Poetical Works of Akenside, Mark Akenside [top novels to read TXT] 📗

there to watch the hours
Of midnight; there, amid the screaming owl's
Dire song, with spectres or with guilty shades 470
To talk of pangs and everlasting woe;
Yet be not ye dismay'd. A gentler star
Presides o'er your adventure. From the bower
Where Wisdom sat with her Athenian sons,
Could but my happy hand entwine a wreath
Of Plato's olive with the Mantuan bay,
Then (for what need of cruel fear to you,
To you whom godlike love can well command?),
Then should my powerful voice at once dispel
Those monkish horrors; should in words divine 480
Relate how favour'd minds like you inspired,
And taught their inspiration to conduct
By ruling Heaven's decree, through various walks
And prospects various, but delightful all,
Move onward; while now myrtle groves appear,
Now arms and radiant trophies, now the rods
Of empire with the curule throne, or now
The domes of contemplation and the Muse.

Led by that hope sublime, whose cloudless eye
Through the fair toils and ornaments of earth 490
Discerns the nobler life reserved for heaven,
Favour'd alike they worship round the shrine
Where Truth conspicuous with her sister-twins,
The undivided partners of her sway,
With Good and Beauty reigns. Oh! let not us
By Pleasure's lying blandishments detain'd,
Or crouching to the frowns of bigot rage,
Oh! let not us one moment pause to join
That chosen band. And if the gracious Power,
Who first awaken'd my untutor'd song, 500
Will to my invocation grant anew
The tuneful spirit, then through all our paths
Ne'er shall the sound of this devoted lyre
Be wanting; whether on the rosy mead
When Summer smiles, to warn the melting heart
Of Luxury's allurement; whether firm
Against the torrent and the stubborn hill
To urge free Virtue's steps, and to her side
Summon that strong divinity of soul
Which conquers Chance and Fate: or on the height, 510
The goal assign'd her, haply to proclaim
Her triumph; on her brow to place the crown
Of uncorrupted praise; through future worlds
To follow her interminated way,
And bless Heaven's image in the heart of man.

Such is the worth of Beauty; such her power,
So blameless, so revered. It now remains,
In just gradation through the various ranks
Of being, to contemplate how her gifts
Rise in due measure, watchful to attend 520
The steps of rising Nature. Last and least,
In colours mingling with a random blaze,
Doth Beauty dwell. Then higher in the forms
Of simplest, easiest measure; in the bounds
Of circle, cube, or sphere. The third ascent
To symmetry adds colour: thus the pearl
Shines in the concave of its purple bed,
And painted shells along some winding shore
Catch with indented folds the glancing sun.
Next, as we rise, appear the blooming tribes 530
Which clothe the fragrant earth; which draw from her
Their own nutrition; which are born and die,
Yet, in their seed, immortal; such the flowers
With which young Maia pays the village maids
That hail her natal morn; and such the groves
Which blithe Pomona rears on Vaga's bank,
To feed the bowl of Ariconian swains
Who quaff beneath her branches. Nobler still
Is Beauty's name where, to the full consent
Of members and of features, to the pride 540
Of colour, and the vital change of growth,
Life's holy flame with piercing sense is given,
While active motion speaks the temper'd soul:
So moves the bird of Juno: so the steed
With rival swiftness beats the dusty plain,
And faithful dogs with eager airs of joy
Salute their fellows. What sublimer pomp
Adorns the seat where Virtue dwells on earth,
And Truth's eternal day-light shines around,
What palm belongs to man's imperial front, 550
And woman powerful with becoming smiles,
Chief of terrestrial natures, need we now
Strive to inculcate? Thus hath Beauty there
Her most conspicuous praise to matter lent,
Where most conspicuous through that shadowy veil
Breaks forth the bright expression of a mind,
By steps directing our enraptured search
To Him, the first of minds; the chief; the sole;
From whom, through this wide, complicated world,
Did all her various lineaments begin; 560
To whom alone, consenting and entire,
At once their mutual influence all display.
He, God most high (bear witness, Earth and Heaven),
The living fountains in himself contains
Of beauteous and sublime; with him enthroned
Ere days or years trod their ethereal way,
In his supreme intelligence enthroned,
The queen of love holds her unclouded state,
Urania. Thee, O Father! this extent
Of matter; thee the sluggish earth and tract 570
Of seas, the heavens and heavenly splendours feel
Pervading, quickening, moving. From the depth
Of thy great essence, forth didst thou conduct
Eternal Form: and there, where Chaos reign'd,
Gav'st her dominion to erect her seat,
And sanctify the mansion. All her works
Well pleased thou didst behold: the gloomy fires
Of storm or earthquake, and the purest light
Of summer; soft Campania's new-born rose,
And the slow weed which pines on Russian hills 580
Comely alike to thy full vision stand:
To thy surrounding vision, which unites
All essences and powers of the great world
In one sole order, fair alike they stand,
As features well consenting, and alike
Required by Nature ere she could attain
Her just resemblance to the perfect shape
Of universal Beauty, which with thee
Dwelt from the first. Thou also, ancient Mind,
Whom love and free beneficence await 590
In all thy doings; to inferior minds,
Thy offspring, and to man, thy youngest son,
Refusing no convenient gift nor good;
Their eyes didst open, in this earth, yon heaven,
Those starry worlds, the countenance divine
Of Beauty to behold. But not to them
Didst thou her awful magnitude reveal
Such as before thine own unbounded sight
She stands (for never shall created soul
Conceive that object), nor, to all their kinds, 600
The same in shape or features didst thou frame
Her image. Measuring well their different spheres
Of sense and action, thy paternal hand
Hath for each race prepared a different test
Of Beauty, own'd and reverenced as their guide
Most apt, most faithful. Thence inform'd, they scan
The objects that surround them; and select,
Since the great whole disclaims their scanty view,
Each for himself selects peculiar parts
Of Nature; what the standard fix'd by Heaven 610
Within his breast approves, acquiring thus
A partial Beauty, which becomes his lot;
A Beauty which his eye may comprehend,
His hand may copy, leaving, O Supreme,
O thou whom none hath utter'd, leaving all
To thee that infinite, consummate form,
Which the great powers, the gods around thy throne
And nearest to thy counsels, know with thee
For ever to have been; but who she is,
Or what her likeness, know not. Man surveys 620
A narrower scene, where, by the mix'd effect
Of things corporeal on his passive mind,
He judgeth what is fair. Corporeal things
The mind of man impel with various powers,
And various features to his eye disclose.
The powers which move his sense with instant joy,
The features which attract his heart to love,
He marks, combines, reposits. Other powers
And features of the self-same thing (unless
The beauteous form, the creature of his mind, 630
Request their close alliance) he o'erlooks
Forgotten; or with self-beguiling zeal,
Whene'er his passions mingle in the work,
Half alters, half disowns. The tribes of men
Thus from their different functions and the shapes
Familiar to their eye, with art obtain,
Unconscious of their purpose, yet with art
Obtain the Beauty fitting man to love;
Whose proud desires from Nature's homely toil
Oft turn away, fastidious, asking still 640
His mind's high aid, to purify the form
From matter's gross communion; to secure
For ever, from the meddling hand of Change
Or rude Decay, her features; and to add
Whatever ornaments may