Poetical Works of Akenside, Mark Akenside [my reading book txt] 📗

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Add thou o'er all the generous toil
The light of thy unclouded smile.
But if, by fortune's stubborn sway
From him and friendship torn away,
I court the Muse's healing spell
For griefs that still with absence dwell,
Do thou conduct my fancy's dreams
To such indulgent placid themes,
As just the struggling breast may cheer,
And just suspend the starting tear, 160
Yet leave that sacred sense of woe
Which none but friends and lovers know.


ODE VII.

ON THE USE OF POETRY.

1 Not for themselves did human kind
Contrive the parts by heaven assign'd
On life's wide scene to play:
Not Scipio's force nor Caesar's skill
Can conquer Glory's arduous hill,
If Fortune close the way.

2 Yet still the self-depending soul,
Though last and least in Fortune's roll,
His proper sphere commands;
And knows what Nature's seal bestow'd,
And sees, before the throne of God,
The rank in which he stands.

3 Who train'd by laws the future age,
Who rescued nations from the rage
Of partial, factious power,
My heart with distant homage views;
Content, if thou, celestial Muse,
Didst rule my natal hour.

4 Not far beneath the hero's feet,
Nor from the legislator's seat
Stands far remote the bard.
Though not with public terrors crown'd.
Yet wider shall his rule be found,
More lasting his award.

5 Lycurgus fashion'd Sparta's fame,
And Pompey to the Roman name
Gave universal sway:
Where are they?--Homer's reverend page
Holds empire to the thirtieth age,
And tongues and climes obey.

6 And thus when William's acts divine
No longer shall from Bourbon's line
Draw one vindictive vow;
When Sydney shall with Cato rest,
And Russel move the patriot's breast
No more than Brutus now;

7 Yet then shall Shakspeare's powerful art
O'er every passion, every heart,
Confirm his awful throne:
Tyrants shall bow before his laws;
And Freedom's, Glory's, Virtue's cause,
Their dread assertor own.


ODE VIII.

ON LEAVING HOLLAND.

I.--1.

Farewell to Leyden's lonely bound.
The Belgian Muse's sober seat;
Where, dealing frugal gifts around
To all the favourites at her feet,
She trains the body's bulky frame
For passive persevering toils;
And lest, from any prouder aim,
The daring mind should scorn her homely spoils,
She breathes maternal fogs to damp its restless flame.

I.--2.

Farewell the grave, pacific air,
Where never mountain zephyr blew:
The marshy levels lank and bare,
Which Pan, which Ceres never knew:
The Naiads, with obscene attire,
Urging in vain their urns to flow;
While round them chant the croaking choir,
And haply soothe some lover's prudent woe,
Or prompt some restive bard and modulate his lyre.

I.--3.

Farewell, ye nymphs, whom sober care of gain
Snatch'd in your cradles from the god of Love:
She render'd all his boasted arrows vain;
And all his gifts did he in spite remove.
Ye too, the slow-eyed fathers of the land,
With whom dominion steals from hand to hand,
Unown'd, undignified by public choice,
I go where Liberty to all is known,
And tells a monarch on his throne,
He reigns not but by her preserving voice.

II.--1

O my loved England, when with thee
Shall I sit down, to part no more?
Far from this pale, discolour'd sea,
That sleeps upon the reedy shore:
When shall I plough thy azure tide?
When on thy hills the flocks admire,
Like mountain snows; till down their side
I trace the village and the sacred spire,
While bowers and copses green the golden slope divide?

II.--2.

Ye nymphs who guard the pathless grove,
Ye blue-eyed sisters of the streams,
With whom I wont at morn to rove,
With whom at noon I talk'd in dreams;
Oh! take me to your haunts again,
The rocky spring, the greenwood glade;
To guide my lonely footsteps deign,
To prompt my slumbers in the murmuring shade,
And soothe my vacant ear with many an airy strain.

II.--3.

And thou, my faithful harp, no longer mourn
Thy drooping master's inauspicious hand:
Now brighter skies and fresher gales return,
Now fairer maids thy melody demand.
Daughters of Albion, listen to my lyre!
O Phoebus, guardian of the Aonian choir,
Why sounds not mine harmonious as thy own,
When all the virgin deities above
With Venus and with Juno move
In concert round the Olympian father's throne?

III.--1.

Thee too, protectress of my lays,
Elate with whose majestic call
Above degenerate Latium's praise,
Above the slavish boast of Gaul,
I dare from impious thrones reclaim,
And wanton sloth's ignoble charms,
The honours of a poet's name
To Somers' counsels, or to Hampden's arms,
Thee, Freedom, I rejoin, and bless thy genuine flame.

III.--2.

Great citizen of Albion! Thee
Heroic Valour still attends,
And useful Science, pleased to see
How Art her studious toil extends:
While Truth, diffusing from on high
A lustre unconfined as day,
Fills and commands the public eye;
Till, pierced and sinking by her powerful ray,
Tame Faith and monkish Awe, like nightly demons, fly.

III.--3.

Hence the whole land the patriot's ardour shares:
Hence dread Religion dwells with social Joy;
And holy passions and unsullied cares,
In youth, in age, domestic life employ.
O fair Britannia, hail!--With partial love
The tribes of men their native seats approve,
Unjust and hostile to each foreign fame:
But when for generous minds and manly laws
A nation holds her prime applause,
There public zeal shall all reproof disclaim.


ODE IX.

TO CURIO. [1] 1744.

1 Thrice hath the spring beheld thy faded fame
Since I exulting grasp'd the tuneful shell:
Eager through endless years to sound thy name,
Proud that my memory with thine should dwell.
How hast thou stain'd the splendour of my choice!
Those godlike forms which hover'd round thy voice,
Laws, freedom, glory, whither are they flown?
What can I now of thee to Time report,
Save thy fond country made thy impious sport,
Her fortune and her hope the victims of thy own?

2 There are, with eyes unmoved and reckless heart
Who saw thee from thy summit fall thus low,
Who deem'd thy arm extended but to dart
The public vengeance on thy private foe.
But, spite of every gloss of envious minds,
The owl-eyed race whom virtue's lustre blinds,
Who sagely prove that each man hath his price,
I still believed thy aim from blemish free,
I yet, even yet, believe it, spite of thee,
And all thy painted pleas to greatness and to vice.

3 'Thou didst not dream of liberty decay'd,
Nor wish to make her guardian laws more strong:
But the rash many, first by thee misled,
Bore thee at length unwillingly along.'