Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB
[blocks in formation]

Like Phlegethon my verse in waves of fire shall flow!

Light of this once all darksome spot Where now their glad course mortals run,

First-born of Sirius begot

Upon the focus of the sun-
I'll call thee - for such thy earthly❘

name

[blocks in formation]

THO' no bold flights to thee belong;
And tho' thy lays with conscious fear,
Shrink from Judgement's eye severe,
Yet much I thank thee, Spirit of my
song!

What name so high, but what too low For, lovely Muse! thy sweet employ

must be?

[blocks in formation]

Exalts my soul, refines my breast,
Gives each pure pleasure keener zest,
And softens sorrow into pensive Joy.
From thee I learn'd the wish to bless,
From thee to commune with my heart;
From thee, dear Muse! the gayer part,
To laugh with pity at the crowds that
press

[blocks in formation]

HEARD'ST thou yon universal cry,

And dost thou linger still on Gallia's shore?

Go, Tyranny! beneath some barbarous sky

Thy terrors lost and ruin'd power deplore!

What tho' through many a groaning

age

Was felt thy keen suspicious rage,

Such scenes no more demand the tear
humane;

I see, I see! glad Liberty succeed
With every patriot virtue in her train!
And mark yon peasant's raptured

eyes;

Secure he views his harvests rise; No fetter vile the mind shall know, And Eloquence shall fearless glow. Yes! Liberty the soul of Life shall reign,

Shall throb in every pulse, shall flow thro' every vein!

VI

Shall France alone a Despot spurn? Shall she alone, O Freedom, boast thy care?

Yet Freedom roused by fierce Dis- Lo, round thy standard Belgia's heroes

[blocks in formation]

burn,

Tho' Power's blood-stain'd streamers
fire the air,

And wider yet thy influence spread,
Nor e'er recline thy weary head,

Till every land from pole to pole Shall boast one independent soul! And still, as erst, let favour'd Britain be First ever of the first and freest of the free! ? 1789.

TO A YOUNG LADY

WITH A POEM ON THE FRENCH
REVOLUTION

[Probably the preceding verses.] MUCH on my early youth I love to dwell,

Ere yet I bade that friendly dome farewell,

Where first, beneath the echoing cloisters pale,

I heard of guilt and wondered at the tale!

Yet though the hours flew by on careless wing,

Full heavily of Sorrow would I sing.
Aye as the star of evening flung its beam
In broken radiance on the wavy stream,

My soul amid the pensive twilight gloom If Smiles more win my hour
Mourned with the breeze, O Lee Boo!!

[blocks in formation]

Mien

Than the love-wildered Maniac's brain. hath seen

Shaping celestial forms in vacant air,
If these demand the empassioned Poet's

[blocks in formation]

Where peaceful Virtue weaves the Myrtle May this (I cried) my course through Life

braid.

30

And O! if Eyes whose holy glances roll, Swift messengers, and eloquent of soul;

1 Lee Boo, the son of Abba Thule, Prince of the Pelew Islands, came over to England with Captain Wilson, died of the small-pox, and is buried in Greenwich church-yard. See Keate's Account of the Pelew Islands. 1788.

2 Southey's Retrospect.

portray!

[display, New scenes of wisdom may each step And knowledge open as my days

[blocks in formation]
[blocks in formation]

When anguish'd care of sullen brow

Elate of Heart and confident of Such was the sad and gloomy hour
Fame,
From vales where Avon sports, the Prepared the Poison's death-cold power.

Minstrel came,

[blocks in formation]

Already to thy lips was rais'd the bowl,
When filial Pity stood thee by,
Thy fixed eyes she bade thee roll
On scenes that well might melt thy
soul-

60

[blocks in formation]
« ZurückWeiter »