In hollow murmurs died away.
But, O, how alter d was its sprightlier tone!
When Cheerfulness, a nymph of healthiest hue,
Her bow across her shoulder flung,
Her buskins gemm'd with morning dew,
Blew an inspiring air, that dale and thicket rung,
The hunter's call, to Faun and Dryad known:
The oak eroward Sisters, and their chaste ey'd Queen,
Satyrs and sylvan Boys were seen,
Peeping from forth their alleys green;
Brown excercise rejoic'd to hear;
And Sport leap'd up aud seiz d his beechen spear.
Last came Joy's extatic trial,
He, with viney crown advancing,
First to the lively pipe his hand address'd-
But soon he saw the brisk awakening viol;
Whose sweet entrancing voice he lov'd the best.
They would have thought, who heard the strain,
They saw in Tempe's vale, her native maids,
Amidst the festal sounding shades,
To some unwearied minstrel dancing;
While as his flying fingers kiss'd the strings,
Love fram'd with Mirth a gay fantastic round,
(Loose were her tresses seen, her zone unbound)
And he, amidst his frolic play,
As if he would the charming air repay,
Shook thousand odors from his dewy wings.
I-Milton's Lamentation for the Loss of his Sight,
AIL. holy light! offspring of heaven firstborn!
Or of th' Eternal coeternal beam!
May I express thee uáblam'd? Since God is light,
And never, but in unapproached light
D velt from eteruity-dwelt then in thee,
Bright effluence of bright essence increate.
Or hear'st thou rather, pure etherial stream,
Whose fountain whe shall tell? Before the sun,
Before the heavens thou wert, and at the voice
Of God, as with a mantle did invest
The rising world of waters dark and deep,
Won from the void and formless infinite.
Thee I revisit now with bolder wing,
Escap'd the Stygian pool, though long detain'd
In that obscure Fojourn; while in my flight,
Through uster, and through middle darkness borne,
With other notes, than to the Orphean lyre,
I sung of Chaos and eternal Night;
Taught by the heavenly muse to venture down
The dark descent, and up to reascend,
Though hard and rare. Thee I revisit safe,
And feel thy sovereign vital lamp-but thou
Revisitest not these eyes, that roll in vain
To find thy piercing ray. and find no dawn;
So thick a drop serene hath quench'd their orbs,
Or dim suffusion veil'd. Yet not the more
Cease I to wander where the Mases haunt,
Clear spring, or shady grove, or sunny hill,
Smit with the love of sacred song--but chief
Thee, Zion, and the flowery brooks beneath,
That wash thy hallow'd feet, and warbling flow,
Nightly I visit-nor sometimes forget
These other two, equall'd with me iu fate,
So were I equall'd with them in renown,
Blind Thamyris, and blind Maeonides;
Aud Tiresias and Phizeus, prophets old;
Then feed on thoughts, that voluntary move
Harmonious numbers-as the wakeful bird
Sings darkling, and in shadiest covert hid,
Tunes her nocturnal note. Thus with the year,
Seasons return-but not to me returns
Day, or the sweet approach of even or morn,
Or sight of vernal bloom, or summer's rose,
Or flocks or herds, or human face divine;
But cloud instead, and ever during dark
Surround me, from the cheerful ways of men
Cut off and for the book of knowledge fair,
Presented with an universa! blank
Of nature's works, to me expunged and razʻd,
And wisdom, at one entrance, quite shut oat.
So much the rather, thou, celestial light,
Shine inward, and the mind, through all her powers,
Irradiate; there plant eyes all mist from thence,
Purge and disperse; that I may see and tell
Of things invisible to mortal sight.
II.-L'Allegro, or the Merry Man.-MILTON.
HENCE, loathed Melancholy;
Of Cerberus and blackest midnight born,
In Stygian cave forlorn,
Mongst horrid shapes, and shrieks, and sights unholy; Find out some uncouth cell,
Where brooding darkness spreads his jealous wings,
And the night raven sings;
There under chon shades, and low brow'd rocks,
As ragged as thy locks,
In dark Cimmerian desert ever dwell.
But come, thou goddess fair and free,
In heaven yelep'd Euphrosyne!
And by men, hearteasing Mirth,
Whom lovely Venus at a birth,
With two Sister Graces more,
To ivy crowned Bacchus bore.
Haste thee, nymph, and bring with thee
Jest and youthful jolity.
Quips and cranks, and wanton wiles,
Nods and becks, and wreathed smiles;
Such as hang on Hebe's cheek,
And love to live in dimple sleek;
Sort, that wrinkled Care derides,
And Laughter, holding both his sides,
Come! and trip it as you go
On the light fantastic toe
And, in thy right hand lead with thee,
The mountain nymph, sweet Liberty-
And, if I give the honor due,
Mirth admit me of thy crew,
To live with her and live with thee,
In unreproved pleasures free:
To hear the lark begin his flight,
And, singing, startle the dull Night,
From his watchtower in the skies,
Till the dappled dawn doth rise;
Then to come in spite of sorrow
And at my window bid good morrow,
Through the sweetbriar or the vine,
Or the twisted eglantine;
While the sock, with lively din,
Scatters the rear of darkness thin,
And to the stack, or the barn door
Stoutly struts his dames before;
Oft list'ning how the hounds and hors,
Cheerly rouse the slumb'ring morn,
From the side of some hear hill,
Through the high wood echoing shrill:
Sometime walking, not unseen,
By hedge row elms, or hillocks green,
Right against the eastern gate,
Where the great sun begins his state,
Rob'd in flames and amber fight,
! The clouds in thousand liveries dight,
While the ploughman, near at hand,
Whistles o'er the furrow'd land,
And the milkmaid singeth blithe,
And the mower whets his scythe,
And every shepherd tells his tale
Under the hawthorn in the dale.
Straight mine eye hath caught new pleasures, Whilst the landskip round it measures;
Russet lawns and fallows gray,
Where the nibbling flocks do stray,
Mountains on whose barren breast
The lab'ring clouds do often rest,
Meadows trig with daisies pied,
Shallow brooks, and rivers wide.
Towers and battlements it sees,
Besem'd high in tufted trees,
Where, perhaps some beauty lies,
The cynosure of neighboring eyes.
Hard by a cottage chimney smokes,
From betwixt two aged oaks,
Where Corynon and Thyrsis met,
Are at their savory dinner set,
Of herbs and other country messes,
Which the neathanded Phillis dresses;
And then in haste, her bower she leaves,
With Thestylis to bind the sheaves;
Or, if the earlier season lead,
To the tann'd haycock in the mead.
Towered cities please us theu,
And the busy hum of men,
Where throngs of knights and barons bold,
In weeds of peace high triomph hold;
With store of ladies, whose bright eyes
Rain influence, and judge the prize
Of wit or arms, while both contend
To win her grace, whom all commend.
There let Hymen oft appear,
In saffron robe. with taper clear,
And pomp, and feast, and revelry,
With mask, and antique pageantry;
Such sights as youthful poets dream,
Oa summer eves, by haunted stream.
Then to the well trod stage anon,
If Johnson's learned scek be on,
Or sweetest Shakespeare, Faney's child,
Warble his native wood notes wild.
And ever, against eating cares,
Lap me in soft Lydian airs,
Married to immortal verse,
Such as the meeting soul may piarca,
In notes with many a wading bout
Of linked sweetness long draw out.
With wanton heed and giddy som
The melting voice through
Untwisting all the chains
The hidden soul of Harmaŭ
That Orpheus' self nave his head
Of heap'd Elysian losers, and hear
Such strains as would have won ths ear
Of Pluto, to have quite set free,
His half regain'd Eurydice.
These delights, if thou canst give,
Mirth, with thee I mean to live.
III-On the Fursuits of Mankind. —Pors. HONOR and shame from no condition rise; Act well your part-there all the honor lies. Fortune in men has some small difference made; One flaunts in rags-one flutters in brocade ; The cobler apron'd, and the parson gown'd; The friar hooded and the monarch crown'd. "What differ more," you cry, "than crown and cowl? I tell you friend a wise man and a fool. You'll find, if once the monarch acts the monk, Or, cobler like, the parson will be drunk;
|