightful thou ! 
 By whose wide tie the kindred sons of men 
 Like brothers live, in amity combined 
 And unsuspicious faith ; while honest toil 110 
 
 Gives every joy, and to those joys a right. 
 Which idle, barbarous rapine but usurps. 
 Pure is thy reign ; when, unaccursed by blood. 
 Nought, save the sweetness of indulgent showers, 
 Trickling distUs into the vernant glebe ; 
 Instead of mangled carcasses, sad-seen, 
 When the blithe sheaves lie scattered o'er the field ; 
 When only shining shares, the crooked knife, 
 And hooks imprint the vegetable wound ; 
 When the land blushes with the rose alone, 120 
 
 The falling fruitage and the bleeding vine. 
 Oh, Peace ! thou source and soul of social life. 
 Beneath whose calm inspiring influence, 
 
BRITANNIA 475 
 
 Science his views enlarges, Art refines, 
 
 And swelling Commerce opens all her ports, 
 
 Blest be the man divine who gives us thee ! 
 
 Who bids the trumpet hush his horrid clang, 
 
 IjNTor blow the giddy nations into rage ; 
 
 Who sheathes the murderous blade ; the deadly gun 
 
 Into the well piled armoury returns ; 130 
 
 And every vigour from the work of death 
 
 To grateful industry converting, makes 
 
 The country flourish, and the city smile. 
 
 Unviolated, him the virgin sings ; 
 
 And him the smiling mother to her train. 
 
 Of him the shepherd in the peaceful dale 
 
 Chants ; and, the treasures of his labour sure, 
 
 The husbandman of him, as at the plough 
 
 Or team he toils. With him the sailor soothes, 
 
 Beneath the trembling moon, the midnight wave ; 
 
 And the full city, warm from street to street, 141 
 
 And shop to shop responsive, rings of him. 
 
 Nor joys one land alone : his praise extends 
 
 Far as the sun rolls the diffusive day. 
 
 Far as the breeze can bear the gifts of peace, 
 
 Till aU the happy nations catch the song. 
 
 ' What would not, Peace ! the patriot bear for 
 thee? 
 What painful patience ? what incessant care ? 
 What mixed anxiety ? what sleepless toil ? 
 Even from the rash protected what reproach ? 150 
 For he thy value knows ; thy friendship he 
 To human nature : but the better thou, 
 The richer of delight, sometimes the more 
 Inevitable war ; when ruffian force 
 Awakes the fury of an injured state. 
 Then the good easy man, whom reason rules. 
 Who, while unhurt, knew nor ofience nor harm, 
 
476 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS 
 
 Roused by bold insult, and injurious rage, 
 
 With sharp and sudden check the astonished sons 
 
 Of violence confounds ; firm as his cause, i6o 
 
 His bolder heart ; in awful justice clad ; 
 
 His eyes effulging a peculiar fire : 
 
 And, as he charges through the prostrate war, 
 
 His keen arm teaches faithless men, no more 
 
 To dare the sacred vengeance of the just. 
 
 ' And what, my thoughtless sons, should fire you 
 more 
 Than when your well-earned empire of the deep 
 The least beginning injury receives ? 
 What better cause can caU your hghtning forth ? 
 Your thunder wake ? your dearest Ufe demand ? 170 
 What better cause, than when your country sees 
 The sly destruction at her vitals aimed ? 
 Eor oh ! it much imports you, 'tis your aU, 
 To keep your trade entire, entire the force 
 And honour of your fleets — o'er that to watch, 
 Even with a hand severe and jealous eye. 
 In intercourse be gentle, generous, just. 
 By wisdom polished, and of manners fair ; 
 But on the sea be terrible, untamed. 
 Unconquerable stiU : let none escape 180 
 
 Who shall but aim to touch your glory there. 
 Is there the man into the hon's den 
 Who dares intrude, to snatch his young away ? 
 And is a Briton seized ? and seized beneath 
 The slumbering terrors of a British fleet ? 
 Then ardent rise ! Oh, great in vengeance, rise ! 
 O'erturn the proud, teach rapine to restore : 
 And, as you ride sublimely round the world, 
 Make every vessel stoop, make every state 
 At once their welfare and their duty know. 190 
 
 This is your glory, this your wisdom ; this 
 
BRITANNIA 477 
 
 The native power for which j'ou were designod 
 
 By fate, when fate designed the firmest state 
 
 That e'er was seated on the subject sea ; 
 
 A state, alone, where Liberty should live, 
 
 In these late times, this evening of mankind, 
 
 When Athens, Rome, and Carthage are no more, 
 
 The world almost in slavish sloth dissolved. 
 
 For this, these rocks around your coast were thrown ; 
 
 For this, your oaks, pecuUar hardened, shoot 200 
 
 Strong into sturdy growth : for this, j'our hearts 
 
 Swell with a sullen courage, growing still 
 
 As danger grows ; and strength, and toil for this 
 
 Are Uberal poured o'er all the fervent land. 
 
 Then cherish tliis, this unexpensive power, 
 
 Undangerous to the pubUc, ever prompt. 
 
 By lavish nature thrust into your hand : 
 
 And, unencumbered with the bulk immense 
 
 Of conquest, whence huge empires rose, and fell 
 
 Self-crushed, extend j'our reign from shore to shore. 
 
 Where'er the wind your high behests can blow; 21: 
 
 And fix it deep on this eternal base. 
 
 For, should the sliding fabric once give way, 
 
 Soon slackened quite, and past recovery broke, 
 
 It gathers ruin as it roUs along, 
 
 Steep rushing down to that devouring gulf 
 
 Where many a mighty empire buried Hes. 
 
 And should the big redundant flood of trade, 
 
 In which ten thousand thousand labours join 
 
 Their several currents, tiU the boundless tide 220 
 
 Rolls ia a radiant deluge o'er the land ; 
 
 Should this bright stream, the least inflected, point 
 
 Its course another way, o'er other lands 
 
 The various treasure would resistless pour. 
 
 Ne'er to be won again ; its ancient tract 
 
 Left a vile channel, desolate, and dead, 
 
478 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS 
 
 With all around a miserable waste. 
 
 Not Egypt, were her better heaven, the Nile, 
 
 Turned in the pride of flow ; when o'er his rocks, 
 
 And roaring cataracts, beyond the reach 230 
 
 Of dizzy vision piled, in one wide flash 
 
 An Ethiopian deluge foams amain 
 
 (Whence wondering fable traced him from the sky) ; 
 
 Even not that prime of earth, where harvests 
 
 crowd 
 On untilled harvests, all the teeming year, 
 If of the fat o'erflowing culture robbed, 
 Were then a more uncomfortable wild. 
 Sterile, and void ; than of her trade depriveid, 
 Britons, your boasted-isle : her princes sunk ; 
 Her high built honour mouldered to the dust ; 240 
 Unnerved her force ; her spirit vanished quite ; 
 With rapid wing her riches fled away ; 
 Her unfrequented ports alone the sign 
 Of what she was ; her merchants scattered wide ; 
 Her hoUow shops shut up ; and in her streets, 
 Her fields, woods, markets, villages, and roads 
 The cheerful voice of labour heard no more. 
 
 ' Oh, let not then waste luxury impair 
 That manly soul of toil which strings your nerves, 
 And your own proper happiness creates ! 250 
 
 Oh, let not the soft penetrating plague 
 Creep on the freeborn mind ! and working there, 
 With the sharp tooth of many a new-formed want, 
 Endless, and idle aU, eat out the heart 
 Of hberty ; the high conception blast ; 
 The noble sentiment, the impatient scorn 
 Of base subjection, and the swelling wish 
 For general good, erasing from the mind : 
 While nought save narrow selfishness succeeds, 
 And low design, the sneaking passions aU 260 
 
BRITANNIA 479 
 
 Let loose, and reigning in the rankled breast. 
 Induced at last, by scarce perceived degrees, 
 Sapping the very frame of government 
 And life, a total dissolution comes ; 
 Sloth, ignorance, dejection, flattery, fear, 
 Oppression raging o'er the waste he makes ; 
 The human being almost quite extinct ; 
 And the whole state in broad corruption sinks. 
 Oh, shun that gulf : that gaping ruin shun ! 
 And countless ages roll it far away 270 
 
 From you, ye heaven-beloved ! May liberty. 
 The light of hfe ! the sun of humankind ! 
 Whence heroes, bards, and patriots borrow flame. 
 Even where the keen depressive north descends, 
 Still spread, exalt, and actuate your powers ! 
 While slavish southern climates beam in vain. 
 And may a public spirit from the throne. 
 Where every virtue sits, go copious forth, 
 Live o'er the land ! the finer arts inspire ; 
 Make thoughtful Science raise his pensive head, 280 
 Blow the fresh bay, bid Industry rejoice. 
 And the rough sons of lowest labour smile : 
 As when, profuse of Spring, the loosened west 
 Lifts up the pining year, and balmy breathes 
 Youth, life, and love, and beauty o'er the world. 
 
 ' But haste we from these melancholy shores. 
 Nor to deaf winds, and waves, our fruitless plaint 
 Pour weak ; the country claims our active aid ; 
 That let us roam ; and where we find a spark 
 Of public virtue, blow it into flame. 290 
 
 Lo ! now, my sons, the sons of freedom ! meet 
 In awful senate ; thither let us fly ; 
 Burn in the patriot's thought, flow from his. tongue 
 In fearless truth ; myself transformed preside, 
 And shed the spirit of Britannia round.' 
 
480 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS 
 
 This said, her fleeting form and airy train 
 Sunk in the gale ; and nought but ragged rocks 
 Rushed on the broken eye, and nought was heard 
 But the rough cadence of the dashing wave. 
 
 [The text of Britannia given above is that of the last ed. (1744) 
 published in Thomson's lifetime — Works, 8vo, vol. i, p. 309.] 
 
 A PARAPHRASE 
 
 OF THE LATTER PART OF THE SIXTH CHAPTER OF 
 ST. MATTHEW 
 
 [Contributed in 1729 to Ralph's Miscellany.] 
 
 When my breast labours with oppressive care, 
 And o'er my cheek descends the falling tear ; 
 While all my warring passions are at strife, 
 Oh, let me Usten to the words of Life ! 
 Raptures deep-felt his doctrine did impart, 
 And thus he raised from earth the drooping heart : — 
 
 'Think not, , when all your scanty stores afford 
 Is spread at once upon the sparing board — 
 Think not, when worn the homely robe appears. 
 While on the roof the howling tempest bears — lo 
 What farther shall this feeble life sustain. 
 And what shall clothe these shivering limbs again. 
 Say, does not life its nourishment exceed ? 
 And the fair body its investing weed ? 
 
 Behold ! and look away your low despair — 
 See the light tenants of the barren air : 
 To them nor stores nor granaries belong. 
 Nought but the woodland and the pleasing song ; 
 yet your kind heavenly Father bends his eye 
 On the least wing that flits along the sky. . 20 
 
A PARAPHRASE 481 
 
 To him they sing when Spring renews the plain, 
 To him they cry in Winter's pinching reign ; 
 Nor is their music, nor their plaint in vain 
 He hears the gay and the distressful call. 
 And with unsparing bounty fills them aU. 
 
 Observe the rising lily's snowy grace ; 
 Observe the various vegetable race ; 
 They neither toil nor spin, but careless grow ; 
 Yet see how warm they blush ! how bright they 
 
 glow ! 
 What regal vestments can with them compare ? 30 
 What king so shining, and what queen so fair ? 
 
 If ceaseless thus the fowls of heaven he feeds, 
 If o'er the fields such lucid robes he spreads ; 
 Will he not care for you, ye faithless, say ? 
 Is he unwise ? or are ye less than they ? ' 
 
 ON THE REPORT OF A WOODEN BRIDGE 
 
 TO BE BUILT AT WESTMINSTER 
 [Attributed to Thomson.] 
 
 By Rufus' hall, where Thames polluted flows, 
 
 Provoked, the Genius of the river rose. 
 
 And thus exclaimed : ' Have I, ye British swains, 
 
 Have I for ages laved your fertile plains ? 
 
 Given herds, and flocks, and villages increase, 
 
 And fed a richer than the golden fleece ? 
 
 Have I, ye merchants, with each swelling tide. 
 
 Poured Afric's treasure in, and India's pride ? 
 
 Lent you the fruit of every nation's toil ? 
 
 Made every climate yours, and every soil ? lo 
 
 THOMSON I 1 
 
482 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS 
 
 Yet, pilfered from the poor, by gaming base, 
 Yet must a wooden bridge my waves disgrace ? 
 Tell not to foreign streams the shameful tale. 
 And be it published in no Gallic vale.' 
 He said ; and, plunging to his crystal dome. 
 White o'er his head the circling waters foam. 
 
 [These lines appeared in The Gentleman's Magazine, 1737.] 
 
JUVENILIA 
 
 THE WORKS AND WONDERS OP 
 ALMIGHTY POWER 
 
 A FRAGMENT 
 
 Now I surveyed my native faculties, 
 And traced my actions to their teeming source. 
 Now I explored the universal frame ; 
 Gazed nature through, and with interior light 
 Conversed with angels and unbodied saints, 
 That tread the courts of the Eternal King ! 
 Gladly would I declare, in lofty strains, 
 The power of Godhead to the sons of men. 
 But thought is lost in its immensity ; 
 Imagination wastes its strength in vain ; 
 And fancy tires, and turns within itself. 
 Struck with the amazing depths of Deity ! 
 
 Ah ! my loved God ! in vain a tender youth 
 Unskilled in arts of deep philosophy. 
 Attempts to search the bulky mass of matter ; 
 To trace the rules of motion ; and pursue 
 The phantom Time, too subtile for his grasp ! 
 Yet may I, from thy most apparent works, 
 Form some idea of their wondrous Author, 
 And celebrate thy praise with rapturous mind ! 
 
 How can I gaze upon yon sparkling vault, 
 And view the planets rolling in their spheres, 
 Yet be an atheist ? Can I see those stars. 
 And think of others far beyond my ken, 
 Ii2 
 
484 JUVENILIA 
 
 Yet want conviction of creating power ? 
 
 What but a Being of immense perfection 
 
 Could, through unbounded spaces, thus dispose 
 
 Such numerous bodies, all presumptive worlds ? 
 
 The undesigning hand of giddy chance 
 
 Could never fill, with globes so vast, so bright, 30 
 
 That lofty concave ! 
 
 Where shall I trace the sources of the hght ? 
 
 What seats assign the element of fire. 
 
 That, unconfined, through all the systems breaks '! 
 
 Here could I lie, in holy contemplation rapt. 
 
 And pass with pleasure an eternal age ! 
 
 But 'tis too much for my weak mind to know. 
 
 Teach me with humble reverence to adore 
 
 The mysteries I must not comprehend I 
 
 A PARAPHRASE OF PSALM CIV 
 
 To praise thy Author, Soul, do not forget ; 
 Canst thou, in gratitude, deny the debt ' 
 Lord, thou art great, how great we cannot know ; 
 Honour and majesty do round thee flow. 
 The purest rays of primogenial light 
 Compose thy robes, and make them dazzUng bright ; 
 The heavens and all the wide-spread orbs on high 
 Thou like a curtain stretched of curious dye ; 
 On the devouring flood thy chambers are 
 Established; a lofty cloud's thy car, 10 
 
 Which quick through the ethereal road doth fly 
 On swift-winged winds that shake the troubled sky. 
 Of spiritual substance angels thou didst frame, 
 Active and bright, piercing and quick as flame. 
 Thou hast firmly founded this unwieldy earth ; 
 Stand fast for aye, thou saidst, at nature's birth. 
 
A PARAPHRASE OF PSALM CIV 485 
 
 The swelling flood thou o'er the earth mad'st creep, 
 And coveredst it with the vast hoary deep : 
 Then hills and vales did no distinction- know, 
 But levelled nature lay oppressed below. 20 
 
 With speed they, at thy awful thunder's roar. 
 Shrinked within the limits of their shore. 
 Through secret tracts they up the mountains creep, 
 And rocky caverns fruitful moisture weep, 
 Which sweetly through the verdant vales doth 
 
 glide, 
 Till 'tis devoured by the greedy tide. 
 The feeble sands thou hast made the ocean's mounds ; 
 Its foaming waves shall ne'er repass these bounds, 
 Again to triumph over the dry grounds. 
 Between the hills, grazed by the bleating kind, 30 
 Soft warbling rills their mazy way do find — 
 By -him appointed fully to supply, 
 When the hot dogstar fires the realms on high, 
 The raging thirst of every sickening beast. 
 Of the wild ass that roams the dreary waste. 
 The feathered nation, by their smiling sides. 
 In lowly brambles or in trees abides ; 
 By nature taught, on them they rear their nests. 
 That with inimitable art are dressed. 
 They for the shade and safety of the wood 40 
 
 With natural music cheer the neighbourhood. 
 He doth the clouds with genial moisture fill, 
 Which on the [shr]ivelled ground they bounteously 
 
 distil. 
 And nature's lap with various blessings crowd : 
 The giver, God ! all creatures cry aloud. 
 With freshest green he clothes the fragrant mead, 
 Whereon the grazing herds wanton and feed. 
 With vital juice he makes the plants abound. 
 And herbs securely spring above the ground. 
 
486 JUVENILIA 
 
 That man may be sustained beneath the toil 50 
 
 Of manuring the ill-producing soil, — 
 Which with a plenteous harvest does at last 
 Cancel the memory of labours past, 
 Yields him the product of the generous vine, 
 And balmy oil that makes his face to shine, 
 Fills all his granaries with a loaden crop. 
 Against the barren winter his great prop. 
 The trees of God with kindly sap do swell. 
 Even cedars tall in Lebanon that dwell, 
 Upon whose lofty tops the birds erect 60 
 
 Their nests, as careful nature does direct. 
 The long necked storks unto the fir-trees fly. 
 And with their crackling cries disturb the sky. 
 To unfrequented hiUs wild goats resort. 
 And on bleak rocks the nimble conies sport. 
 The changing moon he clad with sUver light. 
 To check the black dominion of the night : 
 High through the skies in silent state she rides, 
 And by her rounds the fleeting time divides. 
 The circling sun doth in due time decline, 70 
 
 And unto shades the murmuring world resign. 
 Dark night thou mak'st succeed the cheerful day, 
 Which forest beasts from their lone caves survey : 
 They rouse themselves, creep out, and search their 
 
 prey. 
 Young hungry lions from their dens come out. 
 And, mad on blood, stalk fearfully about ; 
 They break night's silence with their hideous roar. 
 And from kind heaven their nightly prey implore. 
 Just as the lark begins to stretch her wing, 79 
 
 And, flickering on her nest, makes short essays to sing. 
 And the sweet dawn, with a faint glimmering light, 
 Unveils the face of nature to the sight, 
 To their dark dens they take their hasty flight. 
 
A PARAPHRASE OF PSALM CIV 487 
 
 Not so the husbandman, — ^for with the sun 
 
 He does his pleasant course of labours run : 
 
 Home with content in the cool e'en returns, 
 
 And his sweet toils until the morn adjourns. 
 
 How many are thy wondrous works, Lord ! 
 
 They of thy wisdom solid proofs afford : 
 
 Out of thy boundless goodness thou didst fiU, 90 
 
 With riches and delights, both vale and hUl : 
 
 Even the broad ocean, wherein do abide 
 
 Monsters that flounce upon the boiling tide. 
 
 And swarms of lesser beasts and fish beside. 
 
 'Tis there that daring ships before the wind 
 
 Do scud amain, and make the port assigned : 
 
 'Tis there that Leviathan sports and plays. 
 
 And spouts his water in the face of day ; 
 
 Eor food with gaping mouth they wait on thee. 
 
 If thou withhold'st, they pine, they faint, they die. 
 
 Thou bountifully opest thy liberal hand, 101 
 
 And scatterest plenty both on sea and land. 
 
 Thy vital Spirit makes all things Uve below. 
 
 The face of nature with new beauties glow. 
 
 God's awful glory ne'er will have an end. 
 
 To vast eternity it wQl extend. 
 
 When he surveys his works, at the wide sight 
 
 He doth rejoice, and take divine delight. 
 
 His looks the earth into its centre shakes ; 
 
 A touch of his to smoke the mountains makes, no 
 
 I'll to God's honour consecrate my lays, 
 
 And when I cease to be I'U cease to praise. 
 
 Upon the Lord, a sublime lofty theme. 
 
 My meditations sweet, my joys supreme. 
 
 Let daring sinners feel thy vengeful rod, 
 
 May they no more be known by their abode. 
 
 My soul and all my powers, O bless the Lord, 
 
 And the whole race of men with one accord. 
 
488 JUVENILIA 
 
 A COMPLAINT ON THE MISERIES OF LIFE 
 
 I LOATHE, Lord, this life below, 
 
 And all its fading fleeting joys ; 
 'Tis a short space that's filled with woe, 
 
 Which all our bliss by far outweighs. 
 When will the everlasting morn 
 With dawning light the skies adorn ? 
 
 Fitly this life's compared to night. 
 
 When gloomy darkness shades the sky ; 
 
 Just like the morn's our ghmmering hght 
 Reflected from the Deity. lo 
 
 When will celestial morn dispel 
 
 These dark surrounding shades of heU ? 
 
 I'm sick of this vexatious state. 
 Where cares invade my peaceful hours ; 
 
 Strike the last blow, courteous fate, 
 I'll smiling fall hke mowed flowers ; 
 
 I'U gladly spurn this clogging clay. 
 
 And, sweetly singing, soar away. 
 
 What 's money but refined dust ? 
 
 What's honour but an empty name ? 20 
 
 And what is soft enticing lust 
 
 But a consuming idle flame ? 
 Yea, what is all beneath the sky 
 But emptiness and vanity ? 
 
 With thousand ills our life 's oppressed ; 
 
 There 's nothing here worth hving for ! 
 In the lone grave I long to rest, 
 
 And be harassed here no more : 
 Where joy 's fantastic, grief 's sincere, 
 And where there 's nought for which I care. 30 
 
THE MISERIES OF LIFE 
 
 Thy word, Lord, shall be my guide; 
 
 Heaven, where thou dwellest is my goal ; 
 Through corrupt life grant I may glide 
 
 With an untainted upward soul. 
 Then may this life, this dreary night 
 Dispelled be by morning light. 
 
 HYMN ON THE POWER OP GOD 
 
 Hail ! Power Divine, whose sole command 
 
 From the dark empty space 
 Made the broad sea and solid land 
 
 Smile with a heavenly grace ; 
 
 Made the high mountain and firm rock. 
 
 Where bleating cattle stray ; 
 And the strong, stately, spreading oak. 
 
 That intercepts the day. 
 
 The rolling planets thou mad'st move, 
 
 By thy effective will ; lo 
 
 And the revolving globes above 
 Their destined course fulfil. 
 
 His mighty power, ye thunders, praise. 
 As through the heavens you roll ; 
 
 And his great name, ye lightnings, blaze 
 Unto the distant pole. 
 
 Ye seas, in your eternal roar 
 
 His sacred praise proclaim ; 
 While the inactive sluggish shore 
 
 Re-echoes to the same. 20 
 
490 JUVENILIA 
 
 Ye howling winds, howl out his praise, 
 
 And make the forests bow ; 
 While through the air, the earth, and seas 
 
 His solemn praise ye blow. 
 
 O you, ye high harmonious spheres, 
 
 Your powerful mover sing ; 
 To him, your circling course that steers, 
 
 Your tuneful praises bring. 
 
 Ungrateful mortals, catch the sound, 
 
 And in your numerous lays 30 
 
 To all the listening world around 
 The God of nature praise. 
 
 A PASTORAL BETWIXT DAVID, THIRSIS, 
 AND THE ANGEL GABRIEL, 
 
 UPON THE BIRTH OF OUR SAVIOUR 
 
 DAVID 
 
 What means yon apparition in the sky, 
 Thirsis, that dazzles every shepherd's eye ? 
 I slumbering was when from yon glorious cloud 
 Came gliding music heavenly, sweet, and loud, 
 With sacred raptures which my bosom fires, 
 And with celestial joy my soul inspires ; 
 It soothes the native horrors of the night. 
 And gladdens nature more than dawning light. 
 
 THIRSIS 
 
 But hold! see hither through the yielding air 
 
 An angel comes : for mighty news prepare. 10 
 
 ANGEL GABRIEL 
 
 Rejoice, ye swains, anticipate the morn 
 
 With songs of praise ; for lo ! a Saviour's born. 
 
A PASTORAL 491 
 
 With joyful haste to Bethlehem repair, 
 And you will find the almighty Infant there ; 
 Wrapped in a swaddling band you'll find yoiir King, 
 And in a manger laid : to him your praises bring. 
 
 CHORUS OF ANGELS 
 
 To God who in the highest dwells 
 
 Immortal glory be ; 
 Let peace be in the humble cells 
 
 Of Adam's progeny. 20 
 
 DAVID 
 
 No more the year shall wintry horrors bring ; 
 Fixed in the indulgence of eternal spring, 
 Immortal green shall clothe the hills and vales, 
 And odorous sweets shall load the balmy gales ; 
 The silver brooks shall in soft murmurs tell 
 The joy that shall their oozy channels swell. 
 Feed on, my fiocks, and crop the tender grass; 
 Let blooming joy appear on every face, 
 For lo ! this blessed, this propitious morn, 
 The Saviour of lost mankind is born. 30 
 
 THIRSIS 
 
 Thou fairest morn that ever sprang from night. 
 Or decked the opening skies with rosy light, 
 Well mayst thou shine with a distinguished ray, 
 Since here Emmanuel condescends to stay, 
 Our fears, our guilt, our darkness to dispel. 
 And save us from the horrid jaws of hell; 
 Who from his throne descended, matchless love ! 
 To guide poor mortals to blest seats above. 
 But come ! without delay let us be gone ; 
 Shepherd, let's go, and humbly kiss the Son. 40 
 
492 JUVENILIA 
 
 A PASTORAL BETWEEN THIRSIS AND 
 CORYDON 
 
 UPON THE DEATH OF DAMON 
 
 (By Damon is meant Mr. W. Riddell.) 
 
 [Cf. Allan Ramsay's Pastoral, ' Sandy and Richie '.] 
 
 Thir. Say, tell me true, what is the doleful cause 
 That Corydon is not the man he was ? 
 Your cheerful presence used to lighten cares, 
 And from the plains to banish gloomy fears. 
 Whene'er unto the circling swains you sung. 
 Our ravished souls upon the music hung ; 
 The gazing, listening flocks forgot their meat, 
 While vocal grottoes did your lays repeat : 
 But now your gravity our mirth rebukes. 
 And in your downcast and desponding looks lo 
 
 Appears some fatal and impending woe ; 
 I fear to ask, and yet desire to know. 
 
 Cor. The doleful news, how shall I, Thirsis, tell ! 
 In blooming youth the hapless Damon fell : 
 He 's dead, he 's dead ! and with him all my joy ; 
 The mournful thought does all gay forms destroy : 
 This is the cause of my unusual grief, 
 Which sullenly admits of no relief. 
 
 Thir. Begone all mirth ! begone all sports and 
 play ! 
 To a deluge of grief and tears give way. 20 
 
 Damon the just, the generous, and the young. 
 Must Damon's worth and merit be unsung ? 
 No, Corydon ! the wondrous youth you knew, 
 How, as in years, so he in virtue grew ; 
 Embalm his fame in never dying verse, 
 As a just tribute to his doleful hearse. 
 
A PASTORAL 493 
 
 Cor. Assist me, mighty grief ; my breast inspire 
 With generous heats and with thy wildest fire, 
 While in a solemn and a mournful strain 
 Of Damon gone for ever I complain. 30 
 
 Ye muses, weep; your mirth and songs forbear, 
 And for him sigh and shed a friendly tear ; 
 He was your favourite, and by your aid 
 In charming verse his witty thoughts arrayed ; 
 He had of knowledge, learning, wit a store; 
 To it denied he still pressed after more. 
 He was a pious and a virtuous soul, 
 And still pressed forward to the heavenly goal ; 
 He was a faithful, true, and constant friend, 
 Faithful, and true, and constant to the end. 40 
 Ye flowers, hang down and droop your [heavy] heads, 
 No more around your grateful odour spreads; 
 Ye leafy trees, your blooming honours shed, 
 Damon for ever from your shade is fled ; 
 Fled to the mansions of eternal light. 
 Where endless wonders strike his happy sight. 
 Ye birds, be mute, as through the trees you fly. 
 Mute as the grave wherein my friend does lie. 
 Ye winds, breathe sighs as through the air you rove, 
 And in sad pomp the trembling branches move. 50 
 Ye gliding brooks, weep your channels dry, 
 My flowing tears them fully shall supply ; 
 You in soft murmurs may your grief express. 
 And yours, you swains, in mournful songs confess 
 I to some dark and gloomy shade will fly, 
 Dark as the grave wherein my friend does lie ; 
 And for his death to lonely rocks complain 
 In mournful accents and a dying strain, 
 While pining echo answers me again. 
 
494 JUVENILIA 
 
 OF A COUNTEY LIFE 
 
 I HATE the clamours of the smoky towns, 
 But much admire the bUss of rural clowns ; 
 Where some remains of innocence appear, 
 Where no rude noise insults the listening ear ; 
 Nought but soft zephyrs whispering through the trees, 
 Or the still humming of the painful bees ; 
 The gentle murmurs of a purling rill, 
 Or the unwearied chirping of the drill ; 
 The charming harmony of warbling birds, 
 Or hollow lowings of the grazing herds ; lo 
 
 The murmuring stockdoves' melancholy coo. 
 When they their loved mates lament or woo ; 
 The pleasing bleatings of the tender lambs. 
 Or the indistinct mumbling of their dams ; 
 The musical discord of chiding hounds, 
 Whereto the echoing hill or rock resounds ; 
 The rural mournful songs of lovesick swains. 
 Whereby they soothe their raging amorous pains ; 
 The whistling music of the lagging plough, 19 
 
 Which does the strength of drooping beasts renew. 
 
 And as the country rings with pleasant sounds. 
 So with dehghtful prospects it abounds : 
 Through every season of the sliding year, 
 Unto the ravished sight new scenes appear. 
 
 In the sweet Spring the sun's prolific ray 
 Does painted flowers to the mild air display ; 
 Then opening buds, then tender herbs are seen. 
 And the bare fields are all arrayed in green. 
 
 In ripening Summer, the fuU laden vales 
 Gives prospect of employment for the flails ; 30 
 Each breath of wind the bearded groves makes bend. 
 Which seems the fatal sickle to portend. 
 
OF A COUNTRY LIFE 495 
 
 In Autumn, that repays the labourer's pains, 
 Reapers sweep down the honours of the plains. 
 
 Anon black Winter, from the frozen north, 
 Its treasuries of snow and hail pours forth ; 
 Then stormy winds blow through the hazy sky; 
 In desolation nature seems to lie ; 
 The unstained snow from the fuU clouds descends. 
 Whose sparkling lustre open eyes offends. 40 
 
 In maiden white the glittering fields do shine ; 
 Then bleating flocks for want of food repine. 
 With withered eyes they see all snow around. 
 And with their fore feet paw, and scrape the ground : 
 They cheerfully do crop the insipid grass. 
 The shepherds sighing, cry, Alas ! alas ! 
 Then pinching want the wildest beast does tame ; 
 Then huntsmen on the snow do trace their game ; 
 Keen frost then turns the liquid lakes to glass. 
 Arrests the dancing rivulets as they pass. 5° 
 
 How sweet and innocent are country sports, 
 And, as men's tempers, various are their sorts. 
 
 You, on the banks of soft meandering Tweed, 
 May in your toils ensnare the watery breed, 
 And nicely lead the artificial flee. 
 Which, when the nimble, watchful trout does see. 
 He at the bearded hook will briskly spring ; 
 Then in that instant twitch your hairy string. 
 And, when he 's hooked, you, with a constant 
 
 hand. 
 May draw him struggling to the fatal land. 60 
 
 Then at fit seasons you may clothe your hook 
 With a sweet bait, dressed by a faithless cook 
 The greedy pike darts to't with eager haste. 
 And, being struck, in vain he flies at last ; 
 He rages, storms, and flounces through the stream. 
 But all, alas ! his life can not redeem. 
 
496 JUVENILIA 
 
 At other times you may pursue the chase, 
 And hunt the nimble hare from place to place. 
 See, when the dog is just upon the grip, 
 Out at a side she'll make a handsome skip, 7° 
 
 And ere he can divert his furious course, 
 She, far before him, scours with all her force : 
 She'll shift, and many times run the same ground ; 
 At last, outwearied by the stronger hound. 
 She falls a sacrifice unto his hate. 
 And with sad piteous screams laments her fate. 
 
 See how the hawk doth take his towering flight. 
 And in his course outflies our very sight. 
 Beats down the fluttering fowl with all his might. 
 
 See how the wary gunner casts about, 80 
 
 Watching the fittest posture when to shoot : 
 Quick as the fatal lightning blasts the oak. 
 He gives the springing fowl a sudden stroke ; 
 He pours upon't a shower of mortal lead, 
 And ere the noise is heard the fowl is dead. 
 
 Sometimes he spreads his hidden subtile snare. 
 Of which the entangled fowl was not aware ; 
 Through pathless wastes he doth pursue his sport. 
 Where nought but moor-fowl and wild beasts 
 resort. 
 
 When the noon sun directly darts his beams 90 
 Upon your giddy heads, with fiery gleams. 
 Then you may bathe yourself in cooling streams ; 
 Or to the sweet adjoining grove retire. 
 Where trees with interwoven boughs conspire 
 To form a grateful shade ; — there rural swains 
 Do tune their oaten reeds to rural strains ; 
 The silent birds sit listening on the sprays. 
 And in soft charming notes do imitate their lays. 
 There you may stretch yourself upon the grass. 
 And, lulled with music, to kind slumbers pass : 100 
 
OF A COUNTRY LIFE 497 
 
 No meagre cares your fancy will distract, 
 And on that scene no tragic fears will act ; 
 Save the dear image of a charming she, 
 Nought will the object of your vision be. 
 
 Away the vicious pleasures of the town ! 
 Let empty partial fortune on me frown ; 
 But grant, ye powers, that it may be my lot 
 To Hve in peace from noisy towns remote. 
 
 [In these verses appears for the first time, scarcely recognizable, 
 the future author of The Seasons. They were contributed to The 
 Edinburgh Miscellany, a magazine published by ' the Athenian 
 Society ', in 1720.] 
 
 UPON HAPPINESS 
 
 Warned by the summer sun's meridian ray. 
 
 As underneath a spreading oak I lay, 
 
 Contemplating the mighty load of woe 
 
 In search of bliss that mortals undergo. 
 
 Who, while they think they happiness enjoy. 
 
 Embrace a curse wrapt in delusive joy, 
 
 I reasoned thus — Since the Creator, God, 
 
 Who in eternal love has his abode. 
 
 Hath blended with the essence of the soul 
 
 An appetite, as fixed as the pole, lo 
 
 That's always eager in pursuit of bliss. 
 
 And always veering till it point to this. 
 
 There is some object adequate to fill 
 
 This boundless wish of our extended wiU. 
 
 Now, while my thought round nature's circle runs 
 
 (A bolder journey than the furious sun's) 
 
 This chief and satiating good to find. 
 
 The attracting centre of the human mind. 
 
 My ears they deafened, to my swimming eyes 
 
 His magic wand the drowsy god applies, 20 
 
 19 they deafened = became deaf. 
 THOMSON K. k 
 
498 JUVENILIA 
 
 Bound all my senses in a silken sleep, 
 While mimic fancy did her vigils keep ; 
 Yet still methinks some condescending power 
 Ranged the ideas in my mind that hour. 
 
 Methought I wandering was, with thousands more, 
 Beneath a high prodigious hill before, 
 Above the clouds whose towering summit rose. 
 With utmost labour only gained by those 
 Who grovelling prejudices threw away, 
 And with incessant straining cUmbed their way ; 30 
 Where all who stood, their failing breath to gain, 
 With headlong ruin tumbled down amain. 
 This mountain is through every nation famed. 
 And, as I learned. Contemplation named. 
 happy me ! when I had reached its top 
 Unto my sight a boundless scene did ope. 
 
 First, sadly I surveyed with downward eye, 
 Of restless men below, the busy fry. 
 Who hunted trifles in an endless maze. 
 Like foolish boys on sunny summer days 40 
 
 Pursuing butterflies with all their might. 
 Who can't their troubles in the chase requite. 
 The painted insect he who most admires 
 Grieves most when it in his rude hand expires ; 
 Or, should it live, with endless fears is tossed 
 Lest it take wing and be for ever lost. 
 
 Some men I saw their utmost art employ 
 How to attain a false deceitful joy. 
 Which from afar conspicuously did blaze. 
 And at a distance fixed their ravished gaze, 50 
 
 But nigh at hand it mocked their fond embrace ; 
 When lo ! again it flashed in their eyes, 
 But still, as they drew near, the fond illusion dies. 
 Just so I've seen a water-dog pursue 
 An unflown duck within his greedy view: 
 
UPON HAPPINESS 499 
 
 When he has, panting, at his prey arrived. 
 
 The coxcomb fooling — suddenly it dived ; 
 
 He, gripping, is almost with water choked, 
 
 And grief, that all his towering hopes are mocked. 
 
 Then it emerges, he renews his toil, 60 
 
 And o'er and o'er again he gets the foil. 
 
 Yea, all the joys beneath the conscious sun, 
 
 And softer ones that his inspection shun. 
 
 Much of their pleasures in fruition fade ; 
 
 Enjoyment o'er them throws a sullen shade. 
 
 The reason is, we promise vaster things 
 
 And sweeter joys than from their nature springs : 
 
 When they are lost, weep the apparent bhss, 
 
 And not what really in fruition is ; 
 
 So that our griefs are greater than our joys, 70 
 
 And real pain springs from fantastic toys. 
 
 Though all terrene delights of men below 
 Are almost nothing but a glaring show ; 
 Yet, if there always were a virgin joy, 
 When t'other fades, to soothe the wanton boy, 
 He somewhat might excuse his heedless course. 
 Some show of reason for the same enforce : 
 But frugal nature wisely does deny 
 To mankind such profuse variety ; 
 Has only what is needful to us given, 80 
 
 To feed and cheer us in the way to Heaven ; 
 And more would but the traveller delay, 
 Impede and clog him in his upward way. 
 
 I from the mount aU mortal pleasures saw 
 Themselves within a narrow compass draw ; 
 The Ubertine a nauseous circle run, 
 And dully acted what he'd often done. 
 Just so when Luna darts her sUver ray. 
 And pours on sUent earth a paler day ; 
 From Stygian caves the flitting fairies scud, 90 
 
 THOMSON K k 2 
 
500 JUVENILIA 
 
 And on the margent of some limpid flood, 
 Which by reflected moonlight darts a glance, 
 In midnight circles range themselves and dance. 
 
 To-morrow, cries he, will us entertain : 
 Pray what 's to-morrow but to-day again ? 
 Deluded youth, no more the chase pursue ; 
 So oft deceived, no more the toil renew. 
 But in a constant and a fixed design 
 Of acting well there is a lasting mine 
 Of solid satisfaction, purest joy, loo 
 
 For virtue's pleasures never, never cloy : 
 Then hither come, climb up the steep ascent, 
 Your painful labour you wiU ne'er repent, 
 From Heaven itself here you're but one remove^ 
 Here 's the praeludium of the joys above. 
 Here you'U behold the awful Godhead shine. 
 And all perfections in the same combine ; 
 You'U see that God, who, by his powerful call, 
 From empty nothing drew this spacious all, 
 Made beauteous order the rude mass control, no 
 And every part subservient to the whole ; 
 Here you'll behold upon the fatal tree 
 The God of nature bleed, expire, and die. 
 For such as 'gainst his holy laws rebel, 
 And such as bid defiance to his hell. 
 Through the dark gulf, here you may clearly pry 
 'Twixt narrow time and vast eternity ; 
 Behold the Godhead, just as well as good, 
 And vengeance poured on tramplers on his blood ; 
 But all the tears wiped from his people's eyes ; 120 
 And, for their entrance, cleave the parting skies. 
 Then sure you will with holy ardours burn, 
 And to seraphic heats your passion turn ; 
 Then in your eyes all mortal fair wiU fade, 
 And leave of mortal beauties but the shade ; 
 
UPON HAPPINESS 501 
 
 Yourself to him you'll solemnly devote, 
 
 To him without whose providence you're not ; 
 
 You'll of his service relish the delight, 
 
 And to his praises all your powers excite ; 
 
 You'll celebrate his name in heavenly sound, 130 
 
 Which well-pleased skies in echoes will rebound : 
 
 This is the greatest happiness that can 
 
 Possessed be in this short life by man. 
 
 But darkly here the Godhead we survey. 
 Confined and cramped in this cage of clay. 
 What cruel band is this to earth that ties 
 Our souls from soaring to their native skies 
 Upon the bright eternal face to gaze, 
 And there drink in the beatific rays — 
 There to behold the good one and the fair, 140 
 
 A ray from whom all mortal beauties are ? 
 In beauteous nature all the harmony 
 Is but the echo of the Deity, 
 Of all perfection who the centre is. 
 And boundless ocean of untainted bliss ; 
 For ever open to the ravished view, 
 And fuU enjoyment of the radiant crew 
 Who live in raptures of eternal joy. 
 Whose fiaming love their tuneful harps employ 
 In solemn hymns Jehovah's praise to sing, 150 
 
 And make aU heaven with hallelujahs ring. 
 
 These realms of light no further I'll explore. 
 And in these heights I will no longer soar : 
 Not like our grosser atmosphere beneath, 
 The ether here's too thin for me to breathe. 
 The region is unsufferable bright, 
 And flashes on me with too strong a light. 
 Then from the mountain, lo ! I now descend 
 And to my vision put a hasty end. 
 
 [Contributed to The Edinburgh Miscdlany, 1720.] 
 
502 JUVENILIA 
 
 VERSES ON RECEIVING A FLOWER 
 FROM A LADY 
 
 Madam, the flower that I received from you, 
 Ere I came home, had lost its lovely hue : 
 As flowers deprived of the genial day, 
 Its sprightly bloom did wither and decay : 
 Dear, fading flower, I know full well, said I, 
 The reason that you shed your sweets and die ; 
 You want the influence of her enhvening eye. 
 Your case is mine : absence, that plague of love ! 
 With heavy pace makes every minute move : 
 It of my being is an empty blank, lo 
 
 And hinders me myself with men to rank ; 
 Your cheering presence quickens me again, 
 And new-sprung life exults in every vein. 
 
 [First appeared in 1720 in The Edinburgh Miscellany, signed ' I".'] 
 
 ON BEAUTY 
 
 Beauty deserves the homage of the muse : 
 Shall mine, rebellious, the dear theme refuse ? 
 No ; while my breast respires the vital air, 
 Wholly I am devoted to the fair. 
 Beauty I'll sing in my sublimest lays, 
 I burn to give her just, immortal praise. 
 The heavenly maid with transport I'U pursue 
 To her abode, and all her graces view. 
 
 This happy place with all delights abounds. 
 And plenty broods upon the fertile grounds. 
 Here verdant grass their waving . . . 
 And hills and vales in sweet confusion lie : 
 
ON BEAUTY 503 
 
 The nibbling flock stray o'er the rising hills, 
 
 And all around with bleating music fills ; 
 
 High on their fronts tall blooming forests nod, 
 
 Of sylvan deities the blest abode ; 
 
 The feathered minstrels hop from spray to spray, 
 
 And chant their gladsome carols all the day, 
 
 Till dusky night, advancing in her car, 
 
 Makes with declining light successful war. 20 
 
 Then Philomel her mournful lay repeats, 
 
 And through her throat breathes melancholy sweets. 
 
 Still higher yet wild rugged rocks arise. 
 
 That all ascent to human foot denies, 
 
 And strike beholders with a dread surprise. 
 
 This paradise these towering hills surround. 
 
 That thither is one only passage found. 
 
 Increasing brooks roll down the mountain's side, 
 
 And as they pass the opposing pebbles chide. 
 
 But vernal showers refresh the blooming year. 30 
 Their only season is eternal spring, 
 Which hovers o'er them with a downy wing ; 
 Blossoms and fruits at once the trees adorn 
 With glowing blushes, like the rosy morn. 
 
 The way that to this stately palace goes 
 Of myrtle trees lies 'twixt two even rows, 
 Which, towering high, with outstretched arms dis- 
 played. 
 Over our heads a living arch have made. 
 
 To sing, my muse, the bold attempt begin. 
 Of awful beauties you behold within : 4a 
 
 The Goddess sat upon a throne of gold. 
 Embossed with figures charming to behold ; 
 Here new-made Eve stood in her early bloom, 
 Not yet obscured with sin's sullen gloom ; 
 Her naked beauties do the soul confound, 
 
504 JUVENILIA 
 
 From every part is given a fatal wound ; 
 
 There other beauties of a meaner fame 
 
 Oblige the sight, whom here I shall not name. 
 
 In her right hand she did a sceptre sway 
 
 O'er all mankind, ambitious to obey : 50 
 
 Her lovely forehead and her killing eye, 
 
 Her blushing cheeks of a vermilion dye, 
 
 Her lip's soft pulp, her heaving snowy breast, 
 
 Her well-turned arm, her handsome slender waist. 
 
 And all below veiled from the curious «ye — 
 
 Oh ! heavenly maid ! makes all beholders cry. 
 
 Her dress was plain, not pompous as a bride, 
 Which would her sweeter native beauties hide. 
 One thing I mind, a spreading hoop she wore, 
 Than which no thing £,dorns a lady more. 60 
 
 With equal rage could I its beauties sing, 
 I'd with the hoop make all Parnassus ring. 
 Around her shoulders, dangling on her throne, 
 A bright Tartana carelessly was thrown. 
 Which has already won immortal praise, 
 Most sweetly sung in Allan Ramsay's lays ; 
 The wanton Cupids did around her play, 
 And smiling loves upon her bosom stray ; 
 With purple wings they round about her flew. 
 And her sweet lips tinged with ambrosial dew. 70 
 
 Her air was easy, graceful was her mien, 
 Her presence banished the ungrateful spleen ; 
 In short, her divine influence refined 
 Our corrupt hearts, and polished mankind. 
 
 Of lovely nymphs she had a smiling train, 
 Fairer than those e'er graced Arcadia's plain. 
 The British ladies next to her took place, 
 Who chiefly did the fair assembly grace. 
 What blooming virgins can Britannia boast. 
 Their praises would all eloquence exhaust. 80 
 
ON BEAUTY 505 
 
 With ladies there my ravished eyes did meet 
 That oft I've seen grace fair Edina's street, 
 With their broad hoops cut through the wiUing air, 
 Pleased to give place unto the lovely fair : 
 
 Sure this is like those blissful seats above ; 
 [For] here is peace, transporting joy, and love. 
 
 Should I be doomed by cruel angry fate 
 In some lone isle my lingering end to wait, 
 Yet happy I ! still happy should I be ! 
 While blest with virtue and a charming she ; 90 
 With full content I'd fortune's pride despise, 
 And die still gazing on her lovely eyes. 
 
 May all the blessings mortals need below, 
 May aU the blessings heaven can bestow, 
 May every thing that 's pleasant, good, or rare, 
 Be the eternal portion of the fair. 
 
 A PASTORAL ENTERTAINMENT 
 
 While in heroic numbers some relate 
 The amazing turns of wise eternal fate. 
 Exploits of heroes in the dusty field. 
 That to their name immortal honour yield ; 
 Grant me, ye powers, fast by the limpid spring 
 The harmless revels of the plain to sing. 
 At a rich feast, kept each revolving year, 
 Their fleecy care when joyful shepherds shear, 
 A wreath of flowers culled from the neighbouring 
 
 lands 
 Is all the prize my humble muse demands. 10 
 
 Now blithesome shepherds, by the early dawn, 
 Their new-shorn flocks drive to the dewy lawn ; 
 While, in a bleating language, each salutes 
 The welcome morning and their fellow brutes : 
 
506 JUVENILIA 
 
 Then all prepared for the rural feast, 
 And in theip finest Sunday habits drest ; 
 The crystal brook supplied the mirror's place, 
 [Wherein] they bathed and viewed their cleanly face, 
 [Then swains] and nymphs resorted to the fields 
 [Adorned with all the] pomp the country yields. 20 
 
 The place appointed was a spacious vale, 
 Tanned always by a cooling western gale. 
 Which in soft breezes through the meadows stray, 
 And steals the ripened fragrances away ; 
 With native incense all the air perfumes, 
 Renewing with its genial breath the blooms. 
 Here every shepherd might his flocks survey. 
 Securely roam and take his harmless play ; 
 And here were flowers each shepherdess to grace, 
 On her fair bosom courting but a place. 30 
 
 Now in this vale, beneath a grateful shade. 
 By twining boughs of spreading beeches made, 
 On seats of homely turf themselves they placed, 
 And cheerfully enjoyed their rural feast. 
 Consisting of the product of the fields, 
 And all the luxury the country yields. 
 
 No maddening liquors spoiled their harmless mirth ; 
 But an untainted spring their thirst allayed. 
 Which in meanders through the valley strayed. 
 Thrice happy swains ! who spend your golden days 40 
 In country pastime, and, when night displays 
 Her sable shade, to peaceful huts retire ; 
 Can any man a sweeter bhss desire ? 
 In ancient times so passed the smiling hour. 
 When our first parents Uved in Eden's bower, 
 Ere care and trouble were pronounced ou[r doom,] 
 Or sin had blasted the creation's blo[om]. 
 
507 
 
 AN ELEGY UPON JAMES THERBURN 
 IN CHATTO 
 
 [Cp. Allan Eamsay's Elegy on Maggie Johnston or on Lucky Wood.] 
 
 Now, Chatto, you're a dreary place — 
 Pale sorrow broods on ilka face 
 Therburn has run his . . race, 
 * * * * 
 
 And now, and now, ah me, alace ! 
 
 The carle lies dead. 
 
 Having his paternoster said, 
 
 He took a dram and went to bed ; 
 
 He fell asleep, and death was glad 
 
 That he did catch him ; lo 
 For Therburn was e'en ill-bested. 
 
 That none did watch him. 
 
 Por had the carle but been aware. 
 
 That meagre death, who none does spare, 
 
 T'attempt sic things should ever dare. 
 
 As stop his pipe ; 
 He might have come to flee or skare 
 
 The greedy gipe. 
 
 Now had he but a gill or twae 
 Death wou'd nae got the victory sae, 20 
 
 Nor put poor Therburn o'er the brae. 
 Into the grave ; 
 
 The fumbling fellow, some folks say. 
 Should be jobbed on baith night and day ; 
 
508 JUVENILIA 
 
 She had without'en better play- 
 Remained stiU 
 
 Barren for ever and for aye, 
 
 Do what he will. 3° 
 
 Therefore they say he got some help 
 In getting of the little whelp ; 
 But passing that, it makes me yelp, 
 
 But what remead ? 
 Death lent him sic a cursed skelp, 
 
 That now he 's dead. 
 
 Therburn, for evermore farewell, 
 
 And be thy grave baith dry and deep ; 
 
 And rest thy carcass soft and well. 
 
 Free from . . 40 
 
 no night . 
 Disturb . 
 [It is scarcely possible that this is Thomson's.] 
 
 ON THE HOOP 
 
 The hoop, the darling justly of the fair, 
 
 Of every generous swain deserves the care. 
 
 It is unmanly to desert the weak, 
 
 'Twould urge a stone, if possible to speak ; 
 
 To hear stanch hypocrites bawl out, and cry, 
 
 ' This hoop 's a whorish garb, fie ! ladies, fie ! ' 
 
 O cruel and audacious men, to blast 
 
 The fame of ladies, more than vestals chaste ; 
 
 Should you go search the globe throughout. 
 
 You will find none so pious and devout ; 
 
 So modest, chaste, so handsome, and so fair. 
 
 As our dear Caledonian ladies are. 
 
ON THE HOOP 509 
 
 When awful beauty puts on all her charms, 
 
 Nought gives our sex such terrible alarms, 
 
 As when the hoop and tartan both combine 
 
 To make a virgin like a goddess shine. 
 
 Let Quakers cut their clothes unto the quick, 
 
 And with severities themselves afflict ; 
 
 But may the hoop adorn Edina's street. 
 
 Till the south pole shall with the northern meet ! 20 
 
 AN ELEGY ON PARTING 
 
 It was a sad, ay, 'twas a sad farewell, 
 I still afresh the pangs of parting feel. 
 Against my breast my heart impatient beat, 
 And in deep sighs bemoaned its cruel fate 
 Thus with the object of my love to part, 
 My life ! my joy ! 'twould rend a rocky heart. 
 
 Where'er I turn myself, where'er I go, 
 I meet the image of my lovely foe ; 
 With witching charms the phantom still appears, 
 And with her wanton smiles insults my tears ; 
 Still haunts the places where we used to walk. 
 And where with raptures oft I heard her talk : 
 Those scenes I now with deepest sorrow view, 
 And sighing bid to all delight adieu. 
 
 While I my head upon this turf recline, 
 Officious sun, in vain on me you shine ; 
 In vain unto the smiUng fields I hie ; 
 In vain the flowery meads salute my eye ; 
 In vain the cheerful birds and shepherds sing. 
 And with their carols make the valleys ring ; 
 Yea, all the pleasure that the country yield 
 Can't me from sorrow for her absence shield : 
 
510 JUVENILIA 
 
 With divine pleasure books which one inspire, 
 Yea, books themselves I do not now admire. 
 But hark ! methinks some pitying power I hear, 
 This welcome message whisper in my ear : 
 ' Forget thy groundless griefs, dejected swain — 
 You and the nymph you love shall meet again ; 
 No more your muse shall sing such mournful lays, 
 But bounteous heaven and your kind mistress praise.' 
 
 THE MONTH OF MAY 
 
 Among the changing months May stands confest 
 
 The sweetest, and in fairest colours drest ; 
 
 Soft as the breeze that fans the smiling field, 
 
 Sweet as the breath that opening roses yield, 
 
 Fair as the colour lavish nature paints 
 
 On virgin flowers free from unodorous taints. 
 
 To rural scenes thou tempt'st the busy crowd. 
 
 Who in each grove thy praises sing aloud. 
 
 The blooming belles and shallow beaux, strange sight ! 
 
 Turn nymphs and swains, and in their sports delight. 
 
 MORNING IN THE COUNTRY 
 
 When from the opening chambers of the east 
 The morning springs, in thousand Uveries drest, 
 The early larks their morning tribute pay. 
 And in shrill notes salute the blooming day. 
 Refreshed fields with pearly dew do shine. 
 And tender blades therewith their tops incline. 
 Their painted leaves the unblown flowers expand, 
 And with their odorous breath perfume the land. 
 The crowing cock and clattering hen awakes 
 DuU sleepy clowns, who know the morning breaks. 
 
MORNING IN THE COUNTRY 511 
 
 The herd his plaid around his shoulders throws, n 
 Grasps his dear crook, calls on his dog, and goes; 
 Around the fold he walks with careful pace. 
 And fallen clods sets in their wonted place ; 
 Then opes the door, unfolds his fleecy care, 
 And gladly sees them crop their morning fare ! 
 Down upon easy moss his limbs he lays. 
 And sings some charming shepherdess's praise. 
 
 LISY'S PARTING WITH HER CAT 
 
 The dreadful hour with leaden pace approached, 
 
 Lashed fiercely on by unrelenting fate. 
 
 When Lisy and her bosom Cat must part : 
 
 For now, to school and pensive needle doomed, 
 
 She 's banished from her childhood's undashed joy. 
 
 And aU the pleasing intercourse she kept 
 
 With her gray comrade, which has often soothed 
 
 Her tender moments, while the world around 
 
 Glowed with ambition, business, and vice, 
 
 Or lay dissolved in sleep's delicious arms ; lo 
 
 And from their dewy orbs the conscious stars 
 
 Shed on their friendship influence benign. 
 
 But see where mournful Puss, advancing, stood 
 With outstretched tail, casts looks of anxious woe 
 On melting Lisy, in whose eye the tear 
 Stood tremulous, and thus would fain have said, 
 If nature had not tied her strugghng tongue : 
 ' Unkind, ! who shall now with fattening milk. 
 With flesh, with bread, and fish beloved, and meat, 
 Regale my taste ? and at the cheerful fire, 20 
 
 Ah, who shall bask me in their downy lap ? 
 Who shall invite me to the bed, and throw 
 The bedclothes o'er me in the winter night, 
 
512 JUVENILIA 
 
 When Eurus roars ? Beneath whose soothing hand 
 Soft shall I purr ? But now, when Lisy 's gone, 
 What is the dull officious world to me ? 
 I loathe the thoughts of life : ' Thus plained the 
 
 Cat, 
 While Lisy felt, by sympathetic touch. 
 These anxious thoughts that in her mind revolved. 
 And casting on her a desponding look, 30 
 
 She snatched her in her arms with eager grief, 
 And mewing, thus began : — ' Cat beloved ! 
 Thou dear companion of my tender years ! 
 Joy of my youth ! that oft hast licked my hands 
 With velvet tongue ne'er stained by mouse's blood. 
 Oh, gentle Cat ! how shall I part with thee ? 
 How dead and heavy will the moments pass 
 When you are not in my delighted eye, 
 With Cubi playing, or your flying tail. 
 How harshly will the softest muslin feel, 40 
 
 And all the silk of schools, while I no more 
 Have your sleek skin to soothe my softened sense ? 
 How shall I eat while you are not beside 
 To share the bit ? How shall I ever sleep 
 While I no more your lulling murmurs hear ? 
 Yet we must part — so rigid fate decrees — 
 But never shall your loved idea dear 
 Part from my soul, and when I first can mark 
 The embroidered figure on the snowy lawn, 
 Your image shall my needle keen employ. 50 
 
 Hark ! now I'm called away ! direful sound ! 
 I come — I come, but first I charge you all — 
 You — ^you — and you, particularly you, 
 0, Mary, Mary, feed her with the best, 
 Repose her nightly in the warmest couch, 
 And be a Lisy to her ! ' — Having said, 
 She set her down, and with her head across, 
 
LISY'S PARTING WITH HER CAT 513 
 
 Rushed to the evil which she could not shun, 
 While a sad mew went knelling to her heart ! 
 
 [A copy of these boyish verses was written out by Thomson for 
 Lord George Graham. Lisy was the poet's favourite sister 
 Elizabeth.] 
 
 LINES ON MARLEFIELD 
 
 (The seat of Sir William Bennet, of Grubbat, Bart.) 
 
 What is the task that to the muse belongs ? , 
 What but to deck in her harmonious songs 
 The beauteous works of nature and of art, 
 Rural retreats that cheer the heavy heart ? 
 Then Marlefield begin, my muse, and sing ; 
 With Marlefield the hiUs and vales shall- ring. 
 ! what delight and pleasure 'tis to rove 
 Through all the walks and alleys of this grove, 
 Where spreading trees a checkered scene display. 
 Partly admitting and excluding day ; lo 
 
 Where cheerful green and odorous sweets conspire 
 The drooping soul with pleasure to inspire ; 
 Where little birds employ their narrow throats 
 To sing its praises in unlaboured notes. 
 To it adjoined a rising fabric stands, 
 Which with its state our silent awe commands 
 Its endless beauties mock the poet's pen ; 
 So to the garden I'll return again. 
 Pomona makes the trees with fruit abound.. 
 And blushing Flora paints the enamelled ground. 20 
 Here lavish nature does her stores disclose, 
 Flowers of all hue, their queen the bashful rose; 
 With their sweet breath the ambient air 's perfumed, 
 Nor is thereby their fragrant stores consumed; 
 O'er the fair landscape sportive zephyrs scud, 
 And by kind force display the infant bud. 
 
514 JUVENILIA 
 
 The vegetable kind here rear their head, 
 
 By kindly showers and heaven's indulgence fed : 
 
 Of fabled nymphs such were the sacred haunts, 
 
 But real nymphs this charming dwelling vaunts. 30 
 
 Now to the greenhouse let's awhile retire, 
 
 To shun the heat of Sol's infectious fire : 
 
 Immortal authors grace this cool retreat. 
 
 Of ancient times and of a modern date. 
 
 Here would my praises and my fancy dwell ; 
 
 But it, alas, description does excel. 
 
 may this sweet, this beautiful abode 
 
 Remain the charge of the eternal God. 
 
 A POETICAL EPISTLE TO SIR WILLIAM 
 BENNET 
 
 [Written in 1714, aet. 14.] 
 
 My trembling muse your honour does address. 
 That it 's a bold attempt most humbly I confess. 
 If you'll encourage her young fagging flight, 
 She'll upwards soar and mount Parnassus' height. 
 If little things with great may be compared. 
 In Rome it so with the divine Virgil fared ; 
 The tuneful bard Augustus did inspire 
 Made his great genius flash poetic fire ; 
 But, if upon my flight your honour frowns. 
 The muse folds up her wings, and, dying, justice owns. 
 
INDEX OF FIRST LINES 
 
 Accept, loved Nymph, this tribute due . 
 
 Ah ! urged too late, from beauty's bondage free 
 
 Among the changing months May stands confest 
 
 As on the sea-beat shore Britannia sat . 
 
 Beauty deserves ttie homage of the muse 
 
 By Rufus' hall, where Thames polluted flows 
 
 Come, dear Amanda, quit the town 
 
 Cume, gentle god of soft desire 
 
 Come, gentle Spring, ethereal mildness, come 
 
 Come, gentle Venus ! and assuage . 
 
 Come, heaUug God ! ApoUo, come and aid 
 
 Crowned with the sickle and the wheaten sheaf 
 
 Escaped the castle of the sire of sin 
 
 Ethereal race, inhabitants of air 
 
 For ever. Fortune, wilt thou prove . 
 
 From brightening fields of ether fair-disclosed . 
 
 Go, little book, and find our friend 
 
 Hail, mildly pleasing Solitude . 
 
 Hail ! Power Divine, whose sole command 
 
 Hard is the fate of him who loves . 
 
 Here interposing, as the Goddess paused 
 
 Here melting mixed with air the ideal forms 
 
 Here, Stanley, rest ! escaped this mortal strife 
 
 He 's not the happy man, to whom is given 
 
 I hate the clamours of the smoky towns . 
 
 I loathe, Lord, this life below 
 
 It was a sad, ay, 'twas a sad farewell 
 
 Madam, the flower that I received from you 
 
 My trembling muse youi- honour does address. 
 
 Now, Chatto, you're a dreary place 
 
 Now I surveyed my native faculties 
 
 mortal man, who livest here by toil . 
 
 my lamented Talbot ! whUe with thee 
 
 PAGH 
 
 . 470 
 
 , 470 
 
 . 510 
 
 . 471 
 
 . 502 
 
 . 481 
 
 . 425 
 
 . 424 
 3 
 
 . 431 
 
 . 469 
 
 . 133 
 
 . 279 
 
 . 432 
 
 . 427 
 
 . 53 
 
 466 
 
 . 429 
 
 . 489 
 
 . 425 
 
 . 392 
 
 340 
 
 . 456 
 
 . 463 
 
 . 494 
 
 . 488 
 
 509 
 
 . 502 
 
 . 514 
 
 . 507 
 
 . 483 
 
 . 253 
 
 312 
 
516 INDEX OF FIRST LINES 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Nightingale, best poet of the groTe . . . 428 
 
 thou whose tender serious eyes . . . 426 
 
 Oft has the muse, with mean attempt, employed . . 457 
 
 Oh, could I draw, my friend, thy genuine mind . 443 
 
 One day the god of fond desire . . 424 
 
 Say, tell me true, what is the doleful cause . 492 
 
 See, Winter comes to rule the varied year . 185, 228 
 
 Shall the great soul of Newton quit this earth . . 436 
 
 Struck with the rising scene, thus I amazed . . . 357 
 
 Sweet, sleeky Doctor ! dear pacific coul ! . . . 467 
 
 Sweet tyrant Love, but hear me now! . . . 428 
 Tell me, thou soul of her I love . ... 423 
 
 The dreadful hour with leaden pace approached . 511 
 
 The hoop, the darling justly of the fair . 508 
 
 The wanton's charms, however bright . 468 
 
 These, as they change. Almighty Father ! these . . 245 
 
 Thine is the gentle day of love ... . 466 
 
 Thus safely low, my friend, thou canst not fall . 465 
 
 Thus spoke the Goddess of the fearless eye . . 324 
 
 To praise thy Author, Soul, do not forget . , 484 
 
 Unless with my Amanda blest . . . 426 
 
 Warned by the summer sun's meridian ray . . 497 
 
 What is the task that to the muse belongs . .513 
 
 What means yon apparition in the sky . . 490 
 
 When Britain fir.st, at Heaven's command . . 422 
 
 When from the opening chambers of tbo east . . 510 
 
 When my breast labours with oppressive care . 480 
 
 While in heroic numbers some relate . . 505 
 
 While secret-leaguing nations frown around . 464 
 
 While with the public, you, my Lord, lament. . 444 
 
 Ye fabled muses, I your aid disclaim . . . 434 
 
 3}.B1 
 
 SET IN OREAT BHITATN AT THE UNIVEHSITT PRESS, OXFORD, AND 
 REPRINTED FROM PLATES BY THE RIVERSIDE PRESS, EDINBURaH