The Pleasures of Hope: With Other Poems

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H. Maxwell, 1804 - Hope - 160 pages
 

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Page 18 - my bleeding country save! Is there no hand on high to shield the brave ? Yet, though destruction sweep these lovely plains, Rise, fellow-men! our country yet remains ! By that dread name we wave the sword on high, And swear for her to live ! — with her to die!
Page 11 - To sooth and sweeten all the cares we know ; Whose glad suggestions still each vain alarm, When nature fades, and life forgets to charm ; Thee would the muse invoke ! to thee belong The sage's precept and the poet's song. What...
Page 15 - twas there she wept in vain, Till Memory fled her agonizing brain ; — But Mercy gave, to charm the sense of woe, Ideal peace, that truth could ne'er bestow ; Warm on her heart the joys of Fancy beam. And aimless HOPE delights her darkest dream. Oft when yon moon has climb'd the midnight sky, And the lone sea-bird wakes its wildest, cry, Piled on the steep, her blazing fagots burn To hail the bark that never can return ; And still she waits, but scarce forbears to weep That constant love can linger...
Page 28 - But Heaven shall burst her starry gates again ! He comes! dread Brama shakes the sunless sky With murmuring wrath, and thunders from on high, Heaven's fiery horse, beneath his warrior form. Paws the light clouds, and gallops on the storm ! Wide waves his flickering sword ; his bright arms glow Like summer suns, and light the world below! Earth, and her trembling isles in Ocean's bed, Are shook; and Nature rocks beneath his tread!
Page 18 - Firm-paced and slow, a horrid front they form, Still as the breeze, but dreadful as the storm; Low murmuring sounds along their banners fly, Revenge, or death...
Page 102 - By the wolf-scaring faggot that guarded the slain, At the dead of the night a sweet vision I saw ; And thrice ere the morning I dreamt it again.
Page 82 - ON the green banks of Shannon, when Sheelah was nigh, No blithe Irish lad was so happy as I'; No harp like my own could so cheerily play, And wherever I went was my poor dog Tray. When at last I was forced from my Sheelah to part, She said (while the sorrow was big at her heart), Oh ! remember your Sheelah when fur far away ; And be kind, my dear Pat, to our poor dog Tray.
Page 3 - Heaven's ethereal bow Spans with bright arch the glittering hills below, Why to yon mountain turns the musing eye, Whose sunbright summit mingles with the sky ? Why do those cliffs of shadowy tint appear More sweet than all the landscape smiling near i — 'Tis distance lends enchantment to the view, And robes the mountain in its azure hue.
Page 14 - Chide not his peace, proud Reason; nor destroy The shadowy forms of uncreated joy, That urge the lingering tide of life, and pour Spontaneous slumber on his midnight hour. Hark!
Page 3 - Tis distance lends enchantment to the view, And robes the mountain in its azure hue. Thus, with delight, we linger to survey The promised joys of life's unmeasured way ; Thus, from afar, each dim-discover'd scene More pleasing seems than all the past hath been; And every form that Fancy can repair From dark oblivion, glows divinely there.

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